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As we go further and further through the Brexit looking glass, having ‘Taken Back Control’ from Brussels, the government is now being told what to do by the UVF
You really couldn’t make it up
UK ministers meet representatives of NI paramilitaries to discuss Brexit
They do run significant import businesses to be fair.
Before this post of mine, the post count on this thread stood at 8888 - quite apt given much of the motivation behind the popular vote for Leave...
This is what has happened to our country:
"They took me to prison; then I burst into tears". The "nightmare" of a young graduated Italian woman at UK border after Brexit
Marta, 24, was supposed to work as au pair in London. However, without a working visa, she was sent to the Colnbrook Immigration Removal Centre. Every personal belonging was seized, including her smartphone, "because they didn't want me to take pictures or videos: my window had bars, walls barbed wire. I was shocked. Another young woman from Tuscany told me she had been held there for 5 days". Dozens of EU citizens have reportedly suffered the same since January the 1st
^^^^
Remainers think "shame on us".
Leavers think "that's more like it".
Labours saying the clauses could have been removed from the deals.
If, for example, a manufacturer imports raw materials into a Freeport and then turns out finished goods. Neither the raw materials nor finished goods are actually from the UK, so you'd expect them not to be included in any 'trade deal'. Or is this too simplistic?
What's wrong with a ticket on the next flight back and a free latte at Costa? Probably a lot cheaper.
What’s wrong with a ticket on the next flight back and a free latte at Costa? Probably a lot cheaper.
My daughters fiance went to Norway a week ago and although not part of EU they sent him home as his company had not filled out the proper paperwork. Told him not to work and be out of Norway in 24 hours or they would book him a flight out (at his expense)
How does that work if he can't afford it?
They pay for your flight and try to get it back later....
FCO (or whatever Johnson has called it now) will lend you the money.
Interesting. I guess now we'll get an answer to the question of whether the Great British youth will step up to fill the gap left by absent immigrant labour? Anyone want to place bets as to the outcome?
I've got an ad going at the minute for a receptionist, it has [checks listing] 347 applicants...so, my bet is that there are plenty of folk looking for work.
Not exactly hospitality though, is it. It will vary a lot by sector.
I’ve got an ad going at the minute for a receptionist, it has [checks listing] 347 applicants
I"ve got an ad for a senior javascript developer and have had 1 applicant in 3 months. My 16 year old had her first day yesterday in one of the local pubs working tables/glass collecting etc. £5 an hour, and they wonder why they struggle to recruit.
We've had an advert on indeed for a yardsman/handy man for over a month now and nothing. Very few British nationals applying for other jobs either. We're having to rely on agencies at the moment for temps. (Manufacturing and wholesale)
£5 an hour, and they wonder why they struggle to recruit.
But this is one of the main reasons for Brexit. The Brexit Tories want a massive reservoir of low-skilled, indigenous (can't 'go back home'), insecure 'gig' labour. This gives them and their mates free reign to make more dosh for themselves.
Gove wasn't kidding when he said he'd had enough of experts - what he really meant was he doesn't like being challenged, so keep the plebs in their place and keep the dividends up.
^^^^
I.e. a nation modelled on Sports Direct 🤢
Hmmmmm, the gift that keeps giving
https://twitter.com/campbellclaret/status/1394222170671353860?s=19
The Brexit Tories want a massive reservoir of low-skilled, indigenous (can’t ‘go back home’), insecure ‘gig’ labour.
Well they're not going to get it. If there's a shortage, wages and/or conditions will have to rise. You can't have a booming economy, low wages, and labour shortages at the same time. My 16 year old is doing that job because she wants a job and more independence, not because she needs the money. If she doesn't like it she'll walk away without even thinking about it.
You can’t have a booming economy, low wages, and labour shortages at the same time.
Of course you can, in a highly stratified society, with some sectors booming and others falling away.
My 16 year old had her first day yesterday in one of the local pubs working tables/glass collecting etc. £5 an hour, and they wonder why they struggle to recruit.
I've noticed a lot of jobs advertising at minimum wage (not specific as it varies by age) but if you dig back through the company's previous adverts the same jobs were being advertised for £9-11/hr. That's across lots of different sectors. One of my ex-colleagues secured work a few weeks ago but he has a clause that says he can't discuss his hourly rate with his colleagues who have the same clause. Somehow he managed to let one of them know he was on £8.99/hr only to be told that others were on anything between minimum and £10 for doing the exact same thing depending on when they joined. I even know one friend who can't get workers for the warehouse he manages as they advertise at minimum wage but his bosses refuse to let him increase it to get workers. They presume that with lots of unemployment people will just take what they can get, completely forgetting that even with reasonable wages they relied heavily on workers from Eastern Europe as they were the few who would put up with the working conditions.
These are going to become the new normal.
I am reasonably sure that clauses like that are legally unenforceable. My last but one job had one and I am sure its legality was thrown into question.
Google* provides the following: https://www.mytipsandadvice.co.uk/2019-09/are-pay-secrecy-clauses-legal-UKPPPSAR_EU03050301
Another link says pretty much the same thing, but then goes on to say roughly "but if you do discuss it, then your boss may well just fire you for being difficult"
You can’t have a booming economy, low wages, and labour shortages at the same time.
Of course you can, in a highly stratified society, with some sectors booming and others falling away.
Was going to concoct my own response to that bollocks blanket assertion, but kelvin has done it better than I can.
It is a kind of asymmetric, 'flexible', insecure workforce the Tories crave. See Britannia Unchained. Skills? Just enough to clean the moat, no more under any circumstances - that just leads to the plebs getting uppity.
Skills? Just enough to clean the moat, no more under any circumstances
That's not enforceable since if people cannot get skilled staff they will have no choice but to employ unskilled people and train them up, and I don't think the Tories will be able to stop that happening.
+1 Kelvin nailed it
and they wonder why they struggle to recruit
And you don't?
The benefits of FOM to business wasnt about low skilled labour cheap
European workers here were better qualified and paid more than non European
Its about flexibility - hence why UK never used the powers they had to send EU workers home who were out of work.
Brexit simply means more non European workers, who can be paid less and have a higher chance of becoming illegal when work dries up.
This is all part of the societal change that led to Brexit in the first place. There are fewer skilled jobs, but the pay gap between them and the unskilled jobs is widening. As the government continues to reduce state support, people will have no choice but to take those jobs - just look at the US. The only thing that puzzles me is that people who are in poverty don't make great consumers - so how are the people driving all of this going to make money?
Meanwhile Frost is crying that he didn't redirect EU to enforce the deal he negotiated & is threatening Article 16 (again)
They've released a new implementation plan, but vague on dates other than wanting an answer before loyalist marching parties in July!
Still requires checks but no rush to build facilities to carry them out
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-57133682
Can't see the EU agreeing to all of that
Options remain as they anyways were
https://twitter.com/Usherwood/status/1394178871562485762?s=19
That needs an extra row "effect on popularity of UK government with its voters in England".
They’ve released a new implementation plan, but vague on dates other than wanting an answer before loyalist marching parties in July!
Isn't it reassuring to know that your countries economic policies regarding trade with its neighbours is now being dictated by a minority of nutters in bowler hats who want to celebrate a victory in battle from a few hundred years ago
I'm sure that the behaviour of the Rangers fans over the weekend has focussed the governments minds in providing a small insight at what having flag-waving mobs trashing everything in sight is in store for NI in the summer.
I'm sure tat will all be the EU's fault too though
Are we all ready for the EU's new OSS/IOSS rules for third countries in July? And by "we", I mean people who make/sell/do/ship/supply/support/service things. Another clock ticks down...
There are fewer skilled jobs
Are there? Got a source for that?
There are fewer skilled jobs
Are there? Got a source for that?
I doubt it.
I can imagine that the middle of the skill sector is withering, as easy stuff becomes automated but the grunt work is still done by cheap exploited labour. Like for example, banking administration - the business of creating automated systems is in need of technical skills, but the medium-skilled people who used to do the actual admin are now no longer needed as much, perhaps.
There's presumably two sets of shortages... skilled and seasonal... and they overlap to some extent. We're not going to suddenly find British workers to fill the skills gaps, or prepared to do the seasonal stuff... never mind people with the required skills and prepared to do seasonal stints (and often away from home) where a job requires both.
Any company who forbids it's workers from discussing their pay is looking after themselves, not the workers. That would be a big red flag for me, not that I have much choice these days.
We’re not going to suddenly find British workers to fill the skills gaps, or prepared to do the seasonal stuff
Can’t see how a British worker can be seasonal tbh unless it pays enough money for the down time.
So, already this week... we have the Telegraph informing its readers that retiring to Spain is now so much harder for them due to Brexit, and we have good old David Frost... unelected government minister... telling us that... wait for it... THE GOVERNMENT WASN'T EXPECTING BREXIT TO BE SO DISRUPTIVE FOR NORTHERN IRELAND... and that they are setting up a new unit to... wait for it... LOOK FOR BREXIT OPPORTUNITIES.
Spending 5 years with your fingers in your ears looks to be finally coming to an end. Well, it should be. We've had strict new limitations self imposed on our rights and lives. The government still don't know how to solve the NI:Brexit conundrum, they were always just pretending they did, without explaining their solution... because they didn't have one. And all this new red tape, checks, paperwork and costs interrupting trade in the UK, and between the UK countries and the rest of Europe... it's all worth it for... Brexit benefits that those who sold this pile of shit to the public still haven't found!
we have the Telegraph informing its readers that retiring to Spain is now so much harder for them due to Brexit
Yep they’ll have to do a Spanish driving test for starters then there’s the sticky issue with health insurance if under 65 and proof of income,er a single applicant the minimum annual income needs to be at €27,155 - or €33,893 for a married couple.
They’ll need a none lucrative visa which is valid for one year, after which it is renewable for another two years (but sufficient income must be proved to cover both of years), then another two. After five years in Spain you can get a long-term one.
This is assuming your not going gold.
I think the retiring to Spain boat has sailed unless you’ve got the moolah, although it’s been hinted that Spain may do something but they aren’t in a hurry.
The skilled jobs total has almost disappeared...
I served my Time 1979 onwards in Darlington, my rough count of skilled jobs at that time in Darlington would be at least 20,000- rough count now would be 2000? The following employers have gone..
The Whesso
Rolling Mills
Torringtons
Cummins (just about)
Cleveland Bridge
Darlington Forge
Coles Cranes
Rothmans
Paton and Baldwins
Thats what i can remember...
However Amazon and Aldi have arrived
I think it was inevitable that skilled work would go with the whole global market.
I worked in a shoe factory oddly and it was a labour intensive process which is why mass production alway goes overseas and bespoke at a large price tag for the well heeled stays.
Anyway who wants a skilled workforce who may ask awkward questions.
And what constitutes a skill these days 🙂
Skilled work has changed. Lots of it out there, doesn’t mean the same old skills are in demand, or that we can fill the gaps now we have made it punitively hard to employ from outside the UK & Ireland. Companies will move to where they can fill key skilled roles more easily… taking any unskilled or more easily staffed skilled jobs with them.
Can’t see how a British worker can be seasonal tbh unless it pays enough money for the down time.
Easy - multiple seasonal jobs. No security, no build up of in service benefits, no build up of that pesky expertise. That is, effectively, the 'gig' economy in a nutshell.
The term 'flexible workforce' is one that businesses will be majoring on more and more. Of course the 'flexibility' is all theirs.
Selling ice cream to the rich kids in the summer for minimum wage and brollies to the rich adults in the winter, also for minimum wage.
And what constitutes a skill these days
JavaScript
Are there? Got a source for that?
Apologies. I haven't. I had assumed that automation in manufacturing and more recently in clerical work would have reduced the number of skilled jobs. And when you prompted me to go looking I discovered that I was wrong -
I spent the last few years of my career working on cross-sector skills programmes with Government in engineering and science. The UK has a chronic problem in many sectors with imminent retirement for about 50% of the workforce due to post-war demographics, cuts to training through the 80s and 90s and insufficient capacity in terms of trainees, further and higher education to fill those gaps. A lot are small businesses who will simply close because there isn't anyone to do those jobs - it's roughly 50,000 jobs/year for 10 years. Government wasn't prepared to make the required level of investment, cut the funding to dick-about with the apprentice levy which has resulted in fewer trainees...all down the minister, Matt Hancock. Major infrastructure programmes like HS2 are critically dependent on non-UK skills - the QEC aircraft carriers couldn't have been built without huge numbers of Poles and Slovaks. The irony is that "build back better" is going to be scuppered because Boris and chums have told those we need the most to bugger-off to appease the xenophobic gammons who voted for him - one alternative being boat-loads of immigrants from the Indian sub-continent.
Yep
Frosty desperately trying to leverage loyalist violence as the fault of the EU, come the annual bonfire, bigotry and parade season
https://www.ft.com/content/121e0a45-352e-4265-b2d8-3c73161705d7
Frosty
Fat little twunt.
@onewheelgood interesting. If foreign nationals made up the lower skilled workforce, and they are no longer available, the jobs would remain unfilled because people are unlikely to want to move to low skilled jobs.
This could increase demand for automation which is already growing and in demand.
I am reasonably sure that clauses like that are legally unenforceable. My last but one job had one and I am sure its legality was thrown into question.
That's my thoughts too but it seems to be more common now than it was previously. I actually heard it mentioned when I was interviewed to be an uplift driver at a well-known UK bike park back in September last year! Made me rethink the job a bit and meant I didn't give my all for the trial which meant I didn't get the job. Should have told them that was the reason why actually, does mean I'm reluctant to go there as a paying customer though.
Any company who forbids it’s workers from discussing their pay is looking after themselves, not the workers. That would be a big red flag for me, not that I have much choice these days.
If they're trying to essentially cheat their staff out of equal pay then what else are they trying to cheap out on?
There will be more of this type of thing to drive down wages (ie business overheads) for the next few years. I'm just wondering how the likes of the Daily Mail will manage to blame the whole thing on 'forriners' when there's loads of unfilled vacancies as people won't work for the truly crap companies.
Yep
Frosty desperately trying to leverage loyalist violence as the fault of the EU, come the annual bonfire, bigotry and parade season
What are they going to say when the world is pointing the finger at the UK for wrecking the GFA.
Talk up there /\/\ about changes to available jobs took me to this report
Middle-skilled jobs are increasingly exposed to this profound transformation. We estimate that 14% of existing jobs could disappear as a result
of automation in the next 15-20 years, and another 32% are likely to change radically as individual tasks are automated.
On a selfish note, I’m glad my mortgage only has a couple of years left so before I am impacted I’ll at least be debt free.
Ive not been able to read the whole report yet but need to, as I’m right in the firing line. To a degree, it’s as much a case of being on the right side of the changes that are not just on the way, but already arriving on a regular basis depending on your line of work.
I got to there from this article
Which included this little nugget
The report said that while the government had committed to “build back better”, “level up” and embrace “global Britain”, neither it, nor any major political party, had an economic plan for achieving those high-level objectives. “Any such strategy was notably absent from last week’s Queen’s speech,” it added.
Which I think most of us already knew
What are they going to say when the world is pointing the finger at the UK for wrecking the GFA.
That's a can that can still be kicked for a bit. That is this lot's MO. The majority of them are only marginally more intelligent than their support base. They don't know. They chose to endorse a pack of lies for their own political advancement and now the reality can't match the fantasy. Can anyone imagine utter cretins like Williamson being allowed near any senior jobs unless they'd changed the landscape to one where slavish adherence to stupidity is a job requirement?
This current rabble are going to crash and burn and they're taking us with them. What comes after could be really nasty if recent polls like Hartlepool are representative. The Hartlepool 'New Tory' voters probably still feel like they are 'part of' something - a resurgent nationalism/xenophobia/racism - and there are a lot more nasty little fascist types out there.
This could increase demand for automation which is already growing and in demand.
One theory about the UK's consistently poor productivity is that as long as we had a supply of cheap labour to exploit there was insufficient incentive to invest in modern technology.
Er… “we” are the cheap labour. EEA workers in the UK were/are paid more. The need for migrant workers from nearby countries isn’t simply about cost, it’s about skills shortages and seasonal and geographical patterns of demand. And, dare I say it, age demographics and ability/availability to work. Someone has to keep this country working while the boomers do their crosswords.
There will be more of this type of thing to drive down wages (ie business overheads) for the next few years. I’m just wondering how the likes of the Daily Mail will manage to blame the whole thing on ‘forriners’ when there’s loads of unfilled vacancies as people won’t work for the truly crap companies.
Trouble is people need to eat and have a roof over their head.
People already work for crap companies so it’s not a new concept.
I think as in ‘1984’ the necessary war will be with the E.U.
Everything blamed on them as has been and forever will be.
At this rate, we'll have to sign trade deals with every country in the World... and then find another planet with more countries willing to sign deals, and then sign deals with all of them... just to come close to making up what stand to lose due to our awful (Johnson, Gove and Frost didn't negotiate and sign it, honest gov) new deal with the EU... never mind all the additional costs of Brexit...
https://twitter.com/Otto_English/status/1394541265748910083?s=20
https://twitter.com/Otto_English/status/1394542977234599936?s=20
Easy – multiple seasonal jobs. No security, no build up of in service benefits, no build up of that pesky expertise. That is, effectively, the ‘gig’ economy in a nutshell.
Yip. Apeing America, once again, which is the deregulated free-market model they want, now we’re ‘free’ of all those namby-pamby EU workers rights and regulations
If you’ve not done already then watch Nomadland. It’s an incredible film about a nomadic work force, chasing the seasonal work across America. A lot of them older because they can’t afford to retire. Amazon warehouse on the run up to Christmas, flipping burgers for tourists in the summer. Living out of the back of a van.
The future of work in the UK. Now that those pesky foreigners are gone, that fruit isn’t going to pick itself.
When furlough ends, there’s going to be a lot of unemployment. And this government isn’t going to want to be paying benefits when there’s minimum wage positions need filling. They’ll be turbo charging the mantra of Norman Tebbit
Someone has to keep this country working while the boomers do their crosswords.
And they will. For less and less, just so long as you keep pretending to them that you are going to deport everyone with brown skin or a foreign accent.
Someone has to keep this country working while the boomers do their crosswords.
Can't stand crosswords. Some of us have empathy and don't understand why our peers have opted to impoverish their children's generation. (That's when I don't want to hang them from lamp posts with piano wire for their lack of joined up thinking).
I still can't understand why Johnson would go for that Australia trade deal.
The benefits are outweighed by the loses, his attack on UK farmers would be a gift to Sturgeon.
From an environmental point of view shipping frozen meat from the other side of the planet as you push UK farmers out of business is madness
JavaScript
IT stuff can be offshored far more easily and cheaply than most things though?
I still can’t understand why Johnson would go for that Australia trade deal.
An Aussie trade deal will never make much sense - Australian customs tariffs mean that goods they need from overseas are low/no tariff already, stuff they have/make their are 'normal' tariff. The mean tariff rate is therefore half what it is here, and the UK isn't a high tariff country.
Basically were selling manufactured goods to a country where if they need it, it's probably already a minimal tariff if one at all, but in return they'll be sending us mainly agri products I'd expect, all of which are high tariff. It's hard to see any way this deal could be symmetrical.
I still can’t understand why Johnson would go for that Australia trade deal.
He just needs a headline, the details of the deal are irrelevant.
Can’t stand crosswords. Some of us have empathy and don’t understand why our peers have opted to impoverish their children’s generation. (That’s when I don’t want to hang them from lamp posts with piano wire for their lack of joined up thinking).
Some of em think the their children will thank them for removing them from the shackles of the EU.
Free trade deal with Aus/NZ means cheaper beef/lamb in supermarkets, this keeps poor folk (min wage/redwall/pensioners) happy = more votes for Bojo.
The Farming vote is very small and the bus will barely notice the bump.
Drives down land prices.. think development.
IT stuff can be offshored far more easily and cheaply than most things though?
Yep and we’ve proved it over the last year as work from home can be work from anywhere.
There are issues with offshoring thou ‘divided by a common language’ but it’s all down to knowing what to ask for and qc.
From an environmental point of view shipping frozen meat from the other side of the planet as you push UK farmers out of business is madness
Welcome to Brexit.
None of that namby pamby eco nonsense here, we’re British.
I still can’t understand why Johnson would go for that Australia trade deal.
He just needs a headline, the details of the deal are irrelevant.
100% this. The majority of the 'New Tory' support won't have the brains to even look at it from the basic point of view of 'how can it be good to ship stuff 10000 miles instead of 26?'
All he needs is a picture of him holding up something stupid (like TimTams) for the cameras and his 'new' support slap their thighs, have a laugh at 'the lad Boris' and are convinced that something positive has happened.
Cummings recognised this stupidity and weaponised it magnificently.
The trade strategy is simple, go for free trade with no tariffs or quotas with all countries. Cheap food and meat from US, Mexico and Brazil for the masses. Those that can afford it will continue with high welfare, organic home grown food.
That is fine up to a point, but the majority of farmers are going to be pushed out of that market. I see it as a spiral upwards in cost, with the farmers that make decent quality food just being squeezed out by the supermarkets, slaughter costs and imports.
And what do they do after that? Sell their land? Once it is gone, it is gone. You build on it and you lose it forever, you're always going to be importing and that puts you in the pocket of a foreign country. Australia or Ukraine for grain, Ireland for beef, Russia for gas, Canada for wood. How is that "Taking back control"?
I still can’t understand why Johnson would go for that Australia trade deal.
like everything else Brexit-related, slavish following of free-market ideology trumps everything.
This is their crazy Ayn Rand theory of ‘creative destruction’ though it won’t be feeling very ‘creative’ if you’re a farmer or a fisherman, or one of the many other groups who will be the next to get hit with the destruction
They are what the miners and steel plant workers were in the 80’s. Completely expendable collateral damage of an idealogical project, and those communities will be abandoned to their fate in exactly the same manner as the miners were then
More Brexit joy. Mrs Binners works for a large charity. One of their offices is in Dublin. A member of staff just ordered a laptop from their usual supplier in the UK. Postage was 18 euros, she’s just been informed that she needs to pay an additional 160 euros in import tax and handling fees before it can be delivered
Completely expendable collateral damage of an idealogical project, and those communities will be abandoned to their fate in exactly the same manner as the miners were then
Sort of, except of course the miners were in an already dying trade. Don't see anyone proposing we stop eating any time soon, which makes the whole exercise a whole extra level of inexplicable.
Why did they order a laptop from the UK?!?
Anyway, the most depressing thing about the future for farming is that, like fishing, people were talked into voting for Brexit partly with the idea that they were helping "our" people in that sector. It's the blatant bait and switch that depresses me... promise one thing, deliver another, and get cheered on for it by most of the people you have deceived.
I see the plan is to pay off the farming industry as they shut it down
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-57149744
though it won’t be feeling very ‘creative’ if you’re a farmer or a fisherman, or one of the many other groups who will be the next to get hit with the destruction
I heard on the radio this morning that they seem to be floating the idea of bribing farmers with a huge lump sum to get them to retire early/shut their mouths about how global trade deals will make their businesses bankrupt. In their stead will come a new breed of land stewardship that will new and dynamic (ie not grow food) apparently.
If I was a farmer, looking at what happened to the fish industry, I would be unimpressed