Are Any Of You Striking This Wednesday?

[Baby France]

To be honest though....its not the payrises that bothers me the most. Its my pension.

 

[LPF]

Wow! I'm bowing out of this thread before I get really cross! We work really hard for not a great deal of money, above and beyond the call of duty a lot of the time, and Janidog you're acting like we're scum of the earth! Crazy!

I agree!

I also believe in karma

Wow you're a bit bitter!!

hhhhhmmmmmmm MacBeth springs to mind here, and the Three Witches, thats of course if you have read it

My god, you are a really nasty, awful, patronising person.

 

[kirmal12]

Can someone answer me a quick question please?. In the private sector you can choose to opt in or out of the company pension. Can you do that in the public sector?. So if you wanted to, you can take your full salary and place it elsewhere?.

 

[indy and lara]

Wow! I'm bowing out of this thread before I get really cross! We work really hard for not a great deal of money, above and beyond the call of duty a lot of the time, and Janidog you're acting like we're scum of the earth! Crazy!

I agree!

I also believe in karma

Wow you're a bit bitter!!

hhhhhmmmmmmm MacBeth springs to mind here, and the Three Witches, thats of course if you have read it

Janidog, you can disagree with people's opinions and standpoints but downright rudeness/ sarky remarks/ insults have no place in a discussion and are the behaviour of the playground.

 

[tallybee]

I thought one of the most basic forum rules was that "Rudeness, flaming or trolling is not tolerated on, or about, BabyandBump or its members" ? ?

 

[Arcanegirl]

Janidog you have already stated your opinion so i suggest you leave the thread now, or more action will need to be taken on your account for the above rule already quoted

 

[MrsGlitz]

Just a question to throw out there, would you be happy (or rather, accept the changes) if they were only for new employees or would you still see them as unfair and strike?

Also, could you not 'freeze' your pension contributions that you've paid in thus far, refuse to contribute and then put what you are currently putting in into a different scheme, privately?

And a final thing, I am sure I read somewhere today that the only public sector pension scheme which has more people paying into it than taking out of it is the NHS. By the logic that we are all living longer, doesn't that just mean the situation is going to get worse so therefore something does need to be done?

I am not fully understanding of the issues but I am trying at least to understand them.

 

[MrsGlitz]

And for what it's worth, it seems those in the public sector have a skewed idea of the 'benefits' in the majority of the private sector. Certainly the 'spokespersons' on the news bulletins keep quoting the pay rises and bonuses of CEOs; yes they are unfair but many, many of us down at the bottom have to achieve "above and beyond" type status (which is impossible even if you work all hours and make yourself sick) to even get a minuscule raise I've not had one in my 5 years, not even a so-called cost of living rise. And as of Friday I am redundant.

 

[fantastica]

This thread has really educated me on the specific reasons for striking! I always supported the strike, but only knew limited information. I 100% agree with the reasons, and fully support what you are doing, really hope it makes a difference.

That said, whether or not I had agreed with the reasons, it is still important that if people feel that something is wrong that they can and will stand up against it. The problem with Britiain is that sometimes we can be way too passive...we let some things go, and before we know it everyone is in a mess. I like how the French strike/ protest so often! I can understand people not agreeing for whatever reason, but they should at least respect the right to strike when something is unjust.

 

[MrsGlitz]

This thread has really educated me on the specific reasons for striking! I always supported the strike, but only knew limited information. I 100% agree with the reasons, and fully support what you are doing, really hope it makes a difference.

That said, whether or not I had agreed with the reasons, it is still important that if people feel that something is wrong that they can and will stand up against it. The problem with Britiain is that sometimes we can be way too passive...we let some things go, and before we know it everyone is in a mess. I like how the French strike/ protest so often! I can understand people not agreeing for whatever reason, but they should at least respect the right to strike when something is unjust.

I fully support a person's right to strike, whether or not I agree with the reasons for it. And I just wish that there was more scope to be able to if people felt necessary but the vast majority of companies will put clauses in that prevent striking, or even joining unions through and actually the private sector have very little back up and do just have to suck things up.

I know that if there was a wider reaching protest, not a strike as such but a march against the cuts announced yesterday, that on top of a whole bunch of other things would make me join in but I am not entirely convinced what protesting does.

Interestingly the vast majority of friends who were striking today went shopping rather than on a march or picket line. That is wrong, if you want to make a stand at least do it properly.

 

[Boony]

My DH is private sector (Military) since my DH has been in the military the pension scheme has changed 3 times!! (he's only been in 8years!) but he has never striked why? Because the Military aren't allowed to! I don't see why nurses, doctors, police, and firefighters are any different? Anybody striking that means peoples lives are in danger shouldn't be allowed to imo!

Shops were very busy today though!

 

[indy and lara]

It is interesting that people are saying everyone was at the shops. My FB feed is full of comments and pictures of my friends on various marches (all teachers).

 

[blondey]

My DH is private sector (Military) since my DH has been in the military the pension scheme has changed 3 times!! (he's only been in 8years!) but he has never striked why? Because the Military aren't allowed to! I don't see why nurses, doctors, police, and firefighters are any different? Anybody striking that means peoples lives are in danger shouldn't be allowed to imo!

Shops were very busy today though!

Police aren't actually allowed to strike. It's against the law. Good ol' Teresa May was going to give them the right the strike in exchange for stopping making overtime salaried! My husband is a police officer and always said he would never want to strike if he was allowed, but people can only be pushed so far.

Do know who really gets on my wick with striking? BA and tube drivers! 'Oooo our pay rise isn't enough' 'Our perks have been taken away!' 'oooo we want quadruple pay and a day back for working on boxing day' It's not enough that tube drivers already earn more than police officers?!

 

[Tasha]

I stole your quote from earlier in the thread Indy, I really like it

I agree that we are too passive, and too accepting of negative changes. I think it is good that the public sector workers are standing up for what they believe in.

 

[Tasha]

Oh and I have friends who were striking today, some teachers, some work for the Job centre, council etc and ALL of them were marching/at pickets

 

[MrsBandEgglet]

Erm, what the hell was going on with BBC 6 0'clock news tonight?!! How biased were they?!!! I was actually staggered; it seemed like they were just drawing out the most headline-making statistics and interviewing the people who were obviously gonna oppose the strike. Admittedly I was a little annoyed today when my neighbour told me today she had to take an unpaid day off work to look after her kids but the BBC's coverage today, I thought, was pretty bad

 

[Jchihuahua]

Interestingly the vast majority of friends who were striking today went shopping rather than on a march or picket line. That is wrong, if you want to make a stand at least do it properly.

I marched today and I'm 39 weeks pregnant. I agree about making a stand. Almost all my colleagues were at the protests too.

 

[Baby France]

I couldn't make the picket line today unfortunately

I was gutted! HOWEVER, any comment, status or post I have seen I have fought to the death! I used Indy and laras post about the pensions and have just received this response....

Bloody hell your soap box is bigger than mine, we've heard you now please give it a rest....
about an hour ago ·

I also got this from my sister...

are you just arguing on everyone's status today? im not arguing i said its the governments fault! x
2 hours ago · Like

I have fought soo many people and given them the facts. I don't feel as bad about not being able to make the picket line when I've been able to spread the word to others!

 

[Blah11]

shops were very busy here too but mainly cos 90% of schools were closed..

John Lewis toy department was fit to burst!

My mum said it was bizarre walking past her staff standing at the door and saying hello

 

[MrsGlitz]

Huge respect to you ladies then for standing up for what you believe in. I don't think I am ever going to agree in this instance but you do have my respect for listening and discussing sensibly too. Unlike some of the people blindly filling my wall today.