Common sense and fairness at last!
Oct 9th 2010, 1:28 am
#93
And YOU'RE paying for it!
Joined: May 2007
Location: kipper tie?
Posts: 2,328
Oct 9th 2010, 10:01 am
#94
Fighting my corner
Joined: Aug 2005
Location: Adelaide, South Australia
Posts: 11,948
Re: Common sense and fairness at last!
So? I'm in favour of anyone doing charity work.
Oct 14th 2010, 6:25 pm
#97
Proudly Deplorable
Joined: May 2003
Location: Alloha snack bar
Posts: 24,246
Re: Common sense and fairness at last!
Oct 15th 2010, 6:02 pm
#98
Banned
Thread Starter
Joined: Aug 2008
Posts: 22,348
Re: Common sense and fairness at last!
A start but less than a third going - not enough. Government in the UK is heading in the right direction. They've got to nuke welfare though - cut by at least 50%. Cut at least 500k civil servants. The defence cuts are worrying though - UK will be left without an effective air force and navy.
Oct 15th 2010, 6:48 pm
#99
And YOU'RE paying for it!
Joined: May 2007
Location: kipper tie?
Posts: 2,328
Oct 15th 2010, 6:54 pm
#100
Shiny Arse Know All
Joined: Apr 2010
Location: Adelaide, somewhere
Posts: 14,180
Re: Common sense and fairness at last!
so why are we giving aid to India, China and Pakistan 3 countrys with nuclear weapons programmes 2 of which also have space programmes? I understand the obligation we all (The West) signed up to regarding %GDP but we also have a longer obligation to NATO on Defence Spending.
Personaly I wouldn't have ringfenced the NHS or overseas aid.
Personaly I wouldn't have ringfenced the NHS or overseas aid.
Oct 15th 2010, 10:00 pm
#101
Banned
Thread Starter
Joined: Aug 2008
Posts: 22,348
Re: Common sense and fairness at last!
so why are we giving aid to India, China and Pakistan 3 countrys with nuclear weapons programmes 2 of which also have space programmes? I understand the obligation we all (The West) signed up to regarding %GDP but we also have a longer obligation to NATO on Defence Spending.
Personaly I wouldn't have ringfenced the NHS or overseas aid.
Personaly I wouldn't have ringfenced the NHS or overseas aid.
Oct 15th 2010, 10:03 pm
#102
And YOU'RE paying for it!
Joined: May 2007
Location: kipper tie?
Posts: 2,328
Re: Common sense and fairness at last!
In the past, that self-interest often took the form of cheap loans and cheap weapons to dodgy governments (especially if they didn't like Commies) with little oversight or capacity-building. Unfortunately, this often proved to be a short-sighted type of self-interest and has turned around and bitten the UK in the arse quite spectacularly in Iraq, Egypt, Pakistan, Saudi...
Neither is aid a blank cheque to spendthrift governments, as you appear to be suggesting. It's highly conditional and there's a strong preference for funnelling funds through the private or third sector.
The details of DFID's activities and the reasons for them aren't difficult to find:
http://www.dfid.gov.uk/Where-we-work/Asia-South/India/
http://www.dfid.gov.uk/Where-we-work...outh/Pakistan/
http://www.dfid.gov.uk/Where-we-work...Pacific/China/
The same goes for AusAid:
http://www.ausaid.gov.au/about/ausaidmap.cfm
If you really want to improve Britain's security capabilities while spending less money, then your real target should be the subsidy junkie arms industry in the UK: it receives a subsidy of 13,000 pounds per worker and results in 100m pounds waste in defence spending annually.
http://www.caat.org.uk/resources/pub...sheet-0504.php
http://www.samuelbrittan.co.uk/text83_p.html
http://www.oxfordresearchgroup.org.u...re_bad_britain
http://www.oxfordresearchgroup.org.u...defence_indust
Putting a price on the cost to the UK in terms of the insecurity and instability created by the corrupt activities of the UK arms industry is even harder to quantify:
http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2010/02/08/...he-fcpa-piper/
http://www.fcpablog.com/blog/2010/2/...or-bribes.html
Last edited by lapin_windstar; Oct 15th 2010 at 10:06 pm.
Oct 15th 2010, 10:30 pm
#103
Account Closed
Joined: Jul 2006
Posts: 14,188
Re: Common sense and fairness at last!
Because "we" have an interest in promoting sustainable development and good governance in those regions so that the inhabitants don't get pissed off with their poverty and exclusion and start giving succour to extremists who reap dissatisfaction to advance their nihilistic agenda which interferes with our security, that's why. Foreign aid isn't charity, it's self-interest in the UK's economic and security interests.
In the past, that self-interest often took the form of cheap loans and cheap weapons to dodgy governments (especially if they didn't like Commies) with little oversight or capacity-building. Unfortunately, this often proved to be a short-sighted type of self-interest and has turned around and bitten the UK in the arse quite spectacularly in Iraq, Egypt, Pakistan, Saudi...
Neither is aid a blank cheque to spendthrift governments, as you appear to be suggesting. It's highly conditional and there's a strong preference for funnelling funds through the private or third sector.
The details of DFID's activities and the reasons for them aren't difficult to find:
http://www.dfid.gov.uk/Where-we-work/Asia-South/India/
http://www.dfid.gov.uk/Where-we-work...outh/Pakistan/
http://www.dfid.gov.uk/Where-we-work...Pacific/China/
The same goes for AusAid:
http://www.ausaid.gov.au/about/ausaidmap.cfm
If you really want to improve Britain's security capabilities while spending less money, then your real target should be the subsidy junkie arms industry in the UK: it receives a subsidy of 13,000 pounds per worker and results in 100m pounds waste in defence spending annually.
http://www.caat.org.uk/resources/pub...sheet-0504.php
http://www.samuelbrittan.co.uk/text83_p.html
http://www.oxfordresearchgroup.org.u...re_bad_britain
http://www.oxfordresearchgroup.org.u...defence_indust
Putting a price on the cost to the UK in terms of the insecurity and instability created by the corrupt activities of the UK arms industry is even harder to quantify:
http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2010/02/08/...he-fcpa-piper/
http://www.fcpablog.com/blog/2010/2/...or-bribes.html
In the past, that self-interest often took the form of cheap loans and cheap weapons to dodgy governments (especially if they didn't like Commies) with little oversight or capacity-building. Unfortunately, this often proved to be a short-sighted type of self-interest and has turned around and bitten the UK in the arse quite spectacularly in Iraq, Egypt, Pakistan, Saudi...
Neither is aid a blank cheque to spendthrift governments, as you appear to be suggesting. It's highly conditional and there's a strong preference for funnelling funds through the private or third sector.
The details of DFID's activities and the reasons for them aren't difficult to find:
http://www.dfid.gov.uk/Where-we-work/Asia-South/India/
http://www.dfid.gov.uk/Where-we-work...outh/Pakistan/
http://www.dfid.gov.uk/Where-we-work...Pacific/China/
The same goes for AusAid:
http://www.ausaid.gov.au/about/ausaidmap.cfm
If you really want to improve Britain's security capabilities while spending less money, then your real target should be the subsidy junkie arms industry in the UK: it receives a subsidy of 13,000 pounds per worker and results in 100m pounds waste in defence spending annually.
http://www.caat.org.uk/resources/pub...sheet-0504.php
http://www.samuelbrittan.co.uk/text83_p.html
http://www.oxfordresearchgroup.org.u...re_bad_britain
http://www.oxfordresearchgroup.org.u...defence_indust
Putting a price on the cost to the UK in terms of the insecurity and instability created by the corrupt activities of the UK arms industry is even harder to quantify:
http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2010/02/08/...he-fcpa-piper/
http://www.fcpablog.com/blog/2010/2/...or-bribes.html
Tell you what, lets scrap the UK defence industry and put all the skilled engineers who work in it out on their arses. That would do the UK the power of good.
Perhaps we could retrain them to be cooks and hairdressers?
Oct 15th 2010, 11:35 pm
#104
Shiny Arse Know All
Joined: Apr 2010
Location: Adelaide, somewhere
Posts: 14,180
Re: Common sense and fairness at last!
You would need to go a long way before you saw a more distorted piece of one-sided bullshit than this post.
Tell you what, lets scrap the UK defence industry and put all the skilled engineers who work in it out on their arses. That would do the UK the power of good.
Perhaps we could retrain them to be cooks and hairdressers?
Tell you what, lets scrap the UK defence industry and put all the skilled engineers who work in it out on their arses. That would do the UK the power of good.
Perhaps we could retrain them to be cooks and hairdressers?
Oct 16th 2010, 2:03 am
#105
And YOU'RE paying for it!
Joined: May 2007
Location: kipper tie?
Posts: 2,328
Re: Common sense and fairness at last!
You would need to go a long way before you saw a more distorted piece of one-sided bullshit than this post.
Tell you what, lets scrap the UK defence industry and put all the skilled engineers who work in it out on their arses. That would do the UK the power of good.
Perhaps we could retrain them to be cooks and hairdressers?
Tell you what, lets scrap the UK defence industry and put all the skilled engineers who work in it out on their arses. That would do the UK the power of good.
Perhaps we could retrain them to be cooks and hairdressers?
It's pretty telling that you immediately equate a removal of subsidy from the British arms industry with scrapping it. I suppose it really gives the lie to the idea that it's a competitive, value-added, world-class industry when as soon as it's suggested its dole is cut off you start hyperventilating and throwing around abuse. "We" don't have the scrap the arms industry, it should just pay its own way instead of getting a reacharound from the MoD and FCO every year.
There is little doubt that military exports are heavily subsidised. CAAT estimates that UK arms exports receive a subsidy of around £890m per year. Given the 65,000 employees estimated to be working on military exports, the subsidy amounts to over £13,000 for each job each year.
If they're so highly-skilled and competitive, they'll do well in an industry that doesn't mean thousands of pounds of taxpayer money to keep each person employed. Or perhaps you'd prefer to go back to the 1970s, with British Leyland, Sealink and hundreds of other parasitic corporations rorting the taxpayer?
Last edited by lapin_windstar; Oct 16th 2010 at 2:16 am.
