A divided society-what can be done?

skwawkbox.org/2017/08/24/msm-suddenly-filling-pages-with-a-lot-of-skwawkbox-material/

MSM using skwawkbox material.
I must be ahead of the times.
I love the bit about the dog and mint imperials.

voxpoliticalonline.com/2017/08/24/grenfell-tower-and-the-social-divide-if-this-doesnt-make-you-angry-whats-wrong-with-you/

I listened to it.
Quite upsetting at times, and it made me very angry.
Why did journalists miss what was happening in tower blocks?
Why did they miss the fact that Grenfell residents were telling the truth about where they lived?

I have just finished watching the Jon Snow lecture - so interesting and it has sense of one of those happenings that marks out a moment of change - rather as Cathy Come Home did which he refers to early on in the dissertation. It's not on such a scale but draws together many things which are very moot currently.

If you have the opportunity do, please, all of you, listen to Jon Snow: MacTaggart Lecture at Edinburgh TV Festival 2017 It is a brilliant view looking at some of how we have got to where we have got to.

theconversation.com/how-the-english-far-right-co-opted-christianity-and-why-its-crusade-shouldnt-be-ignored-82842

Aw Gilly, I hope I am wrong and you will catch that rainbow x

Welsh wife, I said more tax cheats than benefit cheats

ps then change them back again before you go out.
That's the important bit.

You have to put your knickers on inside out gillybob.

devongirl I think it is true though, from time immemorial the world over and far worse in some other countries than here, which of course doesn't make it right.

I spend my life chasing rainbows Anniebach one day I WILL catch one, I will.

I believe the figures show that there are far fewer benefit cheats than people think.we know there are tax cheats and many of them are large companies which would put huge amounts of money into the treasury if they paid up - more than enough to cover any cheating by the be fit cheats.

Nothing wrong with chasing rainbows if you accept you will never catch one , I have tried

I am not a defeatist, I am a realist

Annie, you said earlier "there has alway been rich and poor, always will be , sadly" - sounds very defeatist to me (just how the govt would like you to feel!)

I ask your question back to you from your last post: what is wrong with chasing rainbows?

It isn't fair but people do not want to pay more tax and even though the number of benefit cheats is not high as tax cheats the ordinary tax payer knows their higher taxes will not be for the tax dodges but the benefit chests.

I do wonder Jen if you spend time with the working man, not those in jobs where qualifications are needed, farm workers, building labourers, shelf stackers etc, and I am not being, unkind . You want utopia and we are not going to have it. You said some time ago - what's wrong with chasing rainbows .

There was never as much money washing around in the North as in the South, and there was a more ( dare I say it)
Scottish approach in the lifestyle stakes in the North, which is why lives are predominently shorter there.

There has been a North/South divide for as long as I can remember, it certainly didn't start in the 1980's.

The old saying of 'it's grim up North' or Softy Southerners'
Were around when I was a child.

All very silly IMHO

We can use tax to reduce the gap, though.
Almost doubled in 12 years? That can't be right.

People cannot be stopped from earning higher salaries than others or for making money legally , there has alway been rich and poor, always will be , sadly

www.theweek.co.uk/87707/income-gap-between-rich-and-poor-almost-doubled-between-2000-and-2012

In England and Wales a council can charge 50% extra council tax if the property has been empty for two years, it's up the each council

Sounds a good idea, actually charging 1% of the value of the property for every six months it is left empty. In Scotland empty properties are charged DOUBLE council tax .You get a short period CT free if you're renovating and it has no kitchen or bathroom.It 's supposed to encourage people to get their houses on the market and sold asap.The pproperty market is fast moving here with houses selling within days and prices are rising

There are many Young people sleeping rough , are children with parents allowed to sleep on the streets in your area Jen ?

Can't see anything about young people. It's mostly about families.

The increase of young people who are homeless over fifty years can be explained , fifty years ago young people were far more reluctant to leave their family home and fewer parents had children hooked on drugs so no reason to throw their addict son/daughter out.

There was an increase in single mothers given council houses, and the sale of council houses added to the problem, plus we have to accept the increase in immigrants