The Starmer Years - Can The New Broom Sweep Clean?

[Baird of the land]

I’m very much a fan of hybrid working
However, There’s definitely pros to some days working in the office (from networking, cohesion, less than ideal home working environments, training/supporting more junior staff.

[Gloucester Saint]

4 hours ago, Baird of the land said:

From a party that's struggled to complete any sort of cut comes yet more spending it seems.

The Conservatives is that? Yeah, they spent tens of billions of our money on extra civil service posts to sort their shambles of a cliff edge hard Brexit https://ukandeu.ac.uk/videos/jill-rutter-and-james-obrien-civil-service-100k-bigger-since-brexit-but-no-clear-vision/

You’re right, they waste taxpayers money right left and centre. Reform wasting it all over the country in local government and DOGE having all the impact of a wet fart.

Didn’t vote for the current government but they’ve had to cut Boris’s huge civil service post increases and Streeting is laying off so many posts in the NHS undoing the barking mad Lansley system by merging NHS England and DHSC (Jeremy Hunt badly wanted to do the same as Health Secretary but politically couldn’t) that he’s clashing with Reeves about the sheer cost of redundancy payments, so much so that they’ll probably need to be staggered over three years https://www.healthcare-management.uk/streeting-reeves-reported-loggerheads-redundancy-payments

Plenty that I can criticise them for but this isn’t it. At least they are accelerating moving the roles around the UK to boost skilled jobs and prosperity across the UK, one Boris policy I did agree with https://www.gov.uk/government/news/thousands-of-civil-service-roles-moved-out-of-london-in-latest-reform-to-the-state

Edited Monday at 22:35 by Gloucester Saint

[Saint Fan CaM]

6 hours ago, whelk said:

You know employers pension are not uncommon. Would be very weird to have worked your whole life and only have a state pension 

You do know when employer pensions were made mandatory right? Phased in from October 2012 to 2018. So it is an unfortunate fact that there are people who only have a state pension (or have a private pension that is so small it’s not enough alone to live on). That’s not the point - the triple lock was designed to ensure the state pension kept up with the basic cost of living and there’s no good humane reason for removing it before first removing other waste from public spending.

[Sir Ralph]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cdxrp7znkdlo

This is 100% unrelated to government policy. 

Edited yesterday at 08:06 by Sir Ralph

[tdmickey3]

10 hours ago, Lord Duckhunter said:

You’ve got to be a bit weird if you want to work from home. 

Why?

[whelk]

11 minutes ago, Sir Ralph said:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cdxrp7znkdlo

This is 100% unrelated to government policy. 

I’m sure if the Tories were in power they’d put a stop to this AI nonsense. This is unfortunately going to get a lot worse and no simple solutions

[whelk]

13 minutes ago, tdmickey3 said:

Why?

Because he can’t regale staff with his great anecdotes involving pony, birds and nets

[Sir Ralph]

8 minutes ago, whelk said:

I’m sure if the Tories were in power they’d put a stop to this AI nonsense. This is unfortunately going to get a lot worse and no simple solutions

Or more likely increasing the minimum wage and increasing employers NI caused this. 
 

Why has the EU employment rate decreased since last year but ours has increased? 

[tdmickey3]

3 minutes ago, Sir Ralph said:

Or more likely increasing the minimum wage and increasing employers NI caused this. 
 

Why has the EU employment rate decreased since last year but ours has increased? 

Yeah, keep those low paid in their place eh... ?

Right from the Farage playbook....





 

[whelk]

12 minutes ago, Sir Ralph said:

Or more likely increasing the minimum wage and increasing employers NI caused this. 
 

Why has the EU employment rate decreased since last year but ours has increased? 

No doubt you have a very simple explanation as why to Spain and France have significantly higher unemployment rate?  
 

is that EU as a whole?

[whelk]

You can do a lot with statistics to make a point, to paraphrase Mark Twain

 

 

Edited yesterday at 08:45 by whelk

[badgerx16]

50 minutes ago, Sir Ralph said:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cdxrp7znkdlo

This is 100% unrelated to government policy. 

You can't call for 'efficiencies' in the publc sector and the cutting away of the 'deadwood' and scivers, then make a negative point about unemployment going up. It is what you are asking for.

[Saint Fan CaM]

9 minutes ago, whelk said:

You can do a lot with statistics to make a point to paraphrase Mark Twain

 

 

It’s an interesting graph, but it’s not complete unless its context is known. For example, when was the data sampled or are the figures an average over the year (difficult as 2025 has not finished)? That’s important because both France and Spain unemployment is affected by seasonal (tourism/farming) fluctuations (Italy also to a lesser extent). It would be interesting to know why Sweden is so high comparatively…perhaps due to unusually high immigration and/or swinging high taxes?

Edited yesterday at 08:56 by Saint Fan CaM

[whelk]

3 minutes ago, Saint Fan CaM said:

It’s an interesting graph, but it’s not complete unless its context is known. For example, when was the data sampled or are the figures an average over the year (difficult as 2025 has not finished). That’s important because both France and Spain unemployment is affected by seasonal fluctuations (Italy also to a lesser extent). It would be interesting to know why Sweden is so high comparatively…perhaps due to unusually high immigration?

It is a point in time, September 2025

Brief explanations:

🇪🇺 Unemployment Rate Comparison (2025)

• Spain: 11.8% — highest in the group, driven by persistent youth unemployment and regional disparities.
• Sweden: 8.8% — elevated due to youth and immigrant labor market integration challenges.
• France: 7.6% — improving slowly with ongoing labor reforms.
• Italy: 6.0% — still facing structural labor issues.
• UK: 4.7% — slightly above the EU average.
• Netherlands: 3.6% — low due to flexible labor policies.
• Germany: 3.0% — lowest, reflecting strong economic fundamentals.

[Sir Ralph]

6 minutes ago, Saint Fan CaM said:

It’s an interesting graph, but it’s not complete unless its context is known. For example, when was the data sampled or are the figures an average over the year (difficult as 2025 has not finished). That’s important because both France and Spain unemployment is affected by seasonal fluctuations (Italy also to a lesser extent). It would be interesting to know why Sweden is so high comparatively…perhaps due to unusually high immigration?

Exactly it’s about changes in unemployment rates since the government has come in. Since the government came in unemployment in the uk has increased and decreased in the eu. Why?

If we had a 0% employment rate before the government came in and now a 2.5% rate it would still be low but they would have done a bad job on the issue

Edited yesterday at 09:00 by Sir Ralph

[whelk]

4 minutes ago, Sir Ralph said:

Exactly it’s about changes in unemployment rates since the government has come in. Since the government came in unemployment in the uk has increased and decreased in the eu. Why?

You can’t have it both ways. I tire of telling you economies are not simple and you cannot go banging on about one figure in isolation, there are so many factors at play, many global. Were you lauding the Labour govt when UK had fastest GDP growth in G7 for Q1?

 

 

 

[Sir Ralph]

37 minutes ago, tdmickey3 said:

Yeah, keep those low paid in their place eh... ?

Right from the Farage playbook....





 

The thing is I would explain to you why increasing minimum salaries has resulted in job losses but I don’t think you want to understand/ listen so there is no point. You just emoji everyone’s post you disagree with

[badgerx16]

2 minutes ago, Sir Ralph said:

The thing is I would explain to you why increasing minimum salaries has resulted in job losses but I don’t think you want to understand/ listen so there is no point. You just emoji everyone’s post you disagree with

Explain why, for the low paid, a minimum wage is a bad thing.

[Sir Ralph]

1 minute ago, whelk said:

You can’t have it both ways. I tire of telling you economies are not simple and you cannot go banging on about one figure in isolation, there are so many factors at play, many global. Were you lauding the Labour govt when UK had fastest GDP growth in G7 for Q1?

 

 

 

No I didn’t to be fair, maybe I should, but I could see the impact their policies were going to have moving forward. This isn’t a partisan position as I don’t care who gets the economy moving. Why do you think our unemployment rate is increasing then compared to eu countries? I understand that economies are complex but we experience similar circumstances to the eu so not an unfair question to sender

[badgerx16]

Just now, Sir Ralph said:

No I didn’t to be fair, maybe I should, but I could see the impact their policies were going to have moving forward. This isn’t a partisan position as I don’t care who gets the economy moving. Why do you think our unemployment rate is increasing then compared to eu countries? I understand that economies are complex but we experience similar circumstances to the eu so not an unfair question to sender

Brexit ?

[Sir Ralph]

Just now, Sir Ralph said:

No I didn’t to be fair, maybe I should, but I could see the impact their policies were going to have moving forward. This isn’t a partisan position as I don’t care who gets the economy moving. Why do you think our unemployment rate is increasing then compared to eu countries? I understand that economies are complex but we experience similar circumstances to the eu so not an unfair question to sender

I run a pub. Price of employment goes up generally but income remains the same. To maintain a profit margin that I need to keep running I have to reduce the employment budget. It’s really simple and lots of people saw it coming

[whelk]

2 minutes ago, Sir Ralph said:

I run a pub. Price of employment goes up generally but income remains the same. To maintain a profit margin that I need to keep running I have to reduce the employment budget. It’s really simple and lots of people saw it coming

I run another pub and now see lots more youngsters as customers spending as they have had a bump in their disposable income.

More customers also flocking from Ralph’s pub as now takes so long to get served since he laid staff off they went somewhere else.

Of course minimum wage increase adds to costs but that is arguably the reset needed. Wasn’t there a Brexit promise of a high wage economy? Markets will always go to equilibriums 

[whelk]

I also run a pub that used to have loads of public sector workers coming in for lunch. Since the Ralph cull , many have lost their jobs so I have had to close the business as no longer can make a profit. And don’t get me started on the higher unemployment rate and how much more we dish out in benefits now.

Same has happened to the local bakery too so even more unemployment 

Edited yesterday at 09:28 by whelk

[Sir Ralph]

21 minutes ago, badgerx16 said:

Brexit ?

Unemployment rate has either reduced in uk (other than the covid period) or been relatively stable until it started to rise when the current government got into power. Seems like the government is linked to unemployment growth rather than Covid

Edited yesterday at 09:34 by Sir Ralph

[Sir Ralph]

8 minutes ago, whelk said:

I also run a pub that used to have loads of public sector workers coming in for lunch. Since the Ralph cull , many have lost their jobs so I have had to close the business as no longer can make a profit. And don’t get me started on the higher unemployment rate and how much more we dish out in benefits now.

Same has happened to the local bakery too so even more unemployment 

When people make sensible points no need to get stupid. More and more I find the Labour supporters on here can’t answer questions on the state of the economy or revert to being sarcastic. I present stats all over the place and none of you ever do is offer speculative opinion

Edited yesterday at 09:36 by Sir Ralph

[Saint Fan CaM]

39 minutes ago, whelk said:

It is a point in time, September 2025

Brief explanations:

🇪🇺 Unemployment Rate Comparison (2025)

• Spain: 11.8% — highest in the group, driven by persistent youth unemployment and regional disparities.
• Sweden: 8.8% — elevated due to youth and immigrant labor market integration challenges.
• France: 7.6% — improving slowly with ongoing labor reforms.
• Italy: 6.0% — still facing structural labor issues.
• UK: 4.7% — slightly above the EU average.
• Netherlands: 3.6% — low due to flexible labor policies.
• Germany: 3.0% — lowest, reflecting strong economic fundamentals.

Thanks - confirms what I guessed.

[whelk]

5 minutes ago, Sir Ralph said:

When people make sensible points no need to get stupid. More and more I find the Labour supporters on here can’t answer questions on the state of the economy or revert to being sarcastic. I present stats all over the place and none of you ever do is offer speculative opinion

I think you are just annoyed that my pub is better than yours

[whelk]

And whilst you continue to say you never get answers, you actually do. You are too dim to understand some of them and cannot process nuance. Do you know what the multiplier effect is?

[Sir Ralph]

15 minutes ago, whelk said:

And whilst you continue to say you never get answers, you actually do. You are too dim to understand some of them and cannot process nuance. Do you know what the multiplier effect is?

Not anything based on evidence if that makes me dumb so be it. Yes I know what it is. 

Edited yesterday at 09:57 by Sir Ralph

[tdmickey3]

52 minutes ago, Sir Ralph said:

The thing is I would explain to you why increasing minimum salaries has resulted in job losses but I don’t think you want to understand/ listen so there is no point. You just emoji everyone’s post you disagree with

Would you be happy on the minimum wage? don`t answer as I already know the answer unless you lie.

Its always the better off who are happy to keep the poor lot in their place.

 

[tdmickey3]

32 minutes ago, Sir Ralph said:

When people make sensible points no need to get stupid. More and more I find the Labour supporters on here can’t answer questions on the state of the economy or revert to being sarcastic. I present stats all over the place and none of you ever do is offer speculative opinion

🤡

[tdmickey3]

53 minutes ago, Sir Ralph said:

I run a pub. Price of employment goes up generally but income remains the same. To maintain a profit margin that I need to keep running I have to reduce the employment budget. It’s really simple and lots of people saw it coming

Bollocks, you are making good money of the back of those you keep on low pay.... and I expect you try to claw back some of the tips too

[tdmickey3]

57 minutes ago, badgerx16 said:

Explain why, for the low paid, a minimum wage is a bad thing.

Because he has to pay it...

[Sir Ralph]

3 hours ago, tdmickey3 said:

Would you be happy on the minimum wage? don`t answer as I already know the answer unless you lie.

Its always the better off who are happy to keep the poor lot in their place.

 

No I would not. But I would think twice if my business was going to make cuts as a result and I might lose my job. Also do you think this may have contributed to the cost of living for people (including those on minimum wage) increasing?
 

There is a time for increasing the minimum wage but it wasn’t then. The problem is you see everything in a very simple way (much like the government) without understanding the implications on the people you are trying to help and wider impacts such as inflationary impacts. It’s relatively predictable but if you look at everything through a socialist lens, that’s where things go wrong. Thats not a personal dig, that’s a wider point.

There are lots of examples where the government has fiddled with business to help groups of people and, because they have f all idea, what they are doing, actually created worse outcomes for those people. 

Edited yesterday at 13:24 by Sir Ralph

[Sir Ralph]

3 hours ago, tdmickey3 said:

Because he has to pay it...

Tell me where I said there should be no minimum wage. Also the minimum wage increase doesn’t impact my business. 

Edited yesterday at 13:10 by Sir Ralph

[Sir Ralph]

4 hours ago, badgerx16 said:

Explain why, for the low paid, a minimum wage is a bad thing.

I didn’t say that. I said the increase in minimum wage probably contributed to the increase in unemployment . I never said the minimum wage was a bad thing in principle.

Edited yesterday at 13:18 by Sir Ralph

[tdmickey3]

26 minutes ago, Sir Ralph said:

No I would not. But I would think twice if my business was going to make cuts as a result and I might lose my job. Also do you think this may have contributed to the cost of living for people (including those on minimum wage) increasing?
 

There is a time for increasing the minimum wage but it wasn’t then. The problem is you see everything in a very simple way (much like the government) without understanding the implications on the people you are trying to help and wider impacts such as inflationary impacts. It’s relatively predictable but if you look at everything through a socialist lens, that’s where things go wrong. Thats not a personal dig, that’s a wider point.

There are lots of examples where the government has fiddled with business to help groups of people and, because they have f all idea, what they are doing, actually created worse outcomes for those people. 

 

26 minutes ago, Sir Ralph said:

Tell me where I said there should be no minimum wage. Also the minimum wage increase doesn’t impact my business. 

That`s why you have the view you have, I`m alright jack attitude.

The minimum was a joke and an increase was well overdue and I hope I goes up again in time

[Sir Ralph]

1 minute ago, tdmickey3 said:

 

That`s why you have the view you have, I`m alright jack attitude.

The minimum was a joke and an increase was well overdue and I hope I goes up again in time

I’m trying to be respectful but you haven’t tried to understand or can’t understand what I’ve said, even if you disagree with it.

[badgerx16]

1 hour ago, Sir Ralph said:

I didn’t say that. I said the increase in minimum wage probably contributed to the increase in unemployment . I never said the minimum wage was a bad thing in principle.

So the minimum wage is a good thing ?

If so, what level should it be set at  ? And how should it increase ?

Edited yesterday at 14:30 by badgerx16

[Whitey Grandad]

On 10/11/2025 at 01:38, egg said:

We've all built up our qualifying years Whitey, and paid our dues expecting a state pension. That doesn't alter that the state pension is part of the welfare system, and is of benefit to many of the people who receive it. It also doesn't alter that we can't afford it, and I'm not calling for it to be means tested, but I think it will be down the line. 

It wS never part of the welfare system when I was contributing and paying my stamps. That was changed long after I had started paying.

[Whitey Grandad]

17 hours ago, Lord Duckhunter said:

You’ve got to be a bit weird if you want to work from home. 

Unless you're self employed. 

[whelk]

You are always on cruises Whitey so assume you aren’t reliant on it?

[badgerx16]

2 minutes ago, whelk said:

You are always on cruises Whitey so assume you aren’t reliant on it?

Maybe he is a 'self employed' cruise rep.

[iansums]

4 hours ago, badgerx16 said:

So the minimum wage is a good thing ?

If so, what level should it be set at  ? And how should it increase ?

The minimum wage is a good thing, I think we can all agree on that. The problem is that the last increase along with the employer NI hike ended up making it more expensive for employers to take on or retain staff, especially when they have seen other costs go up. When the economy is more buoyant then that is the time to make significant increases to the minimum wage. My problem with this government is that they are not helping small and medium size businesses in order to achieve growth.

[Sir Ralph]

2 hours ago, iansums said:

The minimum wage is a good thing, I think we can all agree on that. The problem is that the last increase along with the employer NI hike ended up making it more expensive for employers to take on or retain staff, especially when they have seen other costs go up. When the economy is more buoyant then that is the time to make significant increases to the minimum wage. My problem with this government is that they are not helping small and medium size businesses in order to achieve growth.

This. It’s not rocket science

[hypochondriac]

Lots of talk of an imminent leadership challenge just 18 months in (although more likely after May imo.)

 

[egg]

6 hours ago, hypochondriac said:

Lots of talk of an imminent leadership challenge just 18 months in (although more likely after May imo.)

 

His support for his chancellor will cost him his job at some point. 

Milliband would be a disaster. Haigh I like though, but her economic ideas won't curry favour with the slash and cut crowd. 

[whelk]

2 minutes ago, egg said:

Milliband would be a disaster

The other one wouldn’t 

[egg]

4 minutes ago, whelk said:

The other one wouldn’t 

Absolutely. Decent guy, and the party backed the wrong horse there. 

[hypochondriac]

25 minutes ago, egg said:

His support for his chancellor will cost him his job at some point. 

Milliband would be a disaster. Haigh I like though, but her economic ideas won't curry favour with the slash and cut crowd. 

I'm not sure what labour can do tbh. Half of the MPs won't accept spending cuts -some of which are necessary -and half the electorate aren't going to accept big tax rises without any spending cuts.