Slavery hypocrisy

! This post hasn't been updated in over a year. A lot can change in a year including my opinion and the amount of naughty words I use. There's a good chance that there's something in what's written below that someone will find objectionable. That's fine, if I tried to please everybody all of the time then I'd be a Lib Dem (remember them?) and I'm certainly not one of those. The point is, I'm not the kind of person to try and alter history in case I said something in the past that someone can use against me in the future but just remember that the person I was then isn't the person I am now nor the person I'll be in a year's time.

I saw a Facebook comment this morning from a local Labour councillor criticising the use of unemployed people bussed in to the centre of London to marshal the Jubilee concert.  This is “slavery” and of course, all down to the evil Tories.

I actually have some time for this councillor who, despite his politics mostly being fundamentally wrong to me, is doing a reasonable job in trying circumstances but this was a bit hypocritical really because I remember writing something a couple of years ago – April 2009 to be precise – about Gordon Brown proposing to force English children to do 50 hours of community service, threatening exam failure for those that refused.

There is nothing wrong with unemployed people doing community service and I’ve previously written various pieces on why unemployed people should be made to work in exchange for their benefits.  As it happens, the people the aforementioned councillor was referring to weren’t treated particularly well but that doesn’t make the principal wrong because it isn’t.  But what is interesting, though, is that forcing adults claiming unemployment benefits to do some community work for the benefit of those paying the benefits is considered to be wrong whilst an MP elected in Scotland proposing to force English children to do community service and threatening them with exam failure for not complying is apparently ok.

Isn’t it interesting how the moral compass is so often guided by the colour of someone’s rosette?

5 comments

  1. Stan (222 comments) says:

    The two most obvious flaws in the idea of making the unemployed work for their benefits are:
    1 Under the governments own rules you they are then unavailable for work and therefore no longer qualify for benefits
    2 You are replacing replacing private contractors with cheap labour and therefore creating unemployment. They did this in my local hospital a while back when they had groups of young offenders replacing the private gardening company they had previously employed. Fine as long as you like looking at random areas of weeds and piles of earth

    Why not give the unemployed longer hours, a decent wage and employment rights? It’s called job creation and is the opposite of current government policy. Hey, they would even pay tax and national insurance too….

    • wonkotsane (1133 comments) says:

      If the current rules are to be changed to make this happen then the current rules won’t matter. Naturally people would get all the time they need for job interviews and the community work would have to be for value added things that the local authority can’t afford to pay to be done.

  2. Ðave (21 comments) says:

    Why not give the unemployed longer hours, a decent wage and employment rights? It’s called job creation and is the opposite of current government policy. Hey, they would even pay tax and national insurance too….

    The only problem with that is how it is paid for. Current “austerity” measures are a reflection of the political class’s (reluctant and grudging) recognition that you can’t go on borrowing indefinitely. Sooner or later you have to repay your loans.

    The major problem we have at the moment is that the government is spending more than it receives. There are 3 possible responses:

    1 – Raise taxes

    2- Cut spending

    3 – Borrow money

    Option 1 has the major drawback in that it takes money from the productive part of the economy and channels it to the unproductive part. Soaking the rich – as proposed by those on the left of the political spectrum – frequently fails to produce the tax gain expected as those affected by it are either geographically mobile or else able to employ expensive accountants and tax lawyer – who incidentally probably attended University at the same time as some of the proponents of this policy.

    In the late 1990,s the much maligned Bush administration reduced tax rates for the very wealthy yet it was noted that tax revenues remained virtually unchanged.

    Option 2 is the harder one. One which the Coalition government for all it’s much trumpeted “austerity” seems reluctant to face as it continues to fund expensive overseas aid programmes and “initiatives” in a knee jerk attempt to tackle unfavourable situations that might cost it votes.

    Option 3 is that we borrow the money and invest it in the likes of job creation schemes or infrastructure improvements in the hope that it somehow kick starts economy and that tax receipts will finally match outgoing expenditure. It’s what I call the double or quits scenario, a gamble that if it fails will plunge this country into a Greek-style crisis with negative growth (decline) and political instability. Most of those who support this policy – like the leadership of the PCS trades union I’m a disenchanted member of – seem to do so out of self-interest. The PCS solution to our current economic crisis for example, employ more civil servants, seems more based on maintaining or increasing the power and prestige of the union leadership than any recognition of the blind that irresponsible politicians have taken us into.

    The problem is that our political class when faced with bad news stories they can’t spin or bury has become addicted to throwing money at the problem. For years now we’ve seen government ministers on the news promising X million for that or Y million for the other in response to the burning issue of the week. A long time ago I used to wonder where the money was coming from. Now I know, it was borrowing on the never-never!The only problem with that is how it is paid for. Current “austerity” measures are a reflection of the political class’s (reluctant and grudging) recognition that you can’t go on borrowing indefinitely. Sooner or later you have to repay your loans.

    The major problem we have at the moment is that the government is spending more than it receives. There are 3 possible responses:

    1 – Raise taxes

    2- Cut spending

    3 – Borrow money

    Option 1 has the major drawback in that it takes money from the productive part of the economy and channels it to the unproductive part. Soaking the rich – as proposed by those on the left of the political spectrum – frequently fails to produce the tax gain expected as those affected by it are either geographically mobile or else able to employ expensive accountants and tax lawyer – who incidentally probably attended University at the same time as some of the proponents of this policy.

    In the late 1990,s the much maligned Bush administration reduced tax rates for the very wealthy yet it was noted that tax revenues remained virtually unchanged.

    Option 2 is the harder one. One which the Coalition government for all it’s much trumpeted “austerity” seems reluctant to face as it continues to fund expensive overseas aid programmes and “initiatives” in a knee jerk attempt to tackle unfavourable situations that might cost it votes.

    Option 3 is that we borrow the money and invest it in the likes of job creation schemes or infrastructure improvements in the hope that it somehow kick starts economy and that tax receipts will finally match outgoing expenditure. It’s what I call the double or quits scenario, a gamble that if it fails will plunge this country into a Greek-style crisis with negative growth (decline) and political instability.

    Most of those who support this policy – like the leadership of the PCS trades union I’m a disenchanted member of – seem to do so out of self-interest. The PCS solution to our current economic crisis for example, employ more civil servants, seems more based on maintaining or increasing the power and prestige of the union leadership than any recognition of the blind that irresponsible politicians have taken us into.

    The problem is that our political class when faced with bad news stories they can’t spin or bury has become addicted to throwing money at the problem. For years now we’ve seen government ministers on the news promising X million for that or Y million for the other in response to the burning issue of the week. A long time ago I used to wonder where the money was coming from. Now I know, it was borrowing on the never-never!

  3. Ðave (21 comments) says:

    Sorry about the length of the above post – a hamfisted paste from MS Word & a failure to proof read!

    Sorry again

  4. Israel (1 comments) says:

    Everyone and everybody can enjoy the satisfaction of these getaways.

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