Pubic Sector Cuts

[Dawg]

This is all the usual mindless pub bore bar ranting. Essentially most of you are clueless and I wouldn't employ you to wash my socks. Firstly we must axe the welfare state to all but the most needy. Living on benefits has become a lifestyle choice for great swathes of the country. What about all the waste in the private sector that has to be dealt with using public funding.

Pot calling kettle twot, eh lorro?

 

[leemason]

This is all the usual mindless pub bore bar ranting. Essentially most of you are clueless and I wouldn't employ you to wash my socks. Firstly we must axe the welfare state to all but the most needy. Living on benefits has become a lifestyle choice for great swathes of the country. What about all the waste in the private sector that has to be dealt with using public funding.

Have you been in touch with David Cameron? Such finely argued and intelligently conveyed argument is worthy of more wide spread discussion. He could possibly give you a seat in his "Star Chamber".

 

[JonM]

For those people who are interested, other governments have previously reduced huge deficits. This is how Canada did it back in 1995:

http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/179776

 

[Homshaw]

I think the Major change in the public sector needs to be a shift from “is this service needed?” or “is this service good?”

To

“Does this service offer value for money?”

The highways agency “officers” in their 4x4s that are dressed up to look as close to police cars as possible. I can’t see how they offer value for money!

I think this does highlight a problem. The standard of public services and their cost is a joke. We are taxed heavily but the streets are dirty, there are pot holes everywhere, you can't get an appointment at the doctors and when you do see one the quality is poor

The problem is our taxes are used not to provide a service but to cater to the egos of public service staff. Doctors have had massive rises, MP's feel they deserve to fiddle their expenses, we are expected to provide pensions to public "servants" which we ourselves can't afford.

As for the Highways Agency I used to work for a Managing Agent. I could tell some stories

 

[cosmetics4less]

In the past the problem with public sector cuts is that the management in councils, hospitals, government depts and so on have been told to make x number of pounds worth of savings in their department.

Are they going to cut their jobs or wages? No of course not. So we end up with fewer nurses, dentists, dustmen, social workers, and reduced services while the managment and beaurocracy gets more and more top heavy.

I hope that this will be tackled this time and we make sure the cuts are made in the right places.

Lets get back to the time when hospitals were run by Matron and a secretary!

 

[montrano]

Half the problem with the country is all the nanny state European human rights rubbish we have to put up with.
We have prisons full of people, which from some figures I saw recently cost 25k per person per year. Isn't that more than the average wage. We either need to bring back capital punishment or privatize the system.
We've also got thousands of immigrants, who we shouldnt have taken anyway under asylum rules, that can't work. They either need to be removed or given working rights.
The public sector can be trimmed, with its countless highly paid beauracrats.
Money does need to be put back in though, the country needs to be making more money to clear the defecit.
At one point we were a world leader in science and engineering, now we seem to be made up of layabouts and sociology graduates

 

[leemason]

Half the problem with the country is all the nanny state European human rights rubbish we have to put up with.
We have prisons full of people, which from some figures I saw recently cost 25k per person per year. Isn't that more than the average wage. We either need to bring back capital punishment or privatize the system.
We've also got thousands of immigrants, who we shouldnt have taken anyway under asylum rules, that can't work. They either need to be removed or given working rights.
The public sector can be trimmed, with its countless highly paid beauracrats.
Money does need to be put back in though, the country needs to be making more money to clear the defecit.
At one point we were a world leader in science and engineering, now we seem to be made up of layabouts and sociology graduates

Human Rights legislation actually keeps many people out of prison. We should have the courage not to send so many people to prison. We have some of the highest imprisonment rates in Europe and there is no evidence that it actually works in stopping people from re-offending.

I would certainly agree that if asylum seekers loose their right to stay in this country we should make every effort to remove them immediately. I would also ensure that any foreign national who commits any offence more serious that a parking or speeding ticket should be considered for deportation.

We have never been very good at converting scientific discovery into technology and profits. We still produce World Class science but we need (and I hate to say it) to be more like the Americans on covering this into real products and profits for the UK.

 

[KDMINX]

no evidence that it actually works in stopping people from re-offending.

Giuliani made 5 year sentences mandatory for 3rd offence even minor offences. Any crime involving violence or the threat of violence got a mandatory 10 year minimum. When the prisons got full, he built prison ships.

5 years later they had the lowest prison population in their history.

Compare that to our yobs with dozens of ASBOs, every time they actually do get a trip in front of the magistrate they get a small fine that they don’t pay.

I would certainly agree that if asylum seekers loose their right to stay in this country we should make every effort to remove them immediately. I would also ensure that any foreign national who commits any offence more serious that a parking or speeding ticket should be considered for deportation.

Very very few asylum seekers come direct from their home country to the UK. They travel through other countries (often other EU countries) where they could have claimed asylum. If someone travels from France to the UK to claim asylum, they are an economic migrant not an asylum seeker. Otherwise they would have claimed asylum in France!

We have never been very good at converting scientific discovery into technology and profits. We still produce World Class science but we need (and I hate to say it) to be more like the Americans on covering this into real products and profits for the UK.

I aggree!

 

[Psl]

What cuts would you make if you were DC?

I’d start with a 50% reduction in public sector wages over £50k

So a nurse on £30k would still get £30k
An HR manager on 150k would get £100k

Re-distribute and save - Nurse 50K HR manager 50K.

I wonder how much would be saved if all Government expense accounts were scrapped? oh and Quangos must go.

 

[KDMINX]

Re-distribute and save - Nurse 50K HR manager 50K.

That's a bit Trot!

I wonder how much would be saved if all Government expense accounts were scrapped? oh and Quangos must go.

Brown gave them all company credit cards!

 

[Jeff FV]

Well, I'm pleased to see that Michael Gove has begun to swing the axe, shutting down the General Teaching Council - GTC - (http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6047336) a useless and pointless body, and also Becta. Not sure how much money it will save, but the GTC was a classic case of a bureaucracy being set up because it didn't exist, rather than there being a need for it.

And I agree with an earlier poster - pull out of Afghanistan. Genghis Kahn is the only foreign soldier to have won a war in Afghanistan. I don't think we will 'win' the war, I don't think that we are actually making the place a better place and I don't think our presence their is making our streets any safer. And the cost of this folly? - incalculable in terms of human life wasted and who knows in financial terms.

And whilst I do accept that public sector cuts are needed, it does gall that the crisis was precipitated by the private sector bankers. Squeeze them for more tax - and when they cry"we'll go elsewhere" call their bluff and let them. It is fundementally wrong that a large number of bankers (and I'm not just talking the odd one or two) can buy a (second) house for cash from one's years bonus in (say) Cornwall when a local may have to work 20 years to earn the same amount of money.

Sadly, I fear, that it will be the hardworking individual/family with an income (combined in a families case) between £18K - £40K that will be hardest hit.

 

[Rufford]

What a great thread. Fantastic emotion. I do fear that we're all in for a pay cut with the upping of the VAT rate Time for us all to pay.

 

[KDMINX]

What a great thread. Fantastic emotion. I do fear that we're all in for a pay cut with the upping of the VAT rate Time for us all to pay.

VAT is a tax where revenues increase as the tax rate increases. For almost all other taxes (particularly income tax and capital gains tax) it might be a vote-winner to “tax the rich more” but in fact, as you increase the rate revenues decrease (see Laffer curve).

This makes it almost certain that VAT (which is a regressive tax) will be increased in a couple of weeks time.

I just hope that whilst they’re at it they simplify the VAT system.

 

[leemason]

Well, I'm pleased to see that Michael Gove has begun to swing the axe, shutting down the General Teaching Council - GTC - (http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6047336) a useless and pointless body, and also Becta. Not sure how much money it will save, but the GTC was a classic case of a bureaucracy being set up because it didn't exist, rather than there being a need for it.

And I agree with an earlier poster - pull out of Afghanistan. Genghis Kahn is the only foreign soldier to have won a war in Afghanistan. I don't think we will 'win' the war, I don't think that we are actually making the place a better place and I don't think our presence their is making our streets any safer. And the cost of this folly? - incalculable in terms of human life wasted and who knows in financial terms.

And whilst I do accept that public sector cuts are needed, it does gall that the crisis was precipitated by the private sector bankers. Squeeze them for more tax - and when they cry"we'll go elsewhere" call their bluff and let them. It is fundementally wrong that a large number of bankers (and I'm not just talking the odd one or two) can buy a (second) house for cash from one's years bonus in (say) Cornwall when a local may have to work 20 years to earn the same amount of money.

Sadly, I fear, that it will be the hardworking individual/family with an income (combined in a families case) between £18K - £40K that will be hardest hit.

It's always hard working families in that bracket the suffer. I agree that Private Banks were undoubtedly to blame but so was Government regulation which allowed their greed to get out of control. I would be wholly in favour of a Windfall tax on Banks excess profits (as they can't fail to make massive profits as we crawl out of a recession). It's not the first time it will have been done and it certainly won't be the last time. Tory and Labour Governments have levied Windfall taxes on what they have seem from time to time as excess profit.

However I do think also that the public sector just grew too large under labour. Even in the best of times they ran a budget deficit which is unforgivable. How anyone could have thought that Brown was a prudent Chancellor is beyond me. One massive Albatross that we have around our necks though is PFI. We are locked into billions oif pounds of PFI contracts for decades to come! All because the Government wanted to spend money they didn't have a hide the bill!