Monday 30 March 2015

Life after Schengen.






Free Movement of Labour
The big question, no not the Sunday Morning program which I enjoy, but it's the Big Question of what we are to do with our society in this new economic paradigm of Globalisation?
Is it true that society has grown flabby through,( up until recently ) a concentrated effort after the Second World War to develop civilised, concerned, feely, protective governmental support for its citizens in all aspects of their lives.
Huge strides have been made in health, in transport, in environmental control, whilst equally we have mismanaged many things. For instance a huge deficit has been accumulated in affordable housing held under public control. Our education system has been high jacked by ideologs who, idealistic and doctrinaire, determine the way are children are brought up both inside and outside of school, seemingly oblivious to the fact that for many their ideas seem to be failing.
The introduction of the Welfare State, a very laudable idea which was initially designed to absorb only those at the edges of society, has become a support system for many who do not need it. The concept that one should not 'suffer' holds good as long as the suffering is out of your hands to remedy, for instance if you were sick or mentally ill ( and even here the mental condition must be clearly defined). The Welfare State was also intended as a temporary support when a person, for no fault of his/her own found themselves out of work (again, clearly monitored) and unable to feed their family.
Of course today being unemployed and unemployable is in many ways a direct result of our education system. The fact that we took our eye off the ball and concentrated on getting more and more of our kids on  tertiary education instead of training them through trade and craft skills to give them overall ability and equip them for the actual workplace not the panacea for an idealised world of work. Because we didn't train lads and lasses to be focused on the workplace after school (we filled their heads with dreams) they had no concept or basic skills to cope when they entered the workforce and so we now have the much more astute and grounded young men and women coming over from the Continent to do the work we are now clearly unsuited to do.
Does large immigration from the EU impose a stress on our local workforce with their acceptance of lower wages, or is it a fact of life that with overpopulation and porous boarders, we have to accept a new dawn is upon us and that Globalisation has rid the employer of any constrain he once had.  Profit, of which low wages is one important constituent, is after all, a great incentive to view the world through a selective prism, seeing only ones own selfish needs.
Is the main problem that when the Schengen Treaty in 1985 which was drawn up it encompassed only a limited number of fairly comparable societies whilst today there are 29 nations belonging to the EU all with the same claim of hegemony but clearly at vastly different stages of development. Only the "Palaces"  seem to kept pace whilst around the wall the peasants do as well as they can !!!
Perhaps as the Giants of Industry and Finance have righted the ship (their ship) and put the silly notion of Liberty Fraternity and Equality to sleep for the more mundane concept of "servitude" !!!



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