Bolitics The New Condem Government

[peterms]

Regardless of where your political allegiances lie I am sure most would agree that there is something seriously wrong in the fact that these cuts have hit the poorest in society the hardest, aside from the richest 2%.

And the impact on the richest 2%, let's not forget, is because of the last government's decisions on taxes, not because Osborne and Cameron are recent converts to progressive taxation.

[blandy]

...its basically been a pack of lies since before the election, maybe all politicians are like that...

Ain't no maybe about it, Drat. All parties do it. Sometimes they do it to win votes, sometimes they do it and then realise what they wanted to do was not really feasible when things change, or they find out from the civil servants that things are not as they thought (applies to nee Gov'ts only, not re-elected ones), sometimes, as we now find out, they do it because their coalition partners draw a line that they will not cross.

Aside from the party allegiances, I'm not really that bothered by many of the broken pledges - you can look at the Uni student fees thing, something brought in by Labour, despite a promise not to do so, then increased by ConLib, despite the Libs promising not to. But in the end, in that example, there's sound argument on all counts to do what has been each time been done.

Anyone who thinks any party will stick to any promise 100% needs to look at the past and see that it's unlikely to be guaranteed that all promises will be met.

Then you have so called core values - Labour for the poor, or Tories to look after working people, or whatever - these things take sudden leaps, and you end up with parties priorities being "adjusted" by all kinds of forces - political one-upmanship (Labour getting rid of the 10% tax band), Tories abolishing child benefit for more well off people.

It goes on all the time. Outrage at it is fine, but should ,IMO be sometimes temepered by acceptance of circumstances and at other times, speaking about all of us, directed not with partisanship, but at all of the beggars.

[blandy]

Regardless of where your political allegiances lie I am sure most would agree that there is something seriously wrong in the fact that these cuts have hit the poorest in society the hardest, aside from the richest 2%. This all at the same time as the bankers, who most would agree were the cause of this mess, have got off lightly with a levy of only 2.5billion a year.

Tory, Labour, Lib Dem, Green etc wherever your allegiance lies surely we should all agree this just doesn't sit right.

To blame the bankers negates that they weren’t regulated properly and that the government themselves failed to see what was going to happen. Brown as chancellor and prime minister believed his prudence had ended boom and bust; had he been a bit more like the humble minister at the kirk he might have actually been better.

What worries me is not that the poor will be hit hardest, but the vulnerable. I think one has to make a distinction; some people cannot help themselves through no fault of their own. These are the people that society should protect. In the traditional English village these are the people that charity supported....

True about the Gov't (and Tories) leaving the bankers too much free reign, but equally, the bankers still did it. They didn't have to. They chose to. They didn't just wreck the economy, they wrecked their own banks.

I agree about the distinction between the "poor" and the "vulnerable", (acknowledging that poverty makes people more vulnerable, in most cases).

[Awol]

The Government does owe people a living even if too many now believe the reverse.

(Like your last sentence)

Typo from hell there.

[peterms]

...These are the people that society should protect. In the traditional English village these are the people that charity supported....

That's an interesting reference.

In the traditional English village, say 150-200 years ago, there were various forces at play. There was charity for the "deserving poor", often given out in a way which made the recipient express gratitude and thanks directly to the donor. We are generally less comfortable with that approach now.

There was relief in a more institutional setting. Snowy's earlier pictures of the workhouse give an example. The point here was to make the recipient feel demeaned. That spirit lives on, and still informs some of the philosophy of the DWP and the attitude of a minority of the staff who work there; Daily Mail leader writers keep that flame alive.

There was brutality and exploitation, ranging from child labour, to whipping poor people from the parish, to overlooking enforced and unpaid prostitution among domestic servants.

There was simple, direct, generous charity.

There was social engineering, on the lines of Cadbury, New Lanark, and others.

There was unspeakable cruelty towards people with mental health problems - well, some of them, those who were likely to get pushed aside, rather than the ones who ended up commanding regiments.

But there was certainly a distinction between the deserving and undeserving poor. Much of this week's debate, and the anecdotal, shitty journalism which has laid the path for it, has reprised that 200-year old discussion. And the other one which just won't go away is "Where shall the poor live? In town, so I can get my stairs swept and my dinner made? Or elsewhere, so I don't see them and I can sell my land for more expensive housing?"

[peterms]

The Government does owe people a living even if too many now believe the reverse.

(Like your last sentence)

Typo from hell there.

A typo? I thought you'd come over to the dark side. :cry:

[PauloBarnesi]

True about the Gov't (and Tories) leaving the bankers too much free reign, but equally, the bankers still did it. They didn't have to. They chose to. They didn't just wreck the economy, they wrecked their own banks.

The banks were wrecked because they lent too much money to people they shouldn’t have. But also they lent a lot of money to people who should have known better. People who thought like GB that boom and bust had gone. To single out bankers fails to deal with the millions and millions of people who borrowed beyond their means...

[peterms]

True about the Gov't (and Tories) leaving the bankers too much free reign, but equally, the bankers still did it. They didn't have to. They chose to. They didn't just wreck the economy, they wrecked their own banks.

And also let's not forget that deregulation wasn't something foisted on the banks against their will, but something they spent many years and much money lobbying, schmoozing, cajoling, entreating, bribing (possibly!), to bring about.

They are expert at holding a confidential briefing for a well-placed hack, having a quiet word over dinner with a minister, all the rest of the little tricks which undermine the democratic process and get them what they want.

Well, they got what they wanted. let's see them get the consequences, too. It is simply unacceptable that any of us, let alone the poorest, should pick up the bill for this bunch of clueless, avaricious chancers.

[peterms]

Nick calls a spade a spade (or, man in hole says "Pass me a bigger spade")

Nick Clegg, the deputy prime minister, today took the highly unusual step of attacking the respected Institute for Fiscal Studies, describing its methods of measuring the fairness of the coalition's controversial spending review as "distorted and a complete nonsense".

The Liberal Democrat leader also contradicted IFS claims that the spending review would see cuts in spending in classrooms by insisting the coalition had provided a cash increase per pupil for every schoolchild, and had added on top a pupil premium for deprived children worth £2.5bn. He described the premium as one of the biggest engines for long-term fairness.

In an interview with the Guardian Clegg also admitted that the government had not yet won the argument on why it is cutting the deficit at this pace, saying "we have more work to do".

He also distanced himself from Conservative backbenchers who cheered and waved their order papers at the end of George Osborne's statement on Wednesday cutting public spending by £81bn. "I don't think this is something to be triumphalist about ... this is a very serious task that we do not relish. This is not something I would get bunting out for. This is a really serious time."

Clegg said the work by the IFS took no proper account of public spending inputs, or the potential for some spending, such as the pupil premium, to improve social mobility.

"I think you have to call a spade a spade. We just fundamentally disagree with the IFS. It goes back to a culture of how you measure fairness that took root under Gordon Brown's time, where fairness was seen through one prism and one prism only which was the tax and benefits system. It is a complete nonsense to apply that measure, which is a slightly desiccated Treasury measure. People do not live only on the basis of the benefits they receive. They also depend on public services, such as childcare and social care. All of those things have been airbrushed out of the picture by the IFS."

He said "the richest are paying the most", and, in a reference to Labour, added: "Those who say otherwise are not being very straight with people and frankly they are frightening people."

Clegg argued that the Treasury had tried to provide more than a snapshot of tax and benefits, and instead give a richer picture including the interaction between taxes and benefits cuts, public service cuts and public service gains. "We are also trying to shift the debate bit by bit by asking fundamental questions about fairness from one generation to the next."

He admitted he had struggled with himself throughout the spending review. But he insisted "shrill allegations" that the state is going to be decimated did not stand up to scrutiny. "We are going to spend 5% more of national income on the state at the end of this process that Tony Blair and Gordon [brown] were in 1997. We are going to employ 200,000 more people in the public sector at the end of this process. I think it is a cavalier misrepresentation to claim somehow it is a scorched earth policy."

He also admitted that the decision to back a rise in university tuition fees – in contrast to his repeated election pledges – had been very difficult. "It quite understandably raises questions about promises politicians make. I signed a pledge that I have now not been able to honour."

But he said the more he looked at the alternative of the graduate tax, the more impractical it appeared. He had been very uneasy about the idea contained in Lord Browne's review into university funding of lifting the cap on tuition fees entirely, and was looking at how to keep one.

Clegg also disclosed that he had insisted the near £3bn cut in university funding in the spending review had not been so tough that it would be impossible to retain a cap. He also promised to prevent the rich being able to repay loans to cover fees more quickly and not face some penalty. "We have got to deal with the point that if you are wealthier you can pay the loan back more quickly and so reduce your costs. I don't think that is right at all."

He defended plans to cut funding for social housing and introduce a more short- term tenancy, closer to market rents, for social housing.

"Registered social landlords tell us that what would be the greatest catalyst for them to build homes is to allow rents for new tenants to drift up to something like 80% of market rents. They say that would give them the guaranteed revenue stream in order to invest to build new homes. People on low pay on those new rents will be compensated in full through housing benefit."

[leviramsey]

I think the US is again feeling the impact of some of those effects - 1.5m people spending at least one night in a homeless shelter in 2009, and no, not as a fundraising event. No thanks.

A stunning level of ignorance of facts in that post. If this homeless advocacy group (so it's presumably not right-wing propaganda) is to be believed, the UK has a higher homelessness rate than the USA...

Western Europe has, in general, at least as big a homelessness problem as the USA (Western European governments by and large pretend that there's no problem, and only a few pressure groups even attempt to call them on it).

(I fully expect you to suddenly become quiet when confronted with actual facts... I'm used to it by now)

[Gringo]

Second on the we have seen it before and will see it again bit, yes just like we have seen before ( and no doubt will again ) the Labour economic shambles in this country that once again the Conservative Party has to come in and do something about. Ask yourself why we see these cuts from the Tories after each Lab govt.

Thirdly we have seen it before and will see it again bit, yes just like we have seen before ( and no doubt will again ) the tory social shambles in this country that once again the bluelabour Party has to come in and do something about. Ask yourself why we see this increased spending from the redtories after each Tory govt.

Each tory govt shapes the future, and each fake labour govt fund it.

* Privatising education - tory tick, nulabour tick

* Privatising nhs - tory tick, nulabour tick

* reducing bank regulation - tory tick, nulabour tick

Just two years ago the tories agreed with labour spending plans because all the policies were tory policies - labour had got rid of the nasty,dangerous stuff (min wage - how radical) in the first 1 and half parliaments - everything else (civil rights excluded) the tories have agreed with.

Whose fault are the cuts? The tories - they want to cut x deep

Whose fault is the tory govt? the nulabour party who destroyed the trust the people had given them.

[peterms]

I think the US is again feeling the impact of some of those effects - 1.5m people spending at least one night in a homeless shelter in 2009, and no, not as a fundraising event. No thanks.

A stunning level of ignorance of facts in that post. If this homeless advocacy group (so it's presumably not right-wing propaganda) is to be believed, the UK has a higher homelessness rate than the USA...

Western Europe has, in general, at least as big a homelessness problem as the USA (Western European governments by and large pretend that there's no problem, and only a few pressure groups even attempt to call them on it).

(I fully expect you to suddenly become quiet when confronted with actual facts... I'm used to it by now)

Oh dear. I feel chastised by the chiding tone of your post.

So, returning to facts, let's look at the page you quote.

You will see that the group adopts a broad definition of homelessness, which I think has merit, including "owner dissatisfaction in concealed households", and "risk of eviction".

You use this to counter a stat about the number of people in the US who have had to sleep in a homeless shelter?

Oh, please. You can do better than this. Can't you?

Come on, now, give me the facts...just the facts...comparing like with like, not apples with skateboards...

[Gringo]

True about the Gov't (and Tories) leaving the bankers too much free reign, but equally, the bankers still did it. They didn't have to. They chose to. They didn't just wreck the economy, they wrecked their own banks.

The banks were wrecked because they lent too much money to people they shouldn’t have. But also they lent a lot of money to people who should have known better. People who thought like GB that boom and bust had gone. To single out bankers fails to deal with the millions and millions of people who borrowed beyond their means...

Tha banks were wrecked due to fraud. Massive fraud, massive massive fraud. Most of it based around mortgage lending - this wasn't because they lent to the wrong person because they thought it was a good idea - they lent to the wrong person because they were lied to by the people presenting the loans - not the people taking the loans.

[leviramsey]

I think the US is again feeling the impact of some of those effects - 1.5m people spending at least one night in a homeless shelter in 2009, and no, not as a fundraising event. No thanks.

A stunning level of ignorance of facts in that post. If this homeless advocacy group (so it's presumably not right-wing propaganda) is to be believed, the UK has a higher homelessness rate than the USA...

Western Europe has, in general, at least as big a homelessness problem as the USA (Western European governments by and large pretend that there's no problem, and only a few pressure groups even attempt to call them on it).

(I fully expect you to suddenly become quiet when confronted with actual facts... I'm used to it by now)

Oh dear. I feel chastised by the chiding tone of your post.

So, returning to facts, let's look at the page you quote.

You will see that the group adopts a broad definition of homelessness, which I think has merit, including "owner dissatisfaction in concealed households", and "risk of eviction".

You use this to counter a stat about the number of people in the US who have had to sleep in a homeless shelter?

If you take those out, the implied number of homeless is still c. 600k, which is double the rate in the USA implied by the 1.5 million figure (and from personal experience, the majority of folks in the "sleeping on someone else's sofa" situation will end up spending a night in a shelter... the shelter statistic on the site I linked is, as best I can tell, a snapshot statistic).

[peterms]

I think the US is again feeling the impact of some of those effects - 1.5m people spending at least one night in a homeless shelter in 2009, and no, not as a fundraising event. No thanks.

A stunning level of ignorance of facts in that post. If this homeless advocacy group (so it's presumably not right-wing propaganda) is to be believed, the UK has a higher homelessness rate than the USA...

Western Europe has, in general, at least as big a homelessness problem as the USA (Western European governments by and large pretend that there's no problem, and only a few pressure groups even attempt to call them on it).

(I fully expect you to suddenly become quiet when confronted with actual facts... I'm used to it by now)

Oh dear. I feel chastised by the chiding tone of your post.

So, returning to facts, let's look at the page you quote.

You will see that the group adopts a broad definition of homelessness, which I think has merit, including "owner dissatisfaction in concealed households", and "risk of eviction".

You use this to counter a stat about the number of people in the US who have had to sleep in a homeless shelter?

If you take those out, the implied number of homeless is still c. 600k, which is double the rate in the USA implied by the 1.5 million figure (and from personal experience, the majority of folks in the "sleeping on someone else's sofa" situation will end up spending a night in a shelter... the shelter statistic on the site I linked is, as best I can tell, a snapshot statistic).

Oh, come on. Get real, as you cross-Atlantic peeps would say.

On the page you quote, there are nine categories of visible and hidden homeless. The one which is directly comparable to sleeping in night shelters is the third of the nine, "hostels, night shelters and refuges". You can also reasonably include category 1, rough sleepers; some of these will have spent nights in homeless shelters, others won't.

On the figures you quote, that's something like 44,000, as an overestimate. Far too many people, anyone would agree. But it leaves me wondering about the basis for your strident claim about my ignorance of the "fact" that the UK has a higher rate of homelessness than the US. The US has what, roughly 5x our population? So we would need more than 300,000 people sleeping in shelters even to catch up, never mind pass that? Or about, what, seven times the figure you claim to have found? Please feel free to correct my rough mental arithmetic here.

Oh, since you are concerned that I become quiet when confronted with "actual facts", I'm off to bed shortly, but I will be happy to review whatever "actual facts" you see fit to present in the morning. Night night!

[Gringo]

And on a side note. Red Ed's performance at PMQs yesterday was the lamest performance I have ever seen. Worse than IDS at his lamest. He needs some new script writers fast - the current ones seem to want him out of the way.

[leviramsey]

On the page you quote, there are nine categories of visible and hidden homeless. The one which is directly comparable to sleeping in night shelters is the third of the nine, "hostels, night shelters and refuges". You can also reasonably include category 1, rough sleepers; some of these will have spent nights in homeless shelters, others won't.

On the figures you quote, that's something like 44,000, as an overestimate. Far too many people, anyone would agree. But it leaves me wondering about the basis for your strident claim about my ignorance of the "fact" that the UK has a higher rate of homelessness than the US.

That's a "snapshot" statistic (and an incomplete one at that as it ignores "hostels and shelters directly provided by voluntary organisations, charities, and churches"), the number of people at one time in such a shelter. It is in no way comparable to the statistic (according to HUD, if you're using the source I think you're using) that 1.5 million people used a shelter for at least one night in a given year. To say that there are only 44k people over the year in the UK who were in that category because on any given night there are 44k in that category is as idiotic as claiming that only 43k people visit Villa Park in a year.

Per that same HUD source, the number on any given night in shelters is less than 400k.

Consider then that there is no US parallel to the B&B etc.: cheap short term single-room accommodation for the poor is essentially outlawed in most parts of the US (on the theory that the living conditions in those establishments are subhuman, despite being better than in a shelter), forcing those whose situation would, in the UK, put them in such accommodation onto the street or into shelters. Add the 38k to the 43k from the third category and you've got 81k, approximately a fifth of the USA's figure. Consider also that the UK figures are from early 2008 or late 2007 (before the economy turned sour) while the US figures are for 2009 (including the bottom of a recession) and that the UK figures are (according to the group presenting them) conservative in the absence of hard statistics while the US figure is probably reliable (nearly all shelters (including those run by religious groups thanks to Dubya's "faith-based" initiative bullshit) receive federal subsidy; as a condition of such subsidy they must report occupancy figures to HUD... the only possible error would arise from shelters juking the numbers). At the very least saying that there is a similar level of problem between the UK and US would appear to be the prudent course given the figures and their context.

[PauloBarnesi]

Well, they got what they wanted. let's see them get the consequences, too. It is simply unacceptable that any of us, let alone the poorest, should pick up the bill for this bunch of clueless, avaricious chancers.

So if Natwest, Lloyds, Halifax, Northern Rock, etc, etc had been allowed to go bankrupt what do you think would have happened? I suspect it wouldn’t have been pleasant.

[snowychap]

Well, they got what they wanted. let's see them get the consequences, too. It is simply unacceptable that any of us, let alone the poorest, should pick up the bill for this bunch of clueless, avaricious chancers.

So if Natwest, Lloyds, Halifax, Northern Rock, etc, etc had been allowed to go bankrupt what do you think would have happened? I suspect it wouldn’t have been pleasant.

It might well have put more of us 'in it together'.

[peterms]

That's a "snapshot" statistic (and an incomplete one at that as it ignores "hostels and shelters directly provided by voluntary organisations, charities, and churches")

You need to look at the whole quote.

the CORE database is the best available national source of data on hostels and similar accommodation. However, it does not include some hostels and shelters directly provided by voluntary organisations, charities and churches...CORE is only mandatory for providers with more than 250 beds across all their supported housing and so does not include entries for some people in smaller hostels. etc. But it also includes some types of supported housing that might not be considered to be ‘hostel-like'. Comparisons between the number of London records in CORE with those from the London Hostels Directory (which covers all hostels in London) suggests that these two factors roughly cancel out each other.

(my emphasis)

A lot of temp accommodation in this country is provided by volorgs, charities and to a much lesser extent, churches. Most of it is funded through the capital and revenue funding system which requires submission of the CORE data. Crisis is very well placed to know about the minority of temp accommodation which is outside this system, and as they explain in the section you have only partly quoted, they have made an allowance for it and explained their rationale for doing so.

Your statement that the figures exclude hostels and shelters provided by volorgs etc is wrong, as it is based on overlooking the explanation given by Crisis.

This is not to say that there is not a homelessness problem in the UK; there is, and it's about to get a lot worse.

...It is in no way comparable to the statistic (according to HUD, if you're using the source I think you're using) that 1.5 million people used a shelter for at least one night in a given year. To say that there are only 44k people over the year in the UK who were in that category because on any given night there are 44k in that category is as idiotic as claiming that only 43k people visit Villa Park in a year.

Per that same HUD source, the number on any given night in shelters is less than 400k.

Consider then that there is no US parallel to the B&B etc.: cheap short term single-room accommodation for the poor is essentially outlawed in most parts of the US (on the theory that the living conditions in those establishments are subhuman, despite being better than in a shelter), forcing those whose situation would, in the UK, put them in such accommodation onto the street or into shelters. Add the 38k to the 43k from the third category and you've got 81k, approximately a fifth of the USA's figure. Consider also that the UK figures are from early 2008 or late 2007 (before the economy turned sour) while the US figures are for 2009 (including the bottom of a recession) and that the UK figures are (according to the group presenting them) conservative in the absence of hard statistics while the US figure is probably reliable (nearly all shelters (including those run by religious groups thanks to Dubya's "faith-based" initiative bullshit) receive federal subsidy; as a condition of such subsidy they must report occupancy figures to HUD... the only possible error would arise from shelters juking the numbers). At the very least saying that there is a similar level of problem between the UK and US would appear to be the prudent course given the figures and their context.

I've just looked at the HUD figures in the 2008 annual report to Congress, and they're quite interesting.

On a single night in January 2008, there were 664,414 sheltered and unsheltered homeless persons nationwide. Nearly 6 in 10 people who were homeless at a single point-in-time were in emergency shelters or transitional housing programs, while 42 percent were unsheltered on the “street” or in other places not meant for human habitation.

That's an estimate of over a quarter of a million people sleeping rough, compared to the Crisis estimate of 700 here. The definition in both cases seems to be roughly similar, from what I can tell - people sleeping in tents, boxes, vehicles, or literally on the street. Of course in both countries it's hard to be very accurate about this number, because lots of street homeless people try to conceal themselves, for fear of attack.

I'm unclear how comparable some of the other figures are, because definitions will vary. For example, I can't tell what "emergency shelters or transitional housing programs" would equate to in UK definitions. Emergency shelter is probably broadly comparable, but it tends to be lumped together with the "transitional" bit, which is much less clear. But probably the street homeless figure is defined in a fairly similar way. On those figures, there seems to be a very significant difference of magnitude between the two countries, in this category, using snapshot figures in both cases.

On the B&B point, aren't motels or cheap hotels the nearest equivalent? Or is that the "voucher" system I've seen mentioned?