General Chat

AnnC - sadly even you cannot go beyond infinity!

I've made a decision never to die and keep on claiming my OAP!!! :-D

Couldn't find anything to disagree with there OFITG :-)

Ooh you forgot the terrible senior citizens (OAPs) who are daring to live longer and thus depriving everybody younger of everything.

I need to have a good rant as I am fed up reading some of the rhetoric being used by our prime minister and some of his ministers as to who is to blame for what. No matter what the problem is, governments always finds a way to put the blame on, this section of society or that section of society, anyone or any group except themselves - governments of all persuasions have been guilty of this, none more so than the current government.

I agree there are problems with the benefit system, I agree there are problems with immigration, I agree there are problems with unemployment - especially in relation to the young unemployed, and I agree there are problems in the NHS.

That does not mean that all people claiming benefits are scroungers, that does not mean that all immigrants are illegal, that does not mean that all the unemployed are layabouts who don't want to work, and that does not mean that the NHS and those who work in it are not, on the whole, doing a good job.

For government to stereotype people into groups, then to use scare mongering tactics about those groups, is nothing more than a way, to create smokescreens to divide public opinion and divert attention away from the criticism of their divisive policies.

There is the smokescreen of the need to reform the benefit system to reduce the deficit - when what they are really doing is dismantling as much as they can of it..

There is the smokescreen of illegal immigrants to hide their failed policies on immigration & border controls.

There is the smokescreen that all the unemployed are layabouts to hide their failed policies on creating growth and jobs.

There is the smokescreen of the failings in the NHS to hide the fact that their policy to reform the NHS was more about controlling costs to make it more attractive to private investors, as opposed to improving patient care.

The latest smokescreen is to say that, hard working immigrants from Eastern Europe are better equipped to find a job than our young unemployed, in an effort to hide their failed policies on youth unemployment.

It may well be the case, that the education systems in other European countries prepare young people for the wider world better than our education system does, I don't know, but if that is the case then that's not the fault of our young unemployed - it is the fault of the system.

Our economy used to be geared towards the manufacturing, construction, shipbuilding, and mining sectors, and in those days we required a skilled workforce of engineers, electricians, joiners, welders, shipwrights, draughtsmen, bricklayers, joiners, plumbers, coal miners, etc. Nowadays our economy is geared to the financial and service sectors and those sectors need a different set of skills.

I believe, the prime minister might not, that successive governments of all persuasions, in their rush to promote growth in the financial and service sectors, failed to pay enough attention to the changes required to our education and training systems that would be needed to service those markets.

Stop tarring everyone with the same brush and concentrate on building a fairer society - I feel better now I have had my rant :-)