I believe if we had a referendum on Lisbon, we have seen just such a “run” on the pound. As it is with a Conservative Government on the way, hopefully, and sense finally being talked even by labour, regarding the deficit. That we are starting to look a lot less dodgy to the financial world.

“Bloody Torries”
“Tory Cuts”

Indeed the first three years will be very difficult indeed, and I don’t even imagine we will be in a position to sweeten the pill much, until our 2nd term. Labour have stitched us up good and proper. As it is Labour should never have been allowed 12 years to do their worst, but sadly we were split over the E.U. and as a result some blame must fall on our party as well.

“My great fear is that Mp’s simply don’t understand the anger thats been building since the Iraq war. I can recall the riots here in Liverpool in 1981 (I was there!) It was mosty a backwash of failed “Prop it up/ don’t try to fix” Labour polices from the 70’s.”

One of my friends was imprisoned as a result of the riot in London. I do not recommend Rioting under any circumstance, The State cannot rightly allow the mob to get away with such behaviour.

“ Yes Up road tax & fuel if you must but motorway sales or worse still GPS “Pay as you go” will make the Poll Tax riots look mild.”

Personally I am no fan of the car, but I do recognise that it is the wellspring of our current wealth. I am not in favour of selling the motorways off either. However I note that Labour have left us in a very difficult position, and if it was to reduce the National debt by a significant amount, and access was reasonably cheap, we might have little choice, but to at least consider the option.

Frankly I would not like to see the BBC sold off, but if its public service duty, was maintained and a fair and reasonable price was forthcoming we would be wrong not to at least look at the proposal and consider it. I would be less in favour of ending the governments and tax payers hold on the Tote, as I believe vice, when allowed must contribute to the over all well being of all of the public.

Frankly using the current control of drugs legislation, to make Cannabis available OTC, would bring in a very large tax benefit to the tax-payer. We should at least consider it, although I imagine it will not happen anytime soon.

Labour have spent all our treasure and then have borrowed as much as they could in our name. We will be able to blame Labour for a while but of course we must get our house in order. That will certainly involve difficult decisions, some of which will cause some people to question our motives. I can assure you our chief concern is getting our economy off its knees, and back to work, and of course getting our budgets to balance.

So we are about to enjoy another 5 years of the current crap.

I feel for “DC”, i wonder if he understands the size of the job the he is going to face when he gets to number 10?…the inflation “Hare” will be out & running, i wish it had all crashed on Gordon’s watch………..now sadly most of it will wash up on “DC”’s watch

“Bloody Torries”
“Tory Cuts”

My great fear is that Mp’s simply don’t understand the anger thats been building since the Iraq war. I can recall the riots here in Liverpool in 1981 (I was there!) It was mosty a backwash of failed “Prop it up/ don’t try to fix” Labour polices from the 70’s.

Whatever “DC” has to do John, i strongly advice you leave cars alone. Yes Up road tax & fuel if you must but motorway sales or worse still GPS “Pay as you go” will make the Poll Tax riots look mild.

Cheers
Mike

John you have a very clear and simple way of explaining what others over complicate.

Keep it up many of us are listening, I hope DC is as well.

It will be interesting to see the penalty for failing to live up to this bill. To fine the government of the time? To ban that party from standing at the next election? Whatever the punishment, it will be anti-democratic unless it is agreed by a bipartisan (or tri-partisan) consensus. Perhaps it should be enforced by a referendum. Cutting public spending will have a lot of resistance from interest groups – particularly the public sector workers. Maybe the question should then be about balancing the budget over the business cycle by 2020 – with an independent audit to define what this means. The Prime Minister could hardly disagree.

I was irritated at the odd interruption by those MPs who clearly didn’t understand finance. Then I thought, well atleast they turned up.

The thing that really amazes me is that Labour MPs appeared not to know how bad the figures were until you spelt it out. Are they really so economically unaware? Do they live in hermetically sealed conditions and read nothing but the Guardian?

Most of the rest of the population have know for a year or more (and some of us knew the direction in which we were headed more than 5 years ago). It beggars belief that Labour MPs still didn’t realise the situation. How do these people get to be MPs?

The public is so wedded to the current levels of high spending, and largely unaware of the sheer magnitude of the cuts/tax rises required to square the circle, that any voluntary attempts to impose them will fail.

It is neccessary to virtually have blood on the streets before the penny will finally drop with Joe Public.

As far as I see, this law is the admission from Labour that they spent too much in the years leading up to the recession. Had they exercised responsibility before, we wouldn’t need this law now.

Don’t think that Alistair Darling will even begin this task. We already know the type of budget for 2010/11 that will be outlined in the pre-budget report.

“Of vast proportions and painted red,
And tied with cords to the back of his head.”

['The Dong with a Luminous Nose' - Edward Lear
The Faber Book of Nonsense Verse - hoe appropriate]

Their promise to halve the deficit is not qualified by saying they intend to cut back the structural deficit. They intend to wait for economic recovery to halve the deficit, and then will say they have met the requirements of the Deficit Bill.

Seems to me we need to be really ruthless about cost cutting while helping small business by cutting their punitive costs. Mostly these are from greedy local authorities. The council tax is much hated, it is paid out of already taxed income to incompetent self-serving local nabobs.

Pay schools from central government per head of pupils. Same for police/fire etc.. Pay them an allowance per head of population protected.

Get rid of the endless ranks of middlemen.

We productive people are swamped by hangers-on and jobsworths.

Once again, good luck

G Jones

We must encourage growth to increase tax revenues and reduce total Government spending significantly over time.

Holding spending at the cash total for 2010-2011 for the following three years, will “save” £104 billion over four years, reducing total spending by £56 billion per annum by the end of this period.

Add to that the scrapping of a number of New Labour programmes, changes to others to make them more efficient and deliver more for less, plus tax cuts to increase growth and generate higher tax revenues and you can, just about, see light at the end of the tunnel.

http://iaindale.blogspot.com/2009/11/what-if-theres-no-growth-emily.html

If that is what the average Labour MP genuinely believes, it’s no surprise that the Executive has been allowed to run riot with the finances. I wonder if she has worked out that the negative growth we currently suffer is not considered to be a good thing.

What that worries me is whether the new crop of back-bench MPs to the Speakers right after the election is going to be any better educated or informed than the current mob. It might be that Mr Browns “divide and conquer” tactics have simply confused the existing batch, and the (presumably) Conservative replacements will be a breath of fresh air. However, although there are some shining stars in the Tory firmament, there are many others so anonymous that they could represent any party.

The Treasury Shadow on the Daily Politics today made a reasonable fist of things, even though I can’t remember his name….