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Looking at it economically, the farmers would gain a lot more from selling their land putting that money in the bank and living off the interest. Farmers complain about low prices but this is all down to supply and demand and put bluntly there are too many farmers especially when you consider that we can and do import increasing amounts of our food. The farmers are in a similar position to the steelworkers and the coalminers in the 1970s, there is falling demand for their product and they are being kept in business by expensive subsidies, now I'm not saying just cut them off like that which would be unnecessarily harsh but what we should be doing is discouraging people from entering the agriculture industry and training these farmers to do other jobs.
Trees and plants are all the same, have you been to Kew Gardens or Hyde Park? Just as nice as anywhere in the countryside.
People enjoyed hare coarsing and kicking the shit out of other people but we ban that. Government sets up a moral code for the nation and if banning hunting bothers you that much you can always go to France where they also hunt and I hear are welcoming British hunting groups. You could even make a nice trip of it and go on a booze cruise at the same time.
The reason we institute these laws is precisely because we are better than the animals, we have progressed beyond that and so we can't just kill because we see fit. We as humans are above the normal laws of the jungle and so should act as superiors when it comes to our treatment of animals - giving them a quick and as painless as possible death. Besides we have clay pigeon shooting, I'm sure technology could give a high tech alternative to the fox for those who enjoy it.
LOL No, horrible cars! I'll leave them to you countrysiders with your tweed caps and barbour jackets! I don't drive anyway but if I did I wouldn't pick a horrible 4x4. I have a Rover 416 in my London drive as a matter of fact.
As for the countryside having no productive benefit, have you never heard of agriculture. I know that a lot of the British economy is now focused on secondary, tertiary and quaternary industries, but there are still some basics that the British people rely on domestic producers to supply. And that will never change.
No, an increase in the population should not be encouraged. Rather than it increasing funding to public services, it will put a greater strain on them. The population growth hotspots are mainly in areas with high unemployment. There is no economic reasoning in supplying a larger labour force to an area with little or no available work. And don't suggest that these people will move to find work. They will be as reluctant, if not more so, as the people who live in the countryside and do not want it being built on. All you will end up with an increased proportion of people claiming benefits. Hence the greater strain placed on public services.
Do you study Economics? It says in your profile that you are an A-level student. Do you take Economics as one of your A-levels? Otherwise, why are you claiming knowledge of Economics?
And no, I don't think that most people will support your plans to wipe out the countryside. Agriculture is still too important in this country. Why should farmers be willing to give up their vocation when their is such high unemployment in certain areas of London (and the UKs other cities)? Why should farmers re-train to do something else, when you can't even provide work for people in the city?
You forget that the Royal Family is a very powerful advocate of country life. Do you think that they are going to give up their farms, estates and polo fields, just to allow London to continue its sprawl?
Why can't you just leave things alone?
LOL It was a joke! Don't you have those in the countryside? See there's another one. I think my selflessness is a lot greater than the people on your side - you live in the countryside and want to protect it for yourselves whereas I want to provide thousands of new homes for millions of people, many more than live in the countryside as is and so more people would benefit under my proposals than yours. I do understand the countryside, I have been there you know on several occasions. Countryside people moan about how they don't have enough bus services or that their local primary school is closing - public services require a certain number of people to operate and so by building in the countryside we can actually restore many of the amenities countryside people are currently deprived of. I'm not afraid of the countryside, my main concern is not urban vs rural but giving millions of people nice, affordable homes and if we have to build on greenfield sites to achieve that then so be it.
What real point was that? All I seemed to get out of your post was that for some reason the countryside is a special case and I'm mad for suggesting we even consider building on it.
In fact agriculture makes up a tiny proportion of the British economy, so much that its effect can be considered negligable, especially when bearing in mind the amount of public money it swallows in subsidies. The entire primary sector in the UK only makes up less than 3% of the labour force. In fact with modern technology we can import food from virtually anywhere in the world so reducing the need for our own agricultural industry, in fact it is a lot cheaper for us to import our food from the Third World than grow it ourselves and at the same time we help the Third World develop.
Actually the greater strain on public services is provided by the increasing aging population leading to a greater burden on the NHS and state pension. Therefore, encouraging an increase in population means more people of working age to fund these essential services and gives them time to save for their own retirement so that it isn't a problem. You seem to assume that all the population growth is coming from teenage mums which is a very sensationalist viewpoint, in fact given the increasing importance placed on skills nowadays we are having more skilled workers than ever before and so an increase in the population means an increase in workers to fill the skills shortages and most people are a lot more willing to move to where the jobs are nowadays because they have to. So I don't agree with your reasoning at all, in fact it seems very pessimistic to me.
Yes I do take economics, together with Government & Politics and History. Hence why I can claim knowledge of economics.
I think they will - affordable, nice homes who would be against that apart from the countryside lobby, most sensible people would see an opportunity to get a nicer, more afforable house and back it all the way. Agriculture isn't important to this country, don't kid yourself. I think property developers carrying cheques for hundreds of thousands of pounds would convince most farmers that they're flogging a dead horse and so they'd take it and live off the interest and good on them, who'd seriously want to continue to work themselves stupid when they could have an easy life? There is no such thing as high unemployment nowadays comparatively, we still have unemployment but it's nothing like as bad as it was. The reason we can't find work for the people in the cities is that they lack the skills to be able to get the work available - we demand more skilled workers nowadays and so people have to train more to get it and the help is now there to train people so they are able to work.
The royal family couldn't interfere with the elected government's legislation, there would be a constitutional uproar. So as much as they wouldn't like it they'd have to lump it, although we could always get rid of them at the same time, do the country another favour.
Why should I? I want to make things better for millions of people and all you can say is "can't you leave things alone" - well no I can't, I believe in everyone's right to have a nice affordable home and I want to achieve it. There are 57,000 families in London alone living in temporary accommodation, usually squalid B&Bs - why should all these families and their children be denied a good family home like most people enjoy for the sake of some fields?
My main point was suggesting that some of the investment required for your plan be channelled into providing better sex education. With one of the highest rates of teenage pregnancy in Europe, it is no surprise the the UK is in need of extra housing.
Yes, but agriculture is still a significant part of the economy, even if you view it as 'proportionally negligable'.
There is always a need for a strong domestic supply of primary goods, especially in times of war. At uncertain times, such as now so soon after the war in Iraq, it is important that we have dependable agricultural suppliers at home. The UK will never reach a position where it is completely dependent on foreign countries to supply its entire stock of primary goods. That would leave us highly vulnerable during times of conflict.
As for this being a way of allowing Third World countries, that's very noble in principal, but very poor in execution. The Third World is not developing and expanding fast enough to be able to cope with our demands. Barring a miracle, it will be a long time before it is. The Third World doesn't have the capacity, nor does it have the political stability or reliabilty to become such a significant source. The Third World is unable to feed itself, how can we rely on it to feed us?
That's not true. I am not attributing all population growth to teenage mums. I am merely stating that it is a significant issue that should be given a similar level of consideration.
Secondly, you seem to think that population growth now will bring about an immediate increase in the volume of skilled workers. Surely you would have to wait at least 18 years for this to be the case? And how do you know that the skills that are treasured at this point in time, won't be completely redundant by then?
You also make very grand assumptions about people's willingness to move around the country to find work. I think you will find that most people would rather stay on the dole than move somewhere else. It is the nature and attitude of most unemployed people.
Ok, I just want to know that we are on an even playing field.
And I think that they won't. There are a number of important issues that you are failing to consider.
People, by nature, are biased and selfish. There are plenty of people who will oppose the idea. Not because they don't want nice, affordable housing, but because they don't want to have to move too far to get it. And you forget that many aspects of countryside life will remain, and those relocating will want to avoid adapting to it.
There is more to working in agriculture than the state of your bottom line. A lot of pride, commitment and culture goes into the work, but I don't think you understand that. No farmer would readily sell up and train to work in a skilled industry. Why on Earth would he give up his entire lifestyle? A man who has spent his entire adult life working the land is not going to want to give it up to go assemble computer parts in a factory.
Relatively high unemployment may not exist at this point in time, but you'd be very blinkered to think that it will never occur again. Economies go up and down. Just because the down time that is currently occuring hasn't been so extreme, doesn't mean that the economy will always be this bouyant. You have no idea what lies beyond the next peak.
People in the cities are just as reluctant and lazy as you portray the people in the country to be. The reason that people are unemployed due to a lack of skills, is due to the laziness and stubborness that is rife amongst those people. Why would they want to give up an easy life on the dole, to retrain in some hi-tech industry that they don't even understand? The World has changed, but they are unwilling to change with it.
That's what you'd hope, isn't it? However, as a Royalist, I'm well aware of the fact that the Royal Family holds a great deal of influence over this country's major decision makers. They may not be able to legally force things their way, but I assure you that it would still occur. All that's required is for them to put pressure on the right people.
57,000 families? That's hardly enough to necesitate paving over the entire countryside for housing. Perhaps if they were a little less selfish and reluctant, they would be willing to move to other areas of the country. There are plenty of places where they are having to rip down housing, as there is nobody to live it in. Sounds like the perfect solution to me.
Two further points:
1. I do not live in the country. I live near to it and take part in country pursuits.
2. I have never suggested that you or your ideas are crazy. I have simply maintained that I don't agree with your ideas, and I do not think they would be successful in execution.
I think that's quite an old fashioned view, today's world is so globalised that an old fashioned war with blockades that would cause us to need our own supply of primary goods would be of too great a cost to all countries. Also that would depend on us being equally matched with our opponents, ie; roughly speaking war against our European neighbours or America, which I don't think is too likely in the future. Besides if there was another major war like that it would be over in a few hours with nuclear missiles.
So we could put the EU farm surpluses to good use! We could also order more from our EU neighbours which means that our extra demand would reduce the need for the expensive CAP. Not to mention other countries like Canada and New Zealand who would also be eager to supply us with their food. So we could still help the Third World by ordering food from their farmers giving them more money to improve their farming yields and equipment so increasing the amount of food available for their domestic population.
We actually need an increase in population growth to keep the natural population of the country stable (see above). I don't think most skills are redundant, obviously certain industries like the IT sector change, but that's an expected continuous evolution of skills. Take most ordinary jobs, a plasterer's skills are virtually the same now as they were 20 years ago, and essentially the secretary's job hasn't changed so much as to be indisinguishable from that in 1983. Most peoples skills they pick up in school last them their whole lives, I don't see why this would change and if it did most firms would train their workers so their skills are still relevant. So are you calling unemployed people lazy then?
People come from places well into the Home Counties to work in London, this is just providing more housing there for London workers, as well as providing more jobs for the Home Counties because of the increased population which those who didn't want to move far could take up. I don't see the problem of countryside life you pose - it's not a new thing, with the existing countryside housing you end up with "commuter villages", we're just creating more of them.
Really? You see farmers selling their land to property developers all the time, this is just removing the legal restrictions upon them doing so. The farmer wouldn't have to work again with the money he'd get from selling his land and if he wanted he could re-train, set up his own business but he wouldn't have to with all that money in the bank.
The UK historically has low unemployment, it was only really bad during the Thatcher years because of her brutal restructuring of the economy, if she had got the government involved in gradually winding down the old mining and steel businesses as opposed to brutally closing them the unemployment situation wouldn't have been as bad as it was. Plus encouraging building will provide thousands of jobs in the building industry and other firms will benefit from a ripple effect increasing economic growth.
I never said people in the countryside were lazy, I said they were selfish for denying others the quality of life they enjoy. I agree unemployment is mostly caused by a lack of skills but I don't agree that unemployed people are lazy, I think they've just been out of work so long that it's become an alien concept to them and it's the governments job to do everything in its power to put these people back to work. The dole is not an easy life - you try living on the amount the unemployed get.
As a Republican I agree with you, I think its a national scandal the amount of pressure the establishment put on the Wilson governments in the 60s to derail many of his policies, also even the way Prince Charles can swamp DEFRA with letters campaigning on behalf of the Countryside Alliance. All the more reason to get rid of the lot of them I say.
Okay 57,000 families + the people currently renting because they can't afford their own place + the people who would like to move to a better house but can't afford it - the demand is there. The reason they can't move to other areas of the country is the lack of jobs in other areas of the country. Plus London needs people on lower wages we need teachers, nurses and people to do the less than glamorous jobs - they need to be housed or London would just become a rich person's ghetto lacking in the key workers it needs.
Hope that doesn't include Morris Dancing!
When those are filled, we can talk again about destroying the fields and woods which are the nations kitchen and lungs.
Point taken. However, there are better, more socially responsible ways of increasing population growth. The UK should not allow the rate of teenage pregnancy to spiral out of control.
Old fashioned view or not, it is still the one shared by people who specialise in this area of Economics. It is still necessary for countries entering into war to have a strong domestic supply of food for its people. Wars drag on, even in this time of hi-tech combat. There is still a great deal of Coalition involvement in Iraq, and a great number of consequences and attacks of retribution to be prepared for.
A war ending instantaneously through the might of a nuclear weapon is still some way off. There would be uproar if the government simply chose to nuke its enemies. There exists a great unease amongst the public over the use of nuclear weapons. Any government that went so strongly against the wishes of the British people would find themselves being a lot less popular than Blair is at the moment.
Are you proposing the government sieze people's private property? That said I agree with you, there are a lot of things that we can do to reduce the need for building on greenfield sites but the need is there as I said before London needs 30,000 new houses a year to cope with its increasing population.
Has our involvement in any war since the end of World War Two led to any direct impact on British consumers? Were there blockades of British ports in the Falklands War? Was rationing reintroduced during the first Gulf War? It is only in world wars that our food supply is threatened and World War Three will be a nuclear war if it happens which I hope it won't. In a nuclear winter it won't matter whether our crops come from Britain or Bulgaria, they'll all be dead anyway. As you say a nuclear war is a high improbability so there is no problem with what I'm suggesting.
We would get more food from the EU because the main problem with the EU is that it can (and does) produce much more food than is demanded, so we would get rid of subsidies and keep price levels constant with our increased demand. They wouldn't need to be forced they would see a market and go for it.
Technology means peoples jobs adapt with the times like secretaries and plasterers, it doesn't mean people get pushed out of work. The high-tech bubble bursting a few years ago must surely have proved that we will always need people doing the same old jobs, yes there will be more job opportunities in IT but not at the expense of other workers. Yes, it will take a lot of effort to put the long term unemployed back on the job market but that doesn't mean it can't be done.
Please tell me how you would bring down house prices without increasing the supply of homes - basic economics dictates that if supply is too high we must either reduce demand or increase supply and as there is little chance of the former we should do the latter. My suggestion is that we increase suburbia to give people a higher quality of life. Commuting into London will continue, only 10% of commuters go to work in London by car, most get the train or tube and so the government's motoring plans would have little impact - especially when you bear in mind how any additional charges from the pay as you go system would be cancelled out by cuts in car tax and fuel duty.
I disagree with you about the nature of farmers - human nature dictates that people will always choose the way of life that gives them maximum reward for least effort, last time I heard farmers were human too so I reckon the choice on offer is clear. So, you don't have a problem if I said we were going to build rubbish incinerators and power stations on the countryside but you oppose building houses for people on the same land? You therefore recognise that the countryside needs to be developed. Besides - the government is encouraging recycling as never before which is done in much smaller places and the government's proposed wind turbines are going to be built at sea where the wind power is greater and solar panels can be fitted on the roofs of the new houses I'd build on the countryside.
Yes the British economy required a shake up - not an obliteration. The huge unemployment of the 1980s could have been avoided if she had instituted re-training schemes for the steelworkers and coalminers and given tax breaks to firms to start firms in the depressed areas after the closure of mines/steelworks but instead she allowed the North/South divide to widen putting us in the position we find ourselves in today. As for the milk issue, as I wasn't even born when the free milk policy was ended, I always had to pay for my milk - in fact had her government encouraged measures like free milk we might see less of the dietary problems in this country we keep hearing about. The building on the countryside would take decades, besides first they'd have to put all other alternatives like renovating city places to use - this would take about 50 years by which time we'd need to replace some of the older housing. There's always work for builders. Also can't you see the parallels between farmers now and the steelworkers of the 1970s? Declining industries, swallowing millions in public subsidies, facing increasing international competition from cheaper foreign producers...
Why should I get used to inequality? Why not change it, it doesn't have to be like that. I don't think that's fair I think this government has done a damn sight more to get the unemployed working again in 6 years than the Tories did in 18 years. Also don't patronise me, I may still be in school but I know how little the unemployed get.
When you refer to governments getting above themselves do you mean like the RF blocking the Wilson government's reforms for the House of Lords to make it - shock, horror - democratic!? The RF are only out for their own interests, lobbying to stop them paying taxes like everyone else in this country has to and keeping them in the lifestyle to which they have become accustomed. The sooner we get rid of these greedy parasites the better - but this is for another debate...
You miss the point, London needs these people in badly paid jobs to sweep the streets, teach our kids and cure our sick. Therefore, they need to be housed in homes they can afford hence the need for building. Why isn't it justified? If we can give people nice homes why the hell shouldn't we?