Preparedness for when

Doveling

Being one of those people who is on daily meds for chronic illness and being
well over 50 in body, if not in mind, I dread any mention of private insurance
for health issues. Because they'd sinply say pre existing condition, away with
you or give us 300% of your yearly income to be insured.
short bird

That'll be me as well

Something I forgot to mention, Dad was in hospital a few weeks back (all ok now).
I am very nosy and have ears like a bat:rotfl:,
It was Sunday afternoon visiting and one of the nurses was bemoaning the lack of cleaning staff on the wards that day,to whom I can only presume was the cleaning supervisor.
The person's reply to the nurse was "Well if they're on zero hours contracts they don't have to come in if they don't want. Would you on a sunny Sunday afternoon?"

Zero hours contracts not working so well there then, eh?

[Deleted User]

Doveling wrote: »

when they can scarcely keep body and soul together anyway.

There are very few people, who can't (or, more accurately, couldn't) keep body and soul together.

Few people are truly on the breadline, unless by their own recklessness/stupidity.

Doveling

Have to agree to disagree there, Bedsit Bob

I might not know a lot about finance etc. but I do have a pretty good understanding of human frailty.
Your psychological makeup plays a large part in how you handle adverslty. Some people become stronger, others crumble.

I do think a lot of families are on the breadline and not because of recklessness or stupidity. What about redundancy,zero hours contracts, losing jobs through illness, family breakdown,sudden deaths? The list goes on and on.

You may be right and it is just a few, but that is a few too many still.:(

Maybe I am a soft touch but I just feel " There but for the Grace of (insert deity of choice) go I".

greenbee

jk0 wrote: »

Try to stay out of private hospitals folks. If at all possible, wait a few months for NHS treatment.

I have health insurance through work, but given the choice I prefer the NHS. However, I do use my insurance when there is no difference in the treatment because it is one less referral for my GP to fund.

[Deleted User]

Just looked on Wikkpaedia and the first 'pension' was before the poor laws were abolished in 1908 and it paid 5 shillings (25p) to those whose annual income didn't exceed £31.10shillings (£31.50). The pension as we know it today was intorduced in 1948 and was the first to be paid to those not paying National Insurance. We've really only had that security and the NHS since 1948, people must have managed, in a way, before that or we wouldn't all be here chatting today would we? I guess our forebears were either prepared/forced to accept a very much less privileged lifestyle than we are used to or were made of tough stuff indeed. I would think if you'd been reared in straitened circumstances you'd take on all the knowledge and skills to enable you to make the best of what you did have. Life would have been a whole lot bleaker, hunger would have been well known and illness put up with if you couldn't afford to pay the doctor though wouldn't it?

ikkie

vanoonoo wrote: »

the boy scouts among us will be prepared, but are the rest of us ready?

IMPORTANT NOTE: this thread is a resource for those who want to prepare in an old style way for a variety of scenarios - anything from c0-0p running out of milk to a full scale breakdown in society as we know it - if you don't think you can cope with this sort of discussion please don't read any further! it is not meant to alarm or ridicule, just allow open discussion in a frank but sometimes lighthearted way - that said, all constructive view points are welcome so please join in!

please see a great post from GQ about some thoughts of a home without water and what we would need https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/57006775#Comment_57006775

we've got the storecupboard thread and I can see many people talk about Grab and Go (GAG)/bail/bug out bags (BOB) and getting ready for when the proverbial hits the fan
this is what got me thinking - cross posting sorry but thanks to pugsley

I wondered if it would be good to have a more detailed thread not just about store cupboards for food but for other items, perhaps (to keep it old style), along the lines of air raid shelter/WWII preparedness, with the necessary modern additions

apologies if this has already been done, feel free to merge but I'd rather stay old style if possible to keep it real! :A
useful links and items
calculator for stores http://www.p2snetwork.co.uk/psclite.html
http://www.readyscotland.org/at-home/create-an-emergency-plan/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamo_torch
http://www.silvacompass.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Collins_GEM_books
http://www.mothprevention.com/clothes-moths/moth-balls.html
http://72hours.org/
http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Moneyless-Man-Freeconomic-Living/dp/1851687548
http://www.ikea.com/gb/en/catalog/products/30190857/ - torch
http://www.tesco.com/direct/search-results/results.page?catId=4294967294&searchquery=wind+up&SrchId=4294967294&_requestid=1775502 - tesco wind up stuff
http://www.wilkinsonplus.com/torches/uni-com-wind-up-torch/invt/0255402/?htxt=PsAGyAqy/DSGVBgOHPBfATKVETOKIWHcwqoICuDrG/xTcDPfxIrYzUvEu76RzzM6wutKTeo9AOCB tDs76aYYKg== - wilko wind up torch
http://www.millets.co.uk/category/camping/camping-accessories.html?showAll=true millets wind up stuff
cheap portable homemade hobo stove http://www.mungosaysbah.com/2009/02/bushcraft-hobo-wood-stove.html
some other OS threads

learning how to forage http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/....php?t=4050903
having a storecupboard http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/....php?t=4031559
preparing for winter 4 http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/....php?t=3519771
http://www.rsgb.org/ radio society of great britain
This is agreat site for cooking gear - http://wildstoves.co.uk/rocket-stoves/
foundanother great thread elsewhere on the site htttp://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/...d.php?t=510311
with a flylady updated link http://www.flylady.net/d/getting-sta...sons/prepared/
flood plan http://cdn.environment-agency.gov.uk/geho0709bqpu-e-e.pdf
http://www.bushcraftuk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=37283

??????????????

[Deleted User]

Doveling wrote: »

I do think a lot of families are on the breadline and not because of recklessness or stupidity.

I disagree.

The social security system does provide sufficient to keep you off the bread line.

Of course, there will always be a small number of people, who will spend it on drink, smoking, gambling etc., but there's little TPTB can do about that, short of forcing such people into rehabilitation, and I certainly wouldn't be happy, with such state interference in the lives of adults.

[Deleted User]

ikkie wrote: »

??????????????

Could you elaborate, on what you are confused about?

1Tonsil

Frugalsod wrote: »

I think that the problem is that the turkeys voted for Christmas yet they did not think that they were the turkeys. They are told about the so called abuses of which there are always one but then confabulate that information into all benefit recipients are scroungers, so they demand benefits be slashed so that their tax bill can be reduced. They do not realise that when they lose their jobs because of the next recession or downsizing that they voted for all this.

At some point the government will have their "Let them eat cake" moment and things will collapse very rapidly probably with many MP's dangling from nooses. I can see this happening in Greece.

I can see it happening again and I think its a toss up which politicians get lynched first...the old boys or the new ones. I can see the likeness to the turkeys voting for Christmas as well here in Greece.

At the moment, we have YES politicians and No politicians resigning left right and centre...pardon the pun. While the rest are locked in parliament arguing about the proposal to give Greece away for free....the IMF have decided they, and no one else, can do anything without a debt haircut... or a thirty year grace period for the country to recover from the austerity. The EU have deliberately under estimated the damage done by the banks being closed by the ECB....who also say no more. I can understand the other countries refusing to give any more money....its all going to the German banks. Incidentally, the Deutsche bank is now being investigated for laundering Russian money.....and were asked to do so by Putin.... Interesting times we live in eh?

There are demonstrations tonight and tomorrow in Athens, as the vote is expected tomorrow..they have a deadline of midnight to vote, but some of the changes have to become law tomorrow morning. I can feel revolution in the air....the citizens will NEVER allow this to go through and Greece to be given away, complete with ancient monuments, Gold, oil , gas and bank deposits.

Its not the size of the dog in the fight, but the size of the fight in the dog:D

Meanwhile, there is word that the banks will not be allowed to open till at least Monday of next week.....:eek:

[Deleted User]

I've just dug out from my bookshelf a lovely old cook book published in 1935 and it lists 3 weeks worth of menus for 2 adults and 3 children and says that the smallest amount of money you can exist on is £1.7s.6d per week!!! There are 4 meals each day , every day there is an afternoon tea plumbed in and supper as well. Often the breakfast says 'Bacon for the man' and fried bread in the bacon fat for the rest of the family, often breakfast is fried bread and fried potatoes and sometimes it's porridge, cold cooked bacon (ham), bread and butter, marmalade/jam and tea so pretty substantial. lunches are overlap meals, i.e roast meat one day and cold meat the next followed by a pie using scraps and topped with potato the next and the meat bone is always made into a hefty soup for supper with bread and butter and cocoa. Tea is a more sedate affair with bread and butter, jam, sometimes cake, sometimes scones, sometimes biscuits but always with tea to drink. Lots of emphasis on seasonal fresh fruit and veg and things like making marmalade when the seville oranges are round, jam in the fruit season and lemon curd when the eggs are plentiful. It's a different world now but it sounds like good common sense to fill up on 'afternoon tea' and supper if you're frugal with what you serve. Of course most housewives were at home in the 1930s and were expected to cook, make do and mend and garden along with all the household chores and child rearing but I think it would be possible to run a menu along those lines nowadays, but certainly not for 27'6p! The buy a joint for Sunday and then use it for as much of the week as it stretches to has always been used to stretch meat. There are a couple of pulse based meals each week usually using a couple of ounces of bacon for flavouring and fish pie or baked herrings with a substantial steamed pudding every day too. It's carb heavy and I guess folks worked that off way back then but I arrived in this world 13 years later and it doesn't feel like that long ago when I look at it in that light. I wonder if perhaps adapting our menus today to have better breakfasts, smaller lunches, something at teatime and then a light supper might just make our pennies go a bit further?