UK Politics Thread

[TheMightyEthan]

Ah okay, I kinda guessed it was something like that, but I wasn't familiar with that saying.

[Hot Heart]

My new hero.

http://www.theguardian.com/culture/2015/mar/02/full-text-of-michael-sheens-speech

[TheMightyEthan]

I've often thought the world would be a better place if more people took the attitude of "there but for the grace of God go I."

[deanb]

http://shitjobs.net/

 

hehehe...*cries*

[Thursday Next]

I was on a 0 hours contract while at Uni. It worked for me at the time. Glad to be out of it now of course.

[TheMightyEthan]

What is a 0 hours contract?

[deanb]

It's a work contract where you're guaranteed 0hrs. They've become quite popular of late to offer since, well you can have a very flexible working arrangement of just not having in much staff at any particular time instead of having to have them in for 16hrs or 40hrs just twiddling thumbs. Also really popular with the government since they can go "hey look, we've reduced unemployment" even if a large chunk are on 0hrs contract, which is about how much work they were contracted for when unemployed.

 

Also popular are Apprenticeships since you can hire on a 16-25yr old worker for about half of minimum wage and there's next to no regulations on it, so you can have apprentice barristas and such too, rather than learning an actual trade like plumbing or electrician.

[TheMightyEthan]

If I'm understanding what they are correctly, that's a really prevalent type of job here, where you just work whenever the employer schedules and don't necessarily have a consistent number of hours or schedule from week to week.

[deanb]

See I figured from my understanding of how US laws work, such as "at will states" n what not that it might be something you guys have. But yeah it's balls. It's the kind of thing that means

- businesses can decrease outgoings.

- reduces social mobility

- gov't gets to look good both with employment figures, and keeping thier chums business costs down.

[TheMightyEthan]

Yeah, "at will" employment is the norm here, though many at will jobs are more stable than it seems 0 hour contracts are.

[Thursday Next]

Note that the 0 Hours element cuts both ways (you are not obliged to work more than 0 hours) so it does work for some people. At the time I was on one:

 

1. I was at uni, so I needed flexibility in case of exams, projects, etc.

2. I had a student loan, so wasn't wholly dependent on the 0 hours income.

3. I had at least one other job (see above).

4. They were understaffed so needed me more than I needed them.

 

This meant that I could pick and choose what days and times I worked, of course this was about 12 years ago, it would be a bold (foolish) person who would today say to their 0 hours boss "I'm busy tomorrow and I'm on a zero hours contract. I'm not coming in and if you don't like it you can try to sack me." (which I did once and it felt GREAT!)

[TheMightyEthan]

"Try" to sack?

[Thursday Next]

Yeah, since I was on a zero hours contract, and wasn't in breach dropping me for that would have been an unfair dismissal case. Or at the very least an expensive tribunal.

[TheMightyEthan]

Okay, so that's actually more protection than an at-will employee gets.  In at-will employment any party can terminate the arrangement at any time, for any reason or no reason (although the employer can't fire you for a "bad" reason, like racial discrimination).  So they can fire you just cause they feel like it, or if you don't want to work when they want you to, or anything else.

[Thursday Next]

Yeah, technically, they could have given me notice I suppose, and not given me any work during my notice. But, as I said, they needed me more than I needed them, and being a law student, I'd have taken them to tribunal just to cost them money. It's certainly not a tactic I would suggest anyone ever use unless you are genuinely ok with losing the job.

[deanb]

Worth noting they've made it harder for employees to take employers to tribunal lately. You used to be able to get financial aid, but then gov't was like "too many people are taking employers to tribunal" so cut back on the aid rather than maybe tackling employers who carry out unfair dismissals.

[deanb]

 

So this is a bit different the usual.

 

Oh for the Americans since they're not exact lookalikes:

 

Blue tie = Conservatives (David Cameron, current PM)

Red tie = Labour (Ed Milliband, current leader of opposition)

Yellow tie = Liberal Democrats (Nick Clegg, Current Deputy Prime Minister)

Purple tie = UKIP (Nigel Farage)

 

Oh yeah, general election up in May so expect more like this. 

 

My money is on a coalition government again, but tbh it's pretty up in the air who'll be the majority of that, and who'll end up on the side. Probably end up with it being UKIP if Tories get the majority vote again. Not sure who Labour would side with though. Probably UKIP too.

Lib Dems are kinda fucked this time around, and I'm not sure Greens have much of a swing atm, 5% could be 30 seats but in reality that's spread across the nation . But UKIP potentially weakens the two main parties and maybe to the point that while it'd be an abysmal 5 years could end up with a Lab-Con (or Con-Lab) government.

 

Holy shit, just found out Britain First is actually a politcal party rather than just a Facebook page that occasionally crops up on soon to be acquaintances  n distant relatives wall.

[TheMightyEthan]

Liked for the Monty Python gif.

[deanb]

Remember the good old days

[Mr. GOH!]

0 hour contracts offer more employee protections than any at-will job in the U.S. 

[Thursday Next]

@Dean: It won't be UKIP. No way. UKIP are a one policy party. "Get out of Europe". Neither Tories, nor Labour really want that. Plus there is the fact that UKIP are racist leaning and generally a bit of a Clarkson outfit.

 

To be honest, I don't think we should even be having a referendum on EU membership. Very few of the voting population will be aware of the actual implications and it will descend into a load of "Brussels telling us what shape our bananas should be." bollocks and a load of complaining about how terrible free movement is. This will inevitably lead to an exit from Europe with everyone thinking how great that is until they realise that as a country that is a net importer with limited natural resources we are suddenly paying a lot more for all that stuff, and the businesses that do export are seeing profits fall as they pay foreign taxes, we'll also be queuing longer in airports, which isn't fun.

 

Basically, the UK's place of prominence in the world is due to its role as a hub. We're a place that has pretty good relationships with most countries, even the ones we borrowed. We are part of Europe, but speak the same language as America, we have our history with Hong Kong as a foot in the door to the Far East, we're basically the Babylon 5 of the world and leaving Europe is only going to damage that status.

[Mr. GOH!]

Why don't the Lib Dems form a coalition with Greens and/or Labour? I was always told that Lib Dems are to the left of Labour, so I'm puzzled that they would form a government with the Tories.

[deanb]

@Thursday: I guess when you put it that way. But I imagine Lib Dems for Conservatives again are pretty unlikely, and Greens would be way too far left for them. In fact Greens might be too far left for Labour too, but they might ally with Lib Dems.

 

@Goh: Greens were like practically 0 at the last so Lib Dems n Greens wouldn't have been able to form a government. Labour were the ones sorta being voted out, Lib Dems at the time likely saw it as a worse idea to form a coalition with Labour, allowing both to be big enough to form government, than Conservatives despite being closer in policies mainly cos they were the old government and maybe felt they'd be demonised for allowing Labour to stay in. Instead they joined with the Tories and got demonised for uni tuition fees and allowing Conservatives to get in to power.

[Mr. GOH!]

I keep forgetting that the Greens are not anything in the UK.

 

So the Lib Dem/Tory government seemed weird to UK folks, too? I mean, I'd be livid if I voted for a leftist candidate who turned around and decided to caucus (meaning join for the purposes of counting party membership in Congress) with the Republicans.

[Hot Heart]

So the Lib Dem/Tory government seemed weird to UK folks, too? I mean, I'd be livid if I voted for a leftist candidate who turned around and decided to caucus (meaning join for the purposes of counting party membership in Congress) with the Republicans.

 

Which is why there is a huge expectation that Lib Dems will lose a heck of a lot of seats this election. All those voters are feeling betrayed and the Lib Dems are second-to-last in all the opinion polls I keep seeing (behind UKIP but ahead of Greens).

 

At the moment, there's a lot of talk about the SNP seeing a decisive surge but a great deal of that seems like political grandstanding. The spin is up to maximum, and the knives are out.

 

This is a guy who seems to be doing a lot of good in getting younger people interested in voting, because voter turnout is a fucking shambles and with dickheads like Russell Brand about, who knows what might happen. Greens stealing Labour votes, UKIP stealing Tory votes... seems to be an election about holding onto your base instead of genuine politics. Biggest thing so far has been the non-dom stuff.