I’m a liberal/leftie but do admit I get mixed feelings when public sectors go on strike due to sub-inflation rises. It’s as though they think 2-3% is not what the vast majority of the private sector have had this year!

It’s all us greedy nurses, we’ve been raking it in for the past 12 years whilst the private sector got nothing

Oh wait…..

https://www.nuffieldtrust.org.uk/resource/chart-of-the-week-real-terms-nhs-staff-pay-from-2010-to-2020

Our Trust has granted a bank holiday which I will take in lieu as I don’t work Mondays, as will my wife who’s not rota’d on that day.
Eldest son self employed so he’s losing out as his place of work is closing, youngest son is a Prison Officer, he’s not sure if they’re getting extra leave yet but thinks not.
My dad’s immunotherapy treatment for his lung cancer is postponed, the same as any other bank holiday.

And that includes the majority of young people (two-thirds of those under 24).

What are the health and psychological implications of being bombarded for such an extended period with this stuff?
People who are facing lots of issues – inflation, rent, jobs, housing etc who are being given absolutely no voice or platform in the mainstream media.

What does that do to people?

They think they’ve got it tough. They should try being the Queen, grafting all those years for other people without a thought for herself.

Nothing to add that’s not been said by the more eloquent posters above.
Just another voice offering virtual hugs and wishing your wife and family all best.

Well, assuming Charlie lives another seven years, none.

I suspect it will be none even if he goes next week.

I think that might have been just your school or teacher

Possibly, although my wife was taught too and she was educated in Newcastle not West Yorkshire.

Definitely need to watch the psychological element, especially in the first few months where you think you’ve got it cracked.

I stopped 25 years ago and still feel a pang for a fag with the first sip of beer in a pub; but it now passes in moments.

Never feel that desire in any other situation.

Human minds are odd things.

To be fair, why should she know how to curtsy? It’s ridiculous that anyone should curtsy, never mind the PM. There will be plenty to mock her for, but not this imho.

I’m 57 and I can remember girls at my junior school being taught to curtsy while we were taught to bow.

Along with this title, Prince William automatically inherits the Duchy of Cornwall, which has been an income stream for his father for more than half a century. This is thanks to the ownership of a landed estate of more than 52,000 hectares (128,000 acres), which also makes him one of England’s biggest landowners.”

Can you imagine the inheritance tax he SHOULD have to pay on that?

Is this actually true? How totally bizarre.

Apparently this was the plan when developed a few years back, but the intention now is to air or not on a case by case basis.

Not a chance – Charles is damaged goods to many. He’s not going to attract the same level of attention the Queen did.

Maybe I should have said ‘start to cement’.

However, he did rather well following Dianna’s death, appearing with his wedding ring rather prominent for TV and press appearances. He was definitely the grieving husband not the cheating ex after that.

Not sure it takes much to turn public perception if you have the PR might of the royal family.

It will depend on how it’s categorised I think.

The BBC are planning to suspend all program’s of a comedic nature for 12 days so this may or may not qualify.

The Windsor brand has been very well marketed for decades. I’m quite interested as to seeing how this next fortnight goes and as to whether they can cement Charles into the same spot in the country’s psyche.

People can change – that’s how we end up with different governments, after all – it’s just difficult to do.

I think most people who change do so because of their own observations, and a very small number are persuaded to change by effective argument.

I don’t really fall into that category as a persuader so I’ll leave it to someone else.

I really don’t think the views of many of my family could be changed by anyone though.

@rone and @dazh

Thank you.

A number of my family are certain as to why hospital waiting times are up, GP appointments are hard to come by and ambulances are hours late.

It’s because we’ve wasted time and resources on something that’s no worse than the flu, there are too many foreigners using the NHS, illegal immigrants come here just to use it but don’t contribute, NHS staff are lazy/need to work harder, too many managers/not enough staff and they’re always off on another equality/diversity course rather than doing their jobs.

Totally pointless for me to ever argue as they already ‘know’ the causes.

If people raise a specific issue I restrict myself to advising they make a formal complaint to the relevant Trust and writing to their GP.

Seems to me that not many people are open to change; it’s totally pointless trying to change their minds – they don’t change and I just put my blood pressure up.

@rone again.

So, for example, in the case of Boris Johnson’s 40 new hospitals, they are no doubt needed and the Government could create the money to build them, but you would need to have the builders, equipment and raw materials available in the economy to facilitate the build, thus spending the money?

So they could put those trillions into the economy but choose not to.

So why do they choose not?

@rone

You keep making these statements but people, like me, don’t get it – maybe I’m just too thick but I read what you write and it doesn’t make sense, often it doesn’t even seem to me to bare a resemblance to the question you’re are answering.

So if “All you need to grasp is the government is the currency issuer – it can always meet its obligations. There isn’t a limited number of £££.” is true then why can’t they issue say £20 Trillion and we can all have a great life?

I’m really not trying to be an arse but there must be some point at which it all falls down.

Different tax systems etc. What is the take home pay for both UK and German average wage?

I honestly have no idea and suspect googling it won’t help me much. The article I quoted from was interesting to me though with the suggestion that you could live quite well in Berlin at just over the minimum wage whilst I suspect you would struggle to do that in London.

germany gas price per KWH = 18.3 cents per KWH
uk gas price per KWH (after the increase in october) = ~14p per kwh

roughly the same absolute cost……..

However, German average salary is currently around 57,000 Euros and their housing and transport costs are often significantly less.

According to this housinganywhere.com

Assuming that you’re a young starter moving to Berlin, your average living costs will be as follows:

Rent (studio) €900
Public transport €86
Food €250
Entertainment €150
Total
living expenses €1,386

This means that you need to earn just above the minimum wage to live comfortably in Berlin.

Whilst earning the average net salary of €2,500 would mean that you could set aside roughly €1,000/ month or afford a bigger flat in one of the best neighbourhoods.

Not sure you could pull off living comfortably in a Northern UK city on minimum wage, let alone in the Capital.

People seem to like being shafted by the Tories.

It does indeed. I’ve pretty much given up on ever seeing much of a move towards a fair society, it seems that enough of us just don’t want it that way.

Consequently, I now put more effort into looking after those close to me and, sadly, have to leave others to suffer the consequences of their decisions, or the decisions of their family/friends and neighbours.

Gas: 21,000kWh p.a.

Electric: 6,500kWh p.a.

Daily that’s 59kWh gas, 18kWh leccy.

Previously £145/month, now looking likely at £300+ according to Octopus’ calculations but I expect higher.

My previous usage was 2800kwh electricity and 20,000kwh gas, SO Energy have me on £390 per month as of October.

To be fair we live at 900 feet above sea level, pretty exposed on the Pennines, in a converted 1800’s stable made into 4 terraced houses with ours being on an end.

It’s over 4 floors with the kitchen/dining area converted from the cellar (been lovely and cool in the heat of summer) and the attic opened up as a mezzanine room with open staircase so pretty limited on attic insulation.

Gas central heating, hot water and cooking, with a small electric heater to warm the room we’re in a bit more in the evening, and me at home at least 4 days per week.

To be honest those figures are with no thought to economy, with only me making any effort to ever turn stuff off and the heating set to a permanent 17 degrees; living room a bit warmer of an evening with the extra heater.

I expect usage will come down a fair bit over this 12 months with my wife being more attentive.

It won’t be a struggle for us to pay the increase but I’m typically tight and don’t like paying for anything if I can avoid it.

Very aware we are luckier than most.

We often use Sykes Cottages and I’ve just had a quick look on their page – 4 properties for Alnwick that would meet your needs, one is ridiculously expensive, the others around £1000, which is still dear for 7 nights in my book but might work for you.

Or taking a stand against a tax-dodging, union-crushing, willy-rocket building sociopath, whichever way you want to look at it.

I used to have significant moral standards – they caused me no small amount of angst.

You’ve got it. Prime is fundamentally a marketing tactic. You believe that you’re paying for delivery and content, but it’s real value and why Amazon offer it is to subconsciously make you want to buy item x,y and z from Amazon not elsewhere…..because you have to get use and “value” from your subscription.

So this comment intrigued me as, despite disliking many things about Amazon, I am a fairly big user.

Just looked at past months purchases and there are about a dozen items where I could have got them for a similar price, but would have had to pay postage or gone to town to find and pick up so in reality all a little cheaper and convenient.

A few items were a touch more expensive from Amazon but had proved difficult to find elsewhere, one I wanted urgently, rung some shops, called in at 2 others and no luck. Got next day delivery from Amazon which wasn’t ideal but better than the ‘ we can order you one in, it’ll come in a bulk delivery when our order to them is big enough’.

Other things definitely saved a fair bit, especially when bought in bulk then the unit price is great.

Sure Maximum Protection Antiperspirant: Amazon £37 for 12, Tesco/Sainsburys/Morrisons £5 each so £60 for 12.

Roundup Weedkiller 5 Litre – Amazon £13.99, Wickes £29.50, Local Garden Centre click and collect £33.99

Electric Shaver – Amazon £51.99, Argos £110.00, some company I’ve never heard of on Google £79.99 – this was one of their ‘One Day Deal’ things so got lucky with this.

Printer Ink – Amazon £34.00, Other online around £44.00

Forthglade Dogfood – Amazon £31.40 for 24, Wilko £34.80 plus £5.00 delivery or drive into town to collect.

Plus 2 deliveries of Amazon Fresh that arrived within 4 hours over the week we had Covid.

I also often get my Prime orders sent to the Amazon Lockers at the supermarket I frequent which is on the way home from work.

Occasionally we do watch stuff on there too and I get free kindle books on Prime reads which is good.

So it seems to me I’d be cutting off my nose to spite my face leaving them.

My wife and I caught Covid for the first time, testing positive on the 11th July.

Think we’ve done well both being frontline nurses throughout the pandemic, both working weekly with people with Covid and managing to remain Covid free.

I was pretty rough for about 3 days but my wife was much worse – both recovering now.

Unfortunately my Trust dropped special Covid leave on the 7th July so my 5 days off are now counted as normal sick.

I have had 2 singe days off in the past 6 months with a recurring tooth abscess prior to this so am now waiting for my threatening letter from HR warning that further illness in the next 12 months might result in dismissal.

If only we’d caught it 5 days earlier I’d have been fine.

Wife’s Trust is changing their Covid policy as of September so her episode won’t be counted a sick.

I think I’d have been better off flying to the Maldives this year.

June 23rd went for 2 weeks in Moray at a static caravan site, diesel about £100 and £1200 for the caravan.

Van had a major mechanical wobbly that seemed to be fixed then wasn’t thn was then wasn’t, ended up having to leave it there for the repairs to be completed – total cost around £1000.

Luckily some of our Elgin friends lent us their car so the holiday went OK.

Had to do a one way hire to get home – £600.

Needed a car for work (we were planning to do this anyway to ease the mileage on the camper now savings were earning sod all) so bought one online from a main dealer to be delivered home when we got back – £11,000.

We did toy with having one delivered to Moray but that would have necessitated a couple more nights stay and we couldn’t find anywhere.

Flying back up tomorrow to Inverness to go collect the van and drive it home- about £300 including diesel.

So roughly a £14,000 fortnight for 2 people and a dog in a caravan in Scotland.

:-)

We brought Covid back with us too.

On the plus side we won a crocheted cow at the Forres Highland Games.

I’m really quite annoyed about this.

I posted up to show how it’s handled elsewhere (University of Colorado if you must know). I also commented that it was rigid and, I felt, quite draconian.

For someone who had never experienced that before then, yes, my son struggled with it at first of fear of causing unintended offence or being asked to leave the course he so wanted to complete. He has anxiety and esteem issues anyway so stressors over and above what he expects are always a little fraught.

I bob back in for a read only to find it’s been used by Kryton to justify his anti diversity posts and for Cougar to basically insinuate that my son is either homophobic or a liar or both.

The only thing we have to go on so far is seemingly “someone’s son allegedly felt a bit uncomfortable in the presence of a non-binary person and didn’t know what to say so kept quiet.”

The problem we have here is, really, that you’re hanging your hat on someone else’s post when it’s entirely possible that that someone else is talking bollocks.

And I don’t mean that disrespectfully, it could well be posted in good faith. But our sole evidence for your argument is someone on the Internet’s son going “hey dad, you’ll never guess what happened today…” and I don’t consider that to be an authoritative source. Sorry.

For one I was actually there when the call took place but you seem to have a much better idea than me what happened.

Secondly, my lad has struggled with his own sexual identity since his early teens and, as some of you know, this resulted in an attempt on his life at 18, and again becoming suicidal at the end of last year, although he’s reaching a resolution this time I think/hope.

I find it really insulting.

Unless every conversation I ever have with someone starts with “nice to meet you, what are your preferred pro-nouns?”

My son attended some remote lectures and a discussion forum at a US university and this is what they did.

All 30 students and the lecturers introduced themselves and stated their gender preferences and pronouns.

Everyone else had to note/use them correctly or were asked to leave.

He struggled with it a little and chose to observe rather than actively participate, although he got more used to it in later sessions.

Edit: deleted

I am more than pleased to hear that things have changed so dramatically and that female nurses are now very typically Labour voting lefties and that the Royal College of Nursing is now a left-wing Labour-supporting trade union like Unison.

There must be another reason why that poll of health workers showed a huge Tory lead.

Hopefully it’s not true as the general consensus on stw appears to be that only stupid thick racists vote for Johnson’s Tory Party. And it’s obviously quite worrying to think of all those stupid thick racists working for the NHS.

It’s nice to have my words twisted so you can still come out feeling all superior in ‘winning the argument’.

I never stated that the RCN was now a left wing Labour support trade union like Unison as you well know – I merely told you why many nurses choose to join as regards professional representation and not for political reasons.

Also, as regards why HCP’s are choosing to vote Tory then I suppose a small minority are and always were but most were not.

In the 2019 election the usual reason given by my colleagues who historically had always voted Labour was that they couldn’t vote for Corbyn; I could and I did as I found him a refreshing change and hoped he would win.

Unfortunately he didn’t and now those who, for the first time ever, struggled to vote Tory, have got the first one out of the way and the second time is much easier.

Anyway, wouldn’t want to get in the way of your self congratulatory postings so I won’t bother you again on such topics.

You keep it up, I’m sure being so superior and condescending will encourage the HCP’s who voted Tory to rush back to a proper left wing movement asap.

Nurses in the Royal College of Nursing have always tended to be right-wing, otherwise they would have joined a proper trade union.

Often nurses come from affluent middle-class backgrounds, and no doubt often with the intention of marrying a doctor.

What a totally **** ignorant and irritating thing to write.

You do know that this is 2021 and not 1971 don’t you?

My wife and I are both Nurses (from mining backgrounds) and our youngest son is a Paramedic. Most of our colleagues are from varied backgrounds but certainly not all from this affluent middle class you assume.

There is varied representation split about 70% in favour of RCN with the remainder in Unison; I am in the former predominantly so when I need a rep they are from a Nursing background which my colleagues report is their main motivation too.

We also have a varied spread of Student Nurses coming through the ranks, again they rarely seem to be from this mythical affluent background, predominantly just 18/19 year old taking on £40K plus of debt to do a degree.

The others tend to be Nursing Assistants who are sick of working for not much more than minimum wage and want to improve their life chances. Some do this by following the degree route but a rising number of others via the Trainee Nursing Associate scheme.

The number of people making the move from NA to Nurse is steadily growing as is the number of male Nurses.

Agreed, when Hattie Jakes was the Matron, Nurses from more privileged backgrounds joined the prfession, but since I started Nursing in 1996 this has not been the case and the aspiration to marry a doctor has only been voiced once in all that time by a colleague.

Looking at our teams we would say that predominantly it’s newer NA’s and more senior Nurses who are likely to vote Conservative, along with the domestic and maintenance staff. Obviously I can’t extrapolate this to the wider healthcare community like you have but this is our (limited) experience of jointly 45 years of Nursing.

And when politics was discussed prior to the 2019 election, which is rare, I’m sorry to say that Corbyn wass usually in the first sentence of Tory voters – ‘I’d vote for Labour but………’

You make the mistake of correlating a vote for the conservatives as somehow being uncaring.

We hear reports of increased health inequalities, reduced council and social care funding; life expectancy has been falling for the past 7 years while at the same time infant mortality and child poverty have increased; NHS workers have had real world pay cuts for years as have social care and home care staff; most NHS departments I know are chronically understaffed as people don’t want to do it anymore (same with the 2 Social Work Teams I work with regularly); foreign staff returning to the EU as they don’t feel welcome or feel threatened (we’ve lost a couple of senior professionals from our team and are struggling to get replacements); the dying and disabled hounded to find work and having benefits sanctioned as a result of austerity policies (I see this first hand on a daily basis); we had PPE shortages at the start of this pandemic as our stocks of such items had been drastically cut since 2011 despite a report (2018 I think) warning of the dangers; reports of cronyism and nepotism like never before; massive increase in need for foodbanks; I could go on.

If people who vote Conservative still do so despite all that, and it’s not because they’re uncaring, then I can only imagine it’s either that they are unaware of these issues, don’t believe they really exist or believe that they are for the greater good (price worth paying in the long term).

Or something else I’ve missed?

And yet people continue to support free healthcare, free education, universal benefits, progressive taxes, and publicly owned or not for profit management of strategic infrastructure and services.

They believe in them when they need them, not when they need to pay for them. And they certainly don’t want to be paying for them for someone else.

Whilst I don’t think it’s possible for this country to suddenly tip towards a radical leftist zeitgeist any time soon, you clearly haven’t been around many young people. They’re the future voters and decision makers. They won’t be subscribing to the ‘I’ll alright Jack’ mentality of many of their parents. Because they’ll have to be implementing ‘socialist’ ideals, in order to survive and progress in life. In the same way that if you grew up in the 70s and 80s, you’re probably a lot less racist and homophobic than your parents’ generation, so the kids growing up today, could be a lot less tory. Here’s hoping anyway.

I know lots of young people and I totally agree that they are generally fair minded and hold views for a more equitable world.

BUT so did my friends, family and colleagues when we were young and mostly they have now migrated to the right.

My wife and I are both nurses and many of our colleagues have voted Tory for the past few elections.

FFS.

I do hope you’re both right BTW.

My personal view is that it’s all over for any left wing party in this country; there was never much appetite for it in the first place.

Bloke A struggling with his 3 bedroomed semi-detached, 2 cars and a couple of foreign holidays per year is unlikely to give a shit about some foreigner whose kids are starving or being systematically oppressed by their own (or another) government.

Bloke B on the next street, with even less than Bloke A, will care even less. He knows that if we stopped sending money abroad and looked after our own then he could have what bloke A has.

This idea of people actually giving a shit about others is well and truly debunked now; it was a nice thought for a few years after the war but that time has long passed.

I know there are some of you out there but you are a dying breed.

Makes them sound like the modern equivalent of the Austin Allegro.

Ok.

So I already accept that not all Brexit voters are racist.

What do I, as one bloke struggling through life, do now?

What’s the way forward?

Dazh says I have to listen and learn.

Who do I listen to?

And what am I likely to learn?

And how will what I learn mitigate the problems caused by Brexit?

While I’m doing all this, what will the people who voted for Brexit be doing to reciprocate my efforts, in order for us to jointly make Britain great again?

Yes at the TJ ride many moons ago, I was there with my teenage son.

IIRC we met Binners on a road bike and then went to the pub.

I’d suggest that’s maybe where you should start then. Instead of ‘they’ maybe think more about ‘we’?

I don’t have any solutions, that’s why I asked. I’m more than prepared to listen and learn.