After last week and Mrs Thatcher's demise

Gally It wasn't really a Labour government. As Mrs Thatcher said, her legacy was Tony Blair.

I think most of us who used to be Labour supporters felt totally betrayed by Blair, a liar and a war criminal, so there is no point in getting into a 'they were just as bad' sort of discussion. We know!
Clement Attlee achieved wonders of legislation when the country was on its knees after the war. Now if anybody deserved a showy funeral, it was him, but he was a very modest man (and I know Churchill's 'funny' crack about him).
I find it hard to understand the continuing envy and animosity against public servants - they do a job, like anybody in the private sector and if they have negotiated decent conditions it is just further proof that unions can work. The government rhetoric is, of course, one more example of the 'divide and rule' ploy - set worker against worker, the employed against the unemployed, one ethnic group against another - give people scapegoats and distract attention from the policies that are causing the problems. What a pity some people fall for it.

Strangely, I was under the impression that TB and his government and that of the lamented GB had agendas of their own over a period of some 13 years, post MT?

I was under the impression that TB & 'New' Labour came into being because 'Old' Labour policies, attitudes and politicians were considered to be unelectable.

I agree . With a few honourable exceptions it seems to me that most MPs for many years have been in it for what they can get. I will have no truck with any of them so there is no point in criticising the last Labour administration to me - you would be preaching to the converted.
Just think of the 'revolving door' - a minister is responsible for placing huge, profitable contracts, and, hey presto, when he retires he is given a place on the board of the companies he favoured. This applies to MPs of all colours. Blair and Campbell plummeted new depths when they 'sexed' up the dossier to enable them to go to war with Iraq, but they were not alone in their iniquity - only Robin Cook, I think, had the decency to resign over it.

Of course the companies bribing and corrupting MPs would be those wonderful big businesses that some people revere!

I tend not to revere anyone or anything greatnan.......too much cynicism I'm afraid

JO to pick up on your post..I wonder if certain young people were perhaps better off when they were 'trained' rather than 'educated'? I'm thinking of those who in the past were apprenticed to a trade and could make a good living having a skill at their fingertips.

Going back to immigration [sorry] the S.O. has always said that what caused a lot of problems was the Conservative Party doing away with border contols as a cost cutting exercise [can't back it up; just repeating what I've been told]. But, must point out I'm not pointing a finger at any one party, just saying that a lot of issues are a more complicated than they seem to be and quite often it isn't just one party that's to blame but a series of gaffs on both sides. I'm still trying to find out about this minimum wage thing but having to be careful how I do it [don't want to give them an excuse to sack me and replace me with the 'new, improved, younger/cheaper version' ].

https://www.gov.uk/national-minimum-wage-rates

This gives the information.

Sorry!

https://www.gov.uk/national-minimum-wage-rates

So it is correct then. If it hadn't've happened where I work I would never have known this. Talk about third world sweat shops .

The minimum wage is set to rise again in October Tegan.

Yes, by about fifteen pence or something. These 16 year olds won't be going on a spending spree with it methinks...

And they wonder why some people decide to stay on benefits instead...

Looking at it from the other side (as an Employer) we have recently taken on a young person aged 21 after being persuaded to do so by a well meaning relative. I was extremely reluctant to do so at first as this young man had no experience and virtually no qualifications either. 6 months down the line he still doesn't "earn his keep" so to speak but he is "getting there"and he is mad keen to learn. I ask myself would we have given him that chance if we were obliged to pay him a starting wage of say, £10 per hour? I very much doubt it.

gilly I am rusty with all of this now, but is it still possible to take a young trainee on a scheme and pay a very small wage for 12 months and if you were unwilling to then sign them up you were issued with another trainee, some companies never ended up employing and would just change trainees after the 12 months and the poor trainee was again without a job, end result the company had constant cheap labour.

Looking at that table I am horrified!

How do they manage to make any sense of that? I hope someone checks up to to make sure the apprentice gets really good training. They are almost paying^ for their apprenticeship.

I meant - how can they justify that

Yes Glassortwo there are still several different "schemes" set up in order to take a young person who has been unemployed for a long period of time. Usually 6 months but quite often they have never had any employment at all. I would be ashamed to take anyone one knowing full well that when a period of "slave labour" was over you could get rid of them and start again. I know companies who do it but to me it seems immoral. I know I have said this before (and you will understand exactly what I mean) but in a small company such as ours it is like an extended family and in the 6 months he has been with us, our young guy has become part of it.

Thats exactly what a small business is gilly a family. The companies who make use these schemes for cheap labour dont have any morals, they give the trainee hope that at last things are on the turn and then their hopes are dashed. Of course thats saying they are worth employing.

I believe we no longer have a pool of well trained engineers but that some apprenticeships are trying to address that. I know 2 young men who started theirs last year, one has A levels and his younger brother GCSEs. They are both getting very good training although H & S does rather limit what the younger one is allowed to do. I don't know what they earn but do know they are both very happy with their situations.

This isn't a proper apprentiship I'm referring to; it's just office work.

That is so good to hear Movedalot Engineers are in desperate short supply in this country due to everyone seeing pound signs for working in IT.

The only down side I see to Engineering apprenticeships (in the North East anyway) is that small companies invest the time and money in the young apprentice and then as soon as they have the qualification they are off to the likes of Nissan who seem to swallow all of the good ones up. Smaller companies such as ours could never compete with the wages that these people can pay.

move I hope they are on real apprenticeships and not these schemes that I am refering to, they are just another way for the Government to alter the unemployment figures in the short term.