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ChrisKnott | 11 months ago

His examples of “feeling poor” are nothing to do with being poor and are in fact mostly signs of largesse or affluence.

Councils expanded the number of SEND pupils eligible for free school transport, increasing spending from £9m to £20m - how is that being poor? It’s an improvement in quality of life…? Ok, it might be a waste of money (or might not be) but it’s not a cut is it.

Being poor is like your country sends 10 athletes to the Olympics and they all get eliminated in the heats. No Western nation is actually poor. All Western nations are roughly the same, there’s nothing notable about the UK other than it is towards the richer end and is a cultural superpower.

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order

Nursie|11 months ago

> Councils expanded the number of SEND pupils eligible for free school transport, increasing spending from £9m to £20m - how is that being poor?

Because the money is sucked out of the council coffers and they then can't provide a lot of the basics. It's not an improvement in quality for people who are, for instance, not SEND pupils. The point being that more and more expenses like this appear each year and then the budget is gone when it comes to looking after the library, fixing potholes etc, Small every day things that make the country look and feel like it's functioning are ignored until everywhere just feels a bit grim and broken.

physicsguy|11 months ago

I'm interested to see what Labour have in store for local government reform overall. Where I live will be affected since I'm just into Derbyshire and they're consolidating all boroughs into unitary authorities, which I'm in favour of since I have four tiers of local government where I live.

I hope this will just be the first step.

n4r9|11 months ago

Intuitively, the richer and more productive a country becomes, the better care they can take of the populace. Education, transport, welfare etc... . Yet it feels like the opposite is happening. We're seeing transport costs and tuition fees endlessly rising, cuts to disability payments, and broken promises to lift caps on welfare. All in the name of "stimulating the economy".