UK 19:27 Friday, 23 October 2026
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Tim Martin of JD Wetherspoon has today commented on the moronic plans of George Osborne to put SME's out of business, ooops I meant to say to pushing the minimum wage up to £9. For Paul "Trotsky" Scott, "Red" Darren Atwater and others here are some hard maths. Just who is subsidising who? Look at how much profit JD makes per pub and how much tax that pub generates. Over to my hero of the day Tim Martin:
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Comments
wildrides
Thats great …………put your pint prices up then …….. since wages will rise across the industry competitive advantage will not be lost . In this day and age people go to the pub for social reasons rather than sitting at home and drinking 10 tinnys from ASDA . You can slim down your staff or install more gambling machines . If you go bust I dont care ……….its less strain on the national health and police dealing with the fall out from your dreadful drinking houses. Having less pubs and less alcohol consumed will be good for the country .
J P Spaghetti
“we estimate that each of our pubs generates taxes of approximately £650,000 per annum, around 10 times our net profits per pub”
Eh? Quoi? Comment? Surely he jests or has made a mistake in the relative amounts there…?
alcira16247
Well said ……. Wildrides!
You’d be forgiven for thinking that the end of the world is nigh, listening to the doomsday merchants, from some sections of the business community …….. one can’t help but think that similar themed messages were being broadcast by the capitalistic industrialist’s on pre introduction of the 1833 Factory Acts.
The promotion of a low pay, low skilled workforce, working the longest hours has resulted in a UK economy 25 percent less productive than any of our G7 competitor’s. A valid argument could be used that having access to virtually unlimited cheap labour results in lazy inefficient businesses.
Osborne ought to be applauded for taking action redressing the vast gulf between the highest and lowest paid which will improve workers moral and Britain’s competitiveness!
Phil
Hey Tom, based on these comments, I think you have some cuckoos in the nest, the site has been infiltrated by some public sector pensions lol
J P Spaghetti
“one can’t help but think that similar themed messages were being broadcast by the capitalistic industrialist’s on pre introduction of the 1833 Factory Acts.”
“Please sir…can I have some more…?”!
“Osborne ought to be applauded for taking action redressing the vast gulf between the highest and lowest paid which will improve workers moral and Britain’s competitiveness!”
I observed that being the case in industry in Holland…mind you, they’re less screwed up sexually than us (I’d best not start on religion).
Striebs
What people in catering or hospitality earn is not so much an issue here because they work in the domestic economy and the wages of their competitors will go up too .
The problem is for people working in , or for companies in the global economy eg manufacturing or behind in phones in call centres .
They already have to work ten to the dozen to offset the fact that their wages are much higher than people in the developing world .
Osborne needs to bring the cost of living down so wages become livable .