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Red Head Swift's bio
I am retired, I play bridge,I like gardening, I have been cooking for 25 years, I love going to the cinema. I travel all over Europe on my motorbike. -
Red Head Swift's latest comments
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10th Dec 2015Red Head Swift commented on:
Are we in danger of diluting our Christmas traditions?I have a couple of different views. . Firstly there are more and more single people in our society, particularly among us Silver Surfers. For many people Christmas is a very lonely time. . Secondly this great burst of buying generates tax payment to HMRC. The extra money generated at Christmas trickles down to the NHS and helps us get our pensions paid.ViewDate:
9th Dec 2015Red Head Swift commented on:
Breaking Up Is Hard To DoWhy do you think that on line introductions are a no no. The press and the TV are always giving us horror stories about fraud and scams that started with an on line contact, and quite rightly we all need to be careful. But what the media industry rarely features are the thousands of very successful relationships that started with an on line introduction. Try it for a couple of months, go very slowly and of course do not send money to anybody, no matter how plausible they seemViewDate:
7th Dec 2015Red Head Swift commented on:
Should we leave the EU?If we vote to leave it will take years and years to get out. The processes involved in getting out will cost billions as lawyers and accountants re write legal, commercial and social agreements. Just like any other divorce the first thing that gets forgotten are the good things we have in common. And just like a divorce the people who benefit will be the lawyers. And of course as tax payers will be be the people who pay the bills, and they will run into billions. Lets get some of the rules changed and start to recognize the massive benefits we have in membership.ViewDate:
19th Nov 2015Red Head Swift commented on:
Should drivers over 70 be tested every three years?It’s an age thing and like the rest of us I have had a bus pass for some time. All the friends of my generation recognize that driving is not as easy as it was because our eye sight and reactions are not as good as they were and we all know that we get flustered more easily. There is more and more traffic on the road and there will be even more traffic as the population grows. Plus ever more cyclists, cyclist who seem to have no regard for other road users or their own safety. Into this complicated mix we add an ageing population who cannot see as well as it used to and whose reaction times have slowed down. The first step should be the withdrawal the self-selection process at 70. It should be a requirement that at 70 we have to have our eyesight reconfirmed and get a safe to drive signature from our GP.ViewDate:
7th Nov 2015Red Head Swift commented on:
Do you usually leave a tip in a restaurant?The service charge conundrum has been made very complex by restaurant chains such as Cote. Cote is owned by BC Partners, a private equity group. Until recently all but a very small percentage of the service charge was being kept by BC Partners. It was not going to the staff. A month ago this situation was leaked to the press. Under public pressure Cote / BC Partners changed its policy and the service charge now goes to the employees. As a Cote user I am aware that the service has declined in the past month and I suspect that the restaurants have had to reduce staff numbers to compensate for the loss of profits to BC Partners. Maybe what we should all do is only pay the service charge in cash and directly to the staff that served you. The delights of capitalism. I could go on about how our taxes are being used to support working people who are on minimum rates per hour and zero hours contracts (such as waiting staff in restaurants) whilst big business in the UK is awash with cash. But this is not the place to do that.ViewDate:
5th Nov 2015Red Head Swift commented on:
Would you like to see the railways re-nationalised?I remember the old nationalised railways. For many years I used them to go back and forth to work. The trains were dirty, unreliable, and unpleasant. Strikes were common and the safety record was very poor. London main line stations were gloomy, dirty and there were no shops or facilities for passengers. Today the trains are clean, many are air conditioned and have on board catering and wi-fi. No wonder the trains are so full. The London main main line stations are bright, clean and full of shops. We cannot go back. There are many things that the private sector does so much better than the state. Can you imagine the railways being run by the type of management that controls HMRC.ViewDate:
28th Oct 2015Red Head Swift commented on:
Should Britain stay in the EU or is now the time to leave?I am not saying we should. What I am saying is that if we democratically chose to leave there will be a lot of negative factors as well as a lot of positive factors. We need to consider them both. The problem is that we are only being given information as sound bites. So far neither the stay in group or the lets leave group seem to be able to give us enough facts to be able to make a decision. You may have seen in the newspapers, or was it our Dave at Prime Ministers question time. It seems the Norwegians are paying more per head of population every day to the EU just to maintain the trade agreements it has with EU member countries.ViewDate:
26th Oct 2015Red Head Swift commented on:
Is the correct use of grammar and spelling important to you?Grammar, the written word and of course the spoken word evolve over time. Nothing can change that. When I read novels from the twenties and thirties I know that we do not write like that any more. When I watch old films I know we do not talk like that any more. The Queen is a very good example of how speech and the written word have evolved in her lifetime. Until a few years ago the French had a government department that did its best to ensure that their spoken and written language did not change. It was a loosing battle and they closed the department.ViewDate:
24th Oct 2015Red Head Swift commented on:
Should Britain stay in the EU or is now the time to leave?"Be careful what you wish for". A common theme in this forum is how much better we might be if we left the EU, but very little is said about what we might lose. If we leave then one of the rights we might lose is the automatic right to travel without restriction within the EU, to work anywhere we want within the EU, to go on holiday anywhere we want within the EU and for many Brits the right to live their retirement in a warm and low cost country within the EU. The BBC recently published data that shows that over 5 million Brits live abroad. The three most popular EU destinations the Brits chose are Spain 761,000, France 200,000 and Ireland 291,000. A total of 1,252,000, I think that’s worth repeating, one million two hundred and fifty two thousand Brits living in those three EU countries. Plus of course Brits living in Portugal, Italy, and Greece and so on. There are estimated to be at least 1 million Brits who have retired to an EU country where they do not work and pay tax. But by living in that other EU country they benefit from a state funded infrastructure that supplies, water, energy, roads, democratic national and local government, a civil service, a police force, education, training, hospitals and healthcare. ** If we leave the EU the UK would be just like those other small countries in the north Atlantic such as Iceland with its collapsed economy and Norway with its rising unemployment due to the oil price crash. The UK would need to negotiate with the EU visa agreements, trade agreements, work agreements, healthcare agreements and the right to live and retire in an EU member country. ** Not that Spain and France would be unhappy to close the door to our retirees. The health of retired elderly Brits is already causing major problems in both of those countries. In Spain they are having to build Spanish state funded care homes just for the Brits who can no longer care for themselves.ViewDate:
10th Sep 2015Red Head Swift commented on:
Should Britain agree to take more refugees?Setting aside the emotion and right wing extremism that migration seems to generate in my fellow Silversurfers let us look at the economic and demographic facts and compare Germany with the UK. Ultimately it all comes down to demographics. The population of Germany is falling very fast and this will mean fewer and fewer people working, paying tax and shopping. It is forecast that by 2030, or maybe earlier, the economy of Germany will start to shrink. The UK on the other hand has a rising population. It is forecast that by 2060 the level of people working, paying tax and shopping will make us the economic powerhouse of Europe. Angela Merkel sees this stream of people making their way to Germany as the answer to their economic problems. Germany has very openly stated that they need 1 million more people/immigrants in the country to work, pay tax and shop just to stop the problem getting worse. Going forward they need a further half a million more people/immigrants every year to make the economy grow. As a pensioner I do not work. What I need are lots of people to work and pay tax. The tax pays my pension, funds the NHS and maintains a very balanced society. What I do not need is a declining population or a failed economy (look at Greece) where my pension would be have to be cut and hospitals closed. -
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