Teen beauty spot drinkers are ramblers, not rebels
- Dave Burrows
Letter: Blame the bankers, not public sector workers
Wednesday 7th December 2011, 8:20AM GMT.
I fully support all the hard working public sector workers who are willing to stand up for what is right and fair, and who are now being made out to be villains.
It was the highly paid financial ‘city experts’ who, supported by the politicians, got all of us into this sorry mess.
But the ordinary person is now being forced to pay dearly for their mistakes.
We all enjoy the security of an organised society and are grateful when we need a nurse, firefighter, or a health worker, but we are being brainwashed by this Government that somehow it is the public sector (many low paid) and not the bankers who are being unreasonable in wanting a living wage and pension that is fair.
The simple facts are that some the highest paid people in the country lost all our money, and have been bailed out by our money, and now the lowest paid are being forced to pay for it, either by lost jobs, pension, or loss of services.
I must have missed it where the politicians and the bankers all stood up in public and said to the nation ‘sorry we got it wrong and lost your money, and that they were really grateful for the bailout’.
Let’s remember where the blame lies and this is not coming from a public sector worker, but someone who has a business.
Nick Holden
Shrewsbury
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put your bin out a few inches too far & you get fined.
be a banker & steal millions every year demanding the poor to pay it back,& you get away clean without as much as a raised eyebrow.
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Finally a sensible letter in the Shropshire Star, thanks Nick.
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Alas, if it were so simple!
True, it was the banks who initially precipitated the financial problems which surfaced in 2008, but the underlying sovereign debt problems have been there for decades. The fundamental issue that the government now faces is how to reduce this debt to more manageable levels and this can only be done by reigning in public spending or by increasing taxes. The public sector workers are not the only ones being forced to take their ‘medicine’, countless others in the private sector have already lost their jobs or been forced to accept pay cuts. Public sector employees cannot expect to remain immune.
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‘Public sector employees cannot expect to remain immune.’ But bankers, top execs and their mates in parliament can?
I second what Grey says. At long last a letter in the Star which makes sense.
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I’m sick to death of hearing that “we’re all in this together”.
Francis Maude, who has been lecturing us a lot recently, will receive a parliamentary pension of at least £43,000 – that’s before his pension from his previous merchant banking career is taken into account.
That’s at least EIGHT TIMES the average public sector “gold plated” pension.
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brilliant letter, straight to the point of blame.
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‘You see the recovery always comes ’round again
there’s nothing to worry for things will look after themselves.
It’s alright recovery always comes ’round again
there’s nothing to worry if things can only get better.
Bigger slump and bigger wars and a smaller recovery
Huger slump and greater wars and a shallower recovery’
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Yes blame the bankers , but they are not going to be the section of society who will have to assist and play a part in resolving the issue we all find ourselves in .
So blame anyone you like then we ALL need to deal with it.
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Well said, Andrew. Actually though, the bankers have not been, and are still not immune, although it might seem so. It’s also easy to overlook the fact that the financial sector continues to make a massive contribution to UK plc (which is why the EU would like to impose a transaction tax – they want a share of it!)It’s ironic that many who protest changes to public sector pensions and howl about bankers, long for a return of the Labour party to government, but it was the “Chancellor of the Century” who gave the greedy bankers free rein, who built the economy on the sands of public sector employment and consumer credit spending, and who also oversaw our plunge into a debt abyss. Ed Balls was part of that and today, Labour have no magic solution or even any alternative economic vision. It’s tough. No one likes it, but anyone in employment, let alone pensionable employment, should be grateful, not resentful. Blame the bankers, blame the politicians, blame who you like, but get your head around the fact that change there will be, because there must be.
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I’m afraid that the bankers, and indeed the wealthy in general, are indeed immune from the recession. Look at the figures for executive pay and how it has risen astronomically if you don#t believe me.
Everyone else, public or private sector, takes cut after cut in the values of their income, whilst Cameron amd his millionaire old-Etonian mates sneer at them.
As far as our debt to GDP ratio is concerned, it is amongst the lowest in the Western economies, and far lower than it has been at time in the past.
Approximately half of our current debt was caused by having to bail out failing banks, but instead of hanging on to these until their debt has been paid off with interest, this government wants to hand them over on the cheap to their mates, leaving us to pick up the rest of the bill.
I cannot recall any clamour from the Tory party to tighten up on the banks and financial insitutions (who let’s not forget provide more than 50% of the Tory party’s funds) – on the contrary they were always calling for less ‘red tape’.
The current government are also making it even easier for the wealthy to avoid paying UK tax, by shipping their income and profits abroad.
Surely part of the the answer is to simply make the rich pay the same proportion of their income in tax as the rest of us do rather than constantly hitting upon the poor?
Typically the very wealthy pay less than 10% of their income in tax – the rest of us have no such option. Who could possibly object to that?
We need to wrestle our economic control back from international bond traders and other gamblers who casually play with our livelihoods as chips in their game.
How often have you heard in the news recently governments announcing changes made to improve their economies only to then hear them talk about ‘appeasing the markets’ – how the hell did we get into a situation where the unelected, completely undemocratic markets ended up governing us?
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Look here people its not about blaming anyone, plenty of bank workers are low paid and also many e.g barclays still have final salary pensions too. Sadly we are in a crisis, its no ones fault lets just all pull together and sort it out please, the people who work in banks are peoples mums, dads and loved ones, not ogres and they are generating more GDP and exports for this country than most
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Mary, you may think you are being kind and tolerant, but I’m afraid you’re just being a wimp. Shall I come round and burgle your house, safe in the knowledge that you will just say ‘Sadly I’ve lost everything, but it’s no-one’s fault’ ???
No-one is blaming the people who sit behind the counter at your local high street bank – do you not understand that there are people who just gamble with your money and mine and get away scot free when they make a catastrophic pig’s ear of it all?
… however many lovely family members they have.
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It’s a funny old world, Kath. Over on another thread, there’s talk of birching or deporting the people who took part in the summer riots. Now I’m all for bringing criminals to justice but presumably that would include people like the silly girl who’d never been in trouble before but who, in the midst of the riot, found herself in possession of two left shoes. But bankers and fraudulent execs? Oh no, the country needs them. They’re in it together with us.
I prefer comparing the bankers with incompetent gamblers. Let’s say Mary gives me 100 pounds to safeguard and I go and put it, together with some other peoples’ money, on a three-legged nag at Bangor races. Afterwards I tell Mary that, not only can I not pay her back (because I’ve just discovered that three-legged nags, just like mortgages on properties that’ll never be built, don’t always come good), I need more of her money to pay off my other debts. At the same time, I tell her that she and I are in this together. I also tell her what sweet people my mum, dad and siblings are. And she believes me and pays up.
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Nice one James – but I’m still not sure my burglary analogy is far off the mark.
Oh, and when you break the bad news to Mary, be sure to tell her that her neighbours have won 50p on the horses rather than losing their shirt – and if she wants to blame anybody she should target them, after all they are a bit richer than her.
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Nicely put James!
Compassion and empathy are wasted on bankers… not only do they not deserve it, they probably don’t even understand what those things are. Sub-human parasites getting fat off the rest of us, with Cameron and his cronies green-lighting it all.
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‘Compassion and empathy are wasted on bankers… not only do they not deserve it, they probably don’t even understand what those things are.’
Also a very good point. I read an interesting study recently saying that a lot of them – and some of those top company execs who keep fleecing us – share certain sociopathic characteristics with people locked up long-term in Broadmoor.
@Andrew Finch, if you were a victim of a burglary (to borrow Kath’s analogy) I assume you would want to see justice pursued(?)In what significant way are fraudulent bankers (and swindling MPs, fraudulent execs etc) different?
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Errata to the above;
Barclays no longer has a final salary pension, and haven’t for about 5 years.
Let’s be honest here, people don’t like the top execs of Banks (as opposed to yer cashiers and the like). Why ?
A) Because they got in out of their depth with regards to liquidity
B) Because they gambled more than they could afford to lose.
C) Because they got involved in a global Ponzi scheme
Now consider that a bank chief execs purpose is to primarily look after a) their staff and b) the shareholders, yet…
A) Their shares crashed and are yet to recover, in all likelihood they will continue to badly perform.
B) Their shareholders are not well pleased
C) Their staff are not well pleased.
So, this is why people are unhappy with Banks, because they’re right to be.
But, you’re right. Banks, Public Sector workers, Politicans of whatever hue are a patsy when it comes to the root cause of the mess.
The problem is the system and only a new system can get us out.
Thinking caps on everyone!
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Excellent letter, Nick, thanks. Finally a counterbalance to all the jealous whingers who have fallen for the trick of snapping at their neighbour instead of placing the blame firmly where it belongs.
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It is the Bankers and those who helped to turn the housing market in to a money go round.I recently watched a program where a property developer had debts of 15 million and bragged about being able to get 50 million worth of loans over breakfast,yet in the same program a young Teacher spoke of the joy of getting on the housing ladder with a 40 year mortgage but the new developments owners went bust and she is living on a estate with only a hand full of people surrounded by half built houses and roads and her house is now worth half of what she paid for it.The chap who bragged about millions in debt laughed and said but i still get my 250 euro a year so everything isn’t that bad i agree totally with letter writer.
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A really good letter I agree with the writer’s views 100% Cameron is using newspapers such as The Sun to try to put down the poison towards public sector workers.
A pension of £4K per year is hardly gold plated.
It’s a good job people can hopefully see the wood for the trees in this.
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I agree! Public service workers are heroes, just remember next time theres a war on or a flu epedemic or a recession or a snow fall or a terrorist attack who it is who picks up all the peices and fixes it all again.
its the public sector workers!
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All said and done i much prefer to put my energy and time in to something i can actually do something about.
Sitting in a corner moaning about rich bankers and rich people in general does not help anything, you will not win on that score, it is nothing about wimping out just being aware of what can be changed and what stays the same always has been and always will be.
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That’s very depressing and pessimistic Andrew. You’re absolutely spot-on of course, but it’s nice to dream that one day it will be the bankers up against the wall being made to suffer!
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Succinct and to the point; thank you Nick. Finally a letter that makes sense and does not buy into our leaders’ demonisation of public sector workers, immigrants, the unemployed, the disabled.
Whatever people may state, the bottom line is that the great and glorious financial sector, left unrestrained by not just the previous government, but also by the one before that, was part of a global clique that brought us to our knees. Increasingly complex packages of debts traded as financial products, pyramid schemes, sub-prime mortgages – these were not thought up by the public sector or the majority of the private sector. But these are the people that are having to reap the whirlwind while a minority reward their incompetence with massive bonuses. RBS, which I believe I, as a member of the public, have a not-insignificant share of, awarded bonueses of £500,000,000 days ago; not to its front-line staff, but to the “investment” staff yet to turn a significant profit.
How many day centres could remain open with that sum? How many small businesses could have their overdraft/credit facilities extended to bring them through this financial storm?
I rest easy in the knowledge that our elected ministers will have their gold-plated pensions, (though they are the only public sector workers I know of who will) and that once out of office, they will be kept busy with non-executive directorships paying significant six figure salaries, often on the boards of investment banks.
I would love people to stop the blame game, whether for bankers or the public sector and to just get on with building back our economy. But this isn’t going to happen. Our leaders of whichever political colour have too much to lose by letting this happen. It’s just a shame that people like Nick and the many others who have contributed to this debate in a meaningful way aren’t heard above the Mail/Sun reading masses, who allow the wool to be drawn so far over their eyes and allow themselves to be ruled by fear, lies and ignorance.
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I dont feel that this divide between public and private is helpful. In the real world most households and families have a mix of public and private sector for example a businessman married to a nurse or a soldier who has a grandad working at B&Q
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I have paid for the bankers blunder with my job. I was a public sector worker with a family earning under £20k. I now have no money, my wife is trying to work more shifts and xmas is comming. I am getting interviews for jobs but for some reason not getting them perhaps Iam too old or expensive. The government only seem interested in helping 18 to 25 year olds.
I strongly believe that the bankers should be held responsible and should have all their pay and bonuses capped. They say that they earn their bonus from their tallent. I for one dont think that they have any. I hope they enjoy their Turkey as we cannot afford one this year!
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Gary you paid the ultimate price by losing your job, do not ruin your life pointing the finger of blame for that moan and move on, at he end of the day it was a below average paid job .
Dust yourself down and look what choices you have loads are out there, look at alternatives ie self employment why be a slave to low pay?.
Xmas is coming so what?? short of cash do not spend any on xmas why make life harder for yourself.
2012 is a new year look at it as a chance to improve and better ones lot, not as a dark tunnel where others are to blame for your problems .
Yes they cost you your job but they will not be to blame if you are still on benefits or unemployed and bitter in 6 months that will lay firmly at your feet.
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Andrew Finch, your reply to Gary is condescending bilge of the lowest order.
Your deeply held conviction that ‘some things stay the same and always will be’ is also utter tosh.
History has been shaped by people who have fought against social and economic injustice, from trade unionists, suffragettes, gay rights campaigners, black rights activists.
The centre ground moves. Years ago women having the vote, homosexuality being decriminalised – even a minimum wage may have seemed politically impossible goals – yet here we are now.
And given that there are 5 unemployed people for every vacancy, the public sector is shedding jobs at three times the rate the private sector can create them and the Jobcentres are funnelling free labour to companies like Tesco and Matalan, your assertion that Gary will ‘have himself to blame’ if he finds himself unemployed in 6 months time is inexcusably pomopous drivel.
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Oh if you say so Arther, and while your at it spouting your particular drivel get the violins out, Your attitude sums up UK of today something for nothing,everyone else to blame and no self responsibility.In this county nobody should be able to say nope couldn’t find any form of work after 6 months reason is it is a lie by people who do not try hard enough .
I couldn’t careless what qualifications anyone has unemployed is unemployed, funneling cheap labour what rubbish cheap labour stopped when min wage was introduced .
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Unbelievable condescending drivel!
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‘everyone else to blame and no self responsibility.’
Andrew, your problem is you’re very selective about who should have to take responsibility and whose wrongdoings should be quietly forgotten.
Thus from Post 7 ;
‘blame the bankers , but they are not going to be the section of society who will have to assist and play a part in resolving the issue we all find ourselves in.’
If they (the bankers) took responsibility as you’re so insistent Gary and others like him should do, they most certainly WOULD have to help resolve the issue. After all, they’re the primary reason there’s an issue to resolve in the first place.
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Nothing constructive to say then???
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Andrew, under your definition of ‘constructive’, which seems to be that ‘everyone is responsible for solving a problem except the people who caused it’, I suspect I probably don’t have much ‘constructive’ to say. So sorry.
But in my seemingly antiquated little world, if I lose or misuse somebody else’s money, whether through lending it onto someone untrustworthy, gambling it on a useless horse or drinking it away in a pub, it’s my job to make sure I pay every penny back. I ask again ; why should greedy, incompetent bankers be any different?
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Wish I was a banker.
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I thought your comments were unkind. Gary’s £20k beats benefit or having to run a household on one income. Also, work gives us a sense of purpose and a community. I left the public sector in circumstances not entirely of my own choosing and am now self employed. Even though my overheads are low as I can work from my house the retraining and start up costs were many, many thousands. It’s not as easy as you suggest.
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Gary, I hope you find suitable employment soon. You mentioned that the bankers state that they earn their bonuses from their talent. I wonder what talent that is? Maybe they get another bonus when they get another poor customer to take out a credit card or loan they cannot afford. Responsible lenders? Desperate lenders more like.
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utter rubbish, under gordon brown public sector pay rocketed and its now payback time. Pay and perks including gold plated final salary pensions are completely unfair and unsustainable. So it must be cut and also sheer numbers must come down to get people into productive industry instead of non jobs which do nothing for the real economy
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Just a few facts for you, blue boy:-
After 33 years as a civil servant, my final annual salary was £17663.00.
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To blue boy,
I was a civil servant for 33 years. My final annual pay was £17663.00. Not exactly a lot, is it?
My pension, payable in 2016 if I live that long, will be £7213.39 gross per year. Hardly gold-plated, is it?
And just what do you class as non-jobs? Police, doctors, nurses, firemen? The list is endless
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we have all paid for the bankers blunders with this recession
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Oh, and we get plenty of whingeing about ‘the unions’ – from the right w(h)ingers on here, yet anyone who airs a genuine grievance about ordinary people paying the price for the follies of a rich elite are ‘moaners’ and ‘bitter’.
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I questioned my bank about them being bailed out by the taxpayer. I also asked why £4000 of interest was added to my mortgage each year despite this. They said they “could not comment”.
The bankers get stupendous bonuses on top of their already comfortable salary, try to get their customers to take out more and more loans and credit cards and then bleat to the government when they need help. This country is upside down and no mistake.
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“get their customers to take out more and more loans and credit cards”
Do you not think customers who have become debt laden have only themselves to blame??? they took out the loans credit cards etc instead of buying what they could afford.
Banks guilty, i agree in part of having low rules with regards who they lend to , now they have in place the rules they should have had and few can get a mortgage, few can get credit cards and few can get loans , that is how it should be .
Save, buy when you can afford it not just 20 credit cards and loan after loan just because you have a mortgage, what are people doing with two credit cards???why do people buy brand new cars if they need a loan to buy it they cant afford it live with in your budget cameron was correct get rid of your debt granted it will not help the economy but it will stop debt ridden middle/working class families going bankrupt and splitting up and becoming a burden on the state.
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Andrew, yes, a lot of customers will have themselves to blame. However, credit cards and loans may be the only way out in an otherwise dire situation for others. Of course banks will encourage this. All they see is profit, profit, profit.
I do agree that people should not be getting into debt to buy brand new cars. Have you noticed the huge amount of ’11′ plates on the road this year? Either there are a lot of well off people, or lots of people living beyond their means. I have never had a new car and I am in my 40′s, it doesn’t bother me.
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Re brand new cars – Andy, have no regrets. I’ve had three and they have all been trouble and got me into time consuming disputes. I wouldn’t dream of buying another. My 17 year old Golf convertible has only had one bill in the 12 years I have had it.
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Andrew Finch – “cheap labour stopped when min wage was introduced”.
You’re obviously unaware that people on jobseekers allowance are being forced – on pain of losing their benefit – to work up to 30 hours over 8 weeks for companies such as Tesco.
The companies don’t pay them. This is clearly a case of the taxpayer subsidising the labour costs of companies who make billions in profit.
While they’re available at no cost, why would an employer pay take anyone on at the minimum wage?
That eight week period covers the festive season nicely. Hard luck for the out of work looking to pick up a bit of seasonal work to tide them over, eh?
I’ve backed my comments up with facts.
Maybe you’d like to do the same when making comments like
“In this county nobody should be able to say nope couldn’t find any form of work after 6 months reason is it is a lie by people who do not try hard enough”.
You should have some pretty sound evidence before you accuse people in Gary’s position of being liars.
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Forced labour is a very slippery slope. People on benefit in Germany are required to take any work, including prostitution. There for the grace…
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