Learning skills for todays youth?

The heading could mean lots of things but I did see on Sky TV the other day that the British Government (was it Labour) now want to stop free hand outs to youth who  are not learning a trade or skill?

This came in from my good friend Joe yesterday, seems to make a point?

Read it and if you agree maybe its time to build that boat you have been thinking about!
Joes letter can be found posted in blue below my own entries.

Roy

Doing things for ourselves, it was Joe who assisted with my 998cc Hillman Imp engine back in the early 1970s, he found a company named Bremco to do the engineering work. That was to bore out the old 875cc piston liners and then re bore and fit a set of steel 998cc liners similar to the set in this picture.

Like Joe and a few other like minded guys, learning new skills was a part of the challenge.

We need to invent some tools to get the job done better, this is now the second Hillman Imp based car to use the same turning jig.

I think the real problem with boating of all types are a number of things that these days make the door to entry into that world a really tiny one.

Just like DIY, repairing cars is a thing not done by many anymore, with the result that their children do not learn any mechanical skills and often leave school unable to add a plug to the end of an electric wire, so those who mess about with the sea are becoming fewer and fewer.

I think it is the inability to just go ahead and risk your life in a tin canoe made from a sheet of corrugated iron flattened by a steam-roller, as I did when I was very young, to the stringent safety rules and regulations, coupled with the expense that, relative to other pursuits, make it less attractive to the amateur, leaving only those with real passion or who have grown up gaining some experience to want to be involved. If you just look at fishing you can also see how that has fewer participants today because of our lifestyle.

I was at dinner with my brother a few years ago when he remarked that we had an absolutely idyllic childhood.

No over-crowding, no inflation, minimal crime, and a freedom to go anywhere at any time and to experiment with every possible thing imaginable, in what was relative to today a very simple world, all of which the current generation do not have. We never had any money yet we never really lacked for money either.

From the little I know it seems you have had a good life, and for that I am glad.