[Politics] Are Labour going to turn this country around?

[Bodian]

According to the Government’s own figures (as below) I can see a very easy way to save £9.4bn, not just £6bn. In these difficult times before Rachel fixes the foundations the Government just need to prioritise the interests of British citizens welfare above other interests. Next question.

2.4 Pressures on public spending due to recent events​

In addition to pressures from inflation and pay, recent events have increased pressures significantly on public spending since SR21, including:

• Military assistance to Ukraine – The UK has committed £3 billion of military assistance to Ukraine in 2024-25 including £1.5 billion RDEL, in response to its invasion by Russia.
• Asylum – Asylum seeker arrivals, and the costs associated with supporting them in the UK, have exceeded SR21 forecasts. As a result spending on asylum support has increased seven-fold in the last three years, with asylum and immigration resulting in a pressure of £6.4 billion in 2024-25. The Rwanda migration partnership and Illegal Migration Act would have caused these spending pressures to continue rising even faster than before.
• Rail services – Pressures have emerged on rail finances, primarily due to the weaker-than-expected recovery in passenger demand following the COVID-19 pandemic, leading to a pressure of £1.6 billion in 2024-25.

These events have all taken place against a challenging fiscal backdrop, with public debt at its highest level since the early 1960s.[footnote 10]

I think you might be misunderstanding this.

The £6.4bn is the difference between what the Home Office under the Tories guesstimated / planned they would spend on asylum support and what they actually spent. That's why it's part of the 'black hole' - it was the Tory overspend.

 

[Is it PotG?]

Reading this thread tonight I think the overwhelming message, even from the 'Back Sir Freebie' cabal, is NO, they won't .

 

[abc]

But also need to address generations holding on to farming land they don’t use. I buy meat from 2 farmers and both are tenants. Slogging away trying to make ends meet for land they’ll never own paying rent to landowners who do nothing with it

Agree entirely as to where you are coming from, but those landlords are not ex farmers that have held on to land without farming it but either the big (and utterly ruthless) institutions such as the C of E, The Crown and National trust or 'city Money' that has bought land as an investment and IHT tax dodge. It is worth noting that the protesting farmers argue passionately that non farmers should not benefit from IHT relief if/when re instituted but only those that intend to produce food on it themselves.

 

[abc]

How have you addressed the point you’ve highlighted?? Many farmers are not rich .. get off your high horse and do some research, look at the income per acre and the insane cost per acre… it doesn’t matter how much your lands worth if you’re only making £59/60k a year you can’t pay the inheritance tax ….

Don't bother feeding the troll, he cant understand such 'complex' issues

 

[cunning fergus]

I think you might be misunderstanding this.

The £6.4bn is the difference between what the Home Office under the Tories guesstimated / planned they would spend on asylum support and what they actually spent. That's why it's part of the 'black hole' - it was the Tory overspend.

I understand we are spending billions on the welfare of immigrants and a foreign war whilst withdrawing benefits from pensioners to heat their homes.

Feel free to correct the error here.

 

[abc]

Isn't it precisely these types of owners of farmland that are most likely to be affected by this? (note - the inheritance tax relates to 'farmland', not just 'farmers')

The tenant farmers will NOT be affected at all by this, and indeed, may benefit. If, as some speculate, those owning farmland will have to sell it off to pay their IHT - then their tenants may be able to purchase it.

But they wont because the cost will still be way, way higher than the reflecting earning capacity of the land. Its the same catch 22 why family famers owning land will not be able to pay the tax without selling up. Sad but rue.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

I think you misunderstand. It means I would really like to contribute but don't think I can without appearing completely stupid. We have seen it a few times before

Laughing boy CJD has gone into a rictus.

I do hope it isn't tetanus.

 

[Bodian]

I understand we are spending billions on the welfare of immigrants and a foreign war whilst withdrawing benefits from pensioners to heat their homes.

Feel free to correct the error here.

That's a different statement though. You were directly citing the £6.4bn overspend and saying that we could 'save' it.

But it seems as though what you are actually saying is that we should not be spending monies on asylum seekers. In which case, what is your legally fair solution on dealing with asylum seekers once they arrive here? And bear in mind that 'deport them all immediately' would break international law.

The discussion about Ukraine is probably best dealt with separately - it's a completely different issue.

 

[abc]

Why should 'poor' farmers (who wish to hand over property worth £2 million - an odd notion of poor) be exempt from the taxes all the rest of us would have to pay?
And not even all the tax.
Just half of it.
And with a higher threshold.

They never had this apparent sense of entitlement before Thatcher gave them special status.

Anyway, I thought you right wingers object in principle to people taking offense on behalf of others.
That's one of Clarkson's mantras against the 'woke' left, is it not?
How does Clarkson stand on taxing farmers I wonder.
Oops! I already knew.

Anyway, a business that is 'cash-poor, low turnover' sounds inefficient to me.
Why should hard working tax payers subsidize such businesses?
And hang on, it isn't just the business, it is the homestead that is being handed on.

I seem to recall some deflection argument about undermining traditional rural life.
Why should these people live an elysian existence, untroubled by market forces?
The need to pull up their knickers and make me a cup of tea, I recon.

There comes a point where your attempt at trolling and 'banter' become offensive. Farming has the highest at work death rate, the highest at work injury rate and the highest suicide rate of any profession in the country. Not coincidentally, they work the longest hours under often the harshest and most isolated conditions and make a return on capital that any other industry would baulk at and many earn less than the minimum wage. We consequently benefit from some of the highest quality (safety to welfare) food in the world. If you don't agree with the IHT protestations then you are, of course, entitled to your opinion but I'm sorry, IMHO you are going too far now - much too far.

 

[nicko31]

I understand we are spending billions on the welfare of immigrants and a foreign war whilst withdrawing benefits from pensioners to heat their homes.

Feel free to correct the error here.

Pensioners have had it pretty good for a while in this country, very few will fall between the cracks.

 

[cunning fergus]

That's a different statement though. You were directly citing the £6.4bn overspend and saying that we could 'save' it.

But it seems as though what you are actually saying is that we should not be spending monies on asylum seekers. In which case, what is your legally fair solution on dealing with asylum seekers once they arrive here? And bear in mind that 'deport them all immediately' would break international law.

The discussion about Ukraine is probably best dealt with separately - it's a completely different issue.

How the Government spends taxpayers money is all up for debate, and when it takes away longstanding benefits paid to British citizens whilst increasing spending for non British “projects” the taxpayers are entitled to a grievance.

If you don’t think the WFA issue is seen through that very simple paradigm you’re a fool. It’s a substantial reason why Starmer’s and Labour Party approval ratings are tanking.

Telling British citizens that tough decisions need to be made while increasing the spend on immigrants is truly woeful politics, and the demands of international law won’t be a defence that holds up in the court of public opinion. It’s why the Tories got filled in last year.

 

[Bodian]

How the Government spends taxpayers money is all up for debate, and when it takes away longstanding benefits paid to British citizens whilst increasing spending for non British “projects” the taxpayers are entitled to a grievance.

If you don’t think the WFA issue is seen through that very simple paradigm you’re a fool. It’s a substantial reason why Starmer’s and Labour Party approval ratings are tanking.

Telling British citizens that tough decisions need to be made while increasing the spend on immigrants is truly woeful politics, and the demands of international law won’t be a defence that holds up in the court of public opinion. It’s why the Tories got filled in last year.

But this goes back to your fundamental misunderstanding of the figures you posted.

I am not aware that Labour are 'increasing the spend on immigrants'. The 'overspend' is from the last government.

Indeed, by scrapping the Rwanda scheme, spending on asylum issues will see an immediate saving of around £800m.

Home Office budgeting and asylum overspends | Institute for Fiscal Studies

The Home Office has repeatedly spent far more than budgeted for asylum, border, visa and passport operations in recent years.

ifs.org.uk

https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-9663/

If you believe Labour are indeed increasing the spend on immigrants - then please provide the evidence to show this.

 

[Hugo Rune]

Farming has the highest at work death rate, the highest at work injury rate and the highest suicide rate of any profession in the country.

Did Elon Musk tweet this?

Wretched, wretched lies. The lot of them.

However, the stat above was the closet to your truth (if you include forestry and the fishing industry with farming).

Statistics - Work-related fatal injuries in Great Britain

The information in this document relates to the latest 'full-year'; statistics on fatal injuries in the workplace, for 2018/19.

www.hse.gov.uk

 

[slimes]

Labour going to turn this around?

Good one..

I've never voted in my life!

He is level par with Truss

 

[dsr-burnley]

As an aside, I have millions of pounds worth of Rembrandt's in my loft - but I want to claim my winter fuel allowance - can you campaign for me, please?

This is one of the things that Labour don't realise is really unpopular. They see that rich pensioners get winter fuel allowance; they don't like rich people; they set a policy that takes the winter fuel allowance from them. They are happy because they have made rich people a fraction poorer.

Did they even give half a thought to pensioners on £220 per week, who are also being made poorer? I doubt it. They are so consumed with the idea of punishing the rich that they don't care if they also punish the poor.

 

[dsr-burnley]

So the only asset is land, meaning someone owning a £2 million farm is actually poor?
How did they buy it in the first place?
Oh - they inherited it!
.
But aside from the farm, no assets?
They actually live in a two-up two-down terraced house, do they?
They own no livestock, machinery etc?
They have not invested hundreds of thousands of pounds into business infrastructure?
Jeez. What a hopeless, precarious and inefficient way to manage agriculture!
No wonder we import so much stuff...

You could put forward an argument that for farmers the home and the livelihood are interconnected.
What about trawlermen who live on their boats?
Can they just gift them to the kids?
And if farmers chose to conflate home and business why should they expect to be given special treatment?

I accept that farmers have become used to the special status created for them by Thatcher.
But it isn't a right, and it isn't immutable.
And the argument made (not by you) that it is the poor farmers who will be hit hardest is patently untrue.

Oh well, never mind.
I don't really care and I doubt many other people will care
(apart from people gleefully seeing it as a stick with which to beat Labour, enemy of 'country ways' ).

Yes, trawlermen who live on their boats can (or rather could) just gift them to their kids, tax free. Small businesses had the same exemption as farmers from income tax, and that exemption has been watered down in the same way.

You see, there is a school of thought that says businesses that employ people are a good thing, and making them close down their business because they can't afford the tax is a bad thing. It puts people out of work, you see. One of the common problems is that certain politicians look at who they don't like, and target them to make them worse off. If they put a man out of business, they don't care - they forget about his staff. If they make a landlord sell up, they don't care - and they forget about his tenant. The irony being that the businessman who sells his business still has most of his wealth, but his employees have nothing. The landlord who sells his property still has most of his wealth, but the tenant is homeless.

The new inheritance tax makes the inheritor pay 2% of the inherited value of the farm, per year, for ten years. (For the avoidance of doubt, cows and tractors are included as farm assets.) If the farm is generating income after tax of less than 2% on its notional capital, then it is obviously impossible to pay the inheritance tax - except by selling up.

Non-agricultural businesses have a better chance because their business assets are not typically inflated by investment uplifts way beyond the actual earning power of the assets. Even so, a business that is ticking along quite nicely making 5% return on capital employed, of which 2% points are taxed leaving 3% annually, a hit of 2% can make it not worth their while to carry on.

 

[Bozza]

This is one of the things that Labour don't realise is really unpopular. They see that rich pensioners get winter fuel allowance; they don't like rich people; they set a policy that takes the winter fuel allowance from them. They are happy because they have made rich people a fraction poorer.

Did they even give half a thought to pensioners on £220 per week, who are also being made poorer? I doubt it. They are so consumed with the idea of punishing the rich that they don't care if they also punish the poor.

Starmer et al both pre- and post- the General Election have told us, ad nauseum, they are in the service of working people.

Pensioners don't work. Well, most of them don't. It might just be that simple. Throw them under the bus.

 

[The Clamp]

I want to believe in Labour and Starmer.

But the whole while they are cutting what makes big differences to “little people’s” lives and f*** all difference to the overall economy and letting Southern Water evade fines and give themselves £77k bonuses to fill our waterways with shit,

While they let Amazon and other trillion pound companies pay minimal tax but make sure farmers pay tax time and time again for the same diminishing property, for generations to come?

Starmer is not getting this right, and no amount of people telling me he’s going to turn the country around will change my mind for now.

He tripped over his own head with his first cuts and tax decisions.

He’ll have to do a f*** of a lot better.

 

[Bozza]

I want to believe in Labour and Starmer.

But the whole while they are cutting what makes big differences to “little people’s” lives and f*** all difference to the overall economy and letting Southern Water evade fines and give themselves £77k bonuses to fill our waterways with shit,

While they let Amazon and other trillion pound companies pay minimal tax but make sure farmers pay tax time and time again for the same diminishing property, for generations to come?

Starmer is not getting this right, and no amount of people telling me he’s going to turn the country around will change my mind for now.

He tripped over his own head with his first cuts and tax decisions.

He’ll have to do a f*** of a lot better.

It really sounded like they were going to go after the big, rich, tax-evading guys to make things better for those who struggle but, as you say, there seems to be little tangible evidence of that.

@WATFORD zero said something earlier along the lines of "we're in a load of shit, and we all have to do our bit".

I agree but also disagree. Most of us have to do our bit. There's a level of society that have nothing left to give and, as you'd expect, I put our very poorest pensioners in that bracket.

Just leave them the f*** alone. Let them have the central heating on, relatively stress-free, for a couple of hours a day. They bloody deserve it.

The withdrawal of the WFA at the level that has been pushed through has been described by people and organisations with a close working relationship with our old folk as "cruel" and "dangerous". I'll add "evil".

It's so punitive to people who have no available escape route that you'd assume it to be a Tory policy.

That it's come from a Labour government is almost unbelievable.

 

[The Clamp]

It really sounded like they were going to go after the big, rich, tax-evading guys to make things better for those who struggle but, as you say, there seems to be little tangible evidence of that.

@WATFORD zero said something earlier along the lines of "we're in a load of shit, and we all have to do our bit".

I agree but also disagree. Most of us have to do our bit. There's a level of society that have nothing left to give and, as you'd expect, I put our very poorest pensioners in that bracket.

Just leave them the f*** alone. Let them have the central heating on, relatively stress-free, for a couple of hours a day. They bloody deserve it.

The withdrawal of the WFA at the level that has been pushed through has been described by people and organisations with a close working relationship with our old folk as "cruel" and "dangerous". I'll add "evil".

It's so punitive to people who have no available escape route that you'd assume it to be a Tory policy.

That it's come from a Labour government is almost unbelievable.

Nothing there I could disagree with.