Thursday, January 25, 2007

THE LABOUR EFFECT

NEAR FULL EMPLOYMENT


Interestingly enough Scottish Television tonight ran an article tonight confirming that the UK has 'near full employment' their words not mine! The SNP will be livid given that their assertion has always been that this is not the case, and given that they helped Thatcher destroy the Scottish Economy in the first place.


A while ago I was taken to task by some right wing bloggers over my claim that Scotland was closing in on Full Employment no doubt they will be complaining to OFCOM about tonight's news?


Yet another Labour Gain, from unemployment in Scotland at 16%, to unemployment under 4% TODAY!!


That is the difference between the SNP, the Tories and the Labour Party? We have a proven track record of growing and developing the Scottish Economy, a proven record of developing the Scottish workforce, a proven record of being positive and for the people of Scotland.

6 comments:

Rory Maxwell said...

You're either even more stupid than I thought or happy to lie through your crooked little teeth.

Which?

Rayleen Kelly said...

I published the comment from Max for one simple reason, instead of giving a critique of the arguments presented in this article, he instead decided to go for personal attacks!

It shows exactly why the Conservatives should never re gain power!

Rory Maxwell said...

Why do you persist in assuming that you know which party I'd vote for instead of answering a direct question.

If unemployment in Scotland (as a percentage of the able workforce) is only 4%, why are there so few people paying income tax?

Rayleen Kelly said...

Max: I didn't actually ask/say what party I believed you to be a part of/ a sympathiser of.

On your point in unemployment being so low, maybe you should ask the reporters of Scottish Television, this article is based on a pieve that they wrote!

troubleshooter_13 said...

OK, I can concede that there are high levels of employment nowadays. But many or even most jobs are low-paid, temporary, unstable, menial, with little career progression or job satisfaction. Only in London and the South-East are there many decent opportunities for earning a decent wage in order to support your family in a country where the cost of living (especially house prices, as we all know) is rising all the time.

For example, I guess 40k a year used to be regarded as a high salary a few years ago, but with house prices being what they are (and utility bills and council tax rising all the time) I fail to see that even such salaries offer the decent standard of living that they used to.

Also, Rayleen, you suggested that I am Nationalist on Ewan Aitken's Blog. Nothing could be further from the truth. I am firmly of the opinion that an independent Scotland would be a disaster for us. We would descend into a much more parochial backwater with high taxes and a stale economy focused excessivle on the state sector.

More worryingly for you and Ewan, I am actually a natural Labour voter who always used to vote Labour but will never do so again. For me, it's not about the Iraq war, or trust, or sleaze, but about the economy, jobs, education, public service delivery, PPP / PFI and taxes.

Labour simply can't be trusted to run the country (none of your politicians has a decent pedigree or background in running a business) and interferes far too much in our daily lives these days. I'm in favour of much less public sector involvement in the country, so will be looking to an alternative party at the next elections.

I also live in Edinburgh, and am sick to death of our local councillors who couldn't run a raffle, so will also be booting these muppets out this year too.

Rayleen Kelly said...

Troubleshooter_13 glad to see you found my blog and thanks for putting forward your argument in a logical and respectful manner you should see some of the vulgarity I have had to reject!

On your point about a 'decent standard of living' I would argue that £40,000 is still a good wage, the point that you are making is about the purchasing power of the wage and I agree it is not as strong on certain items like home and utilities and we do need to do something about that. However, there are products that today are significantly cheaper today than they were 10 years ago, TV's, DVD's Computers are all much less expensive.

I have re read the posts that I have put on Cllr Aitken's blog and I said that given your comments you sounded like the Nationalists locally in Renfrewshire, I apologise if this has offended you, and I am glad to hear that we agree on the issue of Independence.

You say you would never vote Labour again, my gran always said 'never say never', I will not give up trying to convince you of my argument and in fact you have done some of the work for me, in your opening paragraph you accept that there are now more people in work than ever before in Scotland. So we can't be doing that bad on the jobs front. Also the Scottish economy has grown stronger and faster than the rest of the UK, so not doing too badly there either.

I don't agree that none of our politicians has a decent pedigree, I would put forward not just myself (of course) but Wendy Alexander MSP, my local MSP as someone with an excellent mind and a good business sense, and she is but one example.

You are entitled to your opinion, on who to vote for, I would urge you to consider it seriously, and if you still want to vote for someone else then do so, but use your vote wisely, or you could end up with the SNP in control, see my latest posts on our budget process for what that would entail.

Again thanks for the comments


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