Off Topic Political Debate

Mr Rees-Mogg’s children are a strange issue in every sense. Have you read their names?? Isn’t one of them called Faustian?

 

The UK public much prefers FPTP, I cannot see it changing for decades as it suits the long standing two party domination.

 

It was a worldwide recession with its roots in the American sub-prime borrowing. The world knows it. Why trot out this Daily Fail crap that it was Labour’s fault? Even you aren’t stupid enough to believe that rubbish. If the Daily Fail repeat their garbage enough, the world will end up believing that illegal asylum seekers were to blame. Obese ones. From the North. With brown skins.

Not the gormless, inbred toffs in the City, of course. Nothing to do with them. “Nothing to see here!”

 

Labour's reckless borrowing, including daft PFI schemes, made matters so much worse.

 

PFI schemes are a disaster, but what Labour might have started the Tories have grabbed with both hands. Northants are now in debt to PFI schemes that they have taken on to £1.7 billion. A Tory shambles that has resulted in a bankrupt CC. And where are those intellectural giants such as Leadsom and Bone who represent people in the county. Nowhere to be seen. PFI is great if you wish to keep your debt off the countries balance sheet, which just shows that the trillions that the country owes is underestimated.

 

The first PFI was launched by the Tories in 1992 but the use of the schemes exploded under the Labour government with 60 being signed off every year. It is not the concept that is terminally fatal but the numbers involved, often ministers were often more concerned with providing facilities at the expense of much later costs. The later PF2's were a great improvement on Gordon Brown's earlier schemes.

 

I'm sure some people thought the Titanic was a great improvement on a rowing boat. Didn't get them anywhere did it?

 

Just thank your lucky stars that whilst the DUP is propping up this sorry lot he will never be PM.

 

The NHS’s PFIs guarantee a little over 6.5% interest annually over 30 years. The debt is expensive compared to usual public borrowing, but is a smoke and mirrors exercise to ‘hide’ borrowing. At the expense of the country, to the benefit of private interests. Call me a cynic, but I bet those private interests are personally linked to those who decided to create the PFIs. It’s shocking. But I agree that ‘Labour’ were keen on this, but I refer the Right Honourable gentleman to the answer I gave earlier re Blair et al being ‘Diet Tory Lite’.

 

You make some good points Andy. Part of the problem goes back years when there was no money to invest in things like decent hospitals. It was easy for governments of the day to say, look at your shiny new hospital we have provided, without saying that actually we haven't provided it, but a private company has. Currently the country is lumbered with huge debts to these private companies, and because of the contracts entered into there is little way out until the contract expires or is paid off. It is not just things like hospitals though. It has spread throughout most things that we rely on. Water, power and transport to just pick three. Government has passed the buck to outside interests, often from abroad, and so profits do not get ploughed back in, but frequently leave the country. Cause and effect are simple to talk about, but you could write a book about the steady decline of the public purse in the UK.

 

Just another example of how all this outsourcing can come back to bite. House of Fraser has had to close down their web-site because they cannot deliver anything from their warehouses. Internet trading has created huge problems for the High Street shops, with some saying that a third of their business now comes from on-line sales. House of Fraser gave a contract to XPO Logistics to supply, manage and deliver from two central warehouses. Having been into administration H of F are not legally obliged to pay monies owed to XPO, so this American company has said, no money, no deliveries. Again we see that losing control will put your company or council at risk if you cannot deliver your service.

 

Some of the large UK retailers have been extremely slow to react to online shopping. Companies like ASOS offer such a good service including no hassle returns at a cheap price. Despite us all moaning about Amazon not paying enough tax, their service is generally excellent. It is not as if these struggling high St shops have not had sufficient warning with online shopping greatly increasing each year.

Outsourcing logistics is vital to many businesses and can work extremely well but of course they need paying.

 

My brother in law has a High Street shop, but also has a successful on line business generating 50% of his sales. The problem is that those shops that do disappear create a further gap in the tax take, so just to stand still the councils have to increase what they charge. In 2020 it is intended by central government to withdraw payments to the councils, making them rely on what is collected from business rates. With a hike of 300%, reduced to 200% on appeal, my brother in law is considering if it is worthwhile to keep his shop any longer, after all he could run his on-line business from home. It has all become a vicious circle.

 

It will become increasing obvious that less shops will be required in future. It is a good opportunity to increase the housing supply, the government has relaxed the planning laws in the last few years to ease change of use.

 

Maybe the High Street of the future will change in some ways, but the British still love shopping. It is up to shop keepers of the future to turn it into a 'social event' with more eg. coffee shops appearing in stores. A friend of mine in Hamburg turned his launderette into a launderette + cafe, and there are many other examples of how premises can be made multi functional.

 

In Berkhamsted we have an abundance of coffee shops, all seem to be doing well. Not sure we need any more though. I would have thought housing is the obvious answer, much needed.

 

The Watford M & S had a brilliant idea once
The had a seating area where the men could drink a coffee or tea watching beautiful girl modelling M & S underwear, swimwear and fashion clothes on a giant screen while the women went shopping
But they closed it due to needing more space for the women to shop in

 

I have spoken to quite a few men while waiting outside the changing rooms in M & S. We have all agreed that a small bar would be a good idea.

 

There was a time you could have been arrested for that OFH

 

The problem with abandoning the local High Street (as far as shopping is concerned) is that there will be only large chains of stores and large retailers left. The problem with shopping in the internet, and with shopping from a large (normally out of town) store is that in both cases my money is lost to the local community. If I spend my money in a small locally owned store then there is a chance that my money will circulate locally. This is why we should be looking at ways to save the local High Street.