What is central Europe supposed to do in the current migrant crisis?

Intervention in the free market can be for protection of the consumer (consumer rights and quality control legislation), for protection of the employee (employee rights, health and safety legislation) and for protection of the company (market protection). But as is usually the case in playing god, a light touch is required. If you do it right, it's almost as if you didn't do anything at all.

Of course both governments and companies often game the system for their own greater profit, and usually with negative consequences for consumer and employees alike.

 

So isn't Immigration control just an extension of that?

In that more Immigration drives down the wages of the poorest, and less does the opposite, that's not to say either is right or wrong for an economy just that it's one of the levers available to TPTB depending on what effect you want to achieve.

 

It is, and it's also a nice example of gaming the system. The UK government for instance doesn't want the expense of investing in UK nurses' and doctors' training, preferring to just import them from abroad when demand outstrips supply and 'encouraging' them to go home again when things have balanced out.

 

If that was a regular mantra from the management I would end up working to rule and looking for a new job. If you have in demand skills but you are fighting tooth and nail to hold on to your job then why bother making an effort or sticking around? Time for private practice at that stage.

 

It's the reality of working in the NHS, I'm afraid. But because we know that, we don't get complacent. We constantly generate new business, anticipate new developments and encourage our team to train and develop (which is part-funded from some of the business we generate). Basically we continuously work to give our team the competitive advantage. Which has made it one of the safest and best places for long-term employment.

 

If employees of what seems to be a vocation rather than just a job, require the constant reminder of redundancy in order to motivate themselves to deliver and improve I would think they are in the wrong job.

Maybe they were but you just needed them around to keep yours

 

The government told the NHS to make around £20 billion in savings by 2015 (the Nicholson challenge. Read it, it's not pretty). It is estimated that between 9,100 to 16,800 staff will be made redundant. Now it is expected that we will be told to find another £20 billion savings by 2020*.

Now I could tell my team a little lullaby about how they are valuable professionals carrying out an important vocation, but unfortunately the reality is that the Department of Health is asking itself right now whether we could reasonably be replaced by someone cheaper. Part of our job is to prove to them that we are indeed valuable professionals carrying out an important vocation. And to make sure that if the DoH refuses to listen (wouldn't be the first time) that our team members are in an excellent position to start a private practice.

I don't think people realise how serious things are in the NHS.

* With significant irony it has been estimated that private companies can expect to benefit from £20 billion worth of income from the privatisation of health services resulting from the Health and Social Care Act 2012.

 

Like I said, if their skills are in demand but their job could be pulled out from under their feet why bother making an effort or sticking around? Especially when the bean counters are making the decisions. I doubt they give a hoot how many people your team has helped or can help, nor would they have the ability to determine usefulness or effort given by your staff. Your team should be masters of their own destiny, not the bean counters.

Anyway I'm sure the department of health could wrangle up a few Syrians to do their job more cheaply

 

Most NHS workers are idealists (we sure aren't in it for the money). It's a bit like being in the army, I suppose.

And part of my job is to make sure that they are in a position where they can be.

That is their strategy: import doctors and nurses from the Commonwealth; send them home six years later before they acquire too many employee rights. Of course, this will attract people who are in it for the money.

 

The funny thing about money is that it is only a focus until it's no longer an issue. If you can afford a reasonable place to live and to do what ever it is that you like to do when you aren't working then a job becomes about other things. Like making a contribution, reasonable autonomy, self improvement things like that. Granted that is what you seem to encourage, but having the threat of redundancy puts a dampener on those things a bit.

Why not have all of those things plus a reduced bureaucracy, plus less brick walls, plus job security and still help people by working somewhere else? Or even better, autonomous security by working for yourself. If I was on your team, I would be more than happy to help the NHS out with the budget cuts.

 

Soooo all my nurse friends that went to the UK to work will be back in 6 years?

 

Have to admit that's not the picture I see when looking at society, to some people gaining more money is their only focus even when they have enough to suit their lifestyle.

 

Not if they're from the EU - I think Nexxo is talking about nurses from within the Commonwealth (so outside the EU and therefore subject to greater restriction on movement and employee rights than EU citizens).

 

Not being critical, disagreeing, or any other slight that maybe perceived, but the 7000 figure reported by the telegraph maybe a little off, like most predictions the numbers are very open to interpretation, saying that no matter how you cut it some Nurses are going to be effected.

 

Yeah, the US Treasury Department research. I know it well...

Well, it's not as if I say this to them every week --it has come up maybe twice over the last several years. But we are all threatened with redundancy, less pay for increased hours/responsibilities in some way. Just look at the moves to cut junior doctor pay up to 30%, and scrapping of overtime rates for all doctors working nights and weekends.

Because ordinary people cannot afford private health care. Most people I work with could not afford me privately. And of course most private health companies aren't any better than the NHS. But I know several colleagues who have left the NHS and started their private practice and are doing quite well by it.

I've read numbers going from 3000 to 16000 and anything in between, so yeah. Either way, we're not swimming in surplus nursing staff as it is.

 

http://www.express.co.uk/news/world...ld-news+(Daily+Express+::+World+Feed)&ref=yfp

but the 90%+ of the migrants (majority are males aged 20+) who come to Europe didn't come for money did they....

 

Slow Internet access you say...Mark Zuckerberg to the rescue.

 

Yeah, if you are a refugee, you should take your suffering seriously. You should put your heart and soul into being properly miserable, make an effort to lose weight, have matted hair and do the whole dead-eye stare thing. You should have faded, torn pictures of loved ones you lost (preferably the whole set: spouse, children and parents) and boils and skin lesions would be desirable.

I bet you don't approve of homeless people (mostly young men, too, coincidentally) smoking either, because they should be spending their money more sensibly.

Of course The Express is not a tabloid known for its objective reporting. Possibly this has more to do with refugees feeling frustrated and out of control:

I am still stunned how people expect refugees just to sit quietly in a camp, being humbly grateful for being fed and sheltered and not shot at, and to do that for five years or more until, we hope, the problem somehow goes away and they can bugger back off to the ruins that used to be their homes. The lack of basic human empathy is staggering.

 

A refugee here in Slovakia gets food, bed to sleep in, roof above it's head and 0.4€/day, or in other words 12€ spending money per month. A unemployed citizen of Slovakia, who was unemployed more than 6 months gets only a social payment of €61.60 per month, and no food/bed/roof is provided by the state. I wonder what will be the refugees reaction once they are going to be sent here in the quota system...

 

That's the paradox right there: if the refugee stays in Slovakia he is placing a burden on an already poor country; if he moves on to a more affluent nation he is an opportunist only in it for the money. Basically whatever he does is wrong.