Do you think we could have avoided recession if the Tories were in power?

nickmason

sandiep wrote: »

I think we'd have headed into it earlier, because the Conservative would have been manipulating the interest rates for political purposes for the last 11.5 years.

Don't forget that during the last conservative government (who also had 12 years, i think), we had 2 recessions.

I'd take a different view - we would indeed have headed into it earlier, because:
1) the conservatives would have know you can't hold these things back, Canute-like, forever
2) we wouldn't have been manipulating the inflation indices and so the interest rates
3) even if being ultra-realpolitik, it makes more sense to get into the recession early and bounce out of it than to lag everyone else. I think the conservatives would have been more receptive to such an approach - although I recognise that is based broadly on my belief that we are more noble than New Labour!

nickmason

bendix wrote: »

The tories were indeed lucky Brown didnt go to the polls in 2007. Very lucky. By the time the next election happens, the tories will sweep to power and, as the world rights itself again, will get the (undeserved) kudos for that.

Which just goes to show - in a modern global economy, electoral fortunes are 95% luck, 10% good management. The surplus 5% there is homage to Labour's inability to do basic accounting.

I rather like that, as well as agreeing with it!
:rotfl::rotfl:

chucky

nickmason wrote: »

The trouble is - and I've said it before, I'll say it again because it seems to take an eternity to sink in - the media didn't want to hear it. It didn't fit with their commentary.

yes - exactly what is happening right now, the media is on the band-wagon

nickmason

LauraW10 wrote: »

And the Tories would have gone into Iraq - for goodness sake they even managed to get into a war over the Falkland Islands.

Frankly I think those two wars show the Tories in much better light.

One was an ENTIRELY legitimate defence of British people from an aggressor, in which risks were taken - especially in the (unjustified) absence of international support - and firm leadership won the day.
The other was an ILLEGAL war against a non-aggressor, fuelled by some of the most despicable misrepresentations of facts and abuse of the constitution of this country, that has not only cost numerous lives but also the moral position from which we claim the right to nuclear weapons etc.

I could go on.

lostinrates

nickmason....your keyboard must be on fire tonight! Look at you go!

Wookster

ninky wrote: »

surely these are both things that could be (and should have been) tackled nationally?

If course, however we'd need a government that would be ready to make the tough choices to create conditions that are conducive to increased productivity.

I've just heard James Purnell saying that the problem at the moment is credit... this sort of attitude explains why Labour just does not understand (and never will) what this mess is about.

nickmason

baileysbattlebus wrote: »

Also from 2005 - Tory manifesto

The best guarantee of future prosperity is a dynamic economy. The growth of China, India and other Asian economies poses a direct challenge to our future competitiveness. New technology and the speed of global capital flows punish the inflexible and the sluggish. We need to reward risk-taking and innovation so that Britain becomes the best place in the world to start and to grow a business

By one D Cameron -

If only because most of politics seems to involve one side taking something completely out of context so the other then denies it (or like the famous "society" Thatcher quote has to lecture deaf ears on the full context) - I completely and utterly agree with David Cameron in what he said there.

And I think the Conservative party will do more than play lip service to such a mantra.

Teacher2301

Facts speak louder than opinion - Labour's socialist agenda cost us a lot of money and now Gordon has borrowed his way out of debt - throwing good money after bad. I agree with nickmason - but also, both wars/ conflicts defined the governments at the time. Good leadership of a country needs the right decision to be made at the right time. Maggie did it, unfortunately Brown/ Blair failed.

nickmason

lostinrates wrote: »

nickmason....your keyboard must be on fire tonight! Look at you go!

Not sure what came over me. The moment will pass.

amcluesent

>And that's just fuelled further by the talk of scorched-earth policies<

There's ample evidence that Clown always set-out to pauperise the English middle-class and engineer a huge transfer of assets, via the State, to the idle and f.eckless in Wales, Scotland, the NE and NW.