Election Year or Fear!

[ramAnag]

I will vote as I always have but with little hope that the successful incumbents will do no more than fudge, fudge, fudge in the hope that things go well and another 5 years beckon. As MA says we should vote with future generations in mind but with the world teetering imo on the brink of another mass extinction event, which will be man made through abuse of the planets natural resources and the inevitable use one day of weapons of mass destruction, their future looks somewhat bleak!

We should always vote with future generations in mind…although - and GP may correct me on this - only Victorian politicians seemed to truly grasp this, which is perhaps why we remain indebted to their establishment of, amongst other things, sewerage systems and educational establishments which remain in use to this day.

As for ‘weapons of mass destruction’. The current situation can seem ‘bleak’ to say the least…I console myself with the knowledge that, probably the first major ‘political’ crisis I have a vivid recollection of was the assassination of JFK when I was just nine. There have been a great many scarier events since, usually involving the Middle East, civil unrest in the USA or war of some description on the fringes of Eastern Europe. We’re all still here and I genuinely hope that sense and decency will prevail and that our younger generations will be able to look back in the same way as we can at events such as the Bay of Pigs crisis, Martin Luther King’s assassination, Vietnam, the 6 Day War, the Iran-Iraq War, the Gulf Wars etc etc.

[SithHappens]

Here's a viewpoint I put in a previous political thread and will repeat it here. We all have far more of our lives behind us than in front. The future is our children and our grandchildren. Vote for their future. Vote for the party THEY believe has most regard for the problems THEY face. I have friends over here who did exactly that, asked their adult kids which party they were voting for and why. They then voted the same as their kids. We did similar with our 2 and ended up with a choice that didn't include the parties our kids were totally against. We still had a choice and, in true Dutch fashion came to a "compromise", ignoring parties that we don't agree with and choosing from those that the kids aren't against.

It's a noble sentiment. However had the younger generation been bothered to 'vote for their future ' in the 2016 referendum then the outcome may have been different.

Turnout in the UK in younger age groups us significantly lower than the older generations. So like I say its noble to think about voting with the younger generation in mind but they should also shoulder some responsibility by bothering to turn up.

I appreciate I'm collectively referring to them as they and not all young people are like that, but certainly those in my close family who are of voting age wont have been anywhere near a polling station. In fact I'm not 100% sure if I asked my 30 yo niece who was PM she would know.

[ramAnag]

It's a noble sentiment. However had the younger generation been bothered to 'vote for their future ' in the 2016 referendum then the outcome may have been different.

Turnout in the UK in younger age groups us significantly lower than the older generations. So like I say its noble to think about voting with the younger generation in mind but they should also shoulder some responsibility by bothering to turn up.

I appreciate I'm collectively referring to them as they and not all young people are like that, but certainly those in my close family who are of voting age wont have been anywhere near a polling station. In fact I'm not 100% sure if I asked my 30 yo niece who was PM she would know.

Fair point that, Sith. Certainly seems that my own children were not as politically aware as I was at the same age and there seems to be no equivalent these days to the huge anti Vietnam War and anti apartheid demonstrations along with the Protest and Survive movement which were largely driven by students and the younger generation of the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s.

Maybe they’re just too disenchanted looking at how their elders have ducked things up.

[macstheman]

Fair point that, Sith. Certainly seems that my own children were not as politically aware as I was at the same age and there seems to be no equivalent these days to the huge anti Vietnam War and anti apartheid demonstrations along with the Protest and Survive movement which were largely driven by students and the younger generation of the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s.

Maybe they’re just too disenchanted looking at how their elders have ducked things up.

They live in the gaming world where they can disappear and hide from reality. Reality to them is texting your mates or watching some crap on the box BUT they will inherit the world and it is our responsibility that it is worth inheriting. While the Putins and Trumps of this world are around causing mayhem that seems in the balance.

[MadAmster]

It might be a "Dutch" thing, or maybe down to me always having spoken to my 2 lads about politics and its importance. The eldest is an ominvore who eats red meat maybe 3 or 4 times a week, The rest of the time its vegetarian for him, much like his folks (I made onion soup with red wine and port yesterday and have enough left over for today). He is well versed in things internationally and takes his time in deciding who should get his cross on the ballot paper. The youngest is a full blown vegan and, like his brother, can explain his voting choice very eloquently.

[Andy_Faber]

it might be interesting to see if we can reach a consensus on what forum members regard as the priorities for any new government.
.

My ‘priorities’ would be

Stop picking on responsible private landlords

Police to do more policing

NHS to be more (consistently) efficient

Those who can’t help themselves to be prioritised over those who won’t help themselves

Public body executive pay to be limited to (let’s say) £250k per year and vacancies advertised on pleb-visible job sites

I doubt there’ll be much concensus there but hey ho

[MadAmster]

My ‘priorities’ would be

1. Stop picking on responsible private landlords

2. Police to do more policing

3. NHS to be more (consistently) efficient

4. Those who can’t help themselves to be prioritised over those who won’t help themselves

5. Public body executive pay to be limited to (let’s say) £250k per year and vacancies advertised on pleb-visible job sites

I doubt there’ll be much concensus there but hey ho

1. but really harass the irresponsible ones

2. by investing in getting police numbers back up to where they were 15 years ago or better

3. Rejig the NHS so it's less "manager" top heavy. Increase investment to attract new staff and help keep the ones already there

4. Absolutely

5. Totally agree. In NL such jobs may not pay salaries above those of (I forget which) either a government minister or the Prime Minister. Same goes for "celebrities" employed by the NOS which is akin to the BBC with the main difference being they have ads and no licence fee but do get some government funding

I'd add that over here, income generated through work gets taxed at a higher rate than income generated through shares or renting out property. Income tax is 0% over the first €13K. The next 54K (up to 67K) is taxed at 24.5% and everything over 67K is taxed at 33%. You can add roughly another 15% in social premiums on top of all of those to reach actual stoppages. Company profits are taxed at 20% and dividend payments are taxed at 15%. From this year profit from renting out property is finally being taxed, at 20%. I find this discriminatory. Why should one type of income be taxed at a lower rate than income from a different source?

[ramAnag]

Not sure about ‘consensus’ or otherwise, AF.
It seems a bit personal and maybe in need of further explanation, at least as far as the ‘landlords’ one is concerned.
Would agree about the police and the NHS although the latter (probably both) need more funding imo.
Think I largely agree on 4.
Why £250k limit and why only ‘public body’ executive pay?

Put another way, I don’t understand the landlord one even though I was briefly a landlord about 12/13 years ago and had no problem at all.
Beyond that, if you’re arguing for greater support for public services (specifically the NHS and the police), people suffering from cancer having priority over those who desire a boob job and greater responsibility and pay restraint to be shown by the most wealthy…then you have my support.

P.S. Completely agree with MA about ‘harassing’ unscrupulous landlords.

[Andy_Faber]

1. but really harass the irresponsible ones

2. by investing in getting police numbers back up to where they were 15 years ago or better

3. Rejig the NHS so it's less "manager" top heavy. Increase investment to attract new staff and help keep the ones already there

4. Absolutely

5. Totally agree. In NL such jobs may not pay salaries above those of (I forget which) either a government minister or the Prime Minister. Same goes for "celebrities" employed by the NOS which is akin to the BBC with the main difference being they have ads and no licence fee but do get some government funding

I'd add that over here, income generated through work gets taxed at a higher rate than income generated through shares or renting out property. Income tax is 0% over the first €13K. The next 54K (up to 67K) is taxed at 24.5% and everything over 67K is taxed at 33%. You can add roughly another 15% in social premiums on top of all of those to reach actual stoppages. Company profits are taxed at 20% and dividend payments are taxed at 15%. From this year profit from renting out property is finally being taxed, at 20%. I find this discriminatory. Why should one type of income be taxed at a lower rate than income from a different source?

Seems like we have a bit of concensus

On the unearned (property) income thing, some of my income is 'unearned' by this definition, BUT

We've already paid vast amounts of tax out of 'earned' income to get in the position we have, AND

Whilst our friends have chosen to spend their 'earned' income on living the high life (cruises, flash cars, blah blah) we have invested more of our income (and sometimes ******* busting levels of effort) in building for our later years.

[Andy_Faber]

Not sure about ‘consensus’ or otherwise, AF.
It seems a bit personal and maybe in need of further explanation, at least as far as the ‘landlords’ one is concerned.
Would agree about the police and the NHS although the latter (probably both) need more funding imo.
Think I largely agree on 4.
Why £250k limit and why only ‘public body’ executive pay?

Put another way, I don’t understand the landlord one even though I was briefly a landlord about 12/13 years ago and had no problem at all.
Beyond that, if you’re arguing for greater support for public services (specifically the NHS and the police), people suffering from cancer having priority over those who desire a boob job and greater responsibility and pay restraint to be shown by the most wealthy…then you have my support.

P.S. Completely agree with MA about ‘harassing’ unscrupulous landlords.

Regarding the landlords one, media/pressure group efforts have resulted in the demonising of private landlords and the subsequent sniffing of a bit of electoral capital by the major parties (I think you'd refer to it as 'populism') which has resulted in a gradual (IMO over) balancing of the law in favour of tenants and further proposed tightening on the way. The impression often given is that ALL landlords are descendants of Rachman himself. I/we take that as a personal insult, but on a wider point, the driving out of private landlords (with only a single property and therefore waaaay higher gearing of risk of punitive taxation or rogue tenants that we do) serves only to increase rental costs as the pool of available properties decreases. The major parties are pushing the anti-landlord agenda either a) hoping the electorate are too dim to see the problem as it affects them or b) the major parties are too dim to see it themselves.

[Andy_Faber]

Not sure about ‘consensus’ or otherwise, AF.
It seems a bit personal and maybe in need of further explanation, at least as far as the ‘landlords’ one is concerned.
Would agree about the police and the NHS although the latter (probably both) need more funding imo.
Think I largely agree on 4.
Why £250k limit and why only ‘public body’ executive pay?

Put another way, I don’t understand the landlord one even though I was briefly a landlord about 12/13 years ago and had no problem at all.
Beyond that, if you’re arguing for greater support for public services (specifically the NHS and the police), people suffering from cancer having priority over those who desire a boob job and greater responsibility and pay restraint to be shown by the most wealthy…then you have my support.

P.S. Completely agree with MA about ‘harassing’ unscrupulous landlords.

No argument about increased funding for NHS and Police, but to give a fairly benign example regarding the police, I'm sure I'm not the only motorist who suspects that the number of police attending (even minor) motor accidents is a bit 'moth to a flame'. I recently queued over an hour getting less than a mile up the M1 due to an accident under the J27 bridge, and counted 11 officers chatting yet none at the top of the J27 ramp exercising a simple bit of traffic management that could have resolved the pressure. I could offer other examples, both motor-related and not

The 250k was just a number plucked from the ether, the public body only was because (you and) I pay for the ****ers

[MadAmster]

The current right of centre Dutch outgoing Cabinet (still in situ until such time as a coalition has been formed) has just put a new Bill to Parliament. It's aim is to reduce private rents. They have gone up incredibly over the past 10 to 15 years. To the extent that, especially in medium sized towns to the bigger cities, there is a dearth of affordable housing, be that to rent or to buy. Nurses, doctors, teachers etc, none of whom are in the worst paid jobs, can't afford to rent/buy where they work.

Why has that happened? It started with "investors" wishing to go "buy to let", buying up properties, wholesale. They were gazumping 1st time buyers. 300K houses were going for between 350k and 400k. Prospective "buy to live"'ers could not outbid the gazumpers who then, perfectly naturally in a business sense, upped the rent they were asking to account for the extra they'd paid so as to not damage their annual yield. It didn't help that government (national and local) allowed Housing Associations to sell off some of their older stock of social housing in order to build new social housing. Then, after the sale, the new plans were submitted for approval and, for reasons such as too much nitrogen in the soil, permission was denied. Some plans did make it through where developers were proposing mixed housing availability. In one development there would be low cost rentals, low cost buys, midrange buys and some top end stuff. The developers were hoping to compensate for the low cost stuff via the midrange ones and the profit would be in the top end market. The problem was there was insufficient demand for the expensive builds so the project never got built.

Local councils have (not all I would add, but a fair few), put a stop to the buy to let market by ensuring that buyers live at least 5 years in a property before they are allowed to rent it out. This has seen a downturn in house prices in those areas. People can buy, rents are proportional to buying costs and the "market" is doing its job in keeping housing costs, be they buy or rent, at more reasonable levels.

Would this work in the UK? No idea but, IMO, it wouldn't hurt to try.

At the last but one election, Wybren van Haga got into Parliament via one of the more right wing parties (Forum voor Democratie) and was one of 12 MPs they had. In no time the FvD started to haemorrhage MPs who formed splinter groups. FvD was down to 3 (the number they still have following the recent election) and van Haga was one of 3 BVNL MPs. BVNL now has zero MPs. Van Haga owns a raft of flats/houses and is not known as being a popular landlord. Both FvD and BVNL are very right wing. Doubt the Holocaust, are full of conspiracy theories and very much in favour of the rich elite remaining exactly that. They have also said the moon landings never took place and they love Putin.

[ramAnag]

No argument about increased funding for NHS and Police, but to give a fairly benign example regarding the police, I'm sure I'm not the only motorist who suspects that the number of police attending (even minor) motor accidents is a bit 'moth to a flame'. I recently queued over an hour getting less than a mile up the M1 due to an accident under the J27 bridge, and counted 11 officers chatting yet none at the top of the J27 ramp exercising a simple bit of traffic management that could have resolved the pressure. I could offer other examples, both motor-related and not

The 250k was just a number plucked from the ether, the public body only was because (you and) I pay for the ****ers

There you go…agreement on the NHS and my own, less ‘benign’, experience leads me to have no difficulty in recognising your police example.

The £250k you say was picked at random so it’s a bit meaningless…all I’ll say is that…do we not pay for those who are extraordinarily well paid in the private sector too?
I ask this because someone I know well has recently moved from being employed by a private company to being self employed. This came about as a result of the pandemic and I admire his bravery and determination enormously. What I am concerned about however is the number of ‘tax and other’ benefits that now come his way as a member of the self employed ‘class’. I don’t consider myself as naive but I was surprised at the level of these ‘extras’ and are we not, indirectly, paying for these ‘benefits’ too?

[Andy_Faber]

The current right of centre Dutch outgoing Cabinet (still in situ until such time as a coalition has been formed) has just put a new Bill to Parliament. It's aim is to reduce private rents. They have gone up incredibly over the past 10 to 15 years. To the extent that, especially in medium sized towns to the bigger cities, there is a dearth of affordable housing, be that to rent or to buy. Nurses, doctors, teachers etc, none of whom are in the worst paid jobs, can't afford to rent/buy where they work.

Why has that happened? It started with "investors" wishing to go "buy to let", buying up properties, wholesale. They were gazumping 1st time buyers. 300K houses were going for between 350k and 400k. Prospective "buy to live"'ers could not outbid the gazumpers who then, perfectly naturally in a business sense, upped the rent they were asking to account for the extra they'd paid so as to not damage their annual yield. It didn't help that government (national and local) allowed Housing Associations to sell off some of their older stock of social housing in order to build new social housing. Then, after the sale, the new plans were submitted for approval and, for reasons such as too much nitrogen in the soil, permission was denied. Some plans did make it through where developers were proposing mixed housing availability. In one development there would be low cost rentals, low cost buys, midrange buys and some top end stuff. The developers were hoping to compensate for the low cost stuff via the midrange ones and the profit would be in the top end market. The problem was there was insufficient demand for the expensive builds so the project never got built.

Local councils have (not all I would add, but a fair few), put a stop to the buy to let market by ensuring that buyers live at least 5 years in a property before they are allowed to rent it out. This has seen a downturn in house prices in those areas. People can buy, rents are proportional to buying costs and the "market" is doing its job in keeping housing costs, be they buy or rent, at more reasonable levels.

Would this work in the UK? No idea but, IMO, it wouldn't hurt to try.

I can only quote back on my experience in commercial property management, and those who buy properties 'wholesale' tend to be looking for return over decades, so wouldn't be especially bothered about such a 'fallow period' law. And then of course, if a 'bulk buyer' business model accounted for that fallow period, it just makes the situation worse for prospective tenants, who go from only having expensive choices to having no choices at all

[Andy_Faber]

There you go…agreement on the NHS and my own, less ‘benign’, experience leads me to have no difficulty in recognising your police example.

The £250k you say was picked at random so it’s a bit meaningless…all I’ll say is that…do we not pay for those who are extraordinarily well paid in the private sector too?
I ask this because someone I know well has recently moved from being employed by a private company to being self employed. This came about as a result of the pandemic and I admire his bravery and determination enormously. What I am concerned about however is the number of ‘tax and other’ benefits that now come his way as a member of the self employed ‘class’. I don’t consider myself as naive but I was surprised at the level of these ‘extras’ and are we not, indirectly, paying for these ‘benefits’ too?

OK, three times the PM's salary. But I gave that in a recent discussion and was told it was too much! I'm talking principles not absolutes.

An easy to explain reason for limiting things to public sector seniors is that most of them are a local or national monopoly, or close to. I can choose who to buy my milk off, but I can't choose who to buy my water off is a clear example. And I simply don't believe the talent pool for executives is so small that those chosen deserve such enourmous payouts. The argument is always that capping salaries would result in a 'talent drain' but I personally think, using a very non-corporate phrase, thats a load of *******s