Fantastic comment piece from the Times on the giveaway to mortgage holders

lostinrates

DirectDebacle wrote: »

Not quite. A while back we had involuntary immigration. I think it was called slavery. Then after WW. 2. there was a massive recruitment drive for immigrants. Plane loads of people were flown in, mainly from the Carribean, to build up our workforce. All over the land you will find 2nd and 3rd generation British citizens who are the descendants of immigrants.

This section of our society is grossly underrepresented in Parliament as indeed are women.

I'd just like to say as a woman, and in some measures a religious minority, married to a Jew who I learn is not a minority, the lack of people of my sex and religion representing me is not the issue. The lack of people with common sense, a true desire to represent and a strong and true moral compass however might be.

RobertoMoir

Guy_Montag wrote: »

I have a friend who works with deprived children, she was telling me that all to often she will visit them to find a large lcd/plasma tv on, with the lights off (to save on the leccy bill). These families are quite obviously impoverished, but some of it must be self-inflicted after all a large tv on HP will cost far more than a more modest one bought second hand (or even a large tv bought cash).

When I worked as a bailiff for a while a long time ago, I saw quite a lot of the same. I've had people stand up and tell me with a straight face that "by the time I've paid for essentials like me fags and booze and bingo, there's barely enough to feed the babby let alone pay bills!"

Of course not everyone I spoke to was like that. Poverty really exists in the UK, but you do have to wonder at a society that allows people to think like that.

lostinrates

How does the measur of poverty in childrn measure attempts to access?

For example, one of the things we can be proud of is our library system, of especial benefit I might have thought, to lower income families. My feling very much is that a child who can read has access to anything in the world he or she wants to read about. Very hard to guage attempts to get children into libraries, very hard for the children of non-reading parents: but quit frankly the problem their is never going to be rsolved with money.

RobertoMoir

lostinrates wrote: »

I'd just like to say as a woman, and in some measures a religious minority, married to a Jew who I learn is not a minority, the lack of people of my sex and religion representing me is not the issue. The lack of people with common sense, a true desire to represent and a strong and true moral compass however might be.

It just doesn't seem to sit well with some people that you might have more in common with people based on a similar postcode than you do based on a similar skin colour.

Nor that being best qualified for a job is more important than meeting a quota.

moggylover

I found this article absolutely heartbreaking, but also interesting:

http://images.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=http://i.thisislondon.co.uk/i/pix/2008/04/towerhamlets_415x275.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23478244-details/Children%2Bof%2Bbad%2Bparents%2B%27doomed%2Bto%2Bpoverty%2Bat%2B3%27/article.do&usg=__nzy1iBUCNrUDscBA6C1adJiZQYA=&h=275&w=415&sz=35&hl=en&start=92&um=1&tbnid=ZKFPoSLd8Lv4ZM:&tbnh=83&tbnw=125&prev=/images%3Fq%3Ddeprived%2Bareas%2Bof%2Bthe%2BUK%26start%3D80%26ndsp%3D20%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN

SingleSue

lostinrates wrote: »

How does the measur of poverty in childrn measure attempts to access?

For example, one of the things we can be proud of is our library system, of especial benefit I might have thought, to lower income families. My feling very much is that a child who can read has access to anything in the world he or she wants to read about. Very hard to guage attempts to get children into libraries, very hard for the children of non-reading parents: but quit frankly the problem their is never going to be rsolved with money.

I'll answer as a benefit family....

We have visited the library a few times but not that often, not because we have no interest in reading but because we already have an extensive library of books at home!

In fact, it has been so large in the past, that I have taken to selling some to raise pennies for bits and bobs and to get some more space in the house.

Myself, ex OH, James and Joe are avid readers...I will get through at least a book a week, James the same. Joshua on the other hand is not that interested unless it is about bugs and there is only a finite amount of books on that subject!

I don't spend much on books at all, boot sales and charity shops are a very handy place to pick them up dirt cheap and I have now got into the habit (as had my eldest son) of buying them cheap, reading them and then selling them off at the next bootsale for the same or sometimes more than we paid for them.

DirectDebacle

lostinrates wrote: »

I'd just like to say as a woman, and in some measures a religious minority, married to a Jew who I learn is not a minority, the lack of people of my sex and religion representing me is not the issue. The lack of people with common sense, a true desire to represent and a strong and true moral compass however might be.

But wouldn't broadening the base our Parliamentarians are drawn from be a way to achieve this? Seems to me that when both chambers are populated by mainly middle/upper class white men in grey suits then that is the section of society Govts. will cater for.

moggylover

My God! Now I realise that I was worse off as a child than I thought:rotfl: .

http://images.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=http://www.geograph.org.uk/photos/02/57/025749_8876e9d8.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/25749&usg=__bk-_-SG6nDDgcRxQlWg-27lLJtw=&h=480&w=640&sz=99&hl=en&start=146&um=1&tbnid=KlePMbq2JGs6uM:&tbnh=103&tbnw=137&prev=/images%3Fq%3Ddeprived%2Bareas%2Bof%2Bthe%2BUK%26start%3D140%26ndsp%3D20%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN

I actually grew up in a house in the shadow of the nearest of those blocks, but the estate was not considered "deprived" in those days at all although the flats (which had been originally built for singles) ended up full of families whose lives were hell due to the ever broken down lifts:D .

The two front blocks of those have now been knocked down (I discovered on my first trip "home" for 10 years earlier this year. I still did not think that the area looked what I think of as deprived, and tbh - the majority of the houses on that estate were long since sold to tennants

lostinrates

DirectDebacle wrote: »

But wouldn't broadening the base our Parliamentarians are drawn from be a way to achieve this? Seems to me that when both chambers are populated by mainly middle/upper class white men in grey suits then that is the section of society Govts. will cater for.

Not really,IMO, no. For example, I find the people most dismissive of non-working women are working women. A full time mother by choice might find a man who has a simialar family set up more representative of them.

In any case, I find my views are influenced by, but not exclusive to my ability to wear a bra.

I'd rather have a person (blank, pink, white, male, female able bodied or otherwise wearing grey suits or a swimsuit) who has a sense of compassion and empathy, with the intelligence to be able to appreciate different points of view. In going for literal representation of, for example, women representing women for no reason other than their female ness I think these skills ar overlooked, undervalued, risking the LACK of representation of many others within the MPs remit and, worringly patantly in som cases, severe miss rpresentation under the guise of 'representation'. (The danger here is it is not accepted this is no more representational, because the stats say it is.)

Its actually somthing I find extremely limited in the dismissal of people with a certain name or education TBH, they may well have these skills in equal measure with anyone else...or not.

Guy_Montag

DirectDebacle wrote: »

In part they have already done a)

To do b) is achievable and does not have to be punitive on the higher earners. With a big fanfare Govt announce sweeping changes to the benefits system in order to get people back into work. These are not sweeping changes but a mere tinkering with it around the edges. The benefits system need a total overhaul. With targeted measures, instead of the universal benefits for all system, there would be better value for the tax payers and recipients alike.

One way of avoiding the 'benefits trap', where the difference between benefits and a low paid job provides no incentive to work, is to raise the minimum wage to a level where there is real incentive to come off benefits. This would be expensive (to business) and would need to be phased in and absorbed over several years.

As you say none of this is going to attract votes. A politicians primary objective is to gain power and the secondary objective is to keep it.

A non-inflationary alternative would be to reduce benefits to the point that working minimum wage is the incentive.

I would argue a better alternative would be to increase the level at which tax (& NI) is not paid to the annual f/t minimum wage would be a better solution. I.e. if you work f/t on minimum wage you keep everything you earn & there is no tax on employers to employ people on minimum wage.

(Generali, I expect a breakdown of the cost of this measure by lunchtime .)