Go with George.

[Maxi]

A national debate on where the cuts to come should fall is now going to happen.WE can ALL input.
If you could,which service etc do you feel can be....


Done without alltogether?


Better done by the private or voluntary sector rarther then the public service?.

Is sacred and should never be cut?.


I think public Libaries could shed paid staff.Have a paid manager,but have VOLUNTEERS to run the thing.An idea I heard on the radio today.


Why not have supermarkets fund advice centres?.

These could be run in supermarkets offering general citizens advice.




I see a very strong case for more being done by charities.



What ideas to you feel merit consideration?.

[Lazydaisy]

If it is a job, why should it be voluntary?We have enough people on jobseekers allowance who need paid work, not voluntary.
I see more and more work locally being advertised as needing volunteers. Jobs that formerly had a salary attached.

[no1mum]

If it is a job, why should it be voluntary?We have enough people on jobseekers allowance who need paid work, not voluntary.
I see more and more work locally being advertised as needing volunteers. Jobs that formerly had a salary attached.

I've noticed the increase as well.

[Eun]

I had 10 years of volunteering for nothing whilst paid workers were along side me doing the same job. I went to Uni for 4 years and got a really good law degree because I did not want to continue in that vein - I want paid!! Why should I work alongside people who are being paid for doing the same job - that does not pay my bills or put food on the table! When I graduated the CAB and the Advocacy Forum both wanted me to come and work for them - but they did not want to pay me anything. Not only that I would have been expected to drive around different towns to work and not get any petrol money. Do I look as if I have "MUG" tatooed on my forehead or soimething? Been there - done that - ain't doing it again!

Eun

[susieq]

A national debate on where the cuts to come should fall is now going to happen.WE can ALL input.
If you could,which service etc do you feel can be....

we all know that if the country's economic situation is to improve then there will have to be cuts in public spending - this doesn't necesarily mean job cuts. What it should mean is that Government only spends what it has - Mr Micawber's dictum - "Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, expenditure twenty pounds nought and six, result misery." - is one they would do well to remember and emulate ! If I consistently spent more money than I have coming in then I'd be bankrupt in a very short space of time - the phrase 'cut my coat according to the cloth' springs to mind.

Why do our hospitals need so many very highly paid administrative Managers ? We need more doctors and nurses and I'm sure they come cheaper than managers ! Likewise have you seen some of the very obscene salaries being paid to the 'chiefs' in local government and the mandarins in Whitehall ?

Besides which more people off Job Seekers and back into PAID work = more taxes paid = more money in the country's coffers.

[charles47]

I'm with Eun on this one. Voluntary work is all very well - I've done it myself and still do some voluntary work because I think it has an important role. But we should not rely on volunteers to replace paid workers. That devalues the work and the person carrying it out. Local libraries are now using automated systems to check books in and out and the libraries are manned for only a very short time - basically to restock the shelves.

It's management by accountancy and frankly it doesn't work. I worked for two private companies - one an arm of a much larger retail company, the other a hosiery manufacturer - and both went down the tubes because the accountants ran the place and forgot that the vital first rule is not the bottom line but the customer. If the customer is unhappy there is no bottom line.

Provide a service and trim the management - better still, introduce a maximum wage system.

[Bob Dobbs]

You have voluteers already Millions of them...Us. I haven't read all the thread but this must have been already mentioned. How about George looking to hisa banker friends the ones that have brought this crisis about. Sixty years I've lived on this earth and found the poorest have to sacrifice most for the mis management of others.

[Maxi]

I heaer some say National Service would be good for the young unemployed.BUT the services dont want them.A rough rabble do not make for a decent army.Many annoyed because they have to be there.

VOLUNTEERING IS a great thing to do.Helps the comunity project the people its good.

I think IF we are to protect the things that we need,then,we need to look at where there can be changes in service provision.

[Lazydaisy]

Two years ago,my son could not get paid work. He had plenty of job opportunities, and plenty of work experience. What employers were doing, was using young people for three months work experience, then saying they did not have fulltime employment for anyone, and just taking on another young person for work experience. No wonder young people are bad tempered and disillusioned. Rhys passed all his GCSE's, was willing to take responsibility for any work he could get, and enjoyed being outdoors or indoors. One job involved him being trusted him to bank several thousand pounds twice a week.
He volunteered at MIND once a week, even while he was doing work experience. He also worked at a summer job at the same time.
I have volunteered plenty of times, and sat at meetings on behalf of Carers, and been on a couple of committees for Carers. I once sat there and looked round, thinking, "what am I doing, this is my time,yet I am the only one here who has had to pay her own petrol and car parking, and I am the ONLY one in a meeting of ten people,who is not being paid for being here."
I have done lots of committee work when my children were younger, but as part of a team that were volunteers, and now are a team of paid workers(at which point we, the parents, were pushed out and Social Services brought in their own paid staff).

[Maxi]

What I find is volunteers in any charity are its backbone,first of all,but they are pioneers too.They lift the spitits bringing a wealth of life-lived with them,so they enhance the charity too.Cant be bad.The charity gains,they gain.

I think charity work is good.


The thing is you can,ofcourse,work for a cause dear to your heart,Carers working for Carers UK etc..etc..
But,maybe,you might choose to do somthing far removed friom the situation you are in?.
Example: A carer 24/7,might-well feel,being a carer means the last thing they want to do when able to do a few hours as a volunteer,is join CARERS charities.Too much the busmans holiday.Often,a change of pace,view etc,makes it different.A charity wholly apart from being a carer.