The Unions are going to fight all spending cuts...

[anonymous-user]

Devil2575 said:

Ok so a proportion of the problem is down to a bloated public sector, another proportion is down to a far too generous tax credit system but a chunk is also down to having to bail out the banks.

care to quantify that? you see i thought i was fairly specific. in 2007 we had run up a national debt of 500bn, we were running a substantial budget defict like we did every year from 2002, and today you can add over 1000bn gbp unfunded pensions, and at least another 160bn in hidden PFI and network rail debt, absolutely none of which has anything to do with the banks. now you can blame the banks for the entire 170bn budget deficit if you like, which is absurd and still only 1/10th of the problem.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/feb/07/apa... doh!

Devil2575 said:

Funny how some are so quick to forget. Very convenient isn't it.

nothing "convenient" at all in blaming the banks and the us government for the 2008 recession and the sovereign debt crisis firmly on the uk and european governments and absolutely nothing at all to do with the banks.

Devil2575 said:

I mean do you know anyone who has one of these so called 'non jobs'?

i dont know a single person in the public sector, does that mean it doesnt exist? i don't recall ever mentioning non jobs anyway.

Edited by fbrs on Wednesday 19th May 00:28

[turbobloke]

Outgoing Treasury Minister Liam Byrne said:

Dear Tories ..I'm afraid there is no money left.

Ho Ho Ho

So Liam Byrne doesn't care. Clearly, all the 'caring' PHers will be outraged.

Country nearly bankrupt, all but the wealthiest 1% worse off than 13 years ago, that's some track record of caring.

[Sticks.]

turbobloke said:

Sticks. said:

turbobloke said:

An offer of a non-job doesn't have to be accepted.....

People are mostly victims of their own poor decision making

If you're on JSA, turning down an offer would result in loss of benefits.

Mostly, or partly, or sometimes? Supposed you worked for Cadbury, for example, how does this apply?

You managed to snip out quite a lot there and what's left, with Cadbury's, doesn't match up.

You seem to be saying that benefits are too generous, that they've become a lifestyle choice not a safety net, that it should be very favourable to lose benefits in favour of paid work. If so we agree.

As to the rest are you saying joining Cadbury's 25 years or 25 days before some corporate manoeuvre was the same as taking a non-job? Clearly it wasn't. Clairvoyance wasn't mentioned in my post.

Try the case of somebody agreeing to be a public sector Chew Ten Times Outreach Coordinator for Jobsworth Council, working for the 5-a-Day Management Team in the Diversity and Equality directorate, even if they were armed with an NVQ in applied mastication it's not the same as taking a real job in a private sectore company where there is real competition to force salaried or wage earning posts to be worthwhile contributors to the bottom line.

just in case anbody thinks there are wondrous gains from the 5-a-Day myth, a recent study led by Paolo Boffetta from Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York and published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute showed that eating five portions of fruit or vegetables a day (about 400g) had little effect on cancer risk while the very small effect that was seen could be caused by other factors

FWIW, that wasn't what I meant at all, but thanks for your comments.

[turbobloke]

You're welcome.

[OzzyR1]

Zod said:

They can and should give them statutory minimum. When they bleat, they can be told that they were being paid to do a non-job, so they should be happy to have been paid the inflated salary they have already received.

That's quite rich coming from a London-based lawyer, although I'm sure you're worth every penny of what you earn

I quite agree that cuts will have to be made somewhere, the country's finances are in an appalling state and the most obvious place to make those cuts is the public sector. It has grown a significant magnitude now vs what it was in 1997.

What I don't agree with is people on this thread apparently taking enjoyment from the fact that some people are going to lose their public sector jobs. As has been said before, they probably took the position in good faith - hell if someone offered me a job a few years back where I could earn a better salary, get a better house and have a few treats I'd have gone for it too.

We're all in this together, cuts will have to be made and even if these are centred around public sector roles it will have an impact on the private sector. Take construction for example, those working for private firms will face some tough times ahead when various Govt funded projects and their respective employees are knocked on the head. That goes onto other private sector feeder roles too - lawyers, developers, accountants etc. I would bet that a fair % of most large private sector firm's work is based on public sector fee-earning in some way.

That's without personal tax rises, inflation going up etc etc.

It isn't going to be pleasant, whichever sector you occupy.

Edited by OzzyR1 on Tuesday 18th May 19:17

[Zod]

OzzyR1 said:

Zod said:

They can and should give them statutory minimum. When they bleat, they can be told that they were being paid to do a non-job, so they should be happy to have been paid the inflated salary they have already received.

That's quite rich coming from a London-based lawyer, although I'm sure you're worth every penny of what you earn

What I earn is paid to me by clients in a free market and I have to fund my own pension.

[OzzyR1]

Zod said:

What I earn is paid to me by clients in a free market and I have to fund my own pension.

I did add a wink, am in a fairly similar position career-wise (vocation and location) to you myself, albeit probably a little down the ladder given your chosen transport

I just don't think that public sector can be altered radically without having a (possibly severe) effect on private sector is all.

Also I don't think that anyone (and because I chose to reply to your post I don't mean you specifically but maybe some others on here) should take any pleasure in knowing that several tens of thousands of people might not know how they're going to pay the bills in a few months. We've had enough redundancies in my firm over the last couple of years that I'm thankful that I've put in enough hard work and had some good luck that I'm not one of them... touch wood.

Edited by OzzyR1 on Tuesday 18th May 19:30

[Dupont666]

OzzyR1 said:

Zod said:

They can and should give them statutory minimum. When they bleat, they can be told that they were being paid to do a non-job, so they should be happy to have been paid the inflated salary they have already received.

That's quite rich coming from a London-based lawyer, although I'm sure you're worth every penny of what you earn

I quite agree that cuts will have to be made somewhere, the country's finances are in an appalling state and the most obvious place to make those cuts is the public sector. It has grown a significant magnitude now vs what it was in 1997.

What I don't agree with is people on this thread apparently taking enjoyment from the fact that some people are going to lose their public sector jobs. As has been said before, they probably took the position in good faith - hell if someone offered me a job a few years back where I could earn a better salary, get a better house and have a few treats I'd have gone for it too.

We're all in this together, cuts will have to be made and even if these are centred around public sector roles it will have an impact on the private sector. Take construction for example, those working for private firms will face some tough times ahead when various Govt funded projects and their respective employees are knocked on the head. That goes onto other private sector feeder roles too - lawyers, developers, accountants etc. I would bet that a fair % of most large private sector firm's work is based on public sector fee-earning in some way.

That's without personal tax rises, inflation going up etc etc.

It isn't going to be pleasant, whichever sector you occupy.

Edited by OzzyR1 on Tuesday 18th May 19:17

Its not about taking enjoyment this thread is about the bullish attitude of the Unions that are demanding no pay cuts and are actually demanding a decent payrise for all this year.

Which is not doable... its about how do you cut the public sector to an acceptable level that the tax money pays for it without borrowing more?

How do you sort out the government waste on complete crap?

Same goes for the public sector, no more expensive furniture or paintings hanging in senior offices to make them look pretty, this is the whole nine yards that needs to be taken back.

Thats the simple truth the cuts need to happen in the public sector but the public sector are trying to fight tooth and nail to make sure they dont happen, from the unions websites it looks like they would rather bankrupt the UK then help it...

[Lickasaurus Rex]

Dupont666 said:

from the unions websites it looks like they would rather bankrupt the UK then help it...

This is typical of socialists who have no idea how economics works.

Which is why you need to force their hands.

[OzzyR1]

Dupont666 said:

Its not about taking enjoyment this thread is about the bullish attitude of the Unions that are demanding no pay cuts and are actually demanding a decent payrise for all this year.

Which is not doable... its about how do you cut the public sector to an acceptable level that the tax money pays for it without borrowing more?

How do you sort out the government waste on complete crap?

Same goes for the public sector, no more expensive furniture or paintings hanging in senior offices to make them look pretty, this is the whole nine yards that needs to be taken back.

Thats the simple truth the cuts need to happen in the public sector but the public sector are trying to fight tooth and nail to make sure they dont happen, from the unions websites it looks like they would rather bankrupt the UK then help it...

I know what the thread was originally about but it has been slightly derailed.

In response to your "its about how do you cut the public sector to an acceptable level that the tax money pays for it without borrowing more?

How do you sort out the government waste on complete crap?

Same goes for the public sector, no more expensive furniture or paintings hanging in senior offices"


Answer is obvious to me as it probably is to you, chuck all the waste in the bin then kill it with extreme prejudice.

When you have to sort out such a big £700bn per year mess though it's like having a teenage house party and you've woken up an hour before your parents are due home... how the hell can we fix this?? We can't, we're screwed.

I really pity this current Govt, the public at large will see the cuts and they'll be fully blamed as "Labour would never have done this".

At the next election, Labour will get in again which might be a saving grace when the IMF have to be called in as impartial witnesses.

I love this country but I genuinely despair for it's future.

[Zod]

OzzyR1 said:

Zod said:

What I earn is paid to me by clients in a free market and I have to fund my own pension.

I did add a wink, am in a fairly similar position career-wise (vocation and location) to you myself, albeit probably a little down the ladder given your chosen transport

I just don't think that public sector can be altered radically without having a (possibly severe) effect on private sector is all.

Also I don't think that anyone (and because I chose to reply to your post I don't mean you specifically but maybe some others on here) should take any pleasure in knowing that several tens of thousands of people might not know how they're going to pay the bills in a few months. We've had enough redundancies in my firm over the last couple of years that I'm thankful that I've put in enough hard work and had some good luck that I'm not one of them... touch wood.

Edited by OzzyR1 on Tuesday 18th May 19:30

I was in too much of a hurry after the gym to spot the smiley .

I take no pleasure from impending job cuts in the public sector. If Labour had not distorted the job market, these people would be employed in the private or unemployed. The private sector does not pay people to do non-jobs; neither should the public sector.

[Devil2575]

fbrs said:

care to quantify that? you see i thought i was fairly specific. in 2007 we had run up a national debt of 500bn, we were running a substantial budget defict like we did every year from 1997, and today you can add over 1000bn gbp unfunded pensions, and at least another 160bn in hidden PFI and network rail debt, absolutely none of which has anything to do with the banks. now you can blame the banks for the entire 170bn budget deficit if you like, which is absurd and still only 1/10th of the problem.

The bank bail out has been estimated to cost us about 850 billion in the long run. How much in terms of cuts do the parties have to find that were't accounted for before the election, about 75 billion give or take a few depending on which ever party it was. The UK government bought 76 billion in RBS and lloyds shares alone. I'd say this is a fair proportion of the deficit

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/1638...

The commitments include buying £76bn of shares in Royal Bank of Scotland and the Lloyds Banking Group; indemnifying the Bank of England against losses incurred in providing more than £200bn of liquidity support; guaranteeing up to £250bn of wholesale borrowing by banks to strengthen liquidity; providing £40bn of loans and other funding to Bradford & Bingley and the Financial Services compensation Scheme; and insurance cover of over £280bn for bank assets.

You can't compare unfunded pensions, this isn't a Labour sepcific problem it's a general issue with the unsustainability of final salary pensions. I bet a lot of private companies that still haven't closed their final salary schemes yet have similar problems. I know mine does.

i dont know a single person in the public sector, does that mean it doesnt exist? i don't recall ever mentioning non jobs anyway.

No, it just makes it very easy for you and others to be very glib about people who are about to be made redundant.

Edited by fbrs on Tuesday 18th May 18:54

[Olivera]

FunkyGibbon said:

Having been involved in a number of public sector redundancies (administering them not subject to) the figure of £50K pay out is not an accurate picture of what actually happens in my experience.

The cost of the redundancy will be a theoretical maximum (currently) of £11400 (20 years max. taken into account and 65 years old at time of redundancy). We offer no enhanced redundancy terms, so statutory maximum of £380 per qualifying week is used.

In a real world examples this averages out as a max of approx £5, often much less.

Now, there will also be notice pay due if you require them to leave without working their notice. This may by typically 1 or up to 3 months.

But this isn't extra cost as you'd be paying this anyway if you did not make the role redundant. And if you didn't need them anyway - you lose nothing by letting them go early.

Redundancies can therefore very quickly recover their costs.

You have those figures totally and completely wrong. We are talking about the public sector (government) here, not private or statutory redundancy. As I stated in an earlier post, statutory redundancy legislation does not cover public sector workers, they fall under the Civil Service Compensation Scheme. The government tried to cut public sector redundancy pay recently and failed - it was thrown out by the High court.

Heres two examples from the PCS union:

"For someone aged 41 who earns £24,000 and has 20 years’ service, their current entitlement if made compulsorily redundant would be £72,000."

"Someone who began work pre 1987 with reserved rights and is 46 earning £24,000 with 26 years’ service is entitled to £106,000."

Edited by Olivera on Tuesday 18th May 22:38

[Devil2575]

turbobloke said:

It's a simple but ineffective argument to say that people who disagree with you "don't care".

My view about not caring was based on the same general view that OzzyR1 has:

"What I don't agree with is people on this thread apparently taking enjoyment from the fact that some people are going to lose their public sector jobs"

If I've misunderstoon your stance then appolgies.

Oh and I don't accept that we are on the brink of bankrupcy. In a poor financial situation but we are not in a postion where we are about to default on loans. In fact the market doesn't seem to think so either given that the last Uk government bond offering they were snapped up.

Edited by Devil2575 on Tuesday 18th May 22:41

[Zod]

Devil, the bank bailout has nothing whatsoever to do with the current deficit. That money was committed in 2008/9. Some of it is now part of the national debt; some represents assets on the national balance sheet.

The deficit is the gap between government income in the current year (almost entirely tax receipts) and government expenditure over the same period.

[loafer123]

Devil2575 said:

The bank bail out has been estimated to cost us about 850 billion in the long run. How much in terms of cuts do the parties have to find that were't accounted for before the election, about 75 billion give or take a few depending on which ever party it was. The UK government bought 76 billion in RBS and lloyds shares alone. I'd say this is a fair proportion of the deficit

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/1638...

The commitments include buying £76bn of shares in Royal Bank of Scotland and the Lloyds Banking Group; indemnifying the Bank of England against losses incurred in providing more than £200bn of liquidity support; guaranteeing up to £250bn of wholesale borrowing by banks to strengthen liquidity; providing £40bn of loans and other funding to Bradford & Bingley and the Financial Services compensation Scheme; and insurance cover of over £280bn for bank assets.

That is the most ridiculous post I have seen in a long time.

Let's go through it, shall we?

£76bn of shares in RBS and Lloyds - currently at or approaching profit, ahead of schedule.
£200bn in liquidity support - cash liquidity provided when funding markets shut - repaid as they opened and banks deleveraged and raised more money
£250bn of wholesale funding gtees - same as the £200bn - roll off as funding is renewed in the commercial markets
£40bn of loans to B&B and FSCS - same again. The FSCS might be the only potential loss in extremis, which is why the funding will be required to be beefed up by the banks providing further money to it.
£280bn insurance gtee - This is the RBS APS where RBS would have to lose £60bn first before it ever got called, which is highly unlikely.

The difference between spending £850bn and the sum of the amounts above is that the £850bn above will be fully returned.

[Devil2575]

Zod said:

Devil, the bank bailout has nothing whatsoever to do with the current deficit. That money was committed in 2008/9. Some of it is now part of the national debt; some represents assets on the national balance sheet.

The deficit is the gap between government income in the current year (almost entirely tax receipts) and government expenditure over the same period.

Ok, fair point. Still, the collapsing economy has resulted in the deficit to some extent as it will have had an impact on government income.

[Devil2575]

loafer123 said:

That is the most ridiculous post I have seen in a long time.

Really, you didn't see the one about denying the unemployed the right to vote then

No matter how you paint it, the fact that the world is in recession, due to the economic collapse, which was caused by the banking sector, will have an impact on the deficit.

[B17NNS]

Tony*T3 said:

PistonHeaders will be the first complaining next winter when theres no one out gritting the roads or repairing potholes etc.

So absolutely no change then

Nobody gritted the roads last winter and nobody was repairing the potholes this Spring.

So nothing changes but the country saves a st load of cash.

I believe that is what they call win-win non?

[loafer123]

Devil2575 said:

loafer123 said:

That is the most ridiculous post I have seen in a long time.

Really, you didn't see the one about denying the unemployed the right to vote then

No matter how you paint it, the fact that the world is in recession, due to the economic collapse, which was caused by the banking sector, will have an impact on the deficit.

You're right - I didn't!

I am not sure I would agree that the banking sector is the sole cause of the recession, but it is a major contributor.

As the banking sector makes less money, tax revenues have declined, and therefore the deficit is larger.

It's contibution to the widening deficit is more from smaller tax income than an actual cost.