That'll learn ya
The coverage of the worst financial disaster since the last one has gotten my blood boiling. This cross-representation of society Sky News just loves representing 24 hours a day wouldn't know a salmon en croute from a fish pie, and the lament on their faces as the math concludes they might need to take responsibility for their actions is the only thing making me get up in the morning.

Here's a regurgitation of comments I've had from people over the last few months:

I've gotten to the point where I don't know if I can keep up with the heating bills

If you are one of the few people in society who legitimately needs the heating on 12 hours a day, the Government gives you a benefit for that on top of your pension payments. Put on a jumper and get a duvet. Don't spend an extra few quid a day popping up the air temperature a degree or two because you want to wear a skirt and tank top indoors.

I've had to cut down from 20 a day and can't afford to go to the pub anymore

People aren't supposed to afford to smoke and drink freely. That's why it's called a luxury. When you get to the point where this becomes a priority in your life above all else, you've got a dependancy under your belt. Maybe the 20 quid a week you burn away can be spent paying off things you need, like food, water, or caring for your children?

Of course, we've had to cancel our winter holiday now

Being a chirpish 21 years old, I probably can't take the 'when I was your age' approach too easily, so I'll keep this quick. The Working Time Directive gives you a legal minimum of 5 weeks off a year. Soon that will be closer to 6. My parents have had a total of a fortnight off each in the last 3 years to keep a roof over their heads and used their own holidays to work second jobs elsewhere. I don't care how lovely the pistes are this time of year, you're being paid not to come into work and whine when you can't do what you want. It's like being given a piece of birthday cake and complaining that you don't like chocolate. It's still free cake and it's from someone else's pocket. Feel free to insult this country's courtesy, now fuck off.

FAO: Carol Vorderman

Oh no, a 90% pay cut from £1,000,000 to £100k for putting numbers on a board? Of course it was unmanagable. My heart bleeds for you.
(FoxyBadger (try saying it backwards), Thu 22 Jan 2009, 16:38, 4 replies)

Working Time directive?
What is this? I've never had 5 weeks holiday (assuming that would be 25 days). If this is so, then I must know more!
( gareth_alien will be human again at, Thu 22 Jan 2009, 16:49, closed)

Mostly, I agree
However, I don't agree with your winter holiday point.

Time off is neither a generous free gift from your employer, nor from the government. It is part of your remuneration package, like pension and NI contributions, interest free loans, subsidised canteens, and whatever else employers may use to entice candidates to work for them. As a worker, I have earned that time, as much as I have earned a salary.

It's commendable that your parents chose to work second jobs in their spare time (although possibly not that they made lifestyle choices that forced such action upon them), but it was still their own hard-earned spare time, not time given to them by their primary employer so that they can go off and work for someone else, like a secondment.

So, it's like buying a cake, and then being told you have to use it as a cushion, because eating it would be wasteful.
(Rastus P Watermelon, Thu 22 Jan 2009, 17:16, closed)

"Time off is neither a generous free gift from your employer, nor from the government. It is part of your remuneration package, like pension and NI contributions, interest free loans, subsidised canteens, and whatever else employers may use to entice candidates to work for them. As a worker, I have earned that time, as much as I have earned a salary."

We're in a recession; with fewer jobs going, and more people needing jobs, things are in favour of the employers when it comes to setting terms. If it weren't for those kind of regulations to set the bare minimum they have to offer, you could very well find yourself choosing between unemployment or 80 hour weeks at £2 an hour with no holiday entitlement, ala the Victorian era.

The kind of free market empowerment for the individual employee only works in the good economic times, when companies are growing and employers are all scrambling after a dwindling pool of available employees. For any other time, you need unions and the government regulation that the unions help to provide.

The only thing we can really debate on is whether a certain amount of paid holiday is something that every working person deserves as a simple matter of human standard of living in this country. Personally, I think it's something worthwhile.
(Musuko, Thu 22 Jan 2009, 17:22, closed)

I don't know if this makes sense. Tipsy and emotional.
"Good men don't need laws to tell them what to do. Evil men will find a way around those laws."

The working time directive is all well and good, but I've seen too many good people trodden down by greedy employers. It's good giving people the "right" to X days off, pro rata; but that's as useful as an image challenge winner if your managers simply won't authorise leave requests becasue they don't want to cover you on O/T.

And after a year of declined requests, the calendar resets, and you lose the balance of your untaken leave, no matter how entitled you are to it. Summer and Christmas are predictable for people who aren't morons, they happens most years; it is unreasonale to keep rolling out the same 'demand spike" defence every year. Try hiring temps for when it gets busy, like competent companies do.

Ok if I just sink into incoherence here? Bastards, the lot of them. HR condoned what was happening, even though they pretended to care. Fired, even though I was the only one without blame. Oh, you were only following an un-named and un-published "company policy"? Ah, the nuremberg defence - yeah, whatever helps you sleep at night.

And about the minimum wage +1% you paid - That is a minimum, Not A Target.
(The Incredible Sulk Finally remembered his password on, Thu 22 Jan 2009, 20:41, closed)