Would you re-nationalise the energy companies?' poll discussion

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Comments

  • elbeie wrote: »
    'Defunct jobs' is a smokescreen used by those who refuse to defend British industry and manufacturing whilst other countries steal an edge off us..

    When British industry and manufacturing came along 200 years ago it made all those peasant jobs working in the fields defunct. It's called progress, or do you think we should still have those defunct jobs now?

    And how exactly do you propose to defend British industry? By pushing taxpayers hard-earned pounds at it?
    elbeie wrote: »
    Government needs to be about serving the people of this country.

    Quite - not about running enterprises.
  • relaxtwotribes
    relaxtwotribes Posts: 369
    First Anniversary Combo Breaker First Post
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    edited 8 December 2010 at 1:59PM
    Eco_Miser wrote: »
    Back in the late 70s, British Steel was losing £1m a day; they also produced the cheapest steel. The losses came not from the production, but from servicing the debts, the money the government had lent them.

    You prove my point nicely.
  • Eco_Miser wrote: »
    Yes it does, not directly, but because the dividends go out the country.

    So, what you want is for the shareholders of Cadbury to invest abroad, so that the dividends on that investment can be remitted back into the UK. Quite bizarre.
  • avinabacca
    avinabacca Posts: 1,062 Forumite
    May I assume you are too young to remember the vastly higher tax rates of the 1960s and 1970s that were set in order to fund the atrociously inefficient state-run basket cases like steel, rail, coal and, yes, electricity?

    For example.....?
    Oh come on, don't be silly.

    It's the internet
    - it's not real!

  • avinabacca
    avinabacca Posts: 1,062 Forumite
    WhiteHorse wrote: »
    A disaster for the nation, certainly. Not a disaster for the vested interests behind it. Thatcher knew what she was doing, and was doing what she was told.

    Can't argue with that - she had her orders, and she fulfilled them to the letter. It's often occurred to me that the UK might nowadays be a very different place if it had ever had a Labour PM who'd acted on behalf of ordinary working people the way Thatcher acted on behalf of the forces of business and capital.......
    Oh come on, don't be silly.

    It's the internet
    - it's not real!

  • avinabacca wrote: »
    For example.....?

    I assume that you are asking for examples of taxes, as no-one could be dimwitted enough to be asking for examples of the basket cases. My reply is: 83% income tax and 15% investment income surcharge ON TOP, leading to a top tax rate of 98%.

    Can you not recall those stalwart Labour PMs Harold Wilson and James Callaghan who acted on behalf of the people and in doing so nearly bankrupted the country, which had to be bailed out by the IMF.

    Thatcher didn't do everything right, but average living standards were a lot higher when she left power than when she took over in 1979.
  • avinabacca
    avinabacca Posts: 1,062 Forumite
    I assume that you are asking for examples of taxes, as no-one could be dimwitted enough to be asking for examples of the basket cases. My reply is: 83% income tax and 15% investment income surcharge ON TOP, leading to a top tax rate of 98%.

    Can you not recall those stalwart Labour PMs Harold Wilson and James Callaghan who acted on behalf of the people and in doing so nearly bankrupted the country, which had to be bailed out by the IMF.

    Thatcher didn't do everything right, but average living standards were a lot higher when she left power than when she took over in 1979.

    Aye, ok - tell you what, I'll take you seriously when you start writing seriously, yeah?

    Comparing taxation as a whole (and remember, no VAT back then for one example), the tax burden was comparable with today - without profiteering, private-sector utility cartels, and the sale of state assets.

    Still, if you think this was some sort of political Dark Age that's entirely your call.

    Not sure many'll take you seriously, though.....
    Oh come on, don't be silly.

    It's the internet
    - it's not real!

  • During Thatcher Government spent:-

    Social Security +31.8%

    Trade & Industry -38.2%

    in real terms.


    And

    GDP +23.3%

    The figures speak for themselves.
  • And VAT was introduced in 1973.
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