Salmond and Sturgeon Want the English Fish for More Fat Subsidies

Mistermeaner

No

A surplus means that income exceeds expenditure NOT that you have no debt. Expenditure includes interest payments.

E.g. if you have a mortgage you have debt, providing each month your income covers your mortgage and other expenditure in that month such there is a little left over you are running a surplus.

You do not even need to be paying off your mortgage balance, you just need to cover the interest payments.

This type of basic lack of understanding is why democracy is not necessarily a good idea because so many of the voting public do not understand the basic issues upon which they are voting. (Not aimed at you dog) look at Greece - in what way is the Greek public equipptd to make decisions about the financial running of their country.

kabayiri

elantan wrote: »

Maybe then the Uk government shouldnt spend money it doesnt have ?

I admire the principal you describe, but when the UK has already borrowed 1.5 trillion plus pounds, I think it's a tad late.

All Mr Swinney can claim is that he spends borrowed money slightly better than his Westminster counterparts.

Thrugelmir

ggb1979 wrote: »

This type of basic lack of understanding is why democracy is not necessarily a good idea because so many of the voting public do not understand the basic issues upon which they are voting. (Not aimed at you dog) look at Greece - in what way is the Greek public equipptd to make decisions about the financial running of their country.

Arguably politicians are the ones now lacking the necessary financial skills. Which is becoming all too apparent.

[Deleted User]

ggb1979 wrote: »

No

A surplus means that income exceeds expenditure NOT that you have no debt. Expenditure includes interest payments.

E.g. if you have a mortgage you have debt, providing each month your income covers your mortgage and other expenditure in that month such there is a little left over you are running a surplus.

You do not even need to be paying off your mortgage balance, you just need to cover the interest payments.

This type of basic lack of understanding is why democracy is not necessarily a good idea because so many of the voting public do not understand the basic issues upon which they are voting. (Not aimed at you dog) look at Greece - in what way is the Greek public equipptd to make decisions about the financial running of their country.

Are you sure? The governerment propose to run a surplus - but not to help pay off the debt? I don't think I said anything about having "no debt" - I was querying your assertion "but saying uk government shouldn't borrow money is just rediculous".

Don't the conservatives want to reduce the interest on the debt that they keep on bangin on about - "we spend £Xm a year on interest on debts that the party opposite ran up - money that could be spent on nukes and our eccies - ahem, I mean nurses and teachers...".

So they DON'T intend to pay off the debt? Glad that's settled then. What do they plan to do with the "surplus" - put benefits back up :rotfl: ; stick it under the bed?

I could see the point if they were lending the cash out and getting back higher interest than they were paying on the debt.... but I was under the impression that the conservatives viewed the interest we are paying on the debt as a bad thing. Pay less interest = less money needed by the government = lower taxes, that kind of thing.

WR

Mistermeaner

I'm not 100% on the details but dont believe the intention is to pay off debt, they may want to reduce it however - just think of your own finances it may be president to clear your credit cards and store cards but makes sense for you to take out a loan and buy a car as that car enableos you to go to work and continue earning to keep paying your mortgage and weekly food shop. Who knows as your earnings go up you may choose to take on an even bigger mortgage (more debt) so you could have an even nicer house but the interest may be proportionally less than the current new salary - your debt will have increased but you are running an even larger surplus.

The main difference to consider with a nations finances is that the nation need never retire - unlike you it will always be earning hence should always be borrowing as borrowing funds growth = more future earnings. Even a deficit from time to time is ok providing it turns into a surplus eventually or you end up like greece.

All opinion but the issue with Labour previously and snp is that their plans for expenditure are not matched by plans for income and growth and hence would lead to deficits perpetually. Conservative approach to surplus is reduce expenditure and encourage growth through pro enterprise policies.

zagubov

Generali wrote: »

LOL. The Head of the European Commission doesn't understand how the EU works.

I love extremists. They're always good for a laugh.

Even the SNP said that Scotland wouldn't automatically join the EU!

http://www.gov.scot/Publications/2013/11/9348/10



Keep 'em coming. I enjoy a bit of historical revisionism on a winter's morning.

Not at all. There's two mechanisms for leaving, and splitting a country isn't one of them. I can understand your confusion, as the GDR demonstrated that joining a country in the EU makes you join the EU. It's the reverse that's mere speculation, and Mr Barosso had too many favours to ask of the rUK to be an honest broker on this issue.

Still, more power to him, his silver tongue got the unionist posters all believing him.:T

Generali

zagubov wrote: »

Still, more power to him, his silver tongue got the unionist posters all believing him.:T

Well he even had the SNP convinced. Well done you for being the only person with the foresight to see through this.

Generali

Wild_Rover wrote: »

Are you sure? The governerment propose to run a surplus - but not to help pay off the debt? I don't think I said anything about having "no debt" - I was querying your assertion "but saying uk government shouldn't borrow money is just rediculous".

Australia ran a surplus for a number of years and in fact managed to find themselves in a position where the Government had no net debt.

However, the Government did still borrow money for two reasons:

1. Lots of Government spending is paid fortnightly or monthly: salaries and welfare payments for example. However, taxes tend to come in lumpily. GST (our VAT) is paid quarterly. Most Corporation Tax is paid annually and Capital Gains Tax can take many, many years to be paid as it's only paid on the realisation of the capital gain.

2. Banks and other financial institutions measure interest rates against the 'risk free rate'. The risk free rate is the rate of interest the Government can borrow at in their own currency. It's risk free because the Government can always simply print money to repay the debt so you should always get your money back although Russia did default on Ruble denominated debt.

Unfortunately, a few years of Labor Government has put us back into a situation where we are in debt and the spending juggernaut is very hard to slow as the Conservatives have discovered.

Generali

antrobus wrote: »

Ken Livingstone was always banging on about it. As in; give me even more money to spend in London.

Well yes but that could equally be said as, reduce London's subsidy to the rest of the country.

.string.

I watched an interview of Mr Salmond on Sunday Politics today. He was asked by Neil what actions he would take against "ISIS".

His reply was

1. Up the anti-"ISIS" propaganda
2. Tackle and reduce/eliminate their funding
3. Arrange for ground forces to take them on, mentioning specifically the Kurds as providing the fighters. But it should not be British Soldiers.

Not much new there in that all these things are being done, the latter by largely Iraq forces, Kurds and Shia.

Salmon condemned the use of British planes in bombing raids, saying it was all pointless. It's part of the SNP strategy to label Westminster as warmongering, following his questions in Parliament where he said much the same thing. (This was in a question following a statement that there would be a debate about the matter).

The pattern is clear and links to the matter of Trident, in that the SNP are in favour of a separated Scotland joining NATO, benefiting from the nuclear umbrella that comes with it while at the same time kicking out the British part of it which is based in Scotland. So we can expect more of the same when Parliament gets round to debating Trident.

The SNP "policy on defence" shakes down, IMHO, to -

"Let's hide behind the sofa, and preferably someone else's sofa".

Now that's a view, at least the first part, that is associated with some elements of the Left, and the Liberal Left of politics. It's a point of view of course but ritual abrogation of responsibility for action is not something I associate with Scots at all. But then this is SNP not Scots and the tactic is to do with Project Whinge and not principle (IMHO of course).

Maybe, if the SNP is going to be ruling the roost on Scotland for some time it is simply not sensible to invest in any defence related activities in Scotland, in case someone attacks.