The Labour Government

Chippy_boy said:
Very good post IMO. I don't agree with all of it, but much I do.

The bit I would differ upon, relates to Reform. I don't differ in terms of their approach being unworkable, which I agree it is. But I do differ about their ideology.

They might seem like they are just the anti-immigration party, but you have to remember they are also really the UKIP party. What UKIP stood for, and Reform still do, is the idea that we could be like Singapore, or some other low-tax, low regulation, small government sovereign nation (not that Singapore is all of these things). Where businesses thrive, tax revenues are high because the economy booms and everyone is better off.

Of course this pipe-dream completely ignore the fact that 50% of our trade was with the EU. And the EU would never allow such a regime, 20 miles off their coast, freely exporting into its market. So it was - and remains - a completely unrealistic aspiration. It was one of the main reasons I voted Remain.
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Singapore has a very simple economy because it isn't really a country, it's a city. It doesn't have a farming or manufacturing sector, it doesn't have millions of people 100's of miles in the north to worry about.

We obviously could just give the city of London free reign and allow them to do anything they want but how is that going to support us lowly folk in Chorley? Is the city of London suddenly going to be supportive of wealth sharing? History and various offshore leaks shows us that this is definitely not true.

It would make sense if the newly flush city of London folk shared their wealth and went out shopping in Scunthorpe for their wares but that clearly isn't going to happen. If anything this sort of system insulates the rich and anybody north of the M25 will be forced to continue to fight over the scraps or rely upon token 'diversity' HQ moves as with the BBC.

The UK is a crazy economy really where actually we have the most powerful and richest city in the world disguising the fact that the rest of the UK could nearly be considered third world. Switching to a Singapore economy just boosts London and growth in that sense but it does nothing for the rest of us.

The UK should actually be more on par with Germany and not Singapore. We should be a manufacturing and technology powerhouse but years of government focus on services and especially finance has only weakened the regions. Thanks to Farage (an ex-city of London trader...) it is this sentiment that caused Brexit and not any qualm with the EU itself.
 
Chippy_boy said:
She was only disabled in later life. For years she just couldn't be arsed to work. But I don't begrudge her getting appropriate benefits at all. What I am questioning is why were the level of benefits so high that she was getting richer, year upon year, merely out of state funding. Seems wrong to me. Also the wasted drugs. Tens of thousands wasted, repeat prescriptions just sent automatically and stuffed in draws. Huge amounts of waste.

Strange comment about being over 66 not being a disability. No idea what you mean by that.
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So you took an exception and made a big deal out of it? If she had property then of course she was going to get rich when prices inflated. It's easy to build up money when you do fuck all and do nothing.

We have scores of pensioners in these threads doing the poor me, poor me, pour me another drink routine.

Age is itself not a disability. People over a certain age are more likely to have a disability because they are older but the disability is what should warrant receiving the support. Not the fact that they happen to be eligible for a pension. My dad became a pensioner this year, he'll never get WFA. I still believe it's the right thing.
 
hammocity said:
We're fine, I retired early, been funding that for 3 years, not wealthy but not poor, no benefits of any kind even though our only income is Mr's H £884 every four weeks, I get my SP next May, wont have to subsidise my retirement as much after that.
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You don't have any private pensions between you?
 
Churchlawtonblue said:
Most are no doubt. My sister certainly is and always has. However there are one or two in her office that are clearly playing the system and are off sick and then return to work the day their pay gets reduced. Work for the required time and then go off sick again with some made up illness. It annoys the hell out of my sister and the others., but the management do nothing about it. There is also a lot of needless duplication certainly between NHS Trusts.
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My missus works for the NHS as well and in her department it's the same, also all Nursing staff don't work their arses off, my missus was in Hospital for 10 weeks and the number of times she was left in the Bathroom for sometimes a hour because she couldn't walk without assistance, the nursing assistants on her unit were bone idle and every time i visited they were either on their mobile phones or talking in groups with assistance alarms going off all over the unit, I know it doesn't apply to every ward /unit
 
inbetween said:
Singapore has a very simple economy because it isn't really a country, it's a city. It doesn't have a farming or manufacturing sector, it doesn't have millions of people 100's of miles in the north to worry about.

We obviously could just give the city of London free reign and allow them to do anything they want but how is that going to support us lowly folk in Chorley? Is the city of London suddenly going to be supportive of wealth sharing? History and various offshore leaks shows us that this is definitely not true.

It would make sense if the newly flush city of London folk shared their wealth and went out shopping in Scunthorpe for their wares but that clearly isn't going to happen. If anything this sort of system insulates the rich and anybody north of the M25 will be forced to continue to fight over the scraps or rely upon token 'diversity' HQ moves as with the BBC.

The UK is a crazy economy really where actually we have the most powerful and richest city in the world disguising the fact that the rest of the UK could nearly be considered third world. Switching to a Singapore economy just boosts London and growth in that sense but it does nothing for the rest of us.

The UK should actually be more on par with Germany and not Singapore. We should be a manufacturing and technology powerhouse but years of government focus on services and especially finance has only weakened the regions. Thanks to Farage (an ex-city of London trader...) it is this sentiment that caused Brexit and not any qualm with the EU itself.
Click to expand...
i'm not seeing 'third world' out me office window in Mcr fella...Chorley though?...well i'll give you that...
 
Mr Kobayashi said:
You don't have any private pensions between you?
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Draw down for me, just in the process of finalising it on Monday, if I left as an annuity it halves the yearly benefit to Mrs H if I died so she would need to live until age 91 before she starts making a profit. Draw down even with the tax implications is the most sensible option, the annuity option doesn't have built in inflationary increases, only a portion of it rises by 3% pa, it's not a great scheme (run by Aviva now).
 
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