What Did Thatcher Ever Do For Us?

Discodee

hang on, I haven't critised anything. The only reason I posted what I did was because you said I knew the value of nothing!!!!!!! See, you can't even remember what you did! LOL

As for petrol, I forgot that one. I walk and cycle everywhere, both kids walk 3 miles to school and hubby cycles to work so i only fill up once every 3 or 4 months.

StevieJ

ash28 wrote: »

You can be as critical of our lifestyle as much as you like but it would be a sad old world if we all had the same values....but fortunately we don't, that's one of the things that makes this board interesting.

I think I would rather visit you than Discodee

ash28

Discodee wrote: »

hang on, I haven't critised anything. The only reason I posted what I did was because you said I knew the value of nothing!!!!!!! See, you can't even remember what you did! LOL

As for petrol, I forgot that one. I walk and cycle everywhere, both kids walk 3 miles to school and hubby cycles to work so i only fill up once every 3 or 4 months.

I actually didn't say anything or comment on any of your posts until the last one...

And "value" is such a subjective term...it can mean many things and for me it doesn't mean getting the cheapest of everything and living as cheaply as I can. For you it might, but don't expect everyone to have or live by your values.

Your criticism of other people was here

If more people lived by those principles there'd be far less debt!

If your children's school is 3 miles away I would be asking the council about transport to and from school for them. It might be classed as outside walking distance.

If you only fill up your car once every 3 to 4 months then I would be looking at whether it's actually worth keeping it...by the time you take into account, insurance, road tax and potential maintenance and depreciation it may be cheaper to use taxis.

I also meant to say that we've had our fair share of debt in the past, mortgage, bank loans, car loans, we've made fairly extensive use of interest free credit in the past too, when it was far more cost effective to leave your money earning interest than to spend it on stuff when you could buy stuff at 0%.

BobQ

Discodee wrote: »

You exemplify the typical labour voter who knows nothing!
I know the value of everythijg. i never earned a lot before having my children and nor has my husband.
However I know the value of EVERYTHING. We own our 4 bed semi outright and have done for the past 10 years, we own our own new car, we have several holidays a year and have no debt. because I know the value of everything and can manage really well!
I will just state I do not own a flatscreen TV, and none of the 4 of us in our home owns a mobile, with the exception of my 18 yr old daughter who has an old second hand one she carries for emergency which has had £5 credit on for months! I have the lowest phone/broadband price possible. We never buy fast food/cans of pop, food/coffee to go. I buy in bulk things on offer, and when we go out I take a flask, kids drinks and sarnies etc etc. I cycle to various supermarkets and buy their reductions. My freezer is full of yellow labels. If we have an icecream as a treat while out, we go to a supermarket and buy a pack of 4 for £1. It ALL adds up!
So, you know nothing and have me ALL wrong... sorry!

If more people lived by those principles there'd be far less debt!

I agree and commend you for your sensible budgeting. My point was about your original comment that everyone was getting richer.

The above is all about knowing and affording the cost of material things. There is a difference between the cost of new car and its value which is about what you can do with it.

Sure most people in the 1950s did not have a colour TV (not invented, no signals) or foreign holidays (very costly, few commercial airlines) and many did not own houses (renting was more common for those below average earnings). But they were not poor.

One day the confidence trick perpetrated by politicians will be better understood. The property owning democracy meant that some people made money and others did not. Today it means expensive houses and a lack of affordable houses to rent. Supply and demand for houses makes it more expensive to rent a property but also makes buying one unaffordable for many people on low incomes. Thatcher made it almost shameful not to own a property. The value of a house is having a roof over your head and living conditions that are well maintained to a good standard. If more affordable, good quality houses were built it would be better to rent and less expensive to buy. The past 20 years has been about living beyond our means and in particular artificially making property expensive.

You may not have lived beyond your means and neither have I but many people have. To me life is about more than material things.

BTW I am not a typical Labour voter!

Camdoon

Where the buy your home policy fell down was that no social housing was built to replace the stock sold off which was the original plan (think it was Parkinson's who said that on Andrew Marr show).
The Labour Party did not consider this during their 12 years in charge.
As for the BT shares being sold too cheaply then that takes little account of no-one having done a similar exercise before. They were certainly priced to go and limited (after applications were in which stopped rampant stagging).

BobQ

Camdoon wrote: »

Where the buy your home policy fell down was that no social housing was built to replace the stock sold off which was the original plan (think it was Parkinson's who said that on Andrew Marr show).
The Labour Party did not consider this during their 12 years in charge.
As for the BT shares being sold too cheaply then that takes little account of no-one having done a similar exercise before. They were certainly priced to go and limited (after applications were in which stopped rampant stagging).

Parkinson may have said it was the policy but the 1979 Manifesto stated the policy very clearly, to sell the council houses, at discounted prices. Nothing about building more.

If a receiver sold off an asset at significantly below the market price it would be rightly challenged by the creditors. The Government did much the same for political benefit.

CLAPTON

as I understand the situation, when council houses were sold off , they were not demolished but people continued to live in them

is the argument, then these people that now live in ex council houses, are less deserving that the people that lived in them when they were council houses?

if so in what way?

BobQ

CLAPTON wrote: »

as I understand the situation, when council houses were sold off , they were not demolished but people continued to live in them

is the argument, then these people that now live in ex council houses, are less deserving that the people that lived in them when they were council houses?

if so in what way?

Personally, I have no objections to selling council houses provided the price is nearer the market value. I have never said anything about those who live in a council house, I agree they are the same people before and after.

What I object to is the way it was done. Council/HA Houses are for those who cannot afford tp buy a house or whose income is not stable enough to pay a mortgage. The housing problems we have to day would be less if the money saved by selling council houses were used to build more.

Many council houses were sold to deserving families who enjoyed them. But others were re-possessed by those who could not afford them when they lost their jobs. More obscene was the way that elderly residents bought the houses when they had no prospect of paying a mortgage purely to enable their children to make a killing when they died.

CLAPTON

BobQ wrote: »

Personally, I have no objections to selling council houses provided the price is nearer the market value. I have never said anything about those who live in a council house, I agree they are the same people before and after.

What I object to is the way it was done. Council/HA Houses are for those who cannot afford tp buy a house or whose income is not stable enough to pay a mortgage. The housing problems we have to day would be less if the money saved by selling council houses were used to build more.

Many council houses were sold to deserving families who enjoyed them. But others were re-possessed by those who could not afford them when they lost their jobs. More obscene was the way that elderly residents bought the houses when they had no prospect of paying a mortgage purely to enable their children to make a killing when they died.

well if they hadn't been sold then there would have been no money to build more houses so the total number of houses would be exactly the same as now;

how is that better?


I certainly agree that old people should always have an official minder before making any decisions about their lives or spend their money.

As a matter of interest how many were re-possessed?

TruckerT

CLAPTON wrote: »

if they hadn't been sold then there would have been no money to build more houses so the total number of houses would be exactly the same as now

If council housing had been left to serve it's original purpose, and property developers had continued to build houses for sale, then the total housing stock would have continued to increase, and the housing market would probably not have overheated to the point of meltdown in 2007/8.

UK politics is still obsessed with the idea that house-ownership is the only way to go, and the latest 'help-to-buy' schemes threaten to kick off another round of market distortion.

The government has talked of putting money into infrastructure, and its austerity programme looks less and less convincing.

Now might be a very good time to fund a massive programme of social house-building. It would provide jobs and houses, as well as an alternative to the game of leapfrog which, these days, we all have to play in order to find somewhere to live.

TruckerT