Thursday 19th February 2015

[refitman]

Morning all. Labour lead at 2 points on Yougov:

Latest YouGov / The Sun results 18th February -

Con 32%, (-1)
Lab 34%, (nc)
LD 8%, (+2)
UKIP 14%, (-1)
GRN 6%; (-1)

APP -20 (nc)

[PaulfromYorkshire]

John Cridland from the CBI seems to be siding with Miliband on the devolution issue - though of course he doesn't say so. Here a link with a Welsh slant for our provincial friends

http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales ... bi-8673986" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

beware-dangers-devolution-deadline-cbi

[citizenJA]

Goodmorning.

[mikems]

Tax dodging wheeze funds the tories...and Progress:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/po ... 54911.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[ephemerid]

.........from the posts and links yesterday......

120 people every day, who are judged by the draconian standards of the WCA, as incapable of work, sanctioned.
The majority for failing to attend an appointment.
100 people every day, with some form of mental illness or learning disability, judged incapable of work, sanctioned.
The majority for failing to attend an appointment.
That's 43,000 people a year - people whose benefits are cut or removed because they are not capable of doing what DWP imposes, thus proving that they fulfil the conditions for claiming their benefits. Punished for being exactly what DWP says they are - incapable.

The story in the Times is nothing new. We have known about this for some time.
If your GP says you are too ill to work, that diagnosis is only allowed to apply for four weeks. No GP's opinion counts after that.
Your employer can now insist that you get another opinion.
That opinion will be garnered from a person who may or may not be qualified, who certainly doesn't know you, and who will make their judgement by asking you a few questions over the phone.
Welcome to DWP's Health and Work Service, delivered by Health Management Limited, a Maximus company.
A company whose head is ex-Unum, ex-Atos, and whose input gave us US-style disability denial.

If you are ill and have no job, you will be tested and you are more likely than not to be found capable of something.
If you are ill enough to be only capable of unspecified work-related-activity, you will be sanctioned.
If you are ill but have a job, you can't be ill for long; your employer can have you assessed over the phone.
If you are ill enough to need more than four weeks off work, your GPs opinion counts for nothing.

Ill people who have jobs will lose those jobs if they're not ill enough.
Ill people who lose their jobs will be sanctioned if they're not ill enough.

I wonder how ill a person will have to be to qualify for help in the future?

[Toby Latimer]

I see another flawed plan coming soon. Two separate items on todays Dacre comic

ScreenShot00231.jpg (64.15 KiB) Viewed 13711 times

ScreenShot00232.jpg (87.91 KiB) Viewed 13711 times

[RogerOThornhill]

I see another flawed plan coming soon. Two separate items on todays Dacre comic

ScreenShot00231.jpg

ScreenShot00232.jpg

Replace red boxes with smart phones?

How many people want to read a 40 page policy document on a smart phone? How are you supposed to write notes in the margin or underline an important bit...or go back to a para 10 pages ago easily?

The trouble with technology is that people think they have to use everywhere it but forgetting the fact that the ideas are utterly bonkers.

[rebeccariots2]

Vince Cable in LibDem doghouse after saying party would do coalition deal with the SNP
http://www.heraldscotland.com/politics/ ... .118839029

He spends a lot of time in that doghouse.

Morning all.

[rebeccariots2]

I see another flawed plan coming soon. Two separate items on todays Dacre comic

ScreenShot00231.jpg

ScreenShot00232.jpg

Replace red boxes with smart phones?

How many people want to read a 40 page policy document on a smart phone? How are you supposed to write notes in the margin or underline an important bit...or go back to a para 10 pages ago easily?

The trouble with technology is that people think they have to use everywhere it but forgetting the fact that the ideas are utterly bonkers.

I don't think many Tories will notice or mind ... they've been using the back of fag packets for policy making ... sort of equivalent size and potential for considered thinking and amending. And we know Nick Clegg doesn't even bother to read the stuff before he signs. He'll be quite happy with someone handing him an electronic signing pad with a dangling pen (a la parcel delivery) and just sticking his signature on.

Having said that - I'm in complete agreement. Shows the tiny mindset up perfectly.

[Maeght]

Good morning everybody and Rebecca, please give Musica a pat from me.

[TheGrimSqueaker]

Morning all.

I gather Nick Clegg is unveiling the Lib Dems child care plans today; is this his new job post-GE 2015, running a nursery?

[Maeght]

Excellent article from Alistair Campbell about football racism on his blog.

Sorry for some reason can't do link on Ipad today.

[rebeccariots2]

John Cridland from the CBI seems to be siding with Miliband on the devolution issue - though of course he doesn't say so. Here a link with a Welsh slant for our provincial friends

http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales ... bi-8673986" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

beware-dangers-devolution-deadline-cbi

That's made me wonder what those business owners (not necessarily the big household names but the individual owner ones) who spoke out before the Scottish Independence referendum re their concerns if it was a YES result and said they would move south of the border are thinking now. It's far from a certain context for them ... with the SNP pushing for greater powers now and, if they hold the balance of power in Westminster, even more over the next five years ... and the possibility of an EU referendum and a further independence referendum on the back of that. Could there come a time when some of them think it might be better to move south anyway?

[yahyah]

Morning.

'Downing Street accused of being 'systemically negligent' with national security secrets after name of ex-SAS officer finds its way into the public domain'
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/po ... 55059.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[yahyah]

Excellent article from Alistair Campbell about football racism on his blog.

Sorry for some reason can't do link on Ipad today.

Here you go Maeght.

http://www.alastaircampbell.org/blog/20 ... ut-racism/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[rebeccariots2]

Dr. Brian May ‏@DrBrianMay 15h15 hours ago
MANIFESTO - ‘Labour: Protecting Animals’ - http://b.3cdn.net/labouruk/1c898776c426 ... 6vj1eg.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; … - an impressive opening salvo from Maria Eagles. Bri

[yahyah]

Excuse my middle aged cynicism but if the alleged Telegraph/Tory HQ emails story had been a similar Labour/Mirror story, the papers/BBC etc this morning would be telling us that it was a storm engulfing the Labour party & bad news for Ed. Instead, silence.

[rebeccariots2]

Paedo Email Smears - Someone’s Lying
[Update at end of post]
http://zelo-street.blogspot.co.uk/2015/ ... lying.html

Anyone get the sense that this election campaign is becoming like an intelligence war ...? It requires journalists and those of a seriously investigative nature (the Tom Watsons and their ilk) to have antennae out and primed to know what dirty tricks are in the hatching so that there can be an advance rout. I hope this public spat now means that these particular emails - or correspondence as the bloke from the Telegraph calls it - are rendered pretty null and void if they emerge in the future - or, better, that they are now worse news for the Tories than anything they were cooking up for Labour.

[AnatolyKasparov]

Excuse my middle aged cynicism but if the alleged Telegraph/Tory HQ emails story had been a similar Labour/Mirror story, the papers/BBC etc this morning would be telling us that it was a storm engulfing the Labour party & bad news for Ed. Instead, silence.

Well, we only have to look back at how they treated the McBride foolishness. Wall to wall coverage, of course.

[rebeccariots2]

Sports Direct founder Mike Ashley called to Westminster over employee treatment
Scottish affairs committee investigating how 200 staff at Ayrshire warehouse lost jobs when administrators called in plus use of zero-hours contracts
http://www.theguardian.com/football/201 ... are_btn_tw

The Sports Direct founder Mike Ashley is being called before MPs at the House of Commons over the treatment of employees at the company’s USC retail business and the use of zero-hours contracts.

The inquiry by the Scottish affairs committee in Westminster is the latest investigation into how about 200 staff at USC’s Ayrshire warehouse lost their jobs when administrators were called in to West Coast Capital (USC), a Sports Direct-controlled entity that owned 28 USC stores. The stores were immediately bought out of administration by another part of Sports Direct but the warehouse was abruptly closed down....

the committee was also interested in Sports Direct’s use of zero-hours contracts following a previous investigation into the matter. As many as 90% of the retailer’s 23,000 staff are employed under the controversial terms, which do not guarantee work. “We would invite people to come forward and tell us their experiences in this area,” Davidson said.

The committee has been seeking to secure the attendance of the publicity-shy Ashley for several weeks and now has about five weeks to conclude its business before parliament is dissolved before the election. If Ashley refuses to attend, MPs have the power to formally summon him.

If Ashley refuses, he faces being held in contempt of parliament. While there is no modern precedent for punishment for being held in contempt, the threat of such a public rebuke has recently seen Tony Blair and the Murdoch family appear before MP-led inquiries.

They've got such a lovely business model ... any company of this size that relies on 90% of staff being on zero hours contracts should be outlawed.

[Rebecca]

Excuse my middle aged cynicism but if the alleged Telegraph/Tory HQ emails story had been a similar Labour/Mirror story, the papers/BBC etc this morning would be telling us that it was a storm engulfing the Labour party & bad news for Ed. Instead, silence.

Morning everyone,
Though not posting due to horrors of tablet fingers(e.g I managed to order a 299.00 sonic hair removing thing from amazon while looking at books)I read all the comments.
Yah yah,my middle aged cynicism was alerted by the ant/DEC/Gallagher denouncing labour tales.FUnny,thought I,how untalented but no doubt very wealthy celebs decide to diss labour when Ed makes a public stand against tax avoiders/evaders.Like that Class woman and the mansion tax.
My heart bl3dsfor them.

[rebeccariots2]

Minister confirms his support for roll out of West badger cull
http://www.westernmorningnews.co.uk/Min ... story.html

[yahyah]

Not often Mr YahYah gets a chance to speak, but was just talking to him about the Telegraph emails.
He used to work many moons ago as a consultant helping businesses & organisations[some public sector] deal with change.

The Tories are using their culture, 'the way we do things around here'...
lack of morality, self serving corruption, personal attacks on Miliband, laziness... to try and improve their public esteem.

Whatever the Tory spinners get back via polling probably feeds inventing more dirty tricks to try and make up for their problems.
Encultured response to being viewed as the 'nasty party' is to react with more nastiness.

I think the voters will sniff it out. Always have to be optimistic.

[Willow904]

Sports Direct founder Mike Ashley called to Westminster over employee treatment
Scottish affairs committee investigating how 200 staff at Ayrshire warehouse lost jobs when administrators called in plus use of zero-hours contracts
http://www.theguardian.com/football/201 ... are_btn_tw

The Sports Direct founder Mike Ashley is being called before MPs at the House of Commons over the treatment of employees at the company’s USC retail business and the use of zero-hours contracts.

The inquiry by the Scottish affairs committee in Westminster is the latest investigation into how about 200 staff at USC’s Ayrshire warehouse lost their jobs when administrators were called in to West Coast Capital (USC), a Sports Direct-controlled entity that owned 28 USC stores. The stores were immediately bought out of administration by another part of Sports Direct but the warehouse was abruptly closed down....

the committee was also interested in Sports Direct’s use of zero-hours contracts following a previous investigation into the matter. As many as 90% of the retailer’s 23,000 staff are employed under the controversial terms, which do not guarantee work. “We would invite people to come forward and tell us their experiences in this area,” Davidson said.

The committee has been seeking to secure the attendance of the publicity-shy Ashley for several weeks and now has about five weeks to conclude its business before parliament is dissolved before the election. If Ashley refuses to attend, MPs have the power to formally summon him.

If Ashley refuses, he faces being held in contempt of parliament. While there is no modern precedent for punishment for being held in contempt, the threat of such a public rebuke has recently seen Tony Blair and the Murdoch family appear before MP-led inquiries.

They've got such a lovely business model ... any company of this size that relies on 90% of staff being on zero hours contracts should be outlawed.

This is essentially what Ed Miliband is talking about when he says he's going to tackle the abuse of zero-hour contracts. If people are in fact working full-time they should have the right to a full-time contract, is basically what Ed has been saying. Outlawing zero-hours contracts completely is difficult as it would impact on flexible arrangements that suit both parties. I still feel the best way to eliminate zero hours abuse is to allow jobseekers to turn them down, on the basis that they are little more than formalised casual labour, without fear of sanction. That would ensure only people who want them are on them.

[TheGrimSqueaker]

Not often Mr YahYah gets a chance to speak, but was just talking to him about the Telegraph emails.
He used to work many moons ago as a consultant helping businesses & organisations[some public sector] deal with change.

The Tories are using their culture, 'the way we do things around here'...
lack of morality, self serving corruption, personal attacks on Miliband, laziness... to try and improve their public esteem.

Whatever the Tory spinners get back via polling probably feeds inventing more dirty tricks to try and make up for their problems.
Encultured response to being viewed as the 'nasty party' is to react with more nastiness.

I think the voters will sniff it out. Always have to be optimistic.

To my mind this is another example of how social media, and blogs like FTN, are changing the game. Tom Watson is a canny operator and has used social media to great effect * in pushing forward the calls for a CSA inquiry; he has done the same here, and made sure that the story hasn't been buried, despite the best efforts of most of the MSM - interestingly the Mail has run with a version of it though.


* Even if he has blocked me because he is a sensitive little soul who doesn't like being asked questions as to why he delights in talking to the papers at the times calculated to cause most embarrassment to his party leadership.

[rebeccariots2]

Cost of childcare so high that it does not pay UK families to work
Family and Childcare Trust report finds some nursery costs have risen by a third in five years, making it cheaper for one parent to stay at home to care for children
http://www.theguardian.com/money/2015/f ... st-nursery

This is one of the issues women have raised on the doorstep with me. I met a young women a couple of weeks ago who was so frustrated at having to give up a good job because the economics of childcare meant it just wasn't viable. She said she and her husband are really struggling to manage financially. She was the first - and maybe only thinking about it - who told me they had voted Tory last time but weren't going to this time - they weren't sure how to vote yet.

Labour needs to get the 25 hours of free childcare offer out there loudly.

[ErnstRemarx]

John Cridland from the CBI seems to be siding with Miliband on the devolution issue - though of course he doesn't say so. Here a link with a Welsh slant for our provincial friends

http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales ... bi-8673986" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

beware-dangers-devolution-deadline-cbi

That's made me wonder what those business owners (not necessarily the big household names but the individual owner ones) who spoke out before the Scottish Independence referendum re their concerns if it was a YES result and said they would move south of the border are thinking now. It's far from a certain context for them ... with the SNP pushing for greater powers now and, if they hold the balance of power in Westminster, even more over the next five years ... and the possibility of an EU referendum and a further independence referendum on the back of that. Could there come a time when some of them think it might be better to move south anyway?

Quite why a business with any sort of reach and ambition would want to be in an independent Scotland without its own currency is utterly beyond me, as is the idea that any businessman/woman would wish to trade from within the UK in the event of a withdrawal from the EU.

It simply makes no sense whatsoever in terms of trade. You end up paying tarriffs (over which you have no influence) to trade under the other party's rules (in which you have no say) having to adhere to basic product/commodity laws (which you haven't shaped and can't influence) before you can even do a deal - and then you repeat the whole fiasco in 26-27 other countries because you have to deal with them on an ad hoc basis.

It's absolute and utter commercial insanity. That the Tories are willing to consider this, and that UKIP are gung ho for such a situation to come about tells me all I need to know about their commercial savvy and fitness to govern.

[rebeccariots2]

Sports Direct founder Mike Ashley called to Westminster over employee treatment
Scottish affairs committee investigating how 200 staff at Ayrshire warehouse lost jobs when administrators called in plus use of zero-hours contracts
http://www.theguardian.com/football/201 ... are_btn_tw

The Sports Direct founder Mike Ashley is being called before MPs at the House of Commons over the treatment of employees at the company’s USC retail business and the use of zero-hours contracts.

The inquiry by the Scottish affairs committee in Westminster is the latest investigation into how about 200 staff at USC’s Ayrshire warehouse lost their jobs when administrators were called in to West Coast Capital (USC), a Sports Direct-controlled entity that owned 28 USC stores. The stores were immediately bought out of administration by another part of Sports Direct but the warehouse was abruptly closed down....

the committee was also interested in Sports Direct’s use of zero-hours contracts following a previous investigation into the matter. As many as 90% of the retailer’s 23,000 staff are employed under the controversial terms, which do not guarantee work. “We would invite people to come forward and tell us their experiences in this area,” Davidson said.

The committee has been seeking to secure the attendance of the publicity-shy Ashley for several weeks and now has about five weeks to conclude its business before parliament is dissolved before the election. If Ashley refuses to attend, MPs have the power to formally summon him.

If Ashley refuses, he faces being held in contempt of parliament. While there is no modern precedent for punishment for being held in contempt, the threat of such a public rebuke has recently seen Tony Blair and the Murdoch family appear before MP-led inquiries.

They've got such a lovely business model ... any company of this size that relies on 90% of staff being on zero hours contracts should be outlawed.

This is essentially what Ed Miliband is talking about when he says he's going to tackle the abuse of zero-hour contracts. If people are in fact working full-time they should have the right to a full-time contract, is basically what Ed has been saying. Outlawing zero-hours contracts completely is difficult as it would impact on flexible arrangements that suit both parties. I still feel the best way to eliminate zero hours abuse is to allow jobseekers to turn them down, on the basis that they are little more than formalised casual labour, without fear of sanction. That would ensure only people who want them are on them.

We know that's never going to happen under this government. They've set the system up so that a non job guaranteeing nothing can be counted as an equivalent to a proper job with pay and that suits them fine ... punishments all round and the figures look even better. I hope the latest kite flying announcement about young people having to do community service will have spurred a few more young people into registering to vote so they can vote for anyone but Tories.

[HindleA]

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015 ... vulnerable" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Benefits and suicide: 'You have to be strong to ask for help'

[rebeccariots2]

Inside GOV.UK: 'CHAOS' and 'NIGHTMARE' as trendy Cabinet Office wrecked govt websites
The most hated website of all time?
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/02/18 ... 4343271307

Exclusive Poor design and chaotic management by the supposedly crack team at the Cabinet Office's Government Digital Service (GDS) left huge swathes of the British government in disarray, internal documents seen by the Register reveal. The documents confirm that GDS knew its flagship initiative to move all government websites under one roof, GOV.UK, was destroying useful online services and replacing them with trendy webpages bereft of useful information.

One internal report is particularly damning. The Home Office Visa and Immigration site “transitioned [to GOV.UK] without a good understanding of users and needs ... there was quickly a flood of negative feedback ... coming from all directions,” an insider states for the record. The report details “a breakdown in fact checking described by more than one person as 'general chaos' and 'a total nightmare'.”

The disclosures paint a picture that contradicts the public image of supremely confident digital gurus modernising the British government's many websites, and making them more efficient. For all its vaunted skills in website design, GDS had a far poorer understanding of what the public actually needed than the relevant government departments did – this, according to GDS' own internal analysis.

At one stage ministers and Home Office press staff were put on alert for a rash of negative stories after the badly redesigned Visa and Immigration website left visiting notables unable to enter the UK. Irate users besieged call centres with complaints – "switchboards are melting", one insider wrote. Yet eight months later, GDS carried on as if nothing had happened, ploughing on with another “big bang” transition that saw more than 300 more domains move to the gov.uk übersite – creating possibly the most unpopular government web redesign ever yet undertaken.

The digital disaster was on such a scale that one BBC reporter speculated that the transition might be a sophisticated attempt to cripple the UK, and joked that perhaps the GDS worked for North Korea.

Editing to add: I'm just reading through the whole - long - article. It is utterly jaw dropping ... why the hell hasn't this shambles come out before?

[rebeccariots2]

Getting towards the end of the article now ... shambles from start to finish and just look at this...

Yet GDS' users didn’t see a great success. BBC Newsnight’s Chris Cook didn't buy into the digital buzzwords, and highlighted the flaws in a devastating analysis.

Huge amounts of actual information had been destroyed, while many of the new pages consisted of fluff and filler. Cook criticised a “silly one-size-fits-all design,” noting crucially that GOV.UK "regularised the irrelevant and allows variation in the essential.”

Functionality had also been lost: "There are also really simple things it can't do that (some) older government sites can.” He concluded the GOV.UK transition came “at a massive cost to users”.

The criticism stung, as GDS staff knew it was true. Managers forbade staff from Tweeting their indignation back at Cook – and the usually chatty Whitehall office went social media silent.

Cook wasn’t alone. As more and more functional government websites were sucked into GDS, employers, accountants and tax experts all criticised the GOV.UK transition.

“GOV.UK is a huge step backwards in terms of good content that was easy to read & understand”, "an insult to intelligence, misleading, incomplete and, I think I can say without fear of contradiction from my respected peers, not something that can be recommended as a good source of content to my clients should I wish them to think I was doing a good job,” wrote one unfortunate user.

Cook’s observation was astute. The more specialist the need, the worse GDS had failed the users, who were asking, "where has that useful information gone?"

Thanks to GDS, doing business in or with UK plc had just become more expensive and more difficult. Yet insiders say it could have been worse: HMRC's Transition provides some useful lessons, as management at the Revenue wrestled some degree of control away from GDS' “Shoreditch types".

[rebeccariots2]

This is it ... my final quote from the jaw dropper.

And the savings?

GDS had boasted that its new services and the new portal would create £1.7bn savings on services that cost £6bn to £9bn to run. That’s predicated on being able to lay off civil servants, as users could self-service. The National Audit Office was sceptical – "the evidence for savings is hard to follow”, it told the Cabinet Office in 2013 – and twice asked GDS to tone down its claims.

But it's worse than that.

"Nobody talks about savings any more,” says one source familiar with the transition process, who added: "If the site doesn't meet user needs because it was rushed out, and it doesn't save money because they've not actually switched off the [old] sites, what is it for?”

With an election looming, the Cabinet Office might just have created an excellent stick with which to beat the Coalition and its trendy “digital revolution”.

[Willow904]

They've got such a lovely business model ... any company of this size that relies on 90% of staff being on zero hours contracts should be outlawed.

This is essentially what Ed Miliband is talking about when he says he's going to tackle the abuse of zero-hour contracts. If people are in fact working full-time they should have the right to a full-time contract, is basically what Ed has been saying. Outlawing zero-hours contracts completely is difficult as it would impact on flexible arrangements that suit both parties. I still feel the best way to eliminate zero hours abuse is to allow jobseekers to turn them down, on the basis that they are little more than formalised casual labour, without fear of sanction. That would ensure only people who want them are on them.

We know that's never going to happen under this government. They've set the system up so that a non job guaranteeing nothing can be counted as an equivalent to a proper job with pay and that suits them fine ... punishments all round and the figures look even better. I hope the latest kite flying announcement about young people having to do community service will have spurred a few more young people into registering to vote so they can vote for anyone but Tories.

The little bits and pieces I've picked up about the government's jobs website has made me greatly concerned that a tragedy is just around the corner. I think I have qualms because of the story a long time ago about the young female estate agent who was murdered when meeting a client that she didn't have full details for. I've read that jobseekers are being forced on threat of sanction to apply for jobs that are little more than a mobile number. This worries me greatly. The whole point of the jobcentre when I was young was that all the jobs had been verified by the jobcentre staff as being legitimate and local. No commission scam / Kleeneeze types of non-jobs. Of course that was before working tax credits ensured someone earning nothing touting tupperware catalogues would still have an income and therefore could be classed as "employed". I always liked Gordon Brown, his heart was in the right place, but the extent to which his tax credit scheme has been abused by this lot to cover up their appalling onslaught on our economy has been disastrous.

Labour's pledge of no targets for sanctions is important, I think. Being harsh on jobseekers is popular with voters so there is unlikely to be any overt policy changes, but then much of what is most wrong with the system isn't even official policy anyway, it's happening behind the scenes in secret. Even if Labour simply followed the current official policy on jobseekers claims, it would be a huge improvement on what is happening now.

[ohsocynical]

Not often Mr YahYah gets a chance to speak, but was just talking to him about the Telegraph emails.
He used to work many moons ago as a consultant helping businesses & organisations[some public sector] deal with change.

The Tories are using their culture, 'the way we do things around here'...
lack of morality, self serving corruption, personal attacks on Miliband, laziness... to try and improve their public esteem.

Whatever the Tory spinners get back via polling probably feeds inventing more dirty tricks to try and make up for their problems.
Encultured response to being viewed as the 'nasty party' is to react with more nastiness.

I think the voters will sniff it out. Always have to be optimistic.

Despite their expensive education, they are increasingly showing themselves as uncultured. No imagination, no wits. Always had someone who'd make a phone call or write a cheque to cover their past mistakes.

Someone forgot to tell them, that it always catches up with you in the end....

[rebeccariots2]

The little bits and pieces I've picked up about the government's jobs website has made me greatly concerned that a tragedy is just around the corner. I think I have qualms because of the story a long time ago about the young female estate agent who was murdered when meeting a client that she didn't have full details for. I've read that jobseekers are being forced on threat of sanction to apply for jobs that are little more than a mobile number. This worries me greatly. The whole point of the jobcentre when I was young was that all the jobs had been verified by the jobcentre staff as being legitimate and local. No commission scam / Kleeneeze types of non-jobs. Of course that was before working tax credits ensured someone earning nothing touting tupperware catalogues would still have an income and therefore could be classed as "employed". I always liked Gordon Brown, his heart was in the right place, but the extent to which his tax credit scheme has been abused by this lot to cover up their appalling onslaught on our economy has been disastrous.

Labour's pledge of no targets for sanctions is important, I think. Being harsh on jobseekers is popular with voters so there is unlikely to be any overt policy changes, but then much of what is most wrong with the system isn't even official policy anyway, it's happening behind the scenes in secret. Even if Labour simply followed the current official policy on jobseekers claims, it would be a huge improvement on what is happening now.

I share your concerns - especially when jobs in the sex / lap dancing type industries are also part of the model. Trouble with the last point you make is that - whilst I agree with you - it's not going to be enough to reassure a lot of people about the worth of voting Labour unfortunately. It seems to me that you have to be able to completely block off any personal morals or empathy to hold down a job as a job centre or DWP manager these days. I couldn't do it. And some of them must have children or other members of their families who have been out of work ... how do they square that experience with what they are doing?

[HindleA]

@Ephemerid


Different levels of languishing,important to propagandise supporting the very few (most people are purposely doing so out of habit and financial penalisation is the way to go to persuade them to give up this habit of being ill)genuinely ill,but to be clear they are still languishing for x years and we are so generous in doing so.We're not total barstewards.PS everybody they are languishing and we're paying for it.

Dave.

[Willow904]

Getting towards the end of the article now ... shambles from start to finish and just look at this...

Yet GDS' users didn’t see a great success. BBC Newsnight’s Chris Cook didn't buy into the digital buzzwords, and highlighted the flaws in a devastating analysis.

Huge amounts of actual information had been destroyed, while many of the new pages consisted of fluff and filler. Cook criticised a “silly one-size-fits-all design,” noting crucially that GOV.UK "regularised the irrelevant and allows variation in the essential.”

Functionality had also been lost: "There are also really simple things it can't do that (some) older government sites can.” He concluded the GOV.UK transition came “at a massive cost to users”.

The criticism stung, as GDS staff knew it was true. Managers forbade staff from Tweeting their indignation back at Cook – and the usually chatty Whitehall office went social media silent.

Cook wasn’t alone. As more and more functional government websites were sucked into GDS, employers, accountants and tax experts all criticised the GOV.UK transition.

“GOV.UK is a huge step backwards in terms of good content that was easy to read & understand”, "an insult to intelligence, misleading, incomplete and, I think I can say without fear of contradiction from my respected peers, not something that can be recommended as a good source of content to my clients should I wish them to think I was doing a good job,” wrote one unfortunate user.

Cook’s observation was astute. The more specialist the need, the worse GDS had failed the users, who were asking, "where has that useful information gone?"

Thanks to GDS, doing business in or with UK plc had just become more expensive and more difficult. Yet insiders say it could have been worse: HMRC's Transition provides some useful lessons, as management at the Revenue wrestled some degree of control away from GDS' “Shoreditch types".

I first twigged my car wasn't taxed when my husband, who had given me his old one, got a refund for the remainder of his tax. When I searched online for information about the car tax changes I ended up getting all my information from an article in the Liverpool Echo (I don't even live in Liverpool). This is a direct result of austerity as far as I'm concerned. There wasn't any "waste" under Labour as such, just a deliberate policy of keeping the public informed about government policies that concerned them, which this government decided wasn't necessary. The chaos will only get worse, I suspect. I still haven't been able to find out what the official school leaving age is, whether Labour's rise to 17 in 2013 and then 18 in 2015 has ever come into law. You'd think, even with my modest internet skills, this information would be easy to find. Meanwhile someone in Whitehall is spending literally hours making minor edits to inconsequential Wiki entries - why?:

Whitehall Edits.png (70.49 KiB) Viewed 13485 times

[Maeght]

Excellent article from Alistair Campbell about football racism on his blog.

Sorry for some reason can't do link on Ipad today.

Here you go Maeght.

http://www.alastaircampbell.org/blog/20 ... ut-racism/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Thank you yahyah

[rebeccariots2]

Patrick Wintour ‏@patrickwintour 7m7 minutes ago
Vince Cable's department given an extra £4bn to cover additional student loan losses. http://andrewmcgettigan.org/2015/02/17/ ... an-losses/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; …

[ScarletGas]

Excuse my middle aged cynicism but if the alleged Telegraph/Tory HQ emails story had been a similar Labour/Mirror story, the papers/BBC etc this morning would be telling us that it was a storm engulfing the Labour party & bad news for Ed. Instead, silence.

Morning everyone,
Though not posting due to horrors of tablet fingers(e.g I managed to order a 299.00 sonic hair removing thing from amazon while looking at books)I read all the comments.
Yah yah,my middle aged cynicism was alerted by the ant/DEC/Gallagher denouncing labour tales.FUnny,thought I,how untalented but no doubt very wealthy celebs decide to diss labour when Ed makes a public stand against tax avoiders/evaders.Like that Class woman and the mansion tax.
My heart bl3dsfor them.

Bore Da, YahYah/Rebecca

YahYah Agree with every word.

Rebecca, Mylene Klass is an inveterate attention seeker (see her recent twitter row with parents at her childrens private school which turned out to be based on year old tweets) who like other Z list "celebrities" need to generate column inches to keep themselves in the public eye.Why she was invited onto that programme heaven only knows.The only surprise is she has not yet turned up on Question time (to my knowledge)

To be fair to these Ant&Dec/Noel Gallagher (and I know how difficult that can be sometimes) in both instances they were also pretty scathing of Cameron,Osborne & Clegg and the political class in general but the MSM headlines only detailed the EM comments.

Knowing that a people remember headlines rather than drill down into paragraph 17 of a story where they "balance" their article then its job done for their right wing friends.

Gives even more substance to YahYah comments

[rebeccariots2]

Kiran Stacey ‏@kiranstacey 7m7 minutes ago
Latest polls from @LordAshcroft show Tories holding onto 4 seats they're defending against Ukip - but only just: http://bit.ly/17zmETt" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Mike Smithson @MSmithsonPB · 21m 21 minutes ago
Lord A UKIP-CON marginals data finds little evidence of anti-purple tactical voting. 18/19% of 2010 LABLIBCON vote goes UKIP but not enough

Mike Smithson @MSmithsonPB · 26m 26 minutes ago
Latest Lord Ashcroft marginals polling finds it’s not going to be as easy for UKIP to take CON seats as was thought http://bit.ly/1Le1Ule" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[AngryAsWell]

Getting towards the end of the article now ... shambles from start to finish and just look at this...

Yet GDS' users didn’t see a great success. BBC Newsnight’s Chris Cook didn't buy into the digital buzzwords, and highlighted the flaws in a devastating analysis.

Huge amounts of actual information had been destroyed, while many of the new pages consisted of fluff and filler. Cook criticised a “silly one-size-fits-all design,” noting crucially that GOV.UK "regularised the irrelevant and allows variation in the essential.”

Functionality had also been lost: "There are also really simple things it can't do that (some) older government sites can.” He concluded the GOV.UK transition came “at a massive cost to users”.

The criticism stung, as GDS staff knew it was true. Managers forbade staff from Tweeting their indignation back at Cook – and the usually chatty Whitehall office went social media silent.

Cook wasn’t alone. As more and more functional government websites were sucked into GDS, employers, accountants and tax experts all criticised the GOV.UK transition.

“GOV.UK is a huge step backwards in terms of good content that was easy to read & understand”, "an insult to intelligence, misleading, incomplete and, I think I can say without fear of contradiction from my respected peers, not something that can be recommended as a good source of content to my clients should I wish them to think I was doing a good job,” wrote one unfortunate user.

Cook’s observation was astute. The more specialist the need, the worse GDS had failed the users, who were asking, "where has that useful information gone?"

Thanks to GDS, doing business in or with UK plc had just become more expensive and more difficult. Yet insiders say it could have been worse: HMRC's Transition provides some useful lessons, as management at the Revenue wrestled some degree of control away from GDS' “Shoreditch types".

I first twigged my car wasn't taxed when my husband, who had given me his old one, got a refund for the remainder of his tax. When I searched online for information about the car tax changes I ended up getting all my information from an article in the Liverpool Echo (I don't even live in Liverpool). This is a direct result of austerity as far as I'm concerned. There wasn't any "waste" under Labour as such, just a deliberate policy of keeping the public informed about government policies that concerned them, which this government decided wasn't necessary. The chaos will only get worse, I suspect. I still haven't been able to find out what the official school leaving age is, whether Labour's rise to 17 in 2013 and then 18 in 2015 has ever come into law. You'd think, even with my modest internet skills, this information would be easy to find. Meanwhile someone in Whitehall is spending literally hours making minor edits to inconsequential Wiki entries - why?:

Whitehall Edits.png

I've mentioned these wiki alteration a few times - just what is going on ? Can it be anything to do with making deleted files unrecoverable? As in the "bites" are overwritten ? Not computer literate enough to understand properly but when I once had to get an expert in to recover a deleted file he told me not to use the computer before he got here so that none of the lost file got overwritten. Anyone cast any light on this?

[ohsocynical]

The little bits and pieces I've picked up about the government's jobs website has made me greatly concerned that a tragedy is just around the corner. I think I have qualms because of the story a long time ago about the young female estate agent who was murdered when meeting a client that she didn't have full details for. I've read that jobseekers are being forced on threat of sanction to apply for jobs that are little more than a mobile number. This worries me greatly. The whole point of the jobcentre when I was young was that all the jobs had been verified by the jobcentre staff as being legitimate and local. No commission scam / Kleeneeze types of non-jobs. Of course that was before working tax credits ensured someone earning nothing touting tupperware catalogues would still have an income and therefore could be classed as "employed". I always liked Gordon Brown, his heart was in the right place, but the extent to which his tax credit scheme has been abused by this lot to cover up their appalling onslaught on our economy has been disastrous.

Labour's pledge of no targets for sanctions is important, I think. Being harsh on jobseekers is popular with voters so there is unlikely to be any overt policy changes, but then much of what is most wrong with the system isn't even official policy anyway, it's happening behind the scenes in secret. Even if Labour simply followed the current official policy on jobseekers claims, it would be a huge improvement on what is happening now.

I share your concerns - especially when jobs in the sex / lap dancing type industries are also part of the model. Trouble with the last point you make is that - whilst I agree with you - it's not going to be enough to reassure a lot of people about the worth of voting Labour unfortunately. It seems to me that you have to be able to completely block off any personal morals or empathy to hold down a job as a job centre or DWP manager these days. I couldn't do it. And some of them must have children or other members of their families who have been out of work ... how do they square that experience with what they are doing?

It reminds me of "I didn't know" or "I was only following orders". Someone posted on Twitter about having to sign the Official Secrets Act.

I'm sorry but if I got put on the spot by suddenly having to treat customers so badly, I'd tear it up and stuff it up their arse. If there aren't enough people with the guts to stand up to this shit, we're done.

[mikems]

Who is behind the fiasco of Government IT? It's old Mankie Fraud himself. Last year there was some comment here about him not having any idea about IT development, agile or not, and that a disaster was in the offing. I remember saying that agile production absolutely depends on close and constant contact with users and that government departments were probably amongst the organisations least capable of it.

[ephemerid]

@Ephemerid


Different levels of languishing,important to propagandise supporting the very few (most people are purposely doing so out of habit and financial penalisation is the way to go to persuade them to give up this habit of being ill)genuinely ill,but to be clear they are still languishing for x years and we are so generous in doing so.We're not total barstewards.PS everybody they are languishing and we're paying for it.

Dave.

Dear HindleA,

Clariication of young David's note is required.
There is languishing, and then there is languishing.

Ill people languish all the time as we know. In bed, in wheelchairs, during chemo, on dialysis, and detained under section.
If they have time for all this languishing, they have time to do work-related-activity, ie. work.

Workless people also languish all the time. They do it at home, they do it whilst smoking, they do it whilst drinking, they do it whilst being obese and watching Sky Movies on their 50" plasma televisions as they play bingo online.

Single mothers and people who call themselves carers languish in the most evil way - they blame their languishing on their children and on their relations, none of whom are young, ill, old, disabled, or anything else needing caring.

There is no excuse for this, and we will put a stop to it. There is work available for everyone and they will do it for pay or no pay.
Eventually there will be nobody who is workless or languishing, and that will save thousands of billions of pounds.

My policies may involve a few million sanctions now and then, but as dear Esther says (fetchingly, especially in that little blue skirt) the vast vast vast majority don't get a sanction and only 0,000003% actually fail to allow us to help them.
As we move towards the outright ban on languishing, and head into the sunny uplands of full employment where nobody need ever suffer from their worklessness again, the need for sanctions will simply disappear.

My nanny, Ms.Poppins, always said that a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down - well, I think that's a very namby-pamby way of dealing with intransigent worklessness and I will not stand idly by while people eat sugar which makes them fat. No. Fatter.

As I said to God only the other day, his boy would have got nowhere if he languished all day. He got a lot done in a few short years before he died, which only goes to show that hard work never killed anybody.

As one of my more intelligent supporters, HindleA, I expect you to pass on this clarification to all and sundry - including the boy Cameron, who for some reason is hiding from the public.

Yours, Iain.

[AngryAsWell]

Its these sort of hidden voting intentions that make me convinced there will be a Landslide
"The survey questioned 2,020 members of the alliance – which says it is an umbrella organisation for up to 2 million evangelical Christians – in August and September 2014 and found that 40 per cent were going to change their vote from 2010. Conservative support fell from 40 per cent to 28 per cent, compared to Labour support which grew from 22 per cent to 31 per cent. Liberal Democrat support also fell, while Ukip grew from 2 per cent to 12 per cent."
(From AS blog)
Coupled with - yesterday I think - the legal profession calling on twitter for all solicitors to vote Labour, there will be a much bigger swing than any fixed poll is indicating.

[Willow904]

@AngryasWell

The first interest in Wiki edits from Whitehall computers was related to a series of amendments to Scottish football pages. The edits seemed relevant enough for those interested in Scottish Football and easily explained by a civil servant using a Whitehall computer during lunch or whatever to indulge a hobby.

There's been a series of edits now, though, that started before Christmas, that are obscure in the extreme and apparently being undertaken alphabetically. My guess (and I have nothing to back this up but gut feeling) is that they are camouflage. That when Whitehall realised people were paying attention to their Wiki edits they realised that any controversial edit would be all over the twitterverse in minutes. The best way to maintain an appearance of transparency whilst burying significant amendments is to flood the Whitehall Edits twitter page with hundreds of red herrings. I really think that's what they are. Why else would someone in Whitehall be editing a Wiki page on an American high school:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?dif ... =631560707

[mikems]

Could it be that some Wikipedia editing software is being developed and tested in some Govt dept? Should be easy peasy to find out - the most transparent government ever, and all.

Why not do an FOI?

[rebeccariots2]

Its these sort of hidden voting intentions that make me convinced there will be a Landslide
"The survey questioned 2,020 members of the alliance – which says it is an umbrella organisation for up to 2 million evangelical Christians – in August and September 2014 and found that 40 per cent were going to change their vote from 2010. Conservative support fell from 40 per cent to 28 per cent, compared to Labour support which grew from 22 per cent to 31 per cent. Liberal Democrat support also fell, while Ukip grew from 2 per cent to 12 per cent."
(From AS blog)
Coupled with - yesterday I think - the legal profession calling on twitter for all solicitors to vote Labour, there will be a much bigger swing than any fixed poll is indicating.

I take some heart from the number of unlikely sectors - lawyers a case in question - that have been well and truly shafted by this govt and are, rightly IMO, peed off. It ought - if there is any kind of justice (pun intended) - to make a difference to the way a lot of them vote. I also think there is a small business vote there for the wooing ... because they are the ones being really shafted by the ability of Amazon, Starbucks and co to get away with paying so little tax and using every means they can re zero hours contracts etc to make the playing field as unfairly lumpy as is possible for the businesses that pay tax here and treat their employees fairly. Come on Labour - shout it loud.

[rebeccariots2]

Could it be that some Wikipedia editing software is being developed and tested in some Govt dept? Should be easy peasy to find out - the most transparent government ever, and all.

Why not do an FOI?

What a truly terrifying thought. It's like something out of Gulliver's travels .... rain cloud making machines to defeat the enemy and all that.