Olympinonsense

[handsomefortune]

Right... A rather pathetic red dragon is chasing a scared little green thing... is there an Primeval anomaly involved?
No... still don't get it. I'm beginning to feel quite left out. Or very stupid...

no not stupid jane, most things relate to perception. for instance, ahinton's belief that

there's no such thing as "public services" (as a distinct and distinguishable phenomenon) any more and there never really was one beyond a kind of marketing con that sought to present and promote some kind of artifically constructed distance between alleged "private" ones and "public" ones?

is perhaps a bit of a Primeval anomaly .....in as much as the objective seems to be to down play the function, and multiple areas of expertise provided by the public sector in post war uk. this had nothing to do with 'marketing', as far as i am aware, but the ethos of rebuilding the uk after the devastation of ww2. imo the fact that the public sector is now 'up for grabs' doesn't detract from the reality of its initial existence this far.

however, i interpreted the dragon as a dinosaur tbh! but interpreting a dragon instead, will entirely suffice jane, since we seem to be entering a fantastical phase in terms of perception. (so perhaps coe's not alone there)!

eg in denying something ever existed, when it clearly did, (or vice versa).

daily tangible evidence still supports the perception that various public sector services do still exist. for instance, anyone who has experienced an operation free at the point of delivery, courtesy of the nhs, will surely dispute the notion that 'the public sector, doesn't, or didn't ever exist'? i guess i interpret myself in the role of the green blob running scared from anyone attempting to convince themselves of unbelievable realities, as a direct result of the stress of current political turbulence, and the dismantlement of existing structures. though my assumptions are perhaps unduly coloured by spending last weekend at a hospital, where a relative gave birth to a premature baby ....how does this complicated procedure pan out exactly, if the nhs doesn't exist? or am i simply delluded, and require primeval anomaly correction ? if so, i'm sorry i shall have to decline on this occasion, as i can't afford to waste money on superfluities that spock Himself would doubt the value of.

[MrGongGong]

as i can't afford to waste money on superfluities that dr spock Himself would doubt the value of.

As this is pedants corner
don't you mean MR Spock ?

[Northender]

'As this is pedants corner'...
Don't you mean 'As this is pedant's corner' - or pedants' corner (if more than 1 pedant is present)?

[MrGongGong]

'As this is pedants corner'...
Don't you mean 'As this is pedant's corner' - or pedants' corner (if more than 1 pedant is present)?

touché

The famous dwarf

[ahinton]

Right... A rather pathetic red dragon is chasing a scared little green thing... is there an Primeval anomaly involved?
No... still don't get it. I'm beginning to feel quite left out. Or very stupid...

Well, if so, that makes at least two of us...

[ahinton]

(now I would pay good money for an Underworld cover version of sumer is icumen in)

I'd pay good money (if I had any) for summer just comin' in at all, with or without musical accompaniment...

[handsomefortune]

thanks - all sorted now mr gong gong.

it may come as a surprise, but this isn't actually 'pedants' corner', it's 'planet olympinonsense' created by old grumpy, and very useful it is too in the circumstances.

perhaps a pedant's mission is best completed amongst the sinners and non believers?

in fact mr gong gong, it might perhaps be (slightly) true to say 'any old spock will do' mr, or dr ..?

both are perhaps a bit 'on the other side'...but it's much more widely perceived (due to tv exposure) that MR spock was THE best...due to his impressive theories about mankind, rather than his ability to 'beam him self up'. some of spock's theories suggest spock should really have been given a title ideally ..'lord spock', or (worse still) 'mr spock of the universe', 'prof spock', or at the very minimum 'dr spock'? though not to be confused with child care theorist, and 'promoter of promiscuity' http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_Spock (although instead, since seemingly for some, 'any old century will do', i might well grasp at controversial, out dated, pseudo scientific theoretical 'advice' in some circumstances! for instance, i might choose a victorian stance to child care: leave those i disagree with alone, bolted in, in a remote spare room, with no bottle, human contact or affection. especially if ahinton was pretending the public sector never existed.

whereas some believe you have to be cruel to be kind, imv this very rarely is actually the case - (but there are some small exceptions) which sociopaths, and sadists, in particular, tend to take to illogical extremes. anyway, back to the subject of captain coe's 'olympinonsense' and on this occasion what amounts to over ambition: poor planning resulting in failure, and over reliance on extreme vanity combined with a belief in extra terrestrial miracles.

[MrGongGong]

LLAP

[ahinton]

no not stupid jane, most things relate to perception. for instance, ahinton's belief that

there's no such thing as "public services" (as a distinct and distinguishable phenomenon) any more and there never really was one beyond a kind of marketing con that sought to present and promote some kind of artifically constructed distance between alleged "private" ones and "public" ones?

is perhaps a bit of a Primeval anomaly .....in as much as the objective seems to be to down play the function, and multiple areas of expertise provided by the public sector in post war uk. this had nothing to do with 'marketing', as far as i am aware, but the ethos of rebuilding the uk after the devastation of ww2. imo the fact that the public sector is now 'up for grabs' doesn't detract from the reality of its initial existence this far.

WWII ended rather a long time ago and we live in a very different world today; what bothers me most about all this "public sector" / "private sector" stuff is the sense of "us and them" - or, more often "us v. them" - to which it inevitably gives rise and I'd have thought that the equality-mongers would find this most distasteful; there are, in any case, quite a few people who work in both sectors more or less simultaneously - some people in the medical and education professions, for example - a fact which serves further to undermine this division and illustrate its sheer artificiality.

eg in denying something ever existed, when it clearly did, (or vice versa).

daily tangible evidence still supports the perception that various public sector services do still exist. for instance, anyone who has experienced an operation free at the point of delivery, courtesy of the nhs, will surely dispute the notion that 'the public sector, doesn't, or didn't ever exist'? i guess i interpret myself in the role of the green blob running scared from anyone attempting to convince themselves of unbelievable realities, as a direct result of the stress of current political turbulence, and the dismantlement of existing structures. though my assumptions are perhaps unduly coloured by spending last weekend at a hospital, where a relative gave birth to a premature baby ....how does this complicated procedure pan out exactly, if the nhs doesn't exist? or am i simply delluded, and require primeval anomaly correction ? if so, i'm sorry i shall have to decline on this occasion, as i can't afford to waste money on superfluities that spock Himself would doubt the value of.

You miss the point here. Of course the public and private sectors "exist" (what I wrote above being a figure of speech, no more, no less), but the point at issue here is that they're effectively all broadly the same and involve businesses that need to run efficiently, serve their customers, make a profit for their shareholders and grow in order to provide more and better services in the future. Anyone with adequate health insurance who's had an operation in a private hospital (or a private operation in an NHS hospital or NHS operation in a private one) also gets it free at the point of delivery, but most of those who get them free at the point of delivery on the NHS have still paid for it in taxes that contribute to enabling its provision (the only exceptions being that not being a taxpayer does not deny the patient entitlement to the operation, so effectively those who can pay for it via their taxes subsidise the minority who can't because they haven't sufficient income or assets to generate tax liability).

The principal point is that medical services provided by both NHS and private facilities all depend upon investment, mostly from those who use them - the patients - and whether that money comes from taxation or from PHI premiums is arguably something of a side issue. There would be - as far as I understand it, at least - no need to "privatise" parts of NHS provided that they ran properly, any more than there would be a need to take parts of the private healtcare industry into the public sector if they do the same. There's a good deal of healthy (sorry!) interaction between NHS and private medical services in any case and these are very fortunately quite different to the ghastly PFIs. I'm all in favour of an efficient and growing NHS.

The other major difference, of course, is in the provision of A&E and some mental healthcare services which are generally accepted to be areas in which the private healthcare industry isn't interested, perhaps in part because it makes insufficient profit overall to enable it to allocate from them some subsidy for provision of such services - it might be interesting for the private healthcare industry to give some consideration to that, with a view to easing the A&E burden on NHS; this would presumably mean offering A&E insurance.

But to return to the basic issue here, it's this public versus private thing that I find unwelcome and often destructive - as though they're actually somehow designed to be at odds with one another.

[Serial_Apologist]

coe was clearly expecting this bunch to materialise? we are led to believe they are very reliable employees, especially in an emergency when teleportation provides an unparalleled universe...

http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?imgur...QEwBA&dur=1876

me up, Scottycelt...

[Anna]

I think the most important thing here are the people that G4S has recruited. Only 17 out of 56 turned up at Salford, 10 out of 59 at Newcastle and then one of them went missing. Prior to the revelations G4S were reported on all news sites that they expected 30% no-shows.

In The Times on Saturday a G4S 'insider' was reported as saying that in fact they expected a 50% no-show, that the people they were dealing with were not the type useful to them. He also said training was rudimentary and recruits had been told not to bring knives to work with them (that in itself is chilling to think they would recruit those who might routinely carry a weapon) It also stated that applicants had been told to apply or lose their benefits. So, these seem to have come via job centres

Looking at the Bridging the Gap website (which links students to G4S security training) it says the work would involve 12 hour shifts @ £8.25ph, no transport would be provided and no accommodation and you should live within easy reach of venues. In their News section there is a splash about students at Aylesbury College being accredited and ready to go for Olympics. This begs the question, how is someone living in Bucks to get to and from, cost of fares, etc., logistics don't add up. Going onto their Facebook page there are so many posts about just not being contacted, not knowing where to turn up, whether they are still employed

If anyone remembers the unpaid job-seekers bussed in and dumped at the Jubilee (link below) this was via Close Protection UK, I cannot find if G4S has a connection to them. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-18338724

The point is, these security firms have acess to vast numbers of unemployed young people, cheap labour whilst there are daily reports on BBC of ex-soldiers, police, etc., simply not being got back to by G4S. It seems there is a very high level of exploitation going on, purely in the interest of making a profit on a contract. I suspect the waters will become very murky.

I'm glad to see that the four police forces in talks with G4S about privatisation have now withdrawn from negotiations. It's quite frightening that G4S not only run some prisons, prison transport, probation, tagging, forensics, asylum detentions centres, asylum housing, etc., particularly when worldwide they have such a dismal record in human rights.

[eighthobstruction]

As someone said last night on R4....if there are an infinite number of (parallel) universes with infinite possibilities....there should be one without the possibility of there being any infinite number of possibilities....

....and one where G4S is doing rather well in forfilling its remit....

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b01ks3v5/The_Infinite_Monkey_Cage_Series_6_Parallel_Universes/

[handsomefortune]

It's quite frightening that G4S not only run some prisons, prison transport, probation, tagging, forensics, asylum detentions centres, asylum housing, etc., particularly when worldwide they have such a dismal record in human rights.

and children's homes allegedly, and a whole lot more besides ..... according to lat's link upthread.

i totally agree anna , it is frightening, to any responsible, sentient person.

[amateur51]

I'd pay good money (if I had any) for summer just comin' in at all, with or without musical accompaniment...

[Serial_Apologist]

Having seen that aerial view of applicants' portacabin "living accommodation", it is astonishing to hear it said that such conditions would have been adequate in more "normal" summer conditions. Can anyone imagine having to sleep in metal boxes closely aligned, with very little space between allowing for natural air circulation, after a day's "normal" midsummer insolation?

The normative values being applied here might appear to be softening us all up for portacabins' use as an economical space-saving way to solve the homelessness problem in London.