Imus

[KenHigg]

What the heck is Corgi? I googled it and got a bunch dog links...

 

[Rich]

If Corgi Resgistered professionals are starting to complain about being undercut - then I think the vast majority of people in the UK will be pleased.

Corgi costs a fortune - anything that brings the cost to the consumer down whilst maintaining standards is good. The more Eastern Europeans the better.

Are Corgi engineers not like doctors who have stiched it up for themsleves to be payed massively more than the market rate?

Corgi engineers had their costs forced on them by government regulation, the cost of being corgi registered is a bone of contention amongst corgi engineers themselves. If you think that the costs are going to come down because immigrants simply don't or aren't being forced to comply then we may as well leave the UK to be blown up by foreigners. As for doctors, would you rather go and see a witch doctor, because that's the comparison you're making between those in this country who comply with the laws of the land and immigrants who feel they don't have too

 

[GaryPanic]

Rich - wasn't pointed at you - was a global comment - if it seem I was having a dig - sorry


re the points A & B ( kinda of agree with you on most of this)
B - Regulation etc

fraid this is a europe issue
if you are qualified as a nurse in 1 EU country then you can work in any
this may not be so with corgi as our plumbing/gas suppies are differnt from 1 country to another

but take a plumber in the UK who is not corgi regestered and an migrant plumber there are a lot from poland at the mo . the polish one are doing a better job and at a cheaper price - now if the standard of work was the same I would probably back the Brit - but I am afraid it isn't

as to the mulitpel occupency - yes you are probably right there

I do know way back inthe 70's the chinneses did the same thing (typo)

there would be about 10 of them in a house working away getting together the money to buy there own place

I have a cousin who did exactly the same thing , they rented a house for 4-5 filled it with as many people as they could - all saving like mad to get on the housing ladder. there were about 8 in total all were up for this short term solution - they are now all on the housing ladder built up deposits etc

so although you are right. it is a clever solutoin keeping the costs down to try and improve your lifestyle level

re PL insurance - again you are right but I would not get work done from any old worker , I would go through a limtied company - and be happy that they might of subcontracted this out - PL insurance then valid my contract with first provider (Insurance is my bag)

With regards to Corgi I was trying to remove this fromth e example and stick with water and not gas

anyone who uses a non corgi plumber (for Gas) is an idiot - for water use any plumber -

Paul

the cost of being reg as crogi is quite high and they have to re register

 

[ColinEssex]

Ken - Corgi is a regulation standard that gas fitters need to belong to. If a gas fitter is "corgi registered" then in theory, the work they do must reach the corgi standards. Its a kind of safety thing.

Like a doctor has to belong to the general medical council etc.

Col

 

[Rich]

Rich - wasn't pointed at you - was a global comment - if it seem I was having a dig - sorry

I didn't take it that way

re the points A & B ( kinda of agree with you on most of this)
B - Regulation etc

fraid this is a europe issue
if you are qualified as a nurse in 1 EU country then you can work in any
this may not be so with corgi as our plumbing/gas suppies are differnt from 1 country to another

The glorious health and safety executive here changed the rules for CORGI membership here to European standards, do you think I can work anywhere in the EU, can I F*%£, the whole thing is a con, the same as our membership of the EU

re PL insurance - again you are right but I would not get work done from any old worker , I would go through a limtied company - and be happy that they might of subcontracted this out - PL insurance then valid my contract with first provider (Insurance is my bag)

I would go near a limited company, the reason they're limited in the first place (aside from the tax advantage) is to limit their personal liability in case anything goes wrong.

With regards to Corgi I was trying to remove this fromth e example and stick with water and not gas

anyone who uses a non corgi plumber (for Gas) is an idiot - for water use any plumber -

Paul

the cost of being reg as crogi is quite high and they have to re register

And CORGI members have to be re-examined every 5yrs to prove their competence and at their own cost, as for the water industry, that too is regulated, did you know that every bathroom now fitted has to be "notified" and comply with a plethora of red tape?

 

[Pauldohert]

Corgi engineers had their costs forced on them by government regulation, the cost of being corgi registered is a bone of contention amongst corgi engineers themselves. If you think that the costs are going to come down because immigrants simply don't or aren't being forced to comply then we may as well leave the UK to be blown up by foreigners. As for doctors, would you rather go and see a witch doctor, because that's the comparison you're making between those in this country who comply with the laws of the land and immigrants who feel they don't have too

I'll start with the doctor bit - there are thousands and thousands of unemployed doctors in this country, both from abroad (who have passed their conversion exams for the UK) and from the UK. We are currently training more doctors than vacancies arise. (And Australia is getting them all delivered, trained and payed for courtesy of us)

So we have a surplus supply of well qualified doctors. (not witch doctors). We also have a demand for more doctors to deliver healthcare, with the NHS barely able to cope.

The only reason why the supply can't staify the demand is the wage deal that means doctors have to be employed at above the market rate. The only winners here are doctors - and the health of the nation suffers - as can be seen by the fact we are at the bottom of every health league across europe going.

Doctors have stitched it up so competition doesn't exist and they can pretty much charge what they like.




Corgi - I agree it should be a level playing field if you need to be registered, then everyone should be registered. At the moment Corgi costs a fortune, way above what the market rate is actually likely to be (even for similarly trained professionals). Either Corgi needs seriouly reforming - or other registers to provide competition to the Corgi stitch up need to be set up. You will know better than I , maybe it does cost the engineers a fortune too. So its in everyone interest to change the status quo.


I am sure I can go to Poland and find engineers who are excellent but not Corgi registered, many of them will now be in the UK. Sure they need to be vetted as of quality in some way - but to include them into some restrictive practice stitch up where the fees of Corgi get passed on to the consumer - is good only for engineers and not the public as a whole -exactly as has happened with doctors.

 

[KenHigg]

Ken - Corgi is a regulation standard that gas fitters need to belong to. If a gas fitter is "corgi registered" then in theory, the work they do must reach the corgi standards. Its a kind of safety thing.

Like a doctor has to belong to the general medical council etc.

Col

Ah - Now the dialog here kind of falls into place a little better for me... Thanks.

Around here, on small stuff, like working on your own home, anyone can go down and purchase gas fittings etc, if they need to do a little work and no one really cares. On the other end of the spectrum, say a large construction job, I'm sure the firm doing the gas work would have to have their workers certified which I'm sure drives the cost up but when you consider what could go wrong if they didn't know what they were doing then I would say it's worth the extra cost...

 

[KenHigg]

...did you know that every bathroom now fitted has to be "notified" and comply with a plethora of red tape?

Sounds like the liberal democrats again...

 

[dan-cat]

I don't think that there is a single frequenter of the 'cooler who likes to be insulted. Hell, we all constantly moan about it happening to us. Why should we not be equally upset about Imus doing the same thing? Because it's not directed to us personally? Not good enough, he deserves all the heat he gets.

 

[Rich]

Sounds like the liberal democrats again...

Actually here it's the Nanny state created by the Labour party, as for your comment on the private purchase of gas fittings in the US, the same is true for the UK, much to the annoyance and against continual complaints of CORGI members here.

 

[Rich]

I don't think that there is a single frequenter of the 'cooler who likes to be insulted. Hell, we all constantly moan about it happening to us.

Mainly Americans, actually

 

[ColinEssex]

Mainly Americans, actually

they can moan for everybody, it seems a national trait. Its hard to say two words to them without getting your head bitten off
They think the whole world is against them - oh, actually thats right

Col

 

[The_Doc_Man]

Rich - regarding your question about who owns the insurance companies.

Most of them are publicly traded corporations in which one could, in theory, own stock.

I'll add one more entity to my rant. The insurance companies have one more partner in the crime of holding back money. FEMA. They and the state of Louisiana have had p|ssing matches about how the money should be paid out, with EVERYBODY getting involved in trying to take their share and the state trying to assure that the money gets to the person who is trying to rebuild.

The loan companies want the payouts to go to them so they can be paid off first, claiming that their prior debt gives them priority in payoffs.

The insurance companies are using this to balk at payouts because now they talk about being party to a lawsuit initiated by the loan companies if they give money to the insured, or party to a lawsuit initiated by the insured if they give the money to the loan companies. Poor darlings. If you look at an 18 month window after Katrina, the big insurance companies declared RECORD PROFITS in the same year as one of the worst natural disasters to ever hit the United States. But they can't afford to pay out the claims. Poor bastards. I really hope they keep this up. Congress is about to lose a lot of its ingrained business-oriented members as the political pendulum swings. The insurance companies need a deep dose of reality and if they keep it up, Congress will give it to them as their constituents complain loudly enough to overwhelm the lobbyists.

But I digress.

Between tight-fisted insurance companies, federal agencies that don't get things right on a good day, and contracts written so that persons trying to research a claim are eating up the available dollars in travel expenses to find all the persons dispersed by Katrina, nothing is getting done. I personally know people who have been waiting for 18 months to get more than a token payout so they can start work on their homes. Without the insurance money or other compensation, they can't afford anything other than do-it-yourself, and the problem there is magnitude.

Here it is, 18 months after Katrina, and I still drive along the edge of some neighborhoods where abandoned, blighted houses outnumber returns by 3:1 or 4:1 easily. I cry for my city. But it isn't for racist issues. It is for the GDSBMF greed of insurers to whom the almighty dollar is their idol. The letters are blasphemous, disrespectful of ancestry, and disrespectful of their treatment of parents, which is how strongly I feel about this.

You want to know why people are not coming back? I'll tell you. Before Katrina, the N'Awlins public school system was so bad that everyone who could afford it sent their kids to private schools. Many folks took a second job to be able to afford it. OK, those folks had to move elsewhere when 10 feet of water (that stayed for weeks) destroyed everything they owned. So now they are in other states that have better public schools. They find that they don't NEED that extra job, they can stay home and be with their families more. OR they can keep the second job and put towards a new house in that new location. Here, they would have nothing. Elsewhere, they have their economic opportunities. Why WOULD they come back?

Oh, one more question: Is America the land of opportunity? Yes, it still is. But the poor folks don't want opportunity. They want their welfare check. The lazy, don't-want-to-work crowd just wants to go on the dole. Which is why I commented as I did earlier about how the Hispanic migrant workers now in our area are showing the lazy bums how opportunity REALLY works. You don't get the lottery check in the mail. You go out, take opportunity by the horns, and WORK for your dreams. In that sense, there are thousands of opportunities still waiting to be taken. All you need is a little sweat-equity. Elbow grease. Or, more plainly, be willing to WORK for a living.

I could rant more about this, but I'm deviating from the Imus theme. (Nor am I the first.) I guess I'll stop here for now. It was a sleepless night because my stepdaughter's cats got out of their room where they stay at night. I had to catch them and toss them through the door before they made deposits on the rug. I talk sometimes about skinning cats, but tonight I was more tempted than ever to demonstrate proper technique.

 

[dan-cat]

They think the whole world is against them - oh, actually thats right

Apart from the UK that is, who still follow us willingly like a 'doting mallard'

 

[KenHigg]

... he deserves all the heat he gets.

Agreed. And the girls should get over it as I'm sure they will as they must be exceptional students. Jack asses like him will always be around to bring the rest of down and finance Jesse inc.

 

[KenHigg]

It was a sleepless night because my stepdaughter's cats got out of their room where they stay at night. I had to catch them and toss them through the door before they made deposits on the rug. I talk sometimes about skinning cats, but tonight I was more tempted than ever to demonstrate proper technique.

You know when 'cat' goes plural she's headed for trouble...

 

[Rich]

But the poor folks don't want opportunity. They want their welfare check. The lazy, don't-want-to-work crowd just wants to go on the dole.

There's that tired old rehtoric again against the poor of America.
In anycase surely since one of the best American presidents of all time (god bless Bill Clinton) surely welfare is now limited to 5yrs in a lifetime? kinda makes that tired old sock redundant, doesn't it?

 

[Bodisathva]

... Because it's not directed to us personally?

no... because I don't personally care for someone else telling me how offended I should be. That's the quickest way to insure that I'm not going to be offended.

 

[KenHigg]

... one of the best American presidents of all time (god bless Bill Clinton)

I just lost my lunch -

 

[Rich]

I just lost my lunch -

Why; have you donated it to the poor and hungry in America?