Westministenders: One for the Women

[RedToothBrush]

Just remember that women are more likely to be worried about Brexit.

Their women's and workers rights are more at risk from departure from the EU, the ECJ and potentially the EHCR.
They are more likely to be worried as EU citizens in the UK due to taking time to have and raise families.
They are more likely to have been badly affected by austerity and an economic downturn will hit them first.
If they are leavers they are more likely to have changed their minds.
They are less likely to be MPs so have less representation.
They are more likely to be feeling politically unrepresented by any party and unsure of who they will vote for at the next election.
They are more likely to get abuse for expressing a political opinion. Many report having been subjected to sexual harassment from political colleagues.
They are more likely to be the target of abuse on social media.
They are earn less than their political colleagues, they earn less than their media colleagues, they earn less than their business colleagues. They are less likely to be in powerful lobby groups.

Then there's #metoo

And to cap it off women's groups are finding it hard to get their voice heard, and are frequently being labelled as hysterical or bigoted for merely wanting to discuss things and be reassured that their fears are acknowledged. They are frequently dismissed as liars or over sensitive.

This is 2018.

It doesn't feel progressive. It doesn't look equal.

Brexit has more of an impact on women.

Sos It's a bit like childcare: it's a lot to pay but not a lot to earn. It needs recognising as an essential and to cease to be seen as some kind of 'individualist' thing. Then it needs massive subsidising - not least at the level of workers' wages. Sadly, like childcare, that ship has sailed. I see no way that is going to happen in the current climate.

The impact of this is going to be huge. Really huge. I've wimbled on about it on MN for years now and I'm too tired (I genuinely feel a bit 'broken by Brexit' today ) to pull apart all the ramifications.

Anyway, long and short of it is that the very, very last thing we needed was to cut down on non-UK care workers.

Anyway, long and short of it is that the very, very last thing we needed was to cut down on non-UK care workers

remember the Brexiteer claim that we needed to be fairer to non-EU workers ? Don't worry if you can't. Neither can they.

Last week I was unable to take my dd to work and pick her up. She had started a new job in a senior position in a residential home and had to get in because she was the only one on duty qualified to give out the medications for 36 people. She managed to get taxis for 5 days at a cost of £15 each way which obviously she could not afford but had to pay. On the 6th day my neighbour helped me dig out my car ( I am disabled) and I took her to work and picked her up 12 hours later. Without me she cannot work as its too far to bike and no public transport. It costs me money almost every day for her to work. Being a single parent and rent over £550 for a 2 up 2 down and bathroom, the whole house riddled with damp ( she has to pay all her rent) she cannot afford to give me petrol of which I use about £40-£50 a week. So what a situation, I go without, on benefits myself to help my dd on minimum wage go to work. Now you see why I go on about things being relative.

Those poor brexshiteers stuck with their head in the empirical past. Always a shock to discover the kid you bullied all through primary went on to become one of the seniors sports team players and now has bigger friends with won't let you get away with it anymore.

My situation and my dds is not due to brexit, its due to a conservative government. And no doubt I agree it will definitely get worse.

That must be tough Sos. I can't see anything will change as long as we have the low tax, low investment in services, pro austerity approach. Meanwhile the carers and service users suffer.

Sostenueto That's my sister. There are points where it costs her money to work, and when she can't pay her bills/buy food without the family chipping in.

The 'it's all relative' thing is - kind of - true. I'm painfully aware that Brexit is going to hit her harder than a lot of other people. Her employment conditions will be driven down, food costs rising will hit her harder, other costs will hit her harder. She needs to use the NHS herself - she's been waiting for treatment for a condition and has finally been seen after months of waiting - all of that is only going to get worse as money dries up post-Brexit. God knows how she'll manage if/when payment for some services is introduced.

But it's also going to impact horrendously on people who are not as badly off as her. It's hard to think of anyone but the vey comfortably off who aren't going to suffer as the NHS shrinks. And rising prices for food and other essential services are going to drag a vast number of people down to a very precarious existence.

I'm baffled as to why people are going along with this. You might - just - tolerate it for yourself, if it was part of some great project that, ultimately, is going to make it better for the many. But it isn;t a great project that is going to benefit the may. it's going to make life really grim for most of us until it's reversed and - most importantly of all - it's going to make the lives of most people's children incredibly hard.

I don't get why people would vote to make their children really, actually suffer.

Your daughter, like my sister, is going to really struggle to buy food and pay bills. Realistically, they're both going to have to go without. Whilst working harder.

I really don't understand why people have voted to do this to them. And -
ultimately - to themselves and their children. Do you?

Wifeofdarth it can get to the point where I wish I'd just expire with all the worry. Also I contribute to my dgds train ticket to school which has now gone up because she's 16. She goes to school 37 miles away because every single high school in town (4) are on special measures and my dgd is a high achiever and luckily we are Catholic and she goes to our diocese high school and is an outstanding school. Cost of ticket is now £180 a month. But we go without ( literally) to give her a chance of a better life. But as my health deteriptes I wonder how they will both manage without me. Sorry bit if self pity crept in. I'll shut up now.

I have come against really shocking adult social care (or lack of care) for both my parents before they died. All due to inadequate funding. Fortunately I was in a position to help them but it was not easy, and many are not so lucky.

The extent of the failure to help one of them in particular was of the scale of unbelievable. It's a very long story.

But that was before the referendum, when we were the 5th richest country.

As we plummet down the rankings on this self destructive path I imagine adult social care will become non existent.

Sorry for the typos.

I think if brexit could be turned around would I really be better off? That question haunts me because I believe, until we get a real caring, responsible and good government it will not. Brexit or not.

Sorry for typos too.

I have a small problem with posting on here. I think most of us made a promise to tell the truth - there have been so many lies around Brexit, it almost becomes an extra moral duty to resist that simply by insisting on truth-telling. However, there is a real problem about telling the truth about Brexit, in that it is probably, OK, almost certainly, going to impact hardest on those who are already vulnerable.

I need to post here just to keep myself sane. But even I have to pull back, sometimes, from thinking about the implications of what people have voted for.

It worries me, it sometimes fills me with fear, and at other times it makes me unbearably angry that people voted for this.

I'm not in the privileged position where Brexit will not impact on myself and my family. It will. And there isn't much I can do to protect my children from the reduced life-chances they will have because of it. I do feel very angry.

If services are discussed in the future fta, it ain't gonna be like now. Tusk mentions financial services (EU27 and UK) are going to be different after Brexit. May and Hammond are doing the opposite of managing people's expectations. They make it sound like it is going to be eyeballing at the ok corral, in the slowest motion possible.

tvnewsroom.consilium.europa.eu/video/president-tusk-meets-the-taoiseach-of-ireland-highlights-1a048

Sostenueto I think, without a doubt, if you imagine 2 paths - one where we pursue Brexit, one where we don't - the path where Brexit is reversed is one in which your daughter will find it less of a struggle to buy food, clothing, and pay bills. I think it is that blunt.

If brexit goes down the way JRM and Minford etc want then thats the NHS and social care gone. Not a worsening decline that could be turned around but a complete dead duck. It infuriates me that there are people out there that would sacrifice them to line their pockets. Snake oil salesmen, nothing more.

The way I see it is that if we go ahead with Brexit we will be stuck like this forever - revenues will be so tight that everyone's quality of life will be negatively impacted for the foreseeable future.
If we reverse Brexit we just have to put up with these conditions until we can vote in a more compassionate and capable government.

thecatfromjapan
I regard these threads as a method of stopping me yelling at colleagues in real life.
I have to spend half a day soon in a room full of no deal Brexiters
I HAVE to keep my temper.

I cannot talk to my daughter - the topic makes her incredibly angry.
I cannot say much to my son - his driving is improving, I do not want him taking aim at Brexiter OAPs
I can talk to DH, but we are our own little echo chamber.

As I say at work I'd love to be proved wrong but fear I will not

remember the Brexiteer claim that we needed to be fairer to non-EU workers ? Don't worry if you can't. Neither can they.

No, honestly - lots still use this. It's one of their stock arguments along with the EU being protectionist.

If you fancy a really good shout have a listen to LBC radio. I can't anymore as I had to throw the radio out of the window.

James Melville
@JamesMelville
Imagine the Brexiter outrage if Remain had won with 52%, and then Remainers wanted a Hard Remain with EU superstate integration, Schengen, Euro currency, EU army - while paying £50 billion to obtain this.

[this plays to the idea that any of the above were actual possibilities, which might be counterproductive, but hopefully the point won’t get lost on this theead]

www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/08/customs-checks-will-cause-huge-tailbacks-warns-calais-port-boss

Port of Calais boss very worried. Aren't we all?

Just flicking at the news .....
I know I keep going on about Dover but its a MASSIVE issue that folks just do not want to absorb
www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/08/customs-checks-will-cause-huge-tailbacks-warns-calais-port-boss

SNAP !!!!

That reminds me to thank Red for her prescience and service to the community in starting these threads. And keeping them going.

I think if brexit could be turned around would I really be better off? That question haunts me because I believe, until we get a real caring, responsible and good government it will not. Brexit or not.

The trouble is is that it doesn't matter how caring and responsible the people running the country are post brexit - there will be no money to implement all the things that need to be done to end austerity and turn things around for normal people. There will be no chance of things improving for decades to come, regardless of how compassionate the people at the top are.

If we stop brexit - we can get rid of this shit shower and start improving things by 2022 at the very latest. And if they still somehow manage to cling onto power -there's always 2027. But brexit is forever.
There is no excuse for fatalism about brexit when you look at it that way.

I get that life is really hard for lots of people - that they just don't have enough to make ends meet and they get penalised in the most stupid ways, and it's unbelievably depressing and scary and unfair. I understand that such people not only want but need actual change.
But Brexit was the worst change they could have possibly picked. They have opted to make themselves and the country poorer - which will inevitably squeeze the welfare state until it suffocates, and they have voted to remove their own workers rights, get rid of the court that would hold a rogue government to account and back individuals up on their rights, and handed absolute power to the evil bastards responsible for ideological austerity - and the ensuing deaths it caused - in the first place.

I do sympathise with people who find themselves in terrible straits because of the way this government have been running the country since 2010. But that doesn't stop me from being incredibly angry with any of them that voted leave - or didn't bother to vote - because they have chosen to make their lives much much worse - and they've done the same to mine in the process.