Threatening to get rid of zero-hours contracts is a very dangerous plan as well (I did love the way Andrew Neil took her to pieces over that by providing figures that proved she was lying and how she was completely unable to deal with it, just parroting the 'You're wrong' line).
Didnt anyone tell her that a third of charity employees are on zero hours contracts, and a quarter of public sector employees likewise, both dramatically more than the private sector.
I somehow think she's past caring about that. She reminds me of Ronald Reagan over Iran-Contra: 'My heart and my best intentions still tell me it is true, but the facts and the evidence tell me it is not.' Except that she seems to have decided that her heart trumps the evidence.
The real risk with banning ZHCs is that you don't get rid of the jobs, you just get rid of the paperwork. There is a case to be made that there is an abuse of process going on, but that's not the case Labour are trying to make, nor would their proposed solution actually make it any better. Instead, by effectively withdrawing contracts from such workers, it might well leave them (a) more vulnerable to exploitation and (b) outside the tax system altogether, which would not be very helpful in dealing with our enormous deficit.
The whole zero hours contract being something new is really kinda of nonsense...in that anybody who has done casual agency work anytime in the past 20+ years will have found this is exactly what you got, it just wasn't called "zero-hours", it was called agency work.
Also, not all zero-hours / agency work is low paid e.g. Supply teachers are normally employed via specialist teacher agencies and aren't guaranteed a set number of hours, but it pays pretty well.
What appears to have come about (which is being outlawed) and is wrong, is employers demanding exclusivity.
When I was a student many moons ago, I spent each summer doing agency work and all the guys and girls I would work in warehouses did the same...signed up to multiple agencies, see which gave decent for the next x weeks and took that.
One thing also not mentioned in the "outcry" over zero hours....I worked at a number of places, where basically they were used agency / zero hours, to hire a group of people, assess them, and then the decent ones to be offered a permanent position.
@FrancisUrquhart - yes, and it would be a real disaster if that ladder were to be kicked away. It's not only in summer work or warehousing, either. Supply teaching, for example, would become impossible, as would early career HE temping (both of which are zero hours options) both of which are recognised routes to finding permanent work.
Just one thought - do you mean 'employers' rather than 'employees'? Or is there an extra dimension to this whole thing about employees trying to cut out other ZHC workers? That's a genuine request for a clarification, because I don't know and I'm interested in finding out.
PS - some figures on supply teaching - it's usually £180 per day through an agency, of which the teacher sees £100-120 less tax.
How many UKIP councillors are there on Southend On Sea UA council . A glance at the council website would say 5 but it is much more complex than that Floyd Waterwoth UKIP PPC for Rochford and Southend East was expelled from the UKIP group on the council following an initiative led by the UKIP group leader James Moyle . James Moyle and the 3 other councillors have been " suspended from party activity " because of the expulsion of Waterworth . One of the other 3 councillors Lee Burling stood as a paper candidate last year and was elected done very little for the last year and has just announced his resignation from the council . James Moyle has called on voters to vote Conservative and not UKIP in the seats of Rochford/Southend East and Castle Point but bot apparently Southend West Floyd Waterworth has now called for Moyle to be expelled from the party and to resign from the council . What is the point of electing UKIP councillors ?
The most compelling facts to me are that Osborne cut the top rate to 45 per cent in 2012, government support collapsed, and they spent the subsequent 24 months trying to get back to where they once were in the eyes of the public.
The irony about this bit is that since the difference in tax take at 45% and 50% is the square root of nothing, the logical extension of this is that the rich were not actually paying any more tax at 50% than they are at 45%, in other words the entire effect of the tax was, or would be, avoided. So people are getting indignant at the rich paying less tax when demonstrably they are paying the same tax.
It is fair to say that by the same reasoning Osborne could have left the band where it was, or even increased it and nothing would have changed, but what is harder to quantify is the disincentive to foreign investors that see and alarming large headline number and decide to take their money elsewhere, not realising how easy it is to sidestep, especially as a non-dom.
Yes, it's interesting. Has anyone worked out why taxes stayed the same? There are a lot of compelling arguments, and I often hear the case that it attracts more high earners, when it could just be that top incomes rose, but I don't know anything about the behaviour of this tax rate so I don't speculate.
I know from personal experience that some high earners brought forward their bonuses before the 50% rate kicked in and then two years later delayed receiving their bonus until the 45% rate kicked in. So bonuses were much reduced while the rate was 50% and were higher either side of it. So I think it was mainly a timing effect not a long term effect. The statistic is mis-used for ideological purposes.
Indeed. The same kind of thing happened with dividends. What we know for certain is that no conclusions about the potential long-term benefits, or otherwise, of the 50 pence rate can be made from the brief period of time in which it applied.
Oh, did Lucy Powell say Labour didn't care about cutting the deficit earlier? Put me in the 100%-cert Labour column if so.
No: she said "we will deal with the deficit"
But then Neil dug into her announced plans and came up with £2bn in tax rises and £1bn in spending cuts, but no plan on how they will deal with the other £90bn+
@FrancisUrquhart - yes, and it would be a real disaster if that ladder were to be kicked away. It's not only in summer work or warehousing, either. Supply teaching, for example, would become impossible, as would early career HE temping (both of which are zero hours options) both of which are recognised routes to finding permanent work.
Just one thought - do you mean 'employers' rather than 'employees'? Or is there an extra dimension to this whole thing about employees trying to cut out other ZHC workers? That's a genuine request for a clarification, because I don't know and I'm interested in finding out.
@FrancisUrquhart - yes, and it would be a real disaster if that ladder were to be kicked away. It's not only in summer work or warehousing, either. Supply teaching, for example, would become impossible, as would early career HE temping (both of which are zero hours options) both of which are recognised routes to finding permanent work
But its part of the ongoing Labour muppetry concerning agency workers and full employment. Labour have had this fantasy idea for decades that if you stopped employers hiring agency workers, they would suddenly hire an equivalent number of full time salaried employees instead. This is of course complete nonsense because the agency workers give the employer flexibility as business conditions change. Win a nice little contract, take on some agency staff for six months. If you employed those people you would have the devils own jobs sacking them after six months, and you cant afford to carry the overhead, so you don't take the work in the first place.
I thought the "E" in PPE was Economics, how do politicians with Oxbridge PPEs (never minds those that have lectured in Economics at Harvard!) have so little idea about how the economy works ?
Oh, did Lucy Powell say Labour didn't care about cutting the deficit earlier? Put me in the 100%-cert Labour column if so.
No: she said "we will deal with the deficit"
But then Neil dug into her announced plans and came up with £2bn in tax rises and £1bn in spending cuts, but no plan on how they will deal with the other £90bn+
And she said "we will deal with the deficit".
So basically, she's either lying or has no clue.
Attractive, huh?
Not sure how saying we will deal with the deficit is either lying or clueless. It does not seem any more mendacious than IDS saying we will make billions of pounds of cuts but we won't say where.
Political betting markets are intriguing. You can get 12/1 to 16/1 on a Labour majority, but no more than 9/4 on the kind of seat that they'd win in a majority situation, like Bristol West. Conservative majority odds are 4/1 to 7/1, and the seats are over 3/1. That makes a lot more sense than Labour's figures.
Wittering on about how depression isn't real and that you just need to go running to beat it. Whilst exercise certainly helps depression, one should note the copilot of Germanwings had done a half marathon recently.
Oh, did Lucy Powell say Labour didn't care about cutting the deficit earlier? Put me in the 100%-cert Labour column if so.
No: she said "we will deal with the deficit"
But then Neil dug into her announced plans and came up with £2bn in tax rises and £1bn in spending cuts, but no plan on how they will deal with the other £90bn+
And she said "we will deal with the deficit".
So basically, she's either lying or has no clue.
Attractive, huh?
Not sure how saying we will deal with the deficit is either lying or clueless. It does not seem any more mendacious than IDS saying we will make billions of pounds of cuts but we won't say where.
Do you think they are going to deal with the deficit ? Do you really deep down believe it ?
Wittering on about how depression isn't real and that you just need to go running to beat it. Whilst exercise certainly helps depression, one should note the copilot of Germanwings had done a half marathon recently.
Also vote Labour get rid of Hopkins......
She is the ultimate twitter troll. Making a career out of saying things in such a way that she knows will get her in the media.
Political betting markets are intriguing. You can get 12/1 to 16/1 on a Labour majority, but no more than 9/4 on the kind of seat that they'd win in a majority situation, like Bristol West. Conservative majority odds are 4/1 to 7/1, and the seats are over 3/1. That makes a lot more sense than Labour's figures.
Labour can well take Bristol West and not get a majority.
Oh, did Lucy Powell say Labour didn't care about cutting the deficit earlier? Put me in the 100%-cert Labour column if so.
No: she said "we will deal with the deficit"
But then Neil dug into her announced plans and came up with £2bn in tax rises and £1bn in spending cuts, but no plan on how they will deal with the other £90bn+
And she said "we will deal with the deficit".
So basically, she's either lying or has no clue.
Attractive, huh?
Not sure how saying we will deal with the deficit is either lying or clueless. It does not seem any more mendacious than IDS saying we will make billions of pounds of cuts but we won't say where.
To be fair, she could also be saying "trust us", but given track record that seems quite a leap of faith.
I did note that when Neil asked "is the 50% tax rate the only tax increase" she said "it's the only tax increase we've set out". And on spending Miliband has said they will protect the NHS + education, and said they will cut local government spending. (You could also infer that he will stick to the overseas development budget)
The Tories have - at least - identified departments that they are going to cut.
In an ideal world, both parties would set out properly worked through plans for consideration. But we have the politicians we deserve
Political betting markets are intriguing. You can get 12/1 to 16/1 on a Labour majority, but no more than 9/4 on the kind of seat that they'd win in a majority situation, like Bristol West. Conservative majority odds are 4/1 to 7/1, and the seats are over 3/1. That makes a lot more sense than Labour's figures.
Labour can well take Bristol West and not get a majority.
OK, sure they can. That was just one example, and the opposite could also be true. Put another way: For 12/1 to 16/1, you can take either Labour majority on the government markets, or Labour wins on the seat markets in places they only won in the 1997 and 2001 landslides.
Slightly OT - over the years, I've noticed we've a lot of physicists, biologists and mathematicians. Do we have any or many chemists out there?
That's my geek interest and wish I'd taken up the offer to do it instead of my weird one of art history combined with historical colour chemistry. I'm thinking of doing an OU Chemistry degree to fill in my interest. Any ideas?
There`s 3 debates/interviews to come and their man isn`t even in all of them.
And when in the next phone poll the Tories are ahead, it will be Labour in full panic. Its a sign of the times I think, possibly an election is due soon ?
Katie Hopkins has said that if Labour win she'll leave the country. I've no idea who she is but I just heard a clip which suggested this might explain Ed's jump in the polls.
Political betting markets are intriguing. You can get 12/1 to 16/1 on a Labour majority, but no more than 9/4 on the kind of seat that they'd win in a majority situation, like Bristol West. Conservative majority odds are 4/1 to 7/1, and the seats are over 3/1. That makes a lot more sense than Labour's figures.
Labour can well take Bristol West and not get a majority.
OK, sure they can. That was just one example, and the opposite could also be true. Put another way: For 12/1 to 16/1, you can take either Labour majority on the government markets, or Labour wins on the seat markets in places they only won in the 1997 and 2001 landslides.
Have only had a LDs weak on crime, drugs & thugs postcard. Their ground campaign may be better in their core wards, but so far I haven't noticed their campaign.
Mike Hancock standing in Portsmouth-that`s one less for the Lib Dems.
You have to be f##king kidding me. The man has no shame.
Edit: Arhhh this make sense...is this true?
"Under the terms of the Parliamentary Resettlement Grant, if he announces he will not be standing as a candidate he will not receive any redundancy pay-out, whereas, as the incumbent, if he fights and loses his seat in the election he would be eligible to receive six months’ MPs salary (the first £30,000 tax-free)."
Everyone seems to have got a bit over-excited about one poll. MOE, rather than any post-Thursday Labour boost, seems to be the best explanation for the result. It still looks nip and tuck to me, with the Tories my favourites to win most seats nationally because their vote is more energised than Labour's and Labour is going to get one hell of a kicking in Scotland.
It seems to me they just got a sample that was more Labour than usual, and far more interested in watching the interview than the public were in general.
I think the Tories will finish ahead of Labour in votes. Seats, I'm not so sure about.
I think the Tories are currently heading for 280-290 seats, so probably won't be in government.
Sporting Index spread between Labour and Tory now down to 9. Even the SNP has dropped 1. LD are now 24-26 and UKIP 6-8. Even the Greens 1.1-1.4. Thee was a good chance to make some money on the Greens when bizarrely 1.4-1.8 was being quoted. Why ? Is there a second seat they can win ?
Slightly OT - over the years, I've noticed we've a lot of physicists, biologists and mathematicians. Do we have any or many chemists out there?
That's my geek interest and wish I'd taken up the offer to do it instead of my weird one of art history combined with historical colour chemistry. I'm thinking of doing an OU Chemistry degree to fill in my interest. Any ideas?
I had read this year that we had too many dispensing chemists.
I once worked with a guy with *no shame*. He was a chartered accountant sent to gaol for 9yrs for tax avoidance. He came out larger than life and didn't give an eff about shame. He was charming, gay, threatening and seductive.
I knew his other half and worked with him. He was a master of the art of seduction and bullying. I've never met another like him. He was enormous fun, if he wasn't threatening you...
Katie Hopkins has said that if Labour win she'll leave the country. I've no idea who she is but I just heard a clip which suggested this might explain Ed's jump in the polls.
Oh, did Lucy Powell say Labour didn't care about cutting the deficit earlier? Put me in the 100%-cert Labour column if so.
Your position on this is foolish and grotesquely immoral. As well as thoroughly anti-socialist.
Foolish, grotesquely immoral, but in line with approx.60% of the public.
60% of the public might well lack the insight, education, or interest to understand the consequences of their preference. One thing you can be sure of though is if a political party follows that preference, and the economy slams into the ground hard and causes mass unemployment and a run on the pound, it will be the politicians getting it in the neck, telling the public it was what they wanted wont cut any ice at all.
One thing you can be sure of though is if a political party follows that preference, and the economy slams into the ground hard and causes mass unemployment and a run on the pound ...
But the flaw here is I don't accept that that would be the consequence, just like it has never been the consequence in 100 of the past 150 years that the government has run a deficit (including most of Thatcher's years in office).
Slightly OT - over the years, I've noticed we've a lot of physicists, biologists and mathematicians. Do we have any or many chemists out there?
That's my geek interest and wish I'd taken up the offer to do it instead of my weird one of art history combined with historical colour chemistry. I'm thinking of doing an OU Chemistry degree to fill in my interest. Any ideas?
I had read this year that we had too many dispensing chemists.
We do. One of my friends owns a chain of chemists and has told me that the large multiples are cutting base salaries by replacing older pharmacists with newbies on lower rates. He's not doing that, but he has squeezed locum rates by something like 30%.
That is conjecture. We don't know what they need, the efficiency of the Labour vote will have changed a lot. They are piling on wasted votes in central London etc, and the Tory vote is getting substantially more efficient after the kippers taking chunks out of their shire vote... and then there is Scotland.
Oh, did Lucy Powell say Labour didn't care about cutting the deficit earlier? Put me in the 100%-cert Labour column if so.
No: she said "we will deal with the deficit"
But then Neil dug into her announced plans and came up with £2bn in tax rises and £1bn in spending cuts, but no plan on how they will deal with the other £90bn+
And she said "we will deal with the deficit".
So basically, she's either lying or has no clue.
Attractive, huh?
Not sure how saying we will deal with the deficit is either lying or clueless. It does not seem any more mendacious than IDS saying we will make billions of pounds of cuts but we won't say where.
Do you think they are going to deal with the deficit ? Do you really deep down believe it ?
Deficit hawks invariably overlook economic growth in favour of austerity, which kills growth and makes the deficit worse.
Sunil Prasannan @Sunil_P2 · 30m30 minutes ago Con and Lab in ELBOW (Electoral Leader-Board Of the Week) since Aug 2014. Lab lead 0.2% (-0.3) = second lowest ever!
Comments
The real risk with banning ZHCs is that you don't get rid of the jobs, you just get rid of the paperwork. There is a case to be made that there is an abuse of process going on, but that's not the case Labour are trying to make, nor would their proposed solution actually make it any better. Instead, by effectively withdrawing contracts from such workers, it might well leave them (a) more vulnerable to exploitation and (b) outside the tax system altogether, which would not be very helpful in dealing with our enormous deficit.
Also, not all zero-hours / agency work is low paid e.g. Supply teachers are normally employed via specialist teacher agencies and aren't guaranteed a set number of hours, but it pays pretty well.
What appears to have come about (which is being outlawed) and is wrong, is employers demanding exclusivity.
When I was a student many moons ago, I spent each summer doing agency work and all the guys and girls I would work in warehouses did the same...signed up to multiple agencies, see which gave decent for the next x weeks and took that.
One thing also not mentioned in the "outcry" over zero hours....I worked at a number of places, where basically they were used agency / zero hours, to hire a group of people, assess them, and then the decent ones to be offered a permanent position.
Just one thought - do you mean 'employers' rather than 'employees'? Or is there an extra dimension to this whole thing about employees trying to cut out other ZHC workers? That's a genuine request for a clarification, because I don't know and I'm interested in finding out.
PS - some figures on supply teaching - it's usually £180 per day through an agency, of which the teacher sees £100-120 less tax.
A glance at the council website would say 5 but it is much more complex than that
Floyd Waterwoth UKIP PPC for Rochford and Southend East was expelled from the UKIP group on the council following an initiative led by the UKIP group leader James Moyle .
James Moyle and the 3 other councillors have been " suspended from party activity " because of the expulsion of Waterworth .
One of the other 3 councillors Lee Burling stood as a paper candidate last year and was elected done very little for the last year and has just announced his resignation from the council .
James Moyle has called on voters to vote Conservative and not UKIP in the seats of Rochford/Southend East and Castle Point but bot apparently Southend West
Floyd Waterworth has now called for Moyle to be expelled from the party and to resign from the council .
What is the point of electing UKIP councillors ?
But then Neil dug into her announced plans and came up with £2bn in tax rises and £1bn in spending cuts, but no plan on how they will deal with the other £90bn+
And she said "we will deal with the deficit".
So basically, she's either lying or has no clue.
Attractive, huh?
WTF??
A 200000% mark-up?
Ed goes the same colour when he can't make coherent policy statement!
Hell yes!!!
And with that, alas, I must go and do some marking. Have a good week everyone, and happy Easter!
I thought the "E" in PPE was Economics, how do politicians with Oxbridge PPEs (never minds those that have lectured in Economics at Harvard!) have so little idea about how the economy works ?
Also vote Labour get rid of Hopkins......
https://shop.labour.org.uk/products/labour-party-mug-101/
I did note that when Neil asked "is the 50% tax rate the only tax increase" she said "it's the only tax increase we've set out". And on spending Miliband has said they will protect the NHS + education, and said they will cut local government spending. (You could also infer that he will stick to the overseas development budget)
The Tories have - at least - identified departments that they are going to cut.
In an ideal world, both parties would set out properly worked through plans for consideration. But we have the politicians we deserve
There`s 3 debates/interviews to come and their man isn`t even in all of them.
That's my geek interest and wish I'd taken up the offer to do it instead of my weird one of art history combined with historical colour chemistry. I'm thinking of doing an OU Chemistry degree to fill in my interest. Any ideas?
Edit: Arhhh this make sense...is this true?
"Under the terms of the Parliamentary Resettlement Grant, if he announces he will not be standing as a candidate he will not receive any redundancy pay-out, whereas, as the incumbent, if he fights and loses his seat in the election he would be eligible to receive six months’ MPs salary (the first £30,000 tax-free)."
I knew his other half and worked with him. He was a master of the art of seduction and bullying. I've never met another like him. He was enormous fun, if he wasn't threatening you...
Misses the point.Labour don`t need to be ahead
Sunil Prasannan @Sunil_P2 · 29m 29 minutes ago
ELBOW week-ending 29th Mar: Lab 33.8 (nc), Con 33.6 (+0.3), UKIP 13.8 (-0.1), LD 7.9 (-0.1), Grn 5.7 (+0.2).
https://twitter.com/Sunil_P2/status/582183414062813184
Labour % leads in ELBOW (Electoral Leader-Board Of the Week) since August 2014. Week-ending 29th March = 0.2% (-0.3)
https://twitter.com/Sunil_P2/status/582183941739847681
Con and Lab in ELBOW (Electoral Leader-Board Of the Week) since Aug 2014. Lab lead 0.2% (-0.3) = second lowest ever!
https://twitter.com/Sunil_P2/status/582185731872940032