Retired Professor of Political Economy
(Lancaster University, UK - retired 2021)
(also #ProfDJ across the Lune Valley)
Contributor: North West Bylines #NoBridge
Well, well, well, one of the 'clarifications' offered to businesses by Labour's watering down of its New Deal for Workers, is to allow zero-hours contract to continue (despite a commitment to ban them completely) of workers choose them;
cue, off-line (verbal) pressure & 'incentives;' to adopt zero hours contracts 'voluntarily'...
Clueless about employers methods!
If Keir Starmer was trying to build trust in an incoming Labour Govt.,its not workers' trust that he is interested in.
So, as Boeing stumbles under the weight of its own (fatal) mistakes, and Airbus struggles to keep up with the resulting pivot in demand, Brazilian Embraer is now (perhaps unsurprisingly) exploring entering the segment of the market for commercial jets that for so long as been an effective duopoly of Boeing & Airbus.
Embraer is already the third largest global manufacturer of jet aircraft & dominates the market fr regional jets.... one firms mistake is another's opportunity!
Depressing, but hardly surprising: since 2020, dividends to shareholders grew at more than 14 times that of rises in workers wages across developed countries.
To be clear: the BoE & other central banks have been calling for workers to constrain their demands for wages to rectify losses to their standard of loving, while Central Bankers have been 'relaxed' about the maintenance of profits... which of course, contribute to (along with new debt) to dividends!
In a letter to the Guardian Toby Wood raises an interesting point:
Is the profit/surplus-driven model of education (the Academy model) worsening the problems of retaining teachers & the thrusting of teaching assistants into their role(s)?
This may be a single case but its not implausible that it represents a wider trend.
Another case of the ideology of markets corrupting & damaging a vital public service?
As previously discussed in my timeline, what is being presented as a crisis brought on by the need to retrospectively deal with an equal pay problem, is actually much more a case of the impossibility of financial planning when the newly installed IT system means the financial management of the Council has become impossible due to an absence of financial data....
Another IT firm is wrecking lives with impunity; sound familiar?
Meanwhile, in Saudi Arabia, their view of feminism continues to equate support for women's right with terrorism.
As always there is talk of a move towards better rights in Saudi, but its hard to square this narrative of improvement of the plight of women, with the continued judicial actions against females who are promoting such social change via social media.
Well, you will not be surprised that the FT is reporting the shadow cabinet is now discussing ways of responding to lobbying by the corporate sector by weakening or diluting commitments to workers rights previously made by Labour...
Behind the 'New Deal for Working People' is a lot of consultation & 'clarification with businesses. leading business representative to claim they are now more 'relaxed' about the proposals.
As Chris Stark, (now ex-head of UK's Climate Change Committee) observes, about Rishi Sunak stepping back from the UK's climate commitments:
'Climate is the lens through which we discuss a host of global issues & not being at the table, at least not being perceived to be at the table as amongst the most ambitious countries, is a hindrance to that [influence you can have on other issues]'
Tories anti-green stance has a much wide negative impact on UK's global profile & reputation!
Who in their right mind would now conclude any agreement with the London Govt?
Despite an agreement (from 2020) that the UK would accept returned asylum seekers, (now facilitated by legislation designating the UK a 'safe country') Ireland wants to repatriate some, only Rishi Sunak is refusing.
Quite apart from the morality & (in)humanity of the Tories migrant policies (which is bad enough), now he's also further trashing our reputation for keeping to agreements.
One(!) voluntary failed asylum seeker departed for Rwanda yesterday ... as Yvette Cooper observes
The 'Tories are so desperate to get any flight off to Rwanda before the local elections that they have now just paid someone to go...
British taxpayers aren’t just forking out £3,000 for a volunteer to board a plane, they are also paying Rwanda to provide him with free board & lodgings for the next five years... [and] is likely to be costing on average £2mn per person.”
Aha, another inflationary price rise - this time driven by the Govt. itself... but don't worry the BoE will find a way to reframe it as greedy workers trying to get pay rises.
Making Brexit work means, it would appear, making some people stop work (if you work in or own a small food shop)!
If you're around Kirkby Lonsdale in Cumbria next Sunday (5th May - Bank Holiday weekend), and like soul music, why not join ProfDJ for a Soul Sunday at the Royal Barn (New Road) - from 2.00-6.00 I'll be playing a selection of soul classics, and some lesser known great soul music. Every one, a great groove!
As always they'll be some Motown, some Philly Soul, some Northern Soul & some great southern soul, all played on vinyl for your delight.
Its international jazz day, so I'd thought I'd share the track I heard when I was 18, that made me want to investigate jazz.... 3,550 LPs, nearly five decades & countless evenings DJing jazz nights behind me, its still a great track.
The headline of Gaby Hinsliff's piece this morning in the Guardian says it all:
'if we run out of teachers, who will teach our children?'
The crisis in our schools is not just an immediate problem of education but will have impacts across the generations.
We needed to have sorted this out long ago, but the toxic impact of Tory education policy has undermined, disempowered & compromised the teaching profession to such an extent we're now in crisis
Anyone who believes a G7 'commitment' to end the use of coal generated power in 12 years time (by 2035) needs to recall the people making the commitment will have left the stage by then, have shown no willingness to limit use of coal power before & have already allowed (from this weak declaration) an exemption for Japan due to the character of its energy generation sector.... err. surely that should have made it a focus for change not getting a 'free pass'.
The ex-banker Chair of NHS England thinks it is struggling to complete its recovery for the Covid period because it is having to deal with the 'behaviours of a modern world' including gambling & diet (specifically the consumption of ultra-processed foods).
As he then concludes: 'It’s not for me to do policy. But... should there be a different compact with some of the industries which might cause health issues? Probably'!
Yup, the British model of capitalism is killing us.
According to the British Retail Consortium, non-food retail prices actually fell last month driven by discounting.
So, we are seeing the very real impact of the squeeze on household financing driven by BoE policy.
While food prices seem unlikely to drop for climate & supply reasons, across non-food markets its the potential start of a period of deflation... an 'overshoot' by the BoE that will be hidden in 'headline' inflation but will still be a serious economic problem.
As rich countries' population ages, families have fewer children & the working age population shrinks (a demographic pivot thats already clear).
Charles Kenny (CGD) argues
this makes the economic case for inward migration of working-age people pretty strong; recognising this 'reality' is why across Europe anti-migrant sentiment is now the view of an extremist minority.
Pandering to this prejudice is a pretty bad idea economically (& humanely).
Meanwhile in Nigeria, the health service has imposed a new two year working requirement before nurses qualifications will be validated for work abroad - a measure intended to stop the 'brain drain' of qualified nurses to other countries health care systems... prompting legal action from the nurses
Given the numbers of Nigerian nurses who have headed to the UK, this may prove yet one more factor in the NHS workforce planning problems....
Looks like after the BoE sent out messages about being unlikely to reduce interest rates as soon as some had hoped (or even projected), lenders are easing up their fixed rate deals again.... for the over a million households preparing the transition from their old fixed mortgage deal to a new one this ends any hope of a rescue from the massive bump in rates (and the impact on their spending power) they have been fearing.
But remember, for the BoE: if its not hurting you, it not working for us!
Sadly, Ernest Moret the French publisher stopped & harassed under anti-terrorism law on his way to the London Book Fair last year has agreed to settle his claim before the case he bought against the Met was held....
Which means we will not here the tortuous logic by which the Met would have tried to justify the stop, nor will we hear them explain why books are so dangerous.
The Met's inability to police properly is an enduring national scandal!
