The Politics Thread

[Worthy4England]

And, seemingly, squeezed into the top ten percent of salary earners in the country. Which came as a surprise to me but didn't make me want to vote Tory.

The Rowntree Foundation and the IFS do quite a lot of research round this, the top decile is a lot lower than most people guess at.

[Bruce Rioja]

Has the context escaped you, Monty? We can all conduct a Google search.

And we can all ask pugnacious rhetorical questions (and sulk when they're answered).

OK - you obviously found the idea of grasping a concept a little difficult too, which surprises me. OK, I'll make this as easy as I can. How many people starved to death in Britain, per year, because foodbanks didn't exist? Over to you! (Don't sulk )

[William the White]

Has the context escaped you, Monty? We can all conduct a Google search.

And we can all ask pugnacious rhetorical questions (and sulk when they're answered).

OK - you obviously found the idea of grasping a concept a little difficult too, which surprises me. OK, I'll make this as easy as I can. How many people starved to death in Britain, per year, because foodbanks didn't exist? Over to you! (Don't sulk )

How would you know if I was lying?

[mummywhycantieatcrayons]

I think it's going to be very difficult to find reliable stats, mummy, but any brief internet search finds organisations connected with poverty action telling the same story of the growth of foodbank use, and the problem of working poor. Benefis delays and zero hours contracts would, I think, be two major causes of this.

I am strongly against zero hours contracts and think they are exploitative, but linking them and foodbanks without a solid reason too is the sort of spurious stuff that doesn't move the discussion on - so too talking about the minimum wage as a driver in this context if you haven't got the faintest idea how many people using food banks are working fulltime on minimum wage.

Who do you think should be collecting these stats?

People who want to illustrate their entrenched political views with references to food banks.

hmmm... it doesn't help when the govt. deliberately stops collecting data and then accuses foodbanks of not having the data that they could only have access to if the govt collected it...

I totally agree... but surely it won't do to fill the gap by making it up as we go along?

[Bruce Rioja]

Has the context escaped you, Monty? We can all conduct a Google search.

And we can all ask pugnacious rhetorical questions (and sulk when they're answered).

OK - you obviously found the idea of grasping a concept a little difficult too, which surprises me. OK, I'll make this as easy as I can. How many people starved to death in Britain, per year, because foodbanks didn't exist? Over to you! (Don't sulk )

How would you know if I was lying?

Que? Have I suggested anywhere that you either were or weren't lying?

[William the White]

Has the context escaped you, Monty? We can all conduct a Google search.

And we can all ask pugnacious rhetorical questions (and sulk when they're answered).

OK - you obviously found the idea of grasping a concept a little difficult too, which surprises me. OK, I'll make this as easy as I can. How many people starved to death in Britain, per year, because foodbanks didn't exist? Over to you! (Don't sulk )

How would you know if I was lying?

Que? Have I suggested anywhere that you either were or weren't lying?

No. But suppose I said 'seven'. How would you know it wasn't accurate?

[mummywhycantieatcrayons]

If you mean me, my views have always been on the left, but certainly not entrenched.

I don't really mean you - I have just noticed a lot of people with an anti-government point to make starting to decorate their arguments with reference to foodbanks, without it being clear where their information comes from.

As for the Trussell Trust... it's great that they can be a campaign group as well as a distributor of food to the needy... but I don't think they contribute to a debate based on facts if they stoke up talk of 'working people' using their services if they don't actually have the data on which to base such statements.

We're getting back to this idea of anecdotes tending to be a cycle that simply reinforces what like-minded people thought in the first place.

[Worthy4England]

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style ... 45631.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Some stats here...

I have no idea whether they're lying or not.

[Bruce Rioja]

No. But suppose I said 'seven'. How would you know it wasn't accurate?

Are you saying 'seven' then? Why not just say "I haven't a fecking clue, Pal"? Which would hold more credibility, unless you can actually back-up your figure of seven. I've absolutely no idea as to why you're getting so arsey here?!

[William the White]

No. But suppose I said 'seven'. How would you know it wasn't accurate?

Are you saying 'seven' then? Why not just say "I haven't a fecking clue, Pal"? Which would hold more credibility, unless you can actually back-up your figure of seven. I've absolutely no idea as to why you're getting so arsey here?!

I'm not getting arsey!!! You haven't a clue and i haven't is the answer. Indeed, if i can say so in a non-arsey way - i suspect it was my post saying that getting reliable stats would not be easy that started what seems to border on an unfriendly discussion...

As ever, I post with a smile, apart from to that miserable git, bobo...

[Hoboh]

Sigh

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... wells.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[bobo the clown]

No. But suppose I said 'seven'. How would you know it wasn't accurate?

Are you saying 'seven' then? Why not just say "I haven't a fecking clue, Pal"? Which would hold more credibility, unless you can actually back-up your figure of seven. I've absolutely no idea as to why you're getting so arsey here?!

I'm not getting arsey!!! You haven't a clue and i haven't is the answer. Indeed, if i can say so in a non-arsey way - i suspect it was my post saying that getting reliable stats would not be easy that started what seems to border on an unfriendly discussion...

As ever, I post with a smile, apart from to that miserable git, bobo...

Fck off. I almost never come on here & still I get shit !!

[Hoboh]

in the light of a recent vote in the House of Commons where the house voted to establish a commission of inquiry to investigate the impact of the government’s welfare reforms on the incidence of poverty by a majority of 125-2...

(but the government is ignoring it)

this is interesting (I think)

http://www.michaelmeacher.info/weblog/2 ... arliament/

Disgusting, yet another reason why we should not trust the political elite with other issues like the EU.

Isn't the thrust of the anti-EU argument usually that sovereignty should reside with the British Parliament?

When members of said Parliament, more specifically the elitist members at the top choose to ignore its findings, then what hope is there for the people to be fairly represented by it?

[Bruce Rioja]

You haven't a clue and i haven't is the answer.

Of course not. My question was to Monty, who, as ever, searched on Google for a literal answer rather than taking on board the overall concept of the thread. Anyway: Peace

[thebish]

I totally agree... but surely it won't do to fill the gap by making it up as we go along?

not really sure what else anyone could do if the govt. is refusing to gather the information... all that would be left would be very piecemeal, fragmented and easily dismissed as anecdotal (which - funnily enough - is now what the govt is accusing foodbank statistics of being...)

the people i talk to using foodbanks down here tell me lots of different reasons - among them the following:

1) delays in benefit payments
2) a temporary emergency (recently - flooding)
3) seasonal work drying up outside the tourist season (but bills keep coming)
4) straightforward street homelessness (Torquay is about to close it's only nightshelter because of cuts - Dartmouth already did witdraw funding for its only street-homeless project - and (for good measure) closed the womens refuge.
5) the non-availability of the old social fund to cover emergencies
6) relationship breakdown
7) mental illness
eight) proud and stubborn refusal to claim benefits (mostly old people)

but none of this would amount to the kind of statistical evidence you are searching for - the closest we had for that was those presenting at JobCentre Plus - and as I said - the govt has decided not to collect the stats now...

what would these folk do if they didn't have the foodbank - would they satisfy Bruce's death-test?? I doubt it - they would find other means..

1) stealing food
2) going deeper into debt with local loan sharks
3) become more malnourished (malnourishment - hospitals tell us - is on the increase)
4) going without so that the kids can eat

(all of which i have seen with my own eyes...)

my advice to anyone who REALLY wants to get some kind of a real insight into the lives of those who use foodbanks is that they take the trouble to go and volunteer at one for a while - and interact with the folk who use them - I'm not sure I can help you beyond that...

and/or - write to your MP and ask why the govt has stopped collecting data, yet continues to slag off foodbanks for not having that data that could come from those govt referrals...

[thebish]

Fck off. I almost never come on here & still I get shit !!

you're always fecking on here telling us you never come on here!!

[William the White]

No. But suppose I said 'seven'. How would you know it wasn't accurate?

Are you saying 'seven' then? Why not just say "I haven't a fecking clue, Pal"? Which would hold more credibility, unless you can actually back-up your figure of seven. I've absolutely no idea as to why you're getting so arsey here?!

I'm not getting arsey!!! You haven't a clue and i haven't is the answer. Indeed, if i can say so in a non-arsey way - i suspect it was my post saying that getting reliable stats would not be easy that started what seems to border on an unfriendly discussion...

As ever, I post with a smile, apart from to that miserable git, bobo...

Fck off. I almost never come on here & still I get shit !!

Hey - you wouldn't believe the shit we call you when you're not here... Fit to burn, fit to burn!!! All of it deserved!!!

[mummywhycantieatcrayons]

but none of this would amount to the kind of statistical evidence you are searching for

I'm not really searching for it.

Actually I expected what you said to be the case - that it's hard to generalise and is a very fractured picture. Incidentally, I have noticed that you, as somebody who is actually involved in these things, don't seem to generalise and point score a lot on this subject matter.

I just wondered whether, when people say things like the following, it is based on very much:

That said - a rising number of foodbanks are supporting people in work - in the precarious way so many are. Zero hours contracts. Part time jobs. Minimum wage.

[William the White]

but none of this would amount to the kind of statistical evidence you are searching for

I'm not really searching for it.

Actually I expected what you said to be the case - that it's hard to generalise and is a very fractured picture. Incidentally, I have noticed that you, as somebody who is actually involved in these things, don't seem to generalise and point score a lot on this subject matter.

I just wondered whether, when people say things like the following, it is based on very much:

That said - a rising number of foodbanks are supporting people in work - in the precarious way so many are. Zero hours contracts. Part time jobs. Minimum wage.

Ho hum... It means what it says at every point...

Foodbanks are supporting people who are in work. and say they have seen numbers increase.

Work is precarious for so many. In all three ways identified.

This may be meaningless to you.

Less so, I suspect, for those needing to use foodbanks.

It doesn't mean any more than that. Or any less.

[mummywhycantieatcrayons]

Foodbanks are supporting people who are in work. and say they have seen numbers increase.

Bish says they are not being given this information and that they are not collecting it themselves.