egg

Jesus wept. I couldn't give a monkeys what you and Turkish say about each other. If you want to tangle with him, crack on, but perhaps stop whining about it.

It's variable. I haven't seen number for the total cost but it'll be vast. On a linked ish theme, when discussing public sector pay rises, people never consider the consequential pension cost linked to that pay, especially in schemes that will revert to final salary post McCloud.

Defined benefits are where the pension benefits are defined. That could be linked to final salary, or something else, ie a career average salary. The NHS 1995 scheme was final. The later schemes aren't. I've touched upon values in my previous post. Yes the cev is arbitrary, but that's not the true value, or the cost to the public purse. What happens in the private sector isn't really relevant to the discussion and very few private employers have pensions that match the state schemes. ExxonMobil, BAT, NATS, the uni scheme, and a few others, are superb though.

When I talk about values, I refer to the actuarial fav not the artificially low cev issued by the prpa. it's the fav that more accurately represents the cost of that pension to the taxpayer, or what it cost to buy a replacement or equivalent. The fav (and to a lesser extent the cev) of a huge number of public sector schemes is north of a million. I've got PODE reports sat on my desk for a variety of public sector schemes at that level (service personnel, doctors, police officers) and lots for more junior employees (nurses, pc's, lower level service personnel) at £650k or more.

Reservoir

Bazunu in goal for me, and Salisu rather than ABK who looked unfit last night. Otherwise your team. Although there's a case for Edozie over Aribo, I'd have him off the bench.

As I said, I'm not convinced that Tella offers enough. I think he offers more than Armstrong though and if I had to have one, it'd be Tella.

Any worse than Armstrong? For me Tella offers more. Probably not enough, but more.

Humphrey

No, I ventured outside. I saw a man climbing a ladder, another jogging on a wet pavement, and even saw someone ride a bike. I've never seen such risky behaviour in my life.

All schemes are different, but the values are huge. The 1995 NHS scheme falls in at age 60 with no deferment incentive. For someone retiring then on say £30k pension, that scheme has a value of north of a million. Not shabby. The police schemes fall in earlier (ditto firemen and forces) so have a much higher value as they're secure for a longer period. The McCloud decision, essentially, will restore people shifted from final salary to lesser defined benefit schemes to where they were. The total cost will be eye watering.

Leave that with me tomorrow Whelk and I'll give you actual figures for that sort of scenario. I'll also give you the fair actuarial value, ie what it would cost someone in the private sector to buy the equivalent. Armed forces and police similar. Pension values of 7 figures are very common.

Sounds ideal! But underestimate SoG at your peril I reckon.

There is no irony on the pension point. I deal with public sector pensions daily. The cost to the public is eye watering, and will only increase after the McCloud judgement. Those complaining often overlook the significant value of their pensions.

That presupposes that people are interested in your response to Turkish's posts about you. I doubt anyone is and I get that you can see his posts, but you ain't gotta reply. I support nobody. Seems to me that your choice is to either fight with the bloke and stop moaning about it, or actually ignore him. Seems simple enough.

Yep. It's widespread. The court system is in disarray, both civil and criminal. Short urgent hearings that are needed within days are being listed for months ahead. The Land Registry is dangerously behind with all sorts of consequences. That's on top of the NHS. One issue with pay is that it doesn't leave money for more staff, but another issue with lower pay is that it makes it harder to recruit! It's a proper mess.

On the ignore point. It makes no sense to me that you'd put somebody on ignore but choose to reply to their posts when you see them. That suggests that you don't actually want to ignore them.

Record

Probably not a less than anyone else who's been on it first half to be fair.

It's weird. Selles is the only one of the old guard. Well, the only one on the coaching staff.

Back

They're nothing like each other! Antonio is a bully with proper pace. He's also a goalscorer and creator. Che is none of that . He'd be decent for us imo.

I think there's a proper player in there, and personally I'd play him ahead of Armstrong. He ain't going to develop on the bench, and Armstrong won't get any better than he is now.

It was the BBC piece that I read. Horrendous what happened to him, and amazing that he resisted the medication he needed for so long.

I hadn't realised what happened to him as a kid. Absolutely awful, and fair play to the guy for talking about that stuff in the manner that he did, and for being as successful as he was. I loved his music, and my respect for him has gone up several notches. RIP indeed.