Triumph outsells Kawasaki in the UK

Indeed.

They'll probably have higher expectations in due course, given the
direction this country is heading in, (in part due to a lack of
industry amongst other things) ;-)

 

snip>

I'd sooner see the assembly work done over here using components
sourced overseas but I fully understand why Triumph have to move
production away from the UK.

I have a major problem with cheap labour being brought into this
country and forcing down the accepted rate for a job but that's a
completely different issue.

 

On Sat, 23 Jan 2010 18:11:34 -0800 (PST), JackH

snip>

It might be interesting to have a look at how many posters on here
left jobs where they were doing 'hands on' technical work when
opportunities arose in computing. They were never replaced because
school leavers also wanted to get into programming rather than get
their hands dirty building a 500MW turbine.

To keep the price competitive you have the choice of shipping
production out to countries like Thailand or bring cheap labour over
here. Which do you prefer?

 

If Triumph tried to manufacture motorbikes using locally sourced parts
and labour they'd have to lift their prices by such a margin that
they'd stop selling. The engineers currently working in skilled
positions within Triumph would be made redundant and that'd be the
last we'd see of those skills.

 

Ok.

But at a more base level, in terms of 'for the good of the country',
less jobs here means less people employed here... and you've just
reiterated above why more people employed here rather than abroad
would be good too in terms of them shelling out for council tax / VAT
etc.

That, and possibly more people with money in their pockets to buy the
products of the firm they work for?

(This of course opens another can of worms in terms of exactly where
the money we spend here goes given our taste for imported goods.)

Outsourcing stuff is all well and good when you've are prospering and
have got more work than you can handle, but when you're floundering as
a country economically as the UK is at present, and dealing with
scenarios such as the cost of benefits apparently outstripping the
money being drawn in by way of income tax, (I'll find the reference if
I can be arsed in due course), then you have to ask yourself is it a
good thing after all?

And I fully appreciate that maybe the extra cost of producing the
goods solely here might actually limit the ability of companies
operating in this way to have as much capacity as it does under the
current arrangement.

Another example of how this is arrangement isn't really working for
us.

Up until a couple of years ago, I was managing some aspects of IT for
a company in Central London.

The company concerned is an arm of a company based in the States.

When I was there, all the Deskside Support / Helpdesk / Core Services
for the various offices within the UK was run by out of our office.

When the financial shit storm appeared to be brewing, the States
started taking over some of what we did remotely.

Now?

I spoke to one of my former colleagues the other day and they told me
there had been loads of redundancies over the last months in the main
due to Operations etc, being drawn back to the States as much as
possible.

To be fair, some of it is because they're having to reduce the amount
of staff they have in other parts of the business due to the downturn,
but even so.

Compared to when I was there, there is now a skeleton of staff based
here doing the stuff that they physically can't do remotely from the
States.

Net result is more people from the UK sitting around, scratching their
balls and wondering what the **** they're going to do for a job next,
and invariably becoming yet more of a burden on the benefits system.

It's the same at loads of other companies at present...

'Beancounters... line them all up against a wall' ;-)

 

You may well find them coming back in due course given how thin on the
ground jobs are in certain aspects of IT at present.

I'm still split on where my road leads... but at present it's tilted
towards the more 'hands' on side.

See?

Yet more 'bean counter' speak.

Ask yourself this: why is this country so in the shit all of a sudden,
and what do you suggest should happen to reverse its fortunes?

 

They'll fucking struggle because while there's plenty of work out
there for people with the right skills the only way back in for
someone who's been doing other shit for a number of years is to
undercut those doing it at the moment.

In what field?

I know there are courses out there for electricians etc that claim to
train someone _and_ find them a job afterwards but that won't open up
the more highly paid positions that will require you to have completed
a recognised apprenticeship and have done 4 years at college.

All of a sudden? It's been shit for people working in
engineering/manufacturing for at least 20 years but nobody gave a
****. Now there's a shortage of skilled men out there the rates have
gone up and all of a sudden getting your hands dirty isn't such a bad
thing.

 

Heh. Nice idea, crappy icon.

 

Plumbing and heating.

Aye, well... I'm lucky enough to have a father who is willing to train
me right up and get me through my 'Gas Safe' certification etc, as
well as gradually handing over the reins as he slips into retirement.

I find IT easier at present, but that should change once I've had a
bit more hands on.

Financially, it is... although to be fair a lot of the crap at the mo
is merely 'chickens coming home to roost'.

Aye, well... I think that's a good thing.

Office based work can be pretty stifling when you're doing it full
time.

 

In downtown Santiago there's a wondrous little shop-cum-workshop with a
sign that proudly proclaims it to be 'El Casa Del Gasfiter" (sic).

 

If he is a 1 man band and has an established clientele that provides
regular work on routine servicing with a couple of boiler replacements each
month then it will be a relatively stress free life. Just don't get
involved with insurance jobs or emergency call outs, except to established
clients. Leave that to the cowboys.

 

Get a 60 kw + ticket and you'll never be out of work

 

I had no idea you knew my dad. ;-)

*ding*

Also, there was a scheme last year IIRC, whereby he was supposed to
get some of the cost back from the scheme rather than the customer for
work carried out - he's still waiting for payment from the one he did
succumb to doing.

The new boiler scrappage scheme puts the onus on the customer to claim
it - the only risk we've seen so far for the installer is that some of
the definitions given for whether or not a certain type of boiler
qualifies for scrappage, are a tad ambiguous to say the least as in
'Boiler X may qualify'.

If you get it wrong and they view it as fraudulent, you're open to
prosecution.

 

LOL

I was winding someone I know up on Facebook the other week, by tagging
them in various pictures of iffy named food etc.

Foods such as 'Prick' crisps, and 'Golden Gaytime' ice lollies, which
have the tagline of '4 delicious chances to have a gay time!' on the
front of the box. :-D

 

How long do you reckon it'll be before he hands it all over? You'll
obviously have to spend a few years working 'for' him so that his
existing customer base gets to know you or there's a chance they'll go
elsewhere.

I think it's fucking crap because all of a sudden there's a load of
people with **** all knowledge of mechanical engineering thinking that
because they've got certificates saying they're a systems engineer it
means they can get a job in a power station or a refinery getting
their hands dirty during an outage.

 

Amen brother.
Sex munce a go i cudunt spill injunear now i are wun.

 

It's no different to what I saw in the IT world a decade or so ago.
Every minicab driver was a network engineer.

 

Two immediate questions spring to mind...

1 - By what measure?
2 - How does now stack up if we compare with a time when the country
wasn't in unbelievably deep in the financial shit having just spent every
single possible penny (and a shitload of lives of men at the peak of
their economic activity) in fighting a rather sizable war?

 

And as much as we hate the government, it could be so much worse - the
US, French and Italian ones spring instantly to mind.

Still planning on moving to France, though.

--
Veggie Dave
http://www.iq18films.co.uk

"To assert that the earth revolves around the sun is as erroneous as to claim
that Jesus was not born of a virgin." Cardinal Bellarmine

 

Well, we still can't afford question marks.