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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Left Wing Politics in the UK
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L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
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Posted
Not so Chris Stiles: The Economist is critical of the government because it fears it will lapse back into the safety of the usual British fudge.
It is scornful of most Labour policies (I use that word loosely) because they are insane.
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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
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chris stiles
Shipmate
# 12641
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
Not so Chris Stiles: The Economist is critical of the government because it fears it will lapse back into the safety of the usual British fudge.
There's a large difference between the Economist of old and the one that hired the likes of Megan Mcardle. The first had some kind of - somewhat buckleyesque - intellectual backbone, the latter has a superficial Oxford debating chamber breeziness.
The comparison is seen most clearly if you compare it to the FT - both published by Pearson, and pushing vastly different policies, one with significantly better academic/professional support.
The Economist has about as much empirical support for its economics as do most climate science deniers.
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
"Labour policies are insane".
Translation: "obviously a low-wage, high-flexibility economy is much better ... oh well, for the fucking rich, what do you expect?"
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
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L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
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Posted
quetzacoatl: Insane in the sense that they haven't been thought through.
If you doubt that look at the pronouncement of Ed M on energy prices and his flat denial that this is likely to lead to disaster: all you have to do is look at what a similar action did to California in the 1990s.
One of the biggest problems with energy pricing is the huge premiums that are paid to those generators from renewable sources (offshore wind power costs 3 times power from gas-powered generators): they are completely unsustainable. And the person who put the scheme into place? Step forward Mr Edward Miliband...
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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
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chris stiles
Shipmate
# 12641
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
If you doubt that look at the pronouncement of Ed M on energy prices and his flat denial that this is likely to lead to disaster
It is perfectly possible to be a critic of austerity without having to subscribe to the policies of the labour party past and present.
quote:
One of the biggest problems with energy pricing is the huge premiums
Actually, a far bigger problem is the pool based system that allows the various suppliers to fix the wholesale prices of electricity and gas - a legacy of Thatcher (things like NETA are just a derivative of the original arrangements).
Posts: 4035 | From: Berkshire | Registered: May 2007
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Enoch
Shipmate
# 14322
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sighthound:
Funny that, because I distinctly remember the Heath Government bemoaning the lack of investment in the UK and trying, mainly with words, to stimulate it. No one had heard of Arthur Scargill at that time.
If you read Corelli Barnett's excellent series of books about this country, it appears that the main long term problems have been.
1) A lack of investment.
2) Appalling management.
3) Trade Unions still fighting 19th century wars.
Funnily enough we rarely hear much about issues 1 & 2. Everything is laid at the door of the TUs, as if there were still regular demarcation disputes in the shipyards.
Funny that. I seem to hear all three criticisms quite frequently.
Moving on though, I spent many years in the public sector, and one conclusion I drew was that both the economy and the taxpayer would be better off without well meaning local or central government schemes to stimulate economic growth. Ministers, councillors, civil servants etc all fancy themselves as entrepreneurs manqué. But they are invariably very bad at it. The personal qualities and skills that make a good public servant are completely different from those that make an entrepreneur. The person who tries to be both will be bad at both.
DeLorean has gone down as a classic, but there have been plenty of others, from ground nuts to our local urban development corporation which was eventually wound up with very little to show for itself except a road on a viaduct - which is a public function anyway.
Look at privatisation and PFI. The public sector, for which we pay, always loses out because the commercial sector knows they are patsies who can be taken for a ride further down the track - in the case of the rail franchises quite literally.
Let me ask you all a question. If you wanted to get a first time mortgage, would you go to the Treasury to get one? Would you expect the award mechanism to be simple, quick and predictable?
Or would you only go to the Treasury if you couldn't get one from somewhere else? In which case, wearing ones taxpayer hat, do you think the Treasury ought to lend you the money?
There are functions that belong to government, keeping the peace, protecting the country from invasion, providing roads, courts, bin collections etc, and in this country, schools, health and protection from destitution. Government works best if it concentrates on what it does well, doesn't damage too much the environment for normal economic life and forgoes the temptation to play with the big boys.
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Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson
Posts: 7610 | From: Bristol UK(was European Green Capital 2015, now Ljubljana) | Registered: Nov 2008
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Hairy Biker
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# 12086
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
quetzacoatl: Insane in the sense that they haven't been thought through.
If you doubt that look at the pronouncement of Ed M on energy prices and his flat denial that this is likely to lead to disaster: all you have to do is look at what a similar action did to California in the 1990s.
Oh really? I thought those problems were caused by a rouge trading company's fraudulent fixing of the market. Anyone remember Enron?
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there [are] four important things in life: religion, love, art and science. At their best, they’re all just tools to help you find a path through the darkness. None of them really work that well, but they help.
Damien Hirst
Posts: 683 | From: This Sceptred Isle | Registered: Nov 2006
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Hairy Biker:
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
quetzacoatl: Insane in the sense that they haven't been thought through.
If you doubt that look at the pronouncement of Ed M on energy prices and his flat denial that this is likely to lead to disaster: all you have to do is look at what a similar action did to California in the 1990s.
Oh really? I thought those problems were caused by a rouge trading company's fraudulent fixing of the market. Anyone remember Enron?
What's insane is the concept of six multinational corporations holding the government and people of the UK to ransom by threatening them with a blackout.
This is a sure sign of two things: firstly, that the big six power companies think they can charge whatever they like and we simply have to put up with it. Secondly, that everyone who's with one of those big six (British Gas, EDF Energy, E.ON Energy, npower, Scottish Power and SSE) should change provider now. There are lots of smaller, nimbler energy companies out there who'd love your business.
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Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
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Anglican't
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# 15292
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Posted
I had a little chuckle at 'Doctor' Eoin Clarke calling other people 'pillocks'.
Posts: 3613 | From: London, England | Registered: Nov 2009
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Cod
Shipmate
# 2643
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
The City 'contributes' to the economy by charging fees for moving money around. It doesn't actually create anything new.
I have no love for City spivs, or for gambling with other people's money, but otherwise your comment misses the point. Providing suitably-tailored investments, seed capital, efficient foreign exchange and so on are real services. They are real exports, notwithstanding that you can't pick them up unlike a lump of coal or a brass door-knocker.
As for your point regarding money, nothing is much use unless someone agrees it's valuable. Money is an essential part of a developed economy, therefore it always likely to be considered valuable. No, you can't eat it. But there would be plenty of things you'd never get to eat without it.
quote:
then a fair chunk of our GDP is earned by usury. Given the Biblical disapproval of usury, doesn't that make you feel at least a little uncomfortable?
The problem with "usury" is exploitation. Lending money and charging something much less than ruinous interest rate is totally appropriate. Where is the problem in it? It is worth noting that under moral codes where charging interest is totally forbidden (e.g. Islam) financing tends to rely on schemes are in reality no different from charging interest, but merely disguise the fact by shifting round assets at increased prices.
quote:
ANother point to remember is that financial services can be provided from anywhere on the planet. They don't *have* to be in the City of London. So if the rest of the world suddenly decides that they don't like us, they could stop using the City and 8-10% of our GDP could vanish overnight. Picking up a factory and moving it would take rather more time and trouble.
Do a complex business deal under the law of, say, India, and tell me what happens when the deal goes sour and you decide to litigate. Or tell me what happens when the Indian taxman decides to audit you. Or tell me how you get on when you have to borrow money from an Indian bank. I've nothing against India, but there is a reason why the UK, UK and EU are centres of international finance. It is because they are (comparatively speaking) places governed in a non-corrupt and sophisticated manner, with (and this is particularly true for the UK) a well-developed body of law administered by a non-corrupt, independent judiciary, and a highly-educated workforce. It is actually significantly less trouble to pick up and move a factory, which is probably why developed countries still do finance whereas mass manufacturing has moved to developing countries.
The City of London has a great deal to answer for. It is the spider at the centre of a web of tax havens, all of them British overseas possessions. It sucks in not just British taxpayer money, but money from all over world, snorts it as cocaine and swills it as Dom Perignon. But lest it be forgotten, real and valuable stuff does go on in the City too.
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"I fart in your general direction."
M Barnier
Posts: 4229 | From: New Zealand | Registered: Apr 2002
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Cod
Shipmate
# 2643
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
Cod: quote:
However, I have heard that damaging habits such as smoking have decreased in Britain more slowly than in other places, such as the Continent. Perhaps this is because smokers etc. know the NHS will treat them, no questions asked.
Have you ever actually been to a doctor in the UK? I can assure you, they ask lots of questions about your personal habits and do their very best to get you to give up bad habits such as smoking and overeating, because they are perfectly well aware that prevention is better and cheaper than cure.
Yes, although I have never been a smoker.
Historically it has been the case that the NHS cannot refuse to provide a person treatment simply because that person won't make lifestyle adjustments. The person is legally entitled to treatment, and no amount of finger-wagging from the doctor can change that.
Contrast that situation with a person whose ability to obtain medical treatment depends on private insurance, which might decline cover or increase premiums if the person, for example, continues to smoke.
quote:
I think it is highly unlikely that a teenager sneaking his or her first cigarette behind the bike sheds will pause to consider the cost of medical treatment in twenty years' time. Teenagers' brains don't work like that, and they all think they're immortal at that age anyway. And once you are hooked on cigarettes it is very hard to give them up.
Could you explain the relevance of this?
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"I fart in your general direction."
M Barnier
Posts: 4229 | From: New Zealand | Registered: Apr 2002
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Enoch
Shipmate
# 14322
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Cod:
... The City of London has a great deal to answer for. It is the spider at the centre of a web of tax havens, all of them British overseas possessions. It sucks in not just British taxpayer money, but money from all over world, snorts it as cocaine and swills it as Dom Perignon. But lest it be forgotten, real and valuable stuff does go on in the City too.
People may not like to hear this, but the world needs tax havens. At any particular moment there have always been, and will always be, plenty of states that most of us would regard it as wholly proper and virtuous that people should be able to hide their money from.
There is, of course, a difference between laundering the proceeds of international drug trafficking and a family of middle class Syrian doctors now, or Viennese Jews at the Anschluss finding a way to transfer some of their life savings to somewhere that their state can't see or reach it. But the difference is the source of the money, not the ability to launder it. You must allow for the latter, and once you've got them, it is inevitable that some bad people also will use them.
I've said this before and elsewhere, and will keep on banging on about it, because too many people, many of them worthy and honourable, have too short memories and too little imagination.
Nor can one really say that one will only let people hide money from states that are on some sort of black list. Whatever the arguments about depriving taxes from poor little Third World states that need aid schemes, it's some of those states that are in the hands of the very sort of kleptocracies in dark glasses that it's quite reasonable their citizens and foreign residents should want to protect themselves from. And for legitimate diplomatic reasons, governments are never going to black list any but a few of the states that one could describe that way.
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Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson
Posts: 7610 | From: Bristol UK(was European Green Capital 2015, now Ljubljana) | Registered: Nov 2008
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Alex Cockell
Ship’s penguin
# 7487
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
Yes, there was a postwar consensus on a Welfare State, NHS, low unemployment, and so on.
But the right wing don't want this any more, they want a low-wage high-flexibility economy, and Labour sort of bleat and whine a bit and then say, well, OK, then.
And there is little opposition. Quite odd.
Apparently the opposition is larger than thought - but it's not reported on.
Posts: 2146 | From: Reading, Berkshire UK | Registered: Jun 2004
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Alex Cockell
Ship’s penguin
# 7487
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
But, but, but, surely the Tories were asking for tighter regulation, weren't they? That would be the rational thing to do.
On the contrary - they were asking for LESS or NO regulation..
Posts: 2146 | From: Reading, Berkshire UK | Registered: Jun 2004
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Alex Cockell
Ship’s penguin
# 7487
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
I suppose 'greed is good' works for some people.
This is another reason why the left wing has died in the UK. As soon as they run out of arguments - which is generally pretty quickly - they resort to insulting the other side instead.
How is that an insult? It's taken from a film, 'Wall Street', which was seen as a symbol of a certain attitude to wealth. I guess that Gekko was a caricature, but surely he articulated a kind of thinking among some - that there is no upper limit really to one's possible wealth, and that this actually has a moral force in society. As Gekko says, 'I am not a destroyer of companies. I am a liberator of them.'
Marvin's got it bang to rights here. The Left generally doesn't understand that man is a wanting animal. 'Greed is Good' is a simple expression relating to the material aspects and these are the aspects most easily understood.
Man does want other things, such as relationships and a feeling that he is growing but these are difficult to measure and, with an emphasis on 'the market' these are relegated in the interest of material growth for man which is pretty close to economic growth.
If we don't feel we are growing as a person then we may compensate for that by trying to grow in other ways and this emphasis on material growth via economic growth accelerates until we are where we are now in Britain, where the three main political parties, plus some of the others (UKIP and SNP for a start) are all commmitted to 'the economy' above anything else!
There's certainly a gap. Many of the socialist parties emphasize the economy too and while they can't be ignored we ought to be coming to the voter from the man & mankind point of view, not that of the ownership of the means of production in, let's face it, a post-industrial society.
What had been missed by the pro-Gekko people was that Gekko was the villain of the piece. if people had followed the conscience-led side of Bud Fox...
Posts: 2146 | From: Reading, Berkshire UK | Registered: Jun 2004
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alex Cockell:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
But, but, but, surely the Tories were asking for tighter regulation, weren't they? That would be the rational thing to do.
On the contrary - they were asking for LESS or NO regulation..
I am assuming that that is not a sarcastic reply to my sarcastic post? Ah well, I obviously need to overhaul my 'sarcastic post signalling equipment'. I am loath to have a 'sarcastic post indicator', as then the whole point of the sarcasm is lost really, i.e. deadpan humour.
If yours is sarcastic, then well done.
[ 29. September 2013, 01:11: Message edited by: quetzalcoatl ]
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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Alex Cockell
Ship’s penguin
# 7487
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
quote:
Originally posted by Alex Cockell:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
But, but, but, surely the Tories were asking for tighter regulation, weren't they? That would be the rational thing to do.
On the contrary - they were asking for LESS or NO regulation..
I am assuming that that is not a sarcastic reply to my sarcastic post? Ah well, I obviously need to overhaul my 'sarcastic post signalling equipment'. I am loath to have a 'sarcastic post indicator', as then the whole point of the sarcasm is lost really, i.e. deadpan humour.
If yours is sarcastic, then well done.
You'd be right - there was no sarcasm. Prior to the 2008 crash, Cameron and osborne were asking for even more laissez-faire.
Posts: 2146 | From: Reading, Berkshire UK | Registered: Jun 2004
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South Coast Kevin
Shipmate
# 16130
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Posted
Alex, could you give one or two quotes showing what you have in mind? I'm not doubting you, it's just that I'd be interested to see exactly what the Conservatives were saying back then. Was it untempered enthusiasm for reducing regulation, was it targeted at particular aspects of the system back then, or what?
Also, of course, being in opposition rather than government, they wouldn't have access to the full facts of the UK's financial situation. I don't know any remotely definitive answer, but I wonder how much of the FSA / Treasury / Bank of England regulatory mess would the opposition have been aware of immediately before the credit crunch.
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My blog - wondering about Christianity in the 21st century, chess, music, politics and other bits and bobs.
Posts: 3309 | From: The south coast (of England) | Registered: Jan 2011
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chris stiles
Shipmate
# 12641
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
Alex, could you give one or two quotes showing what you have in mind? I'm not doubting you, it's just that I'd be interested to see exactly what the Conservatives were saying back then. Was it untempered enthusiasm for reducing regulation, was it targeted at particular aspects of the system back then, or what?
You can see some of this in this booklet here (from 2007):
http://www.conservatives.com/pdf/FreeingBritaintoCompete.pdf
Choice quotes:
"We see no need to continue to regulate the provision of mortgage finance, as it is the lending institutions rather than the client taking the risk."
"Competition is the customers’ main ally. It is competition which keeps the bank honest"
"Government claims that this regulation is all necessary. They seem to believe that without it banks could steal our money"
quote:
I don't know any remotely definitive answer, but I wonder how much of the FSA / Treasury / Bank of England regulatory mess would the opposition have been aware of immediately before the credit crunch.
In what sense was there a 'regulatory mess' that they would have been unaware of? They had drafted the legislation that formed the regulatory framework - they knew exactly what was regulated and what wasn't.
Posts: 4035 | From: Berkshire | Registered: May 2007
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
This reminds me of that great photo of Clinton with a bunch of bankers, and they are all grinning very wide grins, and he is signing away various regulations, can't remember their name. It's one of those images which are kind of haunting, a bit like Chamberlain's piece of paper. But then again, you can't just say that it 'caused' the financial melt-down on its own, lots of factors.
Glass-Steagall?
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
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Posted
Chris Stiles:
Very entertaining but, as is obvious from the cover, it was a report to the Shadow Cabinet that was never adopted.
Sorry to spoil your fun but Redwood's report was quietly filed in the usual place for the outpouring from the swivel-eyed ones - which is a pity because some of the things he says about the burdens of imposing (effectively) carbon "fines" on the power industry before alternatives were available at a sensible price were actually quite sensible...
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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
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Anglican't
Shipmate
# 15292
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Posted
A good point, L'organist. It's quite a long document. I started to read some of the stuff on deregulation. While some of it is sound, there's also stuff in it like this:
quote:
You do not need a regulation to stop chimney sweeps sending small boys up chimneys. The invention of the flexible brush and the vacuum cleaner has made that as unnecessary as it is undesirable.
I doubt many Conservatives would agree with this statement.
Posts: 3613 | From: London, England | Registered: Nov 2009
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chris stiles
Shipmate
# 12641
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
Very entertaining but, as is obvious from the cover, it was a report to the Shadow Cabinet that was never adopted.
Yes, and it was never adopted *because* of what happened in the subsequent few months - the little set of circumstances called the global financial crisis. At the time, it was heralded as a move against the Wet tendancy in the party, in a number of articles and briefings such as this:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1560100/Tories-plan-14bn-cuts-to-red-tape.html
quote:
Sorry to spoil your fun but Redwood's report was quietly filed in the usual place for the outpouring from the swivel-eyed ones
This wasn't a self appointed grouping, it was set up by Cameron to advise on policy. That it had an extreme market ideologue in charge or it speaks volumes as to Cameron's (or better - Osbourne's) sympathies.
What it does demonstrate is that the absent the GFC, the Tories would have pushed for further banking deregulation of the sort that played a major role in causing the crisis.
[ 29. September 2013, 18:12: Message edited by: chris stiles ]
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Anglican't
Shipmate
# 15292
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by chris stiles:
What it does demonstrate is that the absent the GFC, the Tories would have pushed for further banking deregulation of the sort that played a major role in causing the crisis.
I thought one of the main criticisms by Conservatives was the kind of regulation that Gordon Brown created, viz that by splitting regulation between several bodies (the Treasury, the Bank of England and the FSA) that no one body was really in charge? As the report says:
quote:
We are concerned about the division of responsibility between the FSA and the Bank over banking and market regulation. Fortunately, conditions in the last decade have been benign internationally, with no serious threats to banking liquidity. We think it would be safer if the Bank of England had responsibility for solvency regulation of UK-based banks, as well as having an overall duty to keep the system solvent. Otherwise, there could be dangerous delays if a banking crisis did hit, with information having to be exchanged between the two regulators; and there might be gaps in each regulator’s view of the banking sector at a crucial time, when early regulatory action might have spared a worse problem.
[ 29. September 2013, 19:11: Message edited by: Anglican't ]
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L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
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Posted
Wrong again Chris Stiles:
The Policy Review Group was not set up by David Cameron to form policy, rather it was set up to look at existing policies of the conservative opposition and to issue recommendations to review, revise, edit or ditch.
In the case of financial regulation, the recommendations formed two strands: one for the banking and financial sector and the other for company financial reporting regulation.
In the case of BANKING it was seen that the "light-touch" regulation put in place under Brown (having been drawn up with heavy input from Balls and Miliband) was (1) open to abuse (2) effectively called for banks to report themselves and (3) put a regulator over banks who might not have any experience of the banking sector.
The final outcome of the Review (NOT the Redwood report) was to say that banking oversight and regulation should be increased and liquidity requirements toughened up...
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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
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chris stiles
Shipmate
# 12641
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
The Policy Review Group was not set up by David Cameron to form policy, rather it was set up to look at existing policies of the conservative opposition and to issue recommendations to review, revise, edit or ditch.
I would argue that that's largely semantics and most of what constitutes forming policy is also contained in those four verbs above. Besides, it was not some kind of neutral fact finding mission - in choosing who was to 'review, revise, edit and ditch' Osbourne could have hardly been unaware which direction Redwood was likely to tilt in.
quote:
The final outcome of the Review (NOT the Redwood report) was to say that banking oversight and regulation should be increased and liquidity requirements toughened up...
In the aftermath 'light touch' became a term of political abuse rather than anything descriptive, if you don't agree please point to specific examples of the Tories tightening banking regulation (rather than just talking about it).
Whilst the FSA didn't operate particularly well, there had been been previous banking failures under the old regime (BCCI and the mid 70s failure spring to mind), adopting a revolving door mentality to appointments is usually just a path to regulatory capture (as a look at the Fed shows us).
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L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
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Posted
The replacement of the FSA with the Bank of England by the coalition government gives you the "proof" you want that the conservatives are aware that banking regulation needs toughening.
As for BCCI: this was founded in Karachi (not in the UK) and the international bit was registered in Luxembourg (also not subject to UK legislation).
What sent BCCI into meltodown was nothing to do with regulation or lack in the UK, rather it was to do with (a) falling foul of the US authorities and (b) distinct murkiness about its shareholders - and specifically the ADIO.
Apart from the ADIO - which was trying to be major shareholder as well as largest depositor, plus lead litigant in a failed action against the BoE - creditors have long since had their deposits returned to them.
There was never any bailout or use of government funds.
As for the difficulties in the 1970s: this arose from government attempts to fix/freeze rents and other prices (sound familiar) which then ran foul of 2 things: the alarming rise in oil prices following the OPEC reduction in production post Yom Kippur war plus the semi-crash of the US stockmarket and the knock-on effect on UK stocks. Interest rates then had to remain high because international markets doubted the competence of incoming Labour goverment of 1974 - which mistrust was shown to be correct when Dennis Healey had to go cap-in-hand to the IMF for a bailout.
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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
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chris stiles
Shipmate
# 12641
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
The replacement of the FSA with the Bank of England by the coalition government gives you the "proof" you want that the conservatives are aware that banking regulation needs toughening.
That a different body now regulates the banking industry is not necessarily proof that regulation has been toughened. We can only get definitive proof of this after the next crisis, but that most of the recommendations of the IBC have been shelved doesn't bode well.
Besides, the original question by SCK was about the Tories enthusiasm for further de-regulation back then (before the financial crisis) - and that Osbourne appointed Redwood to 'review, revise, edit and ditch' at the time certainly speaks to that.
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L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
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Posted
Read my words again: Mr Redwood was invited to review and it was up to the Shadow Cabinet (of which Mr Redwood was not a member) to decide whether to accept his conclusions and thus revise policy, or to edit the Redwood recommendations or ditch up-to-then existing policy.
As for whether or not ANY party "gets" the whole point of trying to either regulate banking (debatable given the international scope of modern banking and tricky in any case given the touch-of-a-button timescales involved) or "run" an economy the jury will be out for longer than the present parliament.
However, the Labour Party's prospects in this regard aren't good - and if you want to know why you only have to look at the off-parroted "endogenous growth theory" of Gordon Brown (and Balls and Miliband) to see that politicians will latch onto anything that sounds good without checking what it means.
According to Balls and Miliband they have all along promoted a government creating jobs: in fact endogenous growth theory means the exact opposite in that it posits that by encouraging innovation and education the growth (and therefore job creation) will look after itself.
Shame that the Tory front bench were so blinded by the big words that they didn't challenge the bullshit more at the time...
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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
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Jane R
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# 331
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Posted
Cod: quote:
Historically it has been the case that the NHS cannot refuse to provide a person treatment simply because that person won't make lifestyle adjustments. The person is legally entitled to treatment, and no amount of finger-wagging from the doctor can change that.
Contrast that situation with a person whose ability to obtain medical treatment depends on private insurance, which might decline cover or increase premiums if the person, for example, continues to smoke.
That's what a public health system does, you know. Are you suggesting the government should be allowed to withhold services from citizens whose "lifestyle choices" they disapprove of? You let them do that for smokers and pretty soon everyone will be paying - most people have one or two bad habits that could affect their health.
Contrast this with a privatised health system, where any and every treatment is available to those with the ability to pay and everyone else has to go cap in hand to their insurance company, whose main interest is in turning a profit and therefore denying treatment to as many people as possible.
Are you REALLY saying that the second system is better than the first?
On the subject of the relevance of teenagers' smoking habits, most of the people I know who smoke started doing it when they were teenagers, mainly because all their friends were doing it and they thought it was cool. Considerations of what they would do when they got lung cancer 20 years later did not enter their heads. So I don't think forcing smokers to pay extra for their medical treatment would stop people from smoking, though it might give the rest of us a nice warm glow of righteousness. They already have to pay extra for other types of insurance and that doesn't seem to act as a deterrent.
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by chris stiles:
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
The replacement of the FSA with the Bank of England by the coalition government gives you the "proof" you want that the conservatives are aware that banking regulation needs toughening.
That a different body now regulates the banking industry is not necessarily proof that regulation has been toughened. We can only get definitive proof of this after the next crisis, but that most of the recommendations of the IBC have been shelved doesn't bode well.
Besides, the original question by SCK was about the Tories enthusiasm for further de-regulation back then (before the financial crisis) - and that Osbourne appointed Redwood to 'review, revise, edit and ditch' at the time certainly speaks to that.
When Northern Rock began to fail, my memory is that the Tories initially were full of glee at the spectacle of Labour nationalizing it. 'Back to the 70s' was the slogan, I think, but I can't remember if they actually opposed it in the Commons.
But I suppose later, nationalization became almost de rigeur in the face of the economic collapse, e.g. Bush did likewise.
I wonder what would have happened if Northern Rock would have been allowed to fail? I think some neo-liberals advocated this.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
I wonder what would have happened if Northern Rock would have been allowed to fail? I think some neo-liberals advocated this.
ISTR that anyone who advocated letting banks sink or swim, while compensating 'small savers' (ie, up to c £100,000) was discouraged once far larger banks appeared to be in trouble. Letting Northern Rock fail then propping up RBS and the Halifax would have destroyed confidence because it would have looked capricious: any benefit from 'letting the free market decide' would have been left by the wayside.
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
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Cod
Shipmate
# 2643
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
That's what a public health system does, you know. Are you suggesting the government should be allowed to withhold services from citizens whose "lifestyle choices" they disapprove of? You let them do that for smokers and pretty soon everyone will be paying - most people have one or two bad habits that could affect their health.
There is a tendency amongst those on the left (who may include you - I don't know) to assume that any suggestion that the NHS has shortcomings can only be made by a person who thinks it should be abolished outright, and replaced wit a fully-privatised alternative. You may have made that assumption.
You have made another more obvious assumption - that I think the Gvt should dictate matters of public health in a rather draconian way. This is rather paradoxical as if I were as pro-private medicine as you seem to think, I would consider individuals' health not to be the Gvt's concern at all.
I prefer the more balanced approach of pointing out that te NHS isn't perfect, and the fact that it provides procedures at a lower cost than other (e.g. private) systems should be considered against the fact that it may require more procedures to be performed than other systems might require. I think this is a common-sense view, and one I share with my father, who has been an NHS doctor for forty years.
I don't see the relevance of the points you raise re why people start smoking. They are obvious enough to anyone older than 12. That smoking might have declined more slowly in the UK than in other countries (including those with state-backed health provision) possibly due to its free-at-the-point-of-need / absolute right of provision (I note you concede the point here) is, I think, an interesting question, which perhaps deserves consideration rather than a knee-jerk condemnation as heresy.
quote:
Contrast this with a privatised health system, where any and every treatment is available to those with the ability to pay and everyone else has to go cap in hand to their insurance company, whose main interest is in turning a profit and therefore denying treatment to as many people as possible.
Are you REALLY saying that the second system is better than the first?
Quite obviously not.
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"I fart in your general direction."
M Barnier
Posts: 4229 | From: New Zealand | Registered: Apr 2002
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
I daresay I am left-wing compared to you, Cod; according to this quiz I am hated by the Daily Mail. However, as merely being female gets you to 'disliked' on this scale I am not sure what it says about my political views.
You certainly seemed to be saying in your previous post that smokers should either be refused NHS treatment or forced to pay for treatment that non-smokers would receive free of charge. That sounds as if you expect NHS staff (who are ultimately paid by the government) to cross-examine people about their lifestyles and impose penalties on those who don't conform to certain standards. Just like the (private) insurance companies do when they ask you to provide details of your medical history before calculating your life insurance premium.
I am not sure where you get the idea that I think the NHS is perfect from; I just think it's better than the alternatives that the Tories are trying to foist on us, and certainly better than the American system.
I've been trying to work out why I find the idea of denying medical treatment to people with unhealthy lifestyles so disturbing, and I think it's because it seems like kicking them when they're already down. Let's say we have a smoker who has developed lung cancer; they'll have quite a lot of extra charges anyway, through having to go to hospital for appointments (most hospitals have parking charges now; public transport is not free), time off work (people on short-term or no-hours contracts may lose their jobs; self-employed people only get paid for hours they actually work). They have a life-threatening disease. Why punish them more by making them pay extra for their medical treatment as well?
They're also probably going to die earlier than an average non-smoker, so what you lose on their medical treatment you will gain back by not having to pay old-age pension until they're in their 80s. If money is all you're worried about.
Or are you just trying to say that maybe fining people who refuse to give up smoking after being diagnosed with cancer would encourage more of them to give up?
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
Also, why stop at smoking? Surely, to be fair (!), you would have to extend this punishment, or whatever it would be called, to anyone who has indulged in an unhealthy lifestyle. This would probably include alcohol, drugs, sexual promiscuity, over-eating, under-eating, lack of exercise, excessive stress, insufficient stress, and so on.
"Well, Mr Slob-Dudgeon, I see that you are a smoker, you admit to eating cream-cakes regularly, you are a lazy sod, and you sit on the sofa all the time. I'm afraid the fine for all that comes to far more than you can afford, so fuck off and die. Next!"
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
Well, yes - that's partly what I was getting at. If you framed the legislation right everybody would end up paying the extra charges. You could start by defining 'sitting down for more than 3 hours a day' as unhealthy, for a start - that would get most office workers and anyone who likes watching TV or playing computer games. You could use this as your justification. Evidence-based medicine, right?
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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Hawk
Semi-social raptor
# 14289
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
They're also probably going to die earlier than an average non-smoker, so what you lose on their medical treatment you will gain back by not having to pay old-age pension until they're in their 80s. If money is all you're worried about.
They're also paying tax on all those cigarettes so they've already paid more to the government than anyone else. It all evens out.
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“We are to find God in what we know, not in what we don't know." Dietrich Bonhoeffer
See my blog for 'interesting' thoughts
Posts: 1739 | From: Oxford, UK | Registered: Nov 2008
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South Coast Kevin
Shipmate
# 16130
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Hawk:
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
They're also probably going to die earlier than an average non-smoker, so what you lose on their medical treatment you will gain back by not having to pay old-age pension until they're in their 80s. If money is all you're worried about.
They're also paying tax on all those cigarettes so they've already paid more to the government than anyone else. It all evens out.
Maybe the tax system is the best way of encouraging healthier lifestyles - increase taxes on foods etc. that are demonstrably unhealthy, while at the same time reducing taxes on healthy foods etc. (alongside providing some kind of tax breaks to, e.g., fresh produce shops setting up in areas where fresh food is hard to come by).
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My blog - wondering about Christianity in the 21st century, chess, music, politics and other bits and bobs.
Posts: 3309 | From: The south coast (of England) | Registered: Jan 2011
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L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
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Posted
The problem with the health service is that it is providing stuff that is nothing to do with health - fertility treatment, for example.
You also have a considerable number of people being treated "free at the point of delivery" who have never paid a penny in NI contributions.
When I lived in central London my local hospital was always snowed under with "emergency" health tourists. Visiting a friend on the maternity unit in the early 1990s, there were about 10-12 women in a unit for 50 who had "suddenly and unexpectedly" given birth when in London - supposedly on holiday/visiting relatives. Since my friend was on the unit for a number of weeks we were able to observe that the number of babies in the SCBU born to mothers from abroad was high.
Yet only ONE of the senior registrars made enquiries about health insurance or passed on details of residency status to the administration: we discovered this because as my friend was leaving she came and sat in the room and ranted about the situation for over an hour.
Yes, the NHS is good at emergency medicine and, yes, emergencies must be treated. But we need to ensure that obvious cases of "health tourism" are tackled. If necessary, the embassies of the countries of origin of these people should be billed for their healthcare - maybe they would then send the message to their nationals that the UK is not the place to go if you have an existing serious health condition.
As for the morality of the situation: if you fly into the US and it is obvious you are well-advanced in pregnancy you will be questioned about health insurance as you arrive. And if you are admitted to hospital as an emergency they will (a) demand your insurance details as they check you in and (b) take credit card details at the same time.
As for the other thing about treating those with unhealthy lifestyles - as others have said, where to start? How about charging all those with type 2 diabetes due to obesity for their prescriptions?
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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
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Cod
Shipmate
# 2643
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Posted
Aren't non-residents expected to pay for NHS services now? I thought the law had changed.
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"I fart in your general direction."
M Barnier
Posts: 4229 | From: New Zealand | Registered: Apr 2002
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Cod
Shipmate
# 2643
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
I daresay I am left-wing compared to you, Cod; according to this quiz I am hated by the Daily Mail. However, as merely being female gets you to 'disliked' on this scale I am not sure what it says about my political views.
I am merely 'disliked', which I suppose makes me some kind of fascist in the eyes of those who formulated the quiz.
quote:
You certainly seemed to be saying in your previous post that smokers should either be refused NHS treatment or forced to pay for treatment that non-smokers would receive free of charge.
Quote me, or it didn't happen.
quote:
That sounds as if you expect NHS staff (who are ultimately paid by the government) to cross-examine people about their lifestyles and impose penalties on those who don't conform to certain standards.
No - although in an earlier post you did mention that something like the former already happens. I didn't see you criticising it.
quote:
Just like the (private) insurance companies do when they ask you to provide details of your medical history before calculating your life insurance premium.
I'm no fan of privatised medicine, as ought to be clear by now, but it really is revealing that you regard the imposition of heightened premiums on certain people as "penalties". They are actually not anything of the sort. They simply reflect the fact that some people - both those who are unfortunate and those who have made bad choices - are a higher business risk to insure.
quote:
I am not sure where you get the idea that I think the NHS is perfect from;
I didn't..
quote:
I just think it's better than the alternatives that the Tories are trying to foist on us, and certainly better than the American system.
There are other alternatives. You do realise that, don't you? The NHS and the American system are probably at opposite (and extreme) ends of the scale. There are plenty of alternatives to consider amongst developed countries that enjoy better public health than the UK.
quote:
I've been trying to work out why I find the idea of denying medical treatment to people with unhealthy lifestyles so disturbing
No-one talked about denying anyone anything except you.
Here is the original offending remark:
quote:
As for the NHS, there is no doubt that it is an example of socialist planning that is preferable to an all-out private model, measurable by the number of procedures it performs and the cost of them. However, I have heard that damaging habits such as smoking have decreased in Britain more slowly than in other places, such as the Continent. Perhaps this is because smokers etc. know the NHS will treat them, no questions asked. It would be interesting to know how public health provision is made in places where health is generally very high, e.g. Sweden, Netherlands, France and so on. My understanding is that they don't operate an open-slather free-at-the-point of-need model like the NHS.
The point is that there may be ways of solving the NHS's imperfections without adopting the American model.
However, from that remark, you deduce that I think
- that the NHS should be privatised
- that full-privatised medicine is better
- that sufferers of lifestyle diseases should be denied treatmet
- or alternatively that they should be financially penalised
- that they should be cross-examined by doctors and nurses.
I think you need to have a lie-down.
It is no good treating any mention of the NHS's shortcomings as being a full-scale argument for its abolition. It is like the stereotypical Pentecostal who thinks it must be never mentioned that my gosh! there are differences between the texts of the Synoptic Gospels!
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"I fart in your general direction."
M Barnier
Posts: 4229 | From: New Zealand | Registered: Apr 2002
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L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
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Posted
quote:
posted by Cod
Aren't non-residents expected to pay for NHS services now? I thought the law had changed.
They've always been meant to pay unless they come from a country (usually EU) which has a similar system and with which the UK has a reciprocal arrangement for treatment/charging of nationals.
However, you get the situation where hospital staff just refuse to ask the question about insurance, or to take details so that bills can be sent out.
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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
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Heavenly Anarchist
Shipmate
# 13313
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Posted
I've been a clinic sister in many hospitals, including 3 in London, and the resident status of patients was checked as part of the booking procedure. The main problem is usually casualty or emergency patients as staff, quite rightly imo, won't refuse emergency treatment to anyone and policy dictates that emergency treatment is given on demand. The hospital admin would follow it up if a non-resident was admitted as an emergency but often it was difficult to chase up payments from abroad. More effort does need to be made to chase up these payments, including for the emergency payments, perhaps the requirement for health insurance on arrival?
There are a multitude of problems with charging for treatment of diseases which are 'self-inflicted'. Type 2 diabetes is genetic as well as related to obesity, the very body shape which denotes risk of type 2 diabetes is sometimes genetic. How does one decide which caused the diabetes? And few diseases are not self-inflicted, many illnesses can be linked to lifestyle in some way, whether it is red meat increasing risk of bowel cancer or a stressful lifestyle causing raised blood pressure and strokes. My mother died of bowel cancer, my father of stomach cancer, both of which are known to be lifestyle diseases. Their diet was poor, dad drank and smoked when he was younger, they both had diabetes and heart disease too. Should they have been refused treatment as undeserving as their diseases were self-inflicted and their habits unlikely to change? I doubt if many people would pass that test.
There is also the health inequalities issues, referred to in the UK as 'patchwork Britain'. There are regions/classes/neighbourhoods with higher risk of disease, and these are poorer areas, any introduction of charges for medical care will disproportionally hit the poorer members of society. These people also tend to have less healthy lifestyles.
When I discuss health inequalities with my students I start with a debate on whether an alcoholic should get a liver transplant. We then move topic to discuss regional and social health inequalities and lifestyles and their causes. We then do a full circle back to the liver transplant and discuss who in society will be excluded from having one.
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Posts: 2831 | From: Trumpington | Registered: Jan 2008
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