OT: The future of EV charging?

[Dave Plowman (News]

You mean like UK elections?

No. A union didn't overturn a goverment. The electorate did.

[Dave Plowman (News]

I take it then you're in favour of controlling perks etc to all CEOs?

Or just in organisations you don't approve of?

[Andrew]

Only in places like Tower Hamlets where postal votes are all filled in by the same person.

[John Rumm]

That and to dismantle some of the power of unions generally. Its notable that no labour government since has sought to restore any of their powers.

[Fredxx]

Or loosen the grip of other closed shops. Wasn't it under their watch they introduced all the Part P nonsense?

[Robin]

But note that the later, coalition government reduced the scope of Part P - an example of deregulation, something which is relatively rare in some other legislatures I can think of.

[williamwright]

I've chatted with him. He's a drip.

Bill

[Dave Plowman (News]

Just shows the power of the meja. Just like Brexit.

Lack of union power has reulted in all these zero hour contracts, etc. And things like company pension schemes being much reduced.

And the range of remuneration between the highest and lowest being so much greater than once. To the point of being obscene.

I'm sure this is exactly what the right wing wanted.

I'm rather glad my working life was mostly before all this.

[Dave Plowman (News]

Regulations like Part P and gas registration are lobbied for by vested interests. ie, big business. They have nothing to do with safety, etc.

[michael adams]

The fact that Heath managed to win the popular vote overall was of little consolation in the circumstances.

In fact far from being brought down by the miners strike, Heath was even more the victim of his own misjudgement than I'd remembered. I'd though that it was Harold Wilson who convened a Pay Board to consider the miners claim as there was great emphasis on their being a "special case" when the final award of a 29% pay rise was announced.

However apparently it was Edward Heath himself who set up the Pay Board to consider the miners claim

<quote>

Just before he called the election, Mr Heath had set up a pay board to look into the miners' claim. It reached its conclusion on 22 February but agreed not to publish it until after the election.

</quote>

The General Election itself was held 6 days later on 28 February.

As the miners subsequently accepted the exceptional 29% pay rise its doubtful whether Heath needed to have called an Election at all. He should have waited for the outcome of the Pay Board and the miners reaction to it. If they accepted then that would be that. Whereas if they rejected what ever was offered by the independent Pay Board then this could only have strengthened his hand in appealing to the voters in any subsequent GE.

michael adams

...

[Dave Plowman (News]

Quite. An independent board awarded a pretty massive pay rise. Which surely justifies their union taking action when their employer (the state) offered nothing like that.

But of course a good Tory expects everyone to work hard for crumbs. Except himself, obviously.

I do wonder how many of these good Tories have ever been down a deep mine. And seen for themsleves the conditions people worked in. And would be happy to do it themselves for a nice small wage.

[Andrew]

Part P ?came about because the daughter of a Lib Dem MP died

[Andrew]

Ably assisted by your chums in the Labour party who opened our doors to the world (not just eastern europeans) and brought in Housing benefit and tax credits that allowed people to work 16 hours a week and still pocket more in benefits that ordinary people could earn full time.

All through the 70's when Britain was the sick man of Europe and teetering between bankruptcy and civil strife.

[John Rumm]

I doubt it would have gained much traction if the then powers did not also believe it would yield a significant increase in tax revenue, by driving a supposed large swath of grey economy workers into the spotlight of regulation.

[Dave Plowman (News]

Interesting idea. All those previous cowboys got registration and started paying tax?

I've no idea how to check if someone is registered or not - given how easy it is to obtain official looking ID these days.

[Tim Streater]

And it's the sort of thing that the structure of the EU makes a lot easier for big business to do. They lobby in Brussels, and no one notices it, or the attendant corruption of the unaccountable Commissioners.

[Tim Streater]

A lot od people *like* zero hours contracts. And company pensions were always a bad idea, as we see from the numbers of such schemes that can no longer afford to pay out the promised pensions. Pensions should be a personal matter, as I've mentioned before. Of course, the gold-plated, index-linked schemes beloved of Our Dave and his union chums (whenever they could bully management into agreeing to them) were just Ponzi scehmes waiting to happen and were bound to crash and burn in the long run.

[Max Demian]

Only if they are the ones to decide which hours they can work, rather than the employer.

[Adrian]

You astound me, shocked I am, shocked.

Adrian

[Adrian]

In message [e-mail]>, Tim Streater [e-mail] writes

Partly due to changes made by one Gordon Brown, remind me again which side of the political divide he was on, was it the one who supposedly looked after the workers, or the one who supposedly looked after the bosses ?.

Adrian