#COVID19 | Page 594 | Vital Football

#COVID19

Tier fucking three.

Seriously, I haven't been this angry since the Cummings affair. The devastation this is going to reap on businesses here is incalculable. Northern and midland areas that are already down on their arses.

And yet London is in tier 2.

I didn't mind tier 3 when you could at least go to a cafe or restaurant. All I want is a meal out with Mrs Pope every now and then, with or without the kids.

Yet this fucking government says Londoners can eat out all they want but people in Nottingham don't get the freedom to visit a cafe or restaurant.

A lot of guff has been talked about liberty by people who could barely spell it

But I do think we have a problem when we are not all in it together and when a government is saying that people in one area can't even have a meal out while others (incidentally, in London where the politicians are based) can do so to their hearts content.

And nottingham doesn't even have a big Covid problem anymore.

Absolutely fuming.
 
Pope John XXIII said:
Tier fucking three.

Seriously, I haven't been this angry since the Cummings affair. The devastation this is going to reap on businesses here is incalculable. Northern and midland areas that are already down on their arses.

And yet London is in tier 2.

I didn't mind tier 3 when you could at least go to a cafe or restaurant. All I want is a meal out with Mrs Pope every now and then, with or without the kids.

Yet this fucking government says Londoners can eat out all they want but people in Nottingham don't get the freedom to visit a cafe or restaurant.

A lot of guff has been talked about liberty by people who could barely spell it

But I do think we have a problem when we are not all in it together and when a government is saying that people in one area can't even have a meal out while others (incidentally, in London where the politicians are based) can do so to their hearts content.

And nottingham doesn't even have a big Covid problem anymore.

Absolutely fuming.
Click to expand...

I understand the anger but regional restrictions seem sensible to me. Why should an area with a fraction of infections be subject to the same restrictions as a hot spot?

And it's a bitter pill to swallow but it's more important that London has some semblance of normality than Nottingham.
 
strettea red said:
Despite austerity, public sector was still paid more than the private sector.
After 10 years of austerity, Public sector workers earned an average of £506 per week.
Private sector workers earn only £464 per week.
More public sector workers are enrolled in pension plans than private sector workers.
Those pensions are more generous in the public sector too.

Facts rock.
Click to expand...
This private v Public sector debate as gone on for as long as I can remember. When I started in the public sector (civil servant) in the mid to late 60's there was a perfectly fair system of awarding pay increases called Pay Research Unit (PRU) which over a 2 year cycle would compare civil service pay to comparable / similar jobs in the private sector. Adjustments would be made for things like pension contributions versus none contributory civil service pensions and other perks like cheap mortgages for bank workers and other similar things.
At the end of the period the PRU would arrive at conclusion based on their figures and Civil servants would receive a pay award on that basis every 2 years, in the intermediate year a small interim rise was sometimes awarded (my first pay rise in the interim year was 2/= / 10p per week. This system was independent, made sure pay / conditions remained comparable and was fair to all.
Obviously the Government of the day, I can't remember when or whether it was Labour or Tory decided they couldn't possibly have a system that was fair to all operating, because on occasions they awarded pay rises which were more than the Government wanted to pay so it was scrapped in exchange for free collective bargaining and things went down hill from there, constant disputes, bad feeling, pay restraint, pay freezes etc.
 
strettea red said:
A great piece by Jethro Elsden in the Telegraph yesterday...

Big government condemned Britain to a miserable postwar recovery. Let's not repeat the mistake with Covid


A grossly inflated state, vast economic damage, closure of much of the private sector. It’s not hard to see why the pandemic has been likened to a global war. Just as during World War Two, we are already seeing calls to maintain a permanently larger government which intervenes, spends, and taxes more. Research I am doing for an upcoming Centre for Policy Studies report suggests the key lesson from the postwar recovery is that this would be a serious mistake.

The Second World War is often hailed as the catalyst which ended the Great Depression and laid the foundations for postwar prosperity. In fact, it wasn’t until after the war – when the US ditched central planning and returned to a more free-market system – that prosperity truly returned to America.

Government spending in the US was slashed – falling 75 per cent between 1944 and 1947 – price and production controls were scrapped, and factories went back to producing consumer goods rather than the tools of war. Rationing ended and American consumers were able to buy new products once again. What followed was a near miraculous economic boom. Freed from the shackles of government control and driven by private investment and consumption, the economy created millions of new jobs ensuring most demobbed soldiers soon found work.


Similarly, in Japan, where inflation was in triple digits, and West Germany, where the people had resorted to bartering when the currency became worthless, killing inflation and freeing the market were key to postwar recovery, not increased government intervention and spending.

Meanwhile, in the UK, where government continued to intervene extensively, and the economy was heavily taxed and highly regulated, the private sector was impeded and recovery lagged embarrassingly behind most other countries. UK GDP per capita growth averaged just 2.1 per cent between 1949 and 1959, far below the 6.3 per cent achieved by West Germany.

Although people sometimes point to the Marshall plan as being responsible for West Germany having a stronger post war recovery than the UK, this is a misconception. For one thing, the UK actually received twice as much money from the plan as West Germany, and secondly the evidence suggests that the aid itself boosted growth only very marginally.

Of course, the coronavirus crisis and the Second World War are not identical. While the virus is tragically killing many people, it is not damaging infrastructure or buildings. Currencies and central banks broadly still have credibility, and it is unlikely we’ll see the hyperinflations that occurred in some countries. And governments have not imposed central planning on the economy (e.g. rationing) – market mechanisms are mostly still operating. However, there are enough similarities to warrant studying the postwar period to learn what governments should do to begin rebuilding the economy and public finances.

We now see light at the end of the tunnel, with near daily vaccine announcements giving us all a glimmer of hope that normal life will shortly resume. But we must be mindful that for the foreseeable future much of the economy, especially the private sector, will operate below capacity meaning government intervention will persist. Once the crisis subsides, many countries will be in a position similar to the end of World War Two: an economy with significant government interference compared to pre-crisis levels, a depressed private sector stifled by government control, and an immediate need to rapidly generate millions of new jobs.

The lesson of the postwar recoveries is that with robust consumer and investor confidence there is less need for government stimulus. As we saw in the early days of the pandemic, the private sector, when allowed, is certainly flexible enough to adjust to even the largest upheavals. If it was strong enough to restore prosperity after the war, it will certainly be able to handle the job of reigniting growth after the pandemic.

So we should eye with caution calls to maintain government intervention and spending in the post-Covid recovery. We know from looking back that such a strategy strangles the private sector and impedes growth. We must heed the lessons of postwar America, West Germany, and Japan, which teach us that reducing government spending, taxation, and interference in the economy will lead to a faster recovery. Rather than looking at maintaining large governments after the pandemic, what we need is smaller governments which intervene less; freeing the private sector and the resources it needs to power higher growth during the recovery

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/20...condemned-britain-miserable-postwar-recovery/
Click to expand...

This is not quite right. The decade immediately after the war saw the foundations laid of the welfare state and most of what we currently take for granted. Incidentally that decade saw more homes built than at any other decade since- some 4m ish- thats public sector buildings not private sector!

Much of the german recovery was due to the fact that the old boy network had been swept away and there were few organised interests to influence investment and innovation. Moreover, uk was still struggling to pay for an empire it was looking to divest.

These journo pieces make for a good read but the reality was nowhere near as simple as the author would have us believe.
 
Forest-England said:
He's gone! He's no longer Labour leader. Get over it!

Like I said Starmer had a really good day. But he's failing in the polls. Against the worse PM in history. I want a Labour govt. I don't like what's happening behind the scenes. And I believe he'll regret it.

They all said that Labour would be 20 points ahead in the polls with a centrists in charge. But it's early days.
Click to expand...
He only harps on about it to get a reaction from you. He is a very needy man and he needs you to respond as you are one of the only few people in his life who gives him any attention. Ignore him and he will move on.
 
strettea red said:
Agree that there has never been a better time for borrow, but a lot should be put into improving infrastructure and doling out contracts to UK firms. We are not constrained by EU competitive tender now, so we can offer tender to UK only firms.

It's like laundering on a national scale and NOTHING can go wrong.
Click to expand...

U mean like we did with PPE. Do me a favour bojo will tender to his m8s again
 
Calvin Plummer said:
I understand the anger but regional restrictions seem sensible to me. Why should an area with a fraction of infections be subject to the same restrictions as a hot spot?

And it's a bitter pill to swallow but it's more important that London has some semblance of normality than Nottingham.
Click to expand...
And it's exactly that attitude that has led to the need to "level up"

I can, and have, lived with restrictions. Prohibition on my city compared with elsewhere is where I draw the line and the government loses my cooperation.

From Wednesday, you can go in a cafe and have lunch. I cannot. Nottingham is not a hotspot; it has a below average number of cases per 100,000 and it was blatently obvious that the original rise in Nottingham was linked to two of the biggest unis in the country starting their term
 
Calvin Plummer said:
I understand the anger but regional restrictions seem sensible to me. Why should an area with a fraction of infections be subject to the same restrictions as a hot spot?

And it's a bitter pill to swallow but it's more important that London has some semblance of normality than Nottingham.
Click to expand...
I live in Lincolnshire where the disparity in infection rates is probably greater than anywhere else in the Country. In my district East Lindsey, there was one area within that district where the infection rate reached 1400 in 100,000 one day last week though it has since dropped back to a mere 700 / 100,000,
In other parts of Lincolnshire the rates are considerably below the national average, but the county as been treated as one and put in Tier 3. I don't know whether this is fair or not but no doubt easier to administrate. It will be interesting to see how they manage their mass testing programme in a county that is the best part of 100 miles from North to South with lots of far flung places
 
Forest-England said:
He's gone! He's no longer Labour leader. Get over it!

Like I said Starmer had a really good day. But he's failing in the polls. Against the worse PM in history. I want a Labour govt. I don't like what's happening behind the scenes. And I believe he'll regret it.

They all said that Labour would be 20 points ahead in the polls with a centrists in charge. But it's early days.
Click to expand...

What is Jeremy doing to support the leader then? Oh wait...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.