I really hate this country ....

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Originally posted by JonR:
How about the Lib Dems?

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Lib Whos?



Oh, if we had proportional representation perhaps.

Stephen

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Originally posted by Laurie Saunders:
it`d be nice if the extra taxes levied by nice Mr Brown actally went towards the Good Causes advertised.

Laurie S

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I see investment in Universities, increased buses and Hospitals in my area. There's knock on effects on Jobs - more builders, nurses and so on. This is my personal experience.

This has only happened since Labour got in. It's true that the years of neglect by the previous administration means that many improvements are often just 'catching up', but, for all the current governments faults (and there are many), it's hard to deny the increased investment.

Regards

Stephen

I used to work for the Lib Dems and then helped a different political party fight them in local government. Over the past ten years they have been one of the most malign forces in British politics. Their holier-than-thou attitude at national level is at odds with the sheer venality and nastiness of what they do at local level.

Laurie has a point about some of the money getting through in the NHS, but the health service really has seen a huge shift in capacity. Ten years ago the Mail or the Standard would run a big story if someone waited longer than 48 hours in A&E, or more than two years for an op. Now it's a scandal if they wait longer than four hours in A&E, or longer than six months for an op...

Tim

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Over the past ten years they have been one of the most malign forces in British politics. Their holier-than-thou attitude at national level is at odds with the sheer venality and nastiness of what they do at local level.

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Tim I would utterly endorse these comments

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Laurie has a point about some of the money getting through in the NHS, but the health service really has seen a huge shift in capacity.

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Th e thrust of my comments were aimed mainly at Education....there was much wrong with it 10 years ago, but what has happened in the last 5 years is absolutely scandalous IMO

I feel sorry now for the students who now feel obliged to go through this hell of a system and get the requisite pieces of paper which turn out to be mostly worthless

laurie S

"it`d be nice if the extra taxes levied by nice Mr Brown actally went towards the Good Causes advertised. In fact the lion`s share seems to be swallowed up by the hordes of extra beaurocrats who can smell a new gravy train a mile away"

This of course happened under Conservative governments as well -- remember the ludicrous "Internal Market" reforms in the NHS? -- it's just that the overall amount of money in health and education has gone up by BILLIONS under Labour. They have built and modernised lots of new hospitals that, if we had had a Tory government, would still be falling down.

One can hide behind specious arguments about improving efficiency and public vs private but the bottom line is the Tories will not provide anywhere near the amount of funding and there is exactly zero evidence (indeed quite the opposite) that they would manage the resources any more efficiently or effectively.

Matthew

Matthew

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but the bottom line is the Tories will not provide anywhere near the amount of funding and there is exactly zero evidence (indeed quite the opposite) that they would manage the resources any more efficiently or effectively.

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In principle, I agree.....the Tories were no better in principle when it came to waste...human nature does not change. However, at least I, as a taxpayer, wasn`t robbed to anything like the same degree to pay for all the waste, so at least I still had some vestige of choice left on how my money was being spent(er...wasted)

PS I suggest that your comments are something of a classic red herring, Matthew;

Answering criticism of the New Labour goverment by suggesting that the Tories were worse...two wrongs don`t make a right, and all that...


I am no flag bearer for the Tories...I hold Ms Thatcher and her band of moneterist maniacs in the highest possible contempt.

Wasn`t it Plato who said that anyone who actually WANTED power shouldn`t be trusted with it?..


however I guess we are stuck with a choice between the two...which is why I find it so hard to go and vote with any real enthusism

laurie S

[This message was edited by Laurie Saunders on Wed 09 June 2004 at 12:18.]

Many people rationalise the fact that they would rather have more money for themselves than pay for increased services by hypothecating (as it were) the extra funding into the waste and pretending it doesn't actually provide any benefit at all.

If put waste at 30% (say, and using arbitary figures) then 70% of £100bn is still a lot more than 70% of £80bn.

Matthew

BTW I have, via my employer who effectively gives me no choice, a generous private medicine insurance package. My experience of this and the NHS during the last year since I was diagnosed a diabetic is that the NHS is better run and provides *massively* better service.

I am not arguing with the stated "ideals" of labour....compassion for all etc etc, just the naivity and crassness of their view of human nature, and the clumsy way that these ideals are implemented. What is often forgotten is that one "unfairness" ironed out in one place simply reappears in another form elsewhere in the system ....the word "fairness" being touted, misleadingly, as if it were something objective, must surely rate as one of the greates con tricks ever played by politicians (of ALL colours)

Laurie S

Hi,
Quite interesting haw someone mentioned the 'performance' word. Ironically that has led from having streets patrolled by traffic cops, to the introduction of speed camera's as a more 'cost effective' way of policing speeders.

So whilst we get hammered for exceeding the speed limit, the drivers who drive like idiots, without due care and without doc's are finding it easier to do so.

This is partially because the govn't are having to target specific area's because of cost constraints placed on the public services, and the result of that is some area's suffer. This is a fact, which I have practically experienced, whichever way you like it.

andy c!

Health
The NHS is excellent at some things and seriously underfunded/resourced at others.

I do not like the two tier system we have but admit that we have used it. My son needed a minor operation, he was put on a waiting list to see the surgeon (we were told it would probably be at least two years before my son could be operated on).

We invoked my employer's private health insurance and were asked if we could see the same surgoen that afternoon and would next Wednesday be ok for the operation.

That was under the Tories, I don't think things have changed.

Education

Where is the money going? Certainly not to the sharp end. I have been a School Governor for the last 7 years and underfunding is still the second biggest headache we have (the biggest being staff retention but that's another issue).

Transport

Locally, we had a large amount of money spent on putting in a bus lane recently. This has stuffed the local traffic and been the cause of several near accidents due to the sudden breaks in the bus lane and traffic veering from one lane to another.

We have been promised a bus every 6 minutes. The buses run virtually empty because they don't go where people want to and there are only three an hour and you never see one after about 6pm.

performance
Clearly every time the Government set targets then the affected agencies then strive to meet them to avoid the consequences of 'failure' which affect other areas.

An education example. A local junior school has been consistently coming out on top in the local league tables for SATs results. 'My' school was near the bottom of the list, mainly due to having a unit for children with learning difficulties who counted towards the headline figures despite being well below the level of being able to take the SATs. We always emphasised the 'value added' (horrible term) i.e. how well the individual chioldren progressed. Because of the league tables many parents with 'bright' children sent them to the top school so the figures stayed high.

Last year the figures were published showing value added. Suddenly the school that had previously been the 'top' school was near the bottom of the heap, much to the consternation of many of the parents. What they had been concentrating on had been to get children to level 4 (the target level), those who could do better and achieve a level 5 were largely left to drift and many didn't attain the level they should have so although they had a high percentage of level 4s they had a low percentage of level 5s.

Definitely a case of method of the measurement distorting the results.

Finally 'cos this has taken so long to write and there have been other posts in the meantime...

What is fair? It's fair when we benefit, unfair if someone else benefits who doesn't "deserve" it.

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underfunding is still the second biggest headache we have (the biggest being staff retention but that's another issue).

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Well isn`t it the same issue? The Government claim that extra £millions are being put int education. Where is it all going?

Just take a glance at the jobs pages of your local paper.....myriad "consultants" and "advisers" and "coordinators" on fat salaries.

Like I said above beaurocrats (mainly employed by Goverment departments have a knack of sniffing out a good gravy train

Laurie S

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Last year the figures were published showing value added. Suddenly the school that had previously been the 'top' school was near the bottom of the heap, much to the consternation of many of the parents.

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Taking into account "value added" is equally misleading.

Crony B.Liar once trotted out that Grammar Schools don't add as much value to a child's education as Comprehensives.

Mathematically the statement is correct but the conclusion to be drawn is highly misleading. Grammar Schools have an obviously higher number of students whose TMGs (target minimum grades) are the maximum grade that can be awarded, i.e: A* at GCSE or A at A Level. It is impossible to add value to a child's education when they are expected to achieve the highest grades from the outset.

Thus if the TMG is A* and the child gets an A* then the value added is zero. A child with a TMG of F but actually gets a D nets a value added score for his/her scool of +2.

The statement is obviously in support of his Socialist agenda for a one-size-fits-all education system that promotes equality of outcome over equality of opportunity.



Regards,

Steve.

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The choice we have in the UK has always been less tax + less public spending (Tory) Vs more tax + more public spending (Labour).

New Labour was never about changing that but about keeping the Labour party's nutters away from anything they could mess up. The Tories, by contrast, have put their nutters in charge.

Overall, It's really about whether you want us to be more like the US or more like Scandanavia.

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The above is all fair comment, and was the basis for my voting Labour back in 1997.

Major was a nice enough bloke but he was weak, and his government was rather corrupt. Kenneth Clark was a great chancellor, probably the best we've ever known, but Gordon Brown was talking the same language and he promised to make the Bank of England independent of direct government control - a great move, and one we cannot possibly regret.

I was in favour of the National Minimum Wage as the UK was the only Western country not to have it and to me this was shameful. It didn't bring about an increase in unemployment as the Tories feared.

I believed that by keeping the economy sustainably bouyant and strong by avoiding boom/bust (and Keynsian-style borrowing to smooth out the effects of bust) Labour could deliver improvements in healthcare, education and infrastructure without having to raise taxes directly or indirectly.

I agreed that it was better to improve public services than to cut taxation further.

However, taxes have gone up, and if they continue to do so they will squeeze the life blood out of the economy so that the flow of cash into treasury coffers will actually fall instead of rising with the increasing fiscal burden.

The ideology of Socialism did not die with New Labour, and the longer they remain in power the more their ideological instincts will adversely influence their judgements - the economy will eventually fail as a result. It won't happen quickly, but it will happen eventually.

Meanwhile there is the gradual erosion of civil liberties, but that is another matter....

It is time for a change, and whilst Howard is no angel either I feel he does have principles. He is also tough enough to face off Blair unlike his two predecessors.

Regards,

Steve.

[This message was edited by Steven Toy on Thu 10 June 2004 at 4:07.]

When history records what occurred in the world in the early part of the twenty-first century, and the UK's part in it, it will, I'd wager, not make mention of PFI, Petrol Duty increases, top up tuition fees, foxhunting, speed cameras or a whole pile of other things.

It will focus on the UK's involvement in US-led "wars": against terrorism (indeed the preposterousness of waging "war" on a state of mind) and Iraq (or the wider Middle East/Islamic-led world). It will record our culpability in facilitating what I suspect will become the bloodiest civil war in history.

History will paint Blair as a fool for failing to show any contrition for getting it wrong. It will paint us - with incredulity - as greater fools for re-electing him.

Worse will befall Bush and the Americans, but that's small comfort.

When I travel abroad now I tell people I'm Scottish. I am more proud/less embarrassed of my grandfather's nationality than that of the rest of my family. Vast percentages of the population of the globe hate us. And frankly, I'm not sure I don't agree with them.

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Originally posted by Laurie Saunders:

Well isn`t it the same issue? The Government claim that extra £millions are being put int education. Where is it all going?


Laurie S

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Laurie, I suggest you go down to your nearest University to see where, at least some of it is going. Here in Norwich, UEA has new buildings, residences, lots of new staff, equipment and researchers - it's the same with our new teaching Hospital too. All done with government funding.

The University was stagnant before Labour came to power. Some things need state funding. When people say 'Where is all the money going' I do wonder if they ever use public services at all.

Regards

Stephen

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Originally posted by Steven Toy:
It is time for a change, and whilst Howard is no angel either I feel he does have principles.


[This message was edited by Steven Toy on Thu 10 June 2004 at 4:07.]

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I agree. Didn't they belong to Margaret Thatcher?



Stephen

Stephen- I agree. I had 7 major school extensions to do last year (mainly sports halls), I have three school extensions on site currently and 2 university blocks to design this summer. There is a massive amount of cash going into schools.

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Originally posted by Don Atkinson:
Dom,

_no taxes and I'd not have to work either._

I don't believe you've thought about this very carefully.

_I'm not going to feed you;

and I think that pooling my efforts and results with Matthew R and Alex G (?? why not??) will put us in a stonger position to survive. Obviously you don't want to share in this, or similar enterprises_

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Well, I've no problem with killing an animal to eat it. As for "survival of the fittest" - if that still happened now I'd be dead within 2 days of birth so I'd not be here in this thread anyway, so that's irrelevant!

Don - re your question on my short term solution for the overpopulation - that's easy. Do the Dead Kennedys thing and "kill the poor" (and chavs) Just kidding. No, I think Nature will find a way personally; HIV didn't work so it'll produce something like a far more robust version of the Plague within a few years. Watch and see - Nature always self regulates sooner or later.

__________________________
Don't wanna be cremated or buried in a grave
Just dump me in a plastic bag and leave me on the pavement
A tribute to your modern world, your great society
I'm just another victim of your highrise fantasy!

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Originally posted by Don Atkinson:
Dom was whinging about having to work and pay taxes. He suggested life in a cave would be idyllic, no more work and no more taxes. I made it clear that I wouldn't feed such a person, in other words 'wake up Dom, you have to work to feed yourself'...yes, even in a cave.

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Ah, but, Don, I don't see feeding myself as "working"; we have to work to pay for food right now, but if it was caveman times, you're not forced to sit in a crappy overheated office with people you don't neccessarily like, being stressed out at muppets ringing/emailing with stupid problems; you feed yourself as and when. I'd much rather be a farmer than what I do now, but the pay's too pants; being a self sufficient farmer in Thailand though, I could handle.

__________________________
Don't wanna be cremated or buried in a grave
Just dump me in a plastic bag and leave me on the pavement
A tribute to your modern world, your great society
I'm just another victim of your highrise fantasy!

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It will record our culpability in facilitating what I suspect will become the bloodiest civil war in history.

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What's your basis for this belief? I assume you're talking about Iraq, where there seem to be a tiny rump of terrorists and a huge majority of people with diverse views but where they really would like to simply get on with it. I don't see how there can be a true civil war, let along 'the bloodiest in history'.

Paul

"Do the Dead Kennedys thing and "kill the poor" (and chavs) Just kidding"

Erm, you do realise that the Dead Kennedy's were indeed "just kidding". And that, much like your sig, it's meant to be ironic/satire?

Matthew

Well Paul

Obviously I'm not a prophet, but Iraq is simply not a country. It is an assemblage of three/four very different groups of people, none of which agrees with the others. In fact to generalise rather about history in many ways - it was Britain's creation. We have seen what Saddam Hussein did to the Kurds, and it will happen again. Saddam, it seems, discovered the only way by which Iraq could be held together (not that I'm defending it of course). Democracy, quite apart from not being the perfect system people appear to believe it, is in many fundamental ways completely contrary to the teachings of the Koran. Many - possibly most - Iraqis simply do not want democracy, and certainly not Bush and Blair's enforced version of it. As it stands despite the presence of vast numbers of well armed troops from the strongest fighting nations on earth, there is already resistance and in-fighting. When (possibly if, although Vietnam suggests there will be an end eventually) those troops are withdrawn, the populace of Iraq will not suddenly start to get on with one another.

I regret that I strongly feel I might be in a position this time next year to say "I told you so". But I bloody hope I'm wrong, really I do.

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Originally posted by Matthew Robinson:
"Do the Dead Kennedys thing and "kill the poor" (and chavs) Just kidding"

Erm, you do realise that the Dead Kennedy's were indeed "just kidding". And that, much like your sig, it's meant to be ironic/satire?

Matthew

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Yep - of course; they're not after all a Nazi fascist punk band, unlike some of them

BTW - I know my sig's ironic, but in many respects this is what I'd want when I die - I'll probably end up as kebab meat or something Failing that, I might sell my body to medical research - I've heard they'll pay up front if you bequeath them your body, and since I have a rare syndrome, it's got to be worth something!

__________________________
Don't wanna be cremated or buried in a grave
Just dump me in a plastic bag and leave me on the pavement
A tribute to your modern world, your great society
I'm just another victim of your highrise fantasy!

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Stephen- I agree. I had 7 major school extensions to do last year (mainly sports halls), I have three school extensions on site currently and 2 university blocks to design this summer. There is a massive amount of cash going into schools.

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Ditto here

Though it`s a pity that (in my area at least) there is a chronic and desperate problem recruiting and retaining teaching staff.... so all that new equipment and new buildings (everlasting monuments to New Labour??!!)are sitting effectively idle

I think that the government could well take on board the response given about 10 years ago by Richard Branson as to what makes for a successful enterprise. The response was along the lines that the premises/facilities were largely inconsequential.....the critical point was to recruit the best quality, most highly motivated staff and treat and reward them very well indeed.

The above comments, sadly, simply reinforce my conviction that new Labour places more emphasis on PRESENTATION rather than CONTENT...ie if you can show the world shiny new buildings, then the fact that what goes on inside them is almost worthless doesn`t matter



laurie s

Laurie,

If you view the building of a new school or hospital as presentation rather than content then I'm not sure what anybody could do to convince you otherwise.

A better example of "presentation not content" would be, say, claiming "the NHS is safe in my hands" and then leaving our hospitals to gradually fall to bits.

Matthew