Preparedness for when

Frugalsod

MrsLurcherwalker wrote: »

If they're going to let in another 37,319,027 people I'm going to need some help folks, I'll need volunteers to help me locate and pull out the plug that keeps the water out and this little island floating, we'll sink the thing and by then MAR will have finished knitting that Ark she started on all those years ago and we'll all sail off to the land where the bong tree grows and live with the owl and his feline partner!!!

I was not even suggesting that we let in any more let alone 37 million. My comment was about the fact that claims that we are full are bogus.

If our infrastructure is crap then that is the fault of the government not the extra snow/rain/weather/immigration that we might get. If the government wanted to maintain the infrastructure they would lower the weight limit of trucks so that they are not so damaging to the roads. Even if there was absolutely no more migration the infrastructure would not improve because the government would still cut the spending on it. The flood defences in Somerset were cut by the government not because of migrants.

Yes building on flood plans is stupid but that is the fault of lazy developers and councils desperate for the revenue that they would bring. Though unless we do something significant to avert climate change much of this is irrelevant long term as the sea levels rise. Once the Antarctic ice sheet melt the sea levels will rise some 60m. Just look at this for the impact on your area.

http://flood.firetree.net

As for benefit migrants they are a fiction. Statistically migrants are less likely to claim than locals. People do not pick a nation to go to because of benefits. If that were the case they would be flocking to Scandinavia. The might come here to work and some will find it harder than they expect to get work. But working will pay more to a migrant than benefits.

I suspect that far too many in general have been getting their facts from the Daily Mail which are often very inaccurate to start with.

GreyQueen

In the past couple of days I've read Winifred Foley's memoir of her childhood in a mining village in the Forest of Dean A Child in the Forest.

I commend it to you. She was born in 1914 and this was published in the 1970s. It's unstinting, unsentimental, warm, funny and wince-makingly awful in the desperate poverty of people living hand-to-mouth.

About the little brother who lapsed into a coma due to malnutrition. About the sister who died, the father dead of a pit accident, the disabled and mentally handicapped in the village. The women who were no better than they ought to be, the bare-arrised kids living on bread and marg and never enough of that and always the hunger and the deprivation as they broke their backs to enrich their 'betters'.

And then on to life in domestic service at 14 in London. Mrs Foley was exactly10 years older than my own Nan, another country girl who also went into service in London as a 14 year old, her money sent back home to help her younger siblings. All five of them. Mrs Foley died in 2009, my Nan is 91 in a fortnight.

If you haven't got your own oldsters to talk to, and even if you have, I think you need to read stuff like this to understand how things were and how they could be again. And to nurture, deep in the centre, a powerful sense of justice and an abiding hatred of the exploiters. Even after all this time, no one in my country family can say the word gangmaster without a contemptuous curl of the lip.

fuddle

My opinion is my opinion based on my experiences and I am entitled to it without ridicule I for one don't read the Daily Mail or any newspaper for that matter.

I note that there doesn't seem to be an argument against the words of "we may be rich in land but much of that land is suited to the crofter amongst us".

I also note the lack of comment on how services are stretched. I'm not talking about the effects of council cuts etcI am talking about hard facts like schools being full, difficulty getting into a GP practice or finding a dental practise that hasn't turned private. These aren't opinions. These are real difficulties I have found in moving from the North to the South lately.

I can see what is happening around us. I don't need to jump on anyone else's bandwagon.

fuddle

GreyQueen wrote: »

In the past couple of days I've read Winifred Foley's memoir of her childhood in a mining village in the Forest of Dean A Child in the Forest.

I commend it to you. She was born in 1914 and this was published in the 1970s. It's unstinting, unsentimental, warm, funny and wince-makingly awful in the desperate poverty of people living hand-to-mouth.

About the little brother who lapsed into a coma due to malnutrition. About the sister who died, the father dead of a pit accident, the disabled and mentally handicapped in the village. The women who were no better than they ought to be, the bare-arrised kids living on bread and marg and never enough of that and always the hunger and the deprivation as they broke their backs to enrich their 'betters'.

And then on to life in domestic service at 14 in London. Mrs Foley was exactly10 years older than my own Nan, another country girl who also went into service in London as a 14 year old, her money sent back home to help her younger siblings. All five of them. Mrs Foley died in 2009, my Nan is 91 in a fortnight.

If you haven't got your own oldsters to talk to, and even if you have, I think you need to read stuff like this to understand how things were and how they could be again. And to nurture, deep in the centre, a powerful sense of justice and an abiding hatred of the exploiters. Even after all this time, no one in my country family can say the word gangmaster without a contemptuous curl of the lip.

Thank you for that. I will hunt it out.

VJsmum

Frugalsod wrote: »

I suspect that far too many in general have been getting their facts from the Daily Mail which are often very inaccurate to start with.

Oh, the daily wail. Can't even call itself a newspaper, there is no news in it. I keep trying to wean myself off the "sidebar of shame". Not sure if its their shame or mine .. Anyhow there is a story today about £30 million in child benefits being sent to other EU countries - but whilst I wouldn't say no to an extra £30 million :rotfl: in the scheme of things that isn't so much. What they don't say of course is the net contribution of those claimants.

Frugalsod

fuddle wrote: »

My opinion is my opinion based on my experiences and I am entitled to it without ridicule I for one don't read the Daily Mail or any newspaper for that matter.

I note that there doesn't seem to be an argument against the words of "we may be rich in land but much of that land is suited to the crofter amongst us".

I also note the lack of comment on how services are stretched. I'm not talking about the effects of council cuts etcI am talking about hard facts like schools being full, difficulty getting into a GP practice or finding a dental practise that hasn't turned private. These aren't opinions. These are real difficulties I have found in moving from the North to the South lately.

I can see what is happening around us. I don't need to jump on anyone else's bandwagon.

I am not saying that anyone is, but the fact that people quote incorrect facts indicates that they must have got them somewhere.

The lack of GP's and Dentists is not the fault of migrants. The Tories blamed the contract negotiated by New Labour some years ago. Why would a Pole use ours when they can get to see their own on a trip back home. Also many of the staff I have met in the NHS are from abroad. I know of a Swedish dentist who works here as a locum and still lives in Sweden. He makes enough in four months here to spend the summer in his summer home. You are right that the fact that services are stretched is probably down to central government interference and mismanagement rather than migration who are probably helping more than they stretch them. Though many services are run so close to the limit that many services struggle as soon as there are any changes. The margin of service is so low in many services that they are impacted as soon as there is a change. When the police helicopter crashed in Glasgow every hospital for miles was filled. The arrival of migrants children has impacted many schools but there really should be some slack in any service no matter where you live.

I do see that there are significant downsides to migration. Bar work used to be a great part time job for students but many such jobs are now taken by migrants. So the opportunities are less than before. The problem is that it is not a black and white issue. There are many shades of grey.

nuatha

A huge amount of the UK is barely sufficient to support sheep.
Whilst there is undoubtedly land that could be used for to build more housing, we also need to grow food. (Despite exporting £12 billion worth of food, we currently produce 62% of domestic needs)

Since 2000 migrants have contributed a minimum of £2.5 billion (net, ie over and above benefits and resources consumed) in taxes each year, money that pays for some of those over stretched services and pensions. Part of the problem is that governments lie to us - we do not pay into our pensions, the government uses current payments to fund current pensions, without any provision for future claimants, then move the goalposts. The bigger problem is that people believe the lies and still rely on governments to solve problems.
We have the infrastructure we've paid for, we elected the politicians and frankly we've got what we collectively deserve.

Last year there were 845,000 habitable homes unoccupied (excludes flats above shops, homes scheduled for demolition and those deemed uninhabitable) yet we have a rising homelessness problem.

bluebag

Frugalsod wrote: »

I am not saying that anyone is, but the fact that people quote incorrect facts indicates that they must have got them somewhere.

The lack of GP's and Dentists is not the fault of migrants. The Tories blamed the contract negotiated by New Labour some years ago. Why would a Pole use ours when they can get to see their own on a trip back home. Also many of the staff I have met in the NHS are from abroad. I know of a Swedish dentist who works here as a locum and still lives in Sweden. He makes enough in four months here to spend the summer in his summer home. You are right that the fact that services are stretched is probably down to central government interference and mismanagement rather than migration who are probably helping more than they stretch them. Though many services are run so close to the limit that many services struggle as soon as there are any changes. The margin of service is so low in many services that they are impacted as soon as there is a change. When the police helicopter crashed in Glasgow every hospital for miles was filled. The arrival of migrants children has impacted many schools but there really should be some slack in any service no matter where you live.

I do see that there are significant downsides to migration. Bar work used to be a great part time job for students but many such jobs are now taken by migrants. So the opportunities are less than before. The problem is that it is not a black and white issue. There are many shades of grey.

What do we pay for all the services needed with?

In the area I live there are very few immigrants that have more than one person per household in work and many have large numbers of children.

This makes an uneven burden on the tax paid versus benefits clainmed and services needed.

I live in a very high immigrant area and there are less shades of grey than the pro immigration, muliticultural promoting lobby think.


Most of them need to live in a similar area to this to appreciate the problems and that is without mentioning the cultural issues.

Frugalsod

nuatha wrote: »

A huge amount of the UK is barely sufficient to support sheep.
Whilst there is undoubtedly land that could be used for to build more housing, we also need to grow food. (Despite exporting £12 billion worth of food, we currently produce 62% of domestic needs)

Since 2000 migrants have contributed a minimum of £2.5 billion (net, ie over and above benefits and resources consumed) in taxes each year, money that pays for some of those over stretched services and pensions. Part of the problem is that governments lie to us - we do not pay into our pensions, the government uses current payments to fund current pensions, without any provision for future claimants, then move the goalposts. The bigger problem is that people believe the lies and still rely on governments to solve problems.
We have the infrastructure we've paid for, we elected the politicians and frankly we've got what we collectively deserve.

Last year there were 845,000 habitable homes unoccupied (excludes flats above shops, homes scheduled for demolition and those deemed uninhabitable) yet we have a rising homelessness problem.

I agree with you fully. If we managed our land use better we could grow more food and end homelessness. I suspect that there are also hundreds of thousands of homes that while not habitable could be made habitable.

Though I am more optimistic in that I do think that governments could actually solve problems. They did in the past, but then they were not run by professional politicians with no experience of the real world. You are right we get the government that we deserve.

thriftwizard

A huge amount of the UK is barely sufficient to support sheep.

Sheep aren't necessarily the best thing to grow. These islands used to be covered in forest, even most of the high bits, until the wool trade really took off at much the same time that vast swathes of forest were chopped down to build ships for the world's biggest Navy, and houses for the burgeoning population. Sheep were hugely profitable then, but not so now, as many of my farming friends keep bemoaning. Fond though I am of sheep & their many by-products, there might well be better, more productive & less damaging ways of managing our land than continuing to do things because that's how they've "always" been done.