Liverpool FC Forum

Boocity » Sun Mar 24, 2013 5:41 pm wrote:

ycsatbjywtbiastkamb » Sun Mar 24, 2013 1:25 pm wrote:it was thatcher who sold british industry down the river, she wanted the country to be based around the financial and service sectors because she knew those 2 industries wouldnt be as bolshy or as big a threat to the establishment as the old traditional heavy industries. when the coal miners basically brought down the conservative government of 1974 it sent shock waves through establishment ranks and her answer to that was to stab her own country in the back.
whenever the IMF get their claws into some poor third world country the first thing they do is make them nationalise all their industries/infastructure and then bring in anti trade union legislation but at least those tin pot leaders are forced to do that with a financial gun to their head, thatcher did it to her own country with glee to f##k over the working classes.
she wrote off more than £15 billion in debt and paid hundreds of millions to advisors to sell off the likes of british telecom, the british gas corporation, the british national oil corporation, british airways, british airports authority, british aerospace, british shipbuilders, british steel, water supply, british transport docks board, british water board, national freight company, enterprise oil, british rail, electricity industry etc etc etc.
she sold the infastructure of one of the greatest nations on earth, built up over hundreds of years by talented engineers and hard working men to the financial markets on the cheap, and left the weakest of her own people (the elderly, disabled, cancer sufferers etc) at the mercy of the speculators.

I partially agree but your view is far to biased with your hatred of Thatcher, we were our own worse enemy in the 70's, if the unions hadn't done their best to destroy any faith in British industry and products coupled with appalling backward looking management then much of our manufacturing industry may have have survived in some form as in Germany.

the unions werent trying to destroy faith in british industry they were trying to preserve peoples standards of living.
it wasnt just the traditional `bolshy` industries like coal and the car workers who went out on strike during the 70`s everyone did (the civil service, fire brigade, nurses, teachers, even the clerks in the houses of parliament!!)
the problem was that the 70`s was the decade of rampant inflation, it ranged from 12% to 25%. the cost of everything went through the roof.
people already felt cheated when decimalisation happened, people swore blind that the cost of living took a sharp rise when that was introduced but then you had the likes of the oil crisis and rampant inflation and pay rise freezes that piled on the agony for average families.
people in the 70`s were going through genuine hardship, they werent striking over f##k all and it was the whole country striking, even people who voted conservative!! (which often gets forgotten these days).

ycsatbjywtbiastkamb » Sun Mar 24, 2013 7:17 pm wrote:

Boocity » Sun Mar 24, 2013 5:41 pm wrote:

ycsatbjywtbiastkamb » Sun Mar 24, 2013 1:25 pm wrote:it was thatcher who sold british industry down the river, she wanted the country to be based around the financial and service sectors because she knew those 2 industries wouldnt be as bolshy or as big a threat to the establishment as the old traditional heavy industries. when the coal miners basically brought down the conservative government of 1974 it sent shock waves through establishment ranks and her answer to that was to stab her own country in the back.
whenever the IMF get their claws into some poor third world country the first thing they do is make them nationalise all their industries/infastructure and then bring in anti trade union legislation but at least those tin pot leaders are forced to do that with a financial gun to their head, thatcher did it to her own country with glee to f##k over the working classes.
she wrote off more than £15 billion in debt and paid hundreds of millions to advisors to sell off the likes of british telecom, the british gas corporation, the british national oil corporation, british airways, british airports authority, british aerospace, british shipbuilders, british steel, water supply, british transport docks board, british water board, national freight company, enterprise oil, british rail, electricity industry etc etc etc.
she sold the infastructure of one of the greatest nations on earth, built up over hundreds of years by talented engineers and hard working men to the financial markets on the cheap, and left the weakest of her own people (the elderly, disabled, cancer sufferers etc) at the mercy of the speculators.

I partially agree but your view is far to biased with your hatred of Thatcher, we were our own worse enemy in the 70's, if the unions hadn't done their best to destroy any faith in British industry and products coupled with appalling backward looking management then much of our manufacturing industry may have have survived in some form as in Germany.

the unions werent trying to destroy faith in british industry they were trying to preserve peoples standards of living.
it wasnt just the traditional `bolshy` industries like coal and the car workers who went out on strike during the 70`s everyone did (the civil service, fire brigade, nurses, teachers, even the clerks in the houses of parliament!!)
the problem was that the 70`s was the decade of rampant inflation, it ranged from 12% to 25%. the cost of everything went through the roof.
people already felt cheated when decimalisation happened, people swore blind that the cost of living took a sharp rise when that was introduced but then you had the likes of the oil crisis and rampant inflation and pay rise freezes that piled on the agony for average families.
people in the 70`s were going through genuine hardship, they werent striking over f##k all and it was the whole country striking, even people who voted conservative!! (which often gets forgotten these days).

that is such an antiquated view. The free market drives prosperity, why do you think every European nation denationalised their state owned enterprises?

There is no value in socialist policies that stifle growth. Breaking down the power of the unions had to happen and we'd be in a lot worse position now if we hadn't.

The best article I have read in a long time explains this well - http://www.adamsmith.org/80ideas/idea/26.htm

if it wasnt for trade unions mate you would be working 12 hours a day seven days a week for a pittance and you wouldnt have the ability to vote to change things. do you think capitalists throughout the ages have given a flying f##k about ordinary people?

to sell off the likes of british telecom, the british gas corporation, the british national oil corporation, british airways, british airports authority, british aerospace, british shipbuilders, british steel, water supply, british transport docks board, british water board, national freight company, enterprise oil, british rail, electricity industry etc etc etc.   

We don't have a centrally planned economy (we were never going to become the USSR - much to the dislike of many "Bolshy" Union leaders), manufacturing output is the business of manufacturing companies not the government.

I personally don't see what's wrong with privatising at least half those companies, if adequate regulations and standards are in place so companies cannot rawt their workforce and the wider public.

ycsatbjywtbiastkamb » Sun Mar 24, 2013 10:56 pm wrote:if it wasnt for trade unions mate you would be working 12 hours a day seven days a week for a pittance and you wouldnt have the ability to vote to change things. do you think capitalists throughout the ages have given a flying f##k about ordinary people?

Yeah, and while those who earned pittance and had their careers equally wrecked by Bolshevik Unions; their member fees were, and still are keeping quasi-political Union members like Arthur Scargill in a 1.5M pound flat in London.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/po ... 28774.html

He profited from those who lost their jobs. I'm sure this champagne socialist regrets every minute of his actions while he sits back in the comforts of his Ivory Tower.

Whilst it can't be denied that Unions defended the rights of the working man ultimately (imo) they went off the rails as the leaders got carried away with their own power and political agenda. In the decade of strife (the 70's) as the Unions repeatedly held the country to ransom on issues of power supply, travel and sanitation it was the general public and union workers that suffered and not the Apparatchiks and Oligarchs orchestrating the whole mess.

On a personal level I remember in the late 50's my old man (a non union worker) was working a night shift at Unilever, the light above the machine he was operating went out and he had to stop work and wait for a unionised electrician to come and replace it. Two hours went by and still no sign of the electrician, my old man was on piece work (got paid for what he produced) so he thought "fk this" went to the store got a light bulb screwed it in and carried on working . Three hours after my old man had first reported the problem an electrician finally turned up and went nuts that my old man had replaced the light bulb, with comments of "you can't take my job" the electrician scurried of to his shop steward. Upshot of it all was they threatened to strike, management caved and my old man lost his job.

F'ucking Unions never got my families support after that, the twa'ts that ran them brought this country to it's knees.

Kenny Kan » Mon Mar 25, 2013 5:25 am wrote:

ycsatbjywtbiastkamb » Sun Mar 24, 2013 10:56 pm wrote:if it wasnt for trade unions mate you would be working 12 hours a day seven days a week for a pittance and you wouldnt have the ability to vote to change things. do you think capitalists throughout the ages have given a flying f##k about ordinary people?

Yeah, and while those who earned pittance and had their careers equally wrecked by Bolshevik Unions; their member fees were, and still are keeping quasi-political Union members like Arthur Scargill in a 1.5M pound flat in London.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/po ... 28774.html

He profited from those who lost their jobs. I'm sure this champagne socialist regrets every minute of his actions while he sits back in the comforts of his Ivory Tower.

and the old commie Bob Crow. Earning over £140K a year and still living in a council house.

The height of hypocrisy.

ycsatbjywtbiastkamb » Sun Mar 24, 2013 10:56 pm wrote:if it wasnt for trade unions mate you would be working 12 hours a day seven days a week for a pittance and you wouldnt have the ability to vote to change things. do you think capitalists throughout the ages have given a flying f##k about ordinary people?

Just take a step back and think about what it was like, look what happened to British industry, shipbuilding, cars, motor cycles, poor investment, poor quality and bad work relations, other countries were steering well clear of us and our products, even our own consumers stopped buying British. it was bad management, poor investment and too powerful and bolshy unions, do you honestly think that could have continued, we would be the 51st state by now if it had.

Boocity » Mon Mar 25, 2013 11:32 am wrote:

ycsatbjywtbiastkamb » Sun Mar 24, 2013 10:56 pm wrote:if it wasnt for trade unions mate you would be working 12 hours a day seven days a week for a pittance and you wouldnt have the ability to vote to change things. do you think capitalists throughout the ages have given a flying f##k about ordinary people?

Just take a step back and think about what it was like, look what happened to British industry, shipbuilding, cars, motor cycles, poor investment, poor quality and bad work relations, other countries were steering well clear of us and our products, even our own consumers stopped buying British. it was bad management, poor investment and too powerful and bolshy unions, do you honestly think that could have continued, we would be the 51st state by now if it had.

you hit the nail on the head when you mentioned bad management, our industries back then were run by ex brigadeer`s and major`s from WWII who didnt have a clue about market forces, whilst the likes of germany, japan and the united states had professionals running their industries and economies we had the `chaps`. our captains of industry were literally `captains`.
in japan you had the CEO`s of huge companies eating lunch with shopfloor workers but in this country the class system turned our workplace into an adversarial contest. in the 1950`s a chairman of a large british company wouldnt be seen dead with a minion from the shopfloor never mind have his lunch with him.
no one bought british goods because they were poorly designed, that wasnt the fault of the unions or the workforce.
it`s not really a surprise that the unions were keen to hold on to their hard won rights because people back then could remember the bad days of the 1930`s where we had hunger marches and before anyone could claim unemployment benefit they had to sell all their worldly possessions including furniture.
the people in power have treated the working class of this country like $*i*e, it`s been a 1000 years since william the conqueror arrived on these shores and yet we`ve only had universal suffrage since 1928, there were universities that didnt allow women to study there as late as 1948.
all those rights we take for granted like the right to vote, pensions, safe working conditions, decent pay, unemployment benefit, universal healthcare, the 5 day week, the 8 hour day, right to have holidays, equality for women and minorities in the workplace etc etc were all won by trade unions or trade unions were at the vanguard of the movement.
those people in the 50`s, 60`s and 70`s knew the sacrifices that people had made to give them a decent standard of living (like the poplar labour councillors going to prison over the issue of fair council rates, one lady councillor millie lansbury contracted pneumonia in holloway prison and died not long after she was released) and they also knew what happened to the poor if you gave the rich free reign.
it was the people at the top who turned this into a contest, not the people at the bottom.