cost of living for a start....in this poxy little island as you put it.
Agree 100% with purple.
Talking about races to the bottom, focusing job creation on the high value end of the market, higher costs of living in this country (as if we are some special closed circuit economy where this is sustainable) and telling people they should try living on social welfare are tired, hackneyed misleading statements.
In the same way the idea of incentivising effort is not comprehended by the intellectually bankrupt left, there also seems to be some serious mental obstacle to figuring out that our higher costs of living are driven primarily by the fact that our labour costs are high, and consistent with having one of the highest minimum wages in the world.
Our wages are higher than those in the UK and Europe and our social welfare is way higher than elsewhere in the UK and europe. The same people who complain that prices are high here don't see the irony in defending our wage levels.
I wouldn't go as far as calling us poxy, but hey someone has to balance the arguement away from those who believe we are some kind of special place where wage and social welfare structures completely out of kilter with our nearest neighbours is a sustainable situation. It is make believe.
And far from being the "caring" left, the champions of this nonsense will leave the next generation bankrupt whilst excluding any hope of the unemployed ever getting back on their feet. It's not socialism, it's protectionism of the haves, as purple has said.
PS: I still await an explanation from someone as to why going back to the real level of welfare payments from 5 years ago cannot be done. We didn't have widespread starvation in 2005. We obviously can't set social welfare to a level capable of paying mortgages taken out at the height of the boom, but every other element of the increases in the cost of living since then are not irreversable