Re: Have This Government Got A Death Wish? : Wed Sep 11, 2013 7:44 am  

Standee wrote:

You've had 7 years and done nothing to change things for yourself, and that is someone else's fault??

figures

You don't know what avenues he might or might not have pursued.

Unemployment figures are still at 5-to-6 times the number of vacancies.
Wage increases have remained low or zero for years.
Zero-hours contracts are on the increase.
80% of jobs created in the last three years are part-time.
Looking for a pay rise in those conditions is much harder than it would otherwise be.

Yeah, being underpaid is always the person's own fault isn't it?
Haul 'em in and make 'em work 80 hours (in further jobs that don't exist), that's the solution.

Re: Have This Government Got A Death Wish? : Wed Sep 11, 2013 9:28 am  

They are getting bold, especially with Miliband making Labour un-electable in 2015 and the Lib Dem'as suicide in 2010, they know there is every chance of an outright win at the next election. It's not that they are any good, it's just that the alternative seems to be hell bent on self destructive infighting, rather than targetting the Tories failures. I think Ed & Ed are so devoid of ideas, they don't fancy winning in 2015.

Re: Have This Government Got A Death Wish? : Wed Sep 11, 2013 10:50 am  

Standee wrote:

You've had 7 years and done nothing to change things for yourself, and that is someone else's fault??

figures

You're a nasty piece of work.

Re: Have This Government Got A Death Wish? : Wed Sep 11, 2013 8:00 pm  

Maybe if the national minimum wage was raised to a level whereby people could earn sufficient money over a 40 hour week not to have to claim in work benefits then the government would save some money.

Re: Have This Government Got A Death Wish? : Thu Sep 12, 2013 12:28 pm  

Sadly, none of this discussion is considered by our politicians: they would state most comments here are ficticious.

Ministerial statement in last day:
"Minister for Employment, Mark Hoban, said: “This is a really encouraging set of figures, with the number of people in work rocketing by 80,000 in only three months. A rise driven entirely by a growth in full-time jobs.

“The private sector has created jobs for 1.4 million more people, and there are now more people employed in the private sector than ever before.”

That what they see as happening.

So how do we get them to see it differently?

Re: Have This Government Got A Death Wish? : Thu Sep 12, 2013 2:19 pm  

Hillbilly_Red wrote:

Sadly, none of this discussion is considered by our politicians: they would state most comments here are ficticious.

Ministerial statement in last day:
"Minister for Employment, Mark Hoban, said: “This is a really encouraging set of figures, with the number of people in work rocketing by 80,000 in only three months. A rise driven entirely by a growth in full-time jobs.

“The private sector has created jobs for 1.4 million more people, and there are now more people employed in the private sector than ever before.”

That what they see as happening.

So how do we get them to see it differently?

Just tell them we believe it to be different. Whats good for the goose an' all that, although it wasn't good for the goose yesterday a la Grant Shapps telling us the Loopy Lefty Brazilian didn't back her observations and statements up with proper research.

Re: Have This Government Got A Death Wish? : Fri Sep 13, 2013 11:39 am  

rover49 wrote:

They are getting bold, especially with Miliband making Labour un-electable in 2015 and the Lib Dem'as suicide in 2010, they know there is every chance of an outright win at the next election. It's not that they are any good, it's just that the alternative seems to be hell bent on self destructive infighting, rather than targetting the Tories failures. I think Ed & Ed are so devoid of ideas, they don't fancy winning in 2015.

I'm actually starting to think that the Lib Dems might do a lot better than people expect at the next election.

It looks more and more likely that the next election campaign will be fought against an expectation of a hung parliament. Unlike last time round, when a hung parliament was a distinct possibility but was largely ignored, Labour and the Tories are likely to have a strategy for such an eventuality. And the media will be much more probing about which of their manifesto proposals might be ditched to enable them to form a coalition, which of the Lib Dem policies might be acceptable to them.

It will be very difficult for Labour or the Tories to take on the Lib Dems. There'll be a lot more "I agree with David". The old argument that a vote for the Lib Dems is a wasted vote will not wash when both parties will be courting the Lib Dems.

Of course, it all still depends on how the economy is doing at the time of the election. But if growth is around 2% I think the Lib Dems, could do a lot better than seemed possible during the last three years.

Re: Have This Government Got A Death Wish? : Fri Sep 13, 2013 12:41 pm  

Hull White Star wrote: Just tell them we believe it to be different. Whats good for the goose an' all that, although it wasn't good for the goose yesterday a la Grant Shapps telling us the Loopy Lefty Brazilian didn't back her observations and statements up with proper research. Ah yes. Good old Grant Shapps. The man who makes up different identities to 'divide' between his business and political careers. Even though that might be confusing when, say, he takes a party of business partners for a tour around Parliament – under a different name. Anyway, Shapps was telling porkies about this incident.

Hull White Star wrote: Just tell them we believe it to be different. Whats good for the goose an' all that, although it wasn't good for the goose yesterday a la Grant Shapps telling us the Loopy Lefty Brazilian didn't back her observations and statements up with proper research. Ah yes. Good old Grant Shapps. The man who makes up different identities to 'divide' between his business and political careers. Even though that might be confusing when, say, he takes a party of business partners for a tour around Parliament – under a different name. Anyway, Shapps was telling porkies about this incident.

[DaveO]

Re: Have This Government Got A Death Wish? : Fri Sep 13, 2013 3:11 pm  

Cibaman wrote:

I'm actually starting to think that the Lib Dems might do a lot better than people expect at the next election.

It looks more and more likely that the next election campaign will be fought against an expectation of a hung parliament. Unlike last time round, when a hung parliament was a distinct possibility but was largely ignored, Labour and the Tories are likely to have a strategy for such an eventuality. And the media will be much more probing about which of their manifesto proposals might be ditched to enable them to form a coalition, which of the Lib Dem policies might be acceptable to them.

It will be very difficult for Labour or the Tories to take on the Lib Dems. There'll be a lot more "I agree with David". The old argument that a vote for the Lib Dems is a wasted vote will not wash when both parties will be courting the Lib Dems.

Of course, it all still depends on how the economy is doing at the time of the election. But if growth is around 2% I think the Lib Dems, could do a lot better than seemed possible during the last three years.

I doubt the electorate won't be reminded of the Lib Dems hypocrisy over tuition fees and their complicity in what is going on with the NHS which according to something I read the other day could be a huge issue by 2015 if things carry on as they are.

If the coalition government has proved anything it is not that a Lib Dem vote is a wasted vote but it is as good as voting Tory.

If there is a portion of the electorate who do not want the Tories returned to power I doubt they will view voting Lib Dem as a way to achieve that. They will simply not know which way the Lib dems will jump.

Instead of doing what they did last time which was to simply form a coalition with the party with the most seats they should state which of the two main parties they feel most aligned with before the election. If that meant after the election the Tories were still the biggest party but the Lib Dems had aligned with Labour then a minority Tory government should be what we end up with. Otherwise we end up with what we have now. A minority Tory government that actually has a working majority due to the Lib Dems!

Had the Lib Dems done this after the last election which as soon as they saw the proposed changes to the NHS they should have, we'd have probably had another election by now and have avoided much of the damage inflicted by what is in effect a very right wing reactionary government.

[DaveO]

Re: Have This Government Got A Death Wish? : Fri Sep 13, 2013 3:21 pm  

As to the notion of people in work not doiing enough work another category of people who may fal foul of this are teaching assistants and administrative staff in schools.

In my area these people are part time workers and are paid part year as well. So they aren't paid for the school holidays unlike teachers. Their salaries are however spread across 12 months so as a monthly wage they will easily drop below the threshold of a 35 hour minimum wage level.

It seems to me under these proposals they would be expected to go and do another job after a day in school or take on work at weekends to make up the difference between their actual employment and what the government thinks they should earn. If they can find a job that is.

There is also an anomaly in educational employment in that in some areas such people as these are not part year but are paid for as teachers are for the full year.