Collapse of normal life

[OldPot]

It feels to me that this is what is beginning to happen. Spiralling bills that surely only the well off can pay, shortages of things we all took for granted (2 of my mum's regular medications are out of stock, no chemicals for the local swimming pool, things opening for a few hours instead of all day (post office, banks etc), NHS on its knees, many other services just not running as they should). Plus the sodding infernal heat and drought this summer.....

And yes I know we are luckier here in the UK than many, many others countries.....but I just feel there is no turning back to life pre-covid.

sadly this is the type of thread that only brings out the bullshitters and the boasters.
and we all vote tory and we listen to the tabloids cos we love it up the arse.

I am very depressed by All of it tbh

It pains me that every August bank holiday I sit with relatives who are in complete denial of where this country is heading. They do not question anything. It is easier to read the Daily Mail simply because it doesn’t tax the grey matter.

When Farage said leave or have 300 million Europeans within our shores they believed him. As if Europe would completely empty itself of human life to come here.

Correct,@carefullycourageous

6.3% of robberies and 4.1% of thefts result in a charge
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-62491194

And yet the government continue to put out lies about the new police officers they've recruited when the truth is there's fewer than we had in 2010 www.statista.com/statistics/303963/uk-police-officer-numbers/

We do seem to be getting more nurses, though:

What is the number of nursing staff (including Midwives and Nursing Associates) who joined the NMC Register from outside EU /EEA in the year 2021-2022?
Almost half of the new nursing staff joining the NMC Register in the year to March 2022 were from overseas.22,745 people from outside the EU / EEA joined the register (up from 9,152 the previous year).
new nmc registrants from outside eu eaa
That's a 149% increase.Meanwhile, just 663 people from within the EU joined.

So BREXIT is working, in that we got rid of those pesky EU nurses stealing our jobs

We weren't mistaken. The march of technological advancement has enabled living standards to rise steadily for some time (centuries, not just the period you're talking about), and widening economic and democratic power through greater sections of society (the working class via trade unions, women via feminism etc.) meant most people benefited to some extent from that. The cold war also meant that western capitalist democracies HAD to be run in such a way that most people kept benefitting, to stop them from thinking they might be better off under communism. Thus the welfare state, universal public services in health, education etc.

The technological side of the equation hasn't changed and indeed should be going even faster considering the implications of current developments in automation, AI etc. What's changed is that Thatcher and Reagan came to power, the Berlin Wall came down, capital flows in and out of countries were deregulated and freed from the constraining power of democratic governments, and we got 40 odd years of neoliberalism reigning unopposed, convincing people that the invisible hand of the free market is EVERYTHING, rather than one element contributing to prosperity in a complex society that requires other elements as well to deliver just and widely beneficial outcomes.

If what you say was true then GDP as a whole would have been continuously shrinking. But it hasn't (overall, despite short term fluctuations). There has continued to be economic growth, it's just that the benefits of it have been syphoned upward to a very small number of people, on an unprecedented scale.

Haha your right!

The whole of the 20s have been so ridiculously and dramatically challenging that if this was a movie I would have said it’s shit, it’s trying too hard and it’s unrealistic.

🤣

. . . and the people who voted for it.

Where are you all living ?

We haven't had any part times shops, post offices etc. the local swimming pools are clean, available and well maintained by plenty of staff. Almost everyone I know has been away or going away on holiday abroad and we live and come from a very mixed background with hugely varying levels of income. (South Manchester). Sure everyone talks about how things are becoming m more expensive but that's about it really.

Everyone seems to be carrying on as normal around here tbh - it's only on Mumsnet that I find the worry and gloom and doom!

Venezuela is not a Marxist state though, so it was a silly and ignorant comment in the first place.

This thread reminded me of this Twitter thread: twitter.com/culturaltutor/status/1557045926769922055?t=p0vtCvBzuAicPvcIdViGkA&s=19

It's like there's no pride in much of England these days. It's all about cost-cutting.

That's funny. Quite a few years ago now I was working with a Polish man. He told me how when he first came to the UK he really loved the post boxes. i remember him saying how much he loved the miniature details and the care given to a functional object, and how it said something about British people. He was a very thoughtful and educated young person.

My city smells of piss & there are street folk openly using drugs. There’s no police presence, at all.

The suburbs are the same as they ever were. Rich, retired people like my parents live there. Lucky them!

The pps bc story was interesting - so glad it has been going well, and hope it continues. I have a yearly mammogram and they all happened throughout CV at the right times, which impressed me. However, that this can be achieved makes me more puzzled that symptoms and a lump found by dr (ovary area) has been addressed very differently- it was a 5 week wait for a requested fast track 2 week scan (apparently the 2 weeks is now 3 but radiology is busier than that) and 4 weeks for results being returned to GP - I was told to return to GP by him if I had worries, and told to return to GP by radiology to try push an appointment sooner - except GP was first closed randomly for 3 days, then a 72 hr response time was given to my request, then after 48 hrs just a text saying they’d re-requested scan urgently though it clearly didn’t work. Why is this part of cancer care so poor compared to breast cancer care? Gp care has its own issues I know, as does A&E and other areas where my appointments have been delayed considerably. Still I am glad for where it goes as well as it can.
Rest of discussion it’s all been said really - for me I don’t expect to have, I don’t expect life to be fair, I don’t expect not to plan and learn to do without and I’d be happy to pay more tax to get a better life for more than just me - But I also don’t expect lazy ass government to have their school summer holidays and ignore the terrible state we are in, nor do I expect to do without to further line pockets of Tory friends or huge companies- the discrepancy between super rich and rest, let alone poor is shameful and makes me angry and sad for my grandchildren and their peers futures.
oh my mum was born in 1931 and not on this forum but worries and says she has never known it so bad for so many people at once in her lifetime, despite her being normally accepting lower classes work whilst their ‘betters’ cream it off - thing is we’re not all in it together like the war and rationing are we. We might be when the rich or cushioned, and the oblivious realise that we do live in society, so whilst they’re ok so many others aren’t that it’s going to cause at least changes in their daily life and expectations too.

Whilst Brexit might be a convenient excuse it isn’t where the blame lies.

The world has had a pandemic, countries around the world have been shut down or have spent the last 2.5 years stopping and starting.
Now just as we are all getting on our feet again Russia invades Ukraine and starts talking about nucleor war and cutting off fuel pipe lines.
Everything the world does relies on fuel so when the supply is under threat. the price of fuel goes up which means the cost of everything else goes up.
The only way out would be a short sharp united shock to Russia and a warning to other countries that you can’t go invading another country just because you want to.
It is 2022. Countries have their own territory Deal with what you have got and the citizens you have and stop looking to aquire more.
This mess is because of the Global Pandemic made worse because Russia decided to invade another country.
If it has anything to do with Brexit then other European countries would be doing well and we would be the ones that are alone in a bad position. But other European countries are in as bad or worse state than us.

Also the NHS has always been in it’s knees

If everything is down to the Tory government then why is the rest of the world in just as bad or a worse state than the U.K.

oh my mum was born in 1931 and not on this forum but worries and says she has never known it so bad for so many people at once in her lifetime

So WW2 when we had bombs falling on our heads and rationing and the 70s when we were subject to hyper inflation, hyper taxed and spent our evenings with blackouts and rubbish and bodies piling up and getting on public transport didn’t guarantee that you would get to your destination (Remember being told to get off a train at Stoke on Trent late at night mid journey from my home town in the north of England to London because the railways workers had gone on strike. It was already hours after the train was supposedly have already reached its destination as they were operating a go slow.

My friend was a nurse.
Loved her job. Then got made redundant under the Blair Brown Labour government.

A short time later the news was broadcasting that their were a lack of nurses.

I wonder why.

Friend would have loved to have stayed in the NHS but with no degree she didn’t have the right qualifications to do the job she had been doing for 22 years and had steadily been promoted to be in charge of a group of wards.
Many more nurses were also made redundant at the same time

This was purely down to Labour government policy

This. And yet people still vote them in.

I agree. We grew up very poor, and in a country with no food banks, benefit system, free schooling or NHS. It was a struggle but we survived, so living through a cost of living crisis here does not scare me but I can see how it would scare people who are used to a better standard of living.

They aren't. However the Ukrainian war has been an issue for everyone. The Tories are responsible for how its been handled ( badly)
When I left school in the 80's ( Tory Govt) we were in a recession, no jobs and it felt there was no future. That was thanks to Thatcher.

This!

It is not 'only on Mumsnet'
e.g. www.disabilitynewsservice.com/truly-shocking-figures-expose-disabled-peoples-precarious-financial-situation/

Energy bills are predicted to cost 1/6 of a fairly average annual income. That is real. It is not 'doom and gloom' to talk about what is really going to happen.

Maybe people don't talk to you about it, but I work in a professional office with colleagues on decent wages and they are discussing it, often in relation to their parents if not concerned for themselves.

I don't think it's capitalism as such that's breaking, but the money system can't be sustained, they say this themselves. I could go and find clips, but they come from hours long summits so it's a bit time consuming.

If you think about the inflation we've seen. A stamp was 25p, now it's £1. That's in 40 years. In another 40 years it will be £2. Min wage was 3.50, it's now almost a tenner. In another 40 years it will be £20.

How long can that go on? Wages £100 an hour? Stamps £4? It has to end, and it's ending now.

No. The Tories have ben systematically breaking apart the NHS for years and selling bits off.

They are now running it down so we'll accept full privatisation.

Labour made a huge effort to reduce waiting times. Tories cancelled that aim (long before Covid) and waiting lists are now at an all time high, with people waiting months or years for operations, often in pain.

Why are they doing this? So their rich mates can turn a profit, it's not for us. Our health suffers so private companies can profit off us.

As long as people let them get away with it, they will continue to exploit us. It makes them a lot on money and it's VERY convenient for them if people refuse to recognise what's happening right in front of their noses.

We are all boiling frogs right now and we need to recognise what's happening and try to get out of the pan, not hang around saying "I think it's always been hot in here"

What will it take for people to realise the Tories are not on your side?

www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/nhs-long-waiting-lists-been-25908330

Inflation can go one for ever because money is artificial concept unlike say lithium

Money itself is also a very basic concept - an iou trading system

I cut your hair , you mend their shelf , they give someone else so peas they have grown and the pea people give you a cat wash and you have been paid - it's a way of tracking those favors

What wrong is how it has value now in itself and worth in itself rather , that people get more not by doing , how people can then gather those IOUs to control other peoples lives