British workers are among the worst idlers in the world

If you judge people by the company that you assume that they keep, and assume that that company is full of right wing thickos, then you are bigoted.

I think the company is right wing, but not the 'thickos' bit. I was thinking more that they might well be agreeing with the judgement of Patel and her co-authors. A judgement which seems to me to be sweeping and unfair as there are other factors which affect productivity. It also makes you wonder about the sincerity of the tory's claim to be on the side of 'hardworking people' if they don't actually believe that the British are hardworking.

As for 'gullible', just look at the major cheerleaders for Brexit. What's in it for them? They most of them seem to be extreme rightwingers with an eye to making a profit from deregulation, 'shrinking the state' and promoting a low wage, low taxation economy.

www.globalresearch.ca/how-brexit-was-engineered-by-foreign-billionaires-to-bring-about-economic-chaos-for-profit/5614194/amp

MaizieD and what is in it for cheerleaders for Remain like Goldman Sachs? They of course always work for the greater good.
I am one of the roughly 40% of Labour supporters who voted Leave so you are wrong on the right wing point too so far as some of us are concerned. I very much doubt that anyone read Priti's book before the referendum.
Tories have always had a snobbish attitude to the average working person and always will. It is a shame that they are in charge of Brexit but for some reason people did not take the opportunity to vote them out.

I have two degrees and voted leave. My DH also. Boris is very educated and voted leave. It has nothing to do with education.

but for some reason people did not take the opportunity to vote them out.

That has always really puzzled me, too. Especially as the conditions many appeared to be voting 'against' in the EU referendum were the result of tory policies and nothing to do with the EU.

But, as we discovered when we were discussing the June GE, people can be just as irrational, or seemingly blind to their own interests, when voting in a General Election.

I am one of the roughly 40% of Labour supporters who voted Leave so you are wrong on the right wing point too so far as some of us are concerned.

I wasn't really thinking of party politics in my original post; just speculating that people who voted Leave might have agreed with right wingers' judgements. Of course, they may well have been quite unaware of them (though I'd be surprised if a Labour voter didn't have a 'view' of right wing thought, based on their experience of right wing governments)

As far as the statistics go, newnanny Remain voters included a higher proportion of people educated to degree level than did Leave. This isn't to say that no Leave voters were educated to degree level, just that there were far fewer of them. So education level did play a part.

Does it really puzzle you?
Not enough voters wanted Corbyn as PM, that’s why.Had they had another Leader ( almost any other) Labour would have won hands down.

That’s because, as already discussed, for a lot of years now almost everybody goes to some kind of University, not because they are amazingly clever, but because it’s become the thing to do, even if your grades are bad and you study
Soap Operas at Preston Uni.I would not bet too highly that they are all well educated.
This ( thick people voted Leave) is just a slur on over 17 and a half million people, put about happily by unhappy Remainers who simply cannot get over the fact that we will be leaving the EU.

Someone with a double first from a top ranking university should be aware that anecdotal evidence does not override or undermine statistical significance.
I,e. “All my friends have PhDs and voted leave therefore the statistical evidence regarding voting and education levels must be inaccurate”. The statistical evidence is not that “ everyone who voted remains had higher levels of education ‘ its just that there was a significant correlation between the 2 variables. This is even the same when age is included in the analysis. So older people with higher education more likely to vote remain than older people without. ( yes we know leave voters on here may all have PhDs, but they should know statistical significance does not mean 100%)The same goes throughout the age groups. Education levels not the same as intelligence. Unless we all take standardised intelligence tests before voting that isn’t going to be supported statistically. Also, correlations do not prove a causal link, so having a higher level of education does not cause you to vote a certain way, there are many variables which contribute to voting behaviour. But merely to claim the statistics wrong because all your friends don’t follow that pattern is weak evidence. I could say “all miy friends have degrees, are over 60 and all voted remain” but that only shows that I might be friends with like- minded people who share similar demographic traits.

Then improve leadership to inspire the managers and the workers to serve their customers with alacrity.

Managers remain responsible for hastening the rate at which work adds value for customers.

All should be focused on their system for responsibly achieving sustained success.

...not sniping at each other.

Someone with a double first from a top ranking university should be aware that anecdotal evidence does not override or undermine statistical significance.

Someone with a double first from a top ranking university shouldn't need to have that pointed out! Thanks for treading where I didn't dare, suzied

Didn't Disraeli say "there are three kind of lies - lies, damned lies and statistics"

I don't understand those who take every opportunity to talk down British workers. We are no different from any other nationality, we have very hard workers, we have those who just go through the motions and we have the scroungers - just like every other country.

OBVIOUSLY That is why Britain called for help from other countries after the war

English people do not wish to do manual jobs and although always go on about immigrants taking over I really do not know what state the UK would be without immigrants!!

suzie that’s an excellent post - a very clear explanation

lemon I don’t know where you get the information from that almost everybody goes to university - it’s just not true. I also dislike your condescending attitude towards what some people study where. As usual your post is in DM territory where myth after myth thrives on the reporting of fictitious degree courses which , if properly examined are often mush more relevant to today’s society than for example, Classics at Oxbridge. In addition, studying for a degree is about far more than the subject matter but about developing skills, ability to assimilate, analyse information and knowledge, think for yourself. You really don’t like the fact do you that statistically, better educated people were more likely to vote remain. As for JC, he inspired the young which another Labour leader almost certainly wouldn’t have.

Disraeli was wrong - what happens with statistics is that the media is full of people who have ‘arts’ degrees of one type or another who simply do not understand statistics and therefore are incapable of reporting such information accurately or intelligently and anyway have to try and sell papers with misleading headlines.

There was that lovely joke about MG when he was at Education - Michael thinks that the plural of anecdote is data.

Surely it is how and where the statistics are collated. I can go to one area of the city and ask "should we control immigration" and the statistics will reveal that the majority of people will say no. I can then go to another part of the city and ask the same question and the statistics will reveal the opposite.

Haha maryeliza you do easily get het up ( as usual)
And as for JC indeed, he inspired the young to vote for him as he promised no tuition fees amongst other things and they see him as an anti establishment rebellious figure.
He still didn’t manage to win though.

I think it’s high time that posters with a superiority complex about the ‘education’ of Leave voters realised that no matter how many insults they toss around, we are leaving the EU.
Time to get over it.

And you lemon frequently post DM level rubbish which when challenged leads you to make personal comments because you are clearly incapable of explaining why you post false and misleading information - I’d rather care about the truth and be accused of ‘getting het up’ than post lies and rubbish.

Of course, which is why those compliling statistical evidence which they wish to generalise to a large population would ensure they use a balanced sample of that population. They wouldn’t just survey a narrow sample from one area, age or background. Academic Social science may be a soft science in terms of causality, but scientific principles of objectivity and observable evidence should ensure that social statistics from a reliable survey has some validity.

Oh dear lemon still ‘getting het up’ about the fact that leaving is not going according to plan? That so much is coming out about the problems, that the negotiations are being handled so badly - I suppose it’s hard to have to admit that you support such a group of losers. By ‘not getting over it’ remain voters at all levels are trying to improve what is going to happen and not just shrugging their shoulders. And how do you get to the phrase ‘superiority complex’ ? Stating the FACT that remain voters statistically have a higher level of education is not being superior - it is stating a fact.Perhaps you ought to get over that and stop ‘getting so het up’.

When studying statistics, one of the first things you learn is about sampling. When critiquing a research project, that is the first thing you will evaluate - the sample and how it was obtained including non response and drop out rates. No one( except a DM journalist) would take a piece of research seriously that based its results on a sample taken from one small subset of a wider population unless of course it was research just on that sub sample and that was clear in the write up.

I am surprised that anyone is surprised that this is the way Patel views British workers. This women is part of the far-right scum who have risen to the surface of the Tory party over recent years and she shares their neoliberal view of economics.

The problem with our productivity has little to do with the people working in it. Three things are creating the problems. Firstly it is because of poor management and the idea large swaths of our society continue to believe that management and leadership requires charisma rather than education, knowledge and experience. This keeps productivity down.

Secondly in is because of poor investment. Money earned is off-shored, saved and hidden; it is not reinvested in improving our industry. This keeps productivity down.

Thirdly it is the idea that the first two can be cured by some sort of puritanical attitude to work. This is something the older generation seem particularly attached to and yet we are one of the longest hours economies but we do not see a rise in productivity because of it. Lazy workers' are certainly not the problem.

Is this anything to do with Brexit? In my view yes. It is basically the same group of neoliberal Tories who have driven us into leaving. These people do not believe in business or a widely successful economy, they only believe in some people getting very rich. This is why they wanted Brexit. Sadly the corollary to that fact is that in order for some to get very rich larger numbers will also need to be very poor and the country will not be run for the best for all.

MaizieD Of course I am aware of right wing Brexit views (you don't have to be so patronising).
People can have different reasons for doing the same thing. That would be an absurd reason to change my vote. I went into the ballot box alone and no one else's behaviour reflects on me just because we voted the same way on one issue.

Suzied that is a very useful explanation - sadly probably not to be read by those taking offence where no such thing is given.

I do not believe that the "lies, damn lies" is helpful as it proposes and untruth. Statistics, those inanimate figures, cannot lie, only people can. So it is the way people use the statistics and why they use them in that way that needs careful watching not the statistics themselves.

Simplified the stats relating to education and voting in the referendum are:
Of those who left school at 15/16 - 3 out of 4 voted 'out'.
Of those who achieved the equivalent of 'A' - 50/50 in/out
Of with Higher Education - 3 out of 4 voted in

So Education did play a part. It is what part they played that is interesting. I found Suzied's point "So older people with higher education more likely to vote remain than older people without." gives us something to think about.

My feeling is that those whose life had been or would be influenced by lower (I wish there was another word but there isn't) education levels believe what we had does not work in their favour and, they may possibly believe it works or has worked, against them. On the other side those who life had been or would be influenced by higher education levels did believe that what we had worked for them.

I could be wrong, any interpretation could be wrong but if I am right we need to work out how the country can work for all - and I do not believe Brexit will, or was even intended to do that by those leading the campaign.