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Different players, same opinions.
Ok Don, are you sitting comfortably? Life story coming up.
Left school at 15, started work as an apprentice fitter with council. Left after 6 years to go self employed with ma & pa in petrol station (see other thread about diesel) Supermarkets come along, i go out of business (along with a 10k debt which I pay off over 5 years) & a failed marriage to wife who doesn't want to work in business. By now I'm 47. opportunity in prison service comes along & I join as an OSG then progress 3 years later as officer. It's just about all I can do to make decent money & government pension with any decent qualifications.
So I've worked solid for 39 years & paid all my taxes & NI contributions.
What your income has to do with anything is beyond me.
I bet your'e happy I fu**ed now eh?
I'm off to bed, got 50 needy lads to see to tomorrow. 😉
esselgruntfuttock,
Wasn't a criticism of you just of what you seemed to say. Me and my wife are both nurses so in the same no strike boat as you. I ust hope that these strikes will have positive benefit for us really.
I accept that the relatively large pensions for the public sector cannot be sustained.
Well, this is were we differ. I don't accept that, I think it's posturing and spin.
It is rubbish, but I really can't see another way of reducing spending (other than raising taxes, but that is the same end result). The view that 'the rich can pay' assumes that there are loads of rich people wallowing in pots of cash. There aren't as a percentage of the total population.
True, but there are still many untapped sources of money out there that are more deserving of being tapped than teachers (and other public sector workers who are/will be in the firing line)
I suppose you think the NHS is fine as it is as well?
I don't think I know enough about it to comment yet. However if this issue is anything to go by, I'd be willing to bet the situation isn't half as bad as some would like to make out.
I accept that the relatively large pensions for the public sector cannot be sustained.Well, this is were we differ. I don't accept that, I think it's posturing and spin.
pensions are projected to cost less as a proportion of GDP in the future if they are kept at current levels which suggests they are sustainable broadly speaking.
anyway Sports day today no kids to teach...whoop whoop
I've got no idea how you are going to maintain your pay/pension over the coming years, but you are doing an important job that I (and probably most on here) would not want to do, so good luck to you.
@don simon
wheel clampers don't do there jobs for bettering of their fellow human beings, they do it because it's all they can do, which is sad.
I agree with you that it is sad, but totally disagree that "it is all that they can do" - it might well be all that is available in this crappy money grabbing society we live in, but that is different. Just to go with the wheelclamping example, who are the wheelclamping companies run by? Money grabbing businessmen or crooks I'd say, who are prepared to and are allowed to manipulate their workforce (OK, some of them I'm sure are already fairly well down the line towards criminality anyway), but this is the flipside of the drive for "efficiency" and "productivity" - you get some firm that only sees the bottom line, thinks that it would be great to get a few quid in from the wheelclampers for practicing extortion on their property and all of a sudden society ratchets another notch down in the race to the bottom. We'd all be a lot better off if we thought more about quality of life and paid people properly to provide proper services instead of spending all our money on (non)essentials like Sky TV, plasma screens, new mobile phones every year, processed food, shit clothes from New Look, shit furniture from IKEA etc etc.....Grrrrrrrrrr........
Public sector pensions unsustainable?
[url= http://flipchartfairytales.wordpress.com/2011/03/15/that-public-sector-pensions-timebomb/ ]Public sector pension cost to peak next year[/url]
Previous reforms mean that the cost will peak next year and then begin to fall.
Public sector pensions 'Gold Plated'?
The Commission firmly rejected the claim that current public service pensions are ‘gold plated.’
[url= http://cdn.hm-treasury.gov.uk/hutton_final_100311.pdf ]Hutton Report Page 26[/url]
Nice simple article for people like me, who know bugger all about the Pensions issue. However, plenty of stats there equally suggest pensions are not totally affordable, if not on the cliff edge.
Interesting how some view the whole issue as ideological, when Hutton used to be a Labour minister, didn't he?
Interesting how some view the whole issue as ideological, when Hutton used to be a Labour minister, didn't he?
The Govt isn't following the Hutton advice (for ideological reasons) - that's the point.
Annual cost of public sector pensions: [b]£4bn[/b]
Annual cost of tax relief on pension contributions for richest 1% of population: [b]£10bn[/b]
Tax relief on contributions over £150k has already been reduced to basic rate, but scrapping [i]all[/i] tax relief on contributions over £50k would save a fortune.
What a fantastic stat.
I think that just about closes down any argument about public sector pensions by itself
Where does it come from?
Where does it come from?
Just word of mouth yesterday, but from a source that knows his stuff. I'm going to try to track down the source today.
I mena the £10 billion bit BTW - the £4 billion is wrong (£33 billion according to Hutton)
Two wrongs apparently do make a right. Whadyaknow?
Your parents having sex and making you shows that is not the case. 😆
The £4bn figure:
Another way of looking at the cost of pensions is known as the "net public service pensions" net public service pension cost. It is the difference between benefits paid out to today’s pensioners from unfunded schemes and current contributions paid by current staff. In the current financial year this is estimated to be £4.1 billion or about 0.3% of GDP.
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The Army are trained up to a certain degree in case we do though. Can't wait to see that one.
The firemen were saying that when they went on strike. The Armed Forces did a rather good job and pretty well proved the point that the fire service wasn't as slick as it said it was.
Ah OK
@don simon,
The question in my mind is, is the money NEEDED elsewhere. In other words, when striking the balance between all of the things the Govt spends money on, what is essential and what isn't?
The Govt has chosen to prioritise the teachers' pensions as an area for saving money. I think that stat shows that they have got their priorities wrong, and maybe it would be better (if we really do NEED to make these savings) to start with tax relief for the rich on money that they won't even be spending until their retirement, ahead of taking money out of the pockets of public servants right now.
The Armed Forces did a rather good job and pretty well proved the point that the fire service wasn't as slick as it said it was.
Good job the armed forces are just sitting round on their arses doing nothing and waiting to jump in then isn't it?
Taechers' strike leads to increase in trolling!