god don't get me started
but yes, in a nutshell, you should get nothing for doing nothing, and given help if you work hard but don't earn much. there is a huge difference between people who want to work and are struggling to find something, and people who have never worked a day in their lives! unfortunately we have a few too many of the latter, abusing the system for everyone else.

also, i think the student rioting could be solved quite simply. if your grades are above a certain level, your fees get paid. if your grades are below that level, you pay your own way if you want to go to university - it's a privilege, not a right. if you fucked around and screwed up your a-levels, you were old enough at 17/18 to know better, you made your own decision to fuck around. more harshly, i suppose, if you worked hard but still got poor grades, then query whether university is really the right place for you anyway.
( rachelswipe with a fork, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:41, 5 replies, latest was 15 years ago)

How about people who are out of work altogether?

( Kroney, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:42, Reply)

death

( Vipros. clever got me this far, then tricky got me in, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:43, Reply)

By firing squad
for daring to be unlucky in work.
( Kroney, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:44, Reply)

on the plus side
they could always volunteer to join the firing squads
( Vipros. clever got me this far, then tricky got me in, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:44, Reply)

Yeah, I mean, the murder gets to me a bit but, you know, it's paying the bills, a job's a job.

( Noeli overtheshoulderboulderholderthingstraplatchboobs, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:48, Reply)

depends why
if they have been out of work for ages, are trying really hard but getting nowhere, fine. if they have just never bothered, like my friend's cousins who at 25, 23 and 21 have all been on the dole and the DHS since they were 18 (one has 4 children. FOUR), then i'd not give them a penny until they did something worthwhile for it.
( rachelswipe with a fork, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:43, Reply)

does worthwhile including killing themselves?

( Vipros. clever got me this far, then tricky got me in, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:44, Reply)

that's for a case by case assessment
yes if they are ugly
( rachelswipe with a fork, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:46, Reply)

Then we are agreed
Debate is fun!
( Kroney, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:44, Reply)

What if they don't have an education Swipey?
What if they have been deemed unemployable because the education system has let them down, they weren't given the support they needed at the time, all the FE colleges were criminally underfunded and there are no apprenticeships anymore?
What if, and this it the most important point, there are a completely insufficent number of fucking jobs out there for all the unemployed people?
(Bazongaloid, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:46, Reply)

fine in theory and on an individual basis
but the problem is that the country simply can't afford to support too many people. it will run out of money. esp as those who are paying taxes at higher rates will get fed up and take their skills elsewhere.

i don't know what the solution is, but for a start, someone needs to din it into the heads of the little shits who don't appreciate what an amazing gift our education system is that education is one of the most important things they will ever have! it's not cool to get shit grades, it's not cool to skip school, it's not cool to sign on your whole life long and for your kids to do the same.
( rachelswipe with a fork, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:50, Reply)

that's why a system of murder and groin-punching
is the only workable solution
( Vipros. clever got me this far, then tricky got me in, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:56, Reply)

it does make sense
i'm in
( rachelswipe with a fork, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:59, Reply)

But swipey
We don't have any jobs for people who don't have an education, and the reason everyone is being forced into university is because there is no vocational alternative.

It's typical Tory dogma, cut everything as you should be able to support yourself. Now, if you already have an education, then yes, you probably can support yourself, but you can't just switch from having a government supported populace to having a self supporting populace in a year.

If you want people to get a job, there have to be jobs for them to get, and there simply aren't. If you want people with no education to get jobs when they eventually are created, you have to educate them. It's not a difficult concept.
(Bazongaloid, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:59, Reply)

the problem with this, like all liberal arguments
is that it assumes everybody is happy to be educated and to work at the end of it. and the problem is... that a lot of people aren't!

so a system which is designed to help people in need gets raped, and you end up with a minority supporting the majority, and getting pretty pissed off with it.
( rachelswipe with a fork, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 12:09, Reply)

It's this attitude that a "minority" are supporting the majority, they aren't. Most people in this country are in work, and if they are in work they are paying taxes which support all teh things we like to have like roads and education and healthcare.

You argue that I'm assuming that everyone is happy to be educated and that actually most people aren't, but that's also clearly an exaggeration.

The education system is in need of help, but the solution is not to suddenly punish people for not helping themselves, at the moment they have no choice, you have to give people an opportunity to help themselves before you can start cracking down on people who really don't want to help themselves.
(Bazongaloid, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 12:16, Reply)

fine
but they've had since ww2 when the benefits system was introduced.

it isn't ever going to work as you say, and as it should do, is it?!
( rachelswipe with a fork, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 12:23, Reply)

That's a stupidly spurious comment from you Swipey
Lots of people used to have manual jobs, but, thanks to the complete destruction of manufacturing in this country, those people had their lives destroyed and were either put on benefits or signed off "sick".

There is no short term fix to this problem, but the Tories aren't trying to fix it, they are just using the world wide economic crisis as an excuse for giving "the poor" a good kicking.
(Bazongaloid, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 12:30, Reply)

If Labour had an ounce of sense, they would have cut back on benefits as well.
The country owes 4.3 trillion pounds. At the same time, you can claim housing benefit even if you do actually have a job. Not a menial job either, a decent one. Councils are having to buy huge houses to home people in because the law requires that each child has its own bedroom.

The benefits system needs to be in place. The benefits system we currently have is too open to abuse in a manner we can no longer afford as a country.
( Kroney, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 12:39, Reply)

a scholarship type arrangement?
not a terrible idea.
( Vipros. clever got me this far, then tricky got me in, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:43, Reply)

it might make people actually do some work
if my dad had been told that the council paid my fees if i got certain grades, but he had to pay them if i got below them, would he have paid for me to go to uni if i pissed around for 2 years and ploughed my exams? er. no. he'd have kicked my arse straight into the nearest mcjob. this would have made damn sure i worked in the first place.

a-levels are not hard. if you can't get decent grades, you shouldn't be getting a degree at the taxpayer's expense, and then probably not getting a job at the end of it anyway!
( rachelswipe with a fork, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:45, Reply)

makes sense to me

( Vipros. clever got me this far, then tricky got me in, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:48, Reply)

My sources could be dodgy on this one
(partly because I can't remember what they were) but I *think*, if you look at it nationwide, the vast majority of people claiming benefits are in employment or looking for it, and it's just a few cases (or indeed, a few communities) which are cited in the press where people or families don't work at all. Obviously it's less interesting to write an article on a person who makes fair use of the benefit system, so people's perception of the balance is skewed.

Having said that, I agree with your point - it's there to help, not to be a way of life.
(LongJohnBaldry, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:45, Reply)

This is the critical point isn't it
the papers will always through up an example of some worthless twat milking the system, but you don't make policy based on tiny exceptions to the general rule, unless you are in fact making policy based entirely on political dogma and not based on any form of evidence.
(Bazongaloid, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:47, Reply)

This is why I have a gut scepticism
Aspects like this do have a ring of pandering to scandal to win public support, and it seems to smell of a typical Tory approach of cutting back on benefits and public service, just this time it's hidden behind the supposedly benevolent mask of "fixing the country's deficit."
(LongJohnBaldry, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:50, Reply)

Problem with 2nd point:
Favours the public school demographic who typically get better tuition and are notoriously 'trained to pass' A-level exams. And even if they do fuck up, Daddy can probably afford their fees anyway.
(LongJohnBaldry, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:47, Reply)

hmm a good counter-point
I propose we solve it by punching everyone at public school in the genitals.
( Vipros. clever got me this far, then tricky got me in, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:49, Reply)

Motion carries

( Labia Majora You keep on talking but it makes no sense at all, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:51, Reply)

hoorah!!!
now come on, if i can see this, why the hell can't the government and the NUS see it?!

if you get CCC or above, you get it paid for.

if you get anything less, you pay your own fees.

job done!
( rachelswipe with a fork, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:52, Reply)

Having had to teach some of the cunts
I would have happily introduced their genitals to the carbon-arc lamp they were taught to use. Some of them would probably be too concerned with their next rugger game or shitting in their mate's Guinness to have questioned such instructions.

(Disclaimer: some of them were perfectly nice people. Sadly they probably spent their years at boarding school being kicked around the dorms by the bigger lads.)
(LongJohnBaldry, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:52, Reply)

true
but come on, everything in life favours the public school demographic - nice clothes, holidays, driving lessons... the lottery of life isn't fair that way! there's always going to be one generation that has to work to make the money, and if your parents haven't done it, it will have to be you. eg i look at my cousins and i realise how lucky i am that it was my dad who grafted his arse off to make his cash - he was made to leave school at 16 because his parents couldn't pay the rent without him contributing.
( rachelswipe with a fork, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 11:59, Reply)

we don't actually have that many people doing the latter,
that is a myth.
( Sir Sand GOBLIN ^popular page dis, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 12:14, Reply)

although obviously a few do.
what you have to remember is that there have been enormous job losses, there simply aren't as many jobs as there used to be.
( Sir Sand GOBLIN ^popular page dis, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 12:16, Reply)

this may be to do with the size of the public sector,
though i am not sure.
( Sir Sand GOBLIN ^popular page dis, Fri 12 Nov 2010, 12:17, Reply)