Is Britain broken (channel 5)

DiamondLily

The Tories will always voncebtrate on the 'Grey pound' because that is where a huge swathe of their votes come from. They also know that older people are more reliable about voting in the first place.

Statistically, younger people are more Labour/LD etc.

Not always, but statistically.

It's ALL about the votes for political parties.

"Age is still the biggest dividing line in British politics
In fact, for every 10 years older a voter is, their chance of voting Tory increases by around nine points, and the chance of them voting Labour decreases by eight points.".

yougov.co.uk/politics/articles/26925-how-britain-voted-2019-general-election?redirect_from=%2Ftopics%2Fpolitics%2Farticles-reports%2F2019%2F12%2F17%2Fhow-britain-voted-2019-general-election#:~:text=Age%20is%20still%20the%20biggest%20dividing%20line%20in%20British%20politics&text=In%20fact%2C%20for%20every%2010,Labour%20decreases%20by%20eight%20points.

New word, voncebtrate . Younger people vote Conservative also. Unless of course they vote for turn about Starmer, if he does that before his party
may be elected,one year is a long time, how can they trust him enough to vote for said party

After so many years of Tory mismanagement of the country it’s not surprising voters are looking elsewhere and want change. When it comes to the ballot box a lot will not commit to change in the numbers needed to give Starmer an outright majority. It’s rather like shoppers saying what they want, then seeing what they actually have in their shopping baskets, what they say and do are not always the same.
It would be nice to see LD make significant gains at national level, currently they seem to have a very low profile

Interesting blog on the publication of the British Social Attitudes Survey (free to read)

While it doesn't deal explicitly with voting preferences it does show that social attitudes are leaning leftwards.

samf.substack.com/p/liz-truss-is-right-britain-has-become?r=72szy&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

natcen.ac.uk/publications/bsa-40-liberalisation-attitudes

Reading about people leaving dog poo bags around amazed me. There are very few bins to collect it here but people don’t leave it around. They just don’t, they take it home. As they should. I think a tv campaign might be needed to ‘educate’ people !

While Curtis's analysis of voters in the aftermath of the 2019 general election may have held that the old truism that voters become more conservative as they age is correct later data seems to show that it no longer holds.

Writing in the Financial Times in Dec. 2022 John Burns Murdoch says that data suggests that 'millennials' (the cohort born roughly between 1981 - 1996) are bucking the trend; more of them are sticking with their centre/centre left views.

Whereas,in the past some 15% have become more conservative as they age, data shows that currently only 5% do so.

Apparently this holds true for the US as well as the UK

This will cause problems for the tories as we 'boomers' die off and there are fewer right leaning voters coming along to replace us.

(I regret that the article is behind a paywall)

www.ft.com/content/c361e372-769e-45cd-a063-f5c0a7767cf4

It seems highly likely that the following generation, 'generation Z' will follow the same trend.

Just as the 'boomers' can't spend enough to get the UK out of an economic hole, they will also become less reliable tory voters...

The Tories will always voncebtrate on the 'Grey pound' because that is where a huge swathe of their votes come from. They also know that older people are more reliable about voting in the first place.

Statistically, younger people are more Labour/LD etc.

Not always, but statistically.

It's ALL about the votes for political parties.

"Age is still the biggest dividing line in British politics
In fact, for every 10 years older a voter is, their chance of voting Tory increases by around nine points, and the chance of them voting Labour decreases by eight points.".

yougov.co.uk/politics/articles/26925-how-britain-voted-2019-general-election?redirect_from=%2Ftopics%2Fpolitics%2Farticles-reports%2F2019%2F12%2F17%2Fhow-britain-voted-2019-general-election#:~:text=Age%20is%20still%20the%20biggest%20dividing%20line%20in%20British%20politics&text=In%20fact%2C%20for%20every%2010,Labour%20decreases%20by%20eight%20points.

I'm not coming round to your view at all, Katie59. 😆

It was just a rare moment of agreement.

WWM
I am in rare agreement with Katie59 as far as the 'grey pound' is concerned. It isn't going to save the economy any more than the spending of the relatively wealthy is going to. There just aren't enough of either.

You are coming round to my viewpoint which is successive governments have been making the wrong decisions for at least the last 25 yrs. Spending too much on policies that have not produced a positive income, Deregulation, Brexit, HS2, Social improvement, Environment. While spending too little (almost nothing) on growth to pay for those policies, so borrowing/QE has had to fill the gap.

Because we have fallen so far behind it’s hard to see how a recovery is going to happen, my own opinion is higher taxation to pay for NHS, Education etc and modest borrowing for growth.

Katie59 I was trying to say that no Government has a magic wand to remedy all that’s perceived as wrong in the U.K. just like magic

There will always be a very vocal anti brigade, as per my previous post.

It would take an exceptionally brave and strong Government to disregard these and crack on regardless taking the majority of the population along with them. Hence we only get tampering round the edges which achieves little and pleases few.

Apologies for rambling, hopefully you will get my drift.

GrannyGravy13

Katie59

GG13

“There isn’t a magic wand that can be waived by the politicians to make everything ok.”

Well who do you think should?

If that’s all you have taken from my post, I cannot be bothered to go through it again.

GG13 I agree with most of the rest
If the government can’t/won’t make the decisions needed who can

I think everything about this country is broken. It’s only a small thing but I read that the Canal Trust in my village have removed all the dog poo bins because they can’t afford to have it collected. I know people should take it home with them if there isn’t a bin but they won’t. They’ll just leave the plastic bag lying around somewhere. I feel that we’re just going backwards. It was only recently that I learned that the maintenance of our canals is charity run. And a local farmer had to have £8,000 worth of cattle euthanised because they’d caught some kind of disease from ingesting dog poo.

I am in rare agreement with Katie59 as far as the 'grey pound' is concerned. It isn't going to save the economy any more than the spending of the relatively wealthy is going to. There just aren't enough of either.

What is going to 'save' it is investment in new industries and in public services. The only likely investor i either is, for the time being, going to be the state because other investors are reluctant to invest in the UK because there isn't enough money around to make it viable.

It really doesn't matter if the money comes directly from the state or indirectly via other investors, it's all the same stuff as far as businesses and consumers are concerned, but if 'others' are reluctant to invest the state has to make a start.

Investment in public services cannot but help to grow the economy because all the suppliers to the state a private sector businesses and improved public sector wages, both by paying more, and by just increasing the numbers of public sector wages, will put more money into the economy. Investment in infrastructure, crumbling schools and other public buildings will increase economic activity; then there is investment in green technologies, to create new industries and new jobs.

Fairer distribution of the national wealth through improved progressive taxation would also help. Regardless of what anyone might believe, the wealthy don't have such a great propensity to spend into the domestic economy as do the less well off. A better distribution of national wealth should mean more spending in the domestic economy.

Posters are constantly noting that the 'rich are getting richer while the poor are getting poorer'. What is noticeable is that our economy is declining as this happens. There is a connection...

Thanks Spinnaker 😊

Totally agree with your post GrannyGravy.

Katie59

GG13

“There isn’t a magic wand that can be waived by the politicians to make everything ok.”

Well who do you think should?

If that’s all you have taken from my post, I cannot be bothered to go through it again.

GG13

“There isn’t a magic wand that can be waived by the politicians to make everything ok.”

Well who do you think should?

maddyone

We’re often told on Gransnet that we shouldn’t mention the hair, nails, iPhones, drinking, excessive hen/stag parties, computer games, and so on because the young are struggling and poor, and they deserve these ‘treats’ to make their lives bearable. I don’t take that line, anymore than I believe that all pensioners should be shivering in their homes because they’re unable to afford heating, despite the £500 heating allowance awarded to all pensioner households last year. Plenty of pensioners can well afford to go out for lunch or coffee, plenty (even on Gransnet) can afford second homes to holiday in, plenty can afford to holiday at home or abroad, and plenty can afford to help their children financially. That is not because of the State Pension, which is abysmally small, but because many have provided for themselves by paying into a private pension or an occupational pension, and many have benefited from extensive inheritances.

Totally agree 👍

Katie59 business owners need incentives to expand not the threat of punitive taxes. When big businesses are given incentives there is the outcry of bribery

Not all U.K. employers pay the living wage many pay above it.

Farmers are in some cases only making 2p in the £ , prices being ground down by supermarkets. For Farmers to earn more it will mean an increase of prices on the shelf, something which the majority of posters on GN have been complaining about for the last year.

Higher wages will inevitably lead to higher end user prices for goods and/or services.

Zero hour contracts suit some students and single parents who can work around their childcare schedules.

There isn’t a magic wand that can be waived by the politicians to make everything ok.

The U.K. needs to invest in infrastructure, but wherever new buildings, railways, roads are proposed there is the tendency to create uproar from so called NIMBY’S

I think I have covered items raised in your post.

We’re often told on Gransnet that we shouldn’t mention the hair, nails, iPhones, drinking, excessive hen/stag parties, computer games, and so on because the young are struggling and poor, and they deserve these ‘treats’ to make their lives bearable. I don’t take that line, anymore than I believe that all pensioners should be shivering in their homes because they’re unable to afford heating, despite the £500 heating allowance awarded to all pensioner households last year. Plenty of pensioners can well afford to go out for lunch or coffee, plenty (even on Gransnet) can afford second homes to holiday in, plenty can afford to holiday at home or abroad, and plenty can afford to help their children financially. That is not because of the State Pension, which is abysmally small, but because many have provided for themselves by paying into a private pension or an occupational pension, and many have benefited from extensive inheritances.

GrannyGravy13

^Nothing is going to change unless we have a much more productive economy even if it means we have to make our own coffee^

Katie59 you do realise that the hospitality industry is big not just in the U.K. but worldwide, consequently your paragraph above is rather misleading.

It’s not just the Barrista who makes your coffee, it’s the supply chain which in coffee houses often supports small village producers, it’s the farmers supplying the milk and other dairy products, it’s the bakers supplying the bread… I could go on but I hope you get the picture

I’m aware of the supply chain and all that’s involved they are all on low wages.
Unless the UK provides more well paid jobs for workers the economy is going to sink further, with increasing numbers of pensioners to support where is the money going to come from?.

Dinahmo

I think that perhaps we should not mention quite so often the grey pound and the retirees out lunching and filling planes. It does give politicians a reason for not maintaining the triple lock and those of the younger generations who are so inclined, another stick with which to beat us (metaphorically speaking).

We could mention all the youngsters out on the town with their designers trainers, jeans and sunglasses, or the girls with their nails, hair extensions etc, that’s before we get onto then having the latest iPhone, computer game as soon as they are released.

Dinahmo not every pensioner is poor nor is every youngster like I have mentioned above however, there is no denying that many pensioners do go out to lunch, dinner and holiday both here and/or abroad.

Or are you suggesting we can only post about pensioners lack of income misery?

I think that perhaps we should not mention quite so often the grey pound and the retirees out lunching and filling planes. It does give politicians a reason for not maintaining the triple lock and those of the younger generations who are so inclined, another stick with which to beat us (metaphorically speaking).

Nothing is going to change unless we have a much more productive economy even if it means we have to make our own coffee

Katie59 you do realise that the hospitality industry is big not just in the U.K. but worldwide, consequently your paragraph above is rather misleading.

It’s not just the Barrista who makes your coffee, it’s the supply chain which in coffee houses often supports small village producers, it’s the farmers supplying the milk and other dairy products, it’s the bakers supplying the bread… I could go on but I hope you get the picture

Yes the “grey pound” is being spent it keeps a lot of workers employed at low wages, but it hasn’t been enough because the economy has been steadily declining

Nothing is going to change unless we have a much more productive economy even if it means we have to make our own coffee.

I agree with you GrannyGravy. The grey pound is huge and without it the economy would suffer severely.
As you say, if you travel outside of school holidays, many of your fellow travellers will be over a certain age. Restaurants, pubs, and cafes are full of the older members of our society, especially at lunch time, and during the week. Gransnetters often mention going out for coffee or lunch. I myself, was out yesterday with a dear friend of mine and we went to the pub for lunch before enjoying a walk along the seafront. The grey pound was very much in evidence in the pub we went to, however when we go out with any of our adult children at the weekend, younger people are more in evidence.

Katie59

Freya5

MerylStreep

An interesting program to hear what people in the real word are thinking.
Analysis Radio 4.

www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m001nvtf

Did you mean in the real world, where is that? I wonder if we in the UK spend as much time navel gazing at others countries problems.

It affects many western countries, we have aging populations that do not contribute enough to the national economy. In addition those that are working are increasingly providing lifestyle services.

The grey £ is being spent in all sectors of the U.K. economy, just go into any coffee/tea shop, restaurant, hotel, hairdressers etc. and look at the demographics.

The last twice we have flown the majority of the passengers were over 60 (obviously going on appearance and overhearing conversations), even the beauty salon girls were saying yesterday that far more of their clientele is now from the elder generation, including nails, facials, pedicures etc.