should the government be ashamed

Wow, Volver.

Wyllow3

It broke a bit of my heart when we "left" Europe. Our culture is embedded for centuries with Europe, not the USA.

Yes you are right.

Europe shares a common cultural heritage that binds us and has done so for centuries.

This commonality has developed and gradually progressed with the interruption of war and other hiccups on the way.

Brexit is yet another attempt to break with those bonds, but it is clearly now going the way of other efforts to cleave the natural bond.

We like to see American citizens as our cousins, but American culture, law and politics is different to European culture.

Wyllow3

It broke a bit of my heart when we "left" Europe. Our culture is embedded for centuries with Europe, not the USA.

We’re still in Europe.
We left the EU trading organisation is all.
We may or may not be embedded in culture with other European countries, just as much I bet with the US as they were all European who colonised it.
Each country within Europe is vastly different culture wise.

Agree Avalon25 😂😂
Now, where can we get one from?

Oh yes. We all know people who could do with a good squish! 👣

Sometimes I wish that big bare foot from Monty Python would come down and squish a few. I expect my choice of who to squish may not be the same as others. Wouldn’t it be fantastic though 😂😂

Some days I think I'm in a Monty Python sketch...

TopSec says she has no sympathies for strikers because she is from a military family.

You say she is probably supportive of her own family.

I said that being supportive of your own family does not mean being unsympathetic to others.

Its really not that hard to understand. Well, I thought not.

Disclaimer: I may have used words that were not used in the original posts, and I may have summarised the conversation. This in no way makes my current post inaccurate.

I never said it was. It was you that brought that up.

Being supportive of one's own family does not necessarily mean having no sympathy for others.

Supportive of her family and the work they are carrying out in order to keep things going for other people.

Not supportive of nurses having to work double shifts for insulting pay rises, for instance? Or teachers having to buy supplies, and clothing and food for their pupils, because their school's budget has been cut to the bone and the parents can;t make ends meet? Or rail workers providing a service that goes outwith their Terms and Conditions?

Conditional support, then...

No. Just supportive

...I guess I would say that wouldn't I?

Why?

Does being from a military family make you hard and uncaring, then?

Well I am from a military family and I have no sympathy for the strikers, but then I guess I would say that wouldn't I?

You’d be surprised at just how well all kinds of service personnel are able to deliver ‘education’. Maybe not School type but most could occupy a bunch of students. I doubt they’d be allowed though.

For once, I agree with you Volver.
The media support the strikers, the headlines show that, but they have to post the truth as well, preferably in small print at the end of an article.
But then again they don’t support them, by posting headlines like 19% for nurses, which alienates many readers struggling to get buy with no chance of a pay rise.

I’ve supported the strikers, avoided the trains, tried not to get sick, though I didn’t turn away the ambulance last Wednesday morning and I accepted the prompt treatment offered.
I’ll support the teachers when they go on strike next year. What sort of pay rise will I get I wonder? Interesting to see if the army will be called in to run classes.

Well both sides have their point of view Mollygo.

Those who think the strikers are in the wrong, will jump on any excuse to show that they are shooting themselves in the foot.

The representatives of the strikers will be keen to show that the job isn't being done as effectively as it was before.

I have no doubt that there are people on duty who can issue this form. But not nearly as many usual because if there was, they wouldn't need to call in the forces.

That’s already been said, but in the first report it says that people able to do so are on duty. Is that a lie do you suppose?

The Guardian 24/12/2022. UK Border Force strike: armed forces cannot detain people, emails reveal.

news.sky.com/story/passengers-waved-through-border-control-to-avoid-queues-as-workers-strike-12774255

So which bit is true?
The version that they are ‘waving people through’ or the version that non striking staff are on hand to deal with issues such as giving out IS81 forms?

MaizieD

Aveline

Also I just heard that with the army and navy on passport control there are no queues. Not doing much for the credibility of the usual staff. Strikers beware of undermining themselves.

I wouldn't be in the least surprised to find that there are more passport control points open when manned (personed?) by the forces then there are when manned by the normal staff.

It's very effective in dividing opinion, isn't it?

Hmmm...

This would definitely keep the queues down...

news.sky.com/story/passengers-waved-through-border-control-to-avoid-queues-as-workers-strike-12774255

It broke a bit of my heart when we "left" Europe. Our culture is embedded for centuries with Europe, not the USA.

And another thing. I’ve always felt European, never American. No disrespect to our American friends. I’m not unfriendly to the USA, far from it but I’m much more European than American.

So yes, pay European/scandi taxes, have good public services, like other European countries

Blinko

Wyllow3

Dibbydod, this simply isn't true.

"We are all struggling with the high cost of living, the prices have gone sky high in the supermarkets, we are all in the same boat "

All of us on gransnet have very different incomes. Some of us here will be struggling, others absorb the extras on basics like heating and price rises. And we have different needs as well, different care costs also on.

And it depends how far the income has to go. Mine is enough for tiny mortgage not the £1000++ young families are shelling out, mortgage and after all I'm just supporting me in food and clothes etc, not a family, and enough to keep my house warm and food, and run a car.

Some here still expect to go on holidays and travel abroad as they have before, as a norm, others accepted its not do-able any more.

"We are all" very different.

But I do pay tax and I would be prepared to pay more, as others do in some other European countries, for decent public services. You get what you pay for. somehow many British people believe in the total myth that you can have low taxes and decent services, well, you cant.

Quite right, we can’t have European standards in public services with USA levels of taxes.

Agree

Disgusting Xmas card from Patel but what can you expect? She's a Tory.