Have students actually got anything to complain about?

Castiel · 12 Dec 2010 at 18:58

prosk said:
They are still part of the coalition though, and if those pledges dont mean anything since they didn't come first then how are those pledges worth anything in the first place? Are they just bargaining chips?

Their manifesto pledges are made on the proviso that they are elected to power. They were not so their pledges are not able to be enacted without the support of the other parties.

They chose to go into a coalition to support the Conservative leadership and thus they have to compromise in those pledges somewhat, which is what they have done. No one has been duped or used a bargaining chips, the students who voted should have looked at the manifestos and the likelihood that they would be elected to power in order to enact the pledges therein.

No-one is to blame here, economics has forced a decision which it turns out is actually better than either the status quo or the alternatives of a graduate tax or fewer available places.

Unfortunately for whatever reason the NUS and associated bodies were under the erroneous and somewhat naive impression that the Liberal Democrats had enough influence to scrap tuition entirely and no matter what option was put forward they would have encouraged the demonstrations against anything less, as they have done.

fez · 12 Dec 2010 at 19:21

I can't tell how I feel about this any more. On the one hand, the retarded comments and opinions from so many people against the rise in fees makes me think that maybe we do need to put more into education.

On the other hand, quite a lot of people seemed to be ignoring the actual policy and instead, fixate on the fact that the liberal democrats have stood by and let this happen.

It just worries me that the majority of people who will vote in the next election seem to have a remedial grasp of anything really.

How can the lib dems run a campaign that aims to win the election if they are constantly explaining not just their policies, but how they will behave if there is a power share. Best be careful though, as there are there are lots of different levels to which they could be involved in government so we had better explain what we would do under every possible outcome.

If every party had the knowledge and resources at its disposal to actually create a manifesto that wasn't based on speculation and incomplete statistics then I will be amazed. If any party was stupid enough to run an election campaign which only promised what they knew for a fact they could deliver, it would be a massive failure.

Its wonderful to be idealistic about government and politics but the very nature of it makes it a minefield of half truths and plain lies. Its never a good idea to have governmental power correspond to social standing and yet our MPs seem to be the most idiotic, over entitled bunch of idiots around. There are some very good ones but the recent focus on politics has unmasked the idiots that sit atop our country.

meghatronic · 12 Dec 2010 at 19:56

fez said:
It just worries me that the majority of people who will vote in the next election seem to have a remedial grasp of anything really.

Churchill:

It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried.

The best argument against democracy is a five minute conversation with the average voter.

PermaBanned · 12 Dec 2010 at 20:06

meghatronic said:
Churchill:

Ah yes, the right wing war commander who was so out of touch with reality that he had no chance of being elected when the main item on the agenda was looking after the citizens rather than sending them to war while you relax safely back home. It was his failings that lead to one of Labour's longest and most productive times in office was it not?

If we're going back 80 or so years then we should realize that it was after WW2 that the country had a huge debt, far larger than the one we have now. Did we cut everything in sight then? No. What happened instead? The Welfare State was introduced.

So why, in a time of less risk are those same services being cut?!

apeZ · 12 Dec 2010 at 20:13

If all of the lib dem MPs who voted went against the fee rise, it would not have gone through.

So technically they did go back on their pledge, by voting for it rather than against...

Mucky_Pup · 12 Dec 2010 at 20:15

apeZ said:
If all of the lib dem MPs who voted went against the fee rise, it would not have gone through.

So technically they did go back on their pledge, by voting for it rather than against...

It doesn't work like that though, that's a very simplistic way to view it.

prosk · 12 Dec 2010 at 21:12

fez said:
It just worries me that the majority of people who will vote in the next election seem to have a remedial grasp of anything really.

Don't worry, I don't intend to vote in the next election, nor did I vote in the previous election and neither shall I vote in any election in the future. I may be naive enough to hold onto unrealistic ideals but I'm not naive enough to believe that any politician will ever be truly dedicated to improving the living standards of the low classes (except Jose Mujica eh?). Now where did I put that "Vote Cthulhu" pic...

Fr0dders · 12 Dec 2010 at 21:35

Superewza said:
Ah yes, the right wing war commander who was so out of touch with reality that he had no chance of being elected when the main item on the agenda was looking after the citizens rather than sending them to war while you relax safely back home. It was his failings that lead to one of Labour's longest and most productive times in office was it not?

If we're going back 80 or so years then we should realize that it was after WW2 that the country had a huge debt, far larger than the one we have now. Did we cut everything in sight then? No. What happened instead? The Welfare State was introduced.

So why, in a time of less risk are those same services being cut?!

WWII was 65 years ago, 80 years ago would be in the 1930s which would refer the period known as the Great Slump after the Wall Street Crash of 1929. So we're talking about the post WW 1 years , not WW II.

But its not nearly as clear and simple as you make out.

The May Report in '31 advised the government to, guess what ? Cut public spending, and public sector wage cuts to avoid a budget deficit. The dispute over whether to cut or not split the Labour Government in half. The election in '31 following the labour turmoil saw a landside win to the conservatives with the now leaderless labour party only winning 46 seats.

After the election, the conservative budget cut public sector wages by 10 %, income tax went up. Many of that generation, and the children of that generation grew up beliving the cause of the economic hardship in the 30s to be all the conservatives fault. Modern historians have been much kinder however.

Yes in '31 the welfare state was changed to a fully government funded unemployment benefit that paid out according to need rather than contributions. But make no mistake, we did not "spend our way out of the recession" as some would argue. Our recovery was more to do with increased taxation in imports, the devaluation of the pound, and abandoning the gold standard than "spending our way out" it.

Dolph · 12 Dec 2010 at 21:36

apeZ said:
If all of the lib dem MPs who voted went against the fee rise, it would not have gone through.

So technically they did go back on their pledge, by voting for it rather than against...

Which would have left the current, less progressive system in place.

Presumably you'd also object if they were putting the fees up by 10x but raising the repayment threshold to £100,000 per annum salary...

Castiel · 12 Dec 2010 at 22:01

Dolph said:
Which would have left the current, less progressive system in place.

Presumably you'd also object if they were putting the fees up by 10x but raising the repayment threshold to £100,000 per annum salary...

Or scraping fees entirely but reducing places by 60%....

[TW]Fox · 12 Dec 2010 at 22:35

See I read your post a couple of times MrLOL and it just seemed a bit weird. You get to know peoples posting styles and this particular posted seemed a bit, I dunno, odd? As if somebody else had written it.

Now, in terms of heaving a head full of useless knowledge I know I'm quite bad with things like cars but it seems no matter what it is, be it cars, or politics, or heck anything, you know all about it.

So I thought I'd have a quick look. People often accuse me of basically re-posting Wikipedia, so I wondered if perhaps thats actually what some people do.

It didnt take me long to find...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Depression_in_the_United_Kingdom

In it, it basically says almost word for word what you posted, just with a few of the words re-arranged.

MrLOL said:
The May Report in '31 advised the government to, guess what ? Cut public spending, and public sector wage cuts to avoid a budget deficit.

Wikipedia said:
The May Report of July 1931 urged public sector wage cuts and large cuts in public spending to avoid incurring a budget deficit

MrLOL said:
The dispute over whether to cut or not split the Labour Government in half.

Wikipedia said:
The dispute over spending and wage cuts split the Labour government

MrLOL said:
a landside win to the conservatives with the now leaderless labour party only winning 46 seats.

Wikipedia said:
The election resulted in a Conservative landslide victory, with the now leaderless Labour Party winning only 46 seats

MrLOL said:
Many of that generation, and the children of that generation grew up beliving the cause of the economic hardship in the 30s to be all the conservatives fault.

Wikipedia said:
the majority of the British people, and particularly the working class and returning servicemen and women, did not want a return to pre-war Conservative economic policies, which they blamed for the hardship of the 1930s

MrLOL said:
Yes in '31 the welfare state was changed to a fully government funded unemployment benefit that paid out according to need rather than contributions

Wikipedia said:
This system, for the first time, paid out according to need rather than the level of contributions

etc etc

It's exactly what everyone used to do when we did homework for school in the late 90's - print out the page from Microsoft encarta and move the words around. Bingo - one peice of homework totally lifted from Encarta but with sufficient words replaced that it wouldnt be obviously not written by us. But one look at the source and it's totally obvious.

Mate, seriously - if you dont know something just dont post about it, it's less hassle and it's less embarrasing than trying so hard like this

Is there where all your opinions and knowledge come from, MrLOL? Or is this the first time you've done this?

InvaderGIR · 12 Dec 2010 at 22:35

Hmmmm...

NickXX · 12 Dec 2010 at 22:49

[TW]Fox;17987780 said:
Is there where all your opinions and knowledge come from, MrLOL? Or is this the first time you've done this?

Tombstone · 12 Dec 2010 at 22:58

Crikey, MS Encarta, now there's a blast from the past, what ever happened to that, is it still going?

Castiel · 12 Dec 2010 at 23:00

[TW]Fox;17987780 said:
See I read your post a couple of times MrLOL and it just seemed a bit weird. You get to know peoples posting styles and this particular posted seemed a bit, I dunno, odd? As if somebody else had written it.

Now, in terms of heaving a head full of useless knowledge I know I'm quite bad with things like cars but it seems no matter what it is, be it cars, or politics, or heck anything, you know all about it.

So I thought I'd have a quick look. People often accuse me of basically re-posting Wikipedia, so I wondered if perhaps thats actually what some people do.

It didnt take me long to find...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Depression_in_the_United_Kingdom

In it, it basically says almost word for word what you posted, just with a few of the words re-arranged.

It's exactly what everyone used to do when we did homework for school in the late 90's - print out the page from Microsoft encarta and move the words around. Bingo - one peice of homework totally lifted from Encarta but with sufficient words replaced that it wouldnt be obviously not written by us. But one look at the source and it's totally obvious.

Mate, seriously - if you dont know something just dont post about it, it's less hassle and it's less embarrasing than trying so hard like this

Is there where all your opinions and knowledge come from, MrLOL? Or is this the first time you've done this?

Quoting wiki aside for the moment...

People gain knowledge from all sorts of places wikipedia included so if MrLOL has looked at what someone has posted and then gone off to research that and then retort with what he has learnt I don't see anything wrong with that.

His mistake is quoting without citation of the source, nothing more.

You were lucky btw, When I was at school/college there was no such thing as MS encarta, we had to rely on libraries and real books....plagiarising was pretty pointless as we had to write the stuff down anyway which meant at least we read it....

NathanE · 12 Dec 2010 at 23:01

Tombstone said:
Crikey, MS Encarta, now there's a blast from the past, what ever happened to that, is it still going?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Encarta

[TW]Fox · 12 Dec 2010 at 23:02

I think there is a massive difference between absorbing knowledge from research - a valid and worthwhile skill, and copy-pasting an article into a forum post and changing key words so it's not quite obvious. We gain almost all of our knowledge from reading - we don't invent concepts ourself - but this does seem rather different.

It's quite clear he was trying to make it look like he had knowledge of the subject when in reality he'd simply gone off, found a Wiki page and moved a few words around. Quite why he did this I've no idea, as detailed knowledge of the Great Depression is not something you should be embarrased for not having - heck most of us here don't know who was in government at the time without checking let alone that level of detail

Tombstone · 12 Dec 2010 at 23:03

NathanE said:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Encarta

Ah so it has gone now then, can't say I am surprised, bit of a redundant package now what with Wikipedia and all

InvaderGIR · 12 Dec 2010 at 23:07

Castiel said:
Quoting wiki aside for the moment...

People gain knowledge from all sorts of places wikipedia included so if MrLOL has looked at what someone has posted and then gone off to research that and then retort with what he has learnt I don't see anything wrong with that.

His mistake is quoting without citation of the source, nothing more.

You were lucky btw, When I was at school/college there was no such thing as MS encarta, we had to rely on libraries and real books....plagiarising was pretty pointless as we had to write the stuff down anyway which meant at least we read it....

Gain knowledge? He's blatantly just copy pasted and changed it a bit to avoid the plagiarism detectors whilst doing his school/uni work.

quickshot89 · 12 Dec 2010 at 23:08

Just to add to this topic, and please read the whole thing as it is important

Im a student at northumbria uni doing computer and network tech
I live at home so did not need to take out that living allowence loan
i get my maintance loan which is around £1.5K a year, so after two years ive had £3K. I get my tution fees paid for but see none of this money (£6500ish for two years)

I decieded to do a placement year, and so i did not see the need to get the full maintance loan. Instead i just applied for the tution fees to be paid, however i have just lost this placement and currently looking for another 6month placement to finish the year. (year placement costs £800ish for uni admin etc)

Final year will probally live at home, apply for the maintenance grant and tution fee. Again another £1.5K+tution fee

So in total i should have in debt of £11.6K, however for the time spent at uni i receive a grant of £1K per year that does not need to be paid back, however this is to be spent on things that you need, books, laptops etc.

With my placement experiance i should be able to find a starting wage of £22K+, and only having to now pay a smaller increase compared to what the system of pay when you earn £14K+, that £7K a year is a huge amount, find a decent flatmate and you can get a better flat, or have a few nice things in life.

So, compared to these students that are moaning, ive picked a course that will give me a well paid job, and i wont have to pay back as much per month compared to the old system, how they can complain about this i have no idea

(also means i have a good chance of being able to move to canada/new zeland)