UK Politics: Tory Closing Down Sale- Everything Must Go

[Derfel Cadarn]

1 hour ago, mormont said:

On what basis?

It's not the position of anyone who's commented here. Everyone wants pay and conditions to be better, including most of the people in those surveys. They agree that care work should be respected more - even while saying that they, personally, don't want to do it.

A parallel can be drawn with apprenticeships. Everyone agrees we desperately need more of those, and that they lead to work that is essential and respected. But nobody wants their own children to do an apprenticeship instead of going to university, even people who think there are too many kids doing the latter and not enough doing the former. There's things people are in favour of, and things they personally are prepared to do, and the two are not the same.

You're advocating here for higher pay for care work and so on - but would you change careers and be a nurse if it was? Not looking for an actual answer, but just saying that of those reading this thread, not many would say yes. I wouldn't. Some of my best friends are nurses, and I respect what they do enormously, but I wouldn't want to do it, even if it paid more than I get now.

I woukd disagree with the bolded. I worked with several colleagues with teenaged kids leaving or preparing to leave school, and they were more in favour of their kids grtting an apprenticeship than in doing a degree for the sake of doingg a degree.

Had they a career path in mind that would have required a degree, that woukd have been different, but such wasn’t the case

[Kalbear]

1 hour ago, Heartofice said:

On that there being so many people claiming to not be able to work due to depression all of a sudden sounds a little fishy for one.

Maybe you missed it, but there was a massive pandemic recently that killed a whole lot of people and disabled a whole lot more. Furthermore, caregivers have reported massive amounts of trauma from their time during the pandemic. I don't know why it is surprising that an event that had casualties on par with world wars would cause some changes to the workforce.

1 hour ago, Heartofice said:

You aren't saying it out loud, but essentially if you think this is a job that brits will never ever want to do because it's so bad, then you are seemingly fine with foreigners doing it out of desperation instead.

I would phrase it as doing it out of opportunity, not desperation. There are a lot of medical and caregiving professionals in other countries that do not have the same opportunities in their country, but do have the skills required. 

For British they have other opportunities to do jobs that have fewer massive problems and better work-life balance, or (as I said previously) they're finding that due to their life changes they are just not able to work.

 

[Heartofice]

12 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

would phrase it as doing it out of opportunity, not desperation. There are a lot of medical and caregiving professionals in other countries that do not have the same opportunities in their country, but do have the skills required. 

For British they have other opportunities to do jobs that have fewer massive problems and better work-life balance, or (as I said previously) they're finding that due to their life changes they are just not able to work.

Yeah you are just phrasing ‘taking advantage of people who will put up with a lot more just to stay in the UK’ a little differently. I’ll give you that. 

[Maltaran]

Rwanda is threatening to pull out of the asylum deal if the Tories break international law

https://x.com/paulbranditv/status/1732453413210730743?s=46&t=3wIxhpuHTnUCtnaT3tVBqQ

[Kalbear]

1 minute ago, Heartofice said:

Yeah you are just phrasing ‘taking advantage of people who will put up with a lot more just to stay in the UK’ a little differently. I’ll give you that. 

Well, the thing is that Britain isn't giving work visas out for working in grocery stores, right? But I'd think in general the idea of getting cheaper, skilled labor is the kind of immigration you would actually support, no? 

Or do you want only UK citizens to get jobs regardless of whether or not they want them? How much money are you willing to spend to ensure that you have zero immigration?

[Heartofice]

1 minute ago, Kalbear said:

But I'd think in general the idea of getting cheaper, skilled labor is the kind of immigration you would actually support,

Not really, not if ‘cheaper’ is achieved by underpaying and creating poor work conditions that would only be accepted by people who need VISAs.

And yes, it doesn’t make sense to import hundreds of thousands of workers into a country if there are a million people available to work. 

[Kalbear]

20 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

Not really, not if ‘cheaper’ is achieved by underpaying and creating poor work conditions that would only be accepted by people who need VISAs.

And yes, it doesn’t make sense to import hundreds of thousands of workers into a country if there are a million people available to work. 

But they're not available to work, at least not at the prices and values you are setting. Some may not be available to work at all any more. 

I'll put it another way then - if it is accurate that the shortages cannot be made up by people who are available to work, what is your proposal on how to fix it?

[Heartofice]

5 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

l put it another way then - if it is accurate that the shortages cannot be made up by people who are available to work, what is your proposal on how to fix it?

That the labour market is out of balance and employee expectations of wages and conditions are not being met by employers, and when those employers raise their wages and improve conditions, UK workers will accept those jobs. 
 

The other solution is accept that firms can under pay and maintain their workforce by going abroad to find more pliable workers. 

[Derfel Cadarn]

Jenrick’s quit as immigration minister. There were Tories warning earlier that this coukd lead to a flood of resignations and topple Sunak. 
 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67640833

Edited December 6, 2023 by Derfel Cadarn

[Kalbear]

21 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

That the labour market is out of balance and employee expectations of wages and conditions are not being met by employers, and when those employers raise their wages and improve conditions, UK workers will accept those jobs. 

That's not what I asked. I am asserting that you are incorrect and that a whole lot of people have left the workforce permanently - either because they died or because they are no longer able to work for a variety of reasons.

Based on that, what do you do to fill those positions? 

21 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

The other solution is accept that firms can under pay and maintain their workforce by going abroad to find more pliable workers. 

You might - just maybe - also be willing to accept that there is a demand for certain positions above the supply that can be given locally.

[Heartofice]

1 minute ago, Kalbear said:

That's not what I asked. I am asserting that you are incorrect and that a whole lot of people have left the workforce permanently - either because they died or because they are no longer able to work for a variety of reasons.

With the 1m unemployed people under 54 who are simply unemployed, see the bbc link I posted earlier.

 

2 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

You might - just maybe - also be willing to accept that there is a demand for certain positions above the supply that can be given locally.

I can, but since the main reason given for people not taking care work, or leaving care work, is due to pay and conditions I’d say there was plenty of flex left in the UK workforce to fill demand. 

[Kalbear]

Just now, Heartofice said:

With the 1m unemployed people under 54 who are simply unemployed, see the bbc link I posted earlier.

Again that's not the question I asked. I get that you don't want to answer the question because it would be the dreaded 'have to import people' answer and I appreciate the evasion. I'll just take that evasion as tacit approval of the plan to import more skilled workers from other places.

Just now, Heartofice said:

I can, but since the main reason given for people not taking care work, or leaving care work, is due to pay and conditions I’d say there was plenty of flex left in the UK workforce to fill demand. 

Maybe, but even with those who left there still would be a major shortage, especially since a whole bunch of other workers just got kicked out. 

[Heartofice]

17 minutes ago, Derfel Cadarn said:

Jenrick’s quit as immigration minister. There were Tories warning earlier that this coukd lead to a flood of resignations and topple Sunak. 
 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67640833

It would be insane to get another leadership contest.. so it will definitely happen.

[Heartofice]

1 minute ago, Kalbear said:

Again that's not the question I asked. I get that you don't want to answer the question because it would be the dreaded 'have to import people' answer and I appreciate the evasion. I'll just take that evasion as tacit approval of the plan to import more skilled workers from other places.

Maybe, but even with those who left there still would be a major shortage, especially since a whole bunch of other workers just got kicked out. 

Are we just talking about care workers or are you just moving the goalposts as usual?

[Kalbear]

Just now, Heartofice said:

Are we just talking about care workers or are you just moving the goalposts as usual?

I was just talking about care workers, but I guess it can apply to basically any field where you simply don't have the people who are willing or able to work in a field available. 

Mostly, I'm curious exactly how xenophobic you really are. How much would you spend to avoid getting foreigners into the UK? How big of a detriment to services would you be willing to accept? 

[Heartofice]

1 minute ago, Kalbear said:

I was just talking about care workers, but I guess it can apply to basically any field where you simply don't have the people who are willing or able to work in a field available. 

Well the point is, you bring in people to fill a skill shortage. Which is what the UK immigration system aims to do.

There is no skill shortage for carers, there is a shortage of people willing to be underpaid and taken advantage of. 

3 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Mostly, I'm curious exactly how xenophobic you really are. How much would you spend to avoid getting foreigners into the UK? How big of a detriment to services would you be willing to accept? 

Generally when you are losing a debate you just make a bad joke, must be really bad if you are jumping straight to insults. 

[Kalbear]

2 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

Well the point is, you bring in people to fill a skill shortage. Which is what the UK immigration system aims to do.

There is no skill shortage for carers, there is a shortage of people willing to be underpaid and taken advantage of. 

But there is a shortage. Again, even if you took every single caregiver that quit since the pandemic and coerced them to come back there still wouldn't be enough. This is going to only increase as more people are disabled and more people get older. 

So what do you do then? 

2 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

Generally when you are losing a debate you just make a bad joke, must be really bad if you are jumping straight to insults. 

Nah, I figured I had already won several posts ago when you continued to avoid answering direct questions. I already got the answer I wanted; I then wanted to see if I could double down a bit and see how much you'd be willing to dig your hole. 

[Liffguard]

I'll put my cards on the table, I'm explicitly a global open borders guy (hell, if you want to get right down to it, I'm a no borders guy). I'm anti-patriotism and anti-nationalist. I think drawing lines over the world and manning these lines with armed guards and checkpoints and saying that only people born on this side of the line have a right to live here, and putting hard limits on how many get to cross it (and stay only on sufferance) is fundamentally unjust.

I have zero problem with immigration, is what I'm saying.

However I'm deeply uncomfrotable with the argument that immigration is good because it's a source of cheap foreign labour. A lot of essential labour that's primarily being done by immigrants is deeply exploitative, and those sectors need to be reformed rather than continue to rely on people who are easy to exploit.

On the other hand, I'm also somewhat suspicious about the argument that there's a pool of local workers able to step up and take those jobs themselves. Labour isn't fungible, different people have different abilities and needs and you can't just compare numbers of jobs against number of people without jobs. Take fruit picking for example, I'm sceptical that you'd get many local workers even if you drastically increased pay and improved conditions, because most people need a steady paycheck and want to live in population centres where there are things to do.

On the other other hand, that still leaves the basic conundrum that certain sectors are only economically viable at all because poorer people from poorer areas of the world are willing to do work here that we ourselves aren't willing (or, to be fair, possibly able) to do. Even if you improve pay and conditions, that's still ultimately an exploitative relationship (albeit less so).

I suppose my preferred solution would be to address both. Improve pay and conditions - drastically increase minimum wage, improve labour laws, publically invest in training and development - and also keep an open immigration policy.

If local people are able but unwilling to do the work under current conditions, then improving those conditions such that they're willing to do the work means that there's more labour competition, and therefore less incentive for other people to move here*. Alternatively, if local people simply aren't willing to do that work at any price, then we need other people to move here one way or another. And if we're going to rely on their labour, it's only just that they're paid and treated better.

 

* Not that I necessarily want less people to move here, but it does address the argument of "wouldn't unsustainable numbers of people move here to take advantage of the extra pay?"