http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7494242.stm

The government needs to do more to prosecute suspected benefit fraudsters, MPs have said.

The committee welcomed progress in cutting benefit fraud from £2bn in 2001/2 to £800m in 2006/7.

But it noted that £700m of this reduction had been due to a decision to reclassify overpayments of disability living allowance as non-fraudulent

[Another stats massage and I am sure it does not include fraud related to HMRC Tax Credits claim whcih would probably add anohter £1bn to the figure]

The MPs also called it “unacceptable” that benefit overpayments due to error had almost doubled from £1bn to £1.9bn over the same period.

The report said: “Potential fraudsters will not be deterred if the department is not seen to be taking firm action where there is good evidence that fraud has taken place.”

[That is why UK is turning to be a land of fraudster and criminals]

I am not against social security payment to those who are truly needy. For the fraudster, so far most are getting community services or a suspended jail sentence which is no deterrent whatsoever to the low life.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2008/07/01/ybsnaps101.xml

Dream may turn into a nightmare

By Richard Tyler Enterprise Editor

Where do you turn when your business gets into financial difficulty? That is the question posed to Your Business by restaurant owner Rochelle Gee, whose business has been knocked sideways by rising prices and the economic slowdown.

And the beureaucrats at Wesminster thinks it is easy to run one (and busy dreaming up new regulation such as incoming shifting anti avoidance rules, anti discrimination rules which go too far etc).

A leaked e-mail shows how university staff are being urged to increase the number of top degree grades to keep pace with competing universities.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/7483330.stm

This has been known for ages and I have seen people with UK master degree who can’t speak english properly and could not write english to O Level lever either.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7481927.stm#costofliving

Food shopper paying at till The benchmarks are often higher than the amounts paid in state benefits

A single person in Britain needs to earn at least £13,400 a year for a minimum standard of living, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) has argued

and in the list of ‘essential’, that includes DVD player, Twix,  Wine,

and as a result,

“According to the calculations, a single person working full-time would need to earn £6.88 an hour to reach the weekly minimum standard - which is more than the current statutory minimum wage of £5.52.”

While people out there in Asia, Africa live on about £1 a day.

Poverty benchmark needs to be on a level that provides sufficient food, heat and a small accomodation. Otherwise, the war against poverty is and endless battle.

UK IS WEAK ON TACKLING WHITE COLLAR CRIME AND SHORT SELLERS, SAYS HBOS CHAIRMAN

guardian

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1029137/Former-soldier-arrested-kidnap-citizens-arrest-yob-pelted-home-eggs.html

The UK is getting hopeless by the day…

Just back fron Singapore, an Island where most if not all things works and the place is clean.   I was playing with my son at 12:00 mignight at the housing estate (HDB) playground with a good set of facilities (similar to most gyms, not the equipment are not as cushy as those in the gyms, but it is free). And, most importantly, it is safe to do so.

There is also something called Growth dividend there when the government took in more money than budgetted, it redistribute it to its people (poorer get more) in the form of growth dividend. It also save up money for rainy days and use the money to fund infrastructure projects when the economy is down (like now).  Back in UK, our greedy government spend and spend and spend and now it is in trouble, so much so that Gordon is asking the OPEC country to invest in UK nuclear energy power so that UK can buy less oil from them.  Imagine I ask my supplier to invest in, say a more advance piece of equipment so that I would buy less, say, replacement part from him.  Further, Gordon is suppose to be an economist)

Western Society… work harder now before it is too late…

http://burningourmoney.blogspot.com/2008/06/bat-girl-meets-remploy.html

http://batsgirl.blogspot.com/2008/06/naughty-remploy.html

Basically, http://www.remploy.co.uk/  a government agency to help disable people find job asked an applicant (and it is reasonable to expect that many other applicants are asked to do the same thing) to sign some forms with details of the form omitted and with the signature date back-dated so that they can potentially show that the scheme is working.  For this, they offered the disabled job applicants £50 cash (tax payer cash that is it).  To many disabled, £50 is a lot of money and would be happy to go along with the scam.

Where is the Integrity of our government which I pay 5 stars price for ? (and receive  3 starts service)

http://www.thestreet.com/story/10422230/1/did-this-college-admissions-junkie-play-fair.html

To most people, applying to 18 colleges probably sounds like overkill. But, not to Lukasz Zbylut, of Brooklyn, N.Y., who was accepted to all seven Ivy League schools, as well as top-notch institutions like Stanford and New York University to rack up a total of 17 college choices. (The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) sent his single rejection letter.) And, while he chose Harvard as his destination for the fall, he said no to 16 schools.

Hah..that is Kia Su.  I am not convinced the article claim that other would have lost their chances to enter thse uni as I would imagine most uni would have a backup list of applicants (otherwise, these Ivy League top U certainly have a less than top adminission system - even airlines knows that they need to overbook).

We’re all proletarian nowadays The new reality of economic insecurity is hitting the middle class hardest, says Phillip Blond at http://www.thefirstpost.co.uk/39161,opinion,were-all-proletarians-now

There are a few facts that the author forgot to mention:

(a) There are far more skilled labours than ever before.  Being a lawyer or accountants used to be a great great deal. Now, there are just so many of them.  Economic competition and achievements are all relative - if one can count from 1 to 10 and others can only do 1-5, then his success is lightly to be extremely signifnicant.   Making cards used to be a great deal, but now most countries make them and only the most efficient players like Toyota will do well.  Err…so what we call it ? The struggle of the ‘Car Making Class ?’!

(b) Nearly  all European Advanced Economies (except US) had their REAL PER CAPITA peak GDP (adjusted for inflation) achieved befoer year 2000, some reached their peak in the 1970.  These are of coure caused by various factors, including, as I would argue, the welfare state system whcih prioritise equality over the overall growth.  The Western Sociaist model encourages an outcome of 2 people earning $50, 6 people earning £150 and  2 truly exceptional who managed to bypass the system earning $500 versus a system where 2 people (who are least productive) earning $10, 6 people earning $350 and the 2 people earning $500 (as the two will always find ways round the system).

Labour forces in these countries are simply not becoming productive fast enough or moving up the value chain (and the French even had this 35 hours week rule) relative to their emerging market counterparts.   Being able to write computer programme used to be quantum physics stuffs, but today, there are just so many programmers in India etc.  The relative change in skills have been significant in the emerging economy, but an average accountant in Britain today is not much better than an average accountant back in the 1970.

Anotehr thing that article failed to mentioned is that artifically increase the wages of the workers beyond what their productivitis are worth will result in one of the following two things:

(a) In a close economy, like USSR, the people will be able to enjoy less goods and services and have less purchasing power.  What people tend to think is that, it would be good if ME, as a teacher, earns £100k. That is fine if the chap at Tesco checkout got paid £15k.  If the Tesco checkout chap got paid £70k, this will filter out in the food cost etc and the teacher may not be much better off at all.  The keyword here is relative prosperity.

(b) In an open economy, and as I have mentioned several times - consumers don’t buy a product just because it is British made or US made, but would buy what gives them value.  A worker who moan about his job being outsourced to India is nearly certain to buy a £20 China made DVD over a £80 British made DVD that have exactly the same function. (I read about a survey where China produced electronics are about 4 times cheaper than those made in Western countries)

Further, if the super wealthy are not able to invest their capital productively, then they have one mortal enemy - Inflation. The wealth controlled by the Rockefeller used to be so great, a 1 billion dollar US Steel used to be an unimaginably big companiy, but today wealth controlled by the Rockefeller pale into insignificant compared to those controlled by the Buffet, Gates, the Ambanis etc. The $1bn US Steel is child play today (China mobile is worth $400bn at one point). And the controller of great wealth DID get replaced by newere richest who are more entrepreneurial and creative.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealthy_historical_figures_2008

It is indeed going to be a more competitive world, but the competitiveness also produced lots of goods and services that enhance lives of many.  To try to obstruct the tide of this creative force in the West, and the East would be laughing.  With the competition for resources which the west has no control over.. I dare not imagine the consequences of trying to do otherwise….