UK Pension Service - Total Farse

[itsari]

1 hour ago, spambot said:

No they will not backdate the lost pension payments for the indexed benefits lost, but will unfreeze your current pension to pay the same amount going forward as the full payment each month that you would be receiving in the UK as if you had never left.

 

This unfreezing lasts as long as the time of the visit and hence there are two situations a). short visit to Philippines and b) Moving to Philippines full time.

 

If you simply visited the Philippines for x days then your pension could increase for the time you were in the Philippines to reflect the unfrozen amount increase. You just need to provide your full name and home telephone number, date you are arriving and leaving the Philippines, nationality, address and telephone number of where you will be staying during this visit together with any travel details that might be relevant. 

 

This is different to moving your home to Philippines since this would require that you to apply for a change of circumstances and this process will be in writing with retirements to complete a change of circumstances form and a residency test. I am not entirely clear how it works in detail for the Philippines, but if say you were to return to the UK to unfreezing your pension the the following would occur:

 

You would be subject to a 'Habitual Residence Test' and this is designed to test your intent to stay in the UK backed with proof. The sort of things that the decision maker will look for include: how long you’ve been in the UK and how long you intend to stay. You usually need to have been in the UK for at least one to three months to be consider ‘habitually resident’ (but this depends on your circumstances). The test will establish your reasons for returning and how much your life is based in the UK, such as whether you own property in the UK or you have family in the UK or even proof that  you’ve registered with a GP / dentist. The decision maker is looking for anything that shows compelling reasoning that you are there to stay long term. Here you might include proof that you've sold a property abroad or given up a tenancy or proof to show you just bought or rented a property in the UK. The Habitual Residence Test is subjective and can be carried out by your local council, the Department for Work and Pensions, or HM Revenue and Customs. If you fail the test, you have the right to appeal.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thank you 

[SunsetT]

Same with all public services in the UK. Staff numbers cut back to the bone by 12 years+ of Conservative party austerity. They have destroyed the UK! Yet the UK turkeys continue to vote for Christmas!

[Brick Top]

1 hour ago, Bday Prang said:

I believe if your state pension is less than a certain amount you may be entitled  to "pension credit"  But I know absolutely nothing about it. There was an advert I saw on the TV a few months ago when I was in the UK, I think they said it could be worth  up to £3500 per year . Might be worth checking it out

You would have to reside in the UK to get that and also if you had over a certain amount in savings I think it's a mere £15,000 then you wouldn't get it even if you did reside in the UK.

[Jaggg88]

22 hours ago, Upnotover said:

Why are you special?

You qualify for your state pension when you reach 66 years old and not 64. You need to contact the overseas pension centre by email. https://www.gov.uk/international-pension-centre

[piston broke]

4 hours ago, The Fat Controller said:

@piston broke EDIT due to mistake.


I have never seen any reference at all regarding purchasing missing years at anything else other than the Class 1 rate of around £800.

 

my pal did at the class 2 rate and subsequently advised 2 of his friends, who also did the same .....

 

i'm hoping to be next !

Edited April 14, 2023 by piston broke

[piston broke]

54 minutes ago, Jaggg88 said:

You qualify for your state pension when you reach 66 years old and not 64. You need to contact the overseas pension centre by email. https://www.gov.uk/international-pension-centre

Fer hooks sake - If you read the thread, i said i made a typo - 66 is my retirement age - and if you see Bob - can you tell him ...

Edited April 14, 2023 by piston broke

[piston broke]

 

Talking of total farses - i took the oppertuity of ringing the "international pension centre" help line ....

 

auto answered by a computer ....  giving you 4 options (you know the dope "press 1 for..." etc .....

 

mine was option 4 - just after i pressed, was disconnected !

 

so rang back - pressed 1 - disconnected

 

so rang back - pressed 2 - disconnected....

 

And you guessed it - rand back - pressed 3 - disconnected ......

 

The UK is a total mess .....

 

The irony is that if arrived in a rubber dingy, a free lawyer would advise me free of charge how to get the application through.....

 

i could scream ....

[RayC]

9 hours ago, The Fat Controller said:

@piston broke

 

I have never seen any reference at all regarding purchasing missing years at anything else other than the Class 1 rate of around £800.
 

It used to be the case (+/-10 years ago) that if you are resident and tax-resident abroad AND working (AND are part of the local social security system if such an entity exists), then you would be able to make voluntary contributions - which counted towards your pension - at the lower rate.

 

I did this when I was living and working in Belgium and also 25 years ago when I was working in Thailand.

 

I don't know if the rules have changed in the meantime.

[it is what it is]

 

the government gateway site is extremely good, easy to use to check pension, get passport, driving license, covid vaccination, and so on.

 

i absolutely understand that they have to be strict when people first sign up, but it's very much worth jumping through the hoops as the benefits are great. i recommend every uk citizen sign up so you're ready to go when needed.

 

i have dealings with the DWP every year and find them professional and efficient.

[Bday Prang]

15 hours ago, SunsetT said:

Same with all public services in the UK. Staff numbers cut back to the bone by 12 years+ of Conservative party austerity. They have destroyed the UK! Yet the UK turkeys continue to vote for Christmas!

Because the only alternative is far far worse, but you knew that already

[cleopatra2]

10 hours ago, it is what it is said:

 

the government gateway site is extremely good, easy to use to check pension, get passport, driving license, covid vaccination, and so on.

 

i absolutely understand that they have to be strict when people first sign up, but it's very much worth jumping through the hoops as the benefits are great. i recommend every uk citizen sign up so you're ready to go when needed.

 

i have dealings with the DWP every year and find them professional and efficient.

Are these services still available on the Government Gateway site. 

Since the UK government retired the Government Gateway in favour of Government Verify  and the HMRC is the only department that still uses government Gateway .

[samtam]

23 hours ago, fulhamster said:

I'm told that if you do not receive any letter from DWP about claiming your pension, you can call and make the claim online.

If this is correct, does anyone have the number ??

And if they already have your address in Thailand, can you still call and claim if the letter is not delivered ?

Claim pensions on +44 191 218 7777  press #3.

 

Much easier to claim over the phone than by filling in the forms. But you have to answer a lot of questions, including when you started working in UK, when you ceased working in UK, when you started living abroad etc, (dates including day, month and year). So get all your details ready.

 

Edited April 15, 2023 by samtam

[simon43]

[quote]

As a 'rule of thumb' if you are living abroad and NOT working, you have to pay Class 1 contributions at the higher rate. This happened to me.

[/quote]

 

I paid top-ups for 14 years (from 2016) at class 2 rate.  I stated that I worked overseas as a teacher in Myanmar and provided copies of my employment contracts.  I was never required to pay class 1 ????

[RayC]

3 hours ago, simon43 said:

[quote]

As a 'rule of thumb' if you are living abroad and NOT working, you have to pay Class 1 contributions at the higher rate. This happened to me.

[/quote]

 

I paid top-ups for 14 years (from 2016) at class 2 rate.  I stated that I worked overseas as a teacher in Myanmar and provided copies of my employment contracts.  I was never required to pay class 1 ????

Yes. If  someone is working abroad then, most likely, they will be able to pay Class 2 rather than Class 1 contributions.

[SunsetT]

8 hours ago, Bday Prang said:

Because the only alternative is far far worse, but you knew that already

Wow! You are clairvoyant are you? You not only know what the UK would be like  if the Socialists (not Communists) had won the last election or win the next election, but you can also read my mind.

 

All I know is, at 70 yrs old, I grew up in a country where I received excellent free education to graduate level, excellent free NHS healthcare, incl. dental and eye care as a child, all public services and utilities were nationalised and more efficient and affordable by most,  I felt safe with emergency services and police arriving in minutes not hours or days when needed. And all of this was from Socialist policies introduced by post-war Labour governments.

 

All of this has now been destroyed by the Conservative party!

 

I never thought I would live to see UK people having to pull their own teeth because there are no (affordable) NHS dentists in huge areas of the UK; city people having to hail taxis to get to hospital after road accidents because ambulances take hours to arrive. Elderly folk, after a fall, spending hours (one 9hrs, one, over 90, 14hrs in my area) laying on the ground, even outside, and sometimes overnight, waiting for an ambulance. And when they do eventually reach hospital they, and other patients in emergency circumstances, often have to spend hours and hours in ambulances queued outside of hospitals because A&E is backlogged with patients lining corridors on stretchers waiting for beds to become available. And it is Jeremy Hunt, the current Conservative chancellor who is personally responsible for most for this appalling situation. Because, as Health Minister, he was notorious for closing wards and small rural hospitals cutting the number of beds available, and also nurses and doctors to the bone. As for the police, they have become a complete joke, not even interested in arresting shoplifters, taking hours to answer non-emergency phone calls to report a crime. Rather they expect people to fill in  a lengthy online form to do so. Again even in an emergency, it can take them hours to respond even where there is a threat of violence, and then maybe just with a phone call!

 

Who is responsible for the absurd UK price capping system which has made gas and electric the most expensive in Europe and unaffordable by most and requiring government sudsidy for all. This when the government is refusing to increase windfall  taxes on the fuel companies supplying it who are raking in obscene and record profits?

 

Who is responsible for the total disaster that is Brexit, and which has led us from being one of the most respected countries in the World to being the laughing stock of the World?

 

Have you tried using UK government depts. such as the Passport, Driving Licence, or Pension offices lately? There are often long delays, and it is virtually impossible to contact them by phone or get a reply if you have a problem. Why? 12 years+ of Tory austerity again have cut their underpaid staff numbers to the bone.

 

How about the ongoing Tory corruption, hypocrisy, and cronyism, e.g., the millions of tax payer's money squandered and wasted on PPE, etc., during Covid giving contracts to their mates and Conservative party doners?

 

I could go on and on but sadly most have been brainwashed by extreme Right wing populist propaganda published by tax haven millionaire owned publications such as the Daily Mail who have an extreme vested interest in keeping the Tories in power, i.e., tax avoidance. Also many more voters, thinking they are superior and more enlightened, suck up to the biased political coverage of the BBC who are the propaganda wing of the British public schoolboy establishment & elite who again have a vested interest in tax avoidance and hanging on to their wealth by keeping the Conservative party in power.

 

People in the UK make the mistake of simply voting for the party leaders that they are presented with when they should be scrutinising and voting for party policies and their track record when in power. Labour lost the last election because Jeremy Corbyn, who, OK, never had leadership qualities, was completely demonised by the establishment media who, along with Boris Johnson's lies on Brexit, convinced people that returning to the socialist Britain that I was blessed to have grown up in, would be a nightmare. So Corbyn had no chance compared to the cuddly, charismatic and posh eccentric Boris Johnson (The British Class system is alive and well). They said that Labour would take us back to the Seventies (which were actually great), but hell! the Tories have taken the UK back to the Stone Age!

 

So I ask you, how can the alternative be far far worse than this? Any alternative must be better than the utter disaster that we now have in the UK. Are Corbyn and Starmer far far worse than Theresa May, Boris Johnson, and Liz Truss (????)? I dont think so. And now we have an unelected ethnically Indian millionaire or is it billionaire as Prime Minister (who is actually not doing such a bad job compared to the previous shower!).

 

How can we possibly know that the alternative is far far worse until they are given the chance in power to prove that they are not? Of course I forgot, you are clairvoyant. You must be rich or one of the rich British establishment greedily clinging to their wealth and frightened to death of paying more tax under a Labour govt., or even paying any tax at all to contribute to the country that has given them so much? Or have you been successfully brainwashed by the UK media?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Bday Prang]

21 minutes ago, SunsetT said:

Wow! You are clairvoyant are you? You not only know what the UK would be like  if the Socialists (not Communists) had won the last election or win the next election, but you can also read my mind.

 

All I know is, at 70 yrs old, I grew up in a country where I received excellent free education to graduate level, excellent free NHS healthcare, incl. dental and eye care as a child, all public services and utilities were nationalised and more efficient and affordable by most,  I felt safe with emergency services and police arriving in minutes not hours or days when needed. And all of this was from Socialist policies introduced by post-war Labour governments.

 

All of this has now been destroyed by the Conservative party!

 

I never thought I would live to see UK people having to pull their own teeth because there are no (affordable) NHS dentists in huge areas of the UK; city people having to hail taxis to get to hospital after road accidents because ambulances take hours to arrive. Elderly folk, after a fall, spending hours (one 9hrs, one, over 90, 14hrs in my area) laying on the ground, even outside, and sometimes overnight, waiting for an ambulance. And when they do eventually reach hospital they, and other patients in emergency circumstances, often have to spend hours and hours in ambulances queued outside of hospitals because A&E is backlogged with patients lining corridors on stretchers waiting for beds to become available. And it is Jeremy Hunt, the current Conservative chancellor who is personally responsible for most for this appalling situation. Because, as Health Minister, he was notorious for closing wards and small rural hospitals cutting the number of beds available, and also nurses and doctors to the bone. As for the police, they have become a complete joke, not even interested in arresting shoplifters, taking hours to answer non-emergency phone calls to report a crime. Rather they expect people to fill in  a lengthy online form to do so. Again even in an emergency, it can take them hours to respond even where there is a threat of violence, and then maybe just with a phone call!

 

Who is responsible for the absurd UK price capping system which has made gas and electric the most expensive in Europe and unaffordable by most and requiring government sudsidy for all. This when the government is refusing to increase windfall  taxes on the fuel companies supplying it who are raking in obscene and record profits?

 

Who is responsible for the total disaster that is Brexit, and which has led us from being one of the most respected countries in the World to being the laughing stock of the World?

 

Have you tried using UK government depts. such as the Passport, Driving Licence, or Pension offices lately? There are often long delays, and it is virtually impossible to contact them by phone or get a reply if you have a problem. Why? 12 years+ of Tory austerity again have cut their underpaid staff numbers to the bone.

 

How about the ongoing Tory corruption, hypocrisy, and cronyism, e.g., the millions of tax payer's money squandered and wasted on PPE, etc., during Covid giving contracts to their mates and Conservative party doners?

 

I could go on and on but sadly most have been brainwashed by extreme Right wing populist propaganda published by tax haven millionaire owned publications such as the Daily Mail who have an extreme vested interest in keeping the Tories in power, i.e., tax avoidance. Also many more voters, thinking they are superior and more enlightened, suck up to the biased political coverage of the BBC who are the propaganda wing of the British public schoolboy establishment & elite who again have a vested interest in tax avoidance and hanging on to their wealth by keeping the Conservative party in power.

 

People in the UK make the mistake of simply voting for the party leaders that they are presented with when they should be scrutinising and voting for party policies and their track record when in power. Labour lost the last election because Jeremy Corbyn, who, OK, never had leadership qualities, was completely demonised by the establishment media who, along with Boris Johnson's lies on Brexit, convinced people that returning to the socialist Britain that I was blessed to have grown up in, would be a nightmare. So Corbyn had no chance compared to the cuddly, charismatic and posh eccentric Boris Johnson (The British Class system is alive and well). They said that Labour would take us back to the Seventies (which were actually great), but hell! the Tories have taken the UK back to the Stone Age!

 

So I ask you, how can the alternative be far far worse than this? Any alternative must be better than the utter disaster that we now have in the UK. Are Corbyn and Starmer far far worse than Theresa May, Boris Johnson, and Liz Truss (????)? I dont think so. And now we have an unelected ethnically Indian millionaire or is it billionaire as Prime Minister (who is actually not doing such a bad job compared to the previous shower!).

How can we possibly know that the alternative is far far worse until they are given the chance in power to prove that they are not? Of course I forgot, you are clairvoyant. You must be rich or one of the rich British establishment greedily clinging to their wealth and frightened to death of paying more tax under a Labour govt., or even paying any tax at all to contribute to the country that has given them so much? Or have you been successfully brainwashed by the UK media? 

             

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I think you are the one who has been brainwashed, presumably by the Guardian and the BBC, You really should not believe all you are fed by the lefty MSM

The fact that you consider the BBC in any way right wing tells us all we need to know. The BBC is by anybody's standards "left wing" it's just not left enough for you

                      People pulling their own teeth? for god's sake do you actually believe that rubbish?

I recently spent 5 months in the UK, during that time I renewed both my passport and driving licence with no problems whatsoever. I completed some "free" routine dental treatment on the NHS  and also was forced to attend the A&E department of a national health hospital as a result of an eye injury sustained at work, again no problems whatsoever, and no people left dying in corridors or anything else of that nature.  This is my personal experience and not your second hand cut and pasted tripe from selected lefty news papers. who's sole aim is to bring down any conservative government,

                        The police are now far to busy investigating so called "hate crimes"  (another lefty invention), or raiding pubs displaying gollywog dolls and a multitude of other similar ridiculous operations normally as a result of some lefty snowflake becoming "offended"

                         Any breakdown in the efficiency of public services is mainly as a result of uncontrolled immigration, millions of non tax paying illegals working in the black economy, correctly described as an invasion, nobody can say the current government has performed well in that respect but its hardly surprising when any and every attempt at trying to solve this problem is thwarted by whingeing lefty human rights lawyers, most of your precious labour party are in favour of no borders at all and seem unable to accept that the hundreds of thousands of recent arrivals putting services under incredible strain, are in the main nothing more than economic migrants. 

                           Likewise Brexit, perfectly thwarted by the remoaners, and not yet allowed to become the success it should and ultimately will be,  Kier starmer as usual being no more capable of giving his real opinions on it any more than he is able to define a woman. He certainly like to sit on the fence.  His previous position as director of public prosecutions was hardly a success, under his watch , notorious pedophile Jimmy Saville was "mysteriously" able to avoid prosecution, was this just incompetence or something more sinister

                           Jeremy Corbyn, the anti semite. is probably more responsible than anybody  for preventing  the nightmare scenario of a  Labour government,  and for that  the Uk owes him a huge debt, he should be knighted

                             Boris Johnson has been and gone along with the others you mentioned, although you do seem to have a problem with Rishi Sunak, was it really necessary to mention his ethnicity? No surprise really as racism and prejudice and the like  are never far from the surface of the all so tolerant lefties, In case you have forgotten "Mr Personality"   Gordon Brown  he was also unelected as a replacement for war criminal Tony Blair

                            Your precious "cash starved"  NHS  ruined by mis guided "socialists"  seems to have no problems finding the money to employ hundreds of "diversity consultants"  advertising mind boggling salaries of over £200.000 a year plus very generous pensions, more than the prime minister and most doctors  could ever hope to earn

                             You should remove the rose tinted spectacles you wear when reminiscing about the 70's they have affected your memory,  you  have forgotten about the 33% base rate of income tax, 3 day week , the power cuts, the winter of discontent, and the endless strikes.  Strikes, that unlike the recent series of strikes, were not a purely politically motivated attempt by lefty dinosaur union executives trying to bring down a conservative government at any cost

                               I am not rich, but I am a damn sight better off than I ever was under a labour government as is everybody else, except of course the work shy benefit claimants who wish for a "labour" government and if you are so keen to pay more tax then don't let me stop you, It's not difficult  to voluntarily pay more if you really want to , but you don't really want to at all do you? Although if ,god forbid we ever do end up with a labour government you won't have the choice. They can never be allowed to govern again

                               If you can't understand that things will indeed get worse then your free degree was a complete waste of time , and indeed money, 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                       

                        

[piston broke]

10 hours ago, SunsetT said:

Wow! You are clairvoyant are you? You not only know what the UK would be like  if the Socialists (not Communists) had won the last election or win the next election, but you can also read my mind.

 

All I know is, at 70 yrs old, I grew up in a country where I received excellent free education to graduate level, excellent free NHS healthcare, incl. dental and eye care as a child, all public services and utilities were nationalised and more efficient and affordable by most,  I felt safe with emergency services and police arriving in minutes not hours or days when needed. And all of this was from Socialist policies introduced by post-war Labour governments.

 

All of this has now been destroyed by the Conservative party!

 

I never thought I would live to see UK people having to pull their own teeth because there are no (affordable) NHS dentists in huge areas of the UK; city people having to hail taxis to get to hospital after road accidents because ambulances take hours to arrive. Elderly folk, after a fall, spending hours (one 9hrs, one, over 90, 14hrs in my area) laying on the ground, even outside, and sometimes overnight, waiting for an ambulance. And when they do eventually reach hospital they, and other patients in emergency circumstances, often have to spend hours and hours in ambulances queued outside of hospitals because A&E is backlogged with patients lining corridors on stretchers waiting for beds to become available. And it is Jeremy Hunt, the current Conservative chancellor who is personally responsible for most for this appalling situation. Because, as Health Minister, he was notorious for closing wards and small rural hospitals cutting the number of beds available, and also nurses and doctors to the bone. As for the police, they have become a complete joke, not even interested in arresting shoplifters, taking hours to answer non-emergency phone calls to report a crime. Rather they expect people to fill in  a lengthy online form to do so. Again even in an emergency, it can take them hours to respond even where there is a threat of violence, and then maybe just with a phone call!

 

Who is responsible for the absurd UK price capping system which has made gas and electric the most expensive in Europe and unaffordable by most and requiring government sudsidy for all. This when the government is refusing to increase windfall  taxes on the fuel companies supplying it who are raking in obscene and record profits?

 

Who is responsible for the total disaster that is Brexit, and which has led us from being one of the most respected countries in the World to being the laughing stock of the World?

 

Have you tried using UK government depts. such as the Passport, Driving Licence, or Pension offices lately? There are often long delays, and it is virtually impossible to contact them by phone or get a reply if you have a problem. Why? 12 years+ of Tory austerity again have cut their underpaid staff numbers to the bone.

 

How about the ongoing Tory corruption, hypocrisy, and cronyism, e.g., the millions of tax payer's money squandered and wasted on PPE, etc., during Covid giving contracts to their mates and Conservative party doners?

 

I could go on and on but sadly most have been brainwashed by extreme Right wing populist propaganda published by tax haven millionaire owned publications such as the Daily Mail who have an extreme vested interest in keeping the Tories in power, i.e., tax avoidance. Also many more voters, thinking they are superior and more enlightened, suck up to the biased political coverage of the BBC who are the propaganda wing of the British public schoolboy establishment & elite who again have a vested interest in tax avoidance and hanging on to their wealth by keeping the Conservative party in power.

 

People in the UK make the mistake of simply voting for the party leaders that they are presented with when they should be scrutinising and voting for party policies and their track record when in power. Labour lost the last election because Jeremy Corbyn, who, OK, never had leadership qualities, was completely demonised by the establishment media who, along with Boris Johnson's lies on Brexit, convinced people that returning to the socialist Britain that I was blessed to have grown up in, would be a nightmare. So Corbyn had no chance compared to the cuddly, charismatic and posh eccentric Boris Johnson (The British Class system is alive and well). They said that Labour would take us back to the Seventies (which were actually great), but hell! the Tories have taken the UK back to the Stone Age!

 

So I ask you, how can the alternative be far far worse than this? Any alternative must be better than the utter disaster that we now have in the UK. Are Corbyn and Starmer far far worse than Theresa May, Boris Johnson, and Liz Truss (????)? I dont think so. And now we have an unelected ethnically Indian millionaire or is it billionaire as Prime Minister (who is actually not doing such a bad job compared to the previous shower!).

 

How can we possibly know that the alternative is far far worse until they are given the chance in power to prove that they are not? Of course I forgot, you are clairvoyant. You must be rich or one of the rich British establishment greedily clinging to their wealth and frightened to death of paying more tax under a Labour govt., or even paying any tax at all to contribute to the country that has given them so much? Or have you been successfully brainwashed by the UK media?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

some very valid points there !    what are your thoughts on the "boat people" keep rocking up ??

[brewsterbudgen]

2 hours ago, piston broke said:

some very valid points there !    what are your thoughts on the "boat people" keep rocking up ??

What do refugees/asylum seekers have to do with pensions?? ????

[RayC]

3 hours ago, brewsterbudgen said:

What do refugees/asylum seekers have to do with pensions?? ????

The main reason they make their hazardous journeys is to take advantage of the UK's generous welfare system.

 

Thought everyone knew that!???? (sarcasm alert)

[brewsterbudgen]

7 minutes ago, RayC said:

The main reason they make their hazardous journeys is to take advantage of the UK's generous welfare system.

 

Thought everyone knew that!???? (sarcasm alert)

Sarcasm or not, what does that have to do with State pensions?

[RayC]

2 hours ago, brewsterbudgen said:

Sarcasm or not, what does that have to do with State pensions?

Nothing

[VBF]

18 hours ago, Bday Prang said:

I think you are the one who has been brainwashed, presumably by the Guardian and the BBC, You really should not believe all you are fed by the lefty MSM

The fact that you consider the BBC in any way right wing tells us all we need to know. The BBC is by anybody's standards "left wing" it's just not left enough for you

                      People pulling their own teeth? for god's sake do you actually believe that rubbish?

I recently spent 5 months in the UK, during that time I renewed both my passport and driving licence with no problems whatsoever. I completed some "free" routine dental treatment on the NHS  and also was forced to attend the A&E department of a national health hospital as a result of an eye injury sustained at work, again no problems whatsoever, and no people left dying in corridors or anything else of that nature.  This is my personal experience and not your second hand cut and pasted tripe from selected lefty news papers. who's sole aim is to bring down any conservative government,

                        The police are now far to busy investigating so called "hate crimes"  (another lefty invention), or raiding pubs displaying gollywog dolls and a multitude of other similar ridiculous operations normally as a result of some lefty snowflake becoming "offended"

                         Any breakdown in the efficiency of public services is mainly as a result of uncontrolled immigration, millions of non tax paying illegals working in the black economy, correctly described as an invasion, nobody can say the current government has performed well in that respect but its hardly surprising when any and every attempt at trying to solve this problem is thwarted by whingeing lefty human rights lawyers, most of your precious labour party are in favour of no borders at all and seem unable to accept that the hundreds of thousands of recent arrivals putting services under incredible strain, are in the main nothing more than economic migrants. 

                           Likewise Brexit, perfectly thwarted by the remoaners, and not yet allowed to become the success it should and ultimately will be,  Kier starmer as usual being no more capable of giving his real opinions on it any more than he is able to define a woman. He certainly like to sit on the fence.  His previous position as director of public prosecutions was hardly a success, under his watch , notorious pedophile Jimmy Saville was "mysteriously" able to avoid prosecution, was this just incompetence or something more sinister

                           Jeremy Corbyn, the anti semite. is probably more responsible than anybody  for preventing  the nightmare scenario of a  Labour government,  and for that  the Uk owes him a huge debt, he should be knighted

                             Boris Johnson has been and gone along with the others you mentioned, although you do seem to have a problem with Rishi Sunak, was it really necessary to mention his ethnicity? No surprise really as racism and prejudice and the like  are never far from the surface of the all so tolerant lefties, In case you have forgotten "Mr Personality"   Gordon Brown  he was also unelected as a replacement for war criminal Tony Blair

                            Your precious "cash starved"  NHS  ruined by mis guided "socialists"  seems to have no problems finding the money to employ hundreds of "diversity consultants"  advertising mind boggling salaries of over £200.000 a year plus very generous pensions, more than the prime minister and most doctors  could ever hope to earn

                             You should remove the rose tinted spectacles you wear when reminiscing about the 70's they have affected your memory,  you  have forgotten about the 33% base rate of income tax, 3 day week , the power cuts, the winter of discontent, and the endless strikes.  Strikes, that unlike the recent series of strikes, were not a purely politically motivated attempt by lefty dinosaur union executives trying to bring down a conservative government at any cost

                               I am not rich, but I am a damn sight better off than I ever was under a labour government as is everybody else, except of course the work shy benefit claimants who wish for a "labour" government and if you are so keen to pay more tax then don't let me stop you, It's not difficult  to voluntarily pay more if you really want to , but you don't really want to at all do you? Although if ,god forbid we ever do end up with a labour government you won't have the choice. They can never be allowed to govern again

                               If you can't understand that things will indeed get worse then your free degree was a complete waste of time , and indeed money,                        

                        

Spot on - that was exactly what I was thinking as I read what  @piston broke who i rather think is wearing rose-tinted specs (The red rose of Labour?) posted.

[Jumbo1968]

59 minutes ago, VBF said:

Spot on - that was exactly what I was thinking as I read what  @piston broke who i rather think is wearing rose-tinted specs (The red rose of Labour?) posted.

In all my working years I never felt better off or worse off no matter who was in power, money was just removed from your pocket in different ways by who ever was in power.

[SunsetT]

19 hours ago, Bday Prang said:

I think you are the one who has been brainwashed, presumably by the Guardian and the BBC, You really should not believe all you are fed by the lefty MSM

The fact that you consider the BBC in any way right wing tells us all we need to know. The BBC is by anybody's standards "left wing" it's just not left enough for you

                      People pulling their own teeth? for god's sake do you actually believe that rubbish?

I recently spent 5 months in the UK, during that time I renewed both my passport and driving licence with no problems whatsoever. I completed some "free" routine dental treatment on the NHS  and also was forced to attend the A&E department of a national health hospital as a result of an eye injury sustained at work, again no problems whatsoever, and no people left dying in corridors or anything else of that nature.  This is my personal experience and not your second hand cut and pasted tripe from selected lefty news papers. who's sole aim is to bring down any conservative government,

                        The police are now far to busy investigating so called "hate crimes"  (another lefty invention), or raiding pubs displaying gollywog dolls and a multitude of other similar ridiculous operations normally as a result of some lefty snowflake becoming "offended"

                         Any breakdown in the efficiency of public services is mainly as a result of uncontrolled immigration, millions of non tax paying illegals working in the black economy, correctly described as an invasion, nobody can say the current government has performed well in that respect but its hardly surprising when any and every attempt at trying to solve this problem is thwarted by whingeing lefty human rights lawyers, most of your precious labour party are in favour of no borders at all and seem unable to accept that the hundreds of thousands of recent arrivals putting services under incredible strain, are in the main nothing more than economic migrants. 

                           Likewise Brexit, perfectly thwarted by the remoaners, and not yet allowed to become the success it should and ultimately will be,  Kier starmer as usual being no more capable of giving his real opinions on it any more than he is able to define a woman. He certainly like to sit on the fence.  His previous position as director of public prosecutions was hardly a success, under his watch , notorious pedophile Jimmy Saville was "mysteriously" able to avoid prosecution, was this just incompetence or something more sinister

                           Jeremy Corbyn, the anti semite. is probably more responsible than anybody  for preventing  the nightmare scenario of a  Labour government,  and for that  the Uk owes him a huge debt, he should be knighted

                             Boris Johnson has been and gone along with the others you mentioned, although you do seem to have a problem with Rishi Sunak, was it really necessary to mention his ethnicity? No surprise really as racism and prejudice and the like  are never far from the surface of the all so tolerant lefties, In case you have forgotten "Mr Personality"   Gordon Brown  he was also unelected as a replacement for war criminal Tony Blair

                            Your precious "cash starved"  NHS  ruined by mis guided "socialists"  seems to have no problems finding the money to employ hundreds of "diversity consultants"  advertising mind boggling salaries of over £200.000 a year plus very generous pensions, more than the prime minister and most doctors  could ever hope to earn

                             You should remove the rose tinted spectacles you wear when reminiscing about the 70's they have affected your memory,  you  have forgotten about the 33% base rate of income tax, 3 day week , the power cuts, the winter of discontent, and the endless strikes.  Strikes, that unlike the recent series of strikes, were not a purely politically motivated attempt by lefty dinosaur union executives trying to bring down a conservative government at any cost

                               I am not rich, but I am a damn sight better off than I ever was under a labour government as is everybody else, except of course the work shy benefit claimants who wish for a "labour" government and if you are so keen to pay more tax then don't let me stop you, It's not difficult  to voluntarily pay more if you really want to , but you don't really want to at all do you? Although if ,god forbid we ever do end up with a labour government you won't have the choice. They can never be allowed to govern again

                               If you can't understand that things will indeed get worse then your free degree was a complete waste of time , and indeed money, 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                       

                        

Yep! Successfully brainwashed.

 

https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=people+pulling+own+teeth+in+UK

 

"It's not difficult  to voluntarily pay more if you really want to"  ...Where did you dream that up? Sir Alan Sugar could not even get his Winter fuel payment stopped.

 

"but you don't really want to at all do you? "....Now you are telling me what I want as well as what I think. Your last paragraph shows where your priorities lie. I would be quite happy to pay more tax to provide a higher quality of life for ALL, not just myself.

 

 

 

 

Edited April 16, 2023 by SunsetT

[brewsterbudgen]

1 hour ago, VBF said:

Spot on - that was exactly what I was thinking as I read what  @piston broke who i rather think is wearing rose-tinted specs (The red rose of Labour?) posted.

Whatever tint your specs have, the Tories won't be winning the next election and although Starmer is no Corbyn, "things can only get better". (Cue D-ream 1997).

[transam]

2 minutes ago, brewsterbudgen said:

Whatever tint your specs have, the Tories won't be winning the next election and although Starmer is no Corbyn, "things can only get better". (Cue D-ream 1997).

Let's wait and see, and thankfully Corby & Abbott are now history, but then again, Starmer & Reiner are a joke................????

[Jumbo1968]

26 minutes ago, transam said:

Let's wait and see, and thankfully Corby & Abbott are now history, but then again, Starmer & Reiner are a joke................????

Let the Tories sort out the mess they have created since 2010.

[Bday Prang]

1 hour ago, SunsetT said:

Yep! Successfully brainwashed.

 

https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=people+pulling+own+teeth+in+UK

 

"It's not difficult  to voluntarily pay more if you really want to"  ...Where did you dream that up? Sir Alan Sugar could not even get his Winter fuel payment stopped.

 

"but you don't really want to at all do you? "....Now you are telling me what I want as well as what I think. Your last paragraph shows where your priorities lie. I would be quite happy to pay more tax to provide a higher quality of life for ALL, not just myself.

 

 

 

 

Oh dear now its time to put your money where your mouth is 

https://www.taxjournal.com/articles/want-to-pay-more-tax-

Although it is referred to in the article as "the worst sort of virtue signalling" and quite rightly too.

You certainly didn't look very hard did you, I wonder why ?  Lack of sincerity perhaps?  anyway no excuses now  ! how much are you going to pay?   Assuming you still want to, there is absolutely nothing stopping you , 

    

 

 

[Bday Prang]

1 hour ago, Jumbo1968 said:

Let the Tories sort out the mess they have created since 2010.

They inherited a bit of a mess back in 2010 which seems to have been forgotten about ?  Don't you remember the note the treasury guy  left for his successor   "There's no money left"  just about sums Labour up and Gordon"the moron"  Browns "prudent  fiscal policies"

[Jumbo1968]

2 minutes ago, Bday Prang said:

They inherited a bit of a mess back in 2010 which seems to have been forgotten about ?  Don't you remember the note the treasury guy  left for his successor   "There's no money left"  just about sums Labour up and Gordon"the moron"  Browns "prudent  fiscal policies"

That was 13 years ago, Truss didn’t help either by nearly collapsing the economy single handily with the Bank of England having to bale us out pushing interest rates up.as a result.