To think there are more people becoming poorer in the UK

[fullyfurnished]

I don't know if it's because I am and live in a working class area but I can see my area becoming more run down, loads more people on the streets, more crime, loads of people unemployed. I've been living in this area for over ten years and things are just going downhill. I know covid has resulted in alot of job losses but the slow decline has been gone on for awhile now.

Anyone else noticed this in their area?

Yes things are getting worse. The number of children on pupil premium at my dc school has really gone up.
Also we need to find a new place to live by the end of may. Baby due in summer too. It's not looking good. Nobody will rent to us .

Have you heard St Keir talk about the new Labour aims and strategies, policy initiatives and election manifestos,?

Me either!

Oh! Except maybe "I'm not like Boris Johnson" which doesn't instil much confidence. Defining yourself by an absence of something never does!

And then Labour policy will not be [list all the Tory errors here] - also definiton by a lack of something!

I can't get enthused. I was hoping he'd be the reason I decided to join the Party again. But no. He is as tiresome as a container full of Goodyears! I remain disaffected and politically homeless!

It’s been happening here for about 10 years.

Starmer is a complete and utter damp squib. A total let-down. He is given one opportunity after another to forensically tear this shambles of a government apart, but nope, just like Corbyn he smashes the ball over the bar of a wide-open gaping goal every single time.

@XDownwiththissortofthingX

Starmer is a complete and utter damp squib. A total let-down. He is given one opportunity after another to forensically tear this shambles of a government apart, but nope, just like Corbyn he smashes the ball over the bar of a wide-open gaping goal every single time.

Yep.

I can't believe that I am stil out in the cold.30+ years I was a member. I thought I'd send my card back with a pissed off letter, wait a few years, see the change in leadership and rejoin, with a "Thank fuck for that" letter.

Yet here I am, just over a year of St Starmer and..... nope!

@peak2021

Covid 19 has just speeded up what has been happening in the UK for at least 40 years.

This.

So many aren’t willing to save for things they want let alone a rainy day. We’ve also lost sight of what’s an essential and what isn’t I feel in many cases.

I don't think low interest rates and normalisation of debt via student loans helps there but mostly I think it the cost of living - high housing costs. Rents are high and house prices often need two good incomes to cover and while your saving for a depoist house prices continue to spiral up - it can feel like a moving target.

I also remember when money was tight for us the number of people who begrudged us anything even basic stuff and insisted our priorties were all wrong - they weren't just different and base on our needs and situation.

I should be a natural Labour voter but I'm very unimpressed.

I earn less than I did 20 years ago for a similar job. Except now I have 20 years of further experience. Still in London, no change there. My cost of living is very different though.
If only I was a member of the House of Lords and I could charge the taxpayer £3-5k per month for attendance. Or if I was a friend of a high ranking Tory, with links in manufacturing/to Chony, I could have made a killing with a government contract during the pandemic.

@CuriousaboutSamphire

I also remember he proposed ring fencing the NHS and education from cuts. But it didn't happen, did it? It was sleight of hand, sophistry!, a lie! As Cable said at the time, it just couldn't happen!

www.pulsetoday.co.uk/news/politics/chancellor-leaves-it-to-trusts-to-fill-25bn-budget-black-hole/

And I was in education at the time. That was all bollocks too!

It didn’t happen because they were voted out a matter of weeks after he said it. The level of austerity from 2010 onwards was ideological and is now widely discredited.

I live in a relatively affluent area, though it is somewhat "hidden wealth".
More shops boarded up. Dont know if they will be bought or stay boarded up. Do see some buildings, including high street hotel chains, not getting their buildings repainted, which surprised me.

Yes it is getting worse and will get a lot worse in time to come.

I am appalled living in a developed country we have people queuing for Food banks whilst big businesses sit on billions. Everything is so expensive.

The future is looking really quite bleak where we live in a student dominated city. Lots of empty but unaffordable properties, lots of shops closing and the jobs that went with them gone, lots of gig economy jobs. The gap between rich and poor keeps on getting wider and yet, for the moment, house prices are through the roof!

It didn’t happen because they were voted out a matter of weeks after he said it. The level of austerity from 2010 onwards was ideological and is now widely discredited. Yes! It was empty promises, as Vince Cable said at the time.

The level of austerity from 2010 onwards was ideological and is now widely discredited. You mean they were all morally bankrupt? No arguments from me

We agree at last @CuriousaboutSamphire!

@weekend2021

I think if this is the case, it is quite often due to bad life choices and wrong priorities by individuals. I appreciate that many fall upon hard times through no fault of their own, due to redundancy, poor health etc. But credit is too easily available to ‘help’ people live the ‘Instagram dream’ without thinking through the consequences. It appears that many have a sense of entitlement to the latest IPhone, hot tub (😱), financed cars, several holidays a year etc etc. IMHO anyway.

Do you actually, honestly believe this to be the case?

I work with people in poverty. They can account for every sorry pathetic penny they have. They can't afford to eat. Perhaps you should educate yourself rather than believe the shite on instagram?

I think a lot of this (not all) is due to the failure to deal with housing costs.

Housing is essential - it shouldn't be seen as an investment. It is ridiculous that households with two people working are struggling to get a foot on the property ladder when in the 70s that was easily manageable for one working person.

Multiple home ownership should be heavily taxed.

There's undoubtedly still far too much freely available personal credit in the UK, but it's not people living in penury and unable to fend for themselves who are eligible for it.

The problem again is one of unrealistic living standards. People in the UK want a big home, two cars, multiple holidays a year, AND absolutely perfect public services, but they refuse point blank to pay the taxes necessary to deliver the public part as it will impinge upon their personal pursuit of material things, so the state ends up borrowing to deliver a second rate service anyway, and folk can continue to blame the people who depend on these services for creating the need in the first place... probably while browsing yet another car they can't realistically afford but are willing to take on the never-never in any case.

@XDownwiththissortofthingX

There's undoubtedly still far too much freely available personal credit in the UK, but it's not people living in penury and unable to fend for themselves who are eligible for it.

The problem again is one of unrealistic living standards. People in the UK want a big home, two cars, multiple holidays a year, AND absolutely perfect public services, but they refuse point blank to pay the taxes necessary to deliver the public part as it will impinge upon their personal pursuit of material things, so the state ends up borrowing to deliver a second rate service anyway, and folk can continue to blame the people who depend on these services for creating the need in the first place... probably while browsing yet another car they can't realistically afford but are willing to take on the never-never in any case.

The politicians need to raise the taxes first - you can't really blame individuals for this.

I think a lot of this (not all) is due to the failure to deal with housing costs

House prices in the UK risen by 36% on average since 2008

Wages risen 0% in the same time.

What is driving this is the scourge of speculative landlordism. People buying up what used to be cheap or affordable housing, i.e. buy to rent, or sticking it on AirBnB, all properties which could have been someone's home.

Edinburgh has been utterly destroyed by AirBnB plague, and there are areas in the Highlands and Islands being completely depopulated of locals because the only people who can afford housing there are transplants and wealthy people buying up second homes.

Why AirBnB does not require a hoteliers licence is beyond me. It's nothing remotely close to what the original intent was.

The politicians need to raise the taxes first - you can't really blame individuals for this

Yes you can, because no politician in the UK is ever going to be electable on the back of proposing huge tax rises, and an erosion in 'aspirational' quality of life.

People get the politicians they deserve, in this sense at least.

The politicians need to raise the taxes first - you can't really blame individuals for this

Who votes for the politicians? This place was full of people saying they’d never vote for higher taxes just before the last election.

I disagree because you could increase the taxes of the very wealthiest without affecting the majority of the electorate.

@savvy7

I disagree because you could increase the taxes of the very wealthiest without affecting the majority of the electorate.

That wouldn’t raise enough. And it would hit all the Tory cronies.

@thebillyotea

In any case, anyone who thinks the cost if this pandemic is 'going to have to be paid for' is completely delusional. That's the line the Tories will feed in order to have the public passively accept yet another decade of ideologically-driven austerity and cuts, and yet again it'll will have no impact whatsoever on national debt, deficit, borrowing etc.

you do realise that it's not just the UK who has been victim of the pandemic, don't you..

So you can blame the Tories in this country, but who are you blaming for other parts of the world?

But you can bet that the likes of France and Germany will recover better and avoid making their poorest citizens suffer on the way. That happened after 2008 when despite even more problems (Eurozone) those countries treated less well off citizens so much better than the UK.

I don't think you can say it wouldn't raise enough! But I agree it would hit all the Tory cronies, which is why I think it isn't about individuals, it's about the political will to make the change.