If you need urgent support, call 999 or go to your nearest A&E. To contact our Crisis Messenger (open 24/7) text THEMIX to 85258.
Options
Essential support for under 25s
Essential support for under 25s
Take a look around and enjoy reading the discussions. If you'd like to join in, it's really easy to register and then you'll be able to post. If you'd like to learn what this place is all about, head here.
Comments
I don't buy that i'm afraid, NS oil is not responsible for the demise of UK manufacturing.....it's just another example of short sighted govt policy, now they have used up most of the oil and the country is in no better shape, and we can't re-industrialise because a) we don't have the infrastructure and b) noone can afford to buy our shit anymore because sterling is so overvalued, if they even wanted to.....
What we are left with is a few rich bankers in london and for the rest of us service sector mcjobs and casual labour is the future because the government have ponied up to big business to 'attract investment' as he put it proudly, they have removed protection for the workers (i.e. crushed unions and regulations) and therby created a 'free market', which means little or no job safety, put up and shut up or we'll outsource your job to india etc....get everyone up to their eyeballs in debt and scared, the next step will be to drive down our standards of living through inflation and more tax, and voila you have a 'flexible workforce'.....and if you don't like it well that's fine, because they have created thousands of new laws to stop you voicing your opinion in any meaningful way, and the ID card database and millions of talking CCTVs will allow them to keep an eye on you if you don't behave....but you haven't done anything wrong so you've got nothing to hide right?
That is/was TB and NuLab's real agenda (to be fair Thatcher got the ball rolling), without even touching on Iraq and PFI and peerage scandals and uncontrolled immigration and ridiculous house prices, well I'm getting out pronto...don't you love democracy :rolleyes:
really? you alluded to the right answer here...
a 30% appreciation in stirling's real exchange rates after the discovery of north sea oil basically killed of an important manufacturing sector in the UK. it happend to Holland during the 60s before britain and is happening in Russia now.
try prozac
true but manufacturing had problems long before the sterling appreciation, it obviously didn't help but it's hardly the sole reason for the decline, investment in manufacturing has been falling for decades and the sector still showed signs of recovery since 1980, but the record since labour took over has been pretty dismal....
No completely true. He forced them to look elsewhere and when the strike ended they didn't go back because the Thatcher Government did exactly what he said they would do in the first place.
A fiar point, of course he was trying to bring down the Government. In the first instance because he thought it would then prevent the closure of pits and the mass loss of jobs. He failed on both counts.
Granted, waiting lists are far better now ...
Mortality rate decreases that you refer to are largely due to such fantastic advances in medicine over the last few years - let alone the last ten years. It's certainly not down to Magical Tony.
Far more doctors and nurses has been achieved by raping the medical resources of countries that can ill afford to lose their trained staff ...
And often people are pushed out of hospital well before they should be ... with social services unable to offer the additional care people then need at home.
What the hell do I want after ten years? Exactly what Tony Blair promised us and taxed us for ....
The government had been stockpiling coal for a while, in anticipation of a showdown with the miners.
It was about what is more important - ordinary people's jobs, livelihoods and communities or the ideology of the "free" market. The free market won. The communities are still suffering the effects.
It hardly took Einstein to figure that Scargill was angling for a strike. the Govt had two options 1) ignore him and then either have to capitulate to his demands or let power stations run on empty or 2) be prepared.
For some insane reason they chose option 2.
It was about whether an elected Govt or the unions had power. We're still reaping the benefits (not least in environmental terms)
Seven words there, easy to type and fairly bland. Let's look back at my previous post.
1996 Wait 36 hours on a trolley in A&E before admission or being seen by a doctor
2007 98% of people wait less than 4 hours before being admitted or discharged
1996 From referral to treatment, anything up to four years
2007 Maximum 13 weeks for outpatient, 26 weeks for surgery. Avaerages are much lower. It's the diagnostic which let us down, hence why by December 2008 the whole referral to treatment must happen within 18 weeks
That's not "far better" it's a fucking seachange.
You don't see the link wit hfaster access to outpatients, diagnostics and surgery. Nor the link with the QOF information which means that GPs have to monitor you closer if you have certain conditions, you don't see the link with the drive against smoking and salt etc or the rest of the "health Promotion" work which the Govt has been pushing...?
In 1997 there weren't enough doctors or nurses training posts and hence we had a shortage. These people don't grow on trees so where the fuck was the NHS supposed to get them from???
Now there are more nurses/doctors being trained each year than jobs available, at the moment. It's a big area for complaint at the moment.
a) Adult Services (not social services anymore) are not part of the NHS. They should be IMHO.
b) Pushed out according to whom? The doctor who discharged them, or you?
That would be to reduce waiting lists. That was his promise in 1997. He has done that.
And more besides.
I have never voted for the man, I never would have either. But what you are saying is red rag to the bull my friend. The NHS is in much better position that it was in 1996.
To be fair, they should have anyway regardless of whether they were looking for a showdown. It's just good planning...
You've noticed
Oh so do I. I just realise that a functioning economy is needed for the people and communities to exist, and in the UK's economy wasn't functioning. If it hadn't been sorted there would have been a lot more who lost their livelihoods than just the miners.
And by the strike they made it much, much worse for themselves. But then like many who claim to care about people Scargill and his ilk, don't give a fuck about them - all they care about is a discredited political ideology...
Are there any socialist economies where people are better off? Or do they tend to be basket cases of poverty and misery? You seem to think socialism is a good thing, despite all the evidence...
His record is half and half to me. Out of ten, I would mark him six out of ten. Not bad, but could have done a hell of a lot better. He's had some of the largest Parliamentary majorities ever seen in the UK. He had so much power, and did little good with it. What a shame. He could have been an amazing PM, but he let us all down.
Spot on :thumb:
I'd argue that there has never been a socialist economy.
Of course I'd be foolish to argue that capitalism doesn't have it's benefits. Of course it does. However, it is not sustainable. The human race needs to seek alternatives. We cannot consume and expand forever.
We might be better off, but can that be substantiated over time? Fact is, we barely have a manufacturing base to speak of. So if we import more than we export...the problem is obvious.
I can't believe this post is even real.
More people have cars, consumer goods and more foreign holidays for one major reason - DEBT.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/3935671.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6209170.stm
EDIT - not to mention the stupid housing market bubble - how many people with flash motors and two holidays do you think released a load of their new found equity? A lot I'd guess!
Didn't you notice how everyone got rich all of a sudden? :rolleyes:
Is it? In the 19th century people were saying that it was terrible how few people were in agriculture and that it was sustainable. fact is, it was. Technology has transformed agriculture and meant many fewer people are needed to produce things. The same is happening with industry...
I'd agree - though there have been plenty of attempts which have ended in failure, which should say something.
Malthusian economics...
Its true that capitalism needs to make better use of resources, but there's no evidence that socialism would be any better. In fact as capitalism promotes technology and low cost, it seems to me that capitalism is likely to have a better chance of succeeding.
And especially given that we started this discussion around coal, which is one of the most polluting energy sources around.
But most of that debt is sustainable - now some people get into to trouble, but the majority don't.
And it doesn't explain the rise in living standards...
The majority of the debt obviously isn't sustainable as insolvency is at record highs and continuing to go up, along with interest rates - which will make it even more unmanageable..
And of course it explains the rise, consumer credit has become much more widely available and acceptable and people have used that money to fund their life styles ??
But surely as a basic economic principle, a country has to export more goods than it imports as a result?
Japan's trade barriers were a recognition of that, and it certainly led to their economy booming.
They don't have to be manufactured, though. And we still make plenty of goods- we just need less people to make them. Heavy engineering has declined, but high-tec has gone up...