Treasury Responds To Finance Sector Job Losses

[Albert Tatlock]

From MR: "The Treasury is promising to renew efforts to support the Isle of Man's financial services industry, after news of further job losses in the banking sector...Treasury member responsible for the financial sector Alex Downie, MLC, says jobs losses are inevitable as financial institutions slim-down their operations...But he says the government will continue to seek new employment possibilities across the board"

 

More of the same old baloney from the government. I know of two major financial institutions working on and about to announce the same, none of which is in the public eye yet.

 

With some businesses closing operations, and making people redundant in this sector, along with tax agreements and more regulation compounding the recession, there are no magical solutions to bringing in new firms that quick as is being suggested by the ex-chimney sweep Downie.

 

I reiterate my call that it is now time to apply the existing work permit legislation to the finance sector in order to protect the livelihoods of manx and IOM workers. Job opportunities in this sector are like hens teeth at the moment (I estimate an 80% fall in available jobs over normal), and things are getting and going to get far worse not least with more redundancies to come, and in still allowing outsiders to come in at the expense of equally skilled people available here.

 

Every person that goes on the dole here costs Joe Public £15K a year, and with the end of summer approaching fast, employment is going to do nothing but shoot up. It has risen for decades at the end of summer, and so this year will be no exception.

 

Time our politicians tuned into what is really going on at the moment, and stopped just looking at unemployment figures and number of jobs available, when 99% of those jobs available are just McJobs - and not the skilled jobs that so many people here have carved careers in over the past 25 years.

 

YOUR NOT DOING ENOUGH - DOWNIE OR CRETNEY

 

 

 

edited to add link.

 

 

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[bluemonday]

Time our politicians tuned into what is really going on at the moment, and stopped just looking at unemployment figures and number of jobs available, when 99% of those jobs available are just McJobs - and not the skilled jobs that so many people here have carved careers in over the past 25 years.

 

But they never do. They just churn out figures ad infinitum.

In particular, in the job stats, they always say X vacancies remain unfilled at the end of (month)

They don't point out as you say, that a good proportion are Mcjobs and also not a few are only part time, yet they define these as 'jobs' for the purpose of their figures, implying that the situation is far better than it really is.

 

They always try and spin the reality.

 

Just looked at jobcentre website.

Last 3 days, 39 'new' vacancies - 13 - one third are part time.

[Slim]

I reiterate my call that it is now time to apply the existing work permit legislation to the finance sector in order to protect the livelihoods of manx and IOM workers. Job opportunities in this sector are like hens teeth at the moment (I estimate an 80% fall in available jobs over normal), and things are getting and going to get far worse not least with more redundancies to come, and in still allowing outsiders to come in at the expense of equally skilled people available here.

 

I doubt there's many businesses who'd be encouraged to come to the island if we had more restrictive work permit legislation.

[Albert Tatlock]

I reiterate my call that it is now time to apply the existing work permit legislation to the finance sector in order to protect the livelihoods of manx and IOM workers. Job opportunities in this sector are like hens teeth at the moment (I estimate an 80% fall in available jobs over normal), and things are getting and going to get far worse not least with more redundancies to come, and in still allowing outsiders to come in at the expense of equally skilled people available here.

 

I doubt there's many businesses who'd be encouraged to come to the island if we had more restrictive work permit legislation.

Rubbish Slim - we've had work permit legislation for years and businesses still arrived in droves.

 

You know damn well I am simply saying that if the skills are here then they should be utilised first that's all. Many of those skills are here and they are not being utilisied properly at the expense of people who were born here or have made a life here i.e. manx and IOM workers who have families, mortgages etc. here.

 

Talk to any recruitment agency and ask just how many people are going for any many of the skilled jobs here, and you'll find the numbers are really really scary. Not only have you got people who are unemployed applying, there are many people trying to bail out of certain institutions, and many many more applying from across because they can still be advertised and granted work permits.

 

I'll give you one example, a basic Business Analyst job with a local IT firm recently: 20% of applicants from here, 80% from outside - 120 people applying. In part of what I do, I talk to people who run agencies and run firms - ring up and ask yourself - it isn't hard to ask.

 

It's easy to come up with that kind of crap in an argument if you personally feel secure - and are not even willing to look at how things really are. Stick your head in the sand all you wish.

[Slim]

It's easy to come up with that kind of crap in an argument if you personally feel secure - and are not even willing to look at how things really are. Stick your head in the sand all you wish.

 

Sigh. Albert, I don't feel at all secure, and I've posted about that in the past. I'm not saying that as a manxman on the employment market I wouldn't prefer things to be more in my favour. What I'm saying is, businesses will always prefer an open job market, and in a very competitive environment where we're trying hard to attract businesses vs other jurisdictions doing the same; the last thing we want is to is construct barriers.

[Rog]

I can't comment about Cretney, but I can about Downie.

 

You shouldn’t expect anything from Downie beyond the ability to do as he is told. In the past he was very good at taking instructions from those who wanted particular policies to be put in place and implementing them.

 

When it comes to initiative he simply hasn't got the character let alone the intellectual capacity to perform. Alex is the classic example of a management 'yes' man.

 

As long as such a person is within a structure containing people with the brains, balls, and brawn to drive an organisation he will perform well, but only as a management 'gofer'. Once given a set of problems that require thinking 'outside of the box' they're not just out of their comfort zone, and as is the case with Downie, out of their ability zone.

 

The problem, and problem such people are especially under the present circumstances, is that they always fail to realise that they're way out of their depth --- and have been for years. It's, been the structure of which they have been a part that has been preventing their fall.

 

Worse yet they reduce the difficulties that they face to what they can understand --- and deal with that, leaving what needs to be done not being done and even worse not understood.

 

I've seen the same effect time and again in industry.

 

'Time-servers' with little real ability beyond doing what they've been told, can get slowly promoted in an organisation. But that promotion is based only on the success of the policies theyve been told to implement --- until suddenly they're in a position where there is no one to tell them what to do.

 

If they have a competent staff underneath them to prevent gross failure as is often the case the situation can trundle on for some time, and the TV series 'Yes, Minister' was horribly close to reality in illustrating the role of the staff in preventing The Boss from making a complete arse of himself.

 

But as is the case here when events have changed so radically that the staff can't deal with what must be done and The Boss don't realise there has been a sea-change, the result is inevitably stagnation, the wrong things being done, and usually breakdown as things unravel.

 

If people like Alex really were 'with it' and up to the job they would already know their own limitations, move out, and let someone with the ability required move in and do what they simply can not do.

 

But Downie will not.

 

He hasn't even realised what he doesn't know and can't do, and those are two of the absolutely essential attributes of a good and competent senior manager.

 

Sorry, Alex, you played your part as facilitator, now some real intellectual ability, vision, and drive is needed, you can't be just a link in a chain in your present role, and you simply aren't up to the job.

 

Time to step down before you fall down and take a lot of people with you.

[gazza]

I'll give you one example, a basic Business Analyst job with a local IT firm recently: 20% of applicants from here, 80% from outside - 120 people applying. In part of what I do, I talk to people who run agencies and run firms - ring up and ask yourself - it isn't hard to ask.

 

but if thay picked the one from the uk, does that not imply that thay have picked the best one out of the whole group

[bellyup]

I can't comment about Cretney, but I can about Downie.

 

You shouldn’t expect anything from Downie beyond the ability to do as he is told. In the past he was very good at taking instructions from those who wanted particular policies to be put in place and implementing them.

 

When it comes to initiative he simply hasn't got the character let alone the intellectual capacity to perform. Alex is the classic example of a management 'yes' man.

 

As long as such a person is within a structure containing people with the brains, balls, and brawn to drive an organisation he will perform well, but only as a management 'gofer'. Once given a set of problems that require thinking 'outside of the box' they're not just out of their comfort zone, and as is the case with Downie, out of their ability zone.

 

The problem, and problem such people are especially under the present circumstances, is that they always fail to realise that they're way out of their depth --- and have been for years. It's, been the structure of which they have been a part that has been preventing their fall.

 

Worse yet they reduce the difficulties that they face to what they can understand --- and deal with that, leaving what needs to be done not being done and even worse not understood.

 

I've seen the same effect time and again in industry.

 

'Time-servers' with little real ability beyond doing what they've been told, can get slowly promoted in an organisation. But that promotion is based only on the success of the policies theyve been told to implement --- until suddenly they're in a position where there is no one to tell them what to do.

 

If they have a competent staff underneath them to prevent gross failure as is often the case the situation can trundle on for some time, and the TV series 'Yes, Minister' was horribly close to reality in illustrating the role of the staff in preventing The Boss from making a complete arse of himself.

 

But as is the case here when events have changed so radically that the staff can't deal with what must be done and The Boss don't realise there has been a sea-change, the result is inevitably stagnation, the wrong things being done, and usually breakdown as things unravel.

 

If people like Alex really were 'with it' and up to the job they would already know their own limitations, move out, and let someone with the ability required move in and do what they simply can not do.

 

But Downie will not.

 

He hasn't even realised what he doesn't know and can't do, and those are two of the absolutely essential attributes of a good and competent senior manager.

 

Sorry, Alex, you played your part as facilitator, now some real intellectual ability, vision, and drive is needed, you can't be just a link in a chain in your present role, and you simply aren't up to the job.

 

Time to step down before you fall down and take a lot of people with you.

 

The Peter Principle

[Sparky]

I can't comment about Cretney, but I can about Downie.

 

... Sorry, Alex, you played your part as facilitator, now some real intellectual ability, vision, and drive is needed, you can't be just a link in a chain in your present role, and you simply aren't up to the job.

 

Time to step down before you fall down and take a lot of people with you.

 

Isn't this what Chris Corlett was brought in for?

[Rog]

I can't comment about Cretney, but I can about Downie.

 

... Sorry, Alex, you played your part as facilitator, now some real intellectual ability, vision, and drive is needed, you can't be just a link in a chain in your present role, and you simply aren't up to the job.

 

Time to step down before you fall down and take a lot of people with you.

 

Isn't this what Chris Corlett was brought in for?

 

He's still in the LC though. He, and a few others, should go out to grass and be replaced by elected representatives, elected by the whole electorate and not by their cronies as a reward for toeing the party line.

 

What's more it's way beyond the Peter Principle when ministerial positions are involved.

[pongo]

etc

 

What would be your policy Rog? 'Freedom To Flourish' or tighter implementation of regulation ?

[John Wright]

Criticise criticise and criticise

 

What do you suggest

 

Government does not employ these people. Why not lobby the employers, why not get the members at risk to join a strong union.

 

All government can dis create the right environment for businesses to flourish or not. What is wrong with out environment apart from work permits, which must go, and over regulation which given the climate internationally we are stuck with

 

We have better tax incentives, better available work force, better place to live and bring up families

 

I repaeat apart from prophesying doom what should we do

[Rog]

etc

 

What would be your policy Rog? 'Freedom To Flourish' or tighter implementation of regulation ?

 

With the world economy as it presently stands, very much tighter implementation of regulation and the introduction of further limitation on immigration.

 

The elephant in the dining room is the atrocious balance of trade the UK has along with an economy that is built not so much on sand as make believe, and the continued taking on of debt in order to attempt to sustain the unsustainable.

 

In spite of what people would no doubt like to believe the Island is dependent on the UK, and when the cuts start to come in after the next General Election that’s when the fun will start.

 

It won’t be nice. It’s now that the Manx should be looking after the Manx, because the comeovers certainly won’t.

[Rog]

Criticise criticise and criticise

 

What do you suggest

 

Government does not employ these people. Why not lobby the employers, why not get the members at risk to join a strong union.

 

All government can dis create the right environment for businesses to flourish or not. What is wrong with out environment apart from work permits, which must go, and over regulation which given the climate internationally we are stuck with

 

We have better tax incentives, better available work force, better place to live and bring up families

 

I repaeat apart from prophesying doom what should we do

 

If only the prospects for work in the future were at all positive.

 

They're not.

[Slim]

Rog, what do you think those employment prospects would be if the Island lost more businesses due to over-regulation?