Tories free of spending commitment
With one bound they were free.
The Tories are no longer committed to matching Labour's spending plans. In a speech this morning David Cameron says that his party will take another look at what government should be spending in what is likely to be general election year 2010-11. However, he doesn't and won't say what level of spending there should be.
This is designed to get them out of the political bind they've been in.
The country, they've been saying, cannot afford Gordon Brown's tax cuts because the cupboard is bare and it's irresponsible to borrow to cut taxes.
With a commitment to match Labour's spending plans, the Tories risked being painted as committed to tax rises to fund the gap. They could not promise what many in their party have been demanding - spending cuts to fund tax cuts.
Now they can.
They may be free of one constraint but they are opening themselves up to an old Labour attack - warnings of Tory cuts.
Team Cameron's calculation is that the change in the economic outlook blunts that weapon. If Labour warn of Tory cuts they will be telling the country that they'll carry on spending regardless of current economic circumstances. That will allow the Conservatives to say that Labour's borrowing bombshell will be matched by a tax bombshell.
UPDATE, 11:55AM: George Osborne says that today's move spells out a clear choice for people - spending restraint under the Tories and tax rises under Labour.
Somehow I doubt that's where Labour will want to leave the matter.
Remember that although today is politically significant it still leaves most of the important economic questions unanswered.
All the Conservatives have told us is that they would spend less than the government currently plans to in 2010-11. However, they concede that the government is itself committed to reviewing its spending plans for that year. What's more, the Tories haven't got answers to the really hard question - how much less should be spent on what?
It's clear that David Cameron wants voters to conclude that he tells it to them straight whereas Gordon Brown has a history of being misleading on tax.
Today Labour are pointing out that today's speech did nothing to offer families and businesses help now. In the longer term, I suspect that they will respond by pointing out that the Tories have tended to be rather better at calling for government to do more (more prison places, more money for the armed forces, more tax breaks for marriage... etc) than to do less thus allowing them (you guessed it) to say that the Tory sums don't add up.
UPDATE, 8:30PM: The whole point of David Cameron and George Osborne's commitment to match Labour's spending plans was to neutralise Gordon Brown's favourite election strategy - Labour investment versus Tory cuts.
I explained in my earlier post why the Tories decided to change their position.
It's already obvious, however, that this will throw up difficult questions for the Tory leadership as the Tory right demand bigger cuts sooner and Labour suggests that there'll cut anything they don't make specific promises to match Labour's spending on.
I've just interviewed the Tory leader and he did give one indication of the scale of spending curbs that might be needed:
ROBINSON: Is it your plan to cut spending so that taxes don't have to go up under a Conservative government?
CAMERON: Basically yes. We need to recognise we cannot go on as we are. If we have the current debt we've got plus the government's borrowing binge, which they are going to go ahead with, plus their spending plans, there will be really massive tax increase, a big bombshell after the election. The government aren't really denying it, they're talking about a £15bn or maybe £30bn extra. If they do that and money's got to be paid back through a tax increase, we're talking about 4p on the income tax rate, something like that, a really big increase. Now if we want to avoid [this] we've got to change something. What I'm saying is we need to change the growth of public spending, to get it under control, because we don't need a tax increase like that just as we're trying to come out of recession.
So, to avoid tax rises after the next election is David Cameron saying that public spending will have to rise by around £15bn less than under Labour?
P.S. Before anyone writes in to point out the difference between a cut and a slower rate of increase in public spending, I do know the difference. Indeed, I once had a rather memorable exchange with Tony Blair about just that distinction when during the 2005 election campaign he unveiled a poster claiming that the Conservative Party would initiate cuts of £35bn.
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What a desperate disappointment.
Cameron had the chance to make a huge stride forward with positive policy for the present and a tangible glimpse of the future.
To detatch himself from Labour as he has was to be brutally honest,like conirming he has 4 fingers and a thumb on each hand - all he has done is state the blindingly obvious.
This is no policy change,let alone a c-change its desperately desperately disappointing but sadly predictable as it offers NOT ONE JOT to todays economic debate!.
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Hurrah DAVID has seen the light well done!!
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The country's fate for the price of a pint of beer?
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What ever spin New Labour dish out most children over the age of 6 dismiss it.
Except of course the BBC who always swallow it whole then ask for a second helping.
GREEDY OR WHAT!
I exclude John Humphries from that remark.
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Boring!
What about what we should do with the criminals who took us into Iraq?
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If the Cavalry are coming with reinforcements,we could perhaps reopen our two mothballed production facilities.
ITS CALLED BEAT THE DRUM FOR GREAT BRITAIN!
MADE IN ENGLAND.
JOBS FOR 1500 plus.
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Smart move from the Tories really - everyone surely knows by now that it's possible to slash public sector spending without making the blindest bit of difference to services. After all, Labour have made massive increases in spending to make things worse!
I can think of many quangos, middle management non-jobs and civil service positions that are easily dispensible, not to mention a large number of white-elephant NuLabour projects which could quite happily disappear into the ether and save us billions.
Roll on the election...
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There appears to be not a lot that the opposition (Con and Lib Dem) can say if the media continues to allow the government to peddle its version of the truth.
What we need is a debate with ALL the facts laid bare - to include when, and how much, the tax increases to fund the Brown Christmas giveaway will be.
I suspect the Brown strategy is to target the cuts at what he hopes will be Labour voters, and pass the increases onto Tory Middle England!!
This smacks of a strategy to start up the class divide once more - with Harriet Harperson stoking it for all she is worth!!
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Nick, please don't inflict the phrases "Team Brown" and "Team Cameron" on us.
I don't support "Team GB" but do support "Great Britain"
These Americanisms are a pain in the backside.
Next, heaven help us, you will be talking about "The last chance saloon."
Please TRY to write in English. We are not American ... YET.
Now back to the subject. David Cameron and his team at last will be able to put realistic figures on his government, if there is one. It will allow him to bring into the open the off-balance sheet PFI disaster, and discuss the present government wastage without being held in a stright-jacket by Labour's figures.
A good move.
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The Criminals that took us to Iraq post 5.
Personally i believe the entire labour cabinet of 2002/3 should be tried for war crimes.
In rememberance of David Kelly and all the service men & women and the thousands of Iraqi citizens.
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As a middle-class engineer, when I heard Labour talk of tax-cuts, I started to cut my expenditure, as I know I will get none of them, but will have to pay for them. And when I hear of Tory spending cuts, my optimism level rises, as I know that this country must, as a matter of urgency, reduce the waste of resources by public sector client groups (I include most of the BBC's output in this as well). It's time to get real about our situation.
Remember, history shows all Labour governments end in disaster for the country's finances. Roll on the election !
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Goodbye to newlabour profligacy.
Goodbye to an NHS budget of over 100bn three times what they inherited.
Goodbye to mindless PFI projects and the private sector taking the rise out of government recklessness.
Goodbye to newlabour's age of irresponsibility.
Goodbye to public sector index linked final salary pensions.
Goodbye to ID cards.
Goodbye to 42 detention.
Goodbye to endless form filling and bureaucracy.
goodbye diverstiy officers.
Notice anyone whining about Boris Johnson cutting the link with Hugo Chavez and TfL now the oil price has collapsed? Didn't think so.
Newlabour, Nopurpose.
Goodbye Gordon Brown.
An election please.
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Why, Nick, do you not mention that Cameron has made it clear that he is talking about reducing the rate of increase of public spending, not about cutting it?
You say 'They may be free of one constraint but they are opening themselves up to an old Labour attack - warnings of Tory cuts.'
Well yes, especially if 'journalists' don't see fit to mention crucial points.
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Over the weekend, the BBC made much of George Osborne breaking some non-existent convention that the opposition don't comment on the consequences of financial policies, and was thus talking the pound down. This led many news bulletins.
The pound went up yesterday.
Can we now expect a leading item saying that it's obvious Osborne's words had no effect on sterling? I thought not.
I would have thought that investors (who broadly speaking are intelligent people) would be much more worried by biased and inaccurate reporting from the state media than comments by the opposition when assessing a currency risk.
How on earth can the Tories say now what spending in 2011-12 will be? We're all waiting for a statement on what the government is intending to do and all the indications are that it's going to spend money it hasn't got - and a lot of it. That'll damage the economy hugely, as you should know, so we have to see what extent of the damage they cause before knowing what to do.
The cure for too much borrowing is not more borrowing.
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David Cameron?
Please can we comit to rebuilding our infrastructure like power stations,say 35 nuclear ones so we dont have to rely on the French or the Russians to keep the lights on.
All Brown did was dither dither dither, then claim credit credit credit WHOOPS DEBIT.
BLAME THE YANKS. (BBC will swallow that)
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Sensible.
I await the Conservative report on public spending cuts with great anticipation.
Compare and contrast with Gordon 'announcement' a day on the economy.
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#11 When I was younger someone once said to me "People vote Labour in with empty heads and vote them out with empty wallets".
At the time I never quite appreciated exactly how well that phrase summed it up. What saddens me is that Labour still haven't learned their lessons after all this time.
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If we are going to move out of recession, the easy credit created demand has to be replaced by something. Tax cuts and benefit increases for the poor are at least part of the answer, but Cameron is right they cannot be "just for Christmas". It will be many years before easy credit becomes available again, so a long term change in the distribution of wealth and income is necessary. This is the unpleasant truth that the Cameron's party has to face.
For the Labour Chancellor, eventually the problem will be devising taxes that the wealthy cannot avoid. My suggestion is a land value tax, perhaps replacing the most regressive tax of all, Council Tax. It is difficult to move land to an offshore tax haven and it is traditionally used to store spare cash. It might also persuade builders to use land to build houses instead of keeping it in a land bank.
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sorry commit has two m's
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What about half of violent crime going unsolved?
What about Baby P and the knee jerk council set up by Labour?
What about the war crimes of our government?
What about presumed consent on my liver?
I'm glad you are blogging about this - it shows you are at least taking note of the tories and how they are going to get us out of the mess, but it also is ignoring other vitally important political events. Keep up Nick!
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All Hail Dave
Finally the policy we need.
A commitment to cut the 2million plus non jobs created by the reds.
A commitment to drop ID cards
A commitment to put more of our money back in our pockets to spend or save as we see fit
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Does anyone actually know what is going on at the Conservative Party. One day they say one thing, the next day the opposite. How am I supposed to actually consider voting for them when their policies seems to change whenever the headlines change.
The only one they seem to stick to is that if you have amillion pound in the bank you can die tax free.
That wont get my vote.
I may not agree with everything Labour are doing, but at least I know what they are doing and can form my own opinion about it. They at least stick to what they say.It's not like the press are against the Conservative Party, most of them, whether the Fleet Street cheerleaders or Murdochs empire are backing them to the hilt and still they seem to be directionless.
For god sake Dave, form a policy and stick to it. Give us something to compare you to the government.
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I may be fiscally illiterate but it strikes me that if you haven't got any money then you can't spend it and you'd be pretty darn silly to borrow money to fund your spending...especially when your credit card is maxed out.
Why can't these guys see the obvious? Spending cuts are ONLY things which will work!
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#10
Why stop at cabinet members? Most of the Government was complicit in this.
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Excellent speech by Cameron and, by the way, excellent analysis by Nick Robinson: 'With one bound they were free'
Actually this is more of a continuation of the previous Conservative policy, i.e. over the economic cycle the rate of increase in government spending should be less than the rate of growth in the economy.
By contrast Labour's policy, as shown by their actions over 11 years, appears to be this: over the economic cycle government spending should be greater than the rate of growth in the economy, funded by ever increasing government borrowing. This will lead eventually to both tax rises and cuts in spending programmes as interest payments on government debt take an increasing proportion of total government spending.
Spin all they like, eventually the internal contradictions in Labour's economic policy will be understood by even the most blinkered Labour blogger (though of course they won't admit it)
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Nick
Have you noticed that whenever the Tories propose a tax change it's called unfunded by Gordon Brown.
Whenever Labour propose extra spending it's called prudent and the right thing to do in the circumstances.
How did we get in this mess in the first place, it wasn't ALL America's fault or that's what the G20 statement said?
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Tories have no option really. They've got to distance themselves from Labours spending plans. They can't leave themselves locked in to funding a blank cheque. They'd be caught by the short & curlies and that's political suicide...
But we'll see an even bigger disagreement in PMQ's now. Tories will say that Labours spending plans are irresponsible and reckless over the longer term. Labour will say that Tories are not prepared to take the radical action needed to rescue the economy in the short-term.
I still think we should have a full Parliamentary debate on the CRISIS in the economy, properly debating the issues and attempting to reach a cross-party agreement on a way forward that doesn't bankrupt/compromise the UK in the long-term. We need to look well beyond the next general election, Tories seem to be doing that, Labour aren't...
Only time will tell Who's right.
Doctor, where are you when we so desperately need a lend of your Tardis ?
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Cameron said:
"I am not worried about Labour's lies because nobody believes a word they say any more."
Absolutely right. There is no point engaging Labour in reasonable debate any more.
There is zero point in trying to engage with the false reality that Labour have created - you end up sounding as bonkers as Brown.
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@26
I think you will find that is what the Conservatives have just done.
There is now clear blue water between them and profligate government
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at least that means any current tax cuts may have the desired effect, of stimulating the economy. Whereas labours soon to fail tax lowering today plan with massive tax hikes post election have been proven to fail time and time again. Seeing as nobody (with sense) will spend the money knowing that it'll be snatched away tomorrow
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11 SecretSkivver
I know the feeling ! Good post.
On the main topic, when the "era of irresponsbility" finally come to an end at the next General Election, I am hoping it will not be followed more of the same, so David Camerons statement sounds reasonable to me.
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Nick
Lets see two BBC links to this story -
"Tories cut free from pledge to match Labour's spending" (to this blog entry)
"Tories cut Labour spending pledge" (link to main piece)
Do you think you are really clever getting 'tory and cut' next to each other in these titles?
Is the only chance left for brown/labour for the BBC to try to indulge in a second rate, sub paul daniels, derren brown 'word plant' tricks.
Pathetic.
Now what are you doing about getting answers from Mandleson about his tariff talks with Oleg?
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According to Gordon Brown and fellow Labour spinners we are supposed to be uniquely well placed to survive the downturn (known to everyone else as the recession).
In that case:
why did the UK economy contract 0.5% in Q3 against the EU average of 0.2% and US 0.1%?
why has sterling depreciated 25% against the dollar
I don't have to hand 4Q and 2009 projections but perhaps someone else can kindly supply them?
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A Conservative worker friend told me a few months back they have been told to get as many conservatives they know to flood blogs on the BBC and Sky with Conservative views, and to "scatter gun them" when the party announces anything, so anyone that reads them thinks that is what everyone wants.
I thought she was joking until, being a first time reader, I have read all the views above.
They apparently have been doing the same with people gaining seats at Questiontime as well.
Pretty scary when you think about it.
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@36
You are correct on the subliminal messaging.
Correct grammer would be :
"Tories Set free from pledge to match Labours spending"
"Tories Drop Labour spending pledge"
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I'm quite happy with this.
I for one am sick of the sight of Brown trumpeting the "spending" that Labour does and has done, on appalingly wasteful projects as if its a virtue.
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Here we go again. Cameron is rehashing the 1992 General Election with Labour's Tax Bombshell. Quite soon he'll be using Major's successful lie, Vote Tory for Tax Cuts Year on Year. It was a General Election where the Tory Chancellor Lamont went missing for three weeks and emerged after the Election to say that Major had been wrong in promising Tax Cuts. It seems that George Osborne has been practicing hiding already.
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I look forward to Cameron telling us honestly (and without falling back on nebulous efficiency savings that rarely materialise - see for example Boris's experience in London where he can't find much to cut in amongst the massive waste of Livingston's government):
* What areas of Government spending will be lower under the Conservatives (less on education and Sure Start, less on hospitals, less investment in infrastructure, less tax credits)?
* Who will tax cuts allowed by these spending cuts be targeted on (why not abolish inheritance tax for everyone, or cut higher-rate income tax to 20%)?
* What are their plans for paying back the National Debt? How much should be paid off over the business cycle (a balanced current budget is apparently irresponsible)? How do they propose to trade-off between investment that increase future economic growth and the 'need' to pay off the National debt?
I also look forward to their plans for macroeconomic policy. We've been led to believe that monetary policy will, under the Conservatives, be used to support a fixed exchange rate (but not the Euro) and prevent asset bubbles (more important than maintaining growth in the real economy).
Maybe some policy at last? Or too much to hope for - just general statements about a different approach without giving too much away about what will actually happen.
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Cameron's approach seems at least more straightforward than Brown's euphimism and spin - as typified by yesterday's commons performance. Perhaps, as cassius puts it, the battle lines are now to be drawn more clearly:
http://cassiuswrites.blogspot.com/2008/11/if-you-want-to-invoke-patriotism-mr.html
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Post 36
YES THE REAL TRUTH 100%
I didnt realise how biased the BBC are until i started to use this blog service.
Unless one praises the government one is open to DELETION.
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#38
I find that kind of paranoia quite hilarious. The self-serving attitude of all government apologists is also rather insulting - screaming "conspiracy" any time someone comes along who disagrees with them.
Rather like Labour's "shoot the messenger" policy for everyone who criticises their policies in general really.
I'm simply a hard-working taxpayer with no party allegiance who recognises the fact that the best way to ensure effective government is to have effective opposition. And finally, thankfully, it seems the Tories are showing some common sense and listening to what the people are crying out for - which is more than NuLabour have ever done.
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Shouldn't someone be asking how Labour's fiscal stimulus is going to be funded. In the longer term we know the answer - us by way of tax increases. However, in the short term it will presumably be paid for by increased borrowing. But borrowing is contingent on someone lending. Who?
Normally, such money is raised in the gilts market. But according to Will Hutton - not exactly a Labour critic - speaking on Radio 4 on Saturday money has been flooding out of the UK in recent weeks, hence the run on sterling.
Somewhere lurking in the background is a picture of Darling following in Healey's footsteps by going to the IMF, complete with begging bowl. Perhaps that explains Brown's trip to Saudi Arabia recently to try to persuade them to commit money to the IMF. Are we entering Faustian territory?
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How can Labour claim that the Tories sums dodn't add up," when the rocketing PSBR would suggest that their own sums don't add up?
Or am I missing something here?????
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Nick,
you make your comment that there are economic questions unanswered by the conservatives, i.e. by how much to reduce spending etc, fair point, yet you do not also acknowledge the unanswered questions regarding this governments intention to borrow its way out of the mire they have put us in, and that is, how are they going to afford it, are they going to raise taxes?
Why are you not asking this question, why are you and seemingly the BBC not intent on holding the government to account, as a tax payer I am seriously worried about this government flagrantly spending money they don't have whilst pretending they are economic genuises? I'd appreciate more balanced reporting in future.
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RE POST 38.
I hope you dont count me in that number.
Ive noticed by an avalanche of deletions that anything over critical of Labour,Mandelson and Halifax Plc/HBOS seems to be blackballed.
So the bias appears to be in Labours favour?
Strange how the truth is so unacceptable.
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I fine it funny that the media and people seem to fall once again for the old "Labour Spin" (Good work Mandelson). How can people still seem to trust Gordon on another so called Tax cut. Remember it was him that Conned the poor and needy in the first place with the 10p fiasco by which the country have a unnecessary 2.7 billion pound debt. Then it was the same Gordon who sold our gold reserves which could have been handy in this time of need. Then we had all the money wasted on the Millinium Dome when times were good which is just 1 of the many bad Labour ideas. Therefore I came to the conclussion that no wonder we've got no money set aside for a rainy day. So how can people still think that this same man is best suite to steer us through this economic crisis when he could not even spend our money wisely when we had some.
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36 The Real Truth
Sky News manage with the headline:
"Cameron abandons spending plans"
Now we have to wait and see how creative Pravda will be in peddling the onslaught of tax cut lies that Labour will trot out.
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Stand by for the "Tory cuts" line from Brown.
Cameron needs to make it plain that it is "Tory savings" he will seek by targeting waste and unwise spending, whilst protecting or even increasing effective investment in vital services.
There is masses of scope to cut waste though sheer ineffiiciency in areas where investment is justified but also to take out layers of hare-brained spending on things which are a waste of money - even if it is spent efficiently.
Doing the wrong things right can be even worse than doing the right things wrong because very often the spend does much more harm than good and generates even more spend through red tape, bureaucracy, enforcement, compliance etc.
The problem isn't where to find the areas of hare-brain spending but to know where to start, from a long list, in prioritising the ones to hit fastest and hardest.
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expertfloatingvoter wrote:
It's not like the press are against the Conservative Party, most of them, whether the Fleet Street cheerleaders or Murdochs empire are backing them to the hilt and still they seem to be directionless.
expertfloatingvoter wrote:
A Conservative worker friend told me a few months back they have been told to get as many conservatives they know to flood blogs on the BBC and Sky with Conservative views, and to "scatter gun them" when the party announces anything, so anyone that reads them thinks that is what everyone wants.
Would that friend happen to work for the (supposedly) Tory supporting Murdoch?
Unless I have missed an announcemnet Murdoch has thrown his weight behind Labour since 97. If you haven't even worked that one out I have to query your claim to be an "expert" floatingvoter.
And while it might be true that your friend did tell you that, it is also possible that there is no friend and you just made it up. You wouldn't be the first person on this site to suggest that any pro-Tory viewpoint comes from a Tory party plant.
I personally suspect that the reason that there are so many pro-Tory views is that the Labour government is deeply unpopular.
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expertfloatingvoter - you give the impression of a labour troll.
Anti-brown/anti-labour views are prevalent on blogs and everywhere else that the public can freely express their views.
However this is simply because that is the majority view.
After Blair stepped down he confessed that he had lost the support of the public and he couldn't sensibly continue.
I didn't like Blair much - his one major contribution to the UK was to keep Brown (an even lesser man) out of the top seat - even that, he couldn't do properly...
However at least Blair new when the game was up -- Brown needs to be left in no doubt that his time is passed too.
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The Tories should certainly NOT be promising to match Labour spending.
Labour is famous for wasting taxpayers money. What this country needs now is real prudence - not frittering money away on failed IT projects, ID cards and yet more borrowing.
This does not mean cutting services, but it does mean identifying waste - particularly in the huge bureaucratic mess created by the Blair / Brown years. Wasteful local government spending also needs to be addressed.
The Tories really need to keep their eye firmly on the economy now - and not be distracted with all the social engineering nonsense that seems to be coming from their think tank.
The country can save money by firing the Labour 'nanny'. We don't want a Tory nanny to take her place.
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#36 You raise a good point I've often wondered about on this website - whether it's a conscious effort or not though I'm not sure. After all, it follows that the majority of the staff here are left of centre and might just do it naturally without thinking.
If it is deliberate though, I look forward to a future whistleblower telling all!
As for Mandy, I shouldn't expect any news on that front - however, I do seem to recall reading that he wants to go on Strictly Come Dancing, perhaps in an effort to endear himself to the public?
Personally, I'd kill to see him on Have I Got News For You as a guest presenter. Now that would be priceless television...
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@33 Pot_Kettle. Yes that is what they say now, what about next week. Last week they said they were going to equal Labours spending.
They do not actually say where they will find the money and how much, just generalisations.
Their policy seems to go with whatever is seen as positive in the media. Can you guarantee it won't change again before the next election?
This is the problem I have with thinking about voting Conservative, I don't know what they will be saying next week, nevermind at the election in maybe a couple of years.
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#38 - you are absolutely correct.
The Tories,handed this tactic by their friends in the republican party in USA - great lot of good it did them !!!!!!!! - have used this "facebook/blogger" tactic since the arrival of "boy david" - in essence they actually employ people to sit at home and fill sites like this with anti-Labour and anti anything thats not supportive of Boy David rhetoric.
Thge problem is that people clearly like you and me not pro-Labour by any stretch of the imagination - get tarred with the same brush - if we are not Pro Boy David - we are bolsheviks...
The BBC is bolshevik(in their eyes) - when you argur they are'nt you are dismissed - yet ITN/Evening Standard and Daily Mail clearly the tribune of boy david's propoganda machine are clearly left alone and forgotten.
Ask them a straight-forward question like OK - what would Cameron have done in the past 2 years to keep the UK out of recession - (if he did do that we'd be the only economy safe from recession) and you'll NEVER get a straight answer - just more anti Brown bile!
Dare to comment that part of the global crisis has its roots in the unregulated me first mate Thatcherite and Reagan days of the 80's and you'll get sent to the gallows literally.
You see - everything not Boy David is rosy and bright - everything not Boy David is dirty and glum - thats the message - loud and clear....
The problem is that there is no actual message from boy david (b) Boy David is a political novice who all too easily can be shown to be nieve and loses his temper and his credibility at the drop of a hat and (c) all they can do is dismiss and denegrate -
Finally,if you dont believe that 95% of them are'nt in the paid or voluntary employ of Tory HQ ask yourself this - how else can they be logged on - all day,all night - every day - every night able to rebut anything not praaising the high altar of Boy David "!....????????
They are'nt yet automation robots,but they are'nt real people - I know of 3 Tory activists in the West Midlands who share a common nom de plume and use it under instruction and with pre-written scripts e-mailed to them every time Boy Davis speaks...
Sadly,this is USA style politics in the 21st century...
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#45 DJ Lazarus - I have no party affiliation and am only repeating what she told me. She has no need to lie as she is a Conservative worker.
With regards your no party allegiance - the words NuLabour is what she uses when quoting anything done by the government.
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The BBC headline link is regrettable and petulant.
Economic reality dictates that government spending growth has to slow down.
Here's a breakdown of Labour's spending.
In total, public spending is an eye-watering £585bn, 430bn is central government, 155bn local government. Representing 32% GDP and 11% GDP. 43% in total.
For comparison, the 1988 budget, total government (local and central) was 37%
The government has been taking more and more money from the wealth creating private sector and pouring it into the inefficient and unreformed public sector.
In 2011, Labour plans to spend 33% GDP centrally and 12% GDP locally or 45% total. These are fantasy figures, the GDP projection is going to be way off now.
Enough is enough, this is madness.
This recession will require a re-alignment of spending priorities, fact.
GDP will not be anywhere near 1.5tn to permit this level of government spending.
Don't believe me.
It's all here....
http://www.ukpublicspending.co.uk/
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I have been an avid reader of this blog for a number of months and have finally taken the plunge to sign up out of utter frustration!
I voted Lab in '97 - I think I got blinded by the teeth - and again next time round having fallen for the 'we need 2 terms' rubbish. Last time I voted LibDem because I couldn't bring myself to vote for the other two. Now we're up to date.
If I was up to the limit on my credit card or overdraft and went to the provider/bank and asked them to give me more on the basis that at some time in the dim and distant future I might possibly be able to pay it back I think I might get a short response. Why then are we as taxpayers, or financial institutions (who we appear to be now funding as taxpayers anyway), or whoever, prepared to lend this shower of a government more money on the same basis? Wouldn't that just be proof of the type of actions our Glorious Leader has been describing as 'irresponsible' on the lenders part, and not taking personal responsibility on behalf of the borrower?
I have always gone on the principle that I don't buy anything unless I can afford to pay for it. I expect to see Gordon at the local Westminster Pawn Shop with the Crown Jewels in the spring.
ps....it's good to see the whole Govt is taking this so seriously that one minister has the time to write an 11 page memo on the subject of which coffee they like and when they would like it served.
Presumably he wants HobNobs too, not those Rich Tea things.
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The Beebs sister organisation, Pravda, have this to say about our political parties:
"To this end, the British, both Labour and Tories, but more so Labour, have become the paramount Trotskyte Neocons, out doing all but the most rabid US Neocons."
Pravda
Given Iraq and Brown's Soviet style denial that he ever said "an end to boom and bust" and "we are uniquely placed to weather the recession" - then maybe the term 'Trotskyte Neocon' is very well suited to the great helmsman.
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# 50 - GET YOUR FACTS RIGHT!
The Millenium Dome was the creation of one Michael Heseltine - Labour inherited its spending and creation - TORY SPENDING TORY WASTE!
Indeed Heseltine high-jacked its concept from Birmingham and moved it to loNDON!
Had it been built in Birmingham - it would have most likely broken even and formed the basis of a new NATIONAL STADIUM!"
GET YOU FACTS RIGHT!
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Gordon Brown has stated time after time that it is because his Government took tough decisions and repaid debt that they are able to spend more on schools and hospitals. Money that does not have to be paid in interest can go to these worthy causes.
The Tories, in responding to Labours claims of "Tory Cuts", need do no more than remind Brown of this basic economic point.
Prudence has crossed the House!
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#49 First time on here, how do you know that the overcritical are being blackballed or deleted. You cannot see a comment until it has been moderated.
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No more lies and spin.
NO MORE LABOUR.
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Hm... "In the long run, Keynes is still alive", somebody said recently.
All Labour have to do is call it Hooverism.
I must say, so far, the Tories opposition hasn't been much more than "Irresponsible tax cuts? Hoy! That's our job!"
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expertfloatingvoter @38 wrote:
"A Conservative worker friend told me a few months back they have been told to get as many conservatives they know to flood blogs on the BBC and Sky with Conservative views, and to "scatter gun them" when the party announces anything, so anyone that reads them thinks that is what everyone wants."
Rubbish.
By that standard of hearsay, unless you 'name and shame' this "Conservative worker friend" why should anyone believe that you are not one of Derek Drapers Drones?
I belong to no party and take direction from no-one. I've learnt to hate Brown and Nu-Labour all by myself.....
... and it seems to be a widespread feeling.
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@38, Mr Draper is that you?
I think you'll find it's Labour who are trying to swamp the web and blogs with opinions, they even have a dedicated department for it.
Just as they had applauses pager-managed at conferences.
Pathetic really, and I've no doubt the Cameroons will want to try the same.
As for the raft of more conservative posts across the web, that might have a great deal to do with a PM who's obviously enjoying watching the UK go down the pan, and who has had more than a walk-on part in the economic disaster and perpetually insists on lying through his back teeth about it.
And I cannot believe your post 26 - you accuse the Tories on U-turns? what about Brown? He spent a decade bragging about light touch regulation everywhere he went, and now has developed a curious amnesia about that.
I'm not quite sure what you're an expert in, but it sure as hell isn't unbiased politics.
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#53 I am no expert at anything, it was a username I was offered when I asked for my username to be floating voter.
I am not pro-Conservative or pro-labour. Is this how it works on here, if you are not pro-Conservative you are accused of being a troll.
I only mentioned what was mentioned to me. With regards Labour being unpopular, they are behind in the polls, but not by 95% as which what the posts being anti-Labour on here.
Glad to come on here and see so many varied views.
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"Tories free of spending commitment" that all right then as they are also "Free of Policies" - so no change there then.
The Tories are the 'court jesters' of politics at present - Little Lord Fauntleroys in velvet slacks who get elocution lessons in speaking estuary! Men (and most of them are men!) of straw. They are floundering.
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Also from the Pravda article I posted at 62.
The Russians have accused Brown's Britain of being "Orwellian"....!
"Quite simply, as the UK sinks into the deepest reaches of an Orwellian Police State, where the government tracks every car on the autobahns, every phone call, all Internet usage and even has council members rummaging through people's dust bins before the rubbish is picked up"
Who'd have thought it hey?!
The Russians don't know the half of it though do they?
We have Brown telling lies about the economy, the BBC reporting Browns lies as fact and the Conservatives lambasted when they oppose the government.
I'm not sure Cameron's speech today is going to overturn this strange New Labour world we live in - but at least it is a step in the right direction.
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#38 expertfloatingvoter
Is this all by word of mouth, or do you reckon you could get an e-mail/memo from Conservative central office saying this?
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#55 distanttraveller
That may be true, but there is still some service that is being cut - even if it is, as you say, a wasteful and/or pointless one.
Plans to cut spending are far more credible if they pinpoint the areas where spending will be cut/growth will be slowed, identify which activities are wasteful, and give some idea of how spending growth will be reduced.
The next stage of Cameron's "Fiscal Masterplan" has to set out credible plans - an intention is a start (though at the moment it is really a re-packaging of the "sharing of the proceeds of growth" policy)
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greatandydudley @58 Wrote
"I know of 3 Tory activists in the West Midlands who share a common nom de plume and use it under instruction and with pre-written scripts e-mailed to them every time Boy Davis speaks..."
Then name them!
If you don't then you are all mouth.
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I was in the plush new department's waiting area at my local hospital for a diagnostic test... 3 receptionists chatting amongst themselves making coffee etc. and just me. Piped music, potted palms, blush pink walls, must have cost a fortune.
I get to the business end in the surgery and the machines are easily 30 years old, I can't have general anaesthetic or sedation for what turned out to be an extremely painful and protracted procedure and I had to wait 6 weeks for the appointment as they don't have the medical staff.
Thanks Gordon for wasting the billions poured into 'improving' the NHS.
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Cutting public spendind is going to be a huge problem,particularly for the tories.I suspect between now amd the next election the power of the unions will be increased whether by laws originating from our defunct Nu-labour party or from over-zealous EU rules. As the main power base for the unions is now the public sector (which has been hugely politicized under labour...just look at the bbc) and as the public sector is where significant cost savings will have to be made, if the conservatives win the next election i anticipate that the country will be unmanageable.....Back to the wilson/heath era anyone??
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#52
I agree. Anyone coming in looking to 'trim the fat' is really spoilt for choice these days.
The single fact that the Department for Work and Pensions has more employees than the British Army has soldiers says it all.
The cost of Labour's red tape and nannying is summed up excellently in a book called 'How to Label a Goat' by Ross Clark.
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#59
That's probably because NuLabour are the current party in government?
You don't need any party allegiance to know that, surely?
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I'd love to see Mandy on Strictly Come Dancing - it'll be the our only chance to vote this unelected 'individual' (I had to retype what I initially wrote) off and get him out of our lives...
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Please never forget 10p tax issue was solved with borrowing
This new stimulus is through borrowing.
Brown has wasted it all, and we have mortgaged our hospitals and schools for the next xx years.
He should be charged with crimes against the state and the taxpayer.
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come off it these parties are all the same corrupt inept and should be removed fully from government.
none has the answer and becouse they are to busy fighting each other they have shown themselves as petty small minded and not realy capeable of running for a bus let alone our country.
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#38
As an apolitical observer of this blog I'd just like to say that I would not be suprised if both of the major political parties were involved in this and it's not to be unexpected.
What I can add is that a friend of mine has been employed as an external consultant to several major government departments in an advisory role in helping 'massage' data and statistics. This is to give out the 'impression' to the public/media that the department has been achieving its targets and goals, even if that is not strictly the case.
This is obviously thought to be extremely worthwhile by the government as he is very well renumerated for his 'input' and has two very nice and expensive German cars. I know know where my tax money is going!
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Re 41#, i think the next party election slogans will be repeats of the 2 most succesful slogans of all time.......
1) Labour isn't working and
2) Things can only get better...
Preferably with coverage of the most popular politicians of all time singing it ie Mandelson.Prescott, Brown and Blair with Campbell adding backing vocals....
got to be an election winner for whichever opposition party uses it.......even the Monster Raving Looneys
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@69 Frank - Castle, as stated I am an expert in nothing, it was the name I was offered when joining this messageboard. Who the hell is Mr Draper?
I am not happy with Labour either and yes they have their hands dirty with regards the recession. However, I cannot see any reason for me to vote Conservative at the next election and came on here to see if I was missing the point.
All I have recieved is abuse for not joining in with everyone elses viewpoint.
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Wonderful isn't it?
People have the opportunity to express their views here..but if they show any particular political leaning,they are pilloried and accused of being (mainly) in the pay of the Tories.
Don't those of you that constantly make such accusations realise that you look, and sound, completely paranoid.
Has it ever occurred to you that, perhaps, their comments might just be their personal views?..which they are entirely entitled to have.
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I think your analysis is right, Nick. The Tories have aligned themselves as the Party of fiscal responsibility and hopefully sustainable tax cuts. The government position will be that it's the same old Tory public service cutters.
Hopefully the electorate will be able to make the distinction between spending cuts and a slower rate of spending growth. A fairly sound policy I would have thought.
I groaned when you used the dreaded phrase "the sums don't add up." The most trivial and ambiguous phrase ever used in politics.
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So let's consider the likely effects of the recession.
Say for 2009, a 3% decline in GDP is likely.
Using Labour's own projection GDP is 1.399tn pounds.
Well actually it's going to be 97% of that now, so 1.357tn
So government spending of 620bn will represent 44% GDP using the original figure or 46% of the revised figure.
So they will need to borrow another 3% GDP or £42bn more next year.
Then add the unfunded tax cuts... say £22.5 (midway between 1 and 2% GDP)
So the government will need to borrow another 64.5bn next year!
Madness.
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Don't trust Cameron and his Eaton cronies. The NHS is now at risk, state education is now at risk and crime will escalate as police funding gets slashed. Nothing is sacred to Cameron except power to the rich
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At long last. There is now a glimmer of hope that DC will take an axe to the profligacy of the Nu Liebour project.
There is no need to cut expenditure on essential public services as there is endless scope to do away with all the pointless quangoes, Guardianista jobsworths etc etc.
We all know that Governments do not spend our taxes well its just that Labour are even more profligate. The boom was all smoke and mirrors, the bust is for real and WAS NOT MADE IN THE US as the Big Girls Blouse would have us believe.
Bye bye Gordy, Ally, Mandy and the rest of the spin merchants. Of course they will say that the "Tory figures do not add up". As ever, they will lie and lie, and lie again. And the British Bias Corporation will repeat their lies ad nauseam. Sadly for them and their lackeys in the BBC we are all much wiser and won't be fooled.
Are DC and the Tories any better than the present shower? I'm not sure. But what's certain is that we ought to give them a chance. Brown has never had a proper job in his life. Like far too many of the political class throughout Europe he hasn't a clue about running a business.
Brown has ruined our pensions, sold our gold for a handful of washers and stealth taxed the country to death. The lack of improvement in our public services is lamentable for the money spent.
When you are up to your ears in debt you do not borrow more. What's true at an individual level is also true for the country. Anyone who tells you otherwise is lying to you.
So be it if we have to take some additional pain now. The balance sheets of the UK, individuals and companies have to be cleaned up. If there are casualties that's all part of the process. Life is not meant to be a garden of roses and that's the difference between the utopia of the Nu Liebour project and the reality of life.
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I really am beginning to wonder how the Tories can win the argument. If they tell the truth to the public that we can no longer sustain the public services as they are, the government cries they are going to make cuts and the media pretty much does the same. The government continually lies to the electorate and the media does not point it out. Its like Gordon Brown says the world agrees with his ideas on tax cuts when in actual fact it was only only for the countries which have been fiscally responsible, which we certainly have not been and the media announces that Gordon Brown is hero to the world.
Money needs to move from the public sector to the private and the ring fenced pensions enjoyed by the public sector must stop , but Labour will never do this because its their core voters, and if the conservatives say it they will never get in, no wonder they are cautious.
Im afraid reliance on the state has become so big under Labour it now controls every part of our lives and it appears much of the media.
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#73 Balahamu, haven't got a clue,it is just what I have been told.
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@57
And you think Labour are any better?
Take the expert from your name
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greatandydudley wrote:
#38 - you are absolutely correct.
Thge problem is that people clearly like you and me not pro-Labour by any stretch of the imagination - get tarred with the same brush - if we are not Pro Boy David - we are bolsheviks...
What I find strange is that all the people who suggest that the Tory party are hiring people to post on web sites always claim to be politically neutral - yet they only ever seem to target the Tory party.
CEH - probably the king of this group claims to a non-Labour party voter yet comes out with more pro-Labour comments then Mandleson.
Ironically the people who actively suggest a preference to Labour (rather then posting comments against the Tory party yet claiming to be neutral) never suggest that people who have opposing views are paid Tory members.
Dare to comment that part of the global crisis has its roots in the unregulated me first mate Thatcherite and Reagan days of the 80's and you'll get sent to the gallows literally.
Yes, the right wing bloggers hang everyone that doesn't agree with them, but they must be zombies as they keep coming back! (I suspect that you mean "figuratively"! ;) )
They are'nt yet automation robots,but they are'nt real people - I know of 3 Tory activists in the West Midlands who share a common nom de plume and use it under instruction and with pre-written scripts e-mailed to them every time Boy Davis speaks...
Damn, those Tory plants are stupid! They are paid to post by the Tory party and yet proudly tell every "floating" voter they know about it! I would have thought that there would have been some confidentially clause in their contracts!
So how much does the Labour party pay to spread all these rumours about the Tories? And is it taxable? ;)
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@58
Rewrite your post substituting Brown for BoyDave and vice versa and you will see how biased you truly are
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"The next stage of Cameron's "Fiscal Masterplan" has to set out credible plans"
Indeed, yes, but not before an election is called. They'll be open to the usual Labour criticism of 'no policies' of course, but better that than to have those policies immediately claimed by the governing party.
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No surprise here, just like Maggie he'd rather sit back and sacrifice the people who's hard work made this country strong.
As long as his core support doesn’t suffer too much he and Gideon will be happy.
I am no great supporter of the Labour party, but at least they seem to understand the damage that mass unemployment will have on this society.
If the Tories could try and put there maniacal fear of Tax rises aside and treat the labour parties approach as an investment in people and society, then they might mature as a party and leave some of there private boys club mentality behind.
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Regarding sums and adding up - there is a clear consensus between the Tories and the Liberal Democrats that there is an awful lot of waste in current Government spending. Identifying waste and cutting it out could go a long way to reducing the deficit, without impacting on front line services. Labour will have to do better than bleat about sacked nurses and untaught children - nobody likes to see taxpayers money frittered away on useless projects like the 11 billion on the NHS computer system.
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balhamu wrote:
#38 expertfloatingvoter
Is this all by word of mouth, or do you reckon you could get an e-mail/memo from Conservative central office saying this?
My guess is that it is made up, simply because I would expect that IF the Tory party did hire people to do this they would have a confidentuality clause in their contracts that would prevent them from discussing what they did!
However, there is probably an email telling supporters to spread the word on online message boards but I expect that is the same from all major parties.
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It seems apparent to me that all the government apologists who come on here work on the assumption that everyone who criticises the government is under direct employ of the Conservatives, a laughable, woeful paranoia.
It also seems apparent to me that many of us who criticise the government seem to think that the apologists are all under direct employ of NuLabour, which might be true, but I confess I find it a stretch of the imagination, even for a party as despicable as them.
Then of course there's CEH, who if he isn't Alastair Campbell is probably meditating somewhere in a bubble of his own smugness.
Isn't there anyone else left on here who still has an open mind on anything? Because rather than seasoned debate there seems to be far too much playground points-scoring going on at the moment.
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greatandydudley wrote:
# 50 - GET YOUR FACTS RIGHT!
The Millenium Dome was the creation of one Michael Heseltine - Labour inherited its spending and creation - TORY SPENDING TORY WASTE!
The idea was a Tory one, but the overspend and the actual content was Labour.
We have no idea if it would have been a success under a Tory government, or if it would even more of a failure.
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The Guardian are running a highly scientific poll
Your chance to vote Brown here
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expertfloatingvoter wrote:
#49 First time on here, how do you know that the overcritical are being blackballed or deleted. You cannot see a comment until it has been moderated.
Maybe, just maybe, they have seen one of their own comments moderated?
Plus it is not uncommon for a message to pass initial moderation and then get refered to the mods and THEN get moderated.
Although, nice job on pretending to be new!
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I'm not too sure about trusting the Conservatives' judgement on anything really. They couldn't even see through Labour's smoke'n'mirrors, we're-doing-what-we-think-best, gung-ho attack on Iraq. In fact they overwhelmingly supported it. Labour and Conservative? You couldn't get a cigarette paper between them, and I wouldn't waste one trying.
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These two really are a couple of comedians. Both of them must sit at night trying to think up one liners in order to get one over on the other. For me it really doesn't matter who is in power or what promises they make. They are all as bad as each other. Every government this country has had has lied and broken election promises. That is why the turnout at elections is so low. You might as well just sit back and watch the show and hope that the comedian doesn't pick on you while up on stage.
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71 wrote:
"The Tories are the 'court jesters' of politics at present - Little Lord Fauntleroys in velvet slacks who get elocution lessons in speaking estuary!"
To me this is nothing short of extreme inverted snobbery worthy of someone not unlike John Prescott. It failed miserably as a ploy in Nantwich and Crewe but hey keep it up becuase it's doing your cause absolutely no good!.
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Whatever your political allegiances there are a few facts to consider.....
Our country is in deep doo doo and in no fit state for the quick recovery that is promised...
Do we allow the man who put us all in that position to carry on doing so or....
do we vote for change....
Could it be any worse with someone different in charge ????
Its the equivalent of catching Dick Turpin red handed giving him a pat on the back and saying don't do it again,to vote Labour back in.
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Dear Nick
Cameron is RIGHT,
Gordon Brown has bottled it, this country is going to really suffer with the financial apparatus now put in place by labour, it will be an absoulte major disaster .
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Here Nick,
there's a thought that occurs amidst all these headlines, and falsely posed questions.
The RPI is down to "only" 4.5 percent, whilst the CPI is down below 2 percent. forecasters are predicting that interest rates could go lower, perhaps below 2 percent.
Now those of us whose income is dependent upon the level of interest rates, pensioners etc., they are going to suffer severe deflation, perhaps stagflation. Those of us attempting to save for retirement are going to have similar problems, since any incremental income will be below the effective cost of living. And anybody who buys index linked government securities will also be suffering, because they're tied to the CPI, I believe.
Instead of wondering what the tories might need to do, or not need to do, in eighteen months time, let's focus on the here and now, and ask this lot what they plan to do to address these issues now, or at least next week in the Autumn statement.
Now am I holding my breath that this will bring joy everywhere? No.
Do I think some people might be pleasantly surprised? No.
We're doomed, and the captain of the ship who got us here can't admit to it, and therefore can't begin to address the problems. And it's becom ing increasingly clear that we are on our own in this.
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Why don't we cut benefits of very long term unemployed, say people who were unemployed for over 10 years. Also as a proportion we have more people claiming disability then any other country; I don't have an issue paying disability benefit to those who are truly disabled as long as the payment are reasonable.
We can use this money to cut taxes for middle and lower income people.
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David Cameron made a passing reference to the fact that he wrote the disastrous 2005 Conservative Manifesto and seeks to position himself as the guy who tells the truth about Tax. Is there any chance that he could spend an hour telling us what part he had in Black Wednesday, as part of the time the Tory line is that he was just a bag carrier on the day, however when he was accused of being a novice he was suddenly transformed by Tory Central Office into Norman Lamont's senior economic adviser and now he personally handles all of the Tory Economics Announcements to avoid the embarrassment of letting Good Time George Osborne making a hash of it. Surely he could use his next TV Interview to set the record straight.
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expertfloatingvoter wrote:
#53 I am no expert at anything, it was a username I was offered when I asked for my username to be floating voter.
Really? Well that seems unusual, I would have expected the suggestion to include a number i.e. floatingvoter_1 not a word that would make no sense in front of many nicknames (expertJohnSmith wouldn't make any sense for example)
I am not pro-Conservative or pro-labour. Is this how it works on here, if you are not pro-Conservative you are accused of being a troll.
No, you aren't accused of being a troll if you are not pro-conservative, there are a number of people who are openly pro-Labour/left wing and the majority of them come out with intelligent counter points to dicussions (usually with evidence to back up their accusations, balhamu is a good example of this)
However, what is troll like behaviour
I would consider troll like behaviour to be:
a) claiming to be neutral yet only targeting one side
b) making unproven accusations to discredit one side but not the other
c)
I only mentioned what was mentioned to me. With regards Labour being unpopular, they are behind in the polls, but not by 95% as which what the posts being anti-Labour on here.
It is far from 95%, I can think of a fair few pro-Labour/left wing posters on this site, and several "neutrals" who only attack one party or the other. I would say that those who are unhappy with Labour is probably about 70% (which when you look at the polls is probably about right!)
Although, I find it funny that you chose 95% which is the exact same number chosen by "greatandydudley" - another poster who claims to be neutral yet only targets the Tory party.
"Finally,if you dont believe that 95% of them are'nt in the paid or voluntary employ of Tory HQ"
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It's a start, but we're going to need the beef pretty soon. The Tories performance as the Party of Opposition over the past 12 months has been lamentable. What we need now are some crunchy policies telling us clearly how the hell the Tories are going to get us out of the unprecedented economic mess created by Gordon Brown.
If the Tory policies are half-baked and/or fuzzy around the edges then Gordon Brpwn's economic mess will evolve into social chaos in due course.
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#75 - I will gladly name them - but you of course know full well that without their tacit permission I would be breaking the rules of this site to do so.
However,I am 100% certain that if you were to contact directly either your local Conservative Office or Conservative Central Office they would do this for you....
Alternatively,you may wish to visit - as any member of the public can - indeed you can even stand outside and watch if you like - 2 or 3 activists right now in the quite public public Office of the MP for Bromsgrove Julie Kirkbride MP - anyone standing and looking through the window will see 2 or 3 Conservative Party activists quite openly blogging on political and media sites of all types - now tell me that is NOT orchestrated or pro "Boy David" - and they dont even stop and hide it when you walk in!
Its not illegal,its not wrong- but it does need to be highlighted as a fact!
I know for a fact the same thing happens in Aldridge and Brownhills - Richard Shepherd MP!
These are irrefutable facts I stand by - and can do so without naming individuals names!
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#83 Manendo
That doesn't surprise me in the slightest - after all, who needs truth when you have statistics?
I for one would love a society where you get what you pay for as a taxpayer. Unfortunately as was also pointed out in #76, most of our money goes on re-arranging the deckchairs on the Titanic and ploys to convince the passengers that the ship isn't sinking, they won't need lifeboats, and they'll reach shore very soon.
In other words, our taxes have been spent on spin. And you don't need to be a Tory to be utterly outraged at that by now.
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#85 - it is'nt worth the effort mate - the Tory spin machine is after the BBC,after Nick Robinson,after Michael Crick it glorifies in the totally unbiased reporting of course of party members like Tom Bradbury and Daisy McAndrew on ITN - my God I even find myself watching Sky these days for the totally impartial - well certainly compared to ITN reporting it is of Adam Boulton!
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Tax cuts, viz fiscal stimulus are fine (as other countries accept) if short term and you can afford them. The difference is that this country can't afford them because of Brown's ineptitude and therefore the effects will be not just long but long, long term.
Darling says today that savings have been made and more are to be made - whoops! Cat's now out of the bag - Brown has been wasting money which can be saved; nobody could possibly have guessed that!! At least not from what Brown has been saying. Savings now, why not earlier? To finance public sector over-employment possibly ?- and jobs means votes.
Good to see that your pro- labour bias has not been affected by your jaunt to USA Nick
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#89 - Wait for tomorrows EMERGENCY DC News Conference
DC announces he will afford tax cuts by the immediate repeal of the Hunting Bill when he walks in to No 10 - the justification is that he wont have to fund clandestine legal fees for the likes of Otis Ferry and his group of upper class toffs.
This is a funded tax cut he will announce - the release of political prisoners like Otis will free up the prisons and the Courts and we estimate save £1billion over a decade.
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@85
You didnt come on here seeking opinion to see if you had missed the point at all
You came on here and spouted an anti conservative veiwpoint while using a floating voter moniker.
Maybe you are a floater
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@89
Ah i see another draper clone has been let out of the cage
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#97 SPOT ON!
In fact one ex Cabinet Minister - under Major - I think it was Michael Fallon - I caught it on Newsnight last night - actually stood up in the Commons yesterday and to applause from the Tory Back Benches said exactly that..
WE SHOULD DO NOTHING !
We should'nt spend more,we should'nt tax more,we should let the markets take their course - this is the only course of action!
Cameron and Osborne sat there and smiled.....
Laissez Faire - its in the Tories Blood - the only time they dont Laissz Faire is to look after their own!
Lets be brutally honest dc and Gideon!
"Targetted and Funded Tax cut....
is Toryspeak for giving Inheritance Tax breaks to the 4% of the population that dont need them,is giving a Council tax freeze to those Tory Councils that apparently "freeze Council Budget or keep it below a 2% rise whilst BUTCHERING Social Services - like Tory Brimingham - which results in a 6 year old child STARVING to death!....
The more they moan and bleet,the more they do nothing the more their nightmare and many of ours becomes more likely - 5 more years of Brown!
I AM NOT A LABOUR VOTER - I WANT AN OPTION - IC ANT FIND ONE - AT THE MOMENT BROWN IS THE LESSER OF 2 EVILS! - I believe I am in a growing majority who want an Opposition to vote for - but see Cameron as more right wing than Thatcher,more indecisive than Major,less affable than Heath and about as politically aware as Duncan-Smith....
Where is the "dream ticket Davis AND Clarke - now that would be worth consideration!
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@85, expertfloatingvoter.
Apologies if I got you wrong, and you're not receiving abuse, you're having your opinion eviscerated and it's something you might want to get used to. This is one of the more civilized boards on the web, and growing a thick skin is something of necessity.
As for the next election, there are more options the Tories or Labour.
You have the Lib-Dems, other parties such as the Libertarians, even local Independents.
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I don't think the tories are going anywhere near far enough. What they have done is refuse to support the future insane level of INCREASE in public spending that labour mistakenly feel is needed. In other words, the tories will not waste as much as labour does. Cameron has NOT stated that he will CUT anything.
Labour ALWAYS cry out with their false scare stories that schools and hospitals will close if the tories spend less than labour, but they always ignore the mountain of their own waste. Scrapping the worthless and unworkable multiple national databases, that they admit that they cannot secure anyway, would save at least 20 - 25 Billion straight away. Then there is the multitude of quangos that exist solely to justify their budgets by creating mindless and un-necessary red-tape and rules. and rules about rules and rules about those rules about rules. etc etc....
We need at least 50 Billion in spending cuts immediately. The Government wastes about 100 Billion anyway. You could easily cut 50 Billion without effecting a single operation or classroom or the police. In fact you could make these things far more efficient.
Labour have been lying to us daily for many years, even to the extent that they have committed war crimes and lie to this day to cover it up. the Iraq invasion was an illegal war of aggression based on lies. Saddam was not in breach of UN resolution 1441. If anything, the action of the USA in refusing to submit most of the Iraqi arms declaration of 2002 to international scrutiny in the security council is a breach of 1441. Iraq complied with 1441 and the west refused to accept that complicity, lied about it and invaded a sovereign nation in an action that has led directly to the deaths, injuries and displacement of over five million people. All because of labour lies.
Do not believe them when they falsely claim that the tories will cut schools and hospitals.
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Nick
David Cameron worries me - can he negotiate instead of assert ? Can he work with anyone other than the Tory party faithful? Is Mr Cameron scared to be seen in Paris? What will he do as Prime Minister - behave like a grumpy old timer not happy with changes at the Golf Club and vote against anything?
What will he say if he has to negotiate with the EU "taking the people for fools" - not clever. This would be even worse with Chinese or the Russians!
The Tories appear to be going back to the "Borrowing bad" morality. Well Mr Cameron if I buy a Premium Bond I am saving and the Government is borrowing.
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Nick,
On the BBC website, this blog is currently advertised by this question..
"To the Tories - how much less will be spent on what?"
Fair question. Although, historically I can't remember a single occassion when the opposition party has laid out detailed spending plans some 2 years in advance of a probable election.
But Nick, I digress. I have no problem with you asking akward questions of Her Majesties Opposition, I just wish you and your BBC colleagues would do the same with the current GVN.
For example - When Minister's say that their current splurge in spending and tax cuts with be offset by 'adjustments' in the medium term. Please ask them to define both the level of the adjustment i.e. tax rise and the time-frame. Moreover, when Minister's boast of how the GVN is bringing forward capital building projects and other public works to sustain the economy in the recession, please ask for specific examples. So far, despite the rhetoric - we have none.
Oh! And one last point - when the Chancellor announces the projected borrowing requirement for the years ahead. Don't just take his word for it, ask other economits if his sums add up - because historicaly ever y forcast made by this current GVN has proven to be hoplesly optimistic.
So please, ask tough questions all round and remenber, you are here to hold both the GVN and the opposition to account.
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Would the Tory Bloggers who claim that they can't announce their policies for fear Labour will steal them explain why when Labour implement the policies they are rubbish and are then criticised by Tory bloggers. Is the mess we're in due to Tory policies?
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Bradgate5 @89 wrote:
"Don't trust Cameron and his Eaton cronies. The NHS is now at risk, state education is now at risk and crime will escalate as police funding gets slashed. Nothing is sacred to Cameron except power to the rich"
You forgot to mention that the sky would fall, too.
[BTW: tell Derek it's spelt 'Eton'.]
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Cameron should not fear the NuLabor/BBC onslaught. Most people will welcome a cut in the bloated Public Sector and are heartily sick of working so hard to provide those apparachiks with better golden pension than they can themselves expect. Any one knows you cannot spend wildly when times are hard it is basic economics and the "clever" ones coming up with ideas are the same ones who went along with the 11 years of Brown's rubbish logic anyway and look where we ended up. Any fool can spend other peoples money but it takes a bigger fool to spend those peoples children and grandchildrens money. I give you Brown the Clown
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I don't know what is up with you Mark WE but grow up. It doesn't matter what my stupid username is, it was the first one I was offered, one of them was steelfloatingvoter, how the hell would that make a difference from the one I have. Ask the moderator if you do not believe me.
I came on here to see if there was more to what Cameron had been saying than what I was hearing. All I have read is a bunch of childish remarks made to anyone who doesn't agree with the majority. Maybe I will go to ConservativeHome, I may get a more intelligent response.
With regards what my friend had told me, I wish I hadn't mentioned it now, it was an observation of what was said to what has been posted on here today.
They say the House of Commons is child like, they want to read the posters on here.
I may come back when the kids have gone to bed and ask thier parents.
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Bradgate5 (1.15 pm) wrote that “The NHS is now at risk, state education is now at risk and crime will escalate as police funding gets slashed.” Wrong! There is absolutely no need to cut front line services. What IS needed is a cull of the useless bureaucrats, jobsworths, Guardianistas and quangos that are doing so much to ruin this country and make our lives miserable.
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expertfloatingvoter @92, wrote:
"#73 Balahamu, haven't got a clue,it is just what I have been told.'
By whom?
Your neighbour? A guy in a bar?, Derek Draper?
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"With one bound they were free."
With one General Election we'll all be free.
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@10
Hahahaha
They are only getting a 60-40 split on a pro Labour site.
That is truly bad
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#112
Being politically neutral does NOT make me or anyone else a troll.
My definition of neutral is this-:
I dont belong to any paticular party. I was for 5 years a member of the Lib Dems. I left them becuase frankly they were irrelevant and wooly and locally played at politics. In 11 General Elections since being able to vote I have voted Tory 3 times,Lib Dem (or SDP)5 times and Labour 3 times - I am the classic swing voter.
My political views range from right wing on some of the moral issues - gay marriages/immigration etc to left wing on others I was a member of the anti apartheid movement and find myself being fundamentally pro palestinian - although I could be described as anti Islamic fundamentalism (I fear the Palestine and Islam issues are WRONGLY Linked).
Fiscally I suppose I am margingally left of Centre!
My problem with Cameron,and therefore I am slanted against him is that personally I dont think he has a clue,neither does Osborne.Cameron lets be frank was a media creation,he wowed the blue-rinses on the back of 2 speeches both delivered in a poor salesman than won over from the far more politically wise and experienced David Davis. I have heard Camerons 2007 conference speech called political legend - it was 60 minutes of woffle that Blair would have been proud of - the only true words were at the beginning "I'm going to talk to you without notes so apologoes if its not very good"
The Lib Dems under Clegg are a political wasteland - the irony of this is that in the admirable Vince Cable they had one of the few politicians to forsee the global crisis who not only commented on it - but offers still practical solutions on it....if the next parliament is hung wither party would be wise to utilise the skillls Cable has.
I am no fan of Brown,or Blair-the sadly missed John Smith could have and would have delivered for this country a far better left of centre Government,but Brown to his credit has at least offered plausible leadership ata time of crisis for which he is to be given some credit.
Political rules and guidelines are out of the window-it is a global crisis and we need gloabally aware politicians-with the exception of Clarke and Davis I dont see any in the Tory Party.
That does'nt make me a Troll - it makes me a political enthusiast who just happens to have diverging opinions about British Politicians and policies.
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@ 7 , garethm2 wrote:
"How can Labour claim that the Tories sums dodn't add up," when the rocketing PSBR would suggest that their own sums don't add up?
Or am I missing something here?????"
Well considering that labour have spent the last 11 years consistently decrying the tories and claiming that you cannot cut taxes and increase spending at the same time in any fiscally responsible way. Yet all of a sudden it is the answer to the mess that they helped get us into???
Labours economic policy does not add up and it never ever did.
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#124 - if last weeks PMQ's is anything to go by he is a bully who will throw his briefcase at anyone who disagrees with him....
we've been here before - change the briefcase for the handbag!
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People will say that they don't trust Gordon Brown/New Labour but when it comes down to it they have an even deeper distrust of anything "Tory", even if they have no idea what any of the Tory policies actually are, because there's this weird fear that the Conservatives really want to steal from the poor to give to the rich.
What we need in this country is a rebranding of political parties!!
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greatandydudley wrote:
I AM NOT A LABOUR VOTER - I WANT AN OPTION - IC ANT FIND ONE - AT THE MOMENT BROWN IS THE LESSER OF 2 EVILS!
Perhaps it is time that you admitted to yourself that you probably are!
You seem to have a deep-set distrust of the Tories that I doubt would be shaken even if the Tories actually came out with a fully balanced sensible manifesto which saved every households in the country thousands and still managed to increase public spending (which quite frankly isn't going to happen).
I am leaning to the Tories at present, but I can easily switch if Labour actually realise that the single childless tax payer can struggle as well. I am tempted to write to both my MP and the Conservative candidate and ask them to win my vote (at the moment only the Tories are chasing it - they send regular details of their plans at a local level while Labour don't bother). We have a Labour MP who just doesn't seem to care, and a Tory council who do.
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When it comes to dealing with the old taboo word 'cuts', the simple and easy thing for the Tories would be to go to the public:
either we are happy with our public services, they are well-managed and improve the standard of our living environment - in which case we are going in to a recession and so must accept that belts need to be tightened.
OR
we are not happy with our public services, they are badly managed and do not live up to our basic expectations of them - in which case we should be paying less for them.
I doubt they will though, they seem to miss the point every bit as much as Gordon Brown does when he answers completely different questions to those he is asked with a big dumb grin on his face.
I think there is a lot of waste in public sector management and NHS management, I doubt there are many who would disagree with that, and to those who do - well I've seen quite a bit so it definitely exists.
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There is unecessary abuse of Osborne calling him Gideon although he prefers to use his middle name George. No issue with that as Gordon Brown's real first name is actually James but he prefers Gordon. So lets be consistent heh? I'm sure Jimmy Brown would not mind.
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The great hope is that Barrack Obama will lead the other countries to close down offshore tax havens and ensure that taxation is fair for companies and individuals. This policy could be an election winner for any political party with the bottle to propose it. It would also keep the Tories out.
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#131 MaxSceptic - if you do not know what I was commenting about why comment at all.
Can any of the kids tell me who Derek Draper is, at least I will have learned something from my visit to the playground.
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#126,
Why should the Tories announce detailed spending plans two years in advance of an election?
No other opposition ever has... Today Cameron has outlined the overall frame-work of Tory spending plans i.e. Spending for 2010-11 with still increase, but not by the 2.3% as currently projected by Labour's plans. No doubt a detailed breakdown of how much each Dept's budget, will be forthcoming in the Conservative maifesto. At this point the electorate can decide who has the better plan - GB or DC?
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greatandydudley @114 wrote:
"#75 - I will gladly name them - but you of course know full well that without their tacit permission I would be breaking the rules of this site to do so."
Nonesense:
The following are the House Rules. Please show us which once prohibits you from naming them:
We reserve the right to fail messages which
Are considered likely to disrupt, provoke, attack or offend others.
Are racist, sexist, homophobic, sexually explicit, abusive or otherwise objectionable
Contain swear words or other language likely to offend.
Break the law or condone or encourage unlawful activity. This includes breach of copyright, defamation and contempt of court.
Advertise products or services for profit or gain.
Are seen to impersonate someone else.
Include contact details such as phone numbers, postal or email addresses.
Are written in anything other than English - Welsh and Gaelic may be used where marked.
Contain links to other websites which break our Editorial Guidelines.
Describe or encourage activities which could endanger the safety or well-being of others.
Are considered to be ‘spam’, that is posts containing the same. or similar, message posted multiple times.
Are considered to be off-topic for the particular message board.
C'mon: name these "3 West Miidland Tory activists".
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#42
balhamu
yet again newlabouring under the misapprehension that newlabour 'investment' spending contributed to growth. This despite a decade of evidence that productivity growth under newlabour was below that of both the Major and Thatcher years.
Why don't you say how newlabour plan to balance the budget or why the golden rules are now suddenly the golden hot potato?
Why don't you say how much newlabour plan to cut from SureStart and education and the NHS as we can't afford the current level of expenditures because we have broken the golden rules.
Newlabour, noideas, oldpolicies.
Is it coincidence that Barack Obama declined to turn up at the G20 no ideas photo opportunity summit this weekend?
Maybe not.
Call an election.
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140 Interesting point - but - I think the fact that Gideon actually changed to George because by his own admittance he fears Gideon is too posh - is the real reason for the derision of some.
If a guy cant be proud of his background then the perception is he may be hiding something!
As for James Brown - the mind boggles at what would happen if he had stuck with that.!
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138 Mark WE -
I'm pretty dam sure I would vote Tory if these things happened
1. They replaced Cameron and Osborne with Davis and Clarke
2. They confirmed that they would NOT repeal the Hunting Bill
3. They confirmed they would maintain spending on Health,Education and Law and Order at 2007 Budget levels
Not rocket science really
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The bias of the BBC is getting to be beyond a joke, please can we have some sense of balance?
It is different when people head for the Guardian or the Telegraph, for instance, since they are probably are aware of any bias and can read between the lines. The BBC though informs a great number of people who rightly expect impartial reporting from a service which they pay for.
As the largest news corporation in Britain they have a responsibility to either to declare their inherent left bent or return to impartial standards.
The current state of affairs smacks of a state run media which endangers democracy.
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Re#133
That should read @102...etc
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What an outrageous concept.
Revenue is down and the Tories proposes cut backs.
So long as they dont hit us chaps at the various vegetable promotion quangos all will be fine I guess.
Could you imagine life without National Chip week! how would we cope.
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147. greatandydudley
Are those conditions in order of priority?
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@140
No way!
James Brown had talent, and his papa had a brand new bag
This one.....well
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It really is simple...
Is Labour asking the electorate to back a government that has got all its borrowing numbers wrong since 1997. Played fast and lose with fiscal policy, botched the regulatory reforms and now after a DECADE of decrying unfunded tax cuts - we have to have them.
NO!
Or the other side that promises sound money & fiscal responsibility, that includes cutting the cloth accordingly for both the public and private sector.
Did you know that the cost of servicing this country's debts in interest payments will equal the entire law and order budget for 2009?
Did you know that by 2010 it will overshadow the defence budget?
The UK Government is living beyond its means.
By 2010, the UK will face this simple choice...
1. Keep growing public spending, increase taxes substantially to re-pay debt and pay for more public spending.
2. Manage public spending by growing it less than the economy grows, start to repay back borrowing, keep taxes as they are and get the UK onto an even keel.
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#144.
C'mon: name these "3 West Miidland Tory activists.
I'm Brian!
And so's my wife!
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#140 niloc
Why did he change his name? Too similar to the Godfather of Soul? Or did James Brown sound too posh for his political ambitions?
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I am political pary independant.
I currently support the tories because they disagree with me less than the others.
While they supported ID cards (under howard) I didn't support any party.
If anyone decides to agree with me more then I'll support them.
I don't beleive anyone supports Browns policies -- any support he has is for other reasons -- self-interest/anti-tory etc.
The funniest thing recently (which for some reason the tories haven't made any thing of) - was the tories telling brown that he "hadn't fixed the roof" and "the cupboard was bare" and that was why he couldn't spend his way out of recession - cos he hadn't saved. Brown goes of the the G20 and comes back with an agreed statement saying that only countries that have saved can consider spending their way out of recession.
I had rather expected the tories to tell brown "see - told you so!".
Brown is such a muppet.
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At last the tories have admitted they have learned nothing in the last 11 years, ie that the public want decent public services not stealth public service cuts, which both todays announcement and the gimmicky freeze in Council Tax amount to.
As to the soundbite often levied against Labour about fixing the roof when the sun is shining, well the roof well and truly needed fixing and thats where our hard earned has been invested, and for me the investment has been well worth it to rescue our education and health services and reverse years of tory rot.
My message to those poor deluded souls who are thinking of voting tory, just look back 11 years and remember how badly underfunded our schools and hospitals where, and then ask yourself do you really want to go back to those dark days.
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@150
Carrots I'm so glad to see you are still around.
I thought you may have fallen foul of Labour cuts to fund the pre-election tax bribe
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
"The Tories,handed this tactic by their friends in the republican party in USA - great lot of good it did them !!!!!!!! - have used this "facebook/blogger" tactic since the arrival of "boy david" -"
That (if true) would be because labour have been doing the same thing since 1993. They had an army of people in Millbank who spent all day writing letters to Ceefax and teletext and the newspapers to attempt to shape public opinion. In those days there were fewer outlets for public opinion.
Ultimately today that small number of people do NOT shape popular opinion anywhere near as much as their day to day experience of living under incompetent, wasteful and deceitful labour mis-rule. The proof in the pudding is the fact that even IF the tories did employ people to write on blogs, (a) there are far too many blogs to write for these days and (b) how can these same people get to speak to the pollsters? the pollsters speak to ordinary people picked at random from a wide demographic. That wide demographic of randomly selected adults (NOT paid tories) has consistently put the tories in the lead in those polls. I think this latest announcement from Cameron will actually increase his support in the country.
So even if you are correct, (which I doubt) you cannot argue that the labour party REALLY has any strong support in the country, (implying that people writing here are not representative of the views of the population as a whole) because the independent polling shows that labour does NOT have any decent level of support.
If it wasn't for profoundly unfair seat boundaries, the current opinion polls would be predicting a complete wipe-out of labour in the commons. In fact due to the pro labour bias in seating, labour can get two million fewer votes than the tories and STILL get a working majority and that is the only reason that labour have any chance at all at the next election. It is NOT due to the popular will of the people.
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Why is it that Labour think that people can't work out for themselves that if the government borrows vast sums to bail out banks, then cut taxes, they will have to find the money somewhere to pay for public services. That money will come from further borrowing but ultimalty must be paid back by tax payers.
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#151 YES!
And I would add at No 4 that no effort should be made to stop any of the excellent work done by the growing DNA database - I believe this is the best crime prevention and clearance device yet invented.
I know its standard phrase but ones DNA on a database is only a problem if you have something to hide....
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@157
In case you hadnt noticed, the roof that you think had been fixed has now collapsed and Gordon's solution is to borrow more to may some pikeys to repair it
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expertfloatingvoter @142,
But I do know what you were commenting about. (The trails on this blog thing are really quite easy to follow: see 38, 73, 92, 131...).
Do check out Derek Draper.
(I highly recommend you wash your hands and gargle with mouthwash after perusing the above link).
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So we no longer have a Shadow Labour Party. That sounds like progress.
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157. redonthebed
Quite right and if the public want it then they must have musnt they.
After all this is England and we derserve it dont we.
Order what ever you like and just send me the bill.
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Nick,
Don't you ever get tired of being seen as Gordons / Labours friendly lackey?
The access you have to Labour is exclusive -yet as a journalist you have spectacularly failed to ask anything like pertinent awkward questions.
I am really sick & tired of your under performance.
We pay you to ask these questions.
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#144/154 I tried to answer you on posting 159 - as I suspected it has been referred - so dont say I did'nt try!
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# 74 balhamu
You say: "That may be true, but there is still some service that is being cut - even if it is, as you say, a wasteful and/or pointless one"
Obviously, I was referring to vital services, which should not be 'cut'! There is a lot of waste in the public sector - and we don't always get good value for money. There is clearly scope for saving money without cutting the service. Indeed, becoming more efficient could actually improve the service.
The real problem is often poor management. Paradoxically, too much management can also be a cause of waste (too many cooks and not enough broth). Another problem is all the micro management from this government, instead of letting people get on with the job.
If a service is "a pointless one" as you mention, then it does deserve to be cut. A prime example of this would be the pointless ID card scheme so beloved by this Big Brother government - who now want to tap all our phones and emails as well. Scrapping the ID card scheme would save between £5.4 billion and £18 billion (I know which figure I believe)
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At last we now have clear policy differences. I certainly hope that the Tories have thought out their reply to what we all know will be New Labour's response. What will they cut, Nick? There is so much to choose from. For a start, simply by scrapping the tax credits system and lowering the starting rate of tax you have saved millions in box tickers and fraud.
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#145 robin
It doesn't matter what I think about the efficacy of spending.
All I said is I look forward to Cameron being able to say something more convincing about where he plans to decrease spending.
Is it nebulous efficiency gains that so often don't materialise? Where are these efficiency gains to be had? Is it, for example, too many receptionists in hospitals (as a previous poster suggested)? What approach willl the Conservative Party take to realise them? What will Cameron do if on entering Government he finds things are actually more efficient than he thinks (as Boris has in London) - what's the contingency plan, what will he cut?
Or is it Government expenditure that the Conservatives consider a waste of time - like some of the quangos that Carrots continually points to? Is it, perhaps, NHS Direct or any number of these services that the Government introduced to try and improve public services? If Cameron can point to what he thinks is waste and what he thinks isn't, it will help people make an informed choice won't it?
Maybe benefits are too high? Tax credits are a waste of time?
Who knows.
But surely to be credible he has to say a bit more about what he wants to do. It's dishonest to have a position where he says Conservatives will reduce spending but refuse to say where spending will be reversed ('we'll just reduce waste' doesn't cut it)
BTW on an earlier blog, you said you'd been to vote earlier in the day. I had a vision of you hanging around outside a polling station all day, every day, hoping an election would be called, and then sadly making your way home. A nice image.
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#164 MaxSceptic - If you did know, why ask if it was a barman etc, when I had already said it was a friend.
Anyway, thanks for the Draper link. Amazed he works for the Mail on Sunday. Them being so NuLabour as you all say on here.
I'm off to ConservativeHome hopefully to find some answers without the bunfight.
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#140 niloc5959
Do you mean Hugh Jeers?
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158. Pot_Kettle
Still here and going strong .... No cuts here, busier than ever preparing for National Carrot week launch.
The teams working on a slogan and logo as we speak, its all going a bit slow and very behind schedule, might be in for a productivity review. Luckily Im in charge of the review body that oversees my department.
He He!!
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redonthebed #157
"that the public want decent public services"
I think the phrase foot and shoot spring to mind.
We all want decent public services, but let's get rid of a lot of those wasteful services, including managers, which adds nothing to decency of services you aspire to, that's what DC is advocating
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expertfloatingvoter
I am not a member of any political party, and never have been.
Re Conservatives blogging for the party, I too spoke to someone, who has Labour affiliations, who said that they do the same. He said the only problem was getting enough people to blog such was the unpopularity of his party.
In truth, any switched on party is going to use any means possibly, legal and probably sometimes illegal, to get their message across.
I prefer to talk to people, and over the last 12 months have only found a few people who say they will vote for Brown (note I didn't say Labour) and they are dyed in the wool Labour supporters or activists.
The majority say they won't vote for Brown, and those who can't bring themselves to vote for Cameron will vote Liberal, Green, and even a couple will vote BNP.
I for one am a conservative voter and think that cameron is going down the right lines, even though I want to see more of the detail. I blog here because I want a change of government and because I really don't like or trust Brown and his cronies.
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greatandydudley wrote:
#112
Being politically neutral does NOT make me or anyone else a troll.
I didn't say being politically neutral was a sign of a troll, in fact I would class myself to be a neutral and like you I lean right someways and left on others, although on some issues you lean right I lean left i.e. gay marriages, I think that Labour came up with a proposal that was fair to all sides and on others I lean right where you lean left - I am not pro-palestinian as I feel that in the current situation to be pro one side is to be anti the other. Both sides have a right to live in peace without state-sponsered terrorists bombing the other side - Islamic groups on one side Israeli army on the other)
I actually said "claiming to be neutral yet only targeting one side". You have to admit that most of your posts seem to be anti-Tory (or Anti-Cameron), and you have also made accusations that the majority of people who support the Tories on this board are plants.
I think it is important to point out the faults of the Tories, but we should not forget who is in Government (that was one of the failings of the Lib Dems under Kennedy IMO they didn't seem to realise that the Tories were no longer the party of government).
I personally haven't been won by the Tories yet, but on a local level they are making the right noises and the Labour party are noticable by their absence.
My personal hope is that after the general election the Lib Dems will gain enough seats to be a powerful alternative in the election afterwards.
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"63. At 12:32pm on 18 Nov 2008, greatandydudley wrote: "The Millenium Dome was the creation of one Michael Heseltine - Labour inherited its spending and creation - TORY SPENDING TORY WASTE!"
I suggest it is you that should get your facts right. The millennium dome as implemented by labour was NOTHING like what the tories had proposed.
The tories proposed a permanent great white dome filled with the best of the last 1000 years of British History to serve as inspiration lasting another thousand years. A permanent structure made of marble or granite that would be a testament to British History and shine a light on all that had made us great.
labour, hateful of our history, turned this into a plastic tent-full of tasteless tat that proved an utterly over-priced failure that had to be rescued by the private sector.
The millennium dome as was built was ALL labour's work.. There is no point trying to distance labour from it once it had proven to be a very expensive and embarrassing failure.
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Simple enough solution to the question implied by Nick's article above
http://cassiuswrites.blogspot.com/2008/11/answer-for-nick-robinson.html
Why doesn't he just ask a Labour minister or two next time he interviews them?
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#160 to say the party political boundaries are unfair is frankly a joke - they will always be unfair to one party or another.
If you read my postings you will see that it is my belief that whilst the majority of the country certainly DONT want Brown,a growing majority DONT want Cameron either!
It is my guess that the gap between Tory and Labour will narrow over the next few weeks to a consistent 2-5% Tory lead.
If as you seem to imply the Polls are accurate,and I have no real view on that although a couple I feel are Tory loaded,then it will be interesting to see where the land lies in the New Year.
The old adage "better the devil you know" will be increasingly pertinent in my opinion.
The public in the main are NOT political beasts,if Gordon puts more money in their pockets and the recession is less deep than the right wing press plead - then Gordon could at best form a minority government with Lib Dem support - thats my opinion.
Outside of the Tory heartlands,in large tranches of the Midlands,North,Scotland,Wales,South West - I simply sont think Cameron connects with what voters want - more importantly - his performance ver the past 6 months or rather lack of it - is beginning to frighten increasig numbers of people who 12 months ago were ready for change....
Opinions of course and thereis one final MASSIVE element in this next 18 months no-one can predict.....
I do not mean this in any disparaging way,I wish the lady no actual harm BUT the spectre of Thatcher WILL HAUNT the Tories if Cameron continues to edge right.....
I'll say it now and get it out of the eay,it is a political view,not a disparaging comment....
If the lady dies some time next year - and I was sat in Labour High Command I would call an election 4-6 weeks after her demise when the seismic outpouring in the nation she so bitterly divided is at its peak....the Tory Party will come out to vote in her memory,the Labout vote will come out to put their marker on her history - the VITAL floaters - hardly Thatcherites are they???
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GB states "spending more is not a problem", as a tax payer watching my private pension go down the pan and my business collaps due to the fall in the pound and change in import rules.
All i want is for Gordan to listen....
I'm thinking of starting a campain to get every one to shout at the top of their voices mid day on a wednesday "GORDAN CALL AN ELECTION NOW", but i suspect that even if 33% of the electorate shouted it would land on deaf ears.
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expertfloatingvoter @ #142
Ever heard of Google? Derek Draper is the husband of Kate Garraway, there. Oh, and also the "shamed former aide of a disgraced Labour Minister". The Guardian's words, not mine!!
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177 I respect your views totally.
My problem is not only nationally do I fear Cameron but on a local level - Dudley/Wolverhampton/Birmingham Tory control of local authorities is a mitigated disaster of dogma,cuts and scandal very reminiscent of the dark days of the 80's and early 90's.
I appreciate you can only base opinion on what you see!
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@126. , billatbasing wrote:
"Would the Tory Bloggers who claim that they can't announce their policies for fear Labour will steal them explain why when Labour implement the policies they are rubbish and are then criticised by Tory bloggers. Is the mess we're in due to Tory policies?"
No it is NOT due to tory policies in the main. What labour tends to do, is rubbish the tory policies, then attempt to implement them as their own creation, (thus earning the stealing reputation) but because they do not understand tory philosophy, they implement the policy badly, spend too much on it, tie it down in unworkable red-tape, spend even more on it, lie about it, re launch it, have an expensive internal review, have an even more expensive external review, relaunch under yet another guise, then repeat under a new minister and then, eventually abandon it blaming the tories for thinking up the policy in the first place.
If labour actually stole and then implemented tory policy correctly, then labour would NOT be so deeply unpopular today.
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This is a bit of a joke isn't it. Every post on here is blatantly pro Tory. They've even got the little soundbites down to a tee. I smell a ruse by Tory HQ
What this is, however, on the bright side, is now a clear difference between the parties, perhaps we can now get away from running the country from the sofa's of breakfast TV programmes and trying to smile more than the other guy to win votes and focus on policy.
The argument was always based on who was the better manager of exactly the same system, now its based on clear political choices.
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#97
I am no great supporter of the Labour party, but at least they seem to understand the damage that mass unemployment will have on this society.
Clearly they didn't understand the damage quite enough to actually pursue policies that might have averted mass unemployment. The CBI is predicting unemployment at three million by Jan 1 2010.
That'll be the fallout from the property bubble that Gordon let bubble away under his nose for the past decade. In fact he didn't just let it bubble - he dropped a Minto into the Coca Cola of property to really get it going.
We had a little appetiser for property bubbles back in the late 1980's. Prices only doubled back then but we still got a pretty severe recession when the bubble burst. All that borrowed money that has to be paid back you see. Can't spend it on other stuff instead. You get a recession. Unemployment. Social unrest. Seen it all before.
Well, wadyaknow, it's back to the future.
Property tripled in value this time around so we can expect it to get much worse. We'll be lucky if we only end up with three million unemployed.
All on Gordon Brown's watch and all as a direct result of his policies.
They haven't got a clue.
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#58 Great Andy
I know of 3 Tory activists in the West Midlands who share a common nom de plume and use it under instruction and with pre-written scripts e-mailed to them every time Boy Davis speaks...
And the common nom de plume is ... ?
If your claim isn't made up nonsense - have you any idea how to apply?
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Camerons speech has been trailed as a Keynote Speech. If that was Keynote then please shut the door and leave the key in the lock.
In no way did it adress the problems of today, instead it was another opportunity for the sycophantic press to kiss the feet of another upper class twit from a public school.
Lets live in the real world with a realisation that things were worse in previous downturns when interest rates were over 15% and the pound was only worth US 1.40
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The way it is going the only ones left with jobs will be those in the public services.
I hardly see how the country can keep on borrowing money to pay for the unemployed and the public services alone.
We do need wealth creating businesses otherwise the only way to survive is to keep on printing money until we end up like Zambia.
No wonder Cameron wants out of Labour's spending pledges.
So far the Tories have been pretty restrained about the true state the country's in. They must now be wondering like Obama what on earth they will be letting themselves in for if they win the next election.
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178
I suggest you go to Birmingham Central Library - in Tory Controlled Birmingham.
Look at the evidence there of Birminghams plan for the Dome situated on the NEC site circa 1992/93 passed to the then Secretary of State Michael Heseltine for judgement.
He declined Birmingham - not unexpected by us Brummies,but referred the idea to London as their plans in his own words were way short of those expected.
The plans and designs are remarkable similar to those finally built - indeed the Birmingham plan included provision to remove the central piece of the dome to facilitate an all seater outdoor stadium with 85,000 seats....
So in one fell swoop Heseltine deprived Birmingham of the Dome,created a carbunkel for London,and necessitated the totally unnecessary rebuilding of Wembley....
But a dome and stadium in Birmingham 110 miles north of the metrpolis - simply would'nt do would it?
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balhamu?
why doesn't 'we'll reduce waste' cut it?
Does this mean you support newlabour profligacy in all its manifestations?
Any right minded individual would support the statement 'we'll reduce waste' and Cameron is right to propose it and newlabour have lost the plot to argue for continuing and extending waste.
Waste is waste wherever it is found and newlabour have hng themselves by promising to carry on spending.
Call an election and give us the chance to turf out the wastrels.
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On government spending I firmly believe that it is no good simply throwing money at services like the NHS (wasteful), setting targets (people find ways to meet them without workinhg for the patients' good), or having constant changes/initiatives (destroy moral).
All services should be designed and operated to provide the maximum benefit at the lowest cost, and not just tinkered with by each successive government. In tjis way any incremental increases in funding can provide a disproportionately large improvement.
My sister in law is a ward manager (2 wards in fact) in a NHS hospital. She brings home cases of waste, silly practive, and financial manipulation on a regular basis. She would like to see common sense prevail, but holds out no hope and will soon retire.
Likewise my wife worked in local government and is now a consultant in the same. She beives that there are some very good "managers" and some very poor ones. These are scared of change, scared of losing some of their little empires, and waste tremendous amounts of time and money.
My approach with clients is to say "If you started your business again from scratch what would you do having learned from the past." The government needs to do the same. However, I am not stupid enough to think we can redesign the NHS from scratch, but the input might help move things in a better direction than tinkering.
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168. At 3:00pm on 18 Nov 2008, greatandydudley wrote:
I appreciate your efforts!
[Though, of course, instead of giving the names you could have just made a list of four-letter words which have been 'moderated' ;-) ]
Maybe the Moderators will let your post stand. I honestly can't see what House Rule is being broken.
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greatandydudley wrote:
#151 YES!
I know its standard phrase but ones DNA on a database is only a problem if you have something to hide....
That would be true accept for the fact that if I go to the bank in the afternoon my DNA and finger prints could still be there when the forensic examiners are checking the morning after a bank robbery
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Although Cameron is dazzling in the Commons I strongly suspect that behind the scenes he is completely constrained by the ghastly Tory old guard - Heseltine, Clarke, Lamont, Major, Lawson et alia.
Shame DC can't focus on something actually relevant at this time - on the immediate plight of the UK 'nation', ie: that so many people are being dispossessed thru no fault of their own.
Not newsworthy I guess.
GC
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190 greatanydudley
I think a carbuncle like the Dome would have improved the look of Birmingham; it couldn't have made it any worse to the eye.
I see they have decided to "rebuild" New Sreet station - there is an eyesore if ever there was one. Dark, cold, windy, dirty, and with natives you can't undertand. Native Brummies I mean, not immigrants.
Is yow al-ryt?
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172. At 3:04pm on 18 Nov 2008, expertfloatingvoter @172,
Arrivederci!
BTW: the 'Bun Fight' is the only worth-while - aspect of this blog. Complaining about the 'bun fight' on this blog a bit like those misguided sad people who are complaining that Whatsisname Sargeant is 'degrading' Strictly Come Dancing.
Nick has long since given up on providing either impartial of insightful commentary, so we might as well have some entertainment.
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#157 Red
My message to those poor deluded souls who are thinking of voting tory, just look back 11 years and remember how badly underfunded our schools and hospitals where, and then ask yourself do you really want to go back to those dark days.
Yep
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162. greatandydudley
Would the first 2 swing it? I mean 3 is just faff isnt it.
Hey glad your a fan on the DNA database front. I have a product you might be interested in:
Cyborg Corps... Guardian Angel:
Youd have to be crazy or a criminal not to have one.
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Hosts subject to violent or criminal thought processes can be identified, adolescent suicidal tendencies can be spotted months in advance, warnings discreetly issued and a Cyborg Corp councilor notified and assigned to start reeducationprogram.
Violent and depressed adults or those with a tendency towards criminal activity can be assisted in the same way, offenders can be spotted well before matters go to far and counseling provided.
Hosts with a chip have the added advantage of being waived straight through all US airports without delay.
Police officers can scan your chips for information, immediately eliminating you from their enquiries. No lengthy interrogations required.
As the Home Secretery said “Youd have to be crazy or a criminal not to have one”.
Ill put your name down for one.
I mean why wouldnt you want one if your not guilty.
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#106. sicilian29 wrote:
disparagingly of my remarks:
"The Tories are the 'court jesters' of politics at present - Little Lord Fauntleroys in velvet slacks who get elocution lessons in speaking estuary!"
Well then since you have taken it upon yourself to defend the indefensible: -
1. What are their economic policies?
2. Have these policies been consistent?
3. Are they self consistent?
4. Have they been costed?
What appals me most is the inconsistency of supporting the government one minute in handling the economic crisis and then not supporting them the next when the same policies are being discussed. This is why I see then Tories under David Cameron as jokers.
(The elocution lessons for George Osborne were widely reported today.)
I do not have much truck with any of the parties, or the non-governmental managers of the country's economics. These 'wonderful' men who are supposed to be able to divine what will happen in years to come and manage such things as interest rates were warned of the impending collapse years ago and did nothing. How come we are expected to trust in the proven flawed judgement of these same people? I want them all sacked (heads of BoE, FSA, Treasury etc.)
I am particularly critical of Tory party policies dating from the time of Margaret Thatcher as, under the guidance of Milton Friedman, she instigated the light/no regulation philosophical attitude to 'free market' economic management - and everybody since has just followed her line.
The Tories now seem to want to revert to doctrinaire Thatcherite policies, as far as it is possible to judge, as they have published no detail whatsoever. When they actually tell us what they stand for then the people will be able to judge them, but at present they are lightweight comedians who are not performing the role we pay them for as the loyal opposition.
David Cameron must, in my view, decisively and absolutely break from the party's Thatcherite past. The libertarian wing of the Tory party must be curbed.
PS I also laugh at Steve Bell's portrayal of David Cameron as Little Lord Fauntleroy in his little purple velvet romper suit with his lace collar and cuffs. I don't find Gordon Brown in the least funny - frightening in his certainty, but not funny and not right.
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#169 Distanttraveller
I'm not saying I disagree with you.
Just that if Cameron sets out what Government does that is wasteful or pointless and ripe for cutting, how he plans to achieve that (e.g. I will abolish the Sure Start programme, I will abolish the complex tax credits system, I will reduce funding for schools in deprived areas), his plans would be more credible than a vague ambition to reduce spending.
It is also far more honest - people can look at how they will be impacted by his plans (e.g. if, for example, Cameron is proposing to fund the 3 billion cost of abolishing inheritance tax by e.g. charging commercial interest rates on student loans, abolishing educational maintenance allowances and abolishing Sure Start) and make an informed decision.
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*Sigh* Another blog post with a 100+ tory commenters :)
So if Brown is wrong, and Cameron is wrong, what is the answer to saving our economy?
As with our personal finances, the country should waste less and earn more. But now is not the time to do it, and I still believe Brown is right to use debt to finance the recession. But only in the short term.
Long term repayments on the extra debt won't hurt us too badly. A few billion over a year or two can be repayed over many more years. And if the money is used wisely, i.e. "business building" we will all be in a stronger position to repay.
As many have pointed out UK, Plc. no longer has a strong manufacturing industry. We don't have the exports, and therefore are not bringing in the money. The strong City Of London shored us up for a while, but with that in tatters perhaps we should look at turning the UK into an attractive place to do business via business tax cuts?
There's no easy answer to the balance. Big costs to the government, such as Defence, Benefits, and the NHS have no easy solution. If we want these services, we have to be willing to pay for them.
It's our choice. And even though the traditional Labour view of strong public services and higher taxes vs the traditional Conservative view of louwer public spending and lower taxes have become somewhat blurred it is still a choice.
We'll see.
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#191 robin
It's just nebulous.
Cameron could say "I'm going to cut public expenditure by 75% without harming services through cutting waste" or "I'm going to cut public expenditure by 36% without harming services through cutting waste"
It's meaningless unless he can pin-point what this waste is e.g. if he can do some analysis that suggests the civil service is overly-managed in some areas benchmarked to large private sector organisations and set out what his plans to reduce it would be and the likely savings from that.
I welcome this change in tack from Cameron (acknowledging that the Conservatives would cut spending), and hope he gives the electorate enough credit to show them the implications of the different choices he would make and not hide behind a "Public Service=Inefficient=All waste that can be cut without altering services" argument. It may suffice for making shouty posts on blogs, but not for plans for government.
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Dont worry folks.
Cheer-up!
Nostradamus is reputed to have reported the end of the world in 2012. We're only three and a bit years away.
"Things can only get better !"
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The difference between Labour and the Tories
Labour : We deserve the best health and education systems in the world
Tories: We can't afford them.
Which is the heart and which is the head?
Which is 'Prudent' and which is profligate?
Everyone knows families who went out and splashed money on buying electronic gadgets, televisions, holidays on credit, remortgaged to releae equity etc
What is happening to them now - IVA, Bankruptcy, Job losses....
Do you really want the country to go the same way?
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greatandydudley wrote:
#160 to say the party political boundaries are unfair is frankly a joke - they will always be unfair to one party or another.
While it is true that there will always be some degree of unfairness I think that it is the boundary system that is a joke. The only problem is that the system to fix that is PR - and that has major flaws (minority governments means lots of under the table deals - look at what the Tories accused Brown of over 42 days detention!)
If the lady dies some time next year - and I was sat in Labour High Command I would call an election 4-6 weeks after her demise when the seismic outpouring in the nation she so bitterly divided is at its peak....the Tory Party will come out to vote in her memory,the Labout vote will come out to put their marker on her history - the VITAL floaters - hardly Thatcherites are they???
Personally I would feel that if the Labour party did do that then they would lose the election easily. I would suspect many of those who may not have liked Thatcher would still take offense of a party trying to gain political capital from her death.
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#200
What appals me most is the inconsistency of supporting the government one minute in handling the economic crisis and then not supporting them the next when the same policies are being discussed.
But this was all just a cynical tactic by Brown to draw the opposition parties in and hang the blame for anything that went wrong on everybody. A bit like the Iraq war.
What would be particularly galling for Cameron and the Tories is that having given Gordon assurances they wouldn't rock the boat when he announced the bank bail-out the whole collapse of the banks etc was reported in the BBC and copied by the lazier press as a 'failure of Thatcherism'. Huh?
So the Tories step inside the big tent and agree not to rock the boat while Gordon runs around frantically trying to cover up the mess he's made of the last ten years and what happens? How does Gordon thank them? He's busy briefing the BBC so they can get out their archive tapes of pin-striped yuppies with massive mobile phones and down-load it onto a handy digital format so they can lead with the story 'Failure of Thatcherism'. He blames the Tories!!
No joke. That's how it was reported. Un_be_lievable.
Can you imagine Cameron's face when he watched the news?
And this surreal 'media narrative' has continued since then. Gordon Brown, far from being pilloried as the incompetent that brought our financial system to the point of collapse is being feted by a supine BBC as the saviour of the western world.
Goebbels would be proud.
This is why I see then Tories under David Cameron as jokers.
Only in the sense that they have, yet again, been made to look fools by trusting Labour. You'd think they'd have learned their lesson after Iraq wouldn't you.
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Post 185 - Mikeytothehill wrote
"This is a bit of a joke isn't it. Every post on here is blatantly pro Tory. They've even got the little soundbites down to a tee. I smell a ruse by Tory HQ"
No it is not a joke - It is strength of feeling. I am not currently a member of the Conservative party, though now they have come off the fence and spoken out, finally, against Labour waste and mismanagement, I might be.
As a small businessman who has funded much of Labour's waste through various tax grabs, I was beginning to feel disenfranchised.
Now Cameron has had the courage to speak the truth, and after the Labour attempts to silence Osborne by spinning some mythical "taboo" when he did the same over the risk to the pound, the Conservatives may have a new member.
I finally have someone I can vote for!
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#194 markWE
greatandydudley wrote:
#151 YES!
I know its standard phrase but ones DNA on a database is only a problem if you have something to hide....
That would be true accept for the fact that if I go to the bank in the afternoon my DNA and finger prints could still be there when the forensic examiners are checking the morning after a bank robbery
I agree with you, Mark. A DNA database is not a good idea. This government have already proved time and time again that they are incapable of looking after sensitive information, and one day some civil servant will get a bit careless and leave his laptop on a train. The newspapers are already reporting a surge in cloned personal information. Wonder where the criminals got that from eh?!!
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@202
Well done you have been sucked in and believe the government and BBC hype.
You now qualify for a pre christmas handout to spend to revive the economy.
I trust we the Labour party can count on your vote once the bribe cheque is cashed
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I am fascinated by the comments posted here and how they seem to follow party political lines. In a lot of cases with no thought to the impact that will be felt by people in the wider community. Although some are amusing I must admit
The last time this reducing public debt was tried my mortgage interest rate increased to 15% -(do a quick calculation and see what your monthly payment today would be). Unemployment reached over 3 million. I was out of work twice for 6 months each time. NHS waiting lists were 6 months or more for most operations. This is what a recession and a low spend economy feels like.
To my simple mind it is not a case of which 'tribe' is right but what is best for the economy and people in the UK.
I think we should look at the facts, the plans for what each party will do and vote accordingly not jump to a knee jerk reaction. For me the jury is still out on who is right I'll wait for all the plans to come in and then make a decision.
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#203
It's just nebulous.
Of course it's nebulous. He's surely not going to be so daft as to come out with something concrete.
Same with Lord HawHaw when asked when we should expect to get around to paying back any 'fiscal stimulus'. Vague references to the future.
Same with Gordon Brown.
'Hey, Gordon, what are you going to do to fix this financial crisis you got us into'
'I won't be afraid to make tough choices'
Huh? Such as....
'The necessary steps will be taken...'
Errr. Could you be more specific?
'We are working on a series of measures right now...'
Errrrr. What kind of measures.
'Responsible measures. Appropriate measure..'
etc etc.
You can't demand anything concrete from Cameron when you seem quite content to let Brown away with any amount of vague waffle.
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@205
Your comment typifies the "I want it now" childishness that pervades society today.
I suppose you will be getting a 600 inch plasma for Christmas regardless of whether you can afford it or not because you clearly deserve it
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I have a proposal to the Tories on the really hard question, 'how much less should be spent on what?'
How about scrapping the ID cards? That should be quite a saving. Well, it's a start!
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#192.
I hear similar stories, over-bureaucratic management and lots of forms to fill out. Plenty of managers looking to skim a bit of any 'investment' for their empire.
In the case of poor Baby P, over-loading its case workers and shackling them to a computer for 80% of their time isn't doing the job.
So putting another tier on managers on top of them is the answer then Mr. Balls?
The compulsion for target-setting and endless form filling and excessive tiers of management from this government is legion.
500,000 extra administrators hired since 1997.
Of course, cutting spending is cutting the front-line staff?
No, it should be bringing private sector business practices into the public sector where waste is theft and streamline these organisations, burn the red tape and forms and empower the front-line to make more of the decisions.
I have every confidence that will deliver substantial savings.
I would do it like this:
1. Recruitment freeze, let natural wastage reduce the headcount, if attrition rates were anything like industry average for staff this would reduce the headcount by 7% a year, in five years by 25%.
2. Any new vacancy is met by someone in the organisation.
3. Introduce personal bonuses for performance, appraise the workforce by their peers, develop the best and worst 10%.
4. "Suggest an improvement" scheme, front-line staff would be allowed to suggest improvements and implement them.
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171. At 3:03pm on 18 Nov 2008, balhamu wrote:
('we'll just reduce waste' doesn't cut it)
Works for me:
Did you know:
Two Home Office interpreters are set to win more than £1 million in compensation after being paid to 'do nothing' for 15 years. A tribunal ruled the women had effectively been redundant since 1990 when the Home Office first decided to out-source interpreting to freelancers. But no one bothered to reassign the pair and while they were contracted to work 41 hours a week, they were paid £25,000 a year to 'do nothing' or asked to do 'basic clerical duties' such as filing to fill their time.
They could have stayed in their 'non-jobs' until retirement but in 2005 they wrote to then Home Secretary Charles Clarke to complain and both women were sacked a week later. They are now claiming compensation totalling more than £1 million after the ruling in their favour. Both women are also seeking an order from the tribunal that the Home Office must find them jobs. The bill to the Home Office could total £2.3 million for compensation and legal costs
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#91 Susan-Croft wrote:
I really am beginning to wonder how the Tories can win the argument. If they tell the truth to the public that we can no longer sustain the public services as they are, the government cries they are going to make cuts and the media pretty much does the same.
I beleive there are huge savings to be made with out cutting services at all - lose ID cards for a start - who would notice?
But going further if public-services were 'cut' and the money returned to the taxpayer, then the taxpayer could *choose* to buy those services themselves *if* they wanted to...
In a number of places OAP's have rejected the offer of 'free' swimming. (this scheme was part of the olympic legacy thing). The OAP's said they would rather pay directly as customers rather than through their community-charge - because they beleive they get a better quality facilities and are treated better as genuine *customers* rather than becoming *benefit recipients*. Strike 1 to the private sector.
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171. balhamu
Waste waste waste:
Did you know:
Reducing sickies by public sector workers, who take off 50% more time than private sector staff, will save £1.7bn
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#212 Mr U
You're right, it would be daft wouldn't it.
Without setting out his plans, Cameron can convince the electorate that they can have the moon on a stick. You can have reduced borrowing, reduced expenditure and no services at all will be cut. How about it eh? It's a no-brainer.
If he sets out his plans, people will start to think 'hold on a minute'. They will look at where tax cuts are being targeted, and evaluate their impact on themselves. They will look at how spending cuts are being achieved, and do the same.
You're quite right. Keep mum, and keep the moon on a stick thinking running. Cut waste. That simple.
I'm surprised though Mr U. I thought there was a lot of functions government did that were a waste of time. Surely you want Cameron to highlight these and say he will scrap them. If you don't push on this, you run the risk of Conservative-lite being elected, as Cameron operates the same cautious policies pandering to the loony left, as the Labour-lite Government we have pandering to the neo-cons.
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171. balhamu
Did you know:
Government spent a 100,000 on a study on how to open a plastic bag and £70,000 to change the name of Arts Council of England to Arts Council England.
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#203 Balhamu
I believe it is unrealistic to expect Cameron to spell out target reduced annual increase in government spending - not cuts in the sort of detail you suggest, when the Government with the support of the civil service has still not firmed up its spending plans for 2010 -2011.
Surely you should be demanding that the Government be more precise, both about the spending plans and the forecast growth which is (apparently) going to mitigate borrowing requirements.
I suggest you then look at Labour's record re actual against forecast growth during the last 10 years and use this data to make your own judgement regarding what the real borrowing figure will be in 2011.
The time to demand detail from Cameron is much nearer the date of an election and after the Government have finalised their figures and commentators can form their own view of how realistic the growth forecasts are.
What we have (at last) from Cameron is a clear statement of principal that we need to cut our coat etc.
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Nick,
I see you're still peddling the labour spin then, despite my complaint to the BBC about pro-labour bias which got completely ignored :)
Despite the best efforts of the BBC news team, I'm afraid the British public can see right through all the lies of Brown. This man has singled handledly ruined our economy when he was an all powerful chancellor. End boom and bust that's a laugh.
Rather than attack the tories for not itemising to the penny there plans why don't you highlight why we're in this mess in the first place. All roads lead back to Brown with Pension tax, ridiculous levels of public spending, bloating public sector workforce, disastrous tri-partite financial regulation etc etc.
18 months and counting until we rid this country of the worst government in our history. If only Brown had more bottle it would be sooner, but I suspect they'll need to arrest him to get him out of no 10 :)
Cameron & Co need to keep their nerve and be honest with the public about the realities ahead, even it does n't get reported on the BBC, and they'll win by a landslide!
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171. balhamu
Did you know:....... That two satellite phones stolen in Iraq cost the Foreign Office almost £600,000 in bills and it took about 18 months before the phones were cut off, despite a junior staff member in the Foreign Office telephony unit querying the huge bills.
The National Audit Office said neither senior staff nor the Iraq Policy Unit bothered to look into it and continued to pay the itemised monthly bills.
One bill included calls to a South Pacific number totalling £289,991. Action was finally taken after the service provider also queried the level of calls
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Number 167
Please could everybody leave Nick Robinson alone. How you can say he is pro-labour following today's blog is ridiculous.
Also please can people stop finishing their comments with. "Election Please"
You may hate Lab but it des not work like that.
ps I am anti-Cameron & pro-Brown.
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#216 carrots
No wonder my stress levels are so high. I nearly blew a fuse when I read this!
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171. balhamu
Did you know that government spent 280,000 on a conference addressed by Blair and Brown on value for money in the public services.
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Haven't had chance to read all of the above...some of us are working...but out of interest, did anyone hear some bloke on 5-Live this morning (I only caught the end of it) - introduced as 'the former economic advisor to Tony Blair' - saying what a complete horlicks the government has made of public finances? Guess that's why he wasn't kept on then.
On today's stunning announcement - about time too! I'd really like for DC to NOT ask any questions, at all, at PMQ's tomorrow. Just stand up and say he can't be bothered, because GB never answers them anyway, and even if he did nobody believes a word he says. So let's save ourselves half an hour and go do something porductive.
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171. balhamu
Or this:
The report on assessing whether 400k spent on modern art for seven hospitals was money well spent actually cost 100k
Yep the REPORT cost 100k
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#220, 222 & 226 carrots
I'm furious and I need a drink and a lie down now!
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215 phaeton
Agreed that private sector practices wouold help.
Your point re bonuses already happens. I know of someone in an education department in ,ocal government who has just received her bonus.
It's no bonuses that are needed, it is improvement bonuses. nayone can get a bonus for a year's work. They should work as follows.
1 Assess the job and see what is required under normal working and normal salary.
2 gain agreement with the post holder about what could be achieved over, say, a three year period, and agree a bonus for that extra work.
3 Set milestones for every 6 months, assess the progress, and allocate bonus achieved (0 to 100% of 1/6th of the total agreed bonus).
3 After 3 years total the six bonuses and pay it. This can be between 0 and 100% of the total.
The beauty of this is that the post holder needs to work hard in each 6 month period and achieve the targets to get the whole amount, not just in the last 6 months. The work then becomes second nature and standard practice.
But of course it has to be agreed at the beginning. If all is going well extra targets can be agreed for the next three years, and the bonus.
Of course it depends on the post holder not cracking up.
The manager of course works to the same system, so good management will be needed for him/her to achieve their bonus.
And standards improve, sub-standard staff will leave, and the department gets better.
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#226 carrots
Did you know that government spent 280,000 on a conference addressed by Blair and Brown on value for money in the public services.
Carrots - You don't happen to know who this conference was aimed at, or which sector attended it, do you?
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#220
You're quite right. Keep mum, and keep the moon on a stick thinking running. Cut waste. That simple.
Worked three times running for Labour.
Scuse me Gordon.. When are you planning to stop borrowing?
'Strong economy...prudent levels of debt...investment...blah blah.....'
I'm surprised though Mr U. I thought there was a lot of functions government did that were a waste of time.
There certainly are. And if I was in charge of cutting waste I'd run through the public service with a song in my heart. And I'd have some friends I trusted (who work for the NHS) do a similar job on the NHS.
But the very first thing I'd do is close the TV licensing office and fire everybody.
Then, after breakfast, I'd get an alphabetic print-out from the DVLC of their entire payroll and fire every other name.
Some time around lunch I'd have expected my trusted advisers to have drawn up plans to fire about 25% of the NHS payroll and later on in the afternoon I'd have simplified the tax code and fired 80% of people at the Inland Revenue. Again, just get an alphabetic printout and retain every fifth name.
On Tuesday I'd fire everybody in schools who wasn't a teacher, dinner lady or headmaster's secretary. I'd hand resourcing for new school buildings and hospitals over to whoever does the job of negotiating building new stores for Tescos. I can't believe Tescos pays 10% of the price that we have to pay for a temperature-controlled well-lit new building
On Wednesday I'd cancel just about every computer system ordered by this government. And ID cards. Obviously. I'd fire anybody recruited as part of the ID card rollout and all the people in the passport offices. In future passports would be issued by post-offices. They've got the forms already.
On Thursday I'd have already have saved the country a fortune for generations to come so I'd fire myself and take the rest of the week off.
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Labours snipe 'the tories sum dont add up'
After 11 plus years of Brown nobody knows what the sums are.
Anybody managed to get a fix on PFI,i know we are owed 183 million over 20 years.
But if you ask HMG they wont/cant give an answer.
So GORDON add up yours please?
So you see 20 years thats an example of the PAY BACK period.
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229 Shellingout
I bet, but this will drive you to drink the bottle
Mandleson is actually paid more than the PM.
Lord Mandleson is paid 202,778 this year, 13k more than the PM on 189,994.
Other Ministers settle for just £166,206, nearly 40 grand less.
He gets a 78,000k a year “transitional allowance” from the EU
He also copped a one-off payment of 15,200 for resettlement expenses even though all he had to pay for was a one-way ticket from Brussels to London (from 51 on Eurostar).
Added to that Mandelson gets £104,386 as Business Secretary PLUS his House of Lords allowance of £5,192 . . . total £202,778.
As a bonus he also gets away with paying less tax than anyone else in the Cabinet. His EU dosh is taxed at 26 per cent rather than the 40 per cent on UK earnings. That saves him a useful 10k a year
Lets not forget his pension at 60 will be at least 75,550 a year.
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#224 My-Pet-dragon
You are pro-Brown? I never would have guessed.
People should leave Nick Robinson alone when he stops being a megaphone for the Mandelson/Campbell spin machine. Until then he is fair game and quite rightly.
Call an election.
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#227
about time too! I'd really like for DC to NOT ask any questions, at all, at PMQ's tomorrow.
Yep. I've advopcated that for a while. Just wait until PMQ and then all get up and walk out en masse
The down-side to this is that Brown wastes valuable hours practising his tractor statistics with his PR people. Plus another half hour in the Commons.
All the time he's doing his swotting for PMQ he's not screwing anything else up. So PMQ at least provides a few hours of respite from him dreaming up any further idiocy.
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#216 carrots (and others)
I'm not saying either a) There is no waste; or b) If there is it shouldn't be cut.
Just that a credible plan would pin-point it more than "public sector is very wasteful and inefficient", suggest high-level plans for reducing it and come up with credible cuts in spending achievable over a realistic timescale without harming services.
It would also seperate between functions that the Conservatives thing are valuable but inefficient, and those that are a waste of time and should be scrapped.
If Labour said something nebulous like "Tax evasion is high, we will fund spending increases by cracking down on it" or "We will fund ID cards from administration savings in Whitehall having to have several duplicating conversations with citizens" without figures attached, you would criticise it.
Looking at Boris in London, he was elected partly through saying that there is too much waste at City Hall. He's having a hard job finding it, and his unrealistic axe-wielding attempt was vetoed by experienced Conservative local government heads such as Simon Milton who understood the impact on services that such cuts had.
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And carrots
The Conservatives should be doing exactly what you do.
You identify areas where you think there is inefficiency, or where the Government spends money on pointless functions.
It's exactly the approach I'm suggesting that Cameron should take (with rather more analysis of whether these things are indeed waste than your deliberately simplistic approach).
My point is that thinking the sentence "We will reduce spending by reducing waste" is not enough - you have to identify waste and what you won't do in future to be credible.
BTW you're #218 is comparing apples and pears. People in large organisations take more time off sick, in both the private and the public sectors. If you compared sickness rates in large organisations across the public and private sector, you'll find that there ain't much difference.
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#236
But that's the beauty of it! GB and his economic assination squad spend all morning trying to guess what DC will ask them, rehearsing answers to the questions that weren't asked in the first place, and then having to spend half an hour in the commons seething because he can't not spout the tractor stats as you put it in response to perfectly reasonable questions. Thereby economy gets saved for half a day. Don't think they should walk out though...just sit and grin...or even better, have a nap. :-)
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@237
The problem with announcing now where you would look for and cut the waste is that those that are identified would spend their time between now and the next election Covering there posteriors and inventing ways to make themselves not look like a waste.
Lets face it up until september 1941 Hitler was still being friendly towards Russia.
You never give the people you are going after a clue. Why do you think the US never found Bin Laden. They let him know they were after him, he had plenty of warning.
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The people who control Cameron are the people who fund his party. That's why he will do whatever the hedge fund bandits want him to do. Tax dodgers will be given even more loopholes to evade Tax just as long as the money keeps coming into Central Office.
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#241 billatbasing
The people who control Cameron are the people who fund his party. That's why he will do whatever the hedge fund bandits want him to do. Tax dodgers will be given even more loopholes to evade Tax just as long as the money keeps coming into Central Office.
Don't know about you, but I wouldn't want to be a hedge fund manager now for anything. Not even DC can save thm now.
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
It appears that there might be some politics at last, and not just a beauty parade about who can spend the same pot better.
The problem for Cameron is clearly that Brown is the better politician, not as good as Bliar obviously, but very good nonetheless. Sadly, he'd think that was a compliment.
I like the idea of boycotting PMQs, I wonder if the non Labour MPs would be willing to try it one week. It would be a great laugh and certainly get the message across of the pointlessness of the exercise.
If the debate is moving onto spending, clearly there needs to be clear assumptions made on available budgets and there is no doubt that revenues to government will be severely curtailed as a consequence of the recession. The starting point ought to be therefore, rather than allowing all the politicos to talk about %s of GDP, to start talking in hard cash numbers, making assumptions on what GDP will actually be.
Any chance the BBC might try this approach?
Aye right.
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You never give the people you are going after a clue.
Well I suspect the BBC got wind of some of the Tory plans. Or Mandelson warned the BBC that the Tories were going to sell them to Al Jazeera or something.
It sure explains the volte face about the Brown reportage since bank capitulation day.
Suddenly instead of being the finger-biting, dithering incompetent he was the day before he's a now Titan on the world economic stage and the whole sorry mess is the fault of Thatcher and Reagan.
Suddenly Brown's poop don't stink.
Something happened to change their mind.
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235 Johnno_79
Yeah I am more anti-Cameron than pro_Brown. I met Cammy once and he literally made my skin crawl (not particularly good reasoning I admit).
On old Nick Robinson I just think that this particular blog is pretty evenly handed so he should be left alone by you lot (at least for today).
Who call an election?
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#218 carrots
re sickness leave in the public and private sector - have a butchers
differences in public and private sector sickness absence rates are small, an average of approximately 0.3 days per employee, when account is taken of the size of an organisation; and differences in the age and gender profiles.
Still 'waste' to clamp down on (though its been a theme of several initiatives by Governments of all political persuasions), but the small difference will suggest the low-hanging fruit has already been picked and further progress could be tricky.
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#218 carrots
re sickness leave in the public and private sector - have a butchers
differences in public and private sector sickness absence rates are small, an average of approximately 0.3 days per employee, when account is taken of the size of an organisation; and differences in the age and gender profiles.
I'll also add that most days sick in the public sector are from those on LT absences. The private sector is far better at getting rid of these people (not necessarily completely within the law) than the public sector
Still 'waste' to clamp down on (though its been a theme of several initiatives by Governments of all political persuasions), but the small difference will suggest the low-hanging fruit has already been picked and further progress could be tricky.
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Of course Camoron doesn't want Tax cuts now. He wants them after he has been elected. I can't see why he needs a Presidential style Press Conference to explain this. Despite the fact he is becoming a McCain clone with the fits of temper and the waving arms he seems to imagine he is the Tory version of Barack Obama.
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203 Balhamu
Maybe the Conservatives could consult this book in their quest for ridding government of waste:
The Bumper Book of Government Waste 2008
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Re wasting money.....employers are currently receiving questionaires (with a freephone number)asking about job vacancies....fine....no problem with that it takes 2mins to dial and leave number of vacancies....currently nil..But ....you then get a questionaire 3 pages long....takes 10mins to fill in...asking if you found the first questionaire simple to respond to........DAFT..
Just one more thing,Baby P died over 12 months ago,surely other children will have suffered since this childs death,and surely someone knew about these problems before GORD ELP US ignored the issue last week at PMQ......my point is ....Why are the people in charge only addressing the issue now.......i suppose i could say the same thing about the economy!!!!
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#232 U9461192
The following week how about getting rid of the entire workforce at the ONS:
www.statistics.gov.uk/
About 4000 or so I believe, and looking at the vacancies they all seem to pay well. "Ministry Of Truth" might be a more apt name.
And as for the numerous examples listed by Carrots, I for one am stunned that the Tories aren't more vocal than they are with their criticisms. Leading the opposition against a government as despicable as this one should be the easiest job in the world, frankly.
Can I also give kudos to balhamu for his balanced views, a welcome respite from the more vociferous government apologists on this blog. If only the Labour party had members as balanced as yourself we might not be in the mess we're in now.
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203 Balhamu
If the Conservatives don't like any of the ideas in The Bumper Book of Waste (and I like their idea that government could cut the tax burden of every household by £4,000)
.....then maybe the Conservative could check out this book instead for some ideas:
Squandered - How Gordon Brown is Wasting over 1 Trillions Pounds of Our Money
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It is pertinent to point out that the Labour Party is the Government just now so although the Tories can say what they would do it is irrelevant until a General Election is called.
What they should however do is point out the vacuous statements of Gordon Brown such as the problem was caused by the USA.
The G20 summit communique said no such thing; it did however say in the third paragraph:
Root Causes of the Current Crisis
3. During a period of strong global growth, growing capital flows, and prolonged stability earlier this decade, market participants sought higher yields without an adequate appreciation of the risks and failed to exercise proper due diligence. At the same time, weak underwriting standards, unsound risk management practices, increasingly complex and opaque financial products, and consequent excessive leverage combined to create vulnerabilities in the system. Policy-makers, regulators and supervisors, in some advanced countries, did not adequately appreciate and address the risks building up in financial markets, keep pace with financial innovation, or take into account the systemic ramifications of domestic regulatory actions.
Note in particular the sentence Policymakers in some advanced countries .........
That clearly doesn't state America by name and is plural. The other country that is clearly implicated is the UK and the City of London.
Gordon Brown cannot go on blaming the USA. Culpability Brown is how I see it.
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#253 jonathan_cook
This is a very informative book - but it should come with a health warning.
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I would have thought that the Government line would be that it's right to increase public spending/cut taxes to stimulate the economy during a recession (which the Conservatives are now turning their back on) and pay off the accrued debt when the economy is healthy - exactly what they've been doing over the last 10 years. In their efforts to remain distinct from the Government at a time when they can see the polls moving back towards Gordon Brown because of the recession, it strikes me that the Conservatives are panicking.
PS What is your moderation process? Has the Irag war any relevance to current economic circumstances?
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Nick,
Brown is setting up Team GB to be taken into the Euro, of that there can now be no doubt.
As for the general election I am more convinced with every day that passes that it will be in the spring, even as early as February. Reason being the cash handout will be in peoples pockets, the Obama inaugeration will have happened and he will attempt to put a labour spin on that!
What we need now is tax increases, and raised interest rates. You will even find that pretty soon people will be forced to take wage cuts, it's for your own good, if we don't cut wages then there will be no wages, you are redundant. So the pain will be even worse if what we are hearing about the great tax giveaway actually happens.
In the meantime poor Alistair Darling is being set up as the fall guy. Brown will say everything in Team GB was great whilst I was chancellor, as soon as I left it was Darling who messed up, nothing to do with me says Brown, which would be consistent with what we know he is like.
No wonder Blair thought he was unsuitable for the job. What did somebody say about his character, I wonder if somebody could remind me. Something psychological no doubt.
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#249 billatbasing
Too right.
In a previous life I used to work as a consultant at a staunchly Conservative local authority.
Labour had plans to merge district and county councils, one purpose of which create efficiency savings. A team of officers at the council were commissioned by the Leader of the council to analyse the business case for this.
The memo came round from Tory Central Office with a long list of reasons why the council should not engage in Labour's plans, most to do with the over-representation of Conservative councillors being essential for grassroots operation of the Party and a good source of political ammunition against Labour for lack of councillors).
Locally the party were against this too (didn't want to lose their jobs) and the Leader of the Council was threatened by his colleagues that certain (unfounded) allegations about inappropriate relationships between him and children could appear in the paper if he didn't play ball.
The key reason from Tory Central Office, though, was that "This will create big efficiency savings. We don't want Labour to have these. We will re-consider the case for realising these savings when the Conservative Party are in power and not before"
It was eye-opening that a Conservative administration were turning their backs on massive efficiency savings (at least 100 million pounds per year in the large shire county council I was working in) so they could gain future political advantage. Very cynical from a party that normally likes to claim it is in favour of efficiency.
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#239
the worry is that Lord Mandy and Ali C are off the leash while GB rehearses for PMQ. Actually the thought either are on a leash is flawed as evidenced by the "new headline catching topic a day" being spun with the BBC just now. Same tactic when Blair was in trouble over Iraq. Looks like GB is being led the same " what do you want5 the headlines to be" way..
How can the electorate call an election? A petition with 60 million signatures?
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253 Shellingout
I agree that book does need a health warning!
I was spitting feathers after I read it. The scale of incompetence is mind boggling.
In fact - I wonder how the government can turn up with a straight face to interviews.
Alistair Campbell says "we must defend the record". The record is self explanatory. It is indefensible.
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#253 jonathan
I hope they follow your advice.
I completely welcome Conservative politicians ending their 'moon on a stick' policy pronouncements (though, I understand the attractions of that approach, given how badly burnt they get when they move onto what services they will cut to deliver savings and tax cuts). and actually showing signs of wanting to give the electorate choices (Labour think Government should perform these functions, we think they are a waste of time and will stop them).
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257 TA Griffin
I might be easily talked around to support joining the Euro.
Unlike the dollar or Euro - nobody uses the pound as a reserve currency. It is easy for their to be a run on it. maybe the Euro is more stable?
Gordon, however, won't hold an honest and open debate on the pound versus Euro. He will try and force us in by stealth.
On the downside - I'm loathed to give up more powers and independence to Europe, when Europe consists of unelected politicians who can't be given the boot.
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According to the BBC, our level of debt is just fine; they spent ages explaining how the level of debt is really low when you take into account inflation and gdp.
Sadly they forgot to mention that most of the debt is not actually included in the debt figures in the first place because Brown's cooked the books (pfi, network rail, bank bail outs etc; nothing's in there).
The BBC will always ignore the facts in favour of labour spin.
I don't think anybody believes anything that the BBC says anymore; they've openly become labour's own tax-funded spin machine.
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247. balhamu
I wont do the details on the statistics they get bent in all directions and comparisons are hard I concede that. Firstly there isn’t the motivation that there is in the private sector to be productive, as there are no consequences if you arent.
However, I recall a report in the summer that stated that one third of civil servants take no sick leave what so ever.
The problem that I would deal with is the hard core than are constantly off.
I conduct a lot of business that interfaces with many public sector workers. I know what goes on I see it daily.
I also have many friends who work in the public sector, they know it goes on, they admit it and they hate it too.
At the very least its demoralising for co-workers at the worst its theft from taxpayers.
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I've commented that Cameron is a follower not a leader. He doesn't have a vision unless it's fed to him, and does the steel jawed hero drinking cups of tea with old ladies routine but is too rigid minded and partisan to be much use in the real world.
Nick's topic and The Times tend to agree on the Tories policy and character. They don't have policies that are fit for purpose and they haven't reformed. That's just a by the book analysis but instead of learning the lesson they're sucking even harder on their crack pipe. And these people want to run the country?
Osborne and Cameron are finished. Their policy blizzards and TV studio presentation skills lack the depth and wisdom necessary to deliver. The Thatcherite 'tell' at the Tory conference and the yachtgate affair were the crack in the dam. The Tory brand is broken and the more they struggle the worse their pain will get.
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#257 TAG
Brown is setting up Team GB to be taken into the Euro, of that there can now be no doubt.
If we were to go into the euro, how would this work as regards salaries?
For example, on day X, a salary is £20,000 at an exchange rate of 1. 5 euros. This is worth 30,000 euros.
If the exchange rate drops to 1.25 euros on day Y, the same salary would be worth 25,000 euros. A difference of 5,000 euros.
If I convert all the things I buy, ie food, fuel etc., into euros, at the moment they would all seem expensive compared to last year. But salaries converted now would be worth less.
....or am I missing the point here?
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If/when the tories got into power, their job would be the same as a liquidator; they'd need to go through the books with a fine toothcomb and work out how they can salvage what's left of the economy.
You can't really say what you would do if the company/country being run into the ground is still burning all the money and generally following a scorched earth policy. You have to wait until the owners are kicked out and you get to see the books and have control. You can't have a detailed salvage plan when active destruction is still ongoing.
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INTERESTING
My comment at 234 outlining Lord Mandlesons salary and how he earns more than the PM, his relocation allowances from the EU and his House of Lords expenses have been referred.
Perhaps someone thought it might incite violence Eh?
Or perhaps cause Shellingout to have a another bottle!
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Why do most people commenting on here say extra spending is bad when the rest of the world say it is good? The nature of these comments are getting wilder and insulting. It must be the opinion polls that are upsetting the poor lambs.
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My-Pet-dragon @224,
You're pro-Brown? I would never have guessed!
Call an election!
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This will cheer you all up
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expert@57
"They do not actually say where they will find the money and how much, just generalisations.
Their policy seems to go with whatever is seen as positive in the media. Can you guarantee it won't change again before the next election?"
At first, I thought this was an accurate summary of Labour's position. It IS an accurate summary of Labour's position.
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I think Mr Cameron has been looking at the rather unattractive recent opinion polls for the Conservative party.
Does he sniff an early election in the air?
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T A Griffin (TAG) @257
Psychologically flawed.
There is some argument as to the attribution - Blair or Campbell.
There is no doubt, however, that both men held this view of our Esteemed Leader
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The Tory campaign is a near identical copy of the Republican approach. They're making a bunch of fundamental errors in policy and attitude. Their policies don't add up and their people don't measure up. Their solution? Press harder on the gas pedal.
The more the Tories insist they're "right" and the more their desire for power seizes them, the more they'll look like they're losing the plot and chewing the carpet. Their ego is now so tinder dry that a mere breeze causes the tiniest of sparks to burst into raging flame.
Meanwhile, Labour continue to get under the problem and act as if the Tory party don't exist. This helps focus all effort on getting the job done, and has the neat side effect that the Tories scream louder as their desperation for attention and credibility reaches ever more dizzying heights.
So much for "Cool Dave" and the Tories. They're looking more like General Grievous and the Roger-Rogers every day. Master Jedi Gordon Brown is opening them up with his policy lightsaber like a can of beans. Heck, even the C3PO and R2D2 act of Darling and Prescott are cleaning their clock.
Bah. Sith were never too bright...
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#263 getrid
Yes - I guess you're riled that the BBC won't take the CPS debt definition on.
I mean, this impartial think-tank that Margaret Thatcher set up to convince the world of Friedman and Hayek's views that formulates Conservative Party policy has come up with an impartial view of debt, that is no exaggeration at all, or comparing two different measures of debt (one which excludes a lot of things in 1997, and one that includes as much as possible in 2008).
It's like saying it's unfair to let Alex Ferguson select referees for Man U matches from the Stretford End at Old Trafford.
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# 201 balhamu
"It is also far more honest - people can look at how they will be impacted by his plans ......and make an informed decision".
I think you are right that it would be helpful to have some firm proposals - but those in opposition usually say it's difficult to be too specific until they've had a chance to 'look at the books' properly. When a new government takes over, there's the inevitable black hole in the accounts that no one knew about.
So, I will not be too surprised if the Tories do not dot all the 'i's or cross all the 't's just yet. From the voters point of view it will come down to trust. Which party will give best value for money and cut waste?
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
Cameron wrns against the risk of deflation and most politicians, economists and journalists are schooled in this piece of economic hogwash at University. It's taken as a given that it is a bad thing to happen to an economy.
But as one leading light in the current sorry field of Keynesian resurrected economics states:
"...deflation also creates many winners, and it also punishes many "political entrepreneurs" who had thrived on their intimate connections to those who control the production of fiat money."
[Unsuitable/Broken URL removed by Moderator]
If people think deflation is a problem why don't those in power simply legalise the printing of counterfeit money at home? That would soon provide ample stimulus to the economy and encourage consumer spending - which all Keynesians absurdly hold as the generator of prosperity.
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Chuck,
I'm surprised to find you here. I thought you were spending more time with your doctors.
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The word that makes you tremble, that you dare not speak - for some reason - is UNEMPLOYMENT. That , in a nutshell, is what the Tory price will be for tax cuts. Masses of it, years of it, working families humiliated by it, generations neutered by it. It should be the duty of a BBC journalist of stature to look under every unturned stone - how come you missed this Nick?
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Charles, have you been at the glue again?
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#277 distanttraveller
It's hardly a case of dotting i's and crossing t's though is it.
Today's speech merely sets out the title of their programme (which, incidentally, we knew anyway):
"We will ensure that Conservative plans will involve less Government spending than Labour plans"
But there are a number of questions that they need to answer about their economic plans:
How much less? (1% GDP, 2% GDP, etc?) Is it less growth/real spending cuts, or merely slowing the rate of growth?
What will less be spent on? (education? health? defence? police? transport?)
How will this be achieved? (is it focussed on reducing inefficiency or ending functions that Conservatives consider the Government should not be involved in? How will 'waste and inefficiency' be reduced?)
What will happen to the savings? (will they pay back the debt or reduce taxation? If they reduce taxation, what are their priorities for tax cuts? Who will benefit from this?)
What do Conservatives plan to do to overhaul the tax system? Do they plan to achieve their previously stated aim to shift taxes from business and income onto consumer expenditure (and so from the rich to the poor) to enhance work incentives? Do they think that their should be less redistribution within the tax system?
Will Conservatives reduce borrowing as we enter recession? (as they imply they will)
Will Conservatives set medium-term fiscal policy to ensure the debt is paid off over time? (i.e. to alter Labour's fiscal rules to aim to run a sizeable current budget surplus over the economic cycle, prioritise debt repayment over tax cuts, don't borrow any money even to invest)
Will Conservatives continue with the post-Thacherite consensus of low City regulation (and underfunded regulators) and put the 2007-08 experience as an aberration rather than a systematic problem?
What will be the goal of monetary policy? Will it aim for a fixed exchange rate (as Osborne was suggesting)? Will it aim to control asset bubbles? If so, how?
And so on. These are all valid questions that Conservatives will need to answer before the next election. And it is what Labour will reasonably challenge them to do.
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With the prospect of deflation next year comparisions to Japan are often made, have lived in Japan for 9 years from 1997 I would like to make some observations;
The UK has massive personal dept whereas the Japanese are known as savers, the have the biggest amount of savings sat in their post office in the world. The individual is better prepared to get through a recession.
Yes the Japanese goverment also have massive dept like the UK, but at least they have something to show for their spending, a far better infrastructure, their train system makes the UKs look prehistoric. Labour have spent 10 years taking from the productive and giving to the unproductive( the public sector and nanny state) sum result nothing to show for their spending.
Finally Japan at least manufactures something, cars, electronics, shipbuilding etc, the UK has very little to show in the way of maufacturing, our biggest industry is consumer spending and banking and they are both near enough bankrupt.
What ever pain Japan has been through or is going to experience it is absolutely nothing to what the UK is going to experience. It will be generations before the mess that Brown has made is cleared up.
And yes I am heading back to Japan, I cannot bear much more of being taxed up to the eye-balls then seeing it squandered.
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I listened to Drive (Radio 5) and at 4.00 they had a treasury minister who was basically hacked to pieces by the interviewer (Peter Allen) And at 5.00 they had a shadow spokesman on.
For once I think the interviewing was not biased - so well done the BBC.
With regard to the separation bytheTories of the Labour plans I agree (I am naturally a Tory voter so I declare an interest).
People speaking about Tory cuts in Services should consider the following.
How many people here have friends, colleagues who have maxed out on credit cards, spent the money on plasma televisions, electronic gadgets, new cars - they deserved the best! Re-mortgaged to release equity in their house to continue the good life - and are now subject to an IVA, bankruptcy or repossession.
Do you want the country to go the same way?
Adding a fiscal stimulus is counter-productive. The Government will have to take MORE back in higher taxes than they lend out - if only to pay interest - this reduces the country's spending power even more. In fact the best way of considering a fiscal stimulus is to regard it as another shot of a drug to reduce withdrawal effects - but thereby increasing dependency. As there is a finite sum of money in the economy increasing taxes to repay increased borrowing just reduces the money supply.
So what 'answers' are there.
1) Increase borrowing and reducing taxes/ increase spending to 'stimulate demand'. This as I mentioned is counter-productive in the long run (of course if we had a surplus then this could be done)
2) Print more money (literally) and dish it around - I suspect that most people would agree this would lead to inflation and a run on the pound as it becomes less valuable.
3) Get more money in by selling more goods and services abroad. The reason why the financial sector earned those monstrous bonus's in part was due to money coming in from abroad. The last time that our trade was in the black for 'goods' was 1972 - since then invisibles - such as insurance/ financial services has covered much of the gap (Which in 2007 was £89 Billion)
As 2 is suicide and 1 a failure we are left with option 3. I would support any party that produced a sensible raft of measures to actively encourage the export of british goods and services overseas.
As things stand any 'fiscal stimulus' would most likely end up mainly in money ending up in China through purchase of imported goods - so Jimmy Brown might as well just borrow the money and pay China Direct - much simpler.
Yes, a decision by the Tories to reduce Government spending and borrowing will result in jobs being lost - and not only in public services - although to my mind we could get rid of all the non-productive administrative jobs and concentrate on those that provide a benefit to the consumer at - 'point of sale'. This however requires that people use their common sense and are left alone to use it rather than a vast beurocratic system be in place to implement (ineffectively) myriads of dictums and policy statements - however if this medicine is NOT accepted then the medicine in the future will be MUCH worse.
If people THINK about what is happening with money - where it comes from, where it goes then there is NO WAY they could support LAbour policies.
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#125
Very interesting point I only hope Nick takes note.(doubtful)
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Back to the PMQs wheeze.
As an alternative to the mutual no show, what about everyone asks the same question, e.g.
"Can the Prime Minister confirm when tax will rise to repay the increased borrowing he now proposes and, by how much?"
Clearly the NuLAb trolls won't join in, but that still leaves a dozen or so times we could hear Golum trot out the same nonsense.
Comedy gold.
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tim@227
How about seeing if GB can actually answer questions, and answer honestly.
Something along the lines of
Is your name James Gordon Brown?
Were you born on .......
Etc
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68,maxsceptic,top blog,you said every thing I wanted to say.
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#157
Yes I would do anything to go back to those so called "dark days". No political correctness, no elf and safety, no quangoes, nojobsworths, no spin(lies), less stealth tax, less dumping down, and thats just for a start!!!
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Why does Brown imagine putting into the low-paid's pocket will help either the economy or our manufacturing industry? Everyone knows it will be spent on the cheapest Chinese imported goods as per usual.
And what happened to the 10p tax rate, isn't this another of those NuLabour "I'm giving you back what I intended to take from you" double-thinks? If they actually raised the tax-free allowance thresholds that would have a far greater effect.
Everyone knows that most money is spent on consultants and quangos who spend more than half of the grants available in deciding how to spend them. My experience of local govt work was 3 month maternity cover which turned into 15 months as the incumbent didn't feel able to part herself from the baby. Overseen by a line manager who, 4 weeks into the job, had to go on 6 weeks compassionate sick leave to look after her aged dad who'd put his back out, or something.
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
Missed my usual thread but what fun this one is with lots of discussion of a story which can be summarised as:
The Tories are going to an more than currently but an unspecified amount less than they were thinking last week in 2010-11 than an amount which is forecast but subject to review in the near future by Labour.
If Brown has one ounce of political acumen left all he has to do is announce a spending freeze for 2010-2011 (fiscally prudent you know what with the banks and all) then David Cameron has just committed himself to spending cuts (and the following jobs losses - not clever if you assume unemployment could be 3m already by then).- which David and George are at pains not to say just that they would not increase spending by quite so much.
Like to the smirk on Alistairs' face when announcing the spending review for 2010-11 if they di announce a freeze.
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Since when is a reduction in an increase a CUT!? Let's have some intelligent, balanced and unbiased reporting for a change.
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269 wumper wrote:
"Why do most people commenting on here say extra spending is bad when the rest of the world say it is good?"
You miss the point; everyone else apart from gordon brown says that yes, spending is good in times of recession, but it has to be within your means; you wouldn't borrow a million pounds if you earned 5 grand a year because the interest will drive you bankrupt; same applies to governments.
The g20 said exactly that; spend what you can as a government to help out, but don't spend/borrow more than you can afford.
The point is that Brown is like a man who's happy to take out a million pound loan even though he only earns 5 grand a year, because he knows he's going to do a runner before the interest is due.
He point blank refused to fund any of it at all from reform or savings; it's 100% borrowing (ie deferred tax rises) with no care in the world about paying any of it back later; it's the most irresponsible thing you can do as a government and it drives the country bankrupt.
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So it's full circle with 'Dave' Cameron. Back to the same old Nasty party he said he would change in 2005 - well it's only taken him 3 years to do a complete u-turn.
Same old single policy tories.
Cut taxes come hell or high water, regardless of the consequences.........
Come the election people will remember the state this policy left Britain in in 1997. Infrastructure collapsing, NHS on it's knees.....etc...etc....
Bill McFadden
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It looks like we have another five years or so of Brown.
Cameron and the Tories have really lost the plot - read your history of the Great Depression. The Government was in debt then (thanks to the Great War). Balancing the books and cutting back on public spending during a severe recession goes against what Keynes taught us. Their policies will lead us to deflation and higher unemployment - a depression!
I know the Tory elite believe we, the voters, are a bunch of turkeys, but we aren't going to vote for Christmas just yet!
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@ disnaymatter
How predictable. The opposition says that it can't promise to match the government's spending plans. Why? Because, in its own honest estimation, the country's finances are going down the plughole. Immediately, some apologist for the government twists this to read that the opposition's malicious intent is to cause mass unemployment. Do you know what a 'non sequitur' is in logical argument?
And in any case, are you implying that the point of government is to employ the entire population? Isn't this what the Soviet Union was about?
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@26 - expertfloatingvoter
"I may not agree with everything Labour are doing, but at least I know what they are doing and can form my own opinion about it. They at least stick to what they say"
sorry sir, but if labour cannot meet their own spending committments, then its hardly surprising the conservatives now are refusing to.
it doesnt matter one jot what opposition parties view is, they are not in power and have no access to the nations books, only once an election is called do they have full access and then their policies will be important.
exactly what are labour doing?
could you please tell me, all i hear is that they have been to yet another summit and "they are doing what is right"
exactly what is it they are doing? its never mentioned!
they are sticking to what they say?
* what have they said about the regulation they failed with - which caused much of our banking troubles?
* how will they enforce the current regulation over banks that they previously failed to do?
* what about their long term 10p tax rate plans? they have vanished!
all labour talk about that they stick to is "its not our fault" or "its a global problem" - like america forced our banks to overstretch themselves with their borrowings!
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Wow, an unbiased blog post from you Nick.
Mandy having a day off or did you finally stand up to him?
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#253
Have read this book, Squandered - How Gordon Brown is Wasting over 1 Trillions Pounds of Our Money. Anybody who believes Browns claim to be prudent should read this.
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The Tories are a party of grab-all-and -give-nothing-back whilst Labour have always been a party of tax-a-lot-and -spend-a-lot. When one looks around at the new hospitals, new schools, new roads and the millions spent on police ect ect . I am proud to say i voted Labour.
When the Tories were last in power we had to give children paper to take to school to write on because the school had none.
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Maybe something that the tories would do would be to fire absolutely everyone in the civil service who's been responsible for the government's side of PFI contracts since 1997 and replace them with people who actually know what they're doing; they'd save billions if doing that.
I dread to think how many billions have been thrown down the toilet because the civil servants and politicians simply don't understand commercial contracts and always end up getting a horrific deal for the tax payer.
At the moment the government seem to be using logic like this when securing contracts:
"I need to build a house that I'll be living in; I'll pay you a million pounds to build a 1 bedroom bungalow, then I'll pay you 50grand a month rent for 5 years so that I can live there, and then at the end of that 5 years you get to keep the bungalow and I have to find somewhere else to live - would you be willing to do that Mr Commercial Building Firm Boss? I promise I won't moan if it falls down, and if the roof falls off I'll pay to put a new one on. Is that ok? I'll give you more money if you want, just ask."
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I'm sure that there is a box to think out of, but for me it almost never involves these mainstream parties.
They play their games, cuts here, spending there, today, tomorrow, sometime never.
Such tired old pap they peddle, especially Labour and the Tories.
We, the people, are almost complete bystanders, non-participants, effectively disconnected from any meaningful democratic process.
I prefer to construct an imaginary political world for our country, where politicans behave as genuine public servants, instinctively seeking to co-operate and/or find common ground with each other, for the public good, and where the people have a much more direct say.
That'll be the day.
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Tories drop Labour spending pledge
Tories abolish Labour spending pledge
Tories axe Labour spending pledge
No, it has to be Tories *cut* Labour spending pledge.
How to get Tories and cut in the same sentence.
Shocking, really.
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Supporting unfunded or debt-financed tax cuts is akin to beleiving that a credit card limit is the same as income to be spent without consequences.
Of course, the government can roll out the printing presses, to print more money to repay the debt or fund the tax cuts.
But everyone knows that the consequent inflation of the money supply is a draconian invisble tax that impacts the working classes first and the hardest.
I fail to understand why socilaists continue to support such disproved Keynesian economics which harm the poor first and the wealthy last of all.
The old adage that there is no such thing as a free lunch, is a wise saying that passes many Britains by.
Can anyone explain why this is so?
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#290 tenmaya
Yes I would do anything to go back to those so called "dark days". No political correctness, no elf and safety, no quangoes, nojobsworths, no spin(lies), less stealth tax, less dumping down, and thats just for a start!!!
*No political correctness*
Yes - back to the days when racism, homophobia, ageism, sexism and other discrimination was completely acceptable. This political correctness is destroying life in this country for bigots isn't it?
*No elf and safety*
Yes - back to the days of business cutting corners to endanger their workforce to cut costs. Back to the days of business (and the public sector) getting away with shoddy work that endangers life (e.g. failing to ensure railways are sufficiently maintained). Shift the balance back to business and away from the ridiculous concerns for people's safety.
*No quangos*
Yes - there were no quangos before 1997 were there? All introduced by the evil Labour party no doubt.
*No jobsworths*
I hear that the number of jobs in the central civil service is at record lows. Also, I think that in general the civil service is far more focussed on public service than it has been, so there should be less jobsworths now, with Labour continuing the shift in emphasis that Thatcher/Major encouraged in attitudes of public servants (more marketisation to ensure users of public services were treated more as 'consumers').
*No spin (lies)*
It's true that 'spin' has taken on more importance in an era of the internet, 24 hours news and media focussed on the negative and sensational rather than reporting news. I see few signs that Cameron is trying to end this. Brown tried it (believed the hype that Blair was unpopular because of spin and hoped ending it would be popular) - it was a massive failure that just let Cameron seize the initiative in the media, and Brown has seen the error of this and focussed more on PR now. Spin is a necessary evil.
*Less stealth tax*
We'll see. Cameron is in favour of environmental taxes for example, which have been painted as 'stealthy' when Labour utilise them.
*Less dumping down*
I assume you mean dumbing down? How is Cameron going to achieve this (accepting for a moment your assertion that exams have got easier over time)?
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#38 expert
Some years ago there was a tv documentary (might have been panorama or something on Channel 4) in which the reporter highlighted that the groups of smiling "members of the public" who turned up to public meetings were actually activists from the labour party bussed in to give the "right" impression. In fact, normal members of the public were not allowed access into camera shot at these events. The reporter showed this by picking the same faces out of the crowd, at several separate events and giving their names and quoting the posts they held in local labour party offices.
I have, probably wrongly, supposed that the fairly widespread support for conservative views during the working day was only possible for retired people, but I suppose some in the public sector might be able to find the time to blog ;-)
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#283
Balhamu
You pose a series of very searching questions and I think it important that Cameron answer them in the same spirit as he has become accustomed to having his searching questions answered by Gordon Brown. With utter contempt.
So, when Gordon asks detail on where money will be saved I thing Cameron should set off on a five minute tirade about the IMF being called in during 1976 by a Labour government.
When Gordon asks for the detail on how much is 'less growth in spending' then Cameron should reel off some figures around the greatest annual fall in house prices in UK history blah blah followed by the first run on a bank in over a century blah blah...
If the last 11 years have taught us anything about politics it is that the key is to sound good but be very vague and ambiguous on detail. That's what gets votes.
Sound bites like...
We will take the right decisions to deliver the services the people of Great Britain expect and deserve.
Now, how can you argue with that? Works for Gordon.
The only specifics I would expect from Cameron will be negative specifics about Gordon Brown's incompetent, nay, malevolent reign as chancellor/PM. You know, the type Gordon favours in lieu of defending his own lamentable record...
So, expect from Cameron lots of....
Under Labour national debt has doubled to a staggering umpty hundred billion pounds. This equates to umpty-dump thousand for every man, woman and child.
Under Labour the annual national deficit is this year is forecast at 110bn compared with the 8bn (or whatever) in 1997.
Under Labour unfunded pension commitments have ballooned from (whatever) in 1997 to (whatever) in 2008. An increase of (a hell of a lot).
See how it works?
I'm afraid that all those years of attempting to redefine budget deficits and total debt as %age of total GDP will prove wasted. That's a calculation too far for a soundbite. The raw numbers alone will be used to crucify Labour.
Just as they were used to crucify the Tories in 1997.
Not fair?
How do you think it feels having Brown reel off screeds of utterly bogus numbers at PMQ in lieu of answering the question?
Contemptuous is how it feels. This man treats Cameron and the entire parliamentary process with contempt.
He should not be surprised if Cameron and the voters return the favour.
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296. Billmcfadden
Quite right Bill, this Eton upstart has the audacity to tell us we cant aford what we deserve.
Nasty nasty little man, who does he think he is.
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Billmcfadden at 296
Do you think we are stupid or do you want us to assume you are?
When you totally distort facts either one or other of those 2 conclusions are all that is possible.
Cameron has not said he is going to cut taxes. If anything he is saying the opposite as Gordon Brown prepares to do what you are accusing Cameron of.
Cameron is saying that as Brown increases borrowing by ever greater sums, it will be necessary to either increase taxes enormously or reduce spending in order to bring the budget back into balance or do a bit of both.
The Conservatives don't want to make all the correction via tax increases so don't want to commit themselves to Labours spending plans.
So, next time rather than going off into fantasy land and making up what Conservative policy is... how about sticking to the truth?
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303. getridofgordonnow wrote:
Youll like this:
Government and commercial contracts:
The Home Office wasted 29 million of taxpayers' money on thinking about building a centre to hold asylum seekers. (The centre never got built) The Home Offices civil servants decided that they had to hire outside consultants to advise on how the money allocated for the project could best be spent.
Youd think that was what civil servants were paid to do. But these days, their only real responsibility seems to be to decide how many outside consultants they will hire. On this project, more than 7 million pounds - almost a quarter of the total budget spent - went straight into the pockets of consultants.
The PAC found….. and I quote…. that the whole project embodied a lack of foresight, poor business planning, and a startling absence of common sense.
Those brilliant consultants, some paid more than 15k a month were supposed to at least make sure the Home Office did not do something obviously stupid, such as signing a contract commissioning builders to construct the centre before planning permission had been obtained. They failed. So the Home Office had to pay out a further 7.9 mill in termination fees to the building contractor.
No one in the Home Office lost their job.
You might think the PACs criticism would cause ministers or at least officials, to be a little contrite, perhaps an apology even, but no the Home Office said… and this is the best bit … the whole episode had produced an "overall positive impact for the public", because "officials have learned important and valuable lessons.
Well Yes all 29 million pounds worth….
Bargain
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303. getridofgordonnow
Oh yes and dont forget the Chinooks.
The MoDs civil servants, despite hiring consultants to help them, forgot to include a clause which allowed them to test the Chinooks for airworthiness.
When the helicopters arrived from America, they turned out not to comply with UK safety standards.
The upgrade has taken two decades, still not completed and has cost 300 million so far, and will probably cost at least 200 million more before they are ready.
These copters sit in sheds in Wiltshire while troops die in theatre from lack of heli support.
Another bargain
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I had to laugh at post 309 having just read the magazine article on the "myth of record debt". It quite clearly shows that the proportion of debt to GDP, which is what matters rather than crude measures of absolute debt, are at lower levels now than in '97.
How on earth someone can call that measure a soundbite and make out there is more reality to the distortion of looking at gross figures between years without adjusting for intervening inflation, or taking into account ability to service debt really makes you wonder. As the article says, £10k of debt is not the same to the man in the street as it is to Roman Abramovich.
In the US, they have found an inverse correlation between intelligence and likelihood to vote Republican. Perhaps the same applies to voting Conservative here.
As to Cameron today - he's sort of very vaguely told us what he won't do, but not what he will. The economic crisis has been around for months now, and we still have yet to see a credible strategy or coherent set of policies from the opposition.
And we really could do with a strong opposition with gravitas and good ideas right now. Sadly, we have Dave and George, a right pair of lightweights, following events not leading them, and giving us no clear consistent idea of what they would do.
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The conservative PR machine is out in force. Where have all these people come from? Strange coincidence we get this big announcement from PR Dave Cameron followed by a mass of propaganda on this page. Would you not all prefer to help HYS solve the piracy problem? This site is inhabited by a bunch of Dave Cameron clones. and nasty little trolls like Maxseptic.
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#309 Mr U
I know you would prefer it if Cameron's plans had no scrutiny and people just judged the Government on the basis that Brown is a bit strange, they're feeling unhappy because of the (world) recession and believe all the online right-wing army tell them.
But surely its a good thing (for right-wingers too in the medium-term) if Cameron's plans are scrutinised. For the public in understanding the choice that they will make. For right-wingers to prevent Cameron going 'heir to Blair' on you, and forming politically cowardly policies and ducking unpopular decisions with reference to the median voter in marginal constituencies.
Even a partisan like you can see that, no?
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I am not sure you understood what Cameron said, he said that the Tory party would not increase spending, not quite the same as cutting it. The trouble is you can't sut it, you are so baised it is boring. The BBC 'robustly' interview Cameron, but allow other politicians to rant on relentlessly. Boring. I would like some good reporting and journalism for my licence money.
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Not sure you quite got the message Nick, what Cameron said was that the Tories would not increase spending at the same rate as Labour. It is Gordon who describes this as a cut. You can phrase questions to get the answer that suits your left wing bias, not very good journalism, but hey, you work for the BBC.
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314 Batson_D_Belfry
ah, yes, but have a look at my posting 263; the point being that according to bbc/labour, the figures for relevant debt are in fact quite small, but equally those figures don't include most of the debt.
So, although they're right in that inflation/gdp do need to be taken into account, on the flip side so does your actual debt, and hiding the debt by cooking the books won't give you a true picture.
Now, if someone at the BBC could give a relevant figure which takes into account inflation, gdp, *and* the true amount of debt, then I'd be very interested in what that figure would be compared to 10 years ago.
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#315 dwilkinson
I'll have to admit some of the posters here use very similar phrasing and style which suggests one man and his sock drawer getting mixed up about who he's signed in as (u sceptical goblin)
But there are many of the regular right-wing posters who are genuine.
The puppetry won't change though until the BBC start posting IP addresses and I won't hold my breath on that.
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#317 trueblue
But I thought there was lots and lots of inefficiency and waste in the public sector, goldplated pensions, people getting paid to much.
Cameron has said this too.
Why won't he cut this waste out - he could probably half government spending if the cheerleaders on here are to be believed?
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bats@314
"It quite clearly shows that the proportion of debt to GDP, which is what matters rather than crude measures of absolute debt, are at lower levels now than in '97."
And was the definition of debt the same in both years? 1997 was before PFI, unfunded public pensions etc, etc.
Remember, "there's lies, damn lies and statistics."
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314 Batson_D_Belfry
"In the US, they have found an inverse correlation between intelligence and likelihood to vote Republican. Perhaps the same applies to voting Conservative here."
Interestingly enough, I found a link from google about that a few weeks ago, although I can't find it now, and someone (a university I think it was) had done a massive investigation on that, and they found that there was a correlation in the uk between IQ and voting patterns.
The people with the highest IQs actually voted libdem (strange but true), then came the tory voters with a slightly lower IQ, then came labour voters with an even lower IQ, finally right at the bottom (and rightly so) came the BNP voters.
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309. U9461192
Sadly youre correct, though I prefer Balhamus more searching position.
In 1997 we fell for all these without any real plan or explanation didint we, a few quotes from the 1997 NuLabour manefesto:
Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime.
Whiter than white.... LOL
Education Education Education....
New Labour will be wise spenders, not big spenders..... fantastic.
The myth that the solution to every problem is increased spending has been comprehensively dispelled....
We will protect the basic state pension and promote secure second pensions (oh OK that was just a lie)
We will reform of party funding to end sleaze..... LOL bet they wish theyd left that out.
The Conservatives seem opposed to the very idea of democracy. They support hereditary peers, unaccountable quangos ... Er did he say Quangos???
There is unquestionably a national crisis of confidence in our political system, to which Labour will respond in a measured and sensible way....... Well that worked.
We believe the House of Commons is in need of modernisation and we will ask the House to establish a special Select Committee to review its procedures. Prime Minister's Questions will be made more effective.......by not answering them.
Devolution: strengthening the Union.. LOL
Good local government... Just like Haringey Eh.
We will tackle the unacceptable level of anti-social behaviour and crime on our streets
All great ideas, but I dont recall Blair being questioned at length about how he would achieve all this.
Much more to the point, I dont see BBC political hacks holding them to account for their failure to deliver.
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I dont think it matters who is in next GE there is not going to be the tax income to maintain the current levels of public expenditure without continually dipping into borrowing or raising taxation. The bubble generated very high levels of tax, stamp duty was running at very high levels as an item on its own. The bubble has gone, the City is due to shrink, the construction sector has slumped and who knows when it will recover. That is before all the other decline is taken into account. It is a good thing the Conservatives have finally started behaving differently to the Labour Party not because they are right or wrong, because that is not proven one way or the other at present, but because at least options other than Labours can be considered. I cannot for the life of me see the point of having Labour in government and a Labour clone in opposition which has been the case on occassion. If Brown gets it right then he will stay, get it wrong and at least there is something else to consider. A 'choice' of one is not a choice, you need more than one option for a choice. As Brown has at the very least to be responsible for part of the current mess I am not keen on him being the only possible solution and the only policy proposer. If somebody can say where all the revenue is going to come from to prop up expenditure I would be most grateful. Economic growth was constant, ie roughly flat during the bubble of the last five years so take the bubble away and what have you got. It all looks very much like guesswork to me when any of them start projecting figures, and the the track record all around has not been good at assessing the situation. And yes hindsight is great but you can't make policy with hindsight so a great deal more foresight is needed than shown so far. And by the way I dont write for Labour, and I dont write for the Conservatives, or anybody else for that matter, only myself.
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One spending commitment we could do without is the current bank nationalisation - RBS shares are now trading at two thirds of the government underwritten price, meaning that on the day the shares are issued, our government will have thrown away £5bn to bank shareholders for no reason whatsoever. The disparity on underwritten price/current maket price on Lloyds/HBOS shares is just as bad.
How can this be justified?
It's the sort of thing you'd expect a Tory government to do.... hand public money to undeserving City fatcats, eh, Bill?
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320 Balhamu
I'm not sure that posting IP addresses is a good idea - there must be some sort of security issue with that
Having said that........ it can't be beyond the wit of man to block anybody using multiple log-ons from the same PC / Mac.
But - to be frank - I do not think there is much 'sock-puppetry' going on.
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Have a look at this:
Is the Blair v Brown war back on?
Does Blair not know that Gordon Brown is the saviour of the planets economy?
Given Brown wants a photo opportunity with Obama and to fake his global economic leadership with a G20 meeting in London in the new year - then surely this is going to rile Gordon??!
Maybe there are some ex-leaders and some current ones also that are fed up with Gordon's false posturing - hence the Blair / Sarkozy hosted summit.
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
288 PammyAnny
Gordon has a pathological inability to tell the truth and answer a question.
Even if, during Prime Ministers Questions, the speaker allowed a 'water boarding' specialist from the US to question Gordon - well we still wouldn't hear a reasonable or honest statement pass his lips would we?
Clegg and Cameron should treat Gordon with the same contempt in which Brown treats parliament.
That means they should walk out of PMQ's and leave behind an envelope with their questions in it - which have been submitted in duplicate as Freedom of Information Requests.
Until Clegg and Cameron take drastic action, they will continue to look like someone asking directions of a drunk swigging out of a bottle wrapped in a brown paper bag sat on a park bench.
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Whoops... I've just posted my comment under the wrong item. It was supposed to be this one. I just pointed out I couldn't see how expenditure could be cut without an uproar. And that if taxes needed to be cut so that more money was circulating in the economy I couldn't see how this could be done without further borrowing.
After all we pay our taxes to invest in crime prevention, education, infrastructure and health. The word "invest" is important. So that future generations have the necessary need to live and work in a better and safer environment.
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# 283 balhamu
"What will less be spent on? (education? health? defence? police? transport?)"
It's possible they will spend 'less' compared with Labour because the Government intends now going on a massive shopping spree. Labour hopes to use extra spending as a way of 'stimulating' the economy. In other words, the Tories might not spend less than they were originally intending, just less in terms of Labour's imprudent 'throw-away' and pre-election bribes.
So, instead of asking "what will less be spent on" perhaps we should be asking Gordon what will he spend MORE on? And why? How will that help the economy? How will it be funded? (The answer to this last question has to be tax rises in the near future).
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#283 balhamu
My own ideas for saving money....
I would like to see the ID card scheme scrapped, an end to the proposed new snoopers' database to store all our phone calls and emails, an end to HIPs, more 'real' police and fewer traffic wardens, more 'real' doctors and less spin doctors, cut Whitehall and Town Hall bureaucracy, pointless quangos etc.
The 2012 Olympics also provide a good opportunity. Instead of just trying to 'outdo' previous events by spending even more money, how about a 'green and sustainable' Olympics - recycling, mending and making do? With satellite link ups, do we really need everyone to travel all around the world? Why not a virtual Olympics? Some events could take place with athletes staying in their own countries!
Plenty of innovative ways to save money and improve services
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#266
Let's say that the Euro was at 2 to the pound. If you are in credit brilliant for every 10,000 you would get 20,000 but for a debtor, not so good your debt would be 20,000 for every 10,000.
However, devalue the pound your credit balance 10,000 would equal 10,000 but for debtor the 10,000 would equal 10,000 rather than 20,000.
So, QED if in debt, like the UKis, then to go into the Euro would be brilliant the lower the excahnge rate. Guess what the UK is hugely in debt so what would you do.
Answers on a postcard, but anybody care to disagree Nick, go on put it in writing. Funnily enough I don't expect too many actually having the guts to dent me.
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If the fiscal stimulation is a done deal then frozen taxes can only mean spending cuts if, as Dave sez, growth is not fast enough to pay it off. Behind the smoke and mirrors "Dave" is just talking Britain into depression again and promising tax cuts to the rich.
The Tory campaign is saying:
1. People are too stupid to understand what a fiscal stimulus is.
2. We're too useless to develop business that will turn a profit.
3. It's okay to let the poor starve while tax cuts fund a higher income consumer binge.
The post-apocolyptic scenario of Britain being a wasteland populated by the roving starving while a tiny elite drink champagne from within the silk lined walls of their gated community, probably, isn't the message "Dave" wants to convey. But he did.
I just see it as a crude relationship between the big bully and the wannabes. Reality took the wind out of their sails but another rush by "Dave" gave them some Dutch courage.
These attacks may look big and impressive but it's just so much swagger. It only hurts as much as you let it. As Labour develop policy and, well, just ignore the Tories they have nothing to swing at.
The Tory comments show a lot of "cleverness" and have HQ support behind them but I wouldn't worry about it. They're only shredding themselves to pieces and their support is, mostly, useless.
Heh. A Jedi is worth 100 ordinary men.
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Cameron is right to distance himself from Brown's fiscal policies.
Can anybody explain to me how a crisis caused by borrowing can be solved by even more borrowing? Brown claims the UK can afford to borrow to buy itself out of the credit crunch because we supposedly have a lower national debt than other economies. If that is the case one must suppose that the other countries have less leeway to borrow and yet he is asking them to follow Britain's example and increase their already stretched debt. If they fall for it and in so doing dig him out of a hole at their expense that he dug for himself and us , they deserve whatever comes their way.
Even worse, Brown wants to borrow yet more money so he can afford to cut taxes which he will then have to raise to pay off the extra debt. This is not sound economics, it's fiscal lunacy.
The chickens will be coming home to roost for many months, possibly years to come and Cameron cannot afford to be seen to have supported policies that are bringing Britain to it's knees.
Brown may get a short term reprieve but the major damage is still to come.
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# 335 Charles_E_Hardwidge
"The post-apocolyptic scenario of Britain being a wasteland populated by the roving starving while a tiny elite drink champagne from within the silk lined walls of their gated community, probably, isn't the message "Dave" wants to convey. But he did"
I think you're going off into the realms of fantasy now Charles....
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All credit to the party faithfuls of both Labour and Conservative - your tribal loyalties do you credit. Some good points made on both sides.
But simply supporting respective party lines is a cop out - as a voter I want the facts on which to base judgements when choosing the party I consider best able to handle our failing economy .
I certainly do not want the spin and deceit which we currently have to stomach . Gordon Brown may well have the better option but I am disturbed when he is TELLING me it is the only way forward. You simply do not treat voters in this contemptible way - a company facing bankruptcy would be required from the outset to make available the company accounts.
This should be the starting point for this government - let us have all the real figures (not fudged ones) on our current indebtedness, together with a properly argued case to support the option being proposed. Gordon Browns habit of simply deriding the views made by his opponents is just not good enough.
Nor is the constant disdain he displays towards any legitimate opposition questions (from any of the opposition parties) at PMQ's. Constantly declining to give a straight answer hardly inspires confidence in his leadership.
Perhaps the Speaker will exert his authority once again (as he did earlier this week when ordering the Schools Minister to return to the House to answer questions) by pressing the Prime Minister for answers. For sure - existing exchanges are not only farcical but also an embarrassment !
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I really have to ask, when the Tories announced thier intention not to commit to a previous policy, the BBC reported it as "A political turnaround" whereas when the BBC has previously reported on a similar Labour decision it is reported as "A U TURN" a very emotive term.
This is rather biased as today I have not heard a single BBC news reporter use the term U TURN about the tories.
Please can anyone explain?
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#335 Charles_E_Hardwidge wrote:
"If the fiscal stimulation is a done deal then frozen taxes can only mean spending cuts if, as Dave sez, growth is not fast enough to pay it off. Behind the smoke and mirrors "Dave" is just talking Britain into depression again and promising tax cuts to the rich.
The Tory campaign is saying:
1. People are too stupid to understand what a fiscal stimulus is.
2. We're too useless to develop business that will turn a profit.
3. It's okay to let the poor starve while tax cuts fund a higher income consumer binge."
That's complete rowlocks.
You talk constantly post about the inability of the British to manage anything.
1. People are too stupid to understand what a fiscal stimulus is.
So you presume that people are too stupid to understand that a "fiscal stimulus".
A fiscal stimulous is basically a government saying that it got it all wrong, but never mind, you'll pay for us to correct our mistakes.
It just isn't about that.
It's about trying to work out how a government that has been in office for a decade has only NOW had a blinding flash of insight into the failures THEY permitted and want everybody else to imagine that none of the problems could have been managed better before an imagined "Day One".
Why would anyone buy into the notion that everything started suddenly? Complete nonsense. It was visible for years. Maybe governments don't like to get a bit firm, but that's what they are supposed to do. Brown encouraged credit-based growth.
So now he needs a "fiscal stimulus"? And believes he's the guy to "lead the world".
What was the "Prudence" thing he kept on talking about?
Well, you work in an area of fairly arcane, computer gaming, activity. If that whole industry closed down, would life stop? Nah...
Would two-thirds of the world's population give a damn. Well, not really. Those folk would just like to eat and drink without worrying about tomorrows supply would come from.
Playing games is something that people have always done. But normally with others. With no cost. Not in some sort of cyberspace.
If it disappeared, would it affect mankind? No.
Take your skills to areas where it is needed.
2. We're too useless to develop business that will turn a profit.
Maybe you can't do it, Charles, but there are and always have been plenty of people iin the UK who turn ideas into production and employment.
Pretty poor structures to support them? Yes there have been over a few decades. Plenty of really good ideas have "migrated" elsewhere because governments haven't a clue about business development.
New - and Old - Labour were really great at that, weren't they... Was it Wilson or Tony Benn who waffled on about the white hot heat of technology driving the UK forward, while they allowed the strangulation of invention and production by well-meaning but self-destructive unions?
For goodness sake, the majority of F1 teams have their development bases here in the UK. Why would they do that, if the skills weren't there?
Do you really believe that it's as the result of any political party's input?
Get real.
3. It's okay to let the poor starve while tax cuts fund a higher income consumer binge.
Hang on. Brown did something I thought was decent. He introduced a 10p tax-band apparently to help the lower income earners.
WHO withdrew that?
Not a nasty Tory. Just Gordon.
Why? Goodness knows, but he definitely wanted to burrow his way up the back bits of so-called middle class Briain.
And decided that he and eyebrows Darling could get around a fiasco by dumping 2.7BIL via tax-credits (which many people find difficult to deal with) or supplementary fuel-payments (which have little reason).
And left the on-going problem as a hang-over for all the following years.
I really don't give a tinkers cuss about which party gets elected. But I give a really big bit of concern when a government lets down people it has promised to help.
"Heh. A Jedi is worth 100 ordinary men."
God help us all.
Do you really have the imagination to see Gordon as a Jedi?
Get back to the computer games.
Real world... We'll try to do what we can. Not sure what measures will best help our own economy.
GB world... The world is following our lead, which proves that whatever I've been doing for a decade must be right.
Bankrupted the nation - but with accolytes all over the place in government.
Reducing the absolute government spend would probably take a really good manager about two months of consideration and a few more months of execution.
Winning the 2012 Olympics was a great deal, from my point of view as an athletics fan. But the projected cost was about GBP2.5BIL. Now we assume GBP 9 point something.
That's the point. Government has lost touch with financial reality.
If you told GB that his income was going to drop by 20 percent, you'd hope that he would do what we folk do. That is to shrink expenditure for a while we struggle to make income and expenditure balance.
But that's not the game plan.
NOT his money.
So, no real constraints about what he may do and with no real concern for the impact on his children - because his pension is guaranteed. And he probably hopes that he coudl sell himself in to the world of business or book-publishing.
Heroes?
Not him.
Bad back resonsible for this. Otherwise I'd simply have read postings and gone to sleep.
I do however find it a little odd that as Chancellor, Brown found it just not appropriate to attend grandf functions in a penguin suit. But, once PM, he chucks it on with glee...
Trying to work out the pyschological message.
Anyone out there who could help me - or him - to understand?
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Brown has lost it completely. He insists the 'whole World' has agreed to fiscal stimulus and tax cuts. What he is hiding is the fact this only applies to countries that have good reserves of cash in their Exchequers. The UK has not.
Brown's profligacy has depleted our countries reserves and the 'whole World' would certainly not condone a country with one of the biggest debts following a reckless borrowing course to pile up more debt.
For Brown to follow such a line is to treat the electorate with utter contempt. He will do anything to 'buy votes' to cling to power. He is irresponsible and blind to reason.
Labour have become unaffordable and it is time to tell the truth. Cameron's proposals are absolutely the right course of action. This will be a massive vote winner for the Tories. The electorate, apart from vociferous trendy lefties, understand and want change.
Brown was an awful Chancellor, imposing massive tax rises and imposing more than 112 stealth taxes. His latest proposals as PM are from 'The Maniac's Book of Crazy Finance'. His schemes are definitely unaffordable and he will finish our country.
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"I cannot be the only person bridling at the thought of funding a Christmas bonanza for those already receiving large amounts of tax credits (many of those claims already a fraud on the taxpayer, as everyone outside the Whitehall bubble knows)."
A common thought expressed in The Times today.
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Nick,
we know that the three car producing giants in America are in serious financial trouble, they have been for years.
Now there is talk of a bale out from the American taxpayer. What do they say about this, why just look at a British Compant which had billions thrown at it, and it failed!
The Company British Leyland! Where exactly is it now, and what happened to all that money?
I think that we are going to assist in the bale out of the three car producing giants, in return the Americans will promise not to close their plants in the UK. I think we will give them the money, then the situation will worsen and then they wil close. Just as Brown says British jobs for British workers, then does he not see that as the worst kind of protectionism in a global economy.
Obama has been elected on the Democratic ticket, they will immediately turn on him and his Team America if factories close in America and we give subsidies to the firms in Team GB.
The same is happening throughout Europe, protectionism is spreading fast, despite Gordon and Team GB.
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Graham Turner, author of 'The Credit Crunch', wrote this about Labour and Brown's record:
We needed to create jobs and wage growth that did not just depend on financial services, retailing and construction. And we failed that test, by letting so many of our industries decline. It is no surprise that the biggest downturn in house prices has been in areas that have suffered from heavy manufacturing jobs losses over the years - notably Wales and the West Midlands. In short, I think he will go down as the worst Chancellor in history.
Amen to that.
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Nick,
there is something I don't understand and I wonder if you could ask Gordon a question on my behalf.
We know that cars contribute towards global warming through their emissions.
Petrol in the very recent past was about GBP1.20 a litre, it is now about a pound. So, people were paying substantially more than now.
So, to help towards a reduction in petrol consumption why not put more taxes on the price of petrol and diesel so as to reduce consumption. If we were paying so much more in the recent past then surely there is not a problem!
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What bugs me is this.
Labour say "We are going to spend 620bn in 2011."
Conservatives say "We are going to spend less than 620 in 2011."
The media jump all over this and say "10bn of Tory cuts."
What they forget to mention is this year's spending is 580bn.
The BBC's fervour to dress this up as cuts is ridiculous. It isn't, it's just a smaller increase in spending.
What right does Labour have to set the budget at a time when it might not be in government?
About the same as the Conservatives.
It is disingenuous to mislead readers in that way, it is far more accurate to report as "Spending to slow under Conservatives."
But, the BBC can't help itself can it?
When yesterday it printed some frivolous 'magazine' article regarding the childish arguments over the national debt decrying misleading reporting.
What is the BBC doing on it's Politics page?
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If anybody is interested, I've summed-up the state of UK politics (as I see it) in a comment (no 11) in the Daily Politics "Falling prices are even more scary than rampant inflation" blog from 18/11/2008.
http://bbc.co.uk/blogs/dailypolitics
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Nick,
the wonderful Miss Smith explaining about a six month review and the problems of prostitution and trafficked women operating in the sex industry.
Let's put this forward shall we. A government minister is in the cabinet, the leader says this is my policy I'm going to attack Iraq with the Americans. Now then, you can all either agree with me and resign and lose everything, the power, the perks, the money, the ministerial car etc... oh, and your future promotion prospects, so choose now, are you with me or against me.
What did they do, they chose to support the war in Iraq, the illegal war in Iraq!
My link to Miss Smith? what I would say is to quote Shakespeare, but slightly misquote 'money (and power) is the universal whore, the universal pimp of men and peoples'. I think you will find reference in Karl Marx 'Money the Universal Whore'.
The whole premise of what Smith is proposing does not stand up to serious scrutiny, as per the Today programme when she was interviewed. Just ban it, I'm sure that Harriet Harman would agree with it, and women all over the country will rejoice at not being bought a drink, at not being taken to a restaurant to be fine wined and dined, and as for marriage, well! I think you get my drift. as for the economy, exactly what are men meant to do with all that money we are going to be given.
Oh, and let us not worry about sex discrimination, I want to know what Miss Smith is going to do about those women who also have use of male prostitutes, do they not have needs as well, or have labour completely lost their sex drive?
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Dear All,
I earn far too much to qualify for any tax credit, 22k per year. However, under GB I do now qualify for next years tax hike.
Merry Christmas,
Oh luck me
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#333 distant traveller
I think the Olympics should always be held in Greece. Countries should contribute financially to help with the cost, but Athens should be the venue.
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Latest Opinion poll shows the Tory lead down to 3%.
'Dave' Cameron has wasted over 3 years as tory leader.
A few months settling in, a year projecting his image and the rest of the time sitting back complacently assuming Gordon Brown's unpopularity would let him walk into No. 10.
He has failed to make any change to the tory party other than shallow PR and marketing.
His utter lack of any vision and clear strategy for the UK has left him now a hostage to the rabid right wing of the UNCHANGED tory party. He will talk about change alot - but is not offering it.
He is clueless and is not a credibl;e alternative to the current government.
Bill
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@ Billmcfadden
Many readers will find your comment unfathomable. Whether you like Cameron's party or not, the widely held view of impartial observers is that it has been radically altered. It's noticeable in politics, isn't it, that people see only what they want to see when they gaze on their enemies - usually it's something with horns and cloven feet.
As for a credible alternative to the current government, I would argue that any party or coalition of parties that excluded New Labour would be a vast improvement. Eleven appalling years of 'Tax, Borrow and Waste'. That's New Labour for you and 'clueless' doesn't begin to describe this bunch of self-deluded incompetents.
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#351 bill
Gordon Brown has wasted over 11 years as Chancellor, and Prime Minister.
A few months settling in, a year projecting his image and the rest of the time sitting back complacently assuming David Cameron's unpopularity would let him stay in No. 10.
He has failed to make any change to the Labour party other than shallow PR and marketing.
His utter lack of any vision and clear strategy for the UK has left him now a hostage to the rabid left wing of the UNCHANGED Labour party. He will talk about change alot - but is not offering it.
He is clueless and is not a credibl;e alternative to the current opposition.
....see what I did here....?
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#351 Bill
A small class of 14 year olds in school (if there are any small classes left that is) would be a credible alternative to the current government.
And how any Labour supporter can dish out accusations regarding shallow PR and marketing when shallow PR and marketing has been the only thing the government have done well over the past 11 years astounds me.
Sometimes change is necessary. It was necessary in 1997 but Labour have failed us spectacularly. It's time for change again.
As I keep saying - the only way to ensure effective government is through effective opposition - once complacency sets in in government then we're all doomed.
Apart from those on the government payroll of course.
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Re: 351 to 354
DC and Osborne are a credible alternative.
GB and Dahling are also credible.
Of the two options, DC and Osborne's policies are closest to my opinion on what should be done -(well, for today at least). So that's where my vote would float at the moment.
The problem, I think, is the party machines who, it appears, keep filling up these blogs with accusations of bias and rubbishing each other...
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Get it right Nick - it's NOT "labour investment", it's "labour WASTE"
Just tell me how a "diversity co-ordinator" can ever be deemed an investment?
Finding 25% (£100B) to cut would be a doddle, and BETTER services could easily be provided with a bit of decent management.
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Nick,
the government is getting itself into a right old tizz over prostitution.
I would say that we should also ban the sale of sex aids. If people who wish to be sexually satisfied by having sex with a prostitute are to be criminalised, then where would it end.
It is easier for women to satisfy themselves and I would say a much more pleasant experience, from what I know from some girlfriends. They now even refer to the aids as their 'kit'. As for the top shelf, then that too should not be allowed either.
I mean men are being totally emasculated, there is no hope. I think many people are completely losing the plot. Next they will bringing in prohibition on drinking, I mean we know what happens a woman goes out, gets drunk, and then has sex. I mean it's obvious isn't it.
Hey, let's go the whole hog, no mixed schools, no men and women working together, we cannot have any contact, arranged marriages, that's not a problem either, it's for your own good.
Nick, please will nobody stop this before we all are forced into celibacy and become Puritans, now that was a great time, no more Christmas Pudding! A new rallying call to the masses, ban Christmas, how many children are born in September, we must be told.
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bm @ 351:
In a sense I tend to agree that The Conservatives have tended to sit back on their laurels and relied too much on Gordon Brown's unpopularity. They haven't really inspired large numbers of people to stray away from their comfort zone by pushing policies that can be seen to work. They still however have two years in which to turn things around unless Brown decides to cut and run before the real economy implodes. Lower oil prices, lower inflation, tax cuts etc. are fooling them into thinking that Brown is the man for them. When job cuts, expensive foreign holidays, lost homes and eventually tax rises etc. begin to rear their ugly heads as a result of Government policy decisions taken now they may not be so ready to forgive and forget. Another factor is that they they appear to trust Brown to handle the economy in crisis but when things return to a more even keel they have signalled that they want a change. Brown himself is still disliked and distrusted by many people as a character and as a politician. Plenty of water will flow under the bridge before The General Election.
As for The Conservatives the errors of George Osborne and Caroline Spelman who appears to be anonymous for the moment + the return of Oliver Letwin won't have aided their cause in my opinion but there is time to put that right. Both parties have a core of loyal support but it is the floating voters who will decide who governs.
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#207. U9461192 wrote:
"'failure of Thatcherism'. Huh?"
Do you deny that it was Margaret Thatcher that decisively opened up markets through de-regulation?
Do you deny that the lack of proper regulation was one of the causes of the bubble/crunch?
Do you deny that the policies initiated by Margaret Thatcher's government based on Milton Friedman's economic philosophy have been maintained by every government since?
Do you deny that Margaret Thatcher is 'worshipped' by the vast majority of the Tory party, and reviled by the vast majority of everybody else?
Do you deny that before Margaret Thatcher there was more regulation, and an attitude that regulation was needed?
So, please will you review your "huh!"?
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Right let's settle this...
Government spending this year is 586bn based on a GDP of 1365bn.
Assuming a pro-rata fiscal stimulus of 0.25% GDP or 3.5bn for the rest of the tax year.
Total spending of 590bn.
Or. 43% GDP
In 2009, the economy is assumed to contract by 2% GDP. The Government's projection was 1399bn. Assuming 2008 is correct, GDP will be no more than 1337bn.
Yet government spending is projected at 620bn, plus another 1% GDP fiscal stimulus or 13bn. 633bn in total.
Or. 47% GDP
A shortfall is 75bn. Paid for by borrowing.
In 2010, Government projected GDP is 1438bn, assuming another contract of 1% GDP using 2008's number; GDP will be 1324bn.
Government spending is projected at 653bn plus another 1% fiscal stimulus at 13bn = 666bn.
A shortfall on 2010 figure of £127bn, paid for by additional borrowing.
Or. 50% GDP.
So government in two years is spending 6% GDP more than now.
Total additional government debt - £200bn.
What Cameron is proposing is slowing the additional government spending.
If government spending is slowed to only an additional 1% GDP year on year from 2008 levels of 586bn and the fiscal stimulus is then added.
£590bn in 2008, £612bn in 2009 and £624bn in 2010.
Compared to £590bn, £633bn & 666bn.
%GDP of government spending is 46% in 2009 and 47% in 2010.
A roughly a 3%GDP difference by 2010.
A borrowing shortfall of 54bn + 85bn = 139bn.
61bn less is borrowed.
Far more manageable and any future tax increases are reduced to pay for it.
That's the difference, there are no spending cuts, just slower spending increases and lower overall borrowing.
And less to pay back in recovery.
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#357 TAG
I can't understand why the government hasn't legalised prostitution already. The extra tax revenue must be an incentive for them alone......!!
It's the oldest profession in the world and whatever Jackie Smith says won't ever stop it. Legalising it has worked well in America, so why not here?
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Cameron says several times in his NR interview that the UK has "the biggest budget deficit in the modernised world"
Question: Does Cameron consider that the US is part of the "unmodernised world"?
Question: Does Cameron wish to comment on the fact that debt repayments in the following countries as a % of income are higher than in the UK, which is at the OECD average (Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Portugal, USA)?
Question: Is Cameron going to sack his researchers for making him look a bit silly?
OECD Stats on Fiscal Balances and Public Indebtedness Make Cameron Look Ill Informed
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Re: 357
But I quite like Chrismas pudding !
It goes very well with a spot of Custard
(At which point I refer you to the Daily politics blog again, ahem !)
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
@359
Do you deny that there was more regulation under Thatcher than under "light touch" Brown
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Re: 360
Yes. Agreed. There are no spending cuts, just slower spending increases etc.
And you can't actually cut something that is still only talk, the increased spending hasn't been announced yet. Its just been hypothesised...
Actually, I wish we could cut all the spin from the party machines, the Labour one in particular. They're dreadful. Spin equates to being dishonest in my book.
I trust all floating voters think the same way.
The other book that floating voters need to read is "How to lie with Statistics". Then you'll understand what is going here.
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NIck, it appears that the Tories are appearing to take their weekly shop in the political Lidl, or Aldi, opting to take off the packaging on their products and take on "own brand policies". Indeed, it seems that they have called for a clean up in political isle 4 for Labours economic policy, which they see as having the consistency of milky vomit.
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#361
Let's legalise it all. We can then have earnings taxed, we can have regular health checks, of both parties, we can also start living in the real world where men, and women, are really nothing other than slaves, albeit wage slaves.
I mean look at the reality of the sex trade. Use of pornographic material to stimulate, look at people getting dressed up to satisfy a fantasy. Sales of fine lingerie will diminish, nursing uniforms, maybe even Prince Harry will struggle to find a Nazi uniform to wear at a fancy dress party.
Nick, you know by now where my mind takes me so I will stop here, but I think this one will be in the next labour party manifesto, then we can all laugh when they lose.
However, I will end on a serious note, the trafficking of women for sex must end, get the traffickers and the pimps. The sad women who have to sell their bodies to fund drug addiction, they are the ones who need help, and the police could do something about that, and we have to ask how women do seem to be able to operate with impunity, much to their detriment.
We also still have the serious problem of rent boys, that issue also needs addressing. However, the solution is not the one proposed by Miss Smith, the worst Home Secretary since Jack Straw.
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@362
As you well know the deficit is substantially larger if you include all the stuff that Chancellor Brown likes to keep off balance sheet.
As a percentage of GDP we are the worst when everything is included and in terms of affordability we are the least able to pay.
Welcome to Sub Prime Britain
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#362
Presumably Cameron has begun to learn from the newlabour tactic promulgated by Blair, Brown, Campbell and Mandelson for some eleven years now; take a lie and keep repeating it until people start to believe you.
If newlabour want to pursue these tactics their apologists can hardly blamethe tories for doing the same.
Spending will not be cut; but the non stop rel growth will be cut back.
The spend now pay later culture of newlabour has bought us a credit boom now turning to bust. Over inflated house prices and over inflated commodity prices. The whole country has been living a life it cannot aford to repay; unsold city centre flats in the middle of a housing shortage are testimony to this.
The government is in disarray. Gordon Brown looked completely on the back foot last night when trying to defend more spending to sort out the crisis brought on by an excess of spending. And just because everyone else is doing something doesn't make it the right thing to do. Lemmings do what everyone else is doing and this is one spending cliff the UK economy should step away from.
Newlabour; newlemmings.
Call an election.
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362 - absolutely spot on!
Cameron uses the Thatchet technique very well,he believes that if you tell a blatant lie often enough in a raised voice that it will be believed.
He continually and consistently tells lies about Britains economic position to "big up" his own views and to date he has been allowed to get away with it.
Brown to be fair is also regularly economical with the truth,albeit his favoured technique is to mask his lies with a mass of figures and statistics which once disseminated actually often are counter to the point he is trying to make!
What has suprised me since this announcement is the fact that the BBC have actually been far LESS BIASED and more POLITICALLY neutral than Sky and even ITN - Cameron was seen floundering yesterday at his Keynote Press Conference unable to answer direct questions from Adam Boulton or Tom Bradbury.
The whole charade being overseen by a picture of Churchill must be the biggest political faux pas since last weeks Tory launch of the hideous new logo of 3 cogs !
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Re: 366
Light touch Blair/Brown is a myth.
There's more regulation under Labour.
I can't smoke in a bus shelter.
I have to have my domestic electrics certified by building standards.
I have to have an energy efficiency certificate if I want to sell my house...
ad infinitum.
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I am pretty dam sure I know what this Tory Policy will look like on the ground should they win the next General Election.
That election would be won in the battleground seats of the West and East Midlands and North West,take a look there at Conservative administrations elected to power over the past 3 years,since Cameron came in to Tory leadership and you get a frightening glimpse of what will happen.
Council Tax raised and yet an attempt to mask it and/or to blame Central Government.
Social Services slashed
Education budgets slashed and a reluctance to take up any Central Government grants to rebuild schools
Ecological projects slashed - green talk proliferates but in reality there is little or no tangible action.
Charges increased - car parking,waste collection outside of the minimum requirement.
Road and Transport costs slashed - all new road building plans halted,repair and remedial work halted.
Where does the money go? - in the case of authorities like Birmingham and Wolverhampton - Councillors and Council Executive spending has risen disproportionately to other areas,Consultant fees rise disproportionate to other areas and in some cases can be attributed directly back to high level nationally well know old school Tory supporting companies.
If you want to see Conservatives in action look at Birmingham - social services cut and a 6 year old starving to death,a 33m gift to the Tory Party to stage their party conference,Wolverhampton a £12m budget defecit due to waste on consultancy firms and services and 2 local Tory Councillors forced to resign due to substantiated sleaze allegations,Dudley - school playing fields sold off,libraries and swimming pools closed and a £200m Central Government grant declined by the Education Minister as it would be "politically imprudent" to build new schools at this time...
Thatcherism in action!
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Personally I feel the Tories are keeping their scary underbelly hidden for scaring the voters.
They are not the answer that much is clear but Brown and Darling are even less the answer.
If the GE was tommorrow Cameron would get my vote - but I wish the UK parliment was more PR so every vote really counted and the other parties then had more power when it comes to voting.
Our only choice is Red or Blue. One knows that it will get back in eventually if voted out.
Is this democracy? Doesnt feel like it.
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I would just like to comment on David Cameron's choice of being interviewed by John Snow with a portrait of Winston Churchill in the background.
It highlighted the contrast between Cameron and this historic figure and made me think of Churchill's war cabinet, which contained future big public spenders and reformers Clement Attlee and Aneuran Bevan in it.
Daily we hear from the media calls to spend more money on the helping the infirm, the vulnerable, the latest drugs for the NHS, boosting or replacing "failing" schools etc etc, with heart-rending illustrations to show how not enough resources are allocated to this or that particular cause.
Who would a cut in public spending increases affect or benefit? This is what we need to ask. As I've said before, we get the government we deserve.
As families and communities have become less able or willing to care for the elderly, the sick and the vulnerable the state has taken on this responsibility and it needs to be paid for. With an ageing population expenditure must inevitably increase. Which increases, I ask are likely to be less with the Conservatives?
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269
The problem is not spending per se, but paying for it by massively increasing debt at a time of declining tax receipts.
The Chinese and Indians could comfortaly increase spending because of the amount of money they earned over the last decade.
The australians were able to pump A$20billion of tax cuts into their economy,because of their fiscal surpluses,built up over a decade.
What no-one on the left wants to consider is why should China , India, Brazil and the rest continue to lend us money to fund over priced public services in the UK at ridiculously low interest rates, instead of developing the education and health services of their own people
For those blaming the tories in the 80's for these problems how many bank collapses happened then.
This crisis started in 2001. After GB cancelled 100's of billions of Third World debt, the banks were given carte blanche to restock their balance sheets any way they could.
The unions were promised a spending splurge in thanks for their support in winning re election
It is these 2 factors that have caused the problems we are facing just now
Finally about cuts. When Patricia Hewitt promised to resign if the NHS didn't go into surplus. 30000 nurses lost their jobs, training budgets were slashed,
but no Assistant Director for Equality and Diversity on 77,000 was harmed in the process.
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362 Balhamu
Cameron has to fight fire with fire.
A long time ago Brown stopped bothering with either reality or the truth. Since the media have left his porkies unchallenged - Brown has been able to construct an entire fairy world and convince people that his Narnia is real.
In order to take the fight to the government, Cameron will be forced to ignore reality and tackle Gordon in his fairy tale castle.
Let's hope Cameron can fell Gordon's beanstalk.
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@373
You miss the point the regulation of the Banks was light touch hands off instigateed by Brown
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#359
The point about the whole banking collapse, insane borrowing binge that has lead the UK to the point of collapse is that it all happened entirely on Labour's decade long reign of terror.
Don't you remember? Just as it was all going pear-shaped Darling invited Cameron and Clegg in for a bit of a chat, put the chips on the table and 'fessed up 'Look chaps, it's all gone tits-up, cut me a bit of slack here -we're going to part-nationalise the banks - don't make any waves. Please.'
Okay said Cameron and Clegg. Do what you have to do.
Then, the day the balloon goes up how is it reported?
a)' Unprecedented cross-party agreement as banks are part-nationalised'?
or
)' Standard - Chartered executives devise plan to save UK banks'?
Nope. What we got was...
c)' Gordon Brown single-handedly saves the UK and entire world from failure of Thatcherism' (That'll be the Tories fault then).
And then, when Osborne questions the sanity of printing even more money in an attempt to defer technical recession for another six months you have Brown and Darling on with faux kicked puppy expressions about how the Tories have betrayed them.
And the great lie has been told. It was transmitted repeatedly on the BBC.
Gordon Brown's economic bust, a bust he pumped up for a full decade is dismissed by the BBC and Labour as all the fault of the Tories.
And it appears the lie is working. Instead of Gordon Brown's popularity figures continuing to tank as he is rightly tied to this total economic catastrophe they have actually risen. He has somehow, by dicatating the 'media narrative', managed to convince folk that it all had nothing to do with him.
It's 'global'. It was the yanks what done it. It's all the banks fault. And, for good measure, he's trashed the banks (who he knows nobody has any love for) and the entire reputation of the UK financial system in perpetuity just to have another scape-goat for his personal incompetence.
ANd his solution to this crisis of over-borrowing? Flag up a possible temporary period of zero or negative inflation as evidence of a possible deflationary spiral [dutifully reported by the BBC] and then print hundreds of billions of more borrowed money in an attempt to re-inflate the economy on an ocean of worthless paper.
It'd be funny if it wasn't so tragic.
The nation is in the grip of a madman.
And it is only possible because there is a hard-core of psychotic haters of Margaret Thatcher who still want to punish her for closing the mines. Or something. Even though it's reported she's got a less than iron grip on reality herself these days. ie She doesn't care any more.
Mind you. She's still got more of a grip on reality than Gordon Brown. He is completely off the high-board.
Whatever your thoughts on Thatcher at least when she seemed to be losing the plot in the late 1980's then the Tories got rid of her. Labour, by contrast, seem determined to stick with this economic dementor and indulge his fantasies of global economic saviour even as he proposes the final bonfire of Sterling and our descent into a Mugabe-esque economy.
Meanwhile all the Labour apologists go to their 'happy place'. The ritual hatred of Thatcher. Or Emmanuel Goldstein for those of a literary bent.
Brown can do anything as long as he pulls out the hate figure of Thatcher. All critical reasoning goes out the window.
Bogus statistics on tractor production. Unnecessarily engineered foreign wars to distract the populace with a bit of patriotic fervour. State manipulation of the media. History re-written to absolve the party of any blame. Any bad news blamed on terrorists, or other hate figures. The yanks, the banks, Margaret Thatcher.
God, but Orwell was good wasn't he?
ID cards anybody?
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Re the prostitiution trafficing
If the governemnt didnt have all these illegalss in the country there would be no trafficed ladies to exploit.
Failure to control the borders is the root cause of the problem.
Fix that not the symptom
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Re: 375
Yes.
More on that very point (and more) at http://tgrworzels.blogspot.com
and
http://sirpercyworzels.blogspot.com
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#374.
Erm,
I don't know where you have been but the argument is to slow the growth of public spending not cut it.
So public spending increases but not as much as Brown has determined for 2010 & 11.
I suggest you look at #360.
And step away from the dog whistle...
Also, there are many key marginals all over the country not just limited to the Midlands and North West.
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What we need is a media that are interested in fact-checking. I used to think this was one of the central tasks of journalists, but it appears cutting-and-pasting of press releases is just far easier.
Channel 4 News makes some attempt at this through their fact-check website, though they may be a little left-wing for the tastes of those on here.
Difficult to get enough impartiality in the checking though I guess (e.g. if the fact-check proved that the Conservatives were being economical with the truth I'm sure it would prove that Alistair Campbell wrote or edited it), and to ensure expert views are taken on-board, acknowledging what are facts, what are differences in views, what is wrong.
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Trolls are out in force today
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376 - As I indicated i my earlier post I feel this pathetic attempt to engratiate himself with Churchill - a great war time Leader - WILL COME BACK TO HAUNT HIM!
Why not Thatchers picture Dave?.....are you scared on the Grandson of Thatcher jibes??
RE Churchill - as a war time Leader and mastermind of the ultimate victory he deserved and got the respect of a nation,but lets not forget the subliminal message that maybe Boy Dave was'nt aware of - Churchill as a peace time politician even more as an economist - just short of an unmitigated disaster!....
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Still no Labour apologists want to take up my challenge on the 'tough choices' that Gordon Brown will be announcing.
It is my contention that in order to rig an increase in GDP for this quarter thus deferring technical recession for another six months that Gordon Brown will be sending 15bn quid of borrowed money out in the post with instructions to have a good Christmas.
He'll dress it up as a 'tough choice' and a necessary 'fiscal stimulus' to the economy of course.
Experience from America suggests it will simply get spend on food at ASDA but it will provide a temporary lift to GDP. Enough to rig the GDP figures I'll be betting.
Although perhaps 'bringing forward planned spending' will do that. Sign 20bn quid worth of contracts in a hurry and feed them into the ONS computer.
Tell me I'm wrong. In a quarter where we'll likely see an extra 250,000 people unemployed I'm betting our GDP figures will be rigged to show that the economy in fact 'grew'.
C'mon you Labour apologists. You Thatcher-haters. Tell me that Gordon Brown, your anointed PM, would never pull a cynical stunt like that.
You can't. Can you? You know he's capable of anything to preserve his delusional reputation.
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
Of course much of this debate is irrelevant until we know the exact details of Darlings Pre-Budget report.
Exactly how much will the financial stimulus be?
Exactly how will it be paid for?
Most importantly - what is the timetable to repay it- and how e.g how does any spending be paid back and how eg tax growth receipts,taxation elsewhere and when.
My own hunch is that a give-away of around £25billion will be announced.
Darling will optimistically propose that this will be "paid back/equalised" by 2012/2013 - that is a decent and obtainable payment reschedule but politically raises the issue of the next election and how it would be repaid by a non Labour administration.He simply has to validate how long it will be before he pays it back otherwise the spectre of tax increases will haunt him!
I also think however that he may have a "ace in the hole" politically in respect of low/middle earners in that politically if he imposes levies/taxes on the utilities (windfall tax) whilst monitoring and stopping price rises above the rate of inflation,imposes greater inheritance taxation on estates over £1m,increases or introduces a new top rate taxation on bonuses and perks over £100,000 - he will not only generate substantial extra income - running in to billions- but send a political message to low and middle earners - ie 85% of the electorate - that he is supporting them-whilst accusing the Tories of not supporting them as due to their revised policy they have actually given themselvs a fiscal straightjacket
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The whole thing is nothing but that old game Musical Chairs. The music starts, the players proceed round and round, and when the music stops they all grab a seat. One leaves the game but the others remain to continue until only the winner is left. Same music, same game, same players, just a rotation of winners.
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Re: trafficking in women. What I don't understand is why when there are so many free soup kitchens, there is a market in cheap take-aways?
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Labour free of spending restraint.
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Great Andy Dudley and some others, you really do crack me up!!
Someone was complaining yesterday that these debates were being monitored by the Tories with Tory activists being encouraged to participate and support the Tory line.
I am absolutely sure this is the case; but I am also absolutely sure Labour are doing the same. Both parties have a real battle on here for public opinion, and it is only right that they argue it out for the rest of us to read and form our own view. And make our own contributions.
Anyway, back to my basic point: I seem to recall you said you were unbiased yesterday. Unlike you, I can't blog the whole time as I have a real job to do, but your 374 posting (amongst many others I seem to recall) has to let the cat out of the bag!!! What a load of scaremongering, hyberbolic nonsense!!!
Worse even than what I can recall the Tories throwing at Labour in 1997!!! And look what happened, the first term was actually great: Labour did a great job and were deservedly re-elected with a stonking majority. Only more recently well into their third term have Labour gone off the wires.
You talk about public spending being 'slashed.' Give me a break!! I doubt any government can achieve more than 2% max spending cuts in any one year: the ship of state is a very slow moving one. And anyway, the Tories are not even talking about cuts per se, simply reducing the growth in spending. At a time when I, all my friends, everyone I know is having to exercise genuine restraint and repay debts, etc. it strikes me as utterly bizarre that somehow the Government can't even make a bit of a simlar effort!!!
By the way, we've also learned the hard way that debts do have to be repaid - so having got ourselves into slightly too much debt, we can see that not sorting it out is only going to make the problem worse. The government is no different. Indeed, up till 8 weeks ago, the guy drumming this home most was none other than our very Prime Minister!!!!
Anyway, I just laughed when I saw your 374 posting. Please resign in as Great Labour Andy Dudley: you are entitled to your views and I respect that. But don't try to say you're independent!!!
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#386 greatandydudley
...er wasn't Gordon arrogant enough to associate himself with Churchill not so long ago.....
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One of the few non-partisan on bloggers (backbencherPete @ 338) on this forum wrote:
"But simply supporting respective party lines is a cop out - as a voter I want the facts on which to base judgements when choosing the party I consider best able to handle our failing economy " .
Sounds fair enough?
As a non-partisan blogger myself, I do not think so because Pete's statement assumes that a political party has the answers.
But no political party has the answers.
It is a fact that very few people actively support any of the mainstream political parties in this country - hence their continual funding issues.
Those of us who are not locked into the mainstream party mindset should consider voting for people who stand as individuals, not necessarily party members.
If enough individuals were elected, I believe we would get far better decision making and outcomes because the debate would have to account for a number of different opinions.
When you think about it, these parties seem to have more-or-less hijacked our democracy but it is still within our remit to change that.
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dudley - I'm impressed, all that bile and no supporting evidence, just spite and playing party politics with the death of a small child. Shame on you
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#384. At 11:07am on 19 Nov 2008, balhamu wrote:
What we need is a media that are interested in fact-checking. I used to think this was one of the central tasks of journalists, but it appears cutting-and-pasting of press releases is just far easier.
Well said! Much of the media these days appears to be simply a sounding board for party politics without any interest in Truth.
Similarly, much of the banter on here seems to be either steeped in history or blatant fantasy.
In the current climate, Thatcher, Churchill, et al are irrelevant. We should simply focus on the past 11 years of government and judge it objectively.
My personal view is that it's been an unmitigated disaster on pretty much every level, and the facts are there for everyone to see why.
Just for once I'd like to see the government apologists defend the last 11 years without mentioning the Tories, or quoting statistics, using cold hard facts that can be verified. Similarly, I'd like them to do the same for the opposition parties - look at their policies on merit, rather than in comparision to their opposiing halves.
I only wish the media would try the same...
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#389.
Ok... see the figures in #360.
Say Brown ends up in 2011 with an additional 200bn of borrowing.
At say 4% interest... that's 8bn a year.
Or about 2p on income tax JUST FOR THE INTEREST.
The fiscal stimulus package would have cost about 30bn by then
Pay it back by 2012.?
So increase taxes by £38bn in one year, so that's about 3% GDP.
Give away 1% GDP for 2 1/2 years.. then tax at 3% GDP every year after that.
Now, that's what a call a really great tax cut. :(
Even to pay back the recession borrowing, it would take about 10 years.
So that's 3% GDP can could have been used to invest by businesses, create jobs, using on creating demand through spending by consumers.
3% GDP just to pay back our debts...
Brown's spending plans for 2009-11 are economic suicide.
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@388
I cant for the life of me recall what I wrote in that post but it must of hit the truth alarm at Millbank
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384 Balhamu
I agree with you 100%. I'd like to see journalists who are not only conversant with the basic facts, but whom also challenge political spin.
To be honest I'd never noticed a left wing bias on Channel 4 news. I know that Jon Snow is supposed to be an ardent left-winger - but I never notice any bias. (Even though I hold a personal grudge against Jon Snow after he pushed me out of the way to get on a train ;-) ......)
In fact - I hate to say it - I find Channel 4 news far, far more balanced than the BBC.
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#389
My own hunch is that a give-away of around ?25billion will be announced.
Yep. Wouldn't surprise me. Around 500 quid each conjured out of fresh air. Free magic money. Just like the free 300bn he conjured up over the past decade.
More magic from the miracle PM.
What mechanism will they use to 'bank' that give-away into this quarter's GDP? Will they send out cheques with instructions to spend? Will they simply borrow the money up front and stick it into some account (Northern Rock) so that it somehow adds to this quarter's GDP?
What mechanism do you think they'll use?
I guess we won't have to wait too long to find out.
Do you think anybody will notice them rigging the GDP figures like that and question who do they think they're fooling and what are they playing at when another quarter of a million people just lost their jobs?
Or will that all be Margaret Thatcher's fault too?
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80. At 12:58pm on 18 Nov 2008, StephenWJ wrote:
I'd love to see Mandy on Strictly Come Dancing - it'll be the our only chance to vote this unelected 'individual' (I had to retype what I initially wrote) off and get him out of our lives...
Who would be his dancing partner? The Milipede, Balls or Caterpiller Eyebrows?
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#359 John from Hendon
On the issue of pointing the finger at Thatcherism you could have also raised the issue of the Right To Buy and the concept of the 'home owning democracy' in over inflating house prices in the first place.
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#395 johnconstable
I would disagree with you - political parties have an important place in making our democracy work
Without them, public policy development will be a lot slower, and difficult decisions are more likely to be put off indefinitely, as a seperate coalition will need to be built up on each policy issue.
There will be a lot more 'pork-barrell" politics, as the governing coalition would be forced to 'buy-off' votes of the mass of independents.
Funding, for example, would also become far more difficult, and the economies of scale (e.g. in communication, developing policy and engaging people in it etc) would be lost.
It's no coincidence that every democracy in the world has developed along the lines of political parties.
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At the moment the Conservatives are almost completely irrelevant. They have nothing serious to add to the current struggle to deal with the global financial and economic crisis. Cameron and Osborne blather around like Laurel and Hardy talking about fine messes – but without having anything coherent to say. Meanwhile Gordon Brown rises in stature every day – a politician who looks right on the world stage and indeed is the star actor on that stage at the moment.
Laurel and Hardy are good at playing politics and will win the 6th Form debating prize hands down. Meanwhile Brown gets on with governing – and he is doing it rather well…
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#395
A very good point, I'd love to see the same, though unfortunately I can't see it any time soon. I'd also love to see proportional representation, because until we do have it, we're destined to be seesawing our way between governments continually based on the idea that "they can't be as bad as the idiots already doing it"
I voted Labour in '97 because I felt the Tories had had their day and change was necessary. Plus our local MP (I live in a Labour stronghold) is excellent on a local level, regardless of what the party stand for nationally.
In terms of realistic alternatives though, there's only the Tories. Because they're the only ones with any hope of kicking Labour out again. Voting for any of the "minor" parties is pointless because none of them have enough support nationally to depose of Labour, and so if you want change then the only way to vote is Tory. On the basis, as many have stated before, that they're the lesser of two evils - at least at this point in time.
If I was cyncial I'd say voting for me is pointless anyway - my constituency has been Labour since the beginning of time. Is it democracy? Not really.
But Westminster full of independents who actually represent the people who voted for them, that would be a dream come true.
I'd love to see the funding regulation someone in here suggested during the Osborne "scandal" - that no donations over £1000 should be allowed - thereby eliminating the corporate bribery that shapes policy and would force the political parties to actually engage with public opinion again.
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