The Fabian Society’s New Forms of Work report offers an excellent overview of the debate on the future of work. They emphasise continuity as much as change. Despite the growth of independent and more flexible forms of work, full-time jobs with conventional employers remain the norm and the objective for the great majority. As David Coats puts it, despite the rise and fall of industries over recent decades, “the structure of the labour market has scarcely changed over the last 30 years.”
As in past recessions, so in the present one the biggest problem with work is that there isn’t enough of it. With unemployment at 2.5 million, and youth unemployment constituting more than 20 per cent of under 24 year olds, the imperative is to generate more jobs. For under 24s, we also need far more good quality apprenticeships leading to jobs. The reinvention of apprenticeships is an especially urgent national priority and needs to be at the heart of Labour’s future policy.
Making work pay is also vital. The minimum wage has made a significant difference to pay levels at the bottom, but the debate about a “living wage” is gathering pace and Labour needs to take account of this too. Decent wages are the first and most fundamental form of ‘flexicurity’, as described by Wilson Wong.
Other big issues raised here include the right balance between flexibility and security, the appropriate treatment of the self-employed as against the employed, and the definition of ‘freelancers’. The role of trade unions is also central. In all these areas, these essays contribute new thinking and will help inform Labour’s response to the present economic crisis.
Why do MPs gather together in Londons Parliament and speak to each other without obtaining the permission of the constituents they are honour bound to represent, how can they represent us when they are in Westminster. Their job is within their constituencies speaking to us the only contact with the outside world is the process of telling our civil servants the result our communal decision why involve any other MP they are supposed to be within their own constituencies doing just as we instruct them to do just as we wish it. Londons Parliament is obsolete and should now be pulled down and turned into rubble. We will vote for this process to begin as soon as we are able.
Why are we English invisible, why are we unrepresented,why are we overrun by others who refuse to recognise our own Country and our true Identity to enable them to manipulate us as they please. Why should we be british for thieves in London, why is our National Identity refused us…
THE ANSWER IS … LONDON The KLEPTOCRATIC CITY-STATE THE RISE OF GHORMENGHAST … AS PREDICTED GREETINGS FROM THE (only) ENGLISH EMBASSY in the World – I wonder why? Why is there no English Government … who stole our Identity so as to make more of it’s own! Only City’s have Empire’s. Why should we English be told to be british by every pipsqueak and moribund public and private artificial construct in London’s arsenal of manifestations, why comply when it brings no relevent democratic or economic benefits to us of any kind.
Why are we subjected to a continual barrage of specious yet invasive media advertisements??? adversiding against us in programme film and paper form while the entirely selfish rogue Capital of …. britain exploits us systematically. Some magnificent scam, thieving away with our sensibilities: the whole edifice is a manufactured entity. I would have thought the Commonwealth Countries would get wise in time but even they remain silent … mysteriously servile and compliant without making any form of humanitarian representation about this blatant abuse of England and the English people. Scotland Wales and Ireland have their own governments why are we English absent from the realm of Nations – who made us invisible.
A Dictator doesn’t have to be a person, history proves conclusively that a dictator can be a City exploiting its position for its own advantage. All of China bankrolled the Olympic Games for Beijing’s cultural emancipation – imagine who bankrolls London year on year on year who’s invisible assets back up every event it manages … 365-24-7? Who pays for its almost countless public attractions it’s – Bloodsucking Intellectual Troposphere, London’s Royal Family, London’s Parliament, London’s Museums, London’s Art Galleries, London’s Orchestras. London’s Theatres and Opera’s – a mutual apprecion society with no visible means of support!