Michael Gove.

[North Cardiff Blue]

Re: Michael Gove.

But that doesn't make what insider said wrong. I was in my early twenties in 1978 and all of the stuff he says is true.

The winter of discontent was probably the one event over any other which proved that some unions had too much power and there was a reaction against that in the years which followed, but the pendulum has swung even further towards the employer/shareholder since then and, in my view, a degree of correction is needed as much now as it was in 1978.

I agree on switch of power, it has swung to far towards the employer, but I think that is changing as there is a low unemployment and a shortage of good staff.

[insider]

Re: Michael Gove.

Are you joking?
It was good times in 1978? No
How many people bought there own house? You are good with links look it up.
How many people went to Uni? As above.
Buy a weekly shop, there were 2000 strikes including lorry drivers, can you remember what people ate in 78? Pot noodle and smash if I'm remembering correctly.
NHS in Labour run Wales is a disgrace I agree it's probably as bad as 78. What about nationally with this English government selling it off to there chums for profit? no mention of the Tory destruction of it I see.
Were the Utilities reliable, there were constant blackouts and power cuts? Is that a question or a statement?
As I say Ah those were the days!

Just because you've got up the greasy poll a bit it's the age old story balls to poor and working class.

[A Quiet Monkfish]

Re: Michael Gove.

A mum with 3 kids whose husband is on a zero hours job contract , minimum wage is NOT going to be knocking up a healthy low cost meal for 30 pence ff sake

She's probably under incredible stress and pressure , possibly seeing the doctor for that anxiety

A food bank will provide her with tins of soup , beans , bread ......sorry white only .....jelly , custard , corned beef , tinned peas , tinned carrots etc

These fecking Tories telling poor people what to do whilst they snack on duck pate

They need a good slap

Actually you can make a very good mackerel pate with relatively cheap ingredients. I make it quite often.

[the other bob wilson]

Re: Michael Gove.

On the subject of fish, I always try to have a few tins of sardines in the house as they are cheap, good for you, great with salad and I really enjoy them. However, I went to two local supermarkets this week and neither of them had a single tin between them - it wasn’t a case of them not having a particular sauce flavour or oil, there were just no tins of sardines and yet I had the usual choices of sauce flavours and oils when it came to tinned mackerel.

In one of the supermarkets, its fruit and veg areas were about a third full and there were plenty of shortages with some other goods, whereas there was plenty of others you thought were “related” (e.g. soap powder and detergents for hand washing woolsns) where they’d have one, but not the other.

Now, I accept that the war in Ukraine is probably going to have an effect on what’s available in shops (it probably is already) and Covid must have contributed as well, but I’ve never known a year like this one for large swathes of certain products becoming unavailable for whatever reason.- it’s all very well some MPs telling people to buy cheaper food, but I wouldn’t have been able to make a sardine salad this week even if I’d wanted to because most of the ingredients I’d use were missing from my supermarket.

I find it hard to believe that I can’t get a tin of sardines because of Putin or Covid!

[JamesWales]

Re: Michael Gove.

Of course I read it. Don't be patronising. You're missing the point. It's clearly a stupid idea and they were always going to get grief for it, especially after they posted photos on their own Facebook page. They could quite easily have explained to the organisers that eating at a foodbank opening wasn't a good idea so thanks but no thanks.
It's like an episode of The Thick of It. Malcolm Tucker would be apoplectic.

I disagree. And here's a Merseyside Labour MP smiling at a food bank donation stand too.

It's a twitter storm manufactured by those who seek to politicise the opening of a food bank that was done in accordance with how the volunteers wanted it - everyone was smiling

Check him out - grinning like a Cheshire cat

https://www.southportvisiter.co.uk/news/bill-esterson-thanks-generous-shoppers-8220181

[JamesWales]

Re: Michael Gove.

https://images.app.goo.gl/o6LG2WRM3XVoiAPZ7

The rt hon James Wales CCMB

I wish.

[Feedback]

Re: Michael Gove.

David Cameron's "big society" was essentially about getting the ordinary punter to pay towards services his Government were cutting down on in their "we're all in this together" austerity programme. The whole notion of food banks is on a similar theme. I agree with you to the extent that it is a disgrace that there is such a heavy reliance on them in what we're told is the fifth richest country in the world.

I'd also say that Labour have to be held culpable for there being the number of food banks there were in the noughties, but in 2019 the Trussell Trust said there had been a 3,900 per cent increase in the number of foodbanks in the UK since 2010 - when you're talking figures of such magnitude, this has to be a party political issue because it seems reasonable to believe that the increase would not have been as great if any other party but the Conservatives had been in power for that time.

https://www.charity-works.co.uk/food...st%209%20years.

The Tories freed up the use of foodbanks and made it easier for people to use them, so it is hardly surprising that their use has increased. However, a rise of 3900% cannot be put down to ease of use alone and points towards underlying structural issues in society. The left wing answer of benefits and redistribution via tax is just "foodbanks" provided for by the state, so that's not an answer to the underlying problem either.

both benefits and foodbanks are equally shameful in today's UK, but depending on where you sit on the political spectrum will determine whether you are for or against foodbanks and/or benefits. So whilst the party political acolytes from either side laud their own preference and denounce the alternative, both are equally culpable of missing the real issue at hand. But that's the level of maturity we come to expect from UK politics. All style, no substance. It is better to criticise your opponent that push forward your own policies.

We are in the midst of the greatest foreign affairs crisis since 1938, we have a cost of living crisis where people have to choose between eating and heating and we have a post Covid19 backlog of healthcare cases right across the UK including devolved administrations, but the single biggest political football this week has been about whether Boris Johnson and Keir Starmer had a beer or cake with work colleagues.

We get the system we deserve.

[Pearcey3]

Re: Michael Gove.

But that doesn't make what insider said wrong. I was in my early twenties in 1978 and all of the stuff he says is true.

The winter of discontent was probably the one event over any other which proved that some unions had too much power and there was a reaction against that in the years which followed, but the pendulum has swung even further towards the employer/shareholder since then and, in my view, a degree of correction is needed as much now as it was in 1978.

Yep. Certain unions had become too powerful and the irony being their disruption ushered in Thatcherism. It’s now gone too far the other way which of course will meet with Tory approval.
Not sure I agree with you about food banks. They were very few in number when Labour left office. It really is under the Tories that the numbers have hugely increased which indeed you have pointed out. I don’t blame Labour for any of that but they have been feeble and disunited in opposition and I do blame them for that. If they are not careful they will be out of office for more than 18 years. It was bad enough when that happened the last time around.

[the other bob wilson]

Re: Michael Gove.

The Tories freed up the use of foodbanks and made it easier for people to use them, so it is hardly surprising that their use has increased. However, a rise of 3900% cannot be put down to ease of use alone and points towards underlying structural issues in society. The left wing answer of benefits and redistribution via tax is just "foodbanks" provided for by the state, so that's not an answer to the underlying problem either.

both benefits and foodbanks are equally shameful in today's UK, but depending on where you sit on the political spectrum will determine whether you are for or against foodbanks and/or benefits. So whilst the party political acolytes from either side laud their own preference and denounce the alternative, both are equally culpable of missing the real issue at hand. But that's the level of maturity we come to expect from UK politics. All style, no substance. It is better to criticise your opponent that push forward your own policies.

We are in the midst of the greatest foreign affairs crisis since 1938, we have a cost of living crisis where people have to choose between eating and heating and we have a post Covid19 backlog of healthcare cases right across the UK including devolved administrations, but the single biggest political football this week has been about whether Boris Johnson and Keir Starmer had a beer or cake with work colleagues.

We get the system we deserve.

Your first sentence cracked me up, but I presume you mean this

https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-no-evidence-for-jacob-rees-moggs-food-bank-claims

[SLUDGE FACTORY]

Re: Michael Gove.

Actually you can make a very good mackerel pate with relatively cheap ingredients. I make it quite often.

Do you have the stress and anxiety of your husband being on crap pay , bills coming through the letterbox or kids screaming ?

As far as I am aware you are a fairly well off semi retired chap . With a lot less pressure to put food on the table than a young mum .

She may be able to be taught how to knock up a pate but I think that's a touch cheeky to expect

[Former Labour leader]

Re: Michael Gove.

The Tories freed up the use of foodbanks and made it easier for people to use them, so it is hardly surprising that their use has increased. However, a rise of 3900% cannot be put down to ease of use alone and points towards underlying structural issues in society. The left wing answer of benefits and redistribution via tax is just "foodbanks" provided for by the state, so that's not an answer to the underlying problem either.

both benefits and foodbanks are equally shameful in today's UK, but depending on where you sit on the political spectrum will determine whether you are for or against foodbanks and/or benefits. So whilst the party political acolytes from either side laud their own preference and denounce the alternative, both are equally culpable of missing the real issue at hand. But that's the level of maturity we come to expect from UK politics. All style, no substance. It is better to criticise your opponent that push forward your own policies.

We are in the midst of the greatest foreign affairs crisis since 1938, we have a cost of living crisis where people have to choose between eating and heating and we have a post Covid19 backlog of healthcare cases right across the UK including devolved administrations, but the single biggest political football this week has been about whether Boris Johnson and Keir Starmer had a beer or cake with work colleagues.

We get the system we deserve.

I don't agree with much of your analysis but just picking up on the last para, have you asked yourself why Starmer and beergate has been headlining the last week?

[Undercoverinwurzelland]

Re: Michael Gove.

Here's Lee Anderson MP in action previously 😂 https://mobile.twitter.com/PickardJE...98239128805377

[North Cardiff Blue]

Re: Michael Gove.

Just because you've got up the greasy poll a bit it's the age old story balls to poor and working class.

Pot noodle and smash if I'm remembering correctly.

I used to have vesta curry and put it in bread and butter like a curry sandwich, that was decent to be fair :thumbup:

[A Quiet Monkfish]

Re: Michael Gove.

Do you have the stress and anxiety of your husband being on crap pay , bills coming through the letterbox or kids screaming ?

As far as I am aware you are a fairly well off semi retired chap . With a lot less pressure to put food on the table than a young mum .

She may be able to be taught how to knock up a pate but I think that's a touch cheeky to expect

'twas a bit tongue-in-cheek, but yes, in the early 1990's the wife and I were delivering yellow pages in the evenings to make sure we could pay our monthly mortgage. But the point in question was about how people spend their money on food. If I go shopping with a list of ingredients for 4 days' meals it will probably come to £25 max for two of us. [excl. wine !]. You don't need to 'learn' to cook either, just look up on the internet. You can buy a chicken for £5, all the veg for another £5, and there's a roast dinner for 4/6, plus the fry up the next day. We're not posh, we just like home cooked food which tastes much much better than factory-made, and is less than half the cost.

[Feedback]

Re: Michael Gove.

I don't agree with much of your analysis but just picking up on the last para, have you asked yourself why Starmer and beergate has been headlining the last week?

Both sides are trying to score points over who can hold the moral high ground. The reason partygate came into the spotlight was most likely the same reason beergate came into the spotlight - the other side ensured such information was leaked to the press.