Mrs Magpie
On a bit of break...
...and they were, apart from one, the kids whose parents paid for private tuition.
Work starts on the eagerly awaited new Foxtons office on Brixton Road
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Mrs Magpie
On a bit of break...
Thankfully my old school no longer exists.
Gramsci
Well-Known Member
you really are an unpleasant poster
Gramsci
Well-Known Member
My Black British friend who grew up in Brixton would reckon she will be in the minority in the Village.
Your detailed and reasoned responses are refreshing compared to some people on this board!
Agreed re: your last point. I'm 30 and I've worked without a break since finishing uni. If I lost my job I'd claim every benefit possible, without shame as I've earned it. But I do not expect to receive thing such as child benefit / winter fuel payments whilst I have a decent income.
I've heard those numbers re: the benefits cap before. It all comes down to housing costs in my mind. In the South, housing is too expensive. It is a pity the government isn't attempting to increase the supply of housing.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
What does "too big" mean, though?
Too big to be affordable?
Too big for your liking?
Too big to be able to operate efficiently?
What?
As for "finite resources", that's not exactly a new problem, and yet, for example, there was no wish or requirement to demolish the principle of universality for around 50 years post-Beveridge. "Finite resources" are an excuse to shift welfare out of public hands into private, thereby minimising expenditure "at the faucet" of public need, and maximising it as private profit.
You're great at trotting out the soft-right tropes about the welfare state. The problem is that few of them play beyond the circle of believers they're written for. They don't stand up to serious analysis.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
AprilNatalie
New Member
Your opinion on if Brixton is desirable or not is obviously biased because you live here for so long, and know it well. The unknown is always scary, and to a lot of people (especially following the riots), Brixton, Peckham and other areas of south london have a reputation as being unsafe and undesirable. Maybe I can see that more clearly than you considering that I only moved here last year, and I will admit that this was my attitude towards the area before, and now I love it.
We live in the capital city, it's obviously going to be expensive. Like with every issue, instead of looking at the governments and the way they choose to run the country, we blame other people be it based on race, wealth or social background. The point I was originally making is that who are you or anyone else to decide who can move into a certain area or not, just because you've lived there for a certain period of time.
If someone turned around and said that their criticism of London is that its gradually becoming a playground for the poor, would it be regarded as an appropriate or reasonable comment to make? No probably not. It seems like a slightly skewed attitude to blame the well off for wanting to live in a desirable place and having the money to do so. In an ideal world it wouldn't be like that, but that's how our economy works and that isn't the fault of any group of people - hipsters/yuppies/the wealthy/the poor/blacks/whites/asians/dogs/cats/flamingos. Seems like everyone just wants someone to blame.
I think your misreading what I was trying to say - I was using hipsters as an example. People choose their religion but can still be discriminated against because of it. I don't think any form of prejudice or discrimination is justified, its just a gateway to bigger and worse things.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
I've said it before, and I'll doubtless say it again until people are heartily sick of hearing it, but neither this government nor a Labour government or any form of coalition government can or will increase the housing supply by a volume significant enough to lower rental and purchase prices. To do so would undermine one of the crutches our limping economy is relying on to keep our recession moving on a plateau rather than downhill.
Too big to be affordable.
Gordon Brown was running large deficits during a time of good economic growth and strong tax receipts. Much of this was due to massive expansion of the state (including the welfare state).
State support should always be there. But there isn't an endless pot of money to fund everything that people want. Focusing on the essentials is key.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
el-ahrairah
forward communism, forward gerbils!
because it would have very different connotations to saying an area is a playground for the rich. london IS a playground for the rich, and the poor suffer. if you think that's prejudiced then you need to have a work with yourself.
i do agree that blaming the hipsters and yuppies is blaming a symptom, not a cause. it might seem odd to hear me say that, seeing as i'm quite unreasonably rude about those elements of my fellow man. However, racists and muggers are symptoms of capitalism as well and i'm pretty disdainful about them too.
agreed. a rapid 30% fall in residential property values would crush our banks.
but people need to realise that a house is a place to live. not an investment.
a gradual decline or long term stagnation in house prices would be fantastic news.
it will be interesting to see what the reductions in housing benefit does to rents / house prices. removing a floor to the market should force prices down.
Mrs Magpie
On a bit of break...
Mere stripling! My eldest is 39 this year!
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
It isn't, though. It only appears unaffordable because costs are measured against receipts accepted. Police receipts better (i.e. harden the dividing line between tax avoidance and tax evasion, and then act ruthlessly with those who cross the line) and things are no longer unaffordable. Hartnett alone knocked the Exchequer for about £4 billion (split it over the decade the screw was running and you've got £400 million a year) from a single corporate taxpayer. Even if we use the Treasury's own £45 billion a year figure of 2011, that's a fair degree of "affordability" escaping for ideological reasons (one of which is, of course, the residualisation of the "welfare state").
As I've mentioned elsewhere, Brown was running up those deficits on sound independent advice. "It's fine to go into the red at this stage of the economic cycle, Chancellor!". Neither Brown nor those consultants and economists who gave him such advice saw "the credit crunch" coming.
As for "expansion of the welfare state", the only expansion was a tax credit system that replaced other methods of redistribution and enhanced uptake, all budgeted for anyway. Cost expansion mainly resided in the infrastructure programmes for the NHS and DfE, much of which was undertaken through the ridiculously cost-ineffective PFI and PPP programmes.
Oh my, my favourite cliché, the one about the "endless pot of money"!
We're all well aware that funding is limited. It's writ large on our lives. We also know that funding is being progressively limited at source for ideological reasons, not because the limited resources of the Treasury are anywhere near exhaustion!
Mrs Magpie
On a bit of break...
These boards really make me feel old sometimes.
Libertad
Sparking up a rollie in the Reichstag
It would be interesting to see mass evictions and homelessness would it not?
Mrs Magpie
On a bit of break...
I've already taken in people who can't afford to live in rented places in London any more....and I've had a phone call tonight already asking for a bed for the night on my sofa. I'm already living in interesting times.
Libertad
Sparking up a rollie in the Reichstag
Not liking.
Mrs Magpie
On a bit of break...
Apart from the latter who is disabled and homeless, they're working.
Mrs Magpie
On a bit of break...
....and the latter had a job until recently.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
Neither does mine. Died a few years short of it's 300th birthday, and the building is used as a bloody prep school by South Chelsea-ites.
Mrs Magpie
On a bit of break...
Mine is luxury flats.
Mrs Magpie
On a bit of break...
It was a private nursing home for a while, from the late seventies iirc, but it was empty for a while.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
It should force prices down, all things being equal, but the problem is that all things aren't equal. For example, the MASSIVE excess of demand over housing supply in Greater London alone exerts enough of an upward pressure on prices that the removal of your floor is unlikely to work to do more than put prices on hold for a small amount of time, and as we're moving into "buying season" in a couple of months, it may not even do that.
It isn't, though. It only appears unaffordable because costs are measured against receipts accepted. Police receipts better (i.e. harden the dividing line between tax avoidance and tax evasion, and then act ruthlessly with those who cross the line) and things are no longer unaffordable. Hartnett alone knocked the Exchequer for about £4 billion (split it over the decade the screw was running and you've got £400 million a year) from a single corporate taxpayer. Even if we use the Treasury's own £45 billion a year figure of 2011, that's a fair degree of "affordability" escaping for ideological reasons (one of which is, of course, the residualisation of the "welfare state").
As I've mentioned elsewhere, Brown was running up those deficits on sound independent advice. "It's fine to go into the red at this stage of the economic cycle, Chancellor!". Neither Brown nor those consultants and economists who gave him such advice saw "the credit crunch" coming.
As for "expansion of the welfare state", the only expansion was a tax credit system that replaced other methods of redistribution and enhanced uptake, all budgeted for anyway. Cost expansion mainly resided in the infrastructure programmes for the NHS and DfE, much of which was undertaken through the ridiculously cost-ineffective PFI and PPP programmes.
Oh my, my favourite cliché, the one about the "endless pot of money"!
We're all well aware that funding is limited. It's writ large on our lives. We also know that funding is being progressively limited at source for ideological reasons, not because the limited resources of the Treasury are anywhere near exhaustion!
1) In this age of globalisation a competitive tax system is key. We need to attract business to the UK. Lower corporate taxes would be a good thing as it would create jobs.
2) Agreed. Brown made bad decisions and much of the western world got hooked to a massive debt binge.
3) Listen to the budget. The deficit is huge. Public debt is approaching 100% of GDP. You cannot tax your way out of this kind of hole. The treasury is broke!
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
It'd be interesting to see the political effect(s), but hardly interesting to see the social and personal damage to individuals and communities.
Libertad
Sparking up a rollie in the Reichstag
My implied point VP.
gaijingirl
Well-Known Member
mine too...
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