Chip

Sign on, me? Nope had 6 months of that ,got bored, started up my own comp and never looked back hence the good living now.

Matteeboy

So glad us tax payers were funding your "boredom;" so you didn't consider the drain on the state? Unless you can't work, choosing to sign on is bloody pathetic.

ditchmyster

iTrader: (7)

Chris, I like you and some of the things you say, But you really do struggle to see both sides of the coin sometimes.

The council estates and government owned industries and infrastructure, were crippling the country with the cost of their upkeep, everything needed investment and there was no cash in the pot to do this, so to make it attractive to investors it had to be cheap, council estates were like **** holes and people actively did nothing to enhance the property they were living in, in some cases they did quite the opposite so that the house could be redecorated, get drunk punch the door and call the council to fix it, dump rubbish in the front garden until the council came and shifted it etc,etc.

I don't profess to know the numbers involved, but what she did by allowing people to buy their council house was instil a sense of pride and make normal poor folk think that they could finally do something with their lives and drag themselves out of the poverty trap, I'm an example of that, having started out in one room accommodation with 4 of us as a child to now owning two properties, one outright and the other with a small mortgage.

Todays housing problems are due to many more complexed issues such as the influx of foreigners, location of work and general lack of investment by various governments in social housing along with restrictions on planning, there ARE actually streets full of empty houses around the country, but as usual the GREAT British are too good to live in that area or do a job that pays less than £3k pm, despite never having completed any kind of qualification they want top dollar, much like many of the previously employed workers in government owned industry which was ruined by the unions unreasonable demands for more pay and less work, you don't need to be an aviation engineer to work out that that's not going to fly.

Nobody is ever 100% right but for me and many others she did some very good things, mainly allowing those that wanted to get ahead to do so and thus reap the rewards, i'm by no means well off or an I'm alright jack kind of person, I worked friggin hard to get where I am, and still do, all i did was see an opportunity and have the ***** to do what it takes, but she gave me a leg up and for that I'm grateful.

jonc

Privatised utilities holding us ransom, you're having a laugh! When an unelected power had the ability to grind the country to halt because they felt like it, THAT is holding us, the country, the government to ransom!

You have your own business, that's admirable, you have a nice house and a several nice cars, you can thank Thatcher for all of that!!

dpb

First time buyers were 25 when Maggie came to power, it'll be rising to 43 in the next few years.

Put that on your credit card lol

Chip

Which goes to show you haven't a feckin clue what you are on about. I was told I had to sign on to keep up my ni entitlement , otherwise I wouldn't have bothered as I didn't need to. I was also in the process of setting up my company and negotiating a contract which took months though only took up a small part of the day. So call the system pathetic and not me. And for that 6 months it is the only money in 35 years that the state has ever paid me. You'll also be pleased to know I didn't squander the money, I saved it and had a nice holiday before going back to work. I could have on the other hand sat back and done **** all for the rest of my life, but no, I chose not to.

hodgy0_2

at least they were working, so prob not too dependent on the state,

Although if your argument includes that fact that some of these industries were "subsidised" by the state, tell me a country that does not subsidise its industry in one form or another

The US does massively, China does (to levels unheard off), Germany does and has always - but what the fvck do they know about running successful economies

If you believe these industries needed running into the ground – that’s fine and maybe they did - but surely you need some form of strategy/industrial policy to put in its place.

isn't that is the job of a Goverment,

Don’t you have to put some alternative in it's place? Otherwise you just create a massive welfare problem down the road – oh hang on a minute

Or maybe you just let the “invisible hand of the free market” work its “magic”
But then this has been tried in banking and finance – and delivered the longest depression the world has seen – and we will not recover for a generation

it would be interesting to see the amount spent on welfare before and after her term in office

Funkii Munkii

The ex Mrs Scargill made me laugh yesterday, "She took jobs away from our Children and Grand Children" FFS the majority of the pits were drained there was clearly going to be no work for your Grand Children and only a small amount left for your children whether you liked it or not.

jasey

Huge welfare state is required for the *still* bone idle feckless aresholes while we have the highest net immigration ever of people who ARE willing to work.

The sooner we scrap the welfare state the better - then all the feckless arseholes will have to get a ****ing job (and yes they may have to move more than a hundred yards to get one).

Get on your bike as the man with a hotel on his head once said

An0n0m0us

+1

dpb

Unemployment doubled under Maggie

jasey

If I'd been in charge it would have tripled

dpb

I always thought it was a bit of a shame they didn't finish Norman off..!

jonc

If using poorly regulated employment, low wages and questionable working conditions as in China is a better way of creating a successful economy or for a country having to prop up the rest of Europe is good strategy for economic health then I'm glad Thatcher set a path for the current state of the economy.

Yes we do have a welfare problem, for example with the unsustainable public sector pensions. We currently have a shortfall for public sector pensions that costs taxpayers £8bn per year and is set to increase to £16bn by 2017. Had Thatcher not moved 900,000 workers out of the public sector with privatisation we would be facing massive bill that would require even more drastic changes to the public pension. Remember the strikes from the 400,000 public sector employees last year? and that was over a relatively minor proposal!

Matteeboy

So the state part funded the setting up of your company? When I couldn't find a proper job I did some labouring. And you spent the money on a holiday? It gets worse...

romford-boy

She had the foresight to see that huge government funding of industry was in place yet the quality of the product was not improving, exports were dropping off the cliff and manufacturing was getting worse.

British industry was given the chance to prove itself with huge state subsidies and it let itself down. Now days we have high utility bills, before Thatcher many had no utilities for long periods of time each week.

Longest depression the world has seen........well put it this way, your mortgage is probably the lowest it has ever been, interest rates are more stable than ever, inflation is no where near double digits, tax at it's lowest rate pretty much ever. Yes growth is pretty anemic and jobs are still hard to come by, but in the grand scheme of things to call today a depression and the sh*tness of prior decades anything other is a bit rich.

romford-boy

Oh, and by the way, can we once and for all get over calling our economic status a result of the banks.

We, yes us the public, lapped up their finance offers and cheap mortgages and then balked at the thought of actually repaying these loans. Yes the banks did unusual repackaging schemes with debt, but this was our debt that we owed and we did not repay.

hodgy0_2

if we did not repay the debt, why has no UK bank gone bust or wound up for trading insolvently

David Lock

I think if Thatcher was PM today she would give the country business confidence which would release privately held funds and get this money invested and give a real and much needed kick to the economy. She would make mincemeat out of Milliband and wouldn't take too kindly to Mr Clegg.

And she's probably bomb N Korea (joke)

dl

Chip

Nope, you must stop assumings things, as you will find you are wrong yet again. I used my redundancy money to set up my business which in the past year will have paid back into the system a damn sight more than you would have in income tax, corporation tax and VAT. No NI though which is really nice.

Matteeboy

For us that didn't lap up the banks cr4p schemes to release us of money, its still f**king annoying.

Chip; you still chose to go on the dole. As for company taxes, we pay plenty thanks.

Devildog

Matt

If you leave a job voluntarily you don't qualify for employment benefits a significant time. I suspect that Chip had no choice as far as his employment was concerned.

If it happened to me having contributed significant sums to the pot by way of tax and ni I'd sure as hell be claiming everything I could in the event I found myself out of work through no choice of my own.

Remember.... read, digest, think, read again, digest fully and only then post

Matteeboy

I had paid plenty in NI and tax before I found myself "in between jobs"

I'd been at a fairly senior level, went travelling/honeymoon then had a few nightmares so scoured agencies and did temp work for six months. The situation is no different.

At no point did I consider signing on.

How is that so different?

RA Dunk

I've been off work four months now and haven't signed on.. I woulden't want to be seen mingling with the riff raff down at the social or where ever it is people go to nowadays.

Chip

Matter, As I previously stated I was advised I had to sign on t keep up my ni contributions or did you just choose to ignore that. And as Devildog states I was made redundant, I didn't Just jack a job in.

RA Dunk, you may want to check whether you should sign on to keep up your ni.

Lydia72

You only need thirty years NI for a full pension so for some people it's not worth signing on if it's just to keep contributions up to date.

Matteeboy

That's what I was told. And I REALLY hope I don't need to rely on a state pension too...

Osimabu

iTrader: (2)

Just to make it quite clear, some of us didn't partake of this particular Bliar/Brown inspired lunacy, tried to save instead of borrowing, and are now rewarded with little or no interest on our meagre savings.

I want the interest rates back to how they were when Mrs T took power! (Well, perhaps a bit more than 0.5% anyway).

Lydia72

FWIW I did leave a job voluntarily and still got JSA (the Job Centre agreed I had good reason to leave) so it's not always the case that you wouldn't get any benefit.

I then ended up working in a Job Centre, on a fixed term contract, when that finished I was entitled to six months JSA but did not bother signing on. I didn't need the money so morally it did not sit right with me and also couldn't bear the thought of going in there!

Chip

Lydia, I didn't find anything wrong in going into the job centre to sign on. I was treated with respect at all times and I told them I was in the process of setting up on my own as well, yet they still told me to sign on til I actually started trading which I did. As i said earlier I didnt intend signing on and didnt for 2 months but was then advised to.

Chip