Off Topic Politics Thread

An unrolled thread about the events of the last 24 hours in the Kherson region. The Russians appear to be retreating in such a disorderly manner that they have left thousands of their own men behind.

Check out this thread at Thread Reader App.
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1590834205956923393.html

The Ukrainian advance into the area bordering the Crimea means that the Kerch bridge would then be in range of HIMARS missiles, cutting off the only route out of Crimea for the Russians. It remains to be seen what countermeasures Putin will inflict upon Ukraine.

 

It's also devastating for the already-devastated Russian morale. Kherson was basically the one big gain they had made, and they couldn't even make a stand there because the Ukrainians just ground their logistics into dust so thoroughly that they had to retreat in a panic. They weren't beaten by a clever maneuver or Ukrainian numerical superiority, they were beaten because the Ukrainians are flat-out better at this, and methodically eliminated the Russians' ability to supply their forces. And they can keep doing it again and again so long as they continue to be supplied with the right equipment.

Also, to the argument that Ukraine should just let Russia brutalize a large part of their populace in the name of peace, there are several thousand people in the streets of Kherson who appear to strongly disagree.

 

This is what it means to the locals: (warning, you may develop leaky eyes

 

I think the rumour was Trump was going to announce his 2024 run early next week. Will be interesting to see if that still happens

 

This brought tears to my eye to see actual heroes; brave, brave men being greeted by ordinary people for giving them their town back.

 

A report about how terminally ill people are struggling financially with a link to a petition calling for terminally ill patients being allowed to claim their state pension early.


TERMINALLY ill patients are being pushed into poverty by the cost-of-living crisis, charity bosses warn.

Calls to a support line have risen by more than a third since last year, end-of-life charity Marie Curie says.

Instead of making special memories with loved ones, dying people are spending their final precious weeks worrying about money. Nearly 80 % of callers surveyed by the charity said they were concerned about keeping warm.

And 61% said their family would struggle to pay the energy bills. Among them is Stewart Batty, whose wife Fran was told she is unlikely to live more than a year after bone cancer spread to her brain. The 50-year-old former PA had already beaten breast cancer twice.

Bus driver Stewart, 47, said he had to heap blankets over Fran to keep their £290 a month heating bill down.

The dad to Isla, 14, and Max, 18, said: “All that really matters now is having nice family time together. But it’s really hard when you’re so worried about money and how to pay the bills.

“We’ve even started having a few cross words between each other over it. I’ll say that I’m going to put the heating on to help her warm up and she’ll tell me not to. Things like that. It shouldn’t be like this.”

Stewart, from Leeds, has dropped some of his hours to spend time with Fran, who had to give up work.

He added: “I just want to be with my wife every second right up until the day she passes but if we don’t get the money from my wage we’d go under.

“I feel like I’m living a nightmare. The last thing we both need right now is having to worry about money.”

Marie Curie is campaigning to allow dying people of working age access to their state pension. Stewart added: “If it’s your money when you get to 67, why isn’t it your money when you’re dying at 50?”

More than 147,000 people have signed a petition on the charity’s website, which also calls for the Government to support dying parents with childcare costs and to protect the terminally ill from soaring energy bills. The charity’s Mark Jackson warned that people might freeze to death. He added: “The cost-of-living crisis is pushing people affected by terminal illness to breaking point.”

• Sign the petition for the terminally ill to access their state pension at bit.ly/mariecurie-poverty

• The Marie Curie Information and Support Line is free on 0800 090 2309

 

Another report on sick pay forcing unwell workers to carry on working putting others at risk of catching anything contagious (flu/Covid) and the potential effect it could have on their health and on the NHS.
LOWEST RATE OF SICK PAY IN EUROPE.

EIGHT in 10 workers are carrying on grafting while ill because statutory sick pay is so atrocious they cannot afford to take time off to recover.

A third of people get only statutory sick pay of £99.35 week if they are unwell – and two million get nothing at all.

As fresh waves of flu and Covid strike this winter, a pressure group warns uprating the pay is urgently needed.

The Safe Sick Pay Campaign, backed by the TUC, unions and major charities, is calling for a lift in statutory payments to the living wage rate of £10.90 an hour, or £436 for a 40-hour week.

Workers and campaigners are also demanding the payouts begin on day one of an absence. Currently, statutory sick pay is only given from the fourth day.

For Sofia Torres, a cleaner at a London skyscraper, iron deficiency means she constantly feels tired. She also needed to have an operation because of years of backbreaking work.

IMPOSSIBLE

The mum of four said: “I have always suffered from fatigue, and have pain in my back due to overwork.

“I could never take time off to get better because sick pay is so low. There is no way I can pay rent and support a family on less than £100 a week – especially after losing three days’ pay.

“But having to work through it made it worse, and eventually I needed surgery and had to take a month off work. I never got the full sick pay in my contract.”

Research by campaigners shows one in five cleaners have no access to any sick pay – and more than a third have gone to work while ill.

Sofia, 52, said there were millions of workers across the UK who faced the same impossible choices if unwell.

She added: “We should be valued enough that if we get sick we can take the time we need to get better, and not feel abandoned.”

Jak Howell, from Swansea, worked at a garden centre for seven years until he was diagnosed with skin cancer last year. He blames overuse of sunbeds.

He was on a zero-hours contract, and Jak says the company let him go rather than give him the time off he needed.

The 23-year-old said: “I just wanted to keep working around my treatment, have a bit of normality, and not have to worry about money as well.

“And I thought if you were sick you’re supposed to get sick pay so that you can do what you need to do to get better. But I was told I couldn’t work there any more.

“I felt let down and completely undermined all because of a health issue that was totally out of my control.”

Amanda Walters of the SSPC called on the Government to urgently fix the broken system and protect workers.

She said: “No one should feel pressured to work while they are unwell.

“For millions of workers on low pay and in precarious work such as cleaners and carers, safe sick pay does not exist and they face working through illness, or taking time off they can’t afford.”

There is also a public health risk if someone with flu or Covid keeps going to work, adding pressure on the NHS.

In total, 78% of workers say they could not get by on less than £100 a week for 28 weeks of statutory sick pay. About 20% say they would not last one week, a poll by Opinium for the SSPC found.

One delivery driver ended up in hospital in January with pneumonia.

He had worked through the pandemic until he got Covid.

Recurring chest infections meant six weeks off work and he and his wife now fear they will lose their home.

Hazel Adie, 54, from Dunfermline, Scotland, has had to take time off because of long Covid.

The wiring operator, who is living off tinned food, said: “If only I’d been a bit more financially secure I would have been able to recover faster, and been back at work weeks ago.”

Meanwhile, the number of people no longer looking for work because of long-term illness has hit a record high of 2.5million, Office for National Statistics figures show. Sick pay of less than £20 a day is the lowest in Europe.

Switzerland gives the most, covering two years at 80% of wages. Sweden pays the same for a year and German workers get 70%.

In Britain, two million very low- paid workers get nothing at all because they do not meet the threshold of earning £123 a week.

Cleaners who earn above the limit but who work for multiple employers often miss out because only one wage packet is considered.

Labour’s new deal for working people would increase sick pay and scrap the lower earnings limit.

All workers would be eligible, including the self-employed not covered under the present system.

Deputy leader Angela Rayner said: “Being so sick you need time off work is never easy.

“But people shouldn’t have to worry about paying bills or putting food on the table.

“The Tories crashed the economy and have taken us into the deepest cost-of-living crisis in a generation, putting people on sick pay under even more pressure.”

The campaign is backed by the TUC, Unite, Unison and Usdaw, as well as major charities such as Scope, Mind, Child Poverty Action Group and Disability Rights UK.

Paul Nowak, the TUC’s incoming general secretary, said: “The pandemic should have marked a turning point, but ministers chose to turn a blind eye to our broken sick pay system.” Vicki Nash of Mind added: “If the Government is serious about closing the disability-employment gap, statutory sick pay needs to work flexibly and reliably for all.”

She pointed out that the “harmful three-day wait” was lifted at the height of th e pandemic.

The Fabian Society calculates it would cost firms an extra £110 a year per worker to raise sick pay to the living wage. According to the World Health Organisation there would be long-term savings to the NHS as overwork increases stroke risk by 35% and heart disease by 17%. The Treasury would also have to stump up an extra £850million in welfare spending.

The Confederation of British Industry has called for the lower earnings limit to be axed and for statutory sick pay to be extended to workers on zero-hours contracts.

A DWP spokesman said some employers paid more for longer through occupational sick pay.

They added: “For disability or a long-term health condition there is a strong financial safety net through the welfare system.”

But the TUC’s economics chief Kate Bell said: “Make no mistake, this is a class issue. Those on low pay and in insecure work are significantly less likely to receive decent sick pay.”

 

Details of the government's voter suppression efforts via their introduction of voter ID to attack the non-existent problem of voter fraud in the UK: In addition to Passport/Photo driving licence (neither of which I have).



Note the bias in here towards forms of ID that are predominantly carried by older people (who coincidentally predominantly vote Tory).

I don't possess any of the forms of ID required to allow me to vote. I'll do something about it but it would be so easy just to say "sod it".


From https://bylinetimes.com/2022/11/07/voter-id-its-far-worse-than-any-us-state/

 

"Daddy? Do all fairy tales begin with
"once upon a time"?"

"No", I replied. "There are a whole series of fairy tales that begin with "If elected, I promise...”

 

In case you're interested ...

https://www.bigissue.com/campaigns/big-futures/

 

Thanks, signed and shared

 

I don't disagree with the main point you are making, but you are required to show ID in other circumstances, what do you use then?
e.g. Bank AC, Some types of Registered Mail

 

I think the main point is that Voter ID is completely unnecessary. There was ONE case of electoral fraud in the 2019 GE, which is consistent with other elections.

What the requirement for Voter ID will achieve is to put people off voting, especially young people. Another step towards totalitarian government.

 

I still maintain that it is easier to commit voter fraud via the postal vote system than it is by walking into a polling station.
I could have easily done this with my wife’s vote, simply because there were times owing to her illness and medication, when she didn’t know what she was signing.
I didn’t change her vote because she voted the same as me anyway owing to her political beliefs.
I know a woman, near Leicester, who is a staunch Tory supporter.
Her son is a cerebral palsy sufferer who, sadly, isn’t mentally capable of making well thought out decisions for himself so his mum has POA and makes all his decisions for him, including who to vote for.
Bear in mind that at the time of my knowing them, she was constantly bitching about how her son’s benefits and access to support groups were constantly being reduced by the Tory government, yet she still used his vote to support the party that was harming him.
I have no evidence to support my belief but as I say, it is easy to commit voter fraud in the right circumstances ie a carer assisting a dementia sufferer with completing a form but putting the cross in the box of their choosing and not that of the person they are assisting.

 

It’s another thing that has cascaded over from america - where it also isn’t a widespread issue but there are people who have a vested interest in claiming that it is