Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Big savings needed in Haringey. Where should the savings come from?
Now the party's truly over. I've been talking for a while now about the need for local authorities to save something like 20-25% from their budgets. This evening Panorama took up the theme. It's now out there. For Haringey that'll mean savings of something like £80-100m in savings. That's huge! We're facing the biggest cuts since the 1970s. Handled badly, it will be an emergency.
So what do we think? What would we choose? We can sit back and let the Council take decisions or we can share the responsibility and contribute our views. Probably about as exciting as doing your expenses, but something we should probably be doing.
Here's how Haringey's spending is split right now:
So discuss. For more details on Haringey's finances, see this area on their website.
Some rules. Only constructive discussion allowed. If you want to party-politic or bash the Council, please go to another discussion. I'm opening this discussion for constructive discussion only. Break those rules and ya get nuked!
So what do we think? What would we choose? We can sit back and let the Council take decisions or we can share the responsibility and contribute our views. Probably about as exciting as doing your expenses, but something we should probably be doing.
Here's how Haringey's spending is split right now:
So discuss. For more details on Haringey's finances, see this area on their website.
Some rules. Only constructive discussion allowed. If you want to party-politic or bash the Council, please go to another discussion. I'm opening this discussion for constructive discussion only. Break those rules and ya get nuked!
Tags for Forum Posts: cuts, public spending cuts
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Omotn on
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Oh dear, what does that person do when you don't "need" them?
they do whatever task it is for some other council, provided the employer has a suitable set of contracts
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Permalink Reply by John McMullan on
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Ah yes, all our problems would be solved if labour really was that liquid. It's not.
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Ah yes, all our problems would be solved if labour really was that liquid. It's not.
I think the UK market has been flooded with lots of liquid Poles, Rumanians, etc.
For myself, having been made redundant I took a series of short term contracts and my new employers were very happy with the equation
wages + benefits(pensions?) + costs (full time , permanent employee ) >
the cost of hiring/firing someone only when you need him/her with absolutely no other overhead whatsoever
Perhaps labour could do with a bit of a whizz in a blender.
In order to comply with thread rules my constructive suggestion is:
1) outsource all day to day routine repetitive tasks
2) dismiss all council staff working on projects except a few shit hot project managers and hire the rest on short term contracts as self employed -
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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You got any kids, Omotn? Small and very thin if possible. Our chimney needs a good clean.
What, spending their days in school? Well, I hope it's at least an exclusive private school creating real wealth. Not some publicly funded council rest home for those welfare scroungers aka teachers. -
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Permalink Reply by pamish on
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Maybe some tasks don't need 24/7 staffing - snow clearing? organising carnivals? But how are elder care, or children's homes, sporadic? Do we have great surges of extra oldies suddenly needing care? I do find the idea of 'entrepreneurs' making a profit off such services just a little disgusting.
(Still looking at those Windsor figures, maybe this borough with 40 years of non-stop Labour has resisted the Thatcher-Blair push to sell off everything. Those August open books will let us know.)
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We're not off topic at all.
Over the years Haringey chose to spend a lot of money on various aspects of early years education: including support and training for childminders. In most aspects the council anticipated Government policy.
But good childcare doesn't come cheap. And high quality early education is actually expensive. But it's also an excellent investment for a society to make in its future.
(Declaration of Interest. My partner Zena Brabazon was at one time the Head of Haringey Early Years Service.) -
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its rather difficult to measure the supposedly cheaper job you get from competition
Indeed.
Why is it so black and white that private companies are these evil cost cutting monsters and hospital employees are these angelic Florence Nightingale types
Well, let's just list all the companies in the FTSE250 and see how many of them are NOT all about making a buck. I can't think of one.
Nurses are pretty angelic, they could join the police force for more money, but they'd rather look after ill people. Call me a cynic if you like but I don't think they do it just for the pensions.
had guaranteed 3/4 final salary pension scheme and a fifty grand lump sum pay off when she retired at 55 and kept all her council freebies and discounts until she died
I'd like you to post links to all those claims. I've found a good one here and it shows that you exaggerate the cost to the NHS of these final salary pension schemes (hint: they are contributory). What else are you exaggerating to make a point?
I rather suspect this is going to be moved to a new thread. Sorry Hugh.
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My teaching pension so far ater 16 years is just under £4000 pa.
One day I'll go through my P60's and tot up how much I've put in, and how many years I have to live to get it back. Quite a lot I suspect.
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John, this discussion has broken the rules originally set by Hugh. "Only constructive discussion allowed"; no party politicking or council bashing.
Even so, it has a very important function. Some people from the political Right have given clear answers to Hugh's original questions.
Because they come to the discussion with an almost religious belief. All private enterprise is good and creates wealth. Everything in the public sector creates nothing and is waste.
So what should the council do? Their answer is to cut. Jobs? Cut the lot. Salaries? Slash them. Services? Let the market provide.
Of course this is not what 'One Nation' Tories believed. It's not the image David Cameron took pains to project before the election. But here we are. Axemen and women setting to work with glee. Because despite all the evidence to the contrary they still believe 'the market' is always right. And that any alternative is simply a command economy like the Soviet Union.
Astonishing really. As if J.M. Keynes, William Beveridge, Nye Bevan; Harold Macmillan and many others who contributed to the whole postwar 'settlement' in the U.K. - never existed. As if the more egalitarian social democratic societies of Western Europe hadn't developed their own solutions.
(Labour councillor Tottenham Hale)
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If you know of a private company that is not in business to make a profit then please tell me and I will tip off my Hedge Fund mates in the city and they can short it to death.
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Permalink Reply by John D on
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Private companies " making a buck " or even a profit are not necessarily evil cost-cutting monsters. They are the engines that power the economy. And I think it extremely offensive to suggest that because someone finds child care expensive their pregnancy was unplanned. That's their business and none of ours.
" childcare provided by the state at prices the market will not " - Where, in this socialist paradise, can he find affordable childcare provided by the State ?
With a childminder at £1000 a month and rent or mortgage at another £ 1000 a month, how is the ordinary person to survive ?
@ Will - I'm afraid that in this forum even nice people who profess conservative sympathies are regarded as baby eaters and grinders of the faces of the poor and are the subject of offensive and bigoted remarks. Reason and argument are of no avail and all you can do is try to ignore the facile suggestions about sending children up chimneys while continuing to make your point in a civilised manner
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John, exaggerated facts have not obviously endeared me to Will. That's the kind of thing I do.
Private companies " making a buck " or even a profit are not necessarily evil cost-cutting monsters.
Will called them evil cost-cutting monsters (here), just because I didn't bother objecting to this doesn't mean I agreed with him.
" childcare provided by the state at prices the market will not " - Where, in this socialist paradise, can he find affordable childcare provided by the State ?
I was not saying it existed, just making a point that left to the market it is unaffordable in London (costs are too high). An economist may tell him it's time to go into business as a child minder, Haringey council will help.
Will, you were lining yourself up for a shot at Tottenham's "beneficiaries". Forgive me if you were not but I didn't think you were being light hearted, in fact quite "couple of exaggerated facts, look at poor-old-hard-working-me, look at those scroungers-in-a-council-flat, well, just sayin', eh?".
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