news & politics:discussion

[Guest]

More Tory corruption. 

[Ryan1984]

7 hours ago, Ozanne said:

More Tory corruption. 

Yet it’s the train workers/working class who are greedy…

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Ryan1984 said:

Yet it’s the train workers/working class who are greedy…

Yeah I know, it’s a joke isn’t it. 

[Neil]

13 hours ago, LJS said:

You've said something true, Neil.

See, you can do it.

and its the Scottish parliament ignoring Scottish votes.

[Crazyfool01]

At least the Home Secretary knows what she’s doing !! 
 

question from a Tory mp is quite telling 

[Neil]

48 minutes ago, Barry Fish said:

It so sad that a fair chunk of the Scottish people don't look at something like Brexit and realise how awful the break up of the UK will be for everyone.  The pain would be massive and far out weigh Brexit.  Surely we should be more fearful than ever of nationalist politicians making promises they can't keep.  Border check points on the M6...  awesome...  

The bad impacts of sindy would be hugely onto Scotland. Much more self harm than brexit. With causes  easier to identify as that self inflicted. Queues at the border will be caused by sindy. Cos now without sindy there's no queues 

[Neil]

The uk population was too stupid to properly consider brexit, and from the comments they make snippers are too stupid to properly consider sindy. 

[fraybentos1]

12 minutes ago, Neil said:

The uk population was too stupid to properly consider brexit, and from the comments they make snippers are too stupid to properly consider sindy. 

Do you ever think you might care too much about it considering you live in Bristol?

[Neil]

15 minutes ago, fraybentos1 said:

Do you ever think you might care too much about it considering you live in Bristol?

A bad idea is a bad idea, same as brexit was a bad idea, sold to a prejudiced electorate by liars with prejudicial lies. Sindy is all the same as brexit. 

[fraybentos1]

13 minutes ago, Neil said:

A bad idea is a bad idea, same as brexit was a bad idea, sold to a prejudiced electorate by liars with prejudicial lies. Sindy is all the same as brexit. 

Doesn't really answer my question though. There are bad ideas galore in politics and people who believe them. This seems more like an obsession.

[Neil]

40 minutes ago, fraybentos1 said:

Doesn't really answer my question though. There are bad ideas galore in politics and people who believe them. This seems more like an obsession.

its no more of an obsession than me being anti-brexit was, and i followed indyref1 closely, captivated by the nutty logic and lies they were using, same as i followed the fruitcakes with brecit, trump, and the others where big big lies are at the centre of it.

[Rufus Gwertigan]

I was wondering what the panel thinks of the latest Royal Mail strikes. For transparency I am a CWU member as I worked for the agency that supplied the RM. I was asked to work even though I am on sick benefits but they offered an obscene amount of cash. Still I am not working. We need to relationise the RM. Its a civil service after all

 

[Neil]

1 minute ago, Rufus Gwertigan said:

I was wondering what the panel thinks of the latest Royal Mail strikes. 

i've got a "support the post strikes" poster in my window, and the postie said thanks 🙂 

[Crazyfool01]

17 minutes ago, Rufus Gwertigan said:

I was wondering what the panel thinks of the latest Royal Mail strikes. For transparency I am a CWU member as I worked for the agency that supplied the RM. I was asked to work even though I am on sick benefits but they offered an obscene amount of cash. Still I am not working. We need to relationise the RM. Its a civil service after all

 

fully support them ... although in fairness i rarely get post so the impact to me is minimal 

[Guest]

19 minutes ago, Rufus Gwertigan said:

I was wondering what the panel thinks of the latest Royal Mail strikes. For transparency I am a CWU member as I worked for the agency that supplied the RM. I was asked to work even though I am on sick benefits but they offered an obscene amount of cash. Still I am not working. We need to relationise the RM. Its a civil service after all

 

Fully support them striking, they should be paid more. 

[steviewevie]

51 minutes ago, Rufus Gwertigan said:

I was wondering what the panel thinks of the latest Royal Mail strikes. For transparency I am a CWU member as I worked for the agency that supplied the RM. I was asked to work even though I am on sick benefits but they offered an obscene amount of cash. Still I am not working. We need to relationise the RM. Its a civil service after all

 

I support all strikes until they negatively affect me and then I don't.

[Guest]

Spicy. 

[gizmoman]

8 hours ago, Rufus Gwertigan said:

I was wondering what the panel thinks of the latest Royal Mail strikes. For transparency I am a CWU member as I worked for the agency that supplied the RM. I was asked to work even though I am on sick benefits but they offered an obscene amount of cash. Still I am not working. We need to relationise the RM. Its a civil service after all

 

It's an ongoing question of what a worker's real worth is, those who support UBI, universal basic income, need to consider how much someone should be paid to get up at 5 a.m. on a winters morning to sort and deliver their mail, on the other hand how much should a doctor be paid? A postman's job is relatively easy, it doesn't need a lot of skill (at least not when I did it) so where does the balance lie? In my time the pay was fair for what the job entailed, but that was years ago. I agree essential national services should be publically owned (Mail, Rail, Water) but having unions in public services distorts wages (when other services are not unionised).

[Punksnotdead]

9 hours ago, Rufus Gwertigan said:

I was wondering what the panel thinks of the latest Royal Mail strikes. For transparency I am a CWU member as I worked for the agency that supplied the RM. I was asked to work even though I am on sick benefits but they offered an obscene amount of cash. Still I am not working. We need to relationise the RM. Its a civil service after all

 

"The union forever, defending our rights. Down with the blackleg, all workers unite. With our brothers and our sisters, in many far off lands. THERE IS POWER IN A UNION."

[mattiloy]

[Guest]

 

[steviewevie]

 

[steviewevie]

33 minutes ago, mattiloy said:

Liberal

[Guest]

4 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

 

On top of the biggest fall in living standards for decades. Good job. 

[kaosmark2]

1 hour ago, gizmoman said:

It's an ongoing question of what a worker's real worth is, those who support UBI, universal basic income, need to consider how much someone should be paid to get up at 5 a.m. on a winters morning to sort and deliver their mail, on the other hand how much should a doctor be paid? A postman's job is relatively easy, it doesn't need a lot of skill (at least not when I did it) so where does the balance lie? In my time the pay was fair for what the job entailed, but that was years ago. I agree essential national services should be publically owned (Mail, Rail, Water) but having unions in public services distorts wages (when other services are not unionised).

The thing about early-morning postal/tube-driving type work, is the question of "what would someone accept to do this" is part of the issue. While people acknowledge doctors should be paid more than tube drivers or posties, most people aren't really willing to get up for a low-satisfaction job at stupid hours (which adversely affects physical and mental health, as well as social life).

I'd generally say that as long as the on-call/distasteful hours percentage increase in pay is fairly equal between different public sector jobs, that's reasonable. A GP should probably be paid 40%+ more to work A&E diagnostics vs 9-5, and similarly a postie should probably be paid 40% over minimum wage.

For all the media portrayal of "benefit scroungers", most people want a sense of job satisfaction. They don't necessarily have a high commitment, but the idea that people give zero shits about their job is very rare. Also, under UBI, that'd be even less frequent. If people have their basic needs met (but only their basic needs), they're more likely to take a job that's under-paid for their skill level but has high job-satisfaction or ties in with their passions, in order to pay for their luxuries (particularly as lots of "low-skill" job come with perks of employee discount). 

The thing to bear in mind, is nurses don't quit because they don't want to be a nurse, they quit because it's an unsustainable work-life balance at their wages. Similarly, rail workers don't strike out of sheer greediness, they strike because they're performing an essential service and being proportionally underappreciated. 

I think a lot of people in median-paid office work forget how hard the breadline is, and how hard shift work is. If you're struggling with both, it's fucking horrible. 

The jobs that I can believe would struggle to get staff in a UBI system.... bars, fast food, shift warehouse work, megastore retail, shift work of public transport. Thing is, most of those are currently either treating their staff horribly, or already struggling to get staff. I would foresee UBI leading to a greater balance amidst the workforce, instead of some people doing 0 hours, most doing 35-45, and others doing 65, you'd have lots of people doing 25ish. But even if you say that's a net decrease in "productivity", how many office workers actually work for 37.5 hours? I remember most of the time it being 20-30 hours of work and then a bunch of busy-work, and I imagine that's shifted more since the WFH post-covid revolution. With that shift, hospitality (ie. lunch places and coffee shops) have had demand decrease....

Generally, any union distortion of wages, is a distortion upwards, and it mostly only hurts businesses where staff give zero shits - which usually only happens if an employer is bad.