Work For Politicians!
Posted on 5:59pm, 3rd August 2010 • 13 Comments
Paid work is what most of us do throughout our adult lives; it’s a necessity if we’re to live reasonable lives, pay our bills, keep society functioning and connect to the wider community. Many of us enjoy our work, others hate it but however we feel about it, it’s the glue that holds society together. So two news items today have really annoyed me.
The first is the Cameron and Clegg decree “cutting the deficit’s got to be the highest priority, that’s what government ministers have to work at whatever else they do”.
Most of us don’t see the nation’s highest priority as being the deficit, we’re far more scared about the 25% – 40% shutdown in public spending pushing us – and everyone else – out of work. There’s a terrifying silence from Messrs Clegg and Cameron about their responsibility for finding new work for those their hack and burn policy will put out of a job.
My second beef has to do with the way dropping the default work retirement age is treated in the press and elsewhere.
The gloss that’s been put on it is that it’s socially liberating to encourage people to work on beyond what would be normal retirement age. A whole herd of “elephants in the room” galumph around such an evil proposition. The sad truths are that millions would love to retire from work but can’t afford to – because governments and employers have mis-managed pensions for decades – and we’re still only at the earliest stages of tackling age discrimination at work. We’ve frighteningly high youth unemployment. Encouraging older people to try to work on past retirement is a sneaky device to excuse further government failures on upgrading pensions; the price will be paid by jobless school leavers and new graduates.
Obama’s got it, maybe he’d give our lot a tutorial
Ynot • 6th September, 2010 at 4:36 pm
Politicians don’t know what work is. They think it’s poncing around in parliament.
Cityboy • 23rd September, 2010 at 10:13 pm
OK its straws in the wind … but it seems to me that a few more people are asking the same questions as this blog does. Just look at some of the posts in the “Guardian” and “Independent” on jobs, work, Ireland and the like.
Thatcher used to say “there’s no alternative” and most believed her. Today’s politicians say that and we jeer.
Tomas2 • 5th December, 2010 at 2:25 pm
From today’s Independent:
Outgoing Head of the CBI, Sir Richard Lambert called for “bold initiatives”, such as a green investment bank and investment in the UK’s infrastructure, especially in power generation”.Sir Richard warned: “It’s not enough just to slam on the spending brakes. Measures that cut spending but killed demand would actually make matters worse. It’s easy enough to see how the squeeze could take 400,000 jobs out of the public sector by 2015-16. What’s needed above all is the kind of growth in the private sector that will more than offset this impact. The question is, WHERE’S THE GROWTH to come from?”
Good question, Sir Richard.
Anna211 • 25th January, 2011 at 10:30 am
Months have gone by, the budget was supposed to be about growth (for which read – we’re removing a few employee safeguards to appeal to our core vote) but wasn’t and the economic indicators worsen by the month.
OK government when you are you going to get off your collective arses and start getting people back to work? You’re only good at throwing us onto the scrap heap, bad mouthing us and finding reasons to diddle our benefits.
Up your game! Don’t be too long about it either.
cityboy • 7th April, 2011 at 3:00 pm
Working remotely is already commonplace – our goal is to make working from home mainstream… While companies are moving jobs offshore we are promoting the vast and largely untapped resource of skilled and experienced people that want to work from home.
business • 12th April, 2011 at 5:49 am
@BUSINESS
Wish you were right.
It’s actually very hard to get a job working from home, particularly if you want to do something a bit more stimulating and better paid than ironing. Ask any Mum, home-based carer or worker too disabled to cope in the average workplace.
I’m just hoping the petrol price hikes persuade more senior managers to think about home working.
alison.dodds • 12th April, 2011 at 12:03 pm
More bad news about the UK economy! France and Germany get better results than we do, so why don’t our sodding politicians follow their approach and start getting the rest of us back to work!
I didn’t inherit a trust fund Gideon and I’d like the chance to earn a decent income again.
johnboy • 16th May, 2011 at 9:40 am
It’s been a year now since this blog was posted. Have Cameron and co done ANYTHING to improve work prospects for any of us? They’ve talked and talked but what have they DONE?
In the meantime the “hardworking, decent families” they claim to care so much about are going down the pan.
Jones - Esquire • 7th August, 2011 at 12:54 pm
A big recruitment agency’s survey asking employers their hiring intentions shows a North-South divide (if you live north of the Wash, you’re probably stuffed, if you live south of it you may be luckier).
You hear a lot about “growth” now from politicians but they don’t seem to have a clue what to do to bring it about. We need them to work at it, not just spout about unrelated matters (they seem to think “cutting red tape” and “abolishing the 50% tax rate” will persuade entrepreneurs to set up in the UK when they could earn far more money investing in Asia).
Brooke • 20th September, 2011 at 10:23 am
The only “work” politicians do is to get themselves elected. After that, it’s gravy train all the way (including a nice fat redundancy scheme for when they get kicked out). Fat chance the rest of us have.
All_Balls • 24th September, 2011 at 11:32 am
They have to trot down to vote sometimes – I’m sure they think that’s “work”.
Cityboy • 4th November, 2011 at 11:14 am
There’s a local tragedy which really made me think how important work is and how dreadful job insecurity can be. A mum who was fearful of losing her teaching job in the looming public sector cuts killed herself and her two young teenage children (they all died from multiple stab wounds). Obviously the job insecurity wasn’t the only factor at work – but it certainly didn’t help. This is all so sad.
Gemma_111 • 10th November, 2011 at 4:15 pm