For all those who support the strikes

[chopc]

Where do you think the money will come from for all the pay rises? Are you personally willing to pay more tax?
We all saw during the pandemic it is the poorly paid essential workers that kept the country going and they totally deserve more money than the claps they got. However will YOU be prepared to contribute to the pot ?

If not where do you think the govn will find more money from?

Well maybe if the tories didn't hand out all the money to Michelle Mone or waste it during the mini budget fiasco we would have money. Also there always seems to be money for their cronies and friends but never for us poor public peasants

I can’t really afford to pay more tax at the moment. After I pay my fixed bills (like mortgage and childcare), I have very little left. In theory, I would be ok paying more but only if the big corporations with all the money paid their fair share first.

@mimi0708 exactly
I wish more people would see this

Agency staff nurses being paid £300 per shift. Just imagine what the NHS pays the agency.
So isn’t it better to pay the nurses a better wage in the first place , rather than pay the private sector double ?

The Tories don’t have a track record of listening to unions though, I’d imagine they’ll let the strikes go on so the NHS is broken up and contracted to the private sector.

Surely people can see what the conservatives are doing? It’s an ideology. Market competition, their mates get contracts. They tried to do it with prisons, only many failed.

The Tories want strikes, they can blame the public sector for failing the NHS , then bring out their privatisation plans.
Anyone think I’m right to think this ?

Somethings got to happen with nhs who knows privatisation of some of it might not be a bad thing
there's been escalating problems for decades under various parties
the way it’s run us a shambles
but they dismiss this and hide behind funding
there’s a live thread on here most posters work for nhs shocking examples of waste
prople are totally brainwashed into thinking it’s purely about funding
new government throw money at it and it’s sorted
it won’t there are many problems as well as funding without sorting them as well you might as well set fire to the extra funding

There just isn’t more money, can’t get back which was already spent (and one off payments or tax hits won’t sustain increased pay year after year.

the thing is all professions are seeing mass exodus of staff. No salaries have kept pace with inflation. Everyone is having to get used to a different standard of living. Nurses are paid more than the median wage. Train drivers a lot more. There’s a lot of people in the public, private and third sectors paid a lot less but can’t strike. Previously well paid professions are now fair to middling.

most can’t afford more taxes, the government haven’t got the funds to pay out extra without extra income.

random statements about closing tax loopholes, use the billons paid for x, tax y more are pie in the sky blaming of others usually with no back up.

when it comes down to it. The demanded pay rises just aren’t feasible. There are a small amount of very rich people, there !always will be.

The only people who can't strike are the police and the armed forces, technically anyone else can, if people volunteer to be union reps I'm sure they can find out more. I know people will be offended by this but some jobs are more important to society than others. Without nurses people die or have a much lesser quality of life. You can't replace nurses easily as it requires a degree, even if they abolished that there would be a level of competence and experience required to be safe within the role. Many other staff could be replaced if need be that's the sad truth. Areas that are struggling are those industries where cheap labour has previously been exploited, but for stuff like food retail the companies would find the money if they needed to, they turn huge profits.

Again this isn't about peoples worth as people, but some jobs are more valuable.

There just isn’t more money, can’t get back which was already spent (and one off payments or tax hits won’t sustain increased pay year after year.

yet there is the millions paid to the share holders and the billions that the likes of shell are making.

www.opendemocracy.net/en/firstgroup-abellio-rail-strikes-rmt-shareholders-payout/

5 million in salary and £500 million to shareholders, then ask workers to take a wages cut.

shell had profits of $9.5 billion for the 3rd quarter of 2022

actually paying tax would be a start, we all know the longstanding zero tax payments of very wealthy companies, that could be changed but its choosen not to do so

I’m not saying they are wrong or right but I’m amazed that border force can strike. The police obviously can’t.

We’ve also got lots of people who’ve took early retirement and Brexit, which has helped escalate the labour shortage.

I also agree that just throwing money at the NHS doesn’t solve the problems either.
They have tried that model for decades and look where we’re at.
Just giving the NHS a few billion a year isn’t going to help. It needs a massive overhaul and get rid of lots of management roles.

As a firefighters wife, you can bet your ass I am more than willing to contribute.

@Catlady2021 I asked my DD that despite all the multitude of cock up and poor service she sees most days ... "what is the one think that would make the place run more smoothly?"

She replied "More staff and more management"

When i talk to her, the over whelming impression is lack of oversight and control.. well meaning people all operating in their bubbles and no one in overall charge.

Medics cannot do it all and any good organisation i ve worked worked for has had excellent management... there is also a huge demand for communication.. with both patients and family... So...
'Should medically trained staff be doing this?

my DD can often spend 30 or 40 minutes on the phone several times a day talking through care options with family members... most of whom will be highly critical (and get very angry) of what the NHS can offer whilst living 100s of miles away or in some case, live abroad.
Half the time she is doing a management role and not a caring one.

Sorry but imho the NHS needs a management overhaul, more of them/change in roles and much more long term and thoughtful funding.

...and stop this "we will give the the nhs 2billion this winter to do x y or z rubbish" which then gets wasted.

However, the NHS .... even under these conditions makes real positive differences to peoples lives each and every day and this shouldn't be forgotten either.

In theory if the services were properly funded then fewer staff would leave to join these private agencies. The NHS is then forced to pay exorbitant rates to these agencies in order to meet minimum safe staffing levels.

Better working conditions for staff, improved retention and reduce sickness levels - will give better quality service (staff not exhausted with overlode/pressure to work OT), no more headlines about paying some private agency x thousand pounds to cover a single nursing or doctor shift.

That is EXACTLY what they want.

And not just in the NHS.

I haven’t read the whole thread because it’s massive but, yes, I would take a modest tax increase. I’d also like to see a much bigger tax increase on the super rich and big business. Plus I’d like the tortes to stop giving massive contracts to their chums. These things would help. The inequality in this country is scandalous and I’d like a government to tackle these things, at the same time as funding a decent NHS and education system. I would pay a little more of my (teachers) salary to do so but I’d expect others to pay or economise too.

I'm sorry, I haven't read the whole thread but.....

How much do the NHS pay nurses compared to how much they pay agency nurses (not forgetting the fee that the agency take)?

How much do the NHS pay NHS junior doctors compared to how much they pay agency doctors (again, not forgetting the fee that the agency take)?

If they paid their in house staff enough in the first place, then they wouldn't have to pay three times as much to an agency.

Sort that out and then see how much of a defecit we have.....

A good NHS and education system helps us to have a strong economy. The number of people of working age on long term sickness has soared. How does that help anyone?

Im n NHS Paramedic, if I switched to private then my hourly wage would double but I'd lose job security, training opportunities, holiday/sickness pay. But the shortage of staff through poor retention mostly since we've got strong recruitment means that loads of agency staff are employed long term, the agencies must be making an absolute fortune from the NHS!

A 1% annual wealth tax on assets above 4 million - closing tax loopholes for billionaires - our tax evasion and avoidance hole is far bigger than the national debt or the asks of the workers on strike

Theres loads on money in this country it’s just concentrated in a few hanfs

Tory policy is to underfund public services and claim they are inefficient. Nobody ever created efficiency by simply starving an organisation of cash and telling people to do more with less, because the result is always the same - getting rid of people and expecting the same workload to be achieved with the same crappy infrastructure, zero investment, and far fewer, more stressed, harassed people with no energy, money or time resources whatsoever left over to think how to work more efficiently. The Tories have systematically destroyed systems and procedures and filled in the blanks with exactly the chaos you expect from the rudderless ship of an incompetently governed, poor country. Yes, I would like to pay more tax - to a government that believes in public service as a concept, not one that believes greed is good.

The inequality in this country is shameful. People are freezing in their homes and can’t afford to eat whilst billionaires get even more billions.
The rich are getting richer and it’s us mugs paying the price for it.
Ive listened to what Mick Lynch has been saying not just about the railway’s but also wider society and how unfair it is.

If we’re not careful we’re all going to be working for Amazon on zero hour contracts with no employment benefits.

And where is Labour ? Why aren’t they doing more in opposition?

Also worth pointing out that the Tories want to change the law every time something doesn’t go their way- including strike laws.

What do you want Labour to do?