Friday 15 March 2013

BETTER OFF ALL IN IT TOGETHER IN WESTMINSTER

Members of the House of Lords at Westminster have subsidised meals. Each Lord eating and drinking in parliament receives a subsidy of, on average, £83.90 a week.

As we are all in it together, efforts have been made to cut this subsidy.

It appears that a major component of the costs is staffing, and so their lordships want to cut the cost of that staffing. However, instead of reducing the number of staff and doing a little more for themselves, they propose to reduce the overtime payments made to staff, who are paid only £8.55 per hour.

It occurs to me that if you only earn £8.55 per hour in London, with the cost of housing being so high, there is a likelihood that you will be entitled to in-work benefits.

So in order that their noblenesses, who include some of the richest people in the country, don't loose out on cheap food and booze, people who earn only just above the UK minimum wage, living and working in one of the most expensive cities in the world, will be poorer and obliged to depend more on benefits.

Good thinking.

As an afterthought  having read about Eric Joyce's latest drunken punch up in a House of Commons subsidised bar, where there was a karaoke evening going on, isn't it high time that there was no booze served in Westminster. 

It is a place of work, not a karaoke venue.

16 comments:

  1. I actually feel sorry for Eric Joyce. It's like watching a train crash.
    A family member has alcohol problems, and it's soul destroying for the individual and their family.

    I once worked in Germany, and there was cold beer machines in the workplace. Folk had one or two on a hot summers day, and nobody abused it.
    Could you imagine that happening in this country?

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  2. This is how else they are planning to keep them in ermine supported by the red Tory party.

    DWP seeks law change to avoid benefit repayments after Poundland ruling

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  3. I completely understand what you are saying Juteman. I've similar experience and I've worked with people who had drink problems. It is indeed difficult for everyone.

    In general terms continentals seem to manage alcohol much better than Brits do, although I'm not sure that there aren't more problems in northern Europe.

    I absolutely can't imagine a beer machine in any workplace here!

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  4. FFS -- no excuse -- an elected representative with a history of violence before he was chosen as an MP

    He's a bam and a lager lout

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  5. Tris

    A long time ago I worked for a UK company with headquarters in Wembley. On a training course there I was very surprised to find that part of the staff canteen was a large pub.

    I doubt that it is still there though. Health and Safety and all that.

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  6. tris

    It is a place of work, not a karaoke venue

    reverse that i think

    It is a place of karaoke, not a work venue

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  7. CH: They are a set of right corker. They cheat people out of money; they break the law, they enforce slave labour and then, when they are caught out, they simply change the law.

    A pox on them and all their business.

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  8. Stevie: I don't think should ever have been an MP. He is a man with issues. Perhaps the local party thought he was just the fellow to stir up some sort of trouble with the Tories. But he's done it all wrong.

    I can understand the sympathy Juteman talks about feeling . It is a terrible thing, any kind of an addiction. And booze ruins relationships in families, wrecks kids' lives, and causes despair.

    That said, yes, he is a lout and the sooner he is out of there the better.

    But I maintain they shouldn't have subsidised bars. We don't pay them to drink. We do pay them three times the average wage. If they want to drink at work, they can do what the rest of us do: go down the pub and pay full price. They should be able to afford it.

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  9. I think Dubs, there were quite a lot of places that used to have sports and social clubs as part of the canteen facilities.

    I can't imagine anywhere except parliament having these facilities now.

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  10. LOL @ Niko.

    Yeah, I reckon you probably sum it up right there.

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  11. In cse anyone didn't read the article in teh Guardian linked to by Cynical.

    The Work and Pension Secretary, the creepy man, is introducing legislation to ensure that the people who lost money in the illegal slave labour campaign, after the High Court ruled it illegal, do not get a penny in compensation...ie the money that the Dept of Work and Pensions stole from them.

    To make it even worse the LABOUR PARTY has said it will VOTE THROUGH the legislation.

    So up the workers... huh?

    Yeah, RIGHT up the workers.

    Hang your heads in shame.

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    Replies
    1. And the unions will keep funding them.

      Bruce

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  12. Eric Joyce Staffer Martin Brown Knocked Woman to Ground

    Seems that aggression towards others is part of the Labour parties induction priorities.

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  13. Dear dear, whatever will emerge next about this unlieable lot.

    They aren't Labour though. He resigned from Labour after the last little rumpus.

    I notice that that blog was calling for the stopping of subsidised bars

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  14. There are two worlds one that the clowns in Westminster have that we continue to allow and the real world were real people endure real hardship in the real world. What a f,Ing mess we allow.

    Bruce

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