Voting Lib Dem will be a no go (and I kinda like Brian Paddick, the gay ex-headcop, he seems truthful... but they get maybe 10pc of the vote. He'll swing if there is a hung vote.
{giggle}
Judi, unfortunately we only have two parties here and the Lib Dems don't get a look in. (And I'm sorry to say that I thought it appropriate that my employers in Canada were required to pay for my OHIP. It made sense, it was part of my employment deal.
Don't get me wrong, I agree that setting it up so that employers covered it made sense to me too, however, I was already covered because I had paid for it under the old structure and still had coverage left, and they DINGED me big time for employees I didn't have. If I remember correctly, it was done on a sliding scale something like 1-200 employees, 201 - 1000, or something like that, so I as someone already covered, and not even considered an employee at the time because I didn't draw a salary, got hit with the same rate as someone with 200 people employed. The one employee I did have at the time (moi) who was classified as a shareholder was already covered. It was like when I was 16 and had a part time job. As a dependant minor, I had full coverage through my Mom's insurance, but they took off the insurance premiums from my pay cheques. They had me paying twice. So Bob Rae changed it so people wouldn't be stuck paying twice or or even three times as is the case for those with two parents working, and they themselves having a PT time job. But the way he changed it, still ended up causing me to pay twice, as well as pay for employees I didn't have. I already had full coverage elsewhere. It was essentially forcing me to pay twice for the same thing. I didn't think I should be forced to pay the bill twice, if it was already fully paid... why ...just because they made a change in determining
WHO should pay the bill? Nah! If the bill is paid...
it's paid! Now, if they were going to refund me for the previous payments ok, but that wasn't the case.They quickly figured out they goofed and rectified how it was done. They hadn't taken into account smaller businesses. And even though I was a small fry, I had things structured to take advantage of benefits and strategies that often were only available to the large mega corporations. That initial transition period saw alot of people in similar situations, and those employers who had already stepped up to the plate to pay for their employees coverage and had been doing so for years, also found themselves paying twice as well. It was quickly rectified after that.
Alot of policies from the past didn't accomodate for the new paradigms. It was either you employed people, or you were employed by people. The concept of people doing a bit of this and a bit of that, and diversifying their income sources weren't taken into account because so few people were doing it. The widespread betrayal of the corporate world towards it's employees in the Reagan induced recession and the fallout from that, saw a huge upswing in people doing just that, so now we see these provisions, but they weren't in place back then.
Anyways, I've decided I'm definitely not voting for Red Ken again. I regret to say that I voted for him the first time recently, (he was mayor a long time ago previously when they had the Greater London Council, but I was in Canada), because he promised the earth. I didn't bother voting the second time because he was a shoo-in.
This time, the vote for the London Mayor matters...
xL
