UKIP

[Kelvin]

There may well be the odd member of Ukip that supports a fascist ideology but Ukip isn't a fascist party in the strictest definition of the word compared to say Mussolini's party (where the word was first coined) or Franco's. (Avoided invoking Godwin's law) In fact, I'd go so far to suggest that calling them fascist or racist is dangerous and plays into their hands a little which is a mistake both the Conservatives and Labour have made. They should focus on Ukip's lack of any kind of real thought through policies. An awful lot of what they say is a sweeping generalisation that doesn't hold much water under scrutiny. However, the man on the Clapham Omnibus might agree with the sentiment because it's quite easy to agree with it in the absence of any kind of facts. Take for example the council elections. You'd think Ukip swept to power given the media coverage except they didn't win a single council AFAIK. I do think that Ukip will have the Conservatives running scared however as I can see them losing votes to them at the GE and possibly Ukip will gain the odd MP here and there but it's the swing of voters that will concern just call me Dave.

I did predict Ukip would do well in the Euros simply because of the number of Ukip posters strewn across largely well to do villages in Herts, Beds, and North Essex. I didn't see any labour posters (lol) nor any Conservative posters. I counted 20 odd Ukip posters though...and these were in people's gardens; the kind of people that will have voted Conservative all their lives.

[tut]

Until independence ... then labour lose the Scottish MPs!

Bookies odds today, 1/4 NO, 11/4 YES

So anybody who thinks it is going to be a yes vote get your money on now at nearly 3/1. Bet Alex does not take up those odds.

tut

[Scuffers]

Scuffers,

OK. You clearly think I am misunderstanding you so let's start again.

I interpreted your sentence

I guess its better to have rights and be unemployed?

as being ironic. ie you didn't actually mean it, but what you meant was that more workers rights led to less employment. As this was said in the context of maternity leave I inferred that you meant maternity leave led to unemployment specifically and a less competitive economy generally.

This inference was compounded by the preceding sentence which said:

Are you aware just how many jobs in this country have been off-shored because of ever more stupid workers rights?

Which I took not to be ironic, but to be a theory of yours that workers' rights had caused jobs to go overseas. This was further compounded by the separate posts you had made in response to Kelvin's posts.
Once again because this was posted in response to a comment about maternity leave I took it to mean that you believe that requiring companies to pay maternity leave was causing jobs to go overseas.

The only conclusion I could reach was that you would prefer there to be fewer workers' right so I asked if you would prefer us to have the employment laws of third world countries supported by your sentence -

(and you wonder why our industry has taken a massive beating over the last few decades compared to the so-called third world?)

If you are suggesting, which I think I have demonstrated that you are, that employment laws in this country are causing jobs to go overseas to countries with fewer laws, then the only logical conclusion to draw is that the only way to get these jobs back, something which from your tone I presume you consider is desirable, is to lower our employment protection until it is below theirs'.

So what standard would you have our employment laws set at?

Look, I'm not suggesting that all manufacturing jobs have gone overseas because of this, but a fair chunk have.

clothing is a bad example, no country can compete with the piece rates from Bangladesh, that's been the case for years (and we should hand our heads in shame when you see the conditions they work in and tragedy's when the inevitable accidents happen).

what I am getting at is jobs being off-shored like call centres, look how many banks have done this, (and I would argue what they have done is blatantly illegal re: data protection).

Now, some of this is down to technology making it easier and cheaper to off-shore, but some of it's down to things like the working time directive, and increased maternity leave (including men now!).

The CBI did a report about 8 months ago that basically stated the overhead costs to employ office staff in the UK had grown by 17% over the last 5 years and they pinpointed some 11% of this was down to employment law changes (mostly from EU).

Now, if your business is on the edge of profitability using a UK base, and this comes along and moves your cost base, of course you're going to look elsewhere (outside of the EU too).

How is this a good thing for the UK employment market?

on a wider point, I really am anti paying people to breed, as in things like child benefit, free nursery's, etc. in this day and age we already have too many people in this country (immigration anyone?), our infrastructure can't cope as it is, yet we are effectively encouraging people to breed, if you can't afford to bring up your own kids, don't have them.

we seem to have developed into a society of nanny state and the state will pay for everything (and pay for it by running up massive debts, an taxing the crap out of the few that actually earn a living)

(and yes I am scrooge)

[Lazydonkey]

what I am getting at is jobs being off-shored like call centres, look how many banks have done this, (and I would argue what they have done is blatantly illegal re: data protection).

Now, some of this is down to technology making it easier and cheaper to off-shore, but some of it's down to things like the working time directive, and increased maternity leave (including men now!).

utter utter utter sh*t.

I've worked with contact centres for getting on for 15 years now and the ONLY THING that pushed them to off-shore was wages and ethos. Not working time directive (which most people sign an exemption from) or mat leave or anything else.

Offshore contact centre workers view a contact centre job as a prestigious one that allows them to earn considerably more money than many other josb they could get. As such they try harder, work harder and will hit every target you set them. All for a take home of sub £500 a month. Some of that actually causes an issue as they are so keen to impress, hit their targets and keep their job that they will follow every rule to the absolute letter, but you can work on that.

In contrast scottish contact centre workers are lazy, moaning, whinging fcuk who are only in the centre until they get a proper job. They are also expensive with a £16k-£18k basic with bonuses on top. They won't work at night, they only want to work 9-5 and the ones that do want to work at night are students who are of variable quality.

Most contact centres are now moving away from offshore as they perform very badly in terms of customer satisfaction surveys. There are many reasons for this but in my experience it's a self fulfilling prophecy as they've offshored to save money, employ the cheapest people and then constrained what they can / can't do on the system. So you call up, get a thick accent you can't understand who tells you they can't help you and they'll need to transfer you. Thus angry customer. As such many customers will simply hang up when they get an indian voice and re-dial so the savings aren't there. In general you now find that they are used as lowest common denominator "cannon fodder" press 5 for anything else type calls for reasons of cheapness.

15 years ago people were saying that everything would be automated and online and call centres would be a thing of the past but call volumes are only going up (we get 1.4 million a week) and the more complicated product offerings get the more people crave a human.

The concept of offshoring is still being used in contact centres and IT but more in a "follow the sun" way where you use people in a different timezone so you don't have to pay inflated costs to get good people into the centre when you need them (ie past 4pm)

However, i'll say it again it's got nothing to do with anything other than money.

EDIT : If you call any of the admiral group of companies you'll often get a canadian accent......again that's not due to working practices or regulations and everything to do with the fact it's cheaper to operate a good service at the time's people call. Sky's peak calling time is between 4pm and 8pm and it's a nightmare to get Uk based people in the centres during those times........unless you chuck lots of money at them.

[pete]

on a wider point, I really am anti paying people to breed, as in things like child benefit, free nursery's, etc. in this day and age we already have too many people in this country (immigration anyone?), our infrastructure can't cope as it is, yet we are effectively encouraging people to breed, if you can't afford to bring up your own kids, don't have them.

we seem to have developed into a society of nanny state and the state will pay for everything (and pay for it by running up massive debts, an taxing the crap out of the few that actually earn a living)

(and yes I am scrooge)

Norway has some of the most progressive employment rights in the world and credits that with a great deal of its economic success. It enables women to stay in work and thus contribute to the economy rather than be lost to the economy. <source a Norwegian professor I got chatting to one night in a bar. What? Who doesn't talk economics with strangers in bars?>

Free nurserys are good because education is good.

There are a minority who abuse the system, this is wrong. This should be stopped. I'm a bit more of a socialist than you (I suspect) but I am fond of my mate's definition of socialism that it's not just about folk getting free stuff but about folk contributing to society. We should find a way of excluding those who are unwilling to contribute.

The state did not run up massive debts being a "nanny state". The state ran up massive debts bailing out the financial sector by socialising their losses. In 2007 the debt to GDP ratio was less than 40% - by 2013 it had risen to 90%. (numbers from memory but they are ballpark).

This is not poor people being bailed out by the nanny state, this is the very rich crashing our economy for profit. I would suggest these few hundred deserve your ire far more than the few thousand who have too many kids.

[pete]

There may well be the odd member of Ukip that supports a fascist ideology but Ukip isn't a fascist party in the strictest definition of the word compared to say Mussolini's party (where the word was first coined) or Franco's. (Avoided invoking Godwin's law) In fact, I'd go so far to suggest that calling them fascist or racist is dangerous and plays into their hands a little which is a mistake both the Conservatives and Labour have made. They should focus on Ukip's lack of any kind of real thought through policies. An awful lot of what they say is a sweeping generalisation that doesn't hold much water under scrutiny. However, the man on the Clapham Omnibus might agree with the sentiment because it's quite easy to agree with it in the absence of any kind of facts. Take for example the council elections. You'd think Ukip swept to power given the media coverage except they didn't win a single council AFAIK. I do think that Ukip will have the Conservatives running scared however as I can see them losing votes to them at the GE and possibly Ukip will gain the odd MP here and there but it's the swing of voters that will concern just call me Dave.

I did predict Ukip would do well in the Euros simply because of the number of Ukip posters strewn across largely well to do villages in Herts, Beds, and North Essex. I didn't see any labour posters (lol) nor any Conservative posters. I counted 20 odd Ukip posters though...and these were in people's gardens; the kind of people that will have voted Conservative all their lives.

OK I pretty much buy all that, although it gets in the way of my rhetoric. TBH the opposition (from the other parties) was woeful - I imagine focus groups paralysed with indecision.

They did worse this time than last time in the council elections but that interferes with the story arc the media is drawing.

[robin]

Story arc? Get that man a clip on ponytail and some moccasins

Bankers. It's cockney rhyming slang.

Cheers,
Robin

[pete]

Story arc? Get that man a clip on ponytail and some moccasins

Bankers. It's cockney rhyming slang.

Cheers,
Robin

Ah if only i had something to clip a ponytail to.
Will my Birkenstocks stand in for moccasins?