General Discussion
Strikes
What do people think?
It's a good thing the trains and buses were denationalised ..it means people can get around today.
Prives privatisation then is the way forward ..sell the Libraries make them book shops and borrowing.
Unions surely are outdated, as a new generation comes along, every time they think they will gain from a strike.
If anyone supports the strike are they in effect saying 'I am prepared to pay more than I am now in taxes to pay for what they demand'
When anyone takes a job you should sign a form sayiing 'if I refuse to work I underand my employment may be terminated'
Can you imagine a small shop in Dawlish wanting more customers and income ..so they close the shop and stop people coming in!!!!! ... lol.
I take it that you're being satirical? I mean, you can't be serious can you? Thanks for a good laugh to cheer up a busy day serving customers on our busiest November Wednesday for years!!
I used to be anti the unions until the last government bailed out RBS with taxpayers money and Fred the Shred walked off with a multimillion £ pension pot. This pretty much made it clear to me where politicians' loyalties lie.
Now I believe it is essential that people stick up for themselves in whatever way they can otherwise I can see us being forced back into a feudal society.
Also, I am fed up with hearing the argument that public sector pensions should be cut because they are more generous than private sector ones. Just because the private sector has shite pensions doesn't mean everyone should have a shite one. (Well, except for the likes of politicians and their chums of course).
What they are 'demanding' is that their pensions are not devalued. And the fact is that it wouldn't cost us more in taxes. Unfortunately people are falling for Conservative propoganda, and don't realise that the cost of the public sector pensions will actually fall in time, as shown in the Hutton report.
A Banker, a School Teacher, a Tory MP and a Daily Mail reader are sat around a table.
In front of them is a plate, on which there are ten biscuits.
The Banker scoffs nine of the biscuits, then the Tory turns to the Daily Mail reader and whispers in his ear, "Watch out, that teacher is after your biscuit.
wondering is quite right, I worked in a govt callcentre and when we had reached the daily target for answering the number of calls one some days people were asked if they wanted to go home early.
One manager explained this to me, "If we go over our target for the day we will get increased targets so when we reach the daily target we prefer people not to have their calls answered so we don't go over the target for that day", as wondering said, what private company would send employees home or close their doors because they had large numbers of customers calling in??.
A private company would ask employees to work longer or take on more staff, but as a Civil Servant we would still be paid the same as YOU the taxpayer were paying our salary, so we got paid regardless how much we did for the day. Meeting the daily target was all we had to do.
At Christmas we got shopping vouchers, typically for £20 with a choice of stores such as M&S, WH Smith or other stores. I have no idea why we got them but didn't complain!!
Whatever you hear about the wastage and inefficiency in the Civil Service, it isn't true, it is 100 times worse.
If the Civil Service wasn't so overstaffed the pensions employees are demanding would probably be affordable.
It wouldn't be fair to comment on areas such as the NHS where a lot of people work very hard but many areas such as divisions of the DWP where I worked are grossly overstaffed and unnecesary.
The public sector got bloated under Labour with regional development agencies and similar ideas that were a waste of tax payers money. However, there is no need to take it out on teachers and nurses who in general do a pretty good job.
Daily Mail readers have no sympathy for the school teachers. They believe that they earn about 9 grand a week as it is and only work 3 months a year due to endless bloody holidays.
In all seriousness though SteveJ, in 2009 an independent study by PwC showed that RDAs generated £4.50 for the local economy for every £1 of public spending. There are a lot of myths out there that the public school media peddle as facts.
Okay the public sector may have got bloated, dont disagree with that, but think of all those public sector workers on ground level, the ones who have had a pay freeze for the last 2 years and are going to for the next 5. Those on a minimal wage, it is Not just about Teachers and those on higher wages, there are many affected, who work hard for their money and have not been able to keep up, and a pay freeze for 5 years at least is no easy task for anyone....
The problem is do we want 67 68 year old Teachers trying to teach our kids 67 68 year old Police Officers Ambulance staff how about the Bin men they would really struggle. And then they would all be on long term sick leave costing even more money consider a 67 68 year old going sick when your son daughter had reached a crucial time in there studies for maths English etc it could be devastating its time we looked at the bigger picture
In my experience, the younger members of the work force take off more time in sick leave than older members (and you can check with B&Q, that's why they like to employ older people).
We are all living longer, therefore we can only expect to work longer. I agree that bin men may struggle, but many other's wouldn't, teachers, police, and medics included. Being over 60 / 65 doesn't make you incapable.
Police officer aged 67 chasing thug or breaking up a fight in a pub nurses getting patients in and out of bed me thinks B&Q is a little less demanding than the role of the Police a Teacher or a Nurse I didn't say over 65 where incapable but you are expecting Police Officers to work a extra 12 years it doesn't seem fair to me
Thats the best ive heard for a long while. Can you imagine 67 year old Policeman running up stairs in blocks of flats. Ambulance men doing the same(they'd need one). Teachers, looking after 35 teenagers or 6 year olds. As for soldiers , it will be like Dads Army all over again.
Im one who's union sold out last year. My pension immediately dropped from just under£6,000 to Not much above £2500per year. For that privalege i have to also work 7 more years. The government due to stealing from our pension fund has left it 8 billion pounds short.This money was used to fund ALL the people in Bitain not just public sector workers.
Now we are expected to pay all over again just so we can get a tiny pension. Last year i paid in just under £1,000 pounds, my pension rose £18 per year and my lump sum £68 .I may as well burn a £20 note each week.
Thousands are now leaving the pension fund, meaning the government will have to pay more out when we retire and the government will also be up shit creek, the next time it needs to find some money as the pot will be dry.
If a private company had stolen from pensionfunds the way the governments have they'd be put inside, so whats different.
Many of us are on very poor wages , doing shitty jobs that the rest wont do . For that we were promised a resonable pension.Those that have been on strike were not the 1st to break there contracts that was done by the government when it stole thier pensions. These Sun and Daily Mail readers make me laugh, so gullible its unbelievable, still taking in every word that our corrupt press and goverment put out. Government propaganda papers that they actually pay for. Before anyone says anything The Mirror and Guardian are just as bad if not worse.
Well said Warrener although retired i feel very strongly about public sector pensions i am amazed how you can sign a contract and then it is changed at will by a government who haven't got the guts to tackle the bankers who helped to get us in this mess. They believe its easy to go for the soft underbelly but i believe they are going to get bitten in the preverbal and the sooner the better
I hadn't really being paying much attention to the size of these pensions until the last day or two and I am hearing figures like £10k a year, £6k a year and even as low as £3k a year. These are hardly generous pensions. Mervyn King, the public sector worker who is supposed to be in charge of the bank of england and keep inflation under control and who has failed spectacularly at his job, has a pension pot that went up at the beginning of this year from £3.95m to £5.36m giving him around £200k a year. So, keep fighting and keep striking I'd say.