Cons Increase Deficit & National Debt Targets Missed

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

GeorgeHowell wrote: »

But according to the polls they're all going to vote for them again. Is it just a mid-term protest, or do they believe that Milliband, Balls, and Cooper & co will be any better ?

It's about them not believing they'd be any worse.

Sad to say, the Party I voted for, has royally screwed things up this time. I really did hope we had learned a lesson, and that Dave would detoxify the brand.

As it stands, they've done no better than labour would have, and indeed there's a strong case to say they may have done worse.

GeorgeHowell

HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »

It's about them not believing they'd be any worse.

Sad to say, the Party I voted for, has royally screwed things up this time. I really did hope we had learned a lesson, and that Dave would detoxify the brand.

As it stands, they've done no better than labour would have, and indeed there's a strong case to say they may have done worse.

I don't know how you make that out. Not a stellar performance I agree, but trying to do something about the state education system, trying to do something about the out of control welfare system and the culture of dependency, trying to draw a halt to EU encroachment, & not escalating our foreign military adventures commitments. These are all really major issues facing the country, and at least steps have been taken in the right direction. Would Labour have taken up the same positions on these ? I don't think so. And because of their delusion that a return to growth could be achieved any time soon, they probably would have taken us into even more debt in order to fund more non-jobs and create the illusion that we were getting somewhere.

BobQ

GeorgeHowell wrote: »

If we stop asking who is to blame then the electorate is all the more likely to make the same old mistake of putting them in again. They probably will anyway.

I think you will find that at the next election the public will be interested in the future not the past. I cannot recall a period in UK politics when at some point in a Parliament the polls showed the majority of people tire of arguments that it was all the previous Government's fault. You can say its not right this should happen but it usuually does.

For example, IDS has rightly commented that there have been problems with the tax credit system. But its taken them 2.5 years to do something about it. OK they have had other things to do, but in the next two years people will not accept simplistic arguments that it was all due to Blair.

homelessskilledworker

HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »

So anyway, back on topic......

Labour was useless. ConDems are equally useless.

We can't hit these deficit reduction targets without growth, and we can't cut our way out of a recession. As has been proven by Georgie boy, and his endless forced U-turns.

Many on here and elsewhere have noted for a long time that cutting too far too fast, would send us back into into recession or at best anaemic growth and this would only worsen the deficit problems, and these missed targets prove we were right.

There's an election on the way, and the Tories will have to go one of two ways.

To the centre, where most votes are, with a stimulus plan that actually works, a solid economic recovery, and the return to detoxifying their brand......

Or a knee jerk swing to the right to pander to the ideological base, and defend against UKIP diluting the vote, and that way lies certain defeat as has been learned the hard way by every previous Tory leader since Thatcher.

Will be interesting to see what happens but the way it looks just now the Tories are toast , and likely to spend another 15 years in the wilderness.

You'd think they would have learned by now.....

What Drivel...

Right now there are two types of people(and a bit of grey area). There are a group of people who really are paying the price and suffering, nobody I might add that actually caused the problems we have today.

And there is another group for all it's disingenous crocodile tears about naughty Bankers and the fact that Gordon Brown "probably did get carried away with borrowing and debt" are fighting tooth and nail to hold onto their ill-gotton gains from NuLabors stint. A group I might add who want old borrowing habits like self-cert to return and want an overload with yet more immigration to keep a manufactured housing shortgage going in order to say "f*** you Jack, I am ok" and then claim that they are anti facist lefties who want millions of uneducated poor Bulgarians into the UK in order to save it economically, and because they love those foreigners, Ohhh Pleaseee!!

Yes Labour could get in with a muppet like Milliband(nice as he is) and a chancer and political whor e like Ed Balls with their "were not them" manifesto. But would be under pressure from the start to borrow borrow borrow, they would start making us look like Greece in the first 18 months.

There is a large group in the UK right now who are now desperate enough to vote in ANYONE who says what they want to hear. The Tories right now are probably as close to anyone to doing the right thing if truth be known, but the reality is that they are not cutting in the right areas enough, we will find this out next year when we start losing our AAA rating.

Both the Labour Party and the Tories are in my opinion not up to the job, as for a third option I have no idea. What this country needs now is strong leadership, and from the way our system of schooling robotic political drones, I am not sure we are going to find him/her.

BobQ

Thrugelmir wrote: »

Wasn't that same as Blair/Brown..........

Remind me who became PM without being elected either?

UK Prime Ministers have never been elected except by their constituents.

GeorgeHowell

homelessskilledworker wrote: »

There are a group of people who really are paying the price and suffering, nobody I might add that actually caused the problems we have today.


Both the Labour Party and the Tories are in my opinion not up to the job, as for a third option I have no idea. What this country needs now is strong leadership, and from the way our system of schooling robotic political drones, I am not sure we are going to find him/her. .

If they voted Labour they are part of the problem.

Wouldn't argue with the last paragraph in the sense that we are extremely poorly governed whoever is in office ( I refrain from saying 'in power' because that's the civil service). But there's a distinction between poor, as we have now, and recklessly irresponsible and damaging, as we had with Labour (and would again)

coastline

GeorgeHowell wrote: »

No. I'm afraid we can only move on as a country when we stop putting Labour in power. They always bring the country to its knees (remember '79), and always will. I am realistic enough to know that the country is politically polarised and that there will not be right of centre governments in power in perpetuity. For all their faults I would far rather see the Lib Dems as the main left of centre party, but unfortunately that is not happening. Lib Dems at least have some reality regarding public finances and the need to reward individual endeavour and responsibility. Labour's culture is dog-in-a-manger, initiative-stifling, destructive, and nihilistic. They are completely unfit to govern.

Just to add a bit of balance here I'll post a few links to the 1970's...
Labour inherited a rising budget deficit in 1974 from the Tories as shown on the chart...by 1978 the deficit was falling to balance when the Tories came back into power simply because the economy was growing again.
If you look at the 1990's theres a huge budget deficit...hardly anything to do with Labour...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/hmtreasury/5260056945/

The story of the IMF and Labour can be viewed by going into the website in this link...
The money which was on call from the IMF was never used as the economy improved along with a series of government cuts.
Today I'm guessing the IMF wouldn't be seen as a need as the markets were opened up in the 1980's for cash calls.

http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/cabinetpapers/themes/sterling-devalued-imf-loan.htm

GeorgeHowell

coastline wrote: »

Just to add a bit of balance here I'll post a few links to the 1970's...
Labour inherited a rising budget deficit in 1974 from the Tories as shown on the chart...by 1978 the deficit was falling to balance when the Tories came back into power simply because the economy was growing again.
If you look at the 1990's theres a huge budget deficit...hardly anything to do with Labour...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/hmtreasury/5260056945/

The story of the IMF and Labour can be viewed by going into the website in this link...
The money which was on call from the IMF was never used as the economy improved along with a series of government cuts.
Today I'm guessing the IMF wouldn't be seen as a need as the markets were opened up in the 1980's for cash calls.

http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/cabinetpapers/themes/sterling-devalued-imf-loan.htm

I don't recall IMF involvement ever being even vaguely talked about with a Conservative government in office.

DecentLivingWage

chewmylegoff wrote: »

i don't know why you keep spouting this nonsense that the economy was growing at 4% when labour left power.

the 4 quarters leading up to the 2010 general election and the condems taking power were as follows:

-0.2% Q3 2009
+0.4% Q4 2009
+0.4% Q1 2010
+0.6% Q2 2010

http://www.tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/gdp-growth

this equals an annual growth rate of 1.2%.

even if you annualise Q2 2010 (which is a stupid way to do it) you still only get 2.4% annualised growth.

so can you stop lying please?

I refer you here :

(as to the last quarter and what growth would have been we will never know because Osborne choked it off but in total 3.75 - 4 % would not have seemed unreasonable aggregating the exciting looking third quarter - as to whether we annualise it, well 'you pays your money and you takes your choice' Fact is we would Kill for those growth figures now! The private sector jobs never came.... neither did BSkyB... to save his bacon...)

http://hhgrahamjones.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/the-tories-plan-has-failed-as-borrowing.html

coastline

GeorgeHowell wrote: »

I don't recall IMF involvement ever being even vaguely talked about with a Conservative government in office.

Probably because money sources were restricted in those years...what happened later was a global opening to money supply...the Big Bang..1986 ?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bang_(financial_markets)

What if the Tories couldn't find the money for the mess in 1990's then....where was it coming from..??

[IMG]http://www.ukpublicspending.co.uk/ukgs_line.php?title=Public Net Debt&year=1990_1998&sname=&units=b&bar=1&stack=1&size=m&spending0=152.20_151.30_166.10_202.60_249.80_290.00_322.10_348.00_352.90&legend=&source=a_a_a_a_a_a_a_a_a[/IMG]