So, lack of success has been plaguing me the last week or so. The sink still leaks, or I assume it does. I may have to resort to a whole different bodge to get it to seal. Granted, sealing a 1930s sink is a bit more of an art, probably intended to involve lead plumbing, but my attempts have proven to be less successful than I’d hoped.
Similarly, our trip to Cornwall to revive the Volvo was a failure. Well, semi-failure. I’ve not been able to find my 6-sided socket set for a while, and resorted to using my dad’s 12 sided set when I went down. This proved to be a mistake, because when we got down there I ended up rounding off the 17mm caliper retaining bolts (with the impact driver) and destroying my 17mm spanner (it’s now about an 18mm spanner with some gouges out of it). Granted it’s a Blackspur tool I bought, as part of a roll of spanners, for a very low price from Bristol Tools a long time ago. But the caliper bolts wouldn’t shift, and in the end I resorted to ringing a recovery firm to take the car to a local garage (none of the local garages seem to do recovery) who’ve fitted the new leg. So I’ll be back down in Cornwall on Tuesday retrieving the car.
I’ve also failed to stay well! I had a bit of a sore throat when we were down in Cornwall (in the diagonal rain), and by Wednesday (strike day) it’d turned into a real cold. I downed some Day Nurse so I could go march…
…Now, there seems to be some discussion about the fact that Public Sector pensions are better than private sector ones, which is possibly true. And that we should be glad to work later and pay more (although I find the idea of me being in my late 60s and performing CPR hilarious, given my family history of osteoporosis, I’d probably break something). I’m not quite sure I get this argument though. It seems to speak to the worst sort of childish jealousy. What you’ve got is better than what I’ve got therefore you should get less. Made more frustrating by the fact that government’s own report concluded that the public pension scheme was sustainable until 2031 (which is, as I understand it, as far as it went), and would cost the government no more than it does now as a percentage of GDP (also, the NHS pension scheme gave the government 2 billion pounds in extra takings. That’s 2 billion given to the government, not to people on NHS pensions because of the way the scheme works).
So, why not instead start talking about how the private sector really should be doing better by its staff?
The phrase ‘race to the bottom’ has been said many times, and seems terribly apt. As Cameron/Cronies say that we should relax labour laws so we can compete with China and the like, I wonder what, exactly the future they envisage looks like. Having chucked planning laws, and protection for areas of beauty in the bin, the images that appear in my head are of the areas where vast private companies have been allowed to exercise their ethical principles in the protection of the environment.
And I find it deeply depressing.
As I marched through Bath, the walls seemed to speak to me. I felt like I could hear the poor and the sick in the workhouse. The city is so close to its history, and all that progress that we’ve made towards a more civilised society? All that feels more and more at risk.
