Brexit: Boris' Big Belgian Bangers
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Most young people around here don't wanna do it, and the older workers are on £8.91.
Previously, my local growers hired Polish and Romanian 16-18/18-21s at £4.62/6.56, and then charged for onsite caravans. If we call those £60pw (and I'm pulling that out my arse, but it's ballpark), that brings their hourly down to £3.12/5.06.*
This is how a lot of smallish growers have been making decent profits, and that's obviously now threatened. The ones I know are nice enough people who wish they could afford it long-term, as/if minimum wage increases.
We benefitted greatly from the EU at the cost of reinforcing inequality, not just abroad, but at home via unliveable wages for Brits as a result of this competition. But then it's not like our absence is gonna help any, and we've clearly been screwed over with the exit we got.
*£3.12 is around £134pm above Romanian min. -
Funkstain wrote:It’s difficult to complain if local workers are getting a fairer, more appropriate local wage for the same work that used to underpay eu workers - not getting into the lack of prep and support etc the gov failed to sort out - isn’t it?
That's kind of it in a nutshell. I was soft Remain at the ref. I voted remain in the absence of any description of what Brexit would look like or any plan. The absence of any plan and a long phased, graceful withdrawal; underpinned with the acceptance that Britain (and I say Britain as clearly the idea of the UK has been abandoned) is a not a global power during the negotiation phase is what is causing the real issues.
Of course a proper planning process may have revealed that leaving actually wasn't as good an idea as originally thought - but we won't ever know that now. There won't ever be enough information , baselined and structured in an integrated fashion that will allow us to discern variance from plan or cause and effect. It will be further obfuscated by the pandemic and the absence of a plan, which could have factored that in, removes our ability to hold them to account, or to ever really measure if we are better off or not.Holding the wrong end of the stick since 2009. -
Escape wrote:We benefitted greatly from the EU at the cost of reinforcing inequality, not just abroad, but at home via unliveable wages for Brits as a result of this competition.
Things are a touch more complicated than that, I’d say. The fact that our food retailing is pretty much entirely in the hands of a few big retailers gives those retailers an awful lot of power when it comes to negotiating prices with suppliers, driving profit margins down for them. The poor wages are also as much, if not more, the result of the government not bringing in a living wage as the minimum, which they could have done at any time. -
Someone on Twitter summed it up well I thought. Brexit was always going to be difficult and have impacts on trade and the economy and people’s rights etc. But regardless of brexit’s foundational impacts, we could and should have been better prepared for them, and it was possible to reduce and prepare for those impacts, and truly take advantage of the benefits such as they are.
The issue with the gov is bad project management: even if they did have a strategy for each issue, including the pandemic, they have never implemented or delivered them. It’s highly reactive, with no risk assessment or mitigation, and involves no forward planning, consultation, preparation and implementation of measures. In short they are failing at the basic job of actually governing -
Part of me thinks that the lack of planning was because of sheer unadulterated arrogance. They genuinely thought that the EU would bend over backwards to let us leave and retain most or all of the benefits of membership.
I find it unsettling that the people in charge are either that arrogant, that stupid, or don't care. Either of those options or a combo of them doesn't bode well for most citizens.
Johnson and his crew were educated in the 70s by throwbacks who thought they had to raise a generation to rule an empire. This in the aftermath of the Suez crisis which finished us off certainly as a military power. Running an empire under the heel doesn't require any tact or intelligence. So they were brought up to rule in the mistaken belief that the Empire was still there with its heel on the necks of the colonies and the oiks.
Meanwhile over here in the 1st colony, the DUP backed leave because they were distracted by the fantasy of a hard border between NI and RoI. Of course it has backfired spectacularly.Holding the wrong end of the stick since 2009. -
Yossarian wrote:
Things are a touch more complicated than that, I’d say. The fact that our food retailing is pretty much entirely in the hands of a few big retailers gives those retailers an awful lot of power when it comes to negotiating prices with suppliers, driving profit margins down for them. The poor wages are also as much, if not more, the result of the government not bringing in a living wage as the minimum, which they could have done at any time.Escape wrote:We benefitted greatly from the EU at the cost of reinforcing inequality, not just abroad, but at home via unliveable wages for Brits as a result of this competition.
One of the things my company does outside of the restaurant stuff is produce food for clients who then sell it into Supermarkets. There is way too much power in the hands of the Supermarkets in terms of price they want, promotion you must provide etc. At least a few of them are terrible payers - think 3-4 months waiting for payment. Covid has only made the situation worse.SFV - reddave360 -
davyK wrote:Over here, the DUP backed leave because they were distracted by the fantasy of a hard border between NI and RoI. Of course it has backfired spectacularly.
Backfiring spectacularly should be the tagline for Brexit. -
RedDave2 wrote:
One of the things my company does outside of the restaurant stuff is produce food for clients who then sell it into Supermarkets. There is way too much power in the hands of the Supermarkets in terms of price they want, promotion you must provide etc. At least a few of them are terrible payers - think 3-4 months waiting for payment. Covid has only made the situation worse.Yossarian wrote:
Things are a touch more complicated than that, I’d say. The fact that our food retailing is pretty much entirely in the hands of a few big retailers gives those retailers an awful lot of power when it comes to negotiating prices with suppliers, driving profit margins down for them. The poor wages are also as much, if not more, the result of the government not bringing in a living wage as the minimum, which they could have done at any time.Escape wrote:We benefitted greatly from the EU at the cost of reinforcing inequality, not just abroad, but at home via unliveable wages for Brits as a result of this competition.
Thats not Kerry Foods is it? -
LivDiv wrote:
Thats not Kerry Foods is it?
One of the things my company does outside of the restaurant stuff is produce food for clients who then sell it into Supermarkets. There is way too much power in the hands of the Supermarkets in terms of price they want, promotion you must provide etc. At least a few of them are terrible payers - think 3-4 months waiting for payment. Covid has only made the situation worse.
Things are a touch more complicated than that, I’d say. The fact that our food retailing is pretty much entirely in the hands of a few big retailers gives those retailers an awful lot of power when it comes to negotiating prices with suppliers, driving profit margins down for them. The poor wages are also as much, if not more, the result of the government not bringing in a living wage as the minimum, which they could have done at any time.We benefitted greatly from the EU at the cost of reinforcing inequality, not just abroad, but at home via unliveable wages for Brits as a result of this competition.
Not nearly that big. We work with people who are trying to make that move from making the product themselves to the next stage where they need bigger facilities but not quite there to fund it themselves.SFV - reddave360 -
I get ya.
I used to do some stuff with Kerry but they got fucked by Brexit. Tesco dropped them fearing what has since panned out. -
Britons think Brexit is going badly, and it's an opinion more people have come to as the year has gone on
Going well: 18% (-7)
Going badly: 53% (+15)
Neither: 21% (-4)
Changes from Jun 21, 2021[…]
Who thinks Brexit has been going well this year?
Con voters: 39% (-12)
Leave voters: 35% (-10)
British public: 18% (-7)
Remain voters: 5% (-3)
Lab voters: 3% (-2)
Changes from Jun 21, 2021
https://twitter.com/YouGov/status/1443245359749373962
Impressed with the strength of the delusion from the 18% TBH. -
I imagine the 'going well' is based on the literal fact we have left and nothing else whatsoever.
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Yeah that has to be the "Damn the consequences" brigade.Diluted Dante wrote:I imagine the 'going well' is based on the literal fact we have left and nothing else whatsoever. -
What about the 5% of remainers that think it’s going well? Fuckwits.iosGameCentre:T3hDaddy;
XBL: MistaTeaTime -
Yeah, not sure of the thought process thereThe Daddy wrote:What about the 5% of remainers that think it’s going well? Fuckwits.Switch Friend Code: SW-5407-6034-9226
PSN: derekg -
Yossarian wrote:Britons think Brexit is going badly, and it's an opinion more people have come to as the year has gone on
Going well: 18% (-7)
Going badly: 53% (+15)
Neither: 21% (-4)
Changes from Jun 21, 2021[…]
Who thinks Brexit has been going well this year?
Con voters: 39% (-12)
Leave voters: 35% (-10)
British public: 18% (-7)
Remain voters: 5% (-3)
Lab voters: 3% (-2)
Changes from Jun 21, 2021
https://twitter.com/YouGov/status/1443245359749373962
Impressed with the strength of the delusion from the 18% TBH.
It's who they blame for it going badly that matters.
Don't wank. Zinc in your sperms -
Armitage_Shankburn wrote:Yossarian wrote:Britons think Brexit is going badly, and it's an opinion more people have come to as the year has gone on
Going well: 18% (-7)
Going badly: 53% (+15)
Neither: 21% (-4)
Changes from Jun 21, 2021[…]
Who thinks Brexit has been going well this year?
Con voters: 39% (-12)
Leave voters: 35% (-10)
British public: 18% (-7)
Remain voters: 5% (-3)
Lab voters: 3% (-2)
Changes from Jun 21, 2021
https://twitter.com/YouGov/status/1443245359749373962
Impressed with the strength of the delusion from the 18% TBH.
It's who they blame for it going badly that matters.
Who can they blame except the conservatives (I guess the EU?)
The cons have every thing they desired - a fat majority, Johnson in charge the leader of leave. I worry for anyone who doesn’t see any cock up on them purely. (The one mitigation is covid and maybe that’s the thing they can defend this appalling record on) -
Yossarian wrote:The poor wages are also as much, if not more, the result of the government not bringing in a living wage as the minimum, which they could have done at any time.
So long as they were willing to financially support SMEs during the transition, while their incomes remained at minimum wage market levels. Simultaneously cracking down on supermarkets and exploitative players, etc.
When Corbyn gave the EU a [7]... classic mistake. We all know it's a [5] if it's not an [8]. We had no public discourse on how we might pressure the EU towards reformation, but if you look at the SCG and Momentum versus Keith's blue Labour by way of example, our chances never seemed promising.
Brexit might actually encourage other Europeans to veer leftwards, and so ironically might be our most effective way of discouraging voter-endorsed capitalism over these coming decades. Little Britain's warning. -
Its butchers today folks.
Talks of 1000 EU visas for the meat industry.
No doubt the same issues will arise around EU nationals not wanting to come here.
Pigs are due to be slaughtered and burnt because they can't be killed for consumption.
The fuel station crisis is now a week old and not resolved either. -
Our Government love it when a new crisis comes along because it means they can forget about solving the last one. -
Make your pigs (more) depressed and maybe they'll slaughter themselves. -
Some madness in today's paper about Raab suggesting we use ex-prisoners to drive lorries. What a fucking shower.Holding the wrong end of the stick since 2009.
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DUP had their 50th anniversary dinner last night.
There is an air of doom and slow decline about it for me. I cannot see them surviving the election in May; they certainly won't be the biggest party leaving us with a Sinn Fein 1st minister. For that to happen the 2nd biggest party has to appoint a deputy 1st minister; such are the acrobatics of NI government. If that doesn't happen we don't have an assembly.
If it's the DUP it will require the swallowing of the biggest slice of humble pie ever conceived. I cannot fucking wait.Holding the wrong end of the stick since 2009. -
From Private Eye:
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Diluted Dante wrote:What would happen if the Alliance party won?
They have been walking a bit of a tightrope in recent years. There are many unionists who think they have gone a bit too far in siding with nationalists in recent issues - but then they would, wouldn't they?
My opinion is to give them a go. It couldn't be any worse than the shambles we have had to put up with. If the moderates - the UUP and SDLP offered a viable alternative then I could see that working - but it could be said that they had their time to try and make it work. But - they were the ones who brokered the peace deal after all. It's odd that votes moved from the centre out to the extremes with SF and DUP. Holding the wrong end of the stick since 2009. -
Holding the wrong end of the stick since 2009.
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