The Tory way of governance

Interesting re the umbrella companies and not usual I think in the private (office work etc) sector where agencies generally are the direct employers.
Day6 it was not a land of milk and public sector honey when we were children. Standards of education are much better today with nearly 50% having the opportunity to go to university. Back then the majority left school at 15.
Hospitals were far less busy because there were far fewer old people in the community. People died earlier! In 1950 male life expectancy was 65 and now it is 79. And if you have been inside a hospital recently you might have noticed that most of the people occupying beds are pretty elderly. Policing is also much better in that there is far less corruption and malpractice than when i was young. And don't get me started on the opportunities and rights of women. However I think 2009 marked a turning point. "Things" did get better in the Blair years and now the public sector is being busily dismantled while the economy bumps along as we head for a self-imposed economic suicide.

Good post Day6 there will be many who agree with you on the forum, including me.Of course any Government can always 'do better' and we do need a strong opposition, that's when Parliament works best.

Well said Jess. Day6 I've rarely read a post so full of rose tinted, nostalgic, ill- informed and misleading ( at best) assertions and 'facts'. Just to take one example - the police. The appalling miscarriages of justice suffered by the Guildford 4 and Birmingham 6 were very much in part down to appalling police behaviour( mostly older I seem to recall). And you don't mention the way in which the rights of women not to menition , BME, people with disabilities, gay people etc have been established, don't you know about the deaths and disablement of women before the Abortion Act? The Sex Discrimination Act? Employment Protection Act , rape in marriage being made a crime? I could go on but would be wasting my time as clearly we have grown up on different planets.And just about all the socially progressive legislation in our lifetimes has only come about through Labour Governments and supportive LDs/Liberals. Section 28 anybody?

Day 6

I saw no rose tinted glasses nor certainly any assumption we lived in a land of milk and honey as children in your post. Quite the opposite.

I simply saw a pragmatic thought process in your post.

What Day6 is entirely true and representative of a vast swathe of the British population.

I have to agree with Jess, and Rigby that Day6 is simply spouting what old people have always spouted "it was better when". The younger generations want it to be better now and better with how they see progress. They do not want to live in the La La Land that exists only in the minds of the old but was never true in reality.

I really see no reason why anyone should think they speak for the 'vast swathe of the British population' as scottie does. This is the forum, not the whole of the British population and we are all quite able to speak for ourselves. You and the people in your circle of friends may believe Day6's description. I and my friends would not agree. The best you can make of that is that half the population might agree with you and that is extremely poor research so please, stop thinking you know how everyone else thinks - you don't.

Day6 didn't say 'it was all better when' though, she actually said that we have a better standard of living today.Certain things were better back then and certain things were not.Overall though, as she says we do have a better standard of living now.

Plus the fact that all Governments do meddle, sometimes for the good and sometimes not.It would not be Utopia suddenly if Corbyn were PM ( in fact it would be scary, as the polls about his Leadership, compared to T May make obvious.)

I am not sure how you can turn it into Day6 not saying it was better when she says talks of the decline of virtually EVERYTHING over the last 60+ years. She actually went on to say that "Hospitals were better with matrons and fewer administrators, schools were happy places not hot houses for testing children, teachers were happy, policemen were older, etc, etc, etc."

Was she joking I'm sorry but it just appeared to lead to an attack, rather like yours roses - on Corbyn which in both cases seemed very intentional. Let's hear your views about the Conservative policies. Show us that there is SOMETHING about them worth looking at and that it is not the only way to you and T May can distract people from their attacks on the poor and vulnerable is to double up and attack Corbyn too.

Well GG, TM will be appartntly kicking off her attack on the poor and vulnerable this year by spending in the order of £157bn on pensions, £142bn on healthcare, £113bn on welfare, and £85bn on education. That'll teach 'em!

Daphne - many thanks for all the detail on the agency teachers digression. And I'm sure teachers are paying their taxes!

Fitzy, the figures you give are meaningless as they stand. What period of time are they over and what do they mean in real terms compared with budgets over the past few years? Can you cite a source for them?

I got it from here.

www.ukpublicspending.co.uk/government_expenditure.html

Source guesstimated?

I didn't do any due diligence. My point was really that they are spending a shadload of people's money and I don't really think that amounts to attacking the poor and vulnerable. No doubt they could do more, but that sort of accusation is daft.

But one year's government spending cannot stand alone. It needs comparisons to be meaningful.

JessM, have you misread my post? I was a very poor youngster, and my peers too recognise that we felt real poverty back in the 60s. We knew nothing else, but money was extremely tight. We were often hungry, often cold and I remember well my Mum making cardboard insoles for our leaking shoes because we couldn't afford new ones.

I don't seem to remember charity shops or food banks either back then. No one helped the poor. The fact that we have charity shops and food banks now means that sort of poverty is at least recognised and aided. It will never be eradicated.

Land of milk and honey? Where does that come from? I suggested the opposite. Life is so much better for my grandchildren than it was for me and the poor of the 50s and 60s. Poverty still exists and will never be eradicated, but it is recognised today, and there is sympathy for those who struggle, whereas in years gone by the plight of the poor was seen but not alleviated in any way.

As I said, we won't eradicate poverty - it's existed all my lifetime, under Labour governments too, for a number of reasons. Those who make out the Conservative government are against the poor are grasping at straws. The modern Conservative party has moved more to the centre of politics than at any other time in their history, ironically as Labour moves more to the extreme left and is danger of imploding because the party is so divided.

Working class people cannot trust Labour who have become anti establishment and the party championing .....well, what exactly? They don't speak for working people, ordinary people. Corbyn's rise is thanks mainly to the under 25s with little real life experience who'd quite like to upset the status quo/bring on the revolution. Been there, done that, grew up and out of that sort of mindset. It doesn't appeal to vast swathes of the electorate.

As for the person who jeered 'this is how old people think', well done for illustrating just how out of touch the left wing of politics has become. That elitist sneering does your cause no good.

Do you really think people writing here are "young"? As Grandparents we are likely to be past the first flush of youth, but we are informed, intelligent, au fait with technology, some of us work, we are well read and, if lucky, still energetic. That poster wrote off someone with views differing to her/his own as old. Why stop there? Why not fling around 'stupid', 'uneducated', racist and homophobic too? That's par for the course for many on the left unfortunately, and it's alienating even more people who despise that sort of arrogant, superior one upmanship, typical of those who dismiss the views of others.

In current uncertain times, I am admiring May more and more. She has her finger on the pulse and is wise enough to appreciate how people need to feel heard.

I suspect she is very aware of the course the Tory party has to take, and it's one very far removed from the reactionary, out dated stance of left wing politics in the UK today. Of course the response to this is 'Labour will rescue the NHS'. Standard response sadly, and now so over used to mean much.. Use scare tactics. The government which dismantles our precious NHS will be on a collision course to oblivion. Theresa May is smart enough and compassionate enough to appreciate the NHS has to exist. I imagine she also has ministers looking into wastage of funds, and recent reports would suggest an enquiry into spending is long overdue. I am perfectly OK with that. I suspect most people are.

It could be eradicated if basic income was adopted.
In current times I am despising May more and more.
How can you admire someone who stops benefits while reducing inheritance tax?
How can you admire someone who is destroying the NHS, which you and your family must have taken full benefit from since the sixties, no matter how poor you were?

Basic income? What's that? A levelling down which doesn't recognise that those who strive, study, work hard deserve to be rewarded for their efforts? I believe in giving people a leg up in life and giving opportunities to the less fortunate. Thing is, you have to grasp opportunities, and because we are all so different, some will fall by the wayside. People who are sick, frail, disabled or at any disadvantage have to be cared for, and I'd suggest those people working hard and striving to get on will rightly be paying taxes to fund care. You need a source, so levelling down is unfair on a huge part of the population already doing their bit.

The NHS is a political football and you know it. Is creaking under the strain of usage whilst fat cats within the organisation misappropriate funds..vast amounts of money.

Labour cannot and will not cure the ills of the NHS, and you know it. If they had a magic wand, perhaps. It seems to be the war cry of the left....as though there are no other problems in the UK which need attention.

What an excellent post Day6
That's the problem with those who admire Corbyn, they have lost touch with reality.

Theresa May had a great opportunity to act on the referendum result but still appear as a reasonable woman rather than a reincarnation of the Iron Lady! To go to the EU demanding things with threats if she does not get her own way really is not the way to go about things. Does she know so little about continental men? They are in the main charming and polite to women - she does not need to be so hard. Most of the reaction to what has been said by the UK govt has not been overly positive - there are 27 votes on the continent and only one this side of the Channel and there has to be agreement for the Brexit to take place and an amicable one would be by far the best for everyone especially the UK.
At the moment the UK govt seem to be ignoring the rules agreed for when a country wishes to leave the EU. The UK signed the agreement on this point and seems to think they can ignore it.

Thanks Roses. What p*sses me off is the inference that people who fear a left wing government - and do we have to list the reasons why the left is a shambles, in disarray - I think not - lack compassion and understanding. If like me you had a factory working father, you were brought up in a household which voted Labour and supported the Unions. Why have ordinary folk moved away from the left?

Could be that they offer very little to people who want to get on in life, graft and have aspirations.

It's ground floor politics. A party which recognises ALL strata's of society, including the less fortunate is going to appeal to many more people, most of whom are compassionate and caring and care about the plight of others without wanting to bring down those finding themselves on higher floors.

The politics of envy hold no appeal. Everyone wants the best deal they can get, without scuppering the chances of the more fortunate and without treading all over those unable to rise.

May and the Conservatives have sussed this. One of my local Tory councillors is an adopted boy with a disability who attended the local comprehensive. He feels he can no longer support a Labour government.

Times they are a changing.

Day6 I think you have got the wrong idea completely about the basic income Jen is talking about. It is nothing to do with levelling down - we had a big discussion on here about it a couple of months ago trying to look at the idea from all angles.

I'm afraid 'old people' includes me Day6 and I am well aware that I need to keep in mind that this is not my time, it belongs to the young who, of course, do not post on here.

If I misunderstood your post I apologise but, fairly obviously, I do not know your history and you started with, what I now assume was meant to be irony and ended with lashing out at Corbyn. This is a thread about the Tories and lashing out at the leader of the labour party is a poor argument for what the Conservatives have done so far.

"Why not fling around 'stupid', 'uneducated', racist and homophobic too?" Using what I didn't say to infer I am one of those you describe as offering an"arrogant, superior one upmanship, typical of those who dismiss the views of others is just setting out to lie in a very pejorative fashion about another member.

I did not say that and would not say that because it has become very apparent to me that in our divided society, each division, encouraged to see the 'other' as the enemy by this government, be they old against young, leave against remain, migrant against those who are still in their own country, see the 'other side' not only as wrong but stupid in whatever why they describe it and all those opposing other groups are doing it.

You have summed up your view of the stupidity of those who see things from a different point of view but you have probably increased the feeling of division while decrying others for using words in exactly the same way you have. The words you think the 'other side' uses are really no different to your "arrogant, superior one upmanship".

What I do know is that my grandfather died before the NHS came into being because they could not afford medication for him. My mother was a nurse from 1940 to 1982, and knew how good the NHS was. She died before this government began to destroy it in 2010.
She would have been most upset, having voted Tory all her life.

www.gransnet.com/forums/news_and_politics/1225633-Citizens-or-Basic-Income?pg=1

A thread for you to read, Day6.