PENSION RIGHTS! Tory Steal?

[nonjuror2003]

The Government remains embroiled in a row over public sector pensions after failing to win the endorsement of its final offer from the country's biggest teaching unions.
The executive of the NASUWT refused to sign up to the offer, saying it reserved the union's position and claiming that the Department for Education's (DfE) process of trying to reach a deal had been "completely unsatisfactory".
Meanwhile, the executive of the National Union of Teachers called for further "urgent discussions" with the Government on the future of teachers' pensions.
The moves followed a decision by Unite's health executive to reject the proposed deal for NHS workers, and a decision by the British Medical Association to survey around 130,000 doctors and medical students on the Government's final offer, raising the prospect of their first industrial action ballot for over 30 years.
Chris Keates, general secretary of the NASUWT, said: "Put bluntly, the NASUWT national executive has recognised that the process the DfE used to seek to reach agreement by its imposed deadline of December 20 was a debacle.
"Valuable time was wasted by the DfE. It failed to provide the necessary information on which meaningful discussions could take place, chopped and changed its mind on the issues which were up for discussion, and presented some potential changes which did not have Treasury approval."
Ms Keates claimed teaching unions were "pressurised and threatened" to sign up to a document last month when a final draft was not available.
The NUT said it remained concerned about proposed increases in employee contributions and pension ages, adding that increasing contributions at a time of real terms pay cuts will lead many teachers to opt out from pension provision.
General secretary Christine Blower said: "We remain committed to a negotiated agreement on pensions but these proposals will not, in our opinion, serve the interests of teachers or the education system. Michael Gove assured us in December that sufficient time and resources would be provided to secure a solution. The Government must face the fact that further discussions and additional funding are needed."
A Department for Education spokesman said: "The deal we set out before Christmas is a fair one for teachers and affordable for taxpayers. It means that teachers will still get a far better pension than the vast majority of people in this country - while we can keep long-term costs firmly under control."

[nonjuror2003]

The Conservative Coalition is doing no more than one expects! It is trying to reduce the working class to the state it was in just before the WWII. Why?, Because the Economic system throughout Europe is failing. It isn't certain that there will be a return to the 1930's, but it definitely a strong possibility and the master class wish to protect their interests. They are as a preliminary move trying to stem the tide of Welfare and subsidies! Not for the upper classes, who get plenty in terms of high wages and taxbreaks, but for the working and lower lasses middle classes! Why? Simply because they object to paying taxes for the welfare of other people's children and other peoples education! Why should we pay for people to be made well who smoke and drink and can't afford it? Forgetting that these working people who smoke and drink contribute to the upper classes's welfare by raising their profits. Who pay enormous taxes on drink and tobacco thus keeping the Government happy by subsidising their,( the Governments, ) fight to provide America with oil at third world expense!


The above article is taken from Yahoo News!

[fred]

Another legal challenge to the Governments 'mandatory work' schemes is going to be heard in the High Court.

In November we gave details of how many major high-street stores including Sainsbury, Argos, ASDA, Tesco, Poundland, Primark, were offering no pay, work-for-your-dole placements, for claimants as a condition for retaining their unemployment benefits.

One claimant who was told by her Jobcentre that she would have to work for no pay to keep her benefits was 22 year geology graduate Cait Reilly (pictured) from Birmingham. The geology graduate spent two weeks stacking shelves and sweeping floors for no pay, for 'Poundland' in South Birmingham. Cait told The Guardian newspaper:

"It seems we were being used as free labour in the run-up to Christmas."

Although the 22 year old was not offered an interview following her placement and had told the Jobcentre Plus of her previous retail experience and that she was volunteering at the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery, she was told that she would lose her benefits if she did not accept the 'mandatory' post.

Cait is now challenging the Government over a scheme which she feels compels jobseekers into "futile, unpaid labour". She is asking the High Court to quash regulations that her lawyers claim were created by the government 'without parliamentary authority' and 'force people into futile, unpaid labour for weeks or months at a time.'

Speaking to the Metro, the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) said:
"Our priority is to help people off benefits and into work. It is simply absurd to suggest that we should not be providing this support and effectively leaving people at home doing nothing."

Although Poundland didn't offer Cait a job, they told the newspaper: "Our partnership with Jobcentre Plus is a positive step to get people back into work."

Action against this type of forced labour is also being challenged under the Human Rights Act by solicitors from 'Public Interest Lawyers' in Birmingham who are seeking a judicial review of the scheme on behalf of two clients who they maintain were forced to work against their will when put on the Governments 'mandatory work activity' program. This they say amounted to a breach of their human rights under article 4(2) of the Human Rights Act which states that "No one shall be required to perform forced or compulsory labour."

[fred]

elling England by the Pound' - The rich get richer and the poor get poorer!
A recent report by the 'Bertelsmann Foundation', a German think-tank based in Berlin, revealed that one-in-nine people in Britain are now living in poverty.

The report which is based on the latest data from the 'Organisation for Economic Co-operation & Development (OECD), also says: that there are high levels of earning inequality in the UK; that young people have poor prospects in the labour market; that educational opportunities for children in this country, depend considerably on their social backgrounds.

Other studies into social mobility such as the one published by the Sutton Trust in November, also show that British children's achievement, is more closely linked to parental status than in most developed countries.

Though the language of 'classlessness' may be fashionable nowadays, the social class that one is borne into, seems to determine a persons destiny more today, than it did fifty years ago. Indeed, the front bench of the Con-Dem Government, is packed with multi-millionaires and old boys from the top public schools.

In terms of incomes, there has been a widening of income inequality in the UK over the last three decades. Although GDP has doubled since 1978, only the top 10% have seen their incomes grow at, or above that rate, which has been twice as fast as the median, and four times faster than the bottom 10% of income earners. While incomes for the majority have stagnated or fallen, pay for the rich has soared.

According to the independent "High Pay Commission", Britain's bosses have awarded themselves more than a 4000% pay increase over the past thirty years. Last year, the richest people in Britain, saw their combined fortunes rise by 30% to £333.5 billion.

While the Prime Minister, David Cameron, believes in a scorched earth policy for the poor, cutting benefits and public services and freezing tax credits, there has been a massive shift in wealth & power from the majority in this country to the top 10%. Britain has been dubbed 'Richistan' because it has become home to a global elite of foreign billionaires and multi-millionaires. For the rich living in Britain, there is no recession, no benefit cap, no obligation to work, and in many cases, no taxation, even though the Chancellor George Osborne, tells us "We're all in it together."

Offshore Trusts like Bernie Ecclestone's 'Bambino Holdings' held in his ex-wifes name, allow the rich to avoid paying billions in tax. Deregulation, government handouts and subsidies to the rich, PFI deals, have seen the rise of the corporate welfare state with resources transferred to the rich and the burden of paying off the deficit, shifted onto the shoulders of the most vulnerable, those on low incomes and benefits.

One of Britain's wealthiest men, with an estimated fortune of £500 million, is David Harding a Conservative Party donor who is the C.E.O. of 'Winton Capital', the world's largest hedge fund. Although Winton Capital have made billions of pounds out of the financial crisis through speculation, last month, Harding told the 'Financial Times':

"I am surprised to the degree to which the Treasury and the Financial Services Authority'(FSA), act as lobbying organisations for the financial services industry."

As one of London's biggest speculators, Harding has given qualified support for a European 'Tobin' tax on financial transactions which is supported by Angela Merkel the German chancellor and the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams.

Though Cameron's coalition Government oppose this 'Robin Hood Tax' on financial transactions, he nevertheless tried unsuccessfully, to stop an EU directive from becoming law which improved employment rights for agency workers and he now wants to challenge the rules, on the National Minimum Wage(NMW), Statutory Sick Pay(SSP), and the 'Working Time Directive'.

Under a plan put forward by Adrian Beecroft, a Conservative Party donor, the Government also wants to allow some employers to fire workers 'at will', on a whim, with no right of appeal to an employment tribunal. Though some business leaders have been wildly enthusiatic about this return to Victorian values, Nick Clegg, the Con-Dem deputy leader, fears that it will make English workers feel even more insecure about their jobs and will depress consumer confidence even further.

As George Monbiot pointed out in a recent article in 'The Guardian', though Cameron opposes the 'Robin Hood Tax', he does not oppose the EU's 'Common Agricultural Policy'(CAP) which accounts for half of the EU's spending and costs the British taxpayer £3.6 billion a year. According to a Government database, the entire CAP budget of £47 billion a year, is shared between 16,000 people or businesses. Under the CAP, the biggest landowners receive the most support from the State. Earlier this year, a House of Commons committee demanded that the agricultural subsidies under the CAP be sustained. The Government have also demanded that the EEC drop a proposal that would limit the amount a landowner could receive on the grounds that it would impede the 'consolidation of landownings'. In Britain, 69% of the land is owned by 0.6% of the population and it is this group who are the major beneficiaries of the CAP payouts.

According to Monbiot, it is the aristocrats and utility companies who reap the benefits of the CAP. For example, the Vestey family received a subsidy of £1.2 million for their Thurlow estate. Seemingly, the previous owner Edmund Vestey, who died in 2008, was so adept at managing his business affairs that he paid in one year, just £10 in tax. When asked for a comment on his tax contribution, he remarked:

"We're all tax dodgers, aren`t we?"

POSTED BY BLANCO POSNET AT 1:38 PM
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