The Labour Government

[metalblue]

Pay rises would only move the goalposts due to inflation. The simple problem is we have surrendered our way of life to conglomerates who we totally rely upon for everything.

20+ years ago you went to a local baker or butcher to get a loaf of bread or meat but now you will likely go to Tesco. The problem is your local butcher benefited 100% from his profits whereas the employees of Tesco benefit very little from its profits. Tesco made £3bn profit last year and yet it doesn't pay people much above the minimum wage.

If people shopped locally and bought locally then local people get more of the pie however their food bills would be higher. They could increase the working wage but the problem is we want to shop as cheaply as possible. Paying people as little as possible is part and parcel of how conglomerates compete to keep food bills low.

The conglomerates also employ tens of thousands of people so they might just employ less people or open less stores which means that UK growth stalls. Governments don't like this, they prefer to look good with pointless decimal point percentage increases in GDP growth versus actually helping people.

The government could send a message out by using local firms to deliver local projects.

We seem fixated on using major national firms like Tarmac PLC to be delivering everything on our roads no matter how trivial the job. I recall reading a while back about a mile or so ditch being dug on a country lane verge costing £100k, that didn’t feel like something any builder couldn’t have done who doesn’t have 5 layers of management and shareholders that needed paying on top.

Obviously some things need that whole structure but it’s not a one size fits all.

 

[hampshireblue]

Thanks for the advice, but I was only asking. The thing is, i've worked my arse off all my life doing some really shitty jobs, highly stressed. Not being funny but most people I think would not have been able to put up with it and would have quit citing "stress". Now I have got myself to a position where I can just about afford a relatively comfortable retirement. Not excessive, just enough. If returns on investments take a tumble, it will be squeaky bum. If not, I shoudl just about be OK. I have no "spare" money.

So funnily enough I am rather paranoid about some **** in No. 11 deciding well done, you've amassed a few bob so we will take it off you to pay for the lazy twats who DID quit their jobs citing stress.

Why does he think he is any different to millions of other-he's not? At least he's spreading the blame for his own issues from immigrants to those that didn't quite have his level of fortitude in earlier life. And the Cotswolds is a pretty nice place to live out his remaining years.

 

[We've got Guardiola]

The government could send a message out by using local firms to deliver local projects.

We seem fixated on using major national firms like Tarmac PLC to be delivering everything on our roads no matter how trivial the job. I recall reading a while back about a mile or so ditch being dug on a country lane verge costing £100k, that didn’t feel like something any builder couldn’t have done who doesn’t have 5 layers of management and shareholders that needed paying on top.

Obviously some things need that whole structure but it’s not a one size fits all.

Indeed and it probably comes down to how public procurement contracts work centrally. IE, Tarmac PLC gives a 10% discount on anything offered by anybody else so they get selected to do the lot.

It probably works out cheaper when done as a whole versus selecting many different local companies at different prices. The problem then becomes that Tarmac PLC is incentivised to make its profit and keep its shareholders happy and again one way to do this is to pay people basement wages whilst directors and shareholders get the big spoils.

Farmers have this problem too, many people shop at Tesco so a farmer has to sell to Tesco to sell anything at all. The problem is Tesco then have a huge bargaining chip to dictate the price which is always as low as possible. The profit that the farmer should be putting in his pocket is instead given to a Tesco shareholder sat in the Cayman Islands.

Globalism and corporatism came with its benefits but unfortunately it is breaking the economic and social fabric of the country. It is what led directly to things such as Brexit and it will probably even propel Reform into government who are just liars who seek to grab a piece of the pie that they're currently not really getting.

 

[.db.]

Sorry but deciding we can’t have immigration because of recycling & the state of water companies is a joke, these industries havent maxed out, they’re underfunded and poorly managed. 20% of the water supply is lost to waste because of bad infrastructure and management by water companies that have doubled their profits in 5 years. Your water supply concerns would be entirely addressed by nationalising a public resource and investing the money we pay for water in the infrastructure instead of paying dividends to their foreign owners and relying on the state to bail them out.

Britain has half the population density of the Netherlands, a country which is a net exporter of food. You present these things as insurmountable problems that just can’t be gotten around, but that’s simply not true.

And if it upsets you that your main anti immigration talking points are straight off a 1970s NF flyer and have as much legitimacy now as they did then, that’s not my fault for pointing it out.

That’s not to say I, or anyone, is a supporter of completely unchecked, unlimited immigration, it’s just pointing out “The island is full” rhetoric is far right bollocks and always has been.

I actually think all public services should be nationalised, even to the extent of broadband and telephone network providers. It wouldn’t be as simple as doing it would solve it, though.

Your Netherlands example is typical of the short term thinking of increasing the population. Great, Netherlands are a net exporter of food, that will be benefitting their economy… for now. However, intensive farming and their urban coverage of land has damaged their soil to rank up with the most degraded soil in Europe. It’s called the Dutch Nitrogen Crisis.

Poor soils mean poor crops and poor grass therefore poor meat. Nutritional value of food is decreasing as a result of intensive farming to meet the unnatural surge in populations. Poor soils also pollute water. Poor grass quality increases the nitrogen content of manure which then becomes a cycle because that then becomes a Climate Change issue which exacerbates it all further and that manure laid on soils degrades the soil even further. What also happens with high population increases to places like Northern Europe is more people adopt our high meat diet (the developing world eat far less meat than we do) which puts even more pressure on animal husbandry intensive farming which is now not far behind the energy industry as the biggest contributor to climate change.

Intensive farming is not sustainable, the population increases we are seeing in Europe is not sustainable.

It doesn’t upset me because I’m not averse to agreeing with the far right. The far right can be right on a few things. That’s what upsets a section of the left so they dismiss or shout down anything that the far right may agree with so it’s not taken on board as a wider discussion. But the issues we are seeing with pooulation increases and mass immigration are not a one-strand of politics issue or rhetoric; they’re a green, health, economic and social issue covering every point from far left to far right that everyone should be concerned about.

I’ve seen it twice on this forum in just a couple of weeks now with you here and someone in the Green Party thread. It’s like burying your heads in the sand with a message on your arses saying ‘MUST DISAGREE WITH THIS IN CASE I’M SEEN AGREEING WITH PEOPLE I’M SUPOOSED TO DISAGREE WITH’.

 

[Blue Hefner]

The government could send a message out by using local firms to deliver local projects.

We seem fixated on using major national firms like Tarmac PLC to be delivering everything on our roads no matter how trivial the job. I recall reading a while back about a mile or so ditch being dug on a country lane verge costing £100k, that didn’t feel like something any builder couldn’t have done who doesn’t have 5 layers of management and shareholders that needed paying on top.

Obviously some things need that whole structure but it’s not a one size fits all.

It’s not just governments, big companies do the same. Ever heard the phrase “no one got fired for choosing IBM”?

Essentially, if people are going to be wrong, they want to be wrong for the right/logical reasons

If I take you to Domino’s and it’s shit, you blame Domino’s. Whereas if I take you to a local pizza place that you’ve never heard of and that’s shit, you’ll likely blame me for recommending it in the first place

 

[.db.]

The last time the UK population was 30m was in the 1860s.

Seems unlikely any serious source would argue something that stupid, so perhaps link to something if you’re going to claim it as a source?

It’s not that the population should be 30m, the report from about ten years ago said that the current and planned infrastructure of this country was suitable for between 30-60m people. It’s an infrastructure issue for a growing population, not a need to reduce the country to a 30m population.

But it highlights the huge issue we have of not being able to sustain the population we have. You called the first two points of my post a joke but they all contribute to the wider issue. They’re not a joke when they all come together because we can’t afford to overcome them all.

It’s never been as simple as ‘well let’s just make the infrastructure better then’ because the infrastructure has been lagging behind the need for years and years and the population increase is running away from our infrastructure development which we can’t keep up with.

I’ll try and find that report, but as I say it was last decade. There was a think tank report last decade that said the infrastructure we had was only suitable for 20m people! Think tanks can be ignored but they’ll have had some reasoning behind it… maybe intensive farming and soils came into it.

 

[Blue Maverick]

Am I being Clarkied ... minimum wage of nearly £40000 a year.
Would love to see those inflation figures and unemployment rates.

No because people wouldn’t need top up from the tax payer. You telling me a Tesco couldn’t do it?

 

[Kompany Car]

The government could send a message out by using local firms to deliver local projects.

We seem fixated on using major national firms like Tarmac PLC to be delivering everything on our roads no matter how trivial the job. I recall reading a while back about a mile or so ditch being dug on a country lane verge costing £100k, that didn’t feel like something any builder couldn’t have done who doesn’t have 5 layers of management and shareholders that needed paying on top.

Obviously some things need that whole structure but it’s not a one size fits all.

They do have social value requirements in most contracts, which includes "a local jobs for local people" element plus the use of SMEs. The problem is that in most contracts its about 10% or at most, and very rarely, 20% of the score that tenderers are assessed on, the majority 50% or more is price, the rest made up of programme and quality of the submission.

What they need to do is accept that costs will be higher but have clauses that prevent significant offshoring of design work. Doing so ensures that the money stays within the UK economy.

Similarly mandating a higher percentage of work being performed by UK based SMEs for both design and construction with more favourable commercial terms (e.g. not contracts that have liabilities of £20m when they are only doing 200k of work) would help. For reference TfGM are a nightmare for doing this and not willing to negotiate more reasonable commercial terms.

Whilst I dont advocate trying to have an insular economy, as we do need international trade, which in turn requires some quid pro quo, we dont give our home grown businesses a leg up, unlike every other country. If you believe the Brexit nutcases, it was European legislation stopping us doing this, which 10 years on is clearly not the case.

 

[WRicko]

That does seem weird. Where did you see that?

Was briefly mentioned yesterday when they said how you could get settled status within 20 years ok sky so things like qualifications income etc. To be fair I think that means you can get it with debt at the 20 year point. I get it in a sense but someone without a mortgage renting a rubbish flat is properly more likely to need help from the state than someone with a mortgage on a house and certainly less likely to be progressing and contributing financially at least

 

[metalblue]

Indeed and it probably comes down to how public procurement contracts work centrally. IE, Tarmac PLC gives a 10% discount on anything offered by anybody else so they get selected to do the lot.

It probably works out cheaper when done as a whole versus selecting many different local companies at different prices. The problem then becomes that Tarmac PLC is incentivised to make its profit and keep its shareholders happy and again one way to do this is to pay people basement wages whilst directors and shareholders get the big spoils.

Farmers have this problem too, many people shop at Tesco so a farmer has to sell to Tesco to sell anything at all. The problem is Tesco then have a huge bargaining chip to dictate the price which is always as low as possible. The profit that the farmer should be putting in his pocket is instead given to a Tesco shareholder sat in the Cayman Islands.

Globalism and corporatism came with its benefits but unfortunately it is breaking the economic and social fabric of the country. It is what led directly to things such as Brexit and it will probably even propel Reform into government who are just liars who seek to grab a piece of the pie that they're currently not really getting.

I’d love to see someone in government do that analysis on benefits of using these big nationals for small projects. For sure you need a company with strong balance sheet to build a new road or something of that scale.

Perhaps we need the return of the milk marketing board to ensure farmers get a fair and sustainable gate price for their milk - if all these big nationals are dealing with one entity it significantly reduces their ability to low ball the farmer. This could be extended to meat products etc etc. Of course it will only be great for a couple of years or so until the boards get corrupted by a free holiday on Tesco Island (other islands are available)!!

 

[WRicko]

Low wages

UC ensuring work simply doesn’t pay for many so huge welfare bills

Cost of living crises

Inflation

Scandalous energy bills

We can play the political choice game all day long and it’s in every government, regardless of colour.

Labour are in charge now, nobody else.

So your response to someone pointing out the positive changes labour have brought in is to ? Ignore it ? Post other things they haven’t got round to changing ?

UC is supposed to be better for helping people get into work as they face less of cliff edge with changes of pay or hours resulting in less of fall in benefits.

Also minimum wage has gone up

 

[metalblue]

Was briefly mentioned yesterday when they said how you could get settled status within 20 years ok sky so things like qualifications income etc. To be fair I think that means you can get it with debt at the 20 year point. I get it in a sense but someone without a mortgage renting a rubbish flat is properly more likely to need help from the state than someone with a mortgage on a house and certainly less likely to be progressing and contributing financially at least

Cheers mate. Surely you’d want them to integrate and build a life here etc, being normal means having a mortgage and car loan (other versions of being normal exist!!)

I don’t get that at all but I think some of the messaging has been a bit all over the place from ministers not directly involved in the policy. Maybe they are trying too hard to out perform Reform.

 

[metalblue]

So your response to someone pointing out the positive changes labour have brought in is to ? Ignore it ? Post other things they haven’t got round to changing ?

UC is supposed to be better for helping people get into work as they face less of cliff edge with changes of pay or hours resulting in less of fall in benefits.

Also minimum wage has gone up

UC doesn’t encourage work though. You earn X and pretty much lose X off your UC payment so people are no better off, probably worse off, working. That is a bonkers system that Labour inherited but they are the party in power now and would love to see if reformed to make work pay - and that doesn’t mean making claimants worse off but allowing workers to keep a bit more of their pay.

 

[metalblue]

It’s not just governments, big companies do the same. Ever heard the phrase “no one got fired for choosing IBM”?

Essentially, if people are going to be wrong, they want to be wrong for the right/logical reasons

If I take you to Domino’s and it’s shit, you blame Domino’s. Whereas if I take you to a local pizza place that you’ve never heard of and that’s shit, you’ll likely blame me for recommending it in the first place

Agreed. People say government projects overrun and overspend. So do large scale commercial projects!!!

I have a sneaky suspicion that these big firms come in quoting a decent price before doubling it once you’re too far down the line to tell them to stop work. Probably not accurate but I do wonder how they get it so consistently wrong.

 

[We've got Guardiola]

I’d love to see someone in government do that analysis on benefits of using these big nationals for small projects. For sure you need a company with strong balance sheet to build a new road or something of that scale.

Perhaps we need the return of the milk marketing board to ensure farmers get a fair and sustainable gate price for their milk - if all these big nationals are dealing with one entity it significantly reduces their ability to low ball the farmer. This could be extended to meat products etc etc. Of course it will only be great for a couple of years or so until the boards get corrupted by a free holiday on Tesco Island (other islands are available)!!

Fairer prices just means higher consumer prices though doesn't it in reality?

Consumers don't care about fairer prices for farmers, they want cheaper stuff and in reality that can only be achieved by pressing suppliers/farmers to lower their costs or by controlling other costs such as staff wages. The supermarkets could choose to make less profit and pay farmers fairly, reduce the prices of food and also pay staff properly but that never happens.

It's unfortunately just a consequence of the society that we live in nowadays. We want cheaper stuff and convenience and that has led the big supermarkets to monopolise the food supply. That means now they can name whatever price they want even if it means making obscene profits and not paying people or suppliers properly.

The ultimate benefactors are those who do not supply the food, aren't a customer who buys the food and certainly not the employees who put it on the shelves, it's ridiculous but that's what we're signed up to.

 

[WRicko]

UC doesn’t encourage work though. You earn X and pretty much lose X off your UC payment so people are no better off, probably worse off, working. That is a bonkers system that Labour inherited but they are the party in power now and would love to see if reformed to make work pay - and that doesn’t mean making claimants worse off but allowing workers to keep a bit more of their pay.

That’s the old System UC is supposed to have changed this

 

[cpa]

No because people wouldn’t need top up from the tax payer. You telling me a Tesco couldn’t do it?

it doesnt just effect Tesco's tho does it and where will all these businesses find the extra cost.
People complain about the cost of living now, wait till you see what happens if the minimum wage went up to 20 quid an hour.
Anyway its not going to happen,so pointless discussing it really.

 

[Kompany Car]

Agreed. People say government projects overrun and overspend. So do large scale commercial projects!!!

I have a sneaky suspicion that these big firms come in quoting a decent price before doubling it once you’re too far down the line to tell them to stop work. Probably not accurate but I do wonder how they get it so consistently wrong.

As i mentioned previously, government and public sector procurement is run by idiots. They provide unrealistic budgetary figures often based upon not much more than guesswork. Knock 25% off and then you get businesses going in at zero margin. Once won and in contract, on day one they stick in loads of change and point out all the things that the government procurement missed or forgot about.

Result is that the outturn ends up more expensive than it would have been if they started with a realistic price.

 

[blueinsa]

So your response to someone pointing out the positive changes labour have brought in is to ? Ignore it ? Post other things they haven’t got round to changing ?

UC is supposed to be better for helping people get into work as they face less of cliff edge with changes of pay or hours resulting in less of fall in benefits.

Also minimum wage has gone up

Minimum wage going up happens regardless of who is in power.

Breakfast clubs? What, we will feed your kids because we know you can’t afford to? It’s also not in every school so don’t claim they have done anything of note here.

UC doesn’t encourage work either, it allows folk to not work and more and more are going into it as they no doubt say fuck it, what’s the point in working 40 hours for fuck all when I can get the same for working 20 and have the state prop you up.

Cheap labour is killing us ffs.

 

[hampshireblue]

Minimum wage going up happens regardless of who is in power.

Breakfast clubs? What, we will feed your kids because we know you can’t afford to? It’s also not in every school so don’t claim they have done anything of note here.

UC doesn’t encourage work either, it allows folk to not work and more and more are going into it as they no doubt say fuck it, what’s the point in working 40 hours for fuck all when I can get the same for working 20 and have the state prop you up.

Cheap labour is killing us ffs.

It's down to schools to apply to have a BC. Surely it's a good idea for 2 hard working parents but on a low income to know their kids are getting fed before classes start. Or maybe you'd prefer no help to those that really need it?

If cheap labour is killing us, I assume you want it gone. So do I. But fortunately I can afford to absorb higher prices for stuff,can you?

Imagine being on a fixed income and suddenly it costs £50 to get your windows cleaned instead of £25. Sustainable?