FlyTheNest

tinyclanger2 wrote:Over politeness or can't be arsedness being the key barrier:

The ComRes poll, for the Daily Mirror, found 43 per cent of voters backed the prospect of a second referendum while 51 per cent opposed the idea.

Barking.

Tubby Isaacs wrote:And austerity is something of which there are considerable variations in size and distribution.

House of Commons Library
Transport 2018: FAQ for MPs
Published Thursday, January 11, 2018

http://researchbriefings.parliament.uk/ ... y/CBP-7954" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Fears of Brexit drain as more EU27 ambulance staff quit the NHS
Departures could exacerbate vacancy rates in already understaffed service

Denis Campbell

Sat 13 Jan 2018 13.14 GMT(Guardian)

Tubby Isaacs wrote:From the FT about Carillion:

Carillion has been struggling for survival since last July, when soaring debts and huge writedowns on the value of several old contracts sparked the first in a series of profit warnings and the departure of its chief executive.

Assuming these contracts are with the government, don't these "huge writedowns" rather suggest that government outsourcing isn't quite the guaranteed freebie we keep hearing?

Lost in Thursday’s “ shithole ” shitstorm was a Wall Street Journal interview with Donald Trump that happened to hit around the same time as the Washington Post article detailing the President’s “ tough ” language on Latin and African immigrants......
......But as batshit as all of those quotes (which appear in the edited version of the interview) are, the full transcript is straight up, padded cell nuts.

"Carillion is a leading integrated support services business. We employ around 43,000 people and operate in the UK, Canada and Middle East. We have annual revenues of more than £5bn."

https://www.carillionplc.com/about-us/our-business/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

SpinningHugo wrote:Critics of outsourcing can't have it both ways.

tinybgoat wrote:https://heisenbergreport.com/2018/01/12 ... room-nuts/
"‘Does This Make Sense?’ ‘Yes.’ Transcript Of Trump’s WSJ Interview Is Padded Room Nuts"

Lost in Thursday’s “ shithole ” shitstorm was a Wall Street Journal interview with Donald Trump that happened to hit around the same time as the Washington Post article detailing the President’s “ tough ” language on Latin and African immigrants......
......But as batshit as all of those quotes (which appear in the edited version of the interview) are, the full transcript is straight up, padded cell nuts.

I'm reasonably good at wibble, but he lost me at the invisible wall.
(as an aside, when Trump said "very stable" genius, did he mean "veritable genius", and did the rest of the world already realise this & I'm just slow?)

citizenJA wrote:

SpinningHugo wrote:Critics of outsourcing can't have it both ways.

Critics and non-critics aren't getting anything but hosed.

tinybgoat wrote:https://heisenbergreport.com/2018/01/12 ... room-nuts/
"‘Does This Make Sense?’ ‘Yes.’ Transcript Of Trump’s WSJ Interview Is Padded Room Nuts"

Lost in Thursday’s “ shithole ” shitstorm was a Wall Street Journal interview with Donald Trump that happened to hit around the same time as the Washington Post article detailing the President’s “ tough ” language on Latin and African immigrants......
......But as batshit as all of those quotes (which appear in the edited version of the interview) are, the full transcript is straight up, padded cell nuts.

I'm reasonably good at wibble, but he lost me at the invisible wall.
(as an aside, when Trump said "very stable" genius, did he mean "veritable genius", and did the rest of the world already realise this & I'm just slow?)

howsillyofme1 wrote:

Tubby Isaacs wrote:And austerity is something of which there are considerable variations in size and distribution.

But Labour MPs agreeing with the need for austerity, and blaming the Labour 'over-spending' in the Brown years allowed the cover Osborne needed

Once the 'credit card is maxed out' and the 'we will be like Greece' was out there and not challenged then that allowed Osborne to make his deepest cuts

PorFavor wrote:Bumboils. My last post was edited to close the quotes.

Tubby Isaacs wrote:

AnatolyKasparov wrote:

gilsey wrote: Brexit won't force any govt to destroy the NHS afterwards, either, and I'm getting sick of seeing remainers say it will as if that's a clinching argument, it's Project Fear all over again and it didn't work very well last time.

Brexit will be very bad for workforce management and medical science collaboration, but funding will still be a political decision. The NHS can be be mitigation for Brexit.

The ones who irk me are those who go on about "Brexit making austerity worse" when they didn't give a monkey's about austerity before June 23 2016.

(if this was a case of that day genuinely opening their minds as to why Brexit happened, it would be a different matter - but most of the time, its not)

Hard Brexit is becoming structurally poorer. It's a much bigger deal that some bad fiscal policy for a few years.

Most of the Labour Remainers were perfectly happy with Ed Balls' fiscal policy from 2015 onwards, which (assuming he stuck to it) needed no more than £1bn of austerity, per the IFS.

Brexit happened because of old people.

howsillyofme1 wrote:

Tubby Isaacs wrote:And austerity is something of which there are considerable variations in size and distribution.

But Labour MPs agreeing with the need for austerity, and blaming the Labour 'over-spending' in the Brown years allowed the cover Osborne needed

Once the 'credit card is maxed out' and the 'we will be like Greece' was out there and not challenged then that allowed Osborne to make his deepest cuts

AnatolyKasparov wrote:

howsillyofme1 wrote:

Tubby Isaacs wrote:And austerity is something of which there are considerable variations in size and distribution.

But Labour MPs agreeing with the need for austerity, and blaming the Labour 'over-spending' in the Brown years allowed the cover Osborne needed

Once the 'credit card is maxed out' and the 'we will be like Greece' was out there and not challenged then that allowed Osborne to make his deepest cuts

And most did so for totally cynical internal party reasons, which is unforgiveable.

(there are exceptions, admittedly - there is little doubt that Chris Leslie really believes all this rubbish, which just shows his total unfitness to represent Labour at any level)

citizenJA wrote:

"Carillion is a leading integrated support services business. We employ around 43,000 people and operate in the UK, Canada and Middle East. We have annual revenues of more than £5bn."

https://www.carillionplc.com/about-us/our-business/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

AnatolyKasparov wrote:He hasn't repeated it has he, I suspect JMcD might have got a fair amount of stick behind the scenes for that.

Tubby Isaacs wrote:

howsillyofme1 wrote:

Tubby Isaacs wrote:And austerity is something of which there are considerable variations in size and distribution.

But Labour MPs agreeing with the need for austerity, and blaming the Labour 'over-spending' in the Brown years allowed the cover Osborne needed

Once the 'credit card is maxed out' and the 'we will be like Greece' was out there and not challenged then that allowed Osborne to make his deepest cuts

Brown overspent modestly from about 2002 onwards per Simon Wren Lewis. I don't think pretending it didn't was an option.

PorFavor wrote:

Tubby Isaacs wrote:From the FT about Carillion:

Carillion has been struggling for survival since last July, when soaring debts and huge writedowns on the value of several old contracts sparked the first in a series of profit warnings and the departure of its chief executive.

Assuming these contracts are with the government, don't these "huge writedowns" rather suggest that government outsourcing isn't quite the guaranteed freebie we keep hearing?

Will we ever know which old contracts these are? If Carillion were trying for the sympathy vote, I feel that somehow we'd be "told" that they were directly connected to government outsourcing. (Although I confess to not being au fait with the rules and regulations, if there are any, of disclosing such information in these, or any other, circumstances.)

SpinningHugo wrote:Critics of outsourcing can't have it both ways.

"Carillon going bust shows outsourcing doesn't work."

"Virgins profits shows outsourcing doesn't work."

Carillon will almost certainly go into a CVA. The shareholders will lose. Just like with Railtrack. Not a problem unless you're a shareholder.

howsillyofme1 wrote:It is impossible for us to judge the reality of outsourcing, does it give value for money and what we are on the hook for unless we see what is in the contracts

Unfortunately, we never seem to and even the NAO has no real visibility either

https://www.ft.com/content/69c31024-4af ... 144feabdc0" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Tubby Isaacs wrote:

howsillyofme1 wrote:It is impossible for us to judge the reality of outsourcing, does it give value for money and what we are on the hook for unless we see what is in the contracts

Unfortunately, we never seem to and even the NAO has no real visibility either

https://www.ft.com/content/69c31024-4af ... 144feabdc0" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

That's a few years out of date. I'd be surprised if EU procurement rules hadn't improved that.

Tubby Isaacs wrote:I mentioned Wren-Lewis as one of Labour's "wise men". Owning up to modest overspending doesn't mean you have to back Osborne.

Inflation has different components. You can't do much about world oil prices which effect everybody. A referendum that just effects you is totally different. People have to be helped to make the link.

You can throw out Osborne cuts. Labour had a good crack at doing in in 2015. What you can't chuck out is Hard Brexit.

howsillyofme1 wrote:Just as the 1950-70 were dogmatic nationalizing years, we are now in the 'free market delivers all' dogma - my standard view is that we are handing massive amounts of taxpayer money to private companies (many paying no tax in the UK) of foreign Governments because of this dogma

The question is do they deliver value.....ie cost and quality......not just cost

Tubby Isaacs wrote:

howsillyofme1 wrote:Just as the 1950-70 were dogmatic nationalizing years, we are now in the 'free market delivers all' dogma - my standard view is that we are handing massive amounts of taxpayer money to private companies (many paying no tax in the UK) of foreign Governments because of this dogma

The question is do they deliver value.....ie cost and quality......not just cost

Plus, is it right to outsource at all?

This is a bit subjective, but to me Probation and Prisons ought not to be outsourced at all.

HindleA wrote:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-42676587


France's first panda cub makes its public debut

Tubby Isaacs wrote:

howsillyofme1 wrote:Just as the 1950-70 were dogmatic nationalizing years, we are now in the 'free market delivers all' dogma - my standard view is that we are handing massive amounts of taxpayer money to private companies (many paying no tax in the UK) of foreign Governments because of this dogma

The question is do they deliver value.....ie cost and quality......not just cost

Plus, is it right to outsource at all?

This is a bit subjective, but to me Probation and Prisons ought not to be outsourced at all.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/po ... 57326.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Chancellor says Brussels must let go of idea of punishing Britain for voting to leave the bloc

Tubby Isaacs wrote:

SpinningHugo wrote:Critics of outsourcing can't have it both ways.

"Carillon going bust shows outsourcing doesn't work."

"Virgins profits shows outsourcing doesn't work."

Carillon will almost certainly go into a CVA. The shareholders will lose. Just like with Railtrack. Not a problem unless you're a shareholder.

Maybe Carillion could sell some of its PFI contracts on. Jarvis had to do that in 2004.

Tubby Isaacs wrote:I've got a worry with Labour that "savings from taking in house" is going to be the new "crack down on tax avoidance" ie a balancing figure stuck into the manifesto to avoid having putting taxes up.

Sure, there'll be savings to be had. But there'll likely be problems too.