Welcome to the Great British Underclass

[fallen-archie]

I was chatting to a young lady who recently completed her teacher training and this week was inducted into the new Primary School where she will commence her chosen career. The school is multi cultural and located in West Yorkshire, it is a deprived area but by no means as bad as some inner city areas. Despite this around 90% of the childrens parents are welfare dependent. Most of the children have been labelled as having some kind of lerning difficulty reading standards among eight year olds is expremely poor.

The young Teacher who comes from a middle class background with a strong work ethic is the only member of the family not to be following a medical career, she has always wanted to Teach and help young children.

So what was her verdict following the three days?

The majority of pupils appear to have no respect for authority in any form, Gentle persuasion is the order of the day and the children respond with a tirade of abuse and colourful language.Attempts to impose discipline inevitably result in a family visitation where the source of the colourful language is confirmed. The Head Teacher in conjunction with police and the education authority has introduced a code of conduct and special measures to protect staff from irate and often hostile guardians. What is clear is the children are being raised in a manner likely to confine them to state dependence in one form or another and deprive them of the opportunity to escape poverty. 

We have a young, committed new teacher, keen to get on, with talent and the drive to succeed faced with the uncertainty of a career dealing with feral kids and their often broken families who challenge her ability not by interlect but by threat of physical abuse. The Only beneficiary of this sad situation is Jeremy Kyle. 

Why is it that despite having a welfare state designed to ease poverty and an education system which is free to all we end up with an Underclass seemingly incapable or unwilling to grasp the nettle break away and get on? 

Will this new teacher tough it out or simply follow many others and seek an alternative career? 

[upthecreekyetagain]

Not arguing with any of that but the point is that people call for politicians that are representative of the general public rather than the majority of the ones we have that have little or no experience of living as the majority do.

If however we want 'normal' people as politicians then we would also have to accept all the baggage that comes with 'normal' people.

[joamur_gosof]

yes ,agree ..I would like to see all warps having valid says 

I think I read you somewhere saying people should vote for the person rather than the agenda...100  percent agree .

[joamur_gosof]

Footnote

It appears that the problem this democracy is facing on one level is communication with each other and having people we really don't vote for communicating on our behalf's which in virtually all cases is not what we are saying at all. Of course that suits some as everyone is arguing with each other about what we didnt say think and feel in general

[**caution**opinion_ahead]

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@upthecreekyetagain wrote:

Not arguing with any of that but the point is that people call for politicians that are representative of the general public rather than the majority of the ones we have that have little or no experience of living as the majority do.

If however we want 'normal' people as politicians then we would also have to accept all the baggage that comes with 'normal' people.

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But "all that baggage" comes with the elite Etonians too, so either way we get the baggage.  Where we would benefit by having "normal" people in government would in terms of them being more in touch with how life is out there in the wild, as opposed to in the rarefied air of public schools.

And, no, I was not suggesting ^^^ it is OK to fiddle expenses if it is private money.  We were discussing politicians, who spend public money, and my comment should be read in that light.   

[upthecreekyetagain]

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@**caution**opinion_ahead wrote:

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@upthecreekyetagain wrote:

Not arguing with any of that but the point is that people call for politicians that are representative of the general public rather than the majority of the ones we have that have little or no experience of living as the majority do.

If however we want 'normal' people as politicians then we would also have to accept all the baggage that comes with 'normal' people.

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But "all that baggage" comes with the elite Etonians too, so either way we get the baggage.  Where we would benefit by having "normal" people in government would in terms of them being more in touch with how life is out there in the wild, as opposed to in the rarefied air of public schools.

And, no, I was not suggesting ^^^ it is OK to fiddle expenses if it is private money.  We were discussing politicians, who spend public money, and my comment should be read in that light.   

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I agree that "all that baggage" comes with the elite Etonians too - maybe in that respect they are 'normal' people.  I'm just pointing out that if we do have 'normal' people as MPs then there will be no point chucking them out when they behave as normal people.

If you want someone who is 100% honest, 100% law abiding and 100% above moral reproach as an MP then you most certainly are not looking for someone who is representative of the majority of people in the country.

[joamur_gosof]

lol ,funny and unfortunately very  true :)...would be nice though to see a 100 %  er at the helm,might inspire others to go for it too.

[electric*mayhem*band]

upthecreekyyetagain wrote:

There would be an awful lot of people out of work if all those who 'borrowed' a pen from work or were posting on the web during work hours or slipped a letter in the work mail etc. were dismissed.  

____________________________________________________________________________

Bit of an odd analogy there. The upper echelons (MPs) trousering £65k per annum, and purloining £1,000s of £s from their expenses, and the hoi polloi (Office Workers) earning £8 per hour, and nicking a cheap biro, a first class stamp, and spending five or ten minutes on a chat forum.

[upthecreekyetagain]

Only a matter of scale - both cost their employers.

If every worker in the NHS nicks cheap biros, a first class stamp and five or ten minutes a day on a chat forum the millions that costs would make the expenses scandal pale into insignificance.

[cee-dee]

The other day I was observing some of the workings of the NHS and I saw little has changed since I last had a look round. Although there were no people wandering around with one piece of paper (I guess they'd already left for home after a hard day of it), there were lots of "Blue staff" hanging around chatting and ignoring people waiting and plenty of "Green staff" just idly chatting and obstructing the corridors.

[**caution**opinion_ahead]

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@upthecreekyetagain wrote:

Only a matter of scale - both cost their employers.

If every worker in the NHS nicks cheap biros, a first class stamp and five or ten minutes a day on a chat forum the millions that costs would make the expenses scandal pale into insignificance.

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But scale matters.  If it didn't, there would be one length of prison sentence for every crime.  And the deliberate act of filling in an expense claim to be exchanged for actual cash you are not entitled to is on a different scale to using a work biro for personal use. We have to trust those in government with our money and therefore the standard of honesty they are held to should be extremely high.

[electric*mayhem*band]

He'll be back shortly to repudiate that. May as well just move on.....*moves on*

[Anonymous]

Maybe IF people would not have to live on the breadline, they might not need to nick a biro or a stamp.

On the other hand rich people still seem to feel the need to steal, while their daily lunch allowance is more than most earn in a day.

[electric*mayhem*band]

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@cee-dee wrote:

The other day I was observing some of the workings of the NHS and I saw little has changed since I last had a look round. Although there were no people wandering around with one piece of paper (I guess they'd already left for home after a hard day of it), there were lots of "Blue staff" hanging around chatting and ignoring people waiting and plenty of "Green staff" just idly chatting and obstructing the corridors.

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Really ? Staff blocking and obstructing corridors ? Were you privy to what staff were 'idly chatting' about by the way? They could very well have been discussing a patient's operation, medication, etc, etc. They do have a duty to communicate with each other. As for ignoring people, were these people that were being ignored sitting down in a queue ? I presume they weren't waiting for a bus, but to see a doctor or specialist. A corridor is hardly the place to discuss one's medical condition.

You are speaking there as though NHS staff are a bunch of idle layabouts. I just hope you are not the victim of a road accident in the future, or any other kind of accident either for that matter, whereby you need their help and assistance.

[fallen-archie]

Sometimes a fresh pair of eyes are useful to pick out the obvious, sometimes conclusions are made which are purely judgemental, who knows why those employees were chatting, without being involved oneself.
And it's always those at the bottom who are subjected to scrutiny, Doctors are often late for appointments because private sessions overrun, the more they see the more they earn, the Janitor on the other hand has to sign a sheet each time he cleans the urinals, works to a strict timetable and will indirectly have his entire movements monitored on cctv, that means somebody is employed to monitor him, someone else will line manage him, H&S will govern how he does the job, technical will ensure he is compliant, that's one hell of a costly toilet cleaner except the one doing the main job is on minimum wage paid monthly in arrears.

[malacandran]

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@cee-dee wrote:

The other day I was observing some of the workings of the NHS and I saw little has changed since I last had a look round. Although there were no people wandering around with one piece of paper (I guess they'd already left for home after a hard day of it), there were lots of "Blue staff" hanging around chatting and ignoring people waiting and plenty of "Green staff" just idly chatting and obstructing the corridors.

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I don't know about the "Blue staff" and the "Green staff", or what these terms mean.

But I remember that when I was last in hospital - this was in the 1990's - there seemed to be a rivalry between the "Day staff" and the "Night staff".

It was like a demarcation dispute.  The Day staff wouldn't do any task, if they thought it should've already been done by the Night staff.

[joamur_gosof]

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@fallen-archie wrote:
Sometimes a fresh pair of eyes are useful to pick out the obvious, sometimes conclusions are made which are purely judgemental, who knows why those employees were chatting, without being involved oneself.
And it's always those at the bottom who are subjected to scrutiny, Doctors are often late for appointments because private sessions overrun, the more they see the more they earn, the Janitor on the other hand has to sign a sheet each time he cleans the urinals, works to a strict timetable and will indirectly have his entire movements monitored on cctv, that means somebody is employed to monitor him, someone else will line manage him, H&S will govern how he does the job, technical will ensure he is compliant, that's one hell of a costly toilet cleaner except the one doing the main job is on minimum wage paid monthly in arrears.

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err welcome to the underclass maybe ?