Stabbed in the back Options

[Turin Machine]

What part of care and compassion for the sick, elderly and the vulnerable residents of West Berks does this council not understand ? on the back of last years cuts we now have swinging and damaging cuts in provision in everything from meals on wheels to shopmobility ! I'm sorry "call me Dave" but you really don't understand the damage you are doing and the real resentment that is being generated by the population at large. You will not, cannot be allowed to get away with it anymore, expect heavy losses in the next round of elections when the people that this council and central government have betrayed goes to the poles.

Anyone who is as outraged by these cuts as I am shouls lobby the counil NOW ! and make things change, please, before its too late.


signed

Angry of West Berks

[NWNREADER]

The argument about 'fair' pensions will rumble on and on with nary a solution. The preferred scheme for the public sector is Final Salary based on a scheme (no fund) as it is broadly easier to budget for long term. The public sector prefers to offload the 'guarantee', so go for investment-funded pension schemes they can largely walk away from as employers.
When investments are on the up those funded pensions pay out big time, and the public sector ones are the poor relation. At the moment public schemes, being 'guaranteed' to pay at a certain level, look good and the employees in invested arrangements feel hard done by.
It was only a few years ago Investment 'Advisors' were crawling around the public sector offering their 'far better paying' schemes to employees. No sign of them now, and some are even having to pay compensation for mis-selling.

The two ways of funding pensions are just different - one guarantees a certain payment, one offers the chance, dependant upon investment returns, of a certain payment. The contributions paid by many public sector employees are far higher than most private sector ones.

Plus, we are doubtless living longer, and elderly care is much more 'expected' to be provided by the state. Nearly every geriatric hospital has long closed, so the state either pays for care in the home, or for private provision (when the recipient is skint). It was politically unacceptable to change pension age/contributions to reflect the greater costs that were there to be see. Now the problem is a major one and the solutions hurt.
If a pension is expected to pay out for 10 years (expected life after 65 in 1948), but then pays out for 20 or more (life expectancy now) then something has to give. We either pay more for the pension while working, or we get less while drawing.
In the same way, providing care for - say - 100 people for 5 years costs a lot less than for 150 people for 10 years. We have to bite that bullet and find ways to provide the care (including families taking responsibility) and pay for it.