Portillo - Idle Young Should Be Entitled To Nothing

[wren]

I haven't lived in the UK for over 10 years.

Was all this bashing of the unemployed going on a few years ago during the "boom times"?

Just that it seems to me that that was a time when the problem of the long-term unemployed

could have been usefully addressed and complaints about idle shirkers possibly justified.

Now in a severe recession the number of jobs is down and it will only get harder for people to

find new jobs, even if they try hard.

Why bash the unemployed now of all times?

[Guest sillybear2]

Why bash the unemployed now of all times?

Because the government is broke, NuLabour were quite happy to buy votes with handouts during the boom times, they even sacked Frank Field in 1997 when he proposed to reform the welfare system as originally promised. Back in the early days of NuLabour they were all about the third way and introducing Clinton-esque Welfare-to-Work reforms, but in the end they bottled it, they missed a massive opportunity. Throughout Brown's patrician childhood he witnessed the church controlling poor people via handouts so he set about creating a welfare dependent client vote with eternal victim status.

Edited August 30, 2009 by sillybear2

[Guest BoomBoomCrash]

I haven't lived in the UK for over 10 years.

Was all this bashing of the unemployed going on a few years ago during the "boom times"?

Just that it seems to me that that was a time when the problem of the long-term unemployed

could have been usefully addressed and complaints about idle shirkers possibly justified.

Now in a severe recession the number of jobs is down and it will only get harder for people to

find new jobs, even if they try hard.

Why bash the unemployed now of all times?

Because the Bankstas and venal politicos need a misdirection. It's case of 'look at those unemployed people costing you money' in the hope that the bankers that have cost them much much more will be ignored.

[Pindar]

No, but over its lifespan the combine harvester replaces millions of man hours.

You're wasting your time. Most people are unable to comprehend a life where they are fed and housed but actually do very little "work" in return.

You are absolutely right in your assertion that technology has rendered many of our traditional jobs obsolete. The crazy fiction writers of the 1960s as well as tomorrows world presenters - they always envisioned a futuristic world in which we'd all be zipping around in floating cars, wearing silver jump suits and have robotic hoovers by the 2000s.

To some extent this is true - except the silver jumpsuits turned out to be a bit too delicate for the average wash and it was found that sportswear and burberry baseball caps were better.

Seriously, most the population clings to the notion that you must have "a job", in order to "get paid", even if that job contributes very little. Trickle down certainly works, but it is a waste of money - you may as well just have higher taxes on the rich who could do without most of their workforce. Then that silver jumpsuit might not be such a bad idea after all.

[Guest sillybear2]

You're wasting your time. Most people are unable to comprehend a life where they are fed and housed but actually do very little "work" in return.

You are absolutely right in your assertion that technology has rendered many of our traditional jobs obsolete. The crazy fiction writers of the 1960s as well as tomorrows world presenters - they always envisioned a futuristic world in which we'd all be zipping around in floating cars, wearing silver jump suits and have robotic hoovers by the 2000s.

Very true, our current standard of living is driven by oil, which is essentially a shadow slave. Only a few generations back the chavs would have been forced to work the fields or in manual trades like blacksmithing, there's probably some Wii game to explain what that entails. That's essentially why 80% of our economy is now bull$hit or entertainment based, even those in paid employment are simply part of the pyramid of excess, very few are actually at the coal face.

The consequences of mass production combined with robotics and automation was even seen as an impending problem in the 60's, but not even they realised that would be combined with the actual factories being located in China because of wage-arbitrage, with customer service based in India.

Edited August 30, 2009 by sillybear2

[R K]

But perhaps, at least, we ought to assume that fit young people are not entitled to anything. If a few young men from sink estates are now heroes in Afghanistan, why should we presume that all the others are capable of nothing useful at all?

I think he is flying this as his main kite.

If we can send a few fit young unemployed men from sink estates to be blown up in Helmand and elsewhere we can send more/all of them.

This is starting to look more and more like the outcome..........

Portillo himself of course sponged off the taxpayer as an MP and more lately sponges off the taxpayer as a talking head for the BBC, and holding posh tea parties to discuss how best to blow up our young men with other posh people, whilst moonlighting for Murdoch on the weekend.

Few of these people would send their own kids or go themselves to get blown up of course. I'd put him in the front line next to Brown, Balls and Mandelslime.

[Pindar]

I think he is flying this as his main kite.

Portillo himself of course sponged off the taxpayer as an MP and more lately sponges off the taxpayer as a talking head for the BBC, and holding posh tea parties to discuss how best to blow up our young men with other posh people, whilst moonlighting for Murdoch on the weekend.

Few of these people would send their own kids or go themselves to get blown up of course. I'd put him in the front line next to Brown, Balls and Mandelslime.

I'd put them all in a rocket and send it to the sun. Mandelscum would be sent in his own personal pod.

Edited August 30, 2009 by Von Moses

[R K]

I'd put them all in a rocket and send it to the sun. Mandelscum would be sent in his own personal pod.

Didn't Dave float the idea of some voluntary national service a while back?

I think it might become less 'voluntary' and have more of a military bias once they get in. It's what Portillo is hinting at. If you're going to pay them, stick a rifle in their hand.

[StainlessSteelCat]

Good to see the idle rich reverting to type and scapegoating the idle poor. A tad blatant though.

Given the choice I'd rather have paid the current crop of bankers & politicians £60/week each not to work - it would be cheaper than the current bailout/their expenses and they'd probably do less harm. But no doubt there'd be another crop of snouts eager to get to the trough and give us guidance we so desperately crave.

Edited August 30, 2009 by greencat

[Guest BoomBoomCrash]

I think he is flying this as his main kite.

If we can send a few fit young unemployed men from sink estates to be blown up in Helmand and elsewhere we can send more/all of them.

This is starting to look more and more like the outcome..........

Portillo himself of course sponged off the taxpayer as an MP and more lately sponges off the taxpayer as a talking head for the BBC, and holding posh tea parties to discuss how best to blow up our young men with other posh people, whilst moonlighting for Murdoch on the weekend.

Few of these people would send their own kids or go themselves to get blown up of course. I'd put him in the front line next to Brown, Balls and Mandelslime.

That's very much the agenda, 'heroes' being a euphemism for 'dead'. The situation in Afghanistan continues to deteriorate and as such in the mind of Toryboy now is the perfect time to start shovelling the unemployed into the middle of hell to die senseless deaths that will be spun as heroic sacrifices. Conceptually this isn't all that far from suggesting gas chambers be built to dispose of those troublesome vagabonds who don't fit into his vision of a Britain. One in which the wealthy luxuriate and the working class slave away under the aegis of a puritanical work ethic .

[Pindar]

Didn't Dave float the idea of some voluntary national service a while back?

I think it might become less 'voluntary' and have more of a military bias once they get in. It's what Portillo is hinting at. If you're going to pay them, stick a rifle in their hand.

Actually, national service isn't such a bad thing. They have it in Norway, Greece, Austria, Switzerland and a couple of other countries and it seems to turn out responsible young men and women. If we'd kept national service, it might have been a threat to the social engineering of Europe and creation of the EU. They don't want well armed citizens because they could "get in the way" of integration and could be deployed against the agenda.

Portaloo (chewy-lipped toff) is just a smug right-wing scumbag with middle class prejudices against what he considers "the unworthy". He seems to exhibit all the insight of a lump of coal and has no understanding of why there are so many disaffected unemployed youngsters in the first place. Perhaps his Thatcherite past has left him dazed in the starlight of his heroine and her grotty little crusade of neo-liberal wrecking.

Edited August 30, 2009 by Von Moses

[alexw]

Get off the case, as you know running bull we generate the most GDP and take the least from the state. We are diverse and vibrant and if we spun off with the home counties would be a top 10 world economy as it is we are predicated to be the 4th most powerful world city financially by 2020. The report (PWC 2007) concludes:

"Within the developed world, it seems likely that the most successful cities of the future will be those that have comparative advantages in intangible business, financial and consumer services that are not so easily emulated by the rising stars of China, India or Brazil"

Since we generate the most and take the least from the state shouldn't we be emulated by some of the other poxy little towns calling themselves cities in the UK.

The truth is we don't need the UK but the UK needs us.

What a load of rubbish. London does not create wealth, it simply skims off from what others have made.

Case in point - the massive rise in the contibution of london to the uk's GDP over the last decade, how did it manage this?

Answer - By building a giant ponzi scheme based on getting everyone into debt. How exactly has this been an overall benefit to the uk? I'd love to know how....

[Guest BoomBoomCrash]

Didn't Dave float the idea of some voluntary national service a while back?

I think it might become less 'voluntary' and have more of a military bias once they get in. It's what Portillo is hinting at. If you're going to pay them, stick a rifle in their hand.

The toffee nosed twits know the workforce will continue to shrink as technological progress ameliorates the need for human labour. They don't want the proletarian masses brooding away on subsistence benefits so the plan will be enforced conscription into an enormous army, one they will hire out to fight in situations other countries might not want their troops exposed to.

[Guest BoomBoomCrash]

Actually, national service isn't such a bad thing. They have it in Norway, Greece, Austria, Switzerland and a couple of other countries and it seems to turn out responsible young men and women. If we'd kept national service, it might have been a threat to the social engineering of Europe and creation of the EU. They don't want well armed citizens because they could "get in the way" of integration and could be deployed against the agenda.

Portaloo (chewy-lipped toff) is just a smug right-wing scumbag with middle class prejudices against what he considers "the unworthy". He seems to exhibit all the insight of a lump of coal and has no understanding of why there are so many disaffected unemployed youngsters in the first place. Perhaps his Thatcherite past has left him dazed in the starlight of his heroine and her grotty little crusade of neo-liberal wrecking.

National service can work, but do you want to trust the UK political class with that kind of power?

[wonderpup]

So, after a decade of 'greed is good' and 'I won't do my best work without a multimillion pound bonus to motivate me' our social superiors hope to ressurect the notion of a work ethic based on personal honour instead of boundless greed?

Good luck with that one.

[stormymonday_2011]

People were thinner and fitter then. Now, the people are too fat to fight, won't happen

Like a little wager on that.

[Guest BoomBoomCrash]

So, after a decade of 'greed is good' and 'I won't do my best work without a multimillion pound bonus to motivate me' our social superiors hope to ressurect the notion of a work ethic based on personal honour instead of boundless greed?

Good luck with that one.

You'll note not once in this missive does Portaloo mention any requirement for the same kind of selflessness from the sons and daughters of the wealthy. It seems having wealth in his eyes is in itself morally elevating, and by way corollary being unemployed and in receipt of modest state benefits is demonstrative of such a lack of moral rectitude that it is necessary for you to go to Afghanistan to be killed.

[Authoritarian]

I keep saying it, but the dullard contingent on HPC can't grasp it. Technology is destroying jobs faster than it creates new ones, and the rate at which this is happening is increasing. People can bleat about new industries emerging and so on, but the undeniable fact is that the requirement for human labour is decreasing year on year. Portaloo is simply playing the demagogue and pandering to populist fantasies of a sub-class of people hell bent on living an indolent existence at their expense.

You keep being told but you're unable to grasp the point. People don't want or need jobs, the only things we need are the produce derived from labour. If this can be reduced by the application of technology then so much the better.

If you want to live by your own moral code then throw away your car, computer, tools and any other modern machinery that you use. If you're not prepared to take this action then accept that you're a hypocrite and that your point has fundamental flaws.

[stormymonday_2011]

I haven't lived in the UK for over 10 years.

Was all this bashing of the unemployed going on a few years ago during the "boom times"?

Just that it seems to me that that was a time when the problem of the long-term unemployed

could have been usefully addressed and complaints about idle shirkers possibly justified.

Now in a severe recession the number of jobs is down and it will only get harder for people to

find new jobs, even if they try hard.

Why bash the unemployed now of all times?

Agreed

All the same b*llshit was spouted back in the early 1980s when there were over 3 millions unemployed.

Strange how so many suddenly decide to become feckless layabouts over night then suddenly rediscover the work ethic when the economy recovers.

The reality is that system seems to have largely given up on the hardened benefit bludgers and spends most of its time harassing the genuine unemployed, presumably because they assume that in the long run they will be to respond to such 'treatment' by getting some sort of job.

[Guest BoomBoomCrash]

You keep being told but you're unable to grasp the point. People don't want or need jobs, the only things we need are the produce derived from labour. If this can be reduced by the application of technology then so much the better.

If you want to live by your own moral code then throw away your car, computer, tools and any other modern machinery that you use. If you're not prepared to take this action then accept that you're a hypocrite and that your point has fundamental flaws.

I have no problem with technology, indeed I embrace the changes it will bring. I advocate a citizens wage, national divident or whatever you want to call it as a solution. I have stated this many times stop being so ******ing obtuse you tedious little shit.

[Guest sillybear2]

Actually, national service isn't such a bad thing.

Indeed, I fail to see how training the underclasses to operate guns, handle bayonets and kill without remorse could lead to any kind of problems in the future. That said many seem pre-qualified and would probably excel.

[Authoritarian]

I have no problem with technology

Really.....?

Technology is destroying jobs faster than it creates new ones

indeed I embrace the changes it (technology) will bring.

And then.....

People can bleat about new industries emerging and so on, but the undeniable fact is that the requirement for human labour is decreasing year on year.

I have stated this many times stop being so ******ing obtuse you tedious little shit.

Calm down, its only a debating forum.

Edited August 30, 2009 by chefdave

[Guest BoomBoomCrash]

Really.....?

And then.....

Calm down, its only a debating forum.

Technology is destroying jobs, this is a good thing IMO, so long as we implement a citizens wage. Without it the progress of technology becomes a massive problem for those trying to find work in a shrinking market.

[Authoritarian]

Technology is destroying jobs, this is a good thing IMO, so long as we implement a citizens wage. Without it the progress of technology becomes a massive problem for those trying to find work in a shrinking market.

There is no shrinking market, the market is set by demand, an increase in technology has no negative impact on demand which is the driving force behind the economy. Improved tools can only increase supply or reduce the amount of time spent on to creating the same products.

To put it another way if we got rid of all modern tools do you think we would be richer or poorer?

[Guest BoomBoomCrash]

There is no shrinking market, the market is set by demand, an increase in technology has no negative impact on demand which is the driving force behind the economy. Improved tools can only increase supply or reduce the amount of time spent on to creating the same products.

To put it another way if we got rid of all modern tools do you think we would be richer or poorer?

Your stupidity is really starting to annoy me. Let's say that tomorrow MegaCorp Inc announces that all desktop and laptop PC's can now be assembled by an automated production line, and all manafacturers adopt their technology. Does this...

a) Increase the number of people working to assemble computers

b.) decrease the number of people working to assemble computers

Let's say that over the following few years MegaCorp Inc applies their technology to other industries, all but eliminating the need for human workers. Does this...

a) Increase the size of the job market

b.) decrease the size of the job market

Edited August 30, 2009 by BoomBoomCrash