Meter readings

[ahinton]

Well both - or neither, assuming the state industry is not expected or required to make a profit.

But why isn't it? It should be! It's a business like any other business, the mere ownership of which should make no material difference to the need to make sound profits; how else would it be able to invest in improvements if it doesn't make profits with which to do so?

One of the problems of old-type nationalisation was that it tended, especially initially, to be resorted to for failed but indispensable industries that were at an automatic disadvantage from word go. I happen to quite like the idea of the nationalised firm successfully competing because an unrigged market (ever come across one?) could be the measure of needs being met without treating workforces in the usual way, though I don't think it's an ideal, long-term.

Good point although, as you say, businesses functioning in the market-place, competitively or otherwise, inevitably have to function in a rigged market but hopefully can try to rig in in their favour whenever possible; that goes for wtate owned businesses as well as privately owned ones.

Nominally - which would still mean taking the rap. But we have to get away from this idea of top-down imposed managerialism, with its scapegopating of systemic problems inbuilt within the competitive model and go for bottom-up. Sure the whole rigmarole would be slowed down - and those who diss human nature will say it encourages sloth; but if product were sustainable as opposed to prone to competition-determined planned obsolescence, that would make more time for inclusiveness in the fullest sense of the term in the whole business of management from the grass roots up, and an associated inculcated sense of belonging and stakeholdership Blair once correctly spoke of as generative of social responsibility.

Yes, we do need to get away from that kind of managerialism, but that goes for state businesses as well as privately owned ones; this kind of problem is by no means exclusive to involvement with "the competitive model".

Well maybe it's not too late eh?

It would be a whole lot later that it should have been! One still hopes, of course but, sadly, the state seems now to be getting increasingly cold feet (i.e. not warmed by solar powered underfloor heating) about promoting and subsidising solar power in particular, which is very short-sighted because the very point of subsidy up front is to render itself redundant after a time because more and more people have taken it up, which is not quite what's happening now.

Well it's not the experience of many, as evidenced by consumer reports that come out from time to time, personal anecdote, and the numerous consumer programmes dealing with unfair practices that litter daytime TV whenever I switch over.

Well, I can only speak from my own experience. Yes, such supplier changes are often inconvenient and poorly managed by suppliers but if you complain enough about their mishandling of them loudly enough there is often compensation to be had from this; one supplier actually mis-sold me a tariff and, when I complained about it, the supplier agreed to maintain the tariff as sold.

[Serial_Apologist]

Just popped in to see what people were discussing after so many posts

Hiya french frank!

It's been the really far-ranging and intelligent discussion, including about many matters that would have usually brought in a lot of insults and misrepresentations, that I have always thought the forum had the capacity for hosting.

Bravo to all concerned, I say!

[Serial_Apologist]

But why isn't it? It should be! It's a business like any other business, the mere ownership of which should make no material difference to the need to make sound profits; how else would it be able to invest in improvements if it doesn't make profits with which to do so?


Good point although, as you say, businesses functioning in the market-place, competitively or otherwise, inevitably have to function in a rigged market but hopefully can try to rig in in their favour whenever possible; that goes for wtate owned businesses as well as privately owned ones.


Yes, we do need to get away from that kind of managerialism, but that goes for state businesses as well as privately owned ones; this kind of problem is by no means exclusive to involvement with "the competitive model".


It would be a whole lot later that it should have been! One still hopes, of course but, sadly, the state seems now to be getting increasingly cold feet (i.e. not warmed by solar powered underfloor heating) about promoting and subsidising solar power in particular, which is very short-sighted because the very point of subsidy up front is to render itself redundant after a time because more and more people have taken it up, which is not quite what's happening now.


Well, I can only speak from my own experience. Yes, such supplier changes are often inconvenient and poorly managed by suppliers but if you complain enough about their mishandling of them loudly enough there is often compensation to be had from this; one supplier actually mis-sold me a tariff and, when I complained about it, the supplier agreed to maintain the tariff as sold.

I find nothing essentially to disagree with in what you've written here, and a lot to ponder. This is just about the first time on this forum that I have felt controversial issues within a topic to have been discussed and as fully as possible thought through, though far be it for me to declare this subject closed!

[french frank]

Bravo to all concerned, I say!

The secret is to call your thread 'Carburettor cleaning' or 'Worcester Bosch v Vaillant' and you attract the right kind of participants …

[greenilex]

Does anyone know whether the meter on a solar water-heating system can be read by the uninitiated?

I find mine needs regular maintenance, and it isn't cheap.

[P. G. Tipps]

Employees (and outsiders) would be less cynically disposed and more motivated to be involved if state owned bosses came up through and were periodically elected from and by their workforces, receiving salaries at a pre-negotiated multiple that would be calculated on skill time acquisition. Thereby would they be deserving of a respect appropriate to boss status, rather than subject to class-based envy, the decline of which would accord with efficiency principles closer to forms of co-operation and sustainability that would see an end to any need for greed and waste, and competition consigned to Primary school itineraries.

In theory, that would be a truly excellent idea, S_A, especially the point about more of our bosses 'coming through the lower ranks'. I'm not so sure about 'democracy' in the workplace as businesses really need quick-thinking and swift-acting 'dictators' to survive. I had quite a bit of experience myself involved in a a famous so-called 'workers' democracy' only to discover that the 'democracy' part was a time-wasting sham and an elite set of bosses had ultimate and firm control. Even the official salaries of directors which were capped at 40 times the lowest-paid worker were often bypassed by means of special payments. In some ways this was inevitable to attract qualified outsiders or to retain existing managers. We are now right back to 'greed' ... I'd rather term it 'natural self-interest'. If a private company were wise and canny enough to offer me £1,000,000 pa to do a job similar to my current one, when I was on the relatively poverty wages of £500,000, I don't think I would have sleepless nights of anguish pleading with the wife to help me come to a decision on the matter, though she would be most unlikely to require any further encouragement from me in that particular area in any case, bless her.

You don't like 'competition'. Not sure I'm always a huge fan of it either but we have to compete with others under a state or private system whether we like it or not. Even artists, musicians etc 'compete'. I agree that respective rewards for success (and even, it seems, failure!) are now way out of sync at the top compared to lower down the pecking order and that is the real problem not competition itself.

'Competition' has given us the standard of living most of us enjoy today and very largely take for granted. It is harnessing this natural phenomenon in a way which provides fairer, scaled benefits for all that surely should be the ultimate goal and, sadly, has so far eluded even the finest of brains.

I'll stop right now before I need to consult my very own school précis-writing manual.

[ahinton]

You don't like 'competition'. Not sure I'm always a huge fan of it either but we have to compete with others under a state or private system whether we like it or not. Even artists, musicians etc 'compete'. I agree that respective rewards for success (and even, it seems, failure!) are now way out of sync at the top compared to lower down the pecking order and that is the real problem not competition itself.

Musicians "compete" largely because others set up competitions for violin, piano, conducting, composition and the rest; it doesn't naturally "go with the territory" of being a musician. AS the organist Kevin Bowyer once said (after having won five international organ competitions within the space of a year without it making the slightest impact on his subsequent diary), the only organist I ever compete with is Kevin Bowyer - and I almost always find that he's better than me...

'Competition' has given us the standard of living most of us enjoy today and very largely take for granted. It is harnessing this natural phenomenon in a way which provides fairer, scaled benefits for all that surely should be the ultimate goal and, sadly, has so far eluded even the finest of brains.

Not quite so, methinks; "motivation", rather than "competition" per se has done that - and the only competitive element of that is of the Bowyer kind mentioned above.

I'll stop right now before I need to consult my very own school précis-writing manual.

So you're going to deny the rest of us the benefit of the remainder of your wisdom on the topic, then? That's rather mean-spirited of you, is it not?(!). Out of curiosity, though, what prompted you to retain this volume over so many years since you left school? (answers on a postcard from Scottyland, s'il vous plaît)...

[Lento]

I am currently trying to sort out a "read dispute", in which the company I am leaving (Ovo) is disputing the estimated final read adopted by my "new" company (Co-op) and proposing their own. Co-op, it is alleged, aren't responding to Ovo, therefore a final bill cannot be produced. Happy days!

[Serial_Apologist]

We are now right back to 'greed' ... I'd rather term it 'natural self-interest'.

Wouldn't one say that "greed" is a consequence of insufficient available quantities of whatever, or the imagined prospect of their insufficiency? If everybody knew there was enough to go around, there would be no need for greed.

You don't like 'competition'. Not sure I'm always a huge fan of it either but we have to compete with others under a state or private system whether we like it or not. Even artists, musicians etc 'compete'. I agree that respective rewards for success (and even, it seems, failure!) are now way out of sync at the top compared to lower down the pecking order and that is the real problem not competition itself.

The competitive context legimtimises it, however. And non-durable product (eg light bulbs deliberately made not to last).

'Competition' has given us the standard of living most of us enjoy today and very largely take for granted. It is harnessing this natural phenomenon in a way which provides fairer, scaled benefits for all that surely should be the ultimate goal and, sadly, has so far eluded even the finest of brains.

First of all it is advances in the means of production that have given us the present standard of living; the fact that competition has had a hand in this in the past does not automatically mean it need do forever in the future. Try for a change to imagine the genuine, no-strings-attached fulfilment to be gained from inventing a piece of technology that will end poverty and need, and instead of having it patented and kept from view by commercial secrecy broadcasting to the world how you went about it so that anyone with the necessary skills can do it with the means equitably shared around.

Secondly, an awful lot of bourgeois propaganda is expended on fallaciously attributing naturalness to socially-inculcated attitudes and behaviour which with different social inculcation (which is in any case unavoidable) would be different.

For "natural" some broadcaster should re-show the series of programmes on that young couple who in the 1980s went and spent a year (I think) living and filming with so-called primitive people in a Bornean jungle. This, like their untouched forest, is probably the nearest we can come to "natural", but what we we saw were people who by combining their efforts with minimal division of labour not only managed to survive but had discovered natural medicines which it would take western "civilisations" thousands of years to re-discover their sources to make penicillin and asprin from. There are natural instincts for survival, sure, but just as humans who emerged from forests to create surpluses evolved languages to organise themselves and their needs more easily, those languages could as easily be used by dominant groups to control others as at the same time conceal the fact, and thereby invent propaganda.

[P. G. Tipps]

Musicians "compete" largely because others set up competitions for violin, piano, conducting, composition and the rest; it doesn't naturally "go with the territory" of being a musician. AS the organist Kevin Bowyer once said (after having won five international organ competitions within the space of a year without it making the slightest impact on his subsequent diary), the only organist I ever compete with is Kevin Bowyer - and I almost always find that he's better than me...

Well, ahinton, as Blackadder might gently put it 'call me Mr Naive if you like' but, when an orchestra advertises a vacancy for a player, isn't competition between applicants normally a little bit of a major factor in the final selection?

Unless they are completely removed from Planet Earth surely professional musicians need to compete with others to forge a successful career just like everyone else?

So you're going to deny the rest of us the benefit of the remainder of your wisdom on the topic, then? That's rather mean-spirited of you, is it not?(!). Out of curiosity, though, what prompted you to retain this volume over so many years since you left school? (answers on a postcard from Scottyland, s'il vous plaît)...

Well, I would never, ever boast a monopoly of wisdom, ahinton, good heavens no, and, in any case, one must never confuse wisdom and fact with mere off-the-cuff opinion on an internet forum.

And to answer your final question directly ... my old school precis-writing manual remains firmly in my head, whether any degree of wisdom exists alongside it or not!

[ahinton]

Well, ahinton, as Blackadder might gently put it 'call me Mr Naive if you like' but, when an orchestra advertises a vacancy for a player, isn't competition between applicants normally a little bit of a major factor in the final selection?


Unless they are completely removed from Planet Earth surely professional musicians need to compete with others to forge a successful career just like everyone else?

"Competing" for an employed position - be it that of an orchestral player or any or employed office - is not "competition" in the way that it's been discussed here, to the extent that each applicant/candidate simply goes along and auditions without being - or needing to feel - as though in formal "competition" with other such applicants whom he/s he will not likely either know or meet in a "competitive" environment; this is quite diffeent to the Leeds, Tchaikovsky or any other formal "competition".

That said, I cannot help but wonder (albeit only momentarily) wonder what other participatin"celebrities" might think about finding themselves in competition with La Derham in the latest bout of Strictly Dumb Prancing...

[Serial_Apologist]

That said, I cannot help but wonder (albeit only momentarily) wonder what other participatin"celebrities" might think about finding themselves in competition with La Derham in the latest bout of Strictly Dumb Prancing...

They would probably describe themselves as "going forwards"

[antongould]

Has this thread finally been destroyed by ahinton disparaging Strictly ????

[P. G. Tipps]

"Competing" for an employed position - be it that of an orchestral player or any or employed office - is not "competition" in the way that it's been discussed here, to the extent that each applicant/candidate simply goes along and auditions without being - or needing to feel - as though in formal "competition" with other such applicants whom he/s he will not likely either know or meet in a "competitive" environment; this is quite diffeent to the Leeds, Tchaikovsky or any other formal "competition".

I didn't refer to the Leeds, Tchaikovsky or any other formal "competition", ahinton, and, in any case, I fail to see the sudden subtle difference in one's dictionary definition of 'competition'!.

The Government awards contracts to various private companies in much the same way as an employer awards contracts to employees, including, yes, even musicians, heaven forbid!.

Competition, ahinton, competition ... it's all around us, dammit, if you care to look!

[P. G. Tipps]

Has this thread finally been destroyed by ahinton disparaging Strictly ????

He'll be disparaging Hartlepool United next ...