To SCREAM from the rooftops that furlough needs to be extended at least 6 more months

[Marg33t]

Furlough saves jobs and saves people's health. Why is the extension not announced today?

People are losing their jobs at a rapid rate as it's near to the 30-45 days for consultations for redundancies. It needs to be extended or more people will lose their jobs. Other counties are running it until next year and it makes me feel sick that we aren't protecting and saving jobs!

Are you paying for it?

Because it’s economically unsustainable- that’s why business are collapsing

Many people who would be made redundant now will be made redundant anyway at the end of the furlow period. And the taxpayer is funding people’s salaries just for those jobs to go anyway.

How long do you think businesses can afford to have sit at home? paying out with nothing coming in? It’s unsustainable.

We can’t keep paying it it’s just not viable.

Alternatively we could ask why housing was ever allowed to become a commodity to line the pockets of a few rather than a necessity that every human being should have access to.

We won't, of course, because the few drown out the many.

But it would be a start. Along with realising that you can't have "growth" forever if you want a planet that can sustain your lifeform.

Again, we won't.

Jobs are going to go,this is a Fact. Furlough was about trying to save jobs,that ship has sailed.
Unsustainable for the government to pay salaries for jobs that are going anyway.

Because too many places used it to manage cashflow rather than protecting jobs.

I agree op, and yes we're all paying for it with taxes, or certainly will be in future and that's fine by me for the good of the country

Because tax payers can't keep paying for it simple

Why is the extension not announced today?

Because we can't afford it. We have never had the financial management that a lot of European countries have relied on to support their schemes. We're massively in debt... We can't fund it. And paying the salaries of people to keep businesses going that may well collapse anyway isn't sustainable, or economical.

I very much wish it was different, and a lot of people that I love are facing redundancies right now, but unless you've got a cash tree to donate to the Government, furlough will have to end in its current form.

So you’d rather a depression to a recession OP?

Also for someone who struggled all through lock down as I'm a key worker whilst still doing my job at home so in a new way of working and trying to get my head round that whilst trying to complete child care and then listening to my neighbours having a "holiday" in their garden whilst doing up their house and having endless bbqs and drinking most nights and on almost full pay for doing nothing, then that's annoying to us key workers that have struggled on and then receive no thanks for it. We can't sustain it sorry op you may not agree with my opinion but just wanted to highlight the other type of worker during the covid pandemic not just the furloughed x

It's a hard one. I am definitely not in favour of an extended furlough, it's cost an absolute fortune already. But it's bloody harsh on those effectively having unemployment imposed on them due to the restrictions.

No it is unsustainable and we will be paying for it for decades as it is.

It isn’t saving jobs either, it is just delaying the loss. So we end up with mass unemployment anyway plus mountains of debt to pay off.

@sarahc336

Because tax payers can't keep paying for it simple

Given that the taxpayers have already spent enough on Brexit to own an international space station, it seems there's plenty they can pay for.

No we cannot afford it

How long do we fund businesses that are going to go bankrupt anyway? Yes it's shit but the fact is these people are going to lose their jobs anyway. It's just delaying the inevitable.

It's just delayed the inevitable at the tax payers expense.

Jobs will have to go - the whole house of cards has collapsed and thanks to a thoughtless and selfish minority even more will now be lost.

Tax payers have paid for PPE contracts that produced nothing, testing and tracing that is ineffectual, an app that never even materialised, the utter shitshow that is Brexit, and HS2 which has zero economic benefit. If people are saying we can't afford furlough, I trust they're up in arms about the aforementioned?

It is complex though I vaguely recall HMT's rationale for ending it was that employees in jobs that had in reality ended would be better gaining employment with viable employers/sectors. Easier said than done and there may be an argument for extended, sector-specific end dates to maintain viable firms and employment in sectors that would be viable in the medium term - travel, aerospace, some hospitality, professional sport, entertainment and creative industries and so on?

Everyone saying we can't afford furlough - what do we do about the smaller economy due to businesses folding left right & centre and the enormously increased pressure on benefit budgets and the NHS' mental health service?

If those jobs no longer exist, people will simply have no jobs and no way of getting one. What do we then do, let them starve? I don't mean that hyperbolically - I'm just not sure what we do if not increase borrowing to support people for long term social and economic health, if the other option is to allow thousands of people to go onto UC, which will not sustain their private rents (which are generally unaffordable as e.g. single people or even, in many cases, as two people on UC) or mortgages, when social housing waits are already years in some areas?

Do we rely on the pressure pushing rents down? Because that will destabilise landlords, and still happen far too slowly for some people. Swathes of people will find themselves needing to move to cheaper areas, uprooting families and changing jobs.

Because it isn't necessary and is being used by businesses to cut costs when there is work to be done and staff could be in work.

An alternative scheme to support industries that still can't operate I would definitely support but we can't keep paying salaries as we have been.

and thanks to a thoughtless and selfish minority

That's one way to describe the cabinet!

It's a nice idea OP, but I don't think the chancellor has even worked out how to pay for the current furlough costs. I can't see how it can be extended.