The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #122449 Message #2690891
Posted By: Royston
31-Jul-09 - 05:02 AM
Thread Name: BS: So why has the BNP gained votes?
Subject: RE: BS: So why has the BNP gained votes?
Ake,
Don't make me regret responding civilly to you.
No I have never had to try, fortunately, living on the minimum wage. My point is that Eastern European workers cannot *legally* be treated any worse than an indigenous worker.
Lots of folk have to eke out an existence on minimum wage, my point is to ask why should we regard Polish min wage workers with suspicion? As you said that, for Polish workers "Something doesn't add up".
In my experience of living cheek by jowl with Polish migrants and counting a few of them as friends (some of the mudcatters have met at least one of my Polish friends and his wife and baby daughter), I would suggest that they come here for jobs they sourced through contacts or Polish agencies and have assistance from their employers with accommodation. Or they club together to live in close-quarters in cheap private-sector rented housing. Then they work bloody hard to improve their lot.
I thought I was being sarcastic enough in describing min wage as "What HM government considers fair..." I would be happy to be even less subtle in future; just let me know what you prefer.
I am not left-leaning or politically liberal, I am a socialist. I vote for socialist-values candidates whenever one is available to me - that is normally 'Left List' or Green Party. Otherwise I vote Liberal as the best of a bad lot. One thing I will agree on with many here is that Labour sold itself down the river in 1993/4 and should be ashamed to call itself "Labour"