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The Pension Triple lock abolition looks brave – politicalbetting.com
The Pension Triple lock abolition looks brave – politicalbetting.com
Those of us who have been following politics for some time will remember how important a policy the pension triple lock was at GE2010. This ensures that the state pension rises each year in accordance with prices, earnings or 2.5% which ever is the highest.
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Yes, it's a weird, cynical decision - pension expenditure has not increased in real terms since 2015.
Two potential candidates dropped after the intelligence service said they could be Chinese agents" (£)
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/mi5-conservatives-tory-candidate-list-china-spies-t6nvzxnd0
Well, the country can't really afford pensions, let alone the pension triple lock. It's not sustainable.
Mike's right though: it would be brave, or foolhardy, to take on the Express and Mail over this.
Government expenditure on state pension in the United Kingdom from 1948/49 to 2022/23(in million GBP)
https://www.statista.com/statistics/283917/uk-state-pension-expenditure/
The proposed decision is an entirely unnecessary intervention to fix a largely fictional alleged problem which requires no changed action at this point, and has everything to do with an attempt to buy the next Election, which imo is all this Govt have left.
They may be in for a shock if they think people living on, or who will be living on, a State Pension, will not notice, and assume they can bank the votes.
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/636542
Our local ticket office was closed. It was the re opened after a backlash against it then closed again a few months later as hardly anyone used it.
But for many disabled people it is the difference as to whether they can use the rail system or not.
Some types of ticket and other services are not available via the machines, some people cannot use the machines, and it is not uncommon to be stranded for hours at railway stations. The ticket office has to be the help point.
That is perhaps why disabled peoples' organisations were not even consulted when the proposal was first cooked up in the corridors of power.
See the commentary coming eg from Dame Tanni Grey-Thompson on this. She had to move house to be near a useable railway station.
And that's ignoring the basic legal duties to which the railway service is subject around providing equality of access, and often ignores.
At my local London Mainline Station (around 300k passengers per year) I suspect many disabled people stopped bothering years ago, as to change from Platform 1 to Platform 2 requires a half-hour train journey out and then back to either Nottingham or Chesterfield to use the lifts there to replace the crossing facility that was removed from our station in 1994 and not replaced.
The Govt will get their nuts roasted on this one.
The only ones left are slated to be Newcastle and Hartlepool.
https://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/news/23636047.listed-every-north-east-train-ticket-office-set-close/
Smartcards and apps don't work for me.
"...The Swedish government is considering donating Gripen fighter jets to Ukraine to help repel Russian forces, Swedish public radio (SR) reported. The government may formally ask the armed forces as early as Thursday to officially consider the issue, according to the report.."
On a more serious note - this made me wonder if there were any East Asian origin MPs - I can’t think of any off the top of my head. There seems to be a healthy number of Black and South Asian MPs but I can’t think of any of Chinese origin or Hong Kong or similar which surprises me.
In unsurprising Brexit news, the government is taking advantage of our Brexit freedoms to poison our water supply, kill the pollinators that we rely on and damage human health in pursuit of agribusiness profits.
And I doubt the veracity of your anecdote, by which I mean that I suspect multiple factors at play which you either don't know or haven't reported.
Edit yep Chester-le-track went into administration...
As for the suggestion in the press, it has Weasel written all over it. Either the one-off bonuses in the public sector count towards pay, or they don't. Though I do wonder what happens to morale and retention when the one-off bump is experienced as one-off and public sector staff go back to their normal, lower rate.
The hospitalization rate in 2021 was the 3rd lowest rate of the past decade.
The hospitalization rate in 2022 was the lowest rate of the past decade.
The majority of hospitalizations were related to mental health disorders or pregnancy.
COVID-19 accounted for 1.5% of hospitalizations in 2021 & dropped 70% to under .5% in 2022.
Cancer (neoplasm) hospitalizations in 2020 & 2021 were identical & went down in 2022.
There was no measurable rise in circulatory system, immune disorder or nervous system hospitalizations."
https://twitter.com/thereal_truther/status/1701631888459550970?t=6axTi1ReZyvFSE9k9x5w-A&s=19
That doesn't map on the national network, and I'm not sure it could.
Is it genuine, or do they think I am a Chinese spy and they are trying to smoke me out?
Whatever happens, after the next election, it is toast.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/william-hague-calls-for-end-to-runaway-train-of-pension-triple-lock/ar-AA1gC7SK?ocid=entnewsntp&cvid=6a6bf82534dc46658cf9e4a3c1a67057&ei=10
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/other/a-centrist-labour-is-back-but-this-time-it-cannot-take-the-working-class-for-granted/ar-AA1gCcnF?ocid=entnewsntp&cvid=b2fb03b2b59a42c5bbfe516562676bd7&ei=13
Incidentally, the anniversary of 9/11 theother day was marked with a load of videos about it on YouTube. Sadly, many of these, and the comments below them, were from conspiracy theorists.
Sick scum.
One bad driver not stopping at a pedestrian crossing, and you are the one in the wheelchair.
The Petitions Committee (the group of MPs who oversee the petitions system) have considered the Government’s response to this petition. They felt that the response did not directly address the request of petition and have therefore written back to the Government to ask them to provide a revised response.
So even Parliamentary committees (and one with 60% tory membership) is fed up with the excuses / lies that this Government comes up with in their attempt to push things through...
Greater Anglia is currently advertising its app for ticket purchases. However since it also uses a thuggish Red Hare I’ve taken against Greater Anglia.
I seem to recall that for some, ZHCs are actually rather useful. I’m sure they can be open to abuse, but is banning them the right way ahead?
If a permanent uplift happens next year, then that should count, but that hasn't happened.
An inflation lock - tying state pension increases to CPI - is fine. But saying pensioners get better pay increases than workers when CPI beats salary increases, but should get the same when the other way round, is simply not excusable (other than for the two reasons offered above).
Even looking at the specifics of what the government is looking at, clearly stripping out one-off public sector bonuses is a better reflection of salary growth than including it.
The Tories continuing to consider pensioners as the only relevant voting block is part of the reason they're in the mess they are. Hopefully they start to do the right thing and realise there are much more productive ways to spend money.
Mr. Tubbs, yeah, I forget the stats but while some hate ZHCs others find them very useful.
A straight up ban is daft.
So What if a Candidate Livestreamed Sex Acts with Her Husband?
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2023/09/12/candidate-livestreamed-sex-acts-00115395
The most unfair element of ZHC used to be banning people from working other jobs, but that has already been outlawed a few years ago.
Lots of high rise residential in the cities, of course.
Arguably a pretty good trade off.
Sunak's job, politically, is to save as many Tory seats as possible so they at least have a chance to rebuild in opposition. Since pensioners are the only group that's still vaguely inclined to vote Tory he's trapped and has to keep it because otherwise he might get no votes at all.
The comparisons by Hague are not. The predicted possible pressure is 2050, or 2070 by IFC elsewhere, and Hague (as one would expect) emplasises the number which is 10x bigger. From the piece:
Its analysis found that the triple lock could potentially increase spending by anywhere between a further £5 billion and £45 billion per year, in today’s terms, by 2050.
I'd say Hague is part of the attempt to create rhetorical space for a giveaway budget for the Election.
Every researched number I have ever seen says most workers like them.
Grandson worked for a seafront pleasure park; he was told he would be called when needed and had an hour to get to work. Turning down 3 shifts meant the sack.
Sixty years ago the Lecturer my Higher National Diploma course told us that we 18 year old's had a Pension Problem. Being 18, we all laughed!
He went on to explain that the first part of the problem was that current pensioners were not being paid out of a fund that they had built up over their working lives but by the contributions being made by today's workers, which would soon include us, at which point we stopped laughing.
The second part of the problem was that as the birth rate dropped the number of contributors would fall and that as life expectancy rose the number of pensioners would rise, with the obvious results.
His answer was that the pension age for men and women should be equalised and that they should be raised by a minimum of one year every ten years.
Doing so would at least have helped to solve the funding problem.
PS As it turned out, I did not retire until I was 75.
Start applying NI on pensioner salaries.
It suited me as I could increase or reduce shifts as needed.
The impact of 'banning' them very much depends with what they are replaced with. If it is just for headlines and flexible contracts with some non-zero minimum are retained, then I fail to get excited either way. If only fixed hour contracts remain then we will reduce labour market mobility and likely end up with higher unemployment.
I expect it's more like the former and this change will have little real world impact.
If you want some actual lived experience of the impact of this, try Dame Tanni Grey's twitter feed where she's been retweeting some experiences as they happen. The rail service companies have had a legal obligation to provide an equal service since iirc the DDA in 1995.
If a suitable alternative was provided first then it would be possible, but it's just Ministers tripping over their own feet to save money, whilst ignoring their legal responsibilities.
https://twitter.com/Tanni_GT
Top blind footballer feared she’d fall in front of speeding train after being left stranded at platform
@SamanthaGough19
“No-one there to help despite booking assistance”
“No idea how close I was to platform edge as there’s no tactile paving”
(aside - these are to do with the complications of booking assistance).
@Tanni_GT·Sep 11
Train cancelled this morning. Other company won’t accept tickets. So people on platform are having to buy new tickets. Luckily the ticket office were able to explain
@Tanni_GT
Sep 11
So my booked assistance wasn’t cancelled …. So now I don’t have assistance so have to hope that a different station can sort me out and no other wheelchair user is travelling
Up to now, the most significant change in 2010 was the decision to switch from using RPI to using CPI to calculate price inflation, CPI being on average about 1% less than it is now. There have been several years since where the pension increase has been limited to the 2.5% floor, whereas if RPI had still been in use the increase would have been above that. By contrast, the change to bring average earnings into the calculation would hardly have mattered had RPI still been in use, because the last 13 years have seen wage increases stagnant or falling even behind CPI and very rarely exceeding both RPI and 2.5%.
On the other hand, while the state pension is no higher than it would have been, there have been plenty of other changes which have adversely the incomes of the elderly:
eg.
- the continued raising of the state pension age, despite the rise in life expectancy flatlining
- the particularly harsh treatment of WASPI women
- changes that require longer contribution periods so that fewer new retiree s are able to access the full pension
- freezing of many benefits specific to older people such as pension credits, which amounted to real term cuts.
On the back of all this, with the huge cut in local authority funding, the public services that matter most to the elderly have been drastically cut, with social care a shadow of its former self. And the NHS is starting to go in the same direction.
The reasons that fewer pensioners nowadays find themselves in poverty is due to the growth and generosity of occupational pensions now being paid out.
I looked at the speech and she said: “We will not only ban zero-hour contracts but ensure all contracts come with minimum hours and reflect normal working life, requiring notice of shift changes and pay when they are cancelled at the last minute.” That gives a bit more detail.
Edit: You were presumably referring to this polling, https://fullfact.org/economy/how-many-people-zero-hours-contracts-want-more-hours/ , that says most people on ZHCs don’t want more hours, which isn’t the same as asking them whether they’re happy with the contract they’re on. I might not want more hours, but still be unhappy with the lack of a minimum number of hours specified.
Tanni Grey-Thompson
@Tanni_GT Sep 9
This is what I see at a TVM. I can’t tell when to put my card details in
https://twitter.com/Tanni_GT/status/1700467673539244408
(TVM: Ticket Vending Machine)
As a father of three children aged 11 to 17 this is quite a revealing/disturbing read. I have personally never seen any online pornography so I suspect I am quite naive on the subject.
The implication that stress makes you commit sexual assault/ rape colleagues is 😱. Very many women do stressful jobs without turning to sexual abuse to relieve their "stress". My niece is a consultant anaesthetist at a major teaching hospital who suffered an appalling amount of stress working during Covid and who managed to do so without sexually assaulting colleagues.
Maybe it is men like the doctor writing this letter - who seemingly cannot cope with this "stress" - who are wrong for this profession. Or, indeed, all the other professions with a problem with men assaulting their female colleagues or clients.
There are letters/emails you write - which you then print off, read, screw up and throw in the bin. If you send them you make a fool of yourself - or worse.
This was one of those letters.
* Guards on trains are a necessity.
* Guards in train stations are a necessity
* Ticket offices are a necessity.
It should be politically saleable in those terms. Although admittedly, not without a whole load of moaning.
Not to mention those pensioners solely reliant on the state pension have an annual income less than minimum wage
The fashion for tatoos is one that's hard to understand.
Buried in the ludicrous 1970's views, there is a point somewhere about expectations of hard work in medical training and the workplace. Clearly people need to go into training and jobs with full understanding of what is required.
At Bath we have an issue with students who need extra time to complete exams, based on declarations of disability. I'd estimate around 40% of our pharmacy students receive extra time (for things such as dyslexia etc).
All well and good, although I think many are playing the system. But I doubt that Boots or the Hospital trust who employs them is going to give them extra time to sort the ward round, or 10 minutes rest every hour. At some point people do need to man/woman up.
The Tories given their current polling are hardly going to annoy their last core voters .
Labour surely aren’t going to allow hubris with current polling to shoot themselves in the foot . Or will they ?
As we saw from May’s disastrous election campaign a big lead can evaporate .
Last night 🇺🇦Ukrainian forces mounted a successful attack on the 🇷🇺Russian naval base at Sevastopol.
Cruise missile strikes hit dry docks where a Kilo-class submarine and Ropucha class LCT were believed to be under repair.
#UkraineRussiaWar
https://x.com/NavyLookout/status/1701841320333979960?s=20
But it's not generous even with it, I'll give you that.
In fact, iirc, there was a lawyer on here who proposed banning Uber-type contracts, even though 90% of those with them were happy in one poll.
I raised this topic because Rayner specifically says 'Ban'. Now it may be that that is not the intention, but if so why not say it? I think this is the kind of thing that will cause a narrowing of the polls towards the election when Labour start to get the kind a scrutiny a government in waiting receives.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Mak_(politician)
That doesn't mean it won't stay in place for political reasons.
A lot of people on zero hour contracts just don't have the choice they will accept / suffer really bad conditions (see @OldKingCole 's grandson's example) because they have no choice.
And from what I remember of the Union's demands they aren't actually that insane - it is something like companies need to provide x hours work a week if the worker wants to do it. The one thing it stops is a company "employing someone" but not giving them anywork...
Yes the state pension is not a lot but if people want more they have a potential working career of 40+ years to secure some additional private provision.