Unions - they just dont get it do they
15 September 2010, 01:55 PM
#91
You make it sound so noble of them, when in fact Labour were desperate to cling on to power, so much so they were ready to oust Brown late into the election campaign!
15 September 2010, 02:08 PM
#92
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when a labour government knows the game is up a decision is made to accelerate all spending to perpetuate the myth that they are for services and tories are for cuts. perhaps if just for once, the labour government left the country in a stable financial position cuts would not be needed by a tory government but then how would a labour government win an election?
15 September 2010, 02:10 PM
#93
expenditure, private > % of GDP 1.11 %
[161st of 187]expenditure, public > % of GDP 6.99 %
[19th of 187] expenditure, total > % of GDP 8.1 %
[36th of 187] http://www.nationmaster.com/red/coun...a-health&all=1
15 September 2010, 02:11 PM
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Yes Tel they were starved, and quite deliberately so
We still only spend around the average % of GDP on healthcare (which is a massive improvement on where we were 15 years ago).
If the UK isn't Division 1, then it's a pretty small division, after all no matter how much you want to run the country down, we're still the 5th or 6th biggest economic power on earth!
We still only spend around the average % of GDP on healthcare (which is a massive improvement on where we were 15 years ago).
If the UK isn't Division 1, then it's a pretty small division, after all no matter how much you want to run the country down, we're still the 5th or 6th biggest economic power on earth!
At the end of the day it's just about balancing the books, not spending till the cows come home in the knowledge that you won't have the job of putting it right in the next Parliament. As i said - reckless.
15 September 2010, 02:16 PM
#95
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Well there's a turn-up. A few minutes googling, and I managed to track down the R4 interview I was talking about, which was in fact with Göran Persson, Swedish Finance Minister from '94 to '96 and then PM up until 2006.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/pm/2010/0...n_person.shtml
Well worth a listen IMO, but the main points he makes are:
- you have to start making cuts early, or your small window of opportunity of public support on the one hand and breathing-space from the IMF and/or mahoosive interest rates on the other could vanish before you know it.
- you have to cut across the board. If you make a list of holy cows before you start, you'll just get nowhere.
- you have to share some of the pain with the better off. Govt spending cuts will inevitably hit the worst-off hardest, so some tax increases for the better-off are only fair and reasonable.
- you have to face the reality that talking about the cuts isn't when the pain hits, it's when you actually make them.
So, will the Coalition bottle it, or are they going to start wielding the knife soon?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/pm/2010/0...n_person.shtml
Well worth a listen IMO, but the main points he makes are:
- you have to start making cuts early, or your small window of opportunity of public support on the one hand and breathing-space from the IMF and/or mahoosive interest rates on the other could vanish before you know it.
- you have to cut across the board. If you make a list of holy cows before you start, you'll just get nowhere.
- you have to share some of the pain with the better off. Govt spending cuts will inevitably hit the worst-off hardest, so some tax increases for the better-off are only fair and reasonable.
- you have to face the reality that talking about the cuts isn't when the pain hits, it's when you actually make them.
So, will the Coalition bottle it, or are they going to start wielding the knife soon?
they tax people on modest incomes - 60%
One of the problems not really covered is societal in nature; we have in the UK a very adversarial society imo
In Government – the front benches in parliament are separated by two swords lengths, we lurch from left to right every few years -- politics is much more consensual in the rest of Europe.
In law we have an adversarial system as apposed to the European Napoleonic system (which is more inquisitorial in nature)
And in Industrial relations -- it is the unions against the bosses – unlike most of Europe
until we address this we are doomed to move closer to the US economic social model.
15 September 2010, 02:20 PM
#96
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that's because of our political sysytem, it is designed to lurch left and right and the two main parties wouldn't have it any other way. in the rest of europe coalitions are far more common place which stops any one party shifting too far in any direction.
15 September 2010, 02:30 PM
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Well, ok, living standards and free handouts that the country cannot afford, rather than defining an arbitrary club. This country is getting older, the manufacturing base is a shadow of its former self, the financial industry is being hounded out of town etc etc. All of these things will contribute to a Britain very different to what we've become accustomed. Yes healthcare spending is higher, about 3% of GDP higher in the period you mention, but i'm not sure that demonstrates "starvation" per se. And if we're comparing it to the money-no-object UK statistics of the past 7 years then what meaningful conclusions can we draw anyway?
At the end of the day it's just about balancing the books, not spending till the cows come home in the knowledge that you won't have the job of putting it right in the next Parliament. As i said - reckless.
At the end of the day it's just about balancing the books, not spending till the cows come home in the knowledge that you won't have the job of putting it right in the next Parliament. As i said - reckless.
The tone of your post are incredibly defeatist, and in some ways self-fulfilling.
Take education as an example, yes we could pull the plug on education 'handout'/INVESTMENT, but that is hardly likely to improve the country's long term prospects is it?
I don't believe the last gov. spent wisely by any means, largley because they failed to reform the public services properly. But we couldn't continue as we were, the NHS was in an appalling state 15 years ago, do you not remember that?
15 September 2010, 02:40 PM
#99
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Martin, I'd agree, but I'm not sure this is a purely political question. The recent trend of %GDP spent on public services is as follows (remember that the long term average tax take is 35%-36% of GDP - so anything above that is unsustainable). (These are all official Treasury figures):
2007-08 – 41.1%
2008-09 – 43.9%
2009-10 – 47.5%
2010-11 – 47.3%
Forecast:
2011-12 – 45.5%
2012-13 – 43.9%
2013-14 – 42.2%
2014-15 – 40.9%
2015-16 – 39.8%
The Tories were at 41.8% and 39.9% in the two years up to their defeat at the 1997 election. Labour actually reduced it to a low point in 1999-00 of 36.4% - i.e. they spent less than the Tories when they won the '97 landslide. Why? Because arguably they could after such a large majority. I'm not sure this really supports the healthcare spend - which itself is confused by the increasing costs of modern medicines.
So what does this tell us? Parties of both colours lift their spending in the run up to an election. Whilst these figures need to be considered against a background of macro-economics (i.e. the same spend year on year could be a different % of GDP purely driven by economic growth or recession), the picture is still pretty stark in recent years.
We're all doomed
Gordo
2007-08 – 41.1%
2008-09 – 43.9%
2009-10 – 47.5%
2010-11 – 47.3%
Forecast:
2011-12 – 45.5%
2012-13 – 43.9%
2013-14 – 42.2%
2014-15 – 40.9%
2015-16 – 39.8%
The Tories were at 41.8% and 39.9% in the two years up to their defeat at the 1997 election. Labour actually reduced it to a low point in 1999-00 of 36.4% - i.e. they spent less than the Tories when they won the '97 landslide. Why? Because arguably they could after such a large majority. I'm not sure this really supports the healthcare spend - which itself is confused by the increasing costs of modern medicines.
So what does this tell us? Parties of both colours lift their spending in the run up to an election. Whilst these figures need to be considered against a background of macro-economics (i.e. the same spend year on year could be a different % of GDP purely driven by economic growth or recession), the picture is still pretty stark in recent years.
We're all doomed
Gordo
15 September 2010, 03:35 PM
#100
15 September 2010, 04:14 PM
#102
hodgy
Yes, Sweden has pretty high taxes, although corporation tax is probably a fair bit lower than you imagined, at only 28%. Where they also seem to get badly stung is on VAT, which is an astonishing 25% (except food etc). In any case, to put my earlier post in perspective a little, the 12% or so deficit cuts they achieved in the mid to late 90's came from tax rises of just 1% or 2%, with the rest coming purely from spending cuts, all pushed through I might add by a Labour government.
With you all the way (and with Gordo who first made the point) about our political system swinging too suddenly and too often from one extreme to the other. It takes all the incentive away from planning for the long-term, which is probably what's needed.
Yes, Sweden has pretty high taxes, although corporation tax is probably a fair bit lower than you imagined, at only 28%. Where they also seem to get badly stung is on VAT, which is an astonishing 25% (except food etc). In any case, to put my earlier post in perspective a little, the 12% or so deficit cuts they achieved in the mid to late 90's came from tax rises of just 1% or 2%, with the rest coming purely from spending cuts, all pushed through I might add by a Labour government.
With you all the way (and with Gordo who first made the point) about our political system swinging too suddenly and too often from one extreme to the other. It takes all the incentive away from planning for the long-term, which is probably what's needed.
15 September 2010, 05:34 PM
#103
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pslewis - what's so great about the bank bailouts? Funny how it's Labour voters who always whinge about the bankers, yet are the first to step up and bail them out of any mess they get into. What we have in effect now is a risk free banking industry; "No need to worry about risk folks - whenever you lose money we'll cover it".
Usually the actions taken by government which always seem the best at the time have the worst repercussions further down the line, because they never think about the indirect effects of what they're doing. In Brown's case, all he cared about was the fact that people were going to lose money in the short-term, so he thought "we'll solve that problem by any means necessary", just like he solved every other problem in his career.
Usually the actions taken by government which always seem the best at the time have the worst repercussions further down the line, because they never think about the indirect effects of what they're doing. In Brown's case, all he cared about was the fact that people were going to lose money in the short-term, so he thought "we'll solve that problem by any means necessary", just like he solved every other problem in his career.
15 September 2010, 06:12 PM
#104
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hodgy
Yes, Sweden has pretty high taxes, although corporation tax is probably a fair bit lower than you imagined, at only 28%. Where they also seem to get badly stung is on VAT, which is an astonishing 25% (except food etc). In any case, to put my earlier post in perspective a little, the 12% or so deficit cuts they achieved in the mid to late 90's came from tax rises of just 1% or 2%, with the rest coming purely from spending cuts, all pushed through I might add by a Labour government.
With you all the way (and with Gordo who first made the point) about our political system swinging too suddenly and too often from one extreme to the other. It takes all the incentive away from planning for the long-term, which is probably what's needed.
Yes, Sweden has pretty high taxes, although corporation tax is probably a fair bit lower than you imagined, at only 28%. Where they also seem to get badly stung is on VAT, which is an astonishing 25% (except food etc). In any case, to put my earlier post in perspective a little, the 12% or so deficit cuts they achieved in the mid to late 90's came from tax rises of just 1% or 2%, with the rest coming purely from spending cuts, all pushed through I might add by a Labour government.
With you all the way (and with Gordo who first made the point) about our political system swinging too suddenly and too often from one extreme to the other. It takes all the incentive away from planning for the long-term, which is probably what's needed.
which I don't beleive was the case in the UK - especially health and education
15 September 2010, 07:31 PM
#105
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Im sure even Pete knows we're proper fooked
The important point as far as he and every other Bob Crowe out there is that more of us will make better educated prettier corpses
The important point as far as he and every other Bob Crowe out there is that more of us will make better educated prettier corpses
15 September 2010, 07:40 PM
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just an aside
Are the RMT the heaviest union ? - i havnt spotted anyone i wouldnt class as obese ..
and also
Has anyone spotted a reasonably attractive catholic yet ?
Are the RMT the heaviest union ? - i havnt spotted anyone i wouldnt class as obese ..
and also
Has anyone spotted a reasonably attractive catholic yet ?
Last edited by dpb; 15 September 2010 at 07:59 PM.
15 September 2010, 07:48 PM
#107
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And, yes, we may well be doomed under the Tories.
The good side of the situation we are in is that the Tories cannot form a Government by themselves ..... if they make it all hurt too much the Liberals will leg it back to Labour and ask them to sort the Economy out again.
15 September 2010, 07:48 PM
#108
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I think I might have spotted a sexy catholic though
15 September 2010, 07:54 PM
#109
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They were great simply because they had to be done ..... no-one saw it all coming as it did.
Something had to be done .... Labour stepped in and did it.
Please remember that the Tories said, "Leave it alone, don't do anything, let the world collapse" ..... such are their pathetic economic abilities.
The world listened to Gordon Brown and followed the UK's lead out of the mess - only Labour and Brown could have done what he did - luckily the Eton Boyz weren't in charge!! Laurel and Hardy would have done a better job than those two muppets!
Something had to be done .... Labour stepped in and did it.
Please remember that the Tories said, "Leave it alone, don't do anything, let the world collapse" ..... such are their pathetic economic abilities.
The world listened to Gordon Brown and followed the UK's lead out of the mess - only Labour and Brown could have done what he did - luckily the Eton Boyz weren't in charge!! Laurel and Hardy would have done a better job than those two muppets!
15 September 2010, 09:20 PM
#111
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2007-08 – 41.1%
2008-09 – 43.9%
2009-10 – 47.5%
2010-11 – 47.3%
You're childishly selecting the bits you want to support your irrational arguments, but completely ignore any data that doesn't fit for you. Are you Bob Crow in disguise?
Gordo
15 September 2010, 10:00 PM
#112
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Bob Crow ..... isn't he great?
I'll tell you something for nothing ...... if any one of us were under threat of redundancy we didn't want, pay drops/freezes, terms and conditions being changed - he is the single person you want stood next to you when you go to see the Executive Board!!!!
He makes them **** themselves ..........................
I'll tell you something for nothing ...... if any one of us were under threat of redundancy we didn't want, pay drops/freezes, terms and conditions being changed - he is the single person you want stood next to you when you go to see the Executive Board!!!!
He makes them **** themselves ..........................
15 September 2010, 10:51 PM
#114
Bob Crow ..... isn't he great?
I'll tell you something for nothing ...... if any one of us were under threat of redundancy we didn't want, pay drops/freezes, terms and conditions being changed - he is the single person you want stood next to you when you go to see the Executive Board!!!!
He makes them **** themselves ..........................
I'll tell you something for nothing ...... if any one of us were under threat of redundancy we didn't want, pay drops/freezes, terms and conditions being changed - he is the single person you want stood next to you when you go to see the Executive Board!!!!
He makes them **** themselves ..........................
15 September 2010, 10:57 PM
#115
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15 September 2010, 11:00 PM
#116
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Bob Crow ..... isn't he great?
I'll tell you something for nothing ...... if any one of us were under threat of redundancy we didn't want, pay drops/freezes, terms and conditions being changed - he is the single person you want stood next to you when you go to see the Executive Board!!!!
He makes them **** themselves ..........................
I'll tell you something for nothing ...... if any one of us were under threat of redundancy we didn't want, pay drops/freezes, terms and conditions being changed - he is the single person you want stood next to you when you go to see the Executive Board!!!!
He makes them **** themselves ..........................
Fortunately Crows brand of politics is slowly dying out, he is one of the remaining dinosaurs still wandering the political landscape
15 September 2010, 11:59 PM
#117
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Bob Crow ..... isn't he great?
I'll tell you something for nothing ...... if any one of us were under threat of redundancy we didn't want, pay drops/freezes, terms and conditions being changed - he is the single person you want stood next to you when you go to see the Executive Board!!!!
He makes them **** themselves ..........................
I'll tell you something for nothing ...... if any one of us were under threat of redundancy we didn't want, pay drops/freezes, terms and conditions being changed - he is the single person you want stood next to you when you go to see the Executive Board!!!!
He makes them **** themselves ..........................
Some of his idea's sound great tho - a sit-in on the M25, and encouraging civil disorder
I bet he hasn't got a clue what 'deficit' means - the only word he knows is 'stike'
16 September 2010, 12:24 AM
#118
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16 September 2010, 05:59 AM
#119
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But unions are still going and I noticed surprisingly strong in Australia which is like the UK of the 70's in the regard. Lots of Scouse Docker dinosaur types emigrated there in the 80's and set up shop. They now live in mansions whilst they stir up trouble and collect union fees.