Public sector strikes

[Sawyer]

I would be more than happy to pay an extra 5p on the pound income tax so long as the pain was experienced by all

A good start would be to collect the vast amount of tax already owed (by the super-rich, not ordinary people). They won't do that by cutting 25,000 Inland Revenue staff though, will they? The people who caused this mess have no intention of paying for it themselves and have so far, been successful in handing all of us the bill, whilst holding onto their own immense wealth. 'We're all in this together', is one of the most spectacular lies of all time.

More leftwing twaddle. Where is your evidence? Although I do agree with the statement The people who caused this mess have no intention of paying for it . There was a very interesting and well-researched documentary questioning just how opaque are the finances of Blair, who took us to war, twice.

Now then, let's have a little look at this one shall we? The BBC, hardly noted as a purveyor of 'left wing twaddle' (sic), mentions 20,000 job losses in HMRC, with another 12,000 planned. 200 tax offices have already been closed. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-13885311

Well researched and unbiased enough for you?

Not quite sure how a documentary about Tony Bliar's wars and opaque finances relate to this particular question? (Not that he, and his cronies are blameless for allowing avoidance by the super rich of course).

 

[flanajb]

We won't see eye to eye on this, but I agree the city screwed up, but did anyone complain when the city was contributing billions to the treasury during the boom years. No!

They contributed as little as possible and are masters of tax evasion (aided and abetted by their mates in government). The city wide boys owe the UK taxpayers billions. Enough to pay the deficit, in fact.

I think you need to check your facts on that one. Are you talking about the minority of people on mega high salaries in London or in general. The reason I ask is that most people in the city are PAYE like everyone else. Tax evasion is not possible under that scheme.

The majority of people in this country read the Daily Mail and think they know everything about the city. A little bit of knowledge can be a dangerous thing.

 

[beech1948]

Beech again you are misjudged what Thatcher did to taxation. She misused North Sea Oil Revenue to pay for her taxation and misspending of her govt. Not a viable option then or now and only gained in the short term like her govt and all proceeding govts that followed, that is what her service directed outcome of her policies generated.

I misjudge nothing. The old saw about North Sea Oil is another myth usually put about by the Scots.

North Sea oil revenue would have been better spent supplying jobs for then and the future, Infrastructure of the country and supporting new product development/business. All things Thatcher should have done and any govt worth it salt should do. To project future growth and revenue opportunities is well within their scope. In business a five year plan I have spent my life working in large companies both in general management, MD roles as well as Strategic Planning. NO company has or keeps a 5 yr plan today and has not done so from the 1980's. Change is so fast that such a long range plan would hobble rather than aid a company. Certainly as MD of my company I keep a strict 1 yr budgeted plan, the next year is outlined but not yet firm and year 3 is simply a wish list. We are the most productive in our sector. Investment needs good planning for the investment but a 5 yr plan is no real help these days.to invest to reach an outcome is good planning along with support for investment, no CEO or owner could do so without. Can you tell me Thatchers planned outcome for UK, split local tax to a new system that generated ill will, spend ever decreasing natural asset to fund tax cuts that fuel what spending on imports due to lack of products produced in this country or fuel lifestyles that continued the rich to get richer, sell its assets in public utilities to finance what greed or fail in the future to be able to regulate or stipulate cost of power/gas. Who did we sell our crown jewels to and what was the benefit to the lowly tax payer/previous owner. Yes Thatcher was great for Great Britain was she not.

Hind sight is great is it not as well as rationalising after the fact. Thatcher delivered much to GB. The Poll Tax was a mistake but we all make them. The failure of GB industry is more to do with that industries lack of investment than any Government lack of spending. I see and feel where your view comes from but I do not feel you have it in balance yet. People expect too much from all Governments and do not do enough for themselves.

Al

 

[doorframe]

People expect too much from all Governments.
Al

On the contrary. People expect nothing from Governments any more. And that's just what they get. Except dumped-on maybe.

That's why voter apathy is so high. It just doesn't matter who gets in. They're only there to line their own purses. They say what they want when in opposition. Once they're in.....U-Turn on everything. Get rich. Get out. Next please.

 

[Modernist]

Modernist,
You said>>>>>>
I don't agree with several of your points re education etc
<<<<
This is a matter of public record and is from the figures published by the DoEd. I don't care if you agree or not but you can't disagree with these figures.

Which figures? Before you answer you might like to take into account that my wife is an OFSTED inspector.

I do agree. What I find hard to stomach is that you appear willing to accept it. You identify it but condemn yourself to no choice, no action. Why are you defeated

I am not defeated and how do you know what I do about it? Given that the current crisis has amply illustrated that national governments are powerless against global markets there is little hope of individual progress. If we accept the concept of globalisation, which all governments have, then the only balancing force would be a united Europe, hence Merkel's position.
This of course does not go down well with the island Britain brigade so poorly lead by the current incumbent. What influence do you think we could have in Europe after the tories devastatingly damaging performance over the years. Most industrialists of course ignore the silly person politicians and carry on trading regardless but how different it could have been. Anyone who thinks UK can prosper in isolation in a globalised world is deluded.

What will actually happen is that poverty will enforce common sense on the posturing politicians and we simply will not have the cash for expeditions to Iraq, Afganistan and the like and a good thing too. That incidentally is also the view of the editor of the FT.

The only way out of this mess is Keynsian economics as it always has been before. This is not borrowing to pay for borrowing as the tories bleat but funds for investment to generate the profits to pay the debts.

 

[beech1948]

Modernist,
You said>>>>>>
I don't agree with several of your points re education etc
<<<<
This is a matter of public record and is from the figures published by the DoEd. I don't care if you agree or not but you can't disagree with these figures.

Which figures? Before you answer you might like to take into account that my wife is an OFSTED inspector.

The following figures direct from DoE published annual statistics ( last full set was for 2009):-

21 % leave school and are illiterate...can't read nor write well enough to register
24% leave school and are innumerate...can't count, add up nor calculate decimal fractions
46 % of children can not achieve a Grade C GCSE

These rates of production can only be described as failure.

Just in case you decide to argue I invite you to come to our latest set of interviews for graduate trainee consultants in February 2012. It should be very illuminating for OFSTED to see what they are producing against the requirements and needs of industry.

There are only two common and basic global languages. 1) Math 2) Business.

Being an OFSTED inspector is neither here nor there. Not really that important. Does she teach. Does she deliver employment ready youths who can deal with the complexity of business. Is she a doer or a watcher.

Keynesian economics eh ?. I am not sure about this in the simplistic way you throw it in. The theory is OK the practice is much less sound. It's interesting that no major economy has tried to implement a Keynesian economy in the past 60 yrs. Some debt is OK and even essential. Many business deals could not proceed without debt however short term eg importing a boat load of stuff from China. Keynes would have us all pay up front with no debt this would cause a banking riot when a boat load of stuff was rejected at the factory inbound goods inspection for example.

I agree that debt is generally not so good. Uncontrolled debt is bad. Uncontrolled debt underwritten by Government is very bad. Hence our current economic woes.

I'm reminded of my first board meeting and an old finance director looking at me to say ....Turnover is vanity, Profit is sanity, Cash is survival. He was right then and would be correct now and thats' a spread of 28 years.


Al

 

[Karl]

f
21 % leave school and are illiterate...can't read nor write well enough to register
24% leave school and are innumerate...can't count, add up nor calculate decimal fractions
46 % of children can not achieve a Grade C GCSE

If those figures are true i'd be amazed. Particularly the 1st and 3rd.

 

[Sawyer]

We won't see eye to eye on this, but I agree the city screwed up, but did anyone complain when the city was contributing billions to the treasury during the boom years. No!

They contributed as little as possible and are masters of tax evasion (aided and abetted by their mates in government). The city wide boys owe the UK taxpayers billions. Enough to pay the deficit, in fact.

I think you need to check your facts on that one. Are you talking about the minority of people on mega high salaries in London or in general. The reason I ask is that most people in the city are PAYE like everyone else. Tax evasion is not possible under that scheme.

The majority of people in this country read the Daily Mail and think they know everything about the city. A little bit of knowledge can be a dangerous thing.

Firstly, let me assure everyone that I am not a Daily Mail reader!
I was not so much referring to individuals on PAYE, but to big business tax evasion. Egs:

Vodafone: let off a 6bn tax bill by HM Revenues & Customs.
Boots: moved to a Swiss tax haven. Last year paid £14 millon on profits of £475m.
There are plenty of others.

 

[Modernist]

Modernist,
You said>>>>>>
I don't agree with several of your points re education etc
<<<<
This is a matter of public record and is from the figures published by the DoEd. I don't care if you agree or not but you can't disagree with these figures.

Which figures? Before you answer you might like to take into account that my wife is an OFSTED inspector.

The following figures direct from DoE published annual statistics ( last full set was for 2009):-

21 % leave school and are illiterate...can't read nor write well enough to register
24% leave school and are innumerate...can't count, add up nor calculate decimal fractions
46 % of children can not achieve a Grade C GCSE

These rates of production can only be described as failure.

Just in case you decide to argue I invite you to come to our latest set of interviews for graduate trainee consultants in February 2012. It should be very illuminating for OFSTED to see what they are producing against the requirements and needs of industry.

There are only two common and basic global languages. 1) Math 2) Business.

Being an OFSTED inspector is neither here nor there. Not really that important. Does she teach. Does she deliver employment ready youths who can deal with the complexity of business. Is she a doer or a watcher.

Keynesian economics eh ?. I am not sure about this in the simplistic way you throw it in. The theory is OK the practice is much less sound. It's interesting that no major economy has tried to implement a Keynesian economy in the past 60 yrs. Some debt is OK and even essential. Many business deals could not proceed without debt however short term eg importing a boat load of stuff from China. Keynes would have us all pay up front with no debt this would cause a banking riot when a boat load of stuff was rejected at the factory inbound goods inspection for example.

I agree that debt is generally not so good. Uncontrolled debt is bad. Uncontrolled debt underwritten by Government is very bad. Hence our current economic woes.

I'm reminded of my first board meeting and an old finance director looking at me to say ....Turnover is vanity, Profit is sanity, Cash is survival. He was right then and would be correct now and thats' a spread of 28 years.


Al

You're an aggressive so an so it seems.

Your stats are rubbish and would not be published by the DES in that way. I shall investigate.

I see we are discounting anything to do with art, humanities or culture. There is more to life and education than maths and business.

For myself I have owned and run an successful engineering business for 20 years and I have found all the students we have worked with to be highly impressive and capable in that time and have had to a great deal more hard work than I had to in my day.

What do you do?

 

[Allylearm]

Beech again we are talking of Thatcher and a five year plan has to be taken into the life of any parliament, or are they planning for the following election I think not MP's cannot think past there next recess or junket to attend. So oil revenue went where, did it just vanish or was it like the moon landing and never happened as it made nothing from tax revenue.

A year is short for any planning with enlargement being intended, infrastructure or planning control can swallow up time. But with product change or development I would agree though, but sometimes this gets prolonged due to market forces.

 

[barkwindjammer]

We won't see eye to eye on this, but I agree the city screwed up, but did anyone complain when the city was contributing billions to the treasury during the boom years. No!

They were being reckless with billions, contributing to their own bank balances, bonuses and private trust funds, to be paid for at a later date.

Every good story has a beginning, a middle and an ending. :ho2

 

[jack55]

I have been in public services for the past 37 years. For 36 years I have contributed to my pension provision. Not by choice, it was a condition of employment that after 12 months employment I had to join the pension scheme. The contribution is deducted at source. In return I was promised 1/80th of my final salary for every year I contributed, with a maximum of 40 years. This is not gold plated! I have consently heard in the past few days that those in the public sector should be grateful to have a job. However, I doubt very much those same people would tell that to the face of the fireman who is trying to save their property from burning to the ground, or to the paramedic who is at the scene of an accident or other serious injury, trying to save their life. “ I CANNOT afford to have a pension” is the other mantra which is being trotted out. Yet these same individuals expect that the dinner lady, road sweeper or bin man can afford to pay for their own retirement, which of course they do. The local government pension scheme was reviewed two years ago, benefits were reduced and contributions increased, now it seems we are expected to welcome even more changes. Not to make the pension scheme more affordable but to pay the debts the bankers have ranked up for us all. I will not get a salary increase this year or the next two years, any increases I had in the past rarely were at the same level as inflation. I manage the waste services here in the north east of Scotland, my staff work in all conditions, be it torrential rain or snow blizzards, they earn their wages and the contribute to their pension. They have the right to expect that their employer will honour their part of the contract. If they are lucky and have worked for 40 years they could get £9,000 in a pension, but it’s more likely to be 20 years and get 4,500 a year.

 

[StevieB]

I think you are missing a rather important point Jack - your contribution to your pension in a year does not equal 1/80th of your final salary. This is the way most final salary schemes used to work, with the employer contributing to the pot as well. For example, the scheme I was in took an employee contribution of 6.35% and an employer contribution of 14% to pay out a 40/80ths final salary on retirement. This has recently been closed to new entrants, employee and employer contributions raised becasue the pot was not enough to pay out existing and future liabilities for staff currently in the scheme, let alone new joiners. In your case you are bemonaing the percentage you pay increasing, but there is no 14% equivalent from your employer, its paid for by the tax collected from all of us. Just the same as a private scheme, the pot becomes too small to pay existing and future liabilities without huge tax rises for everyone. The crux of the argument is whether this is fair - and to a large degree this depends on whether you are on the public or private sector side of the line. Previous contributions are protected, so nobody has lost anything except an expectation that things would stay the same for 40 years when they signed up - prehaps an unrealistic assumption given the pace of change in the world?

Confusing the pension issue with the 'worth' of the job in question - teacher, nurse, fireman etc is emotive but irrelevant.

Steve

 

[jack55]

I fully understand my percentage payment did not fully equate to the 1/80th which is why the money paid in to pension funds is invested and the return on the investments goes into the pot. The employers are also required to put in their contribution, and for some considerable time their contribution was small. It was part of the overall agreement. But to force someone to join a scheme, take their money, then want to renage on the deal is not in my opinion fair. Especially after the scheme was reviewed and the deal then was the final salary scheme would remain providing it could prove to be viable, which is why the changes were made to the scheme a couple of years ago. I am not bemaoning the fact I may be asked to pay more, like I said we have already had an increase, and changes have been made to the scheme, so I am not expecting nothing would change over 40 years. What I do object to is having already accepted changes they are proposing more changes, which will not contribute to the pension fund but rarther the treasury. It is just a stealth tax. I have no doubt that changes will be made to the scheme and new entrants will find they are offered different terms. However, it is short sighted to think the Tax payer will not eventually have to pick up the bill anyhow. It is no longer a condition of employment to be part of the pension scheme, so if the benefits are not to be forthcoming then lots will opt out and rely on the state to provide for them in their old age.
What seems to be happening is instead of the aurgument for a fair pension for all, we are sinking to the lowest common denominater.

The reference to the public sector workers is not to judge their worth but rarther to make the point its easy to bemoan the public sector until you need it. Maybe thats the discussion that needs to be had, not whether the public sector workforce has a pension scheme but rather do we need a public sector. Maybe we should just pay for all the service we use directly, no free health service, or education, toll roads, pay as you throw and no welfare service. It would be easy to transfer some public services to none for profit companies which make a direct charge for the services they provide.

Oh and I don't expect to retire earlier than anyone else my retirement age is at the moment 65.

 

[RogerS]

We won't see eye to eye on this, but I agree the city screwed up, but did anyone complain when the city was contributing billions to the treasury during the boom years. No!

They contributed as little as possible and are masters of tax evasion (aided and abetted by their mates in government). The city wide boys owe the UK taxpayers billions. Enough to pay the deficit, in fact.

And your evidence is where? Please spare us the leftwing rhetoric unless you can back it up with some unbiased figures

Well, let's start with some right wing rhetoric shall we? Even the Daily Telegraph admits it's £35 billion. Not an insignificant sum, I feel.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/econ ... -year.html

Sorry but you need to do better than that. Apart from the headline catching £35 bn nowhere else in the article is it mentioned. Nor does the article specifically say that who they are targetting. In fact they are targetting everyone.

I'd like a better example than the one you've given.

 

[Sawyer]

And your evidence is where? Please spare us the leftwing rhetoric unless you can back it up with some unbiased figures

Well, let's start with some right wing rhetoric shall we? Even the Daily Telegraph admits it's £35 billion. Not an insignificant sum, I feel.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/econ ... -year.html[/quote]

Sorry but you need to do better than that. Apart from the headline catching £35 bn nowhere else in the article is it mentioned. Nor does the article specifically say that who they are targetting. In fact they are targetting everyone.

I'd like a better example than the one you've given

And your point is what: Daily Telegraph too left wing is it?
Still, on further enquiry it appears 35bn is the wrong figure: take a look at what the Daily Mail reports today: seems the gap is actually 42bn :!: Mervyn King slating HMRC for it.

And by the way - yes, they are targetting everybody (ie ordinary folk) for it. If they won't take it off the tax-dodgers the less well off majority will have to fork out: VAT, library closures &c. &c.

Hoping of course that Our Merv's opinion is not considered 'left wing twaddle' . :mrgreen:
And if the Daily Mail is too Trotskyist to be relied on, the Financial Times also has stuff on this.

 

[RogerS]

A good start would be to collect the vast amount of tax already owed (by the super-rich, not ordinary people). They won't do that by cutting 25,000 Inland Revenue staff though, will they? The people who caused this mess have no intention of paying for it themselves and have so far, been successful in handing all of us the bill, whilst holding onto their own immense wealth. 'We're all in this together', is one of the most spectacular lies of all time.

More leftwing twaddle. Where is your evidence? Although I do agree with the statement The people who caused this mess have no intention of paying for it . There was a very interesting and well-researched documentary questioning just how opaque are the finances of Blair, who took us to war, twice.

Now then, let's have a little look at this one shall we? The BBC, hardly noted as a purveyor of 'left wing twaddle' (sic), mentions 20,000 job losses in HMRC, with another 12,000 planned. 200 tax offices have already been closed. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-13885311

Well researched and unbiased enough for you?

Not quite sure how a documentary about Tony Bliar's wars and opaque finances relate to this particular question? (Not that he, and his cronies are blameless for allowing avoidance by the super rich of course).

I wasn't referring to the number of jobs being lost in HMRC. I was referring to your first sentence.... The reference to the programme on Blair's company suggested that he had spun a web of companies upon companies and so the true picture as to how much tax was due by both him and his companies was clouded in uncertainty. So you need to stick Blair in that group of 'super-rich' who avoid tax.

 

[RogerS]

Sawyer...you're still missing the point (and the right quote marks to make any sort of sense). Of course there is tax revenue that could be collected. Plucking figures of £35 bn or £42 bn are just newspaper headlines. The point is though that this money is spread across the whole population...not just those at the top (and who are probably non-domiclled here anyway)

 

[Sawyer]

I wasn't referring to the number of jobs being lost in HMRC. I was referring to your first sentence.... The reference to the programme on Blair's company suggested that he had spun a web of companies upon companies and so the true picture as to how much tax was due by both him and his companies was clouded in uncertainty. So you need to stick Blair in that group of 'super-rich' who avoid tax

But I wasn't talking about Blair in the first place.
Corporate tax avoidance was my point. Rather than making ordinary people pay, they should collect the 35bn, 42bn or whatever the figure is from the scoundrels who have been dodging it.
Drastic cuts in HMRC are not going to assist with this.
And yes, super-rich Blair is quite possibly one of the culprits himself.

 

[RogerS]

Wrong the govt are spending more than labour plan, I have done the arithmetic. Maggie good for South England and bad for everyone else.

Any chance we can see your figures? Oh, I already asked this question.