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[Closed] EU Referendum - are you in or out?

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On pensions - the NHS pension fund is more than a million pounds a year in surplus - ie contributions exceed payments. Since 1948 the government have been spending this surplus not investing it. If they had invested the surplus it would be the biggest investment fund in the world.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:13 pm
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[url= https://www.nao.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Evaluating-the-government-balance-sheet-pensions.pdf ]National Audit Office evaluation of public sector pension liabilities [/url]

^^^To support and, in places, refute my earlier statements. The NHS pension is certainly self-funding.

One of the main issues is that public sector employment is already down 15% since 2010 (with more job cuts to come), at a time when the number of retirees is growing.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:13 pm
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All the comments on that robots story are still about immigrants.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:15 pm
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Ben. If all pensions where turned into defined contribution (ie people save) the cost to the government and the employees would be huge to remotely match the current benefits. This is why it's not done politicians et all prefer to just stick their heads in the sand and accrue massive future liabilities which won't be their problem. As for state pensions being self funding - what on earth makes you think that ?

Now this problem exists whether we are in the EU or not but most certainly lots of immigration far from helping makes it worse.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:17 pm
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Getting warmer... 😀


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:19 pm
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Nonsense Jamba - just pure nonsense. The NHS pension fund is and always has been in surplus


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:19 pm
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Mike yes that is a very real problem, automatic and artificial intelligence will further significantly reduce employment particularly for those with a lower education level. Self driving cars/taxis, drone deliveries never mind the factory automation in manufacturing.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:20 pm
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but most certainly lots of immigration far from helping makes it worse.

Immigrants are currently paying in while good old brits are taking out. They are filling about 300,000 jobs a year many in the public service. As said many times unemployment is low and jobs still need filling

and Jamby, the mail see's problems where as others look for solutions (running away isn't one of them)


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:22 pm
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Nonsense Jamba - just pure nonsense. The NHS pension fund is and always has been in surplus

What if employment levels fell or wages reduced on a real basis ? It's really not self sustaining. It cannot be based upon the levels of NI and employee contributions. It's a Ponzi scheme.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:25 pm
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…most certainly lots of immigration far from helping makes it worse.

Most certainly bullshit.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:30 pm
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So, after a bit more reading, if we leave the EU and then following a hard Brexit seek to rely on the WTO rules do we then not loose the influence we had within the EU to shape WTO policy as part of the Quad or Quint group of trading blocks (in relation to which the UK will not become a member) and as such end up doubly worse off i.e. no influence in EU or WTO - how's all that going to work out or do all of these bilateral agreements that other countries are begging us for somehow sidestep the WTO.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:30 pm
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Nonsense Jamba - just pure nonsense. The NHS pension fund is and always has been in surplus

2013-14 is the most recent year Google throws up, but two lines from the NHS pension fund accounts:

As at 31 March 2014 the pension liabilities of the Scheme were valued at £337.2 billion. As the NHS Pension Scheme is an unfunded scheme, these liabilities are underwritten by the Exchequer.

At some point that liability will have to be settled by us.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:34 pm
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Hang on a minute. Whats all this about immigrant robots? 😯


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:35 pm
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Hang on a minute. Whats all this about immigrant robots?

They won't be paying for your pension.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:36 pm
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Oldbloke - the point is that contributions exceed payments by a million pounds a year. That is the maximum possible future liability and disregards the income over that time which will be more than that. Yes if everyone stops paying into the NHS then there is a liability - and that is the goivernments aim by increasing contributions and decreasing benefits so as to make the scheme unattractive and thus go bust. However as things stand income from contributions exceeds payments.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:37 pm
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Are we not mixing things up with the NHS pensions now? 😉


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:39 pm
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Before you were banned TJ we were involved in a discussion where it was clear you didn't understand pensions funds, their funding and their liabilities. I'm not going to bother trying again. I was a Trustee of a public sector pension scheme in a past life. The NHS pension fund accounts tell the story.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:45 pm
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So the NHS employees pay into a pension scheme that has no real money held in it, no asset, no pension fund. This income into the NHS pension scheme is paid out as NHS pension to past/retired eligible employees. Every four years the current employees of the NHS contribution into the scheme is adjusted and set so that the needs of the NHS pensioners can be met.

If you had a new financial entrepreneur offering you such a scheme, you would not pay a penny into it. In terms of the mechanics of how the scheme works it is like a Ponzi. The two differences between a true Ponzi and this one is that the NHS pension is ‘backed by the treasury’ and the primary intention is not to defraud using a fraudulent investment.

If I was depending on this pension, I would want to know how it works!


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:46 pm
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Well.... imagine a pyramid.....

😉


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:52 pm
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Kettle's on and biccies at the ready - NHS pensions is normally a goodie on a par with the sky fairy!


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:54 pm
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Well it will make a change from the usual....

But the Govt lawyer is deciding which car to buy next

After this is concluded, Mr Eadie says time limitations mean that he would like to pass over the section on "double taxation" and remove it from his submission.

He suggests that the subject is fiendishly complex and that the justices would expect him to "walk them through it and ask him all kinds of difficult questions".

He jokes the decision to strike the issue from his submission reflects his own "cowardice" as well as time constraints, something which seems to find sympathy from members of the Supreme Court as they do not demur.


That new aston looks good


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 12:58 pm
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If it's a ponzi scheme, what's the solution?

Logan's Run....?

There was a programme on R4 discussing the idea of limiting life span to help spread resources, especially at a time when so many people are living longer...

You're not wrong. I've seen the price of kids' clothes and shoes in Germany

Yup! Not just kiddies clothing.
In the eight, almost nine years I've been here I can count the number of shoes I have bought here on one hand... Same goes for jeans,too.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 1:08 pm
 DrJ
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In the eight, almost nine years I've been here I can count the number of shoes I have bought here on one hand..

Handschuhe?


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 1:30 pm
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Oldbloke - I do completely understand it. I was ( as I was then) making a different point to counter the lies and propaganda put out by the tories who want to take away our pensions.

The simple fact is that every year since 1948 the NHS -pension scheme has been in surplus ie every year we the contributors put in more money that is take out by those who benefit.

That the governments over the decades have used this surplus as general funding to spend is the problem - not the future pensions that we are entitled to having paid for them over a lifetime of working.

Anyway - a long way off the point of the thread.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 1:31 pm
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jambalaya - Member
Mike yes that is a very real problem, automatic and artificial intelligence will further significantly reduce employment particularly for those with a lower education level. Self driving cars/taxis, drone deliveries never mind the factory automation in manufacturing.

Time for the citizens income.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 1:31 pm
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The simple fact is that every year since 1948 the NHS -pension scheme has been in surplus ie every year we the contributors put in more money that is take out by those who benefit.

tj the 2 points do not actually support each other, a scheme can contribute more than it takes and still have a liability, as life spans increase then unless you have defined benefit you can't define the liability.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 1:35 pm
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Exactly - and there is no direct link to money paid in and money paid out. Details, I know.....


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 1:36 pm
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this getting beyond parody ! wtf is '[url= https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/dec/06/theresa-may-calls-for-red-white-and-blue-brexit ]red white and blue brexit[/url]' the pm seems to be suffering from soundbiteitis


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 1:40 pm
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Did someone mention tariffs? Er... Liam Fox is going to try and match our current trading conditions as closely as possible when we exit the EU. In a recent statement:

"In order to minimise disruption to global trade as we leave the EU, over the coming period the government will prepare the necessary draft schedules which replicate as far as possible our current obligations."

All those pesky tariffs - he's realised that rocking a boat sailing on a sea of complex deals leaves us open to all sorts of disputes.

Read it here. [url= http://http://www.politics.co.uk/blogs/2016/12/06/very-quietly-liam-fox-admits-the-brexit-lie ]Aka 'Brexit means the status quo, but more likely to go tits up'[/url].


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 1:42 pm
 dazh
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Hang on a minute. Whats all this about immigrant robots?

That's the cyber-physical systems Jezza was talking about. Have you not been paying attention? 🙂

this getting beyond parody ! wtf is 'red white and blue brexit' the pm seems to be suffering from soundbiteitis

It's the precursor to the 'British bulldog brexit', closely followed by the 'Stiff Upper Lip brexit', hopefully resulting in a 'Rule Britannia Brexit'. You really couldn't make this s*** up!


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 1:47 pm
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I think the EU was going to give the robots passports and make it illegal to call them robots
[img] [/img]
Look how smug they are with their working nipples and extra attatchments


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 1:49 pm
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I'm don't see why I should pay for immigrant robots pensions.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 1:52 pm
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These promises of increased automation and more leisure time have been spouted since I were a lad. Mind you back then we were promised silver jump suits and hover boards and "increased leisure time" didn't mean "unemployment".

Oh and that stuff the Daily Wail is getting hot under the collar about is a reference to a spearheaded given in 2015.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 2:32 pm
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Don't worry folks. Theresa has just cleared everything up. When asked if she expected a hard or soft Brexit, she replied, and I quote.....

"we will get a red, white, and blue brexit, for the people of Britain"

I expect that Tesco will be requred to remove all French cheese from the shelves by tomorrow afternoon, and the carpet bombing of Dresden is pencilled in for Friday


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 2:35 pm
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It's the precursor to the 'British bulldog brexit', closely followed by the 'Stiff Upper Lip brexit', hopefully resulting in a 'Rule Britannia Brexit'. You really couldn't make this s*** up!

I think those come just before the 'more humiliating than Suez Brexit' and the 'begging letter to the IMF Brexit'.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 2:37 pm
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Brown Brexit. To match the shade of bullshit being fed to the public.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 3:19 pm
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Red white and blue.
One that benefits the french, Dutch, czechs and slovaks.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 3:31 pm
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Christ on a bendybus! She was only stood in front of a bloody RAF helicopter, while visiting 'Our Boys' on the frontline, when she said it. There may possibly be a jingoism button she failed to press there, but I can't think of one

[url= https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/dec/06/theresa-may-calls-for-red-white-and-blue-brexit ]Who the **** is writing this script?[/url]

Tellingly... she's started to do that thing that Gordon Brown did, when he was anointed as PM by his party.

Where they're clearly been told by their media coaches to smile from time to time as they look too serious. But because this emotion is so unnatural to them, instead of looking warm and friendly, they look like a serial killer who is about to hack you to death, then eat your entrails.

[b]Just stop it!!!! All of it!!! The creepy smiling, and the red,white and blue shite!!![/b] 😥


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 3:33 pm
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Well now we know why there's been no progress- it's taken all this time to dream up this new slogan to replace "a titanic success". Mission accomplished.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 3:37 pm
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I would like a brexit with an aroma of fresh elderberries and the sound of grass blowing gently in the wind.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 3:39 pm
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Meanwhile in the Supreme Court. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 3:41 pm
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To be fair I imagine that many a kipper will get their first hard-on for years when they read that headline on the front page of the express/sun/mail/telegraph tomorrow

I cant believe that May doesnt know how trite it sounds to the rest of us, she just doesnt care.

I think she knows shes just a 1 term PM Aand wants to leave a legacy of a patriotic Tory who tried her very best to make a success of Brexit


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 3:42 pm
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She needs to avoid the forced grin thing....

[img] [/img]

[img] [/img]

She does look like she's following the Gordon Brown model. If only there was an opposition to take advantage....


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 3:43 pm
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[quote=binners ]She needs to avoid the forced grin thing....

[img] [/img]


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 3:47 pm
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Oh and that stuff the Daily Wail is getting hot under the collar about is a reference to a spearheaded given in 2015.

Spearheaded? I typed speech!!


 
Posted : 06/12/2016 3:49 pm
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