2024 UK politics - now with Labour in charge
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I agree with this. Throughout a lot of the country farmers can't afford to buy farmland and farm workers can't afford to live near the farms. I don't think this policy will have much impact on anything, but if it does, it might make the land slightly more affordable.
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It would be good to take the heat out of it, if nothing else. Given the precariousness/uncertainty of UK farming overall, one can't help but feel that there are other things driving the relentless upward pressure.
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Maybe the relaxation of planning rules means that it can all be turned into houses now.
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That certainly helps prop up the value of farmland near conurbations. There will be several very rich ex-farmers around Exeter given the rate that Topsham, Pinhoe and Alphington are gobbling up neighbouring farmland. There's a proposal to put up 500 houses on a 20 acre field I used to take cows to graze on that would mean that that family would never have to work again.
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I know a farming family that sold off some of their fields in the 80s for a bypass. Instant cash millionaires.
The above may be fact, or fiction, I may be serious, I may be jesting.
I am not sure. You have no chance.Veronese68 wrote:PB is the most sensible person on here.0 -
The Telegraph not necessarily making the best argument against Reeves' Budget...
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I read that, and it sounds like they are having to sell their boat because they can't afford to pay an agency to manage their portfolio of 60 houses.
I was struggling to see which bit is down to Labour.
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I'm quite happy to swap £300/year for their 60 properties and boat if it'll help them in their time of great need.
The above may be fact, or fiction, I may be serious, I may be jesting.
I am not sure. You have no chance.Veronese68 wrote:PB is the most sensible person on here.0 -
Probably took out mortgages and the rate went up because of woke.
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Nah GB Energy is taking land in lieu of inheritance tax then using it for solar farms - read it on X.
[Castle Donington Ladies FC - going up in '22]0 -
Sounds like the free market in action. I'd have thought that the Telegraph would have been in favour of that. Sixty properties financed entirely by borrowing seems like a risky venture. If lots of portfolios like this go back into the market, it should mean that there's an easing of purchase prices, and a few more people will be able to get out of the rental market, reducing demand and prices there.
Just a thought... maybe the fact that a random not-wealthy couple could buy up sixty properties to rent out suggests that the market for both purchase and rental is not working benignly towards those who need somewhere affordable to live.
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No idea about this or the article, but anyone who employs a lot of low paid people is going to be hit quite hard by the NI change - £615 per person just for the lowered threshold. I could see this having an impact on managing agents.
It feels like labour didn't think through who would be most affected by this.
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I swear the Telegraph are just inventing people to get angry at.
“New York has the haircuts, London has the trousers, but Belfast has the reason!0 -
Same sectors that will be hit by the rise in the minimum wage.
The care sector is an example. This has just come through a post covid staff retention crisis that, effectively, people in care have paid for with their wellbeing.
I fear another round of carnage.
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Sure, but if one's business is only viable by having most of one's workforce at the absolute bottom of the pay scale then maybe it isn't really a viable business and one needs to look at why that is rather than insisting that one simply must keep paying poor wages or the carees will suffer.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
I wonder if Reeves will have the courage to take on the scandal of the cost of children in care, if she's looking to get more taxpayers' money where it belongs...
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The economics are what they are. It is an industry that relies on compassionate but unskilled people.
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I'd suggest that's a counsel of despair. Investors aren't buying up care homes because they think they might just about keep their head above water.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
Care homes are expensive. Staff are cheap. That disjoint in accounting is going somewhere.
The above may be fact, or fiction, I may be serious, I may be jesting.
I am not sure. You have no chance.Veronese68 wrote:PB is the most sensible person on here.0 -
The care sector isn't just care homes. But that aside, I presume you don't see underpaid and overworked staff are incompatible with good investment returns? Because the investment returns will be the last thing to be compromised.
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People moan about the cost of being in a care home already, so increasing the staff wages will increase the cost of being in care, so more complaints about the cost.
The NI changes will have a very big effect in that sector, which will be a big negative on a sector that the NHS needs to work better to enable the NHS to work better.
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I'm more worried about charities that barely break even who look after people with disabilities. Supported living, that sort of thing. There were conditions worse than prison for some during COVID, because of staff shortages. And of course, staff shortages lead to even worse staff shortages.
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I don't think a lower or stagnant min wage helps there either though? The care sector might be able to advertise for twice as many roles if they halved the min wage, but it's not like there are loads of unemployed carers who would take that over a different min wage job.
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The more I think about the worse I think the drop in employer's NI threshold is. It will really affect some industries quite badly.
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It's a circle that needs to be squared, somehow. we want people in care to be looked after well, and so carers should be paid better to widen the appeal of the job, but equally people don't seem to want to pay (even) more for care than it costs already, and not being exempt from the NI chnges will not improve things. It is also not helped by the rate local authorities pay for care being substantially beneath the market rate for providing care.
All parties seem to completely ignore the importance of social care and are blind to the impact it has on getting the NHS to work efficiently.
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No, it's all three measures at the same time that is the shock to the system.
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My point is that if there is enough money going round for it to be worth investing in for a worthwhile return, then there's enough to improve wages. It's not the case that a viable business can't be made without bare minimum wages.
Of course it is in the interests of the investors that wages be minimised but that's just a preference. It's not like the investors don't have agency to look at their other costs and income and do something about these.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
Sorry but this is a bit naive. The response will be fewer staff working harder. It always is.
If it is too much of a pita once the adverse outcomes start to increase, the PE crowd will just start sucking the blood out of some other industry.
Has architecture been targeted yet?
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I don't see this as being fundamentally different from any other professional service that is provided. If providers want to charge more,they need to demonstrate the added benefit to their customers such that they are prepared to pay the extra. It's not easy and requires years of work to build reputation, efficiency and so on, but just sitting there waiting for a government to tweak some spending doesn't seem like a solution.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
It's more likely that some businesses will just go bust.
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