Thought Id start this one going because its rather dead on this board at the moment and I suppose all my usual muckers are either at the Stella tennis event watching Dim Tim (lose again) or at Henly Regatta eating cucumber sandwiches (they wish,...NOT).

Anyway please feel free to just talk to yourself blast away and let it go on any company or subject you wish. Just wish Id thought of this one before.

cheers GF.

I think Blair is a self deceiving liar who will do anything for money.

If you put him in a sack of rats he would be the first to get out.

The UK has had some rubbish PMs. in recent years.

sticky - i admit ignorance, but why does "NO wrong Cyners, you are forgetting benefit sanctions and the bed room tax only came into being about 18 months ago" have a specific let alone significant influence on the use of foodbanks?

btw, you last para was just typically silly

Even the Trussel Trust admits that there are people turning up nine times or even more.

If self-employment is largely the result of people not being able to find direct employment then it seems to me that you would expect to find higher levels of self-employment in the regions of the UK with the highest proportions of long-term unemployment. Infact there is a general pattern revealing that self-employment is higher in those UK that have lower long-term unemployment.

Last week the TUC published research which they said showed that “while some choose to be self-employed, many people are forced into it because there is no alternative work”. In fact, that “some” who choose to be self-employed turned out to be no less than 72% of all self-employed people when the Resolution Foundation released the findings of their survey a couple of days later. This accords very closely with the RSA’s own survey (full results to be published soon) which found that 76% of people in self-employment or running their own micro-business were happy with their work situation.

Hays yep but they dont get served. They get re-directed to the LocalAuthority emergency unit which I posted about earlier today and is sitting on 70 million of unused funds because they dont have the staff to manage the scheme.

*And Manuel if you cant work the coorelation between an increase in benefit sanctions and the increase in the use of Food Banks........wells theirs just no hope for you...............let me S P E L L it out for you..........................

Someone gets benefits stopped.............many a time for admin reasons and not their fault (92% is the figure) this is usualy for 3 months but can be up to 6 months.

they have no contact with parents or relatives no freinds etc etc, so what do they do...........they starve to death and die in the road.

But the alternative is to get a token from thier local vicar and take it to the food bank for food.

They then return to thier cardboard box to live their life of luxury.

Get it now???????????? comprende???????

Hays I see you havent mentioned the DSS try to talk them into self employment and instead of recieving JSA they get a working tax credit.

Of course it wont be long before the HMRC catch up with them and then issue them with a back dated tax bill and instructions they no longer are considered to be self employed.

IR35 etc etc.

Dying Stephen Sutton has more than hit his Bucket List's 'Raising £1m for Charity' target.

:-)

What an inspiration to us all! What a massive thing to have done in your life!

As I type, it's at £1,354,000 and flying along to get even higher.

How utterly brilliant!

https://www.justgiving.com/Stephen-Sutton-TCT

Jess on Say’s Law and the Tory Denial that Increase in Food Banks Represents Genuine Demand

Jess, one of the commenters on this blog has posted a detailed critique of the economic law behind the Tories’ refusal to admit that the rise in food banks is due to a massive increase in poverty. The Tories cannot admit that there is mass starvation in this country due to their austerity campaign. They therefore claim instead that food banks are increasing simply because there are more food banks, and their mere existence attracts more customers.

In her comment to Mike’s post on Vox Political, ‘Food bank blow is new low for the Mail on Sunday’, Jess attacks this assertion, and shows that it is based on Say’s Law, an economic doctrine that has now been comprehensively refuted in the form it has been adopted under Lord Freud to justify the attacks food banks. She states

“Another claim – that “volunteers revealed that increased awareness of food banks is driving a rise in their use” is unsubstantiated, and is clearly an attempt to support the government’s claim that this is the case. But it is silly. Of course starving people will go to a food bank after they have been told it exists; that doesn’t mean they aren’t starving.”

The DWP appear to be pushing this line rather hard, as their response to the public’s growing awareness of the scandal of food banks. Their argument, based on Say’s Law, is utterly fallacious, and they must know it is.

Say’s Law, roughly formulated, is “”Supply creates its own demand”[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supply_creates_its_own_demand].
In the present context it seems to have been first invoked by Lord Freud, and then taken up by his department. EDITOR GF (and our own poster here on this thread HAYS)

It will be familiar to most people through its mention by Keynes in his ‘General Theory’;
“From the time of Say and Ricardo the classical economists have taught that supply creates its own demand; meaning by this in some significant, but not clearly defined, sense that the whole of the costs of production must necessarily be spent in the aggregate, directly or indirectly, on purchasing the product.” [http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/economics/keynes/general-theory/ch02.htm]

But even the free marketeers regard Freud’s interpretation of Say as ridiculous;
“W. H. Hutt once referred to Say’s Law as the most fundamental ‘economic law’ in all economic theory. In its crude and colloquial form, Say’s Law is frequently understood as supply creates its own demand, as if the simple act of supplying some good or service on the market was sufficient to call forth demand for that product. It is certainly true that producers can undertake expenses, such as advertising, to persuade people to purchase a good they have already chosen to supply, but that is not the same thing as saying that an act of supply necessarily creates demand for the good in question. This understanding of the law is obviously nonsensical as numerous business and product failures can attest to. If Say’s Law were true in this colloquial sense, then we could all get very rich just by producing whatever we wanted.” [http://www.fee.org/the_freeman/detail/understanding-says-law-of-markets]

How then, did this silly ‘aphorism’ creep into the language of the DWP?

One route may have been through the IEA and it’s then Director David G Green.. He wrote a couple of pamphlets in the late ’90′s advocating the demolition of Social Security, and a return to the Friendly Societies of Victorian England [Benefit dependency : how welfare undermines dependency.1998; An end to welfare rights : the rediscovery of independence 1999]

Most people, at the time, thought Green was ‘off his trolley’, It is tragic that Say, and Green is being used to attack food banks. The last refuge of the destitute.

This last paragraph, where she mentions IEA and its director, David G Green, is also important. I remember back in the 1990s the Daily Mail criticising the establishment of the modern welfare state for the way it sidelined the Friendly Societies. The Daily Mail had clearly been influenced by Green’s bonkers views, and it shows just how extreme and reactionary the Mail is.

that would not explain "significant" i think, though it may explain a spike
strange as it may seem and unlike you, i have no silly political axe to grind, but merely try to wade through at least some of the garbage to retrieve a sensible explanation - but that may well be beyond your comprehension

=============

as an aside, there was a very interesting piece on long-term unemployed going through a very short army course followed by short work placement
i admit i didn't pay huge attention, but a non-uk chap was offered some full time employment, which he grabbed, whereas the english bloke decided he really didn't fancy that particular job so opted to stay on benefits
says a lot

"and short army course followed by short work placement"??????????

Bailiffs or Bouncers at the local Cons Clubs!

He he.

Was going to say which twit wants to join the forces now that cuts are rife.

Not only that but forces are paid so badly perhaphs benefits are more.

I see that TopGear are in trouble again....it's more about the personalities than the cars that program !....very watchable most of the time...(they go to some great places !).....the only thing wrong is that the car testing is mostly crap !....it's always about rich people's vehicles...well I suppose it is called : "topgear"....so there...just don't expect them to give a proper test report for smaller sporty cars.. GTI's..small 4/4's.. etc....(for that : they never get it right).....but for Aston's, Maserati's : they are ...how shall I call it ?...the top....

I like watching that prog although Im not into cars, transport etc etc. Very good watching.

Their trips abroad are superb...but I find the smaller car testing is not what it should be....screeching wheels....and clocking up times on racetracks is not the way to test cars...

Gf

That nonsense about Say's is completely wrong. It is not a case of supply creating demand, although that is an economic law which does work in special circumstances.

The food bank situation is that increased supply is supplying a latent demand that was there anyway. Most importantly, it still does not imply increased demand.

stick+fred - typically stupid comment as expected, and of course a zillion miles wide of the mark

Hays says.........Latent demand that was there anyway.

Stop talking silly hays, the increased demand over the last 18 months as come about by 2 reasons

1. a massive increase in benefit sanctions which leaves people with no money

2. bedroom tax which is crucifying the very poorest, just look at the social cleansing going on in london.

And manuel educate yourself on the situation before making silly comment like that.

GF.

Manuel was a porter at Eton.

He wasn't educated, but indoctrinated!

-------

God only knows what happened to the Hazier One after birth!

8-)