[Politics] The Labour Government

[Weststander]

Wait, so you turned against the Tory party because they decided they wouldn’t see hundreds of thousands of people lose their livelihoods and cause a massive economic crash?

A surprisingly number of people still believe that, it crops up all the time during economy / budget phone-ins.

Furious about Furlough and the Self Employed scheme in the pandemic.

Often they’re the same people who say the World shouldn’t help Ukrainians fight to survive or provide foreign aid to the developing world.

It’s a strange world, when did the UK gain all these selfish folk? Victims (but they don’t realise it) of subtle Russian propaganda via Twatter/Facebook/TikTok/Reform?

 

[Weststander]

These graphs and figures are all meaningless. The true debt is about (I'm told) two and a half times that figure, but official figures are never produced. Any limited company that produced figures for total debt that excluded finance leases and unfunded pension liabilities, would be prosecuted to the nth degree for producing wildly and deliberately misleading figures. The government makes its own rules, and successive governments need to tell us what the true and nightmareish figures are.

They need to add in the unfunded public sector pension payments, and the undisclosed public-private partnership liabilites, to give an accurate and useful figure of the national debt.

Remember I’m an accountant too. Off balance sheet finance eg the horrendous PFI contracts, hidden from Treasury data.

But what the stats do reveal is that the silly argument of Tories creating most the state debt, whilst the rest of the world is fine, is fantasy. 2007 and 2020-22 changed the world economically. Only outliers such as exporting Germany or despised tax havens Ireland/Netherlands bucked the trend.

 

[A1X]

A surprisingly number of people still believe thar, it crops up all the time during economy / budget ins.

Furious about Furlough and the Self Employed scheme in the pandemic.

Often they’re the sane people who say the World shouldn’t help Ukrainians fight to survive or provide foreign aid to the developing world.

It’s a strange world, when did the UK gain all these selfish folk? Victims (but they don’t realise it) of subtle Russian propaganda via Twatter/Facebook/TikTok/Reform?

Probably the same people who a decade earlier were furious that the Government stepped in to prop up the banks during the financial crisis (although that obviously excluded the bank which they had their savings / mortgage with)

 

[Is it PotG?]

Aaah, I've got it now.

If you have ANY assets, you're not part of the 'working people' group.

Fantastic.

 

[WATFORD zero]

Aaah, I've got it now.

If you have ANY assets, you're not part of the 'working people' group.

Fantastic.

I'm sorry but I'm afraid you're still as far away 'from getting it' as ever

 

[Is it PotG?]

I'm sorry but I'm afraid you're still as far away 'from getting it' as ever

No need to apologise mate.

 

[WATFORD zero]

“We can’t go on like this. I’ll cut the deficit, not the NHS,” read David Cameron’s poster campaign before the 2010 general election.

14 years of Tory rule later it has risen from 64.7% of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2010 to 103% currently – the highest level since the 1960s. That‘s some failure.

I don’t recall you saying this about your beloved Tory party.

You need to keep up, @Giraffe has given up his lifelong support of the Tory party and has now been backing Farage's private company for some time because he doesn't believe the way the Conservatives elect their leader is democratic

I don't think you need to worry. It will be a stitch up. MPs will narrow it down to two, Badenoch and one other and then the one other will be forced to withdraw before the members even vote. There is no democracy left in the Tory party.

 

[Is it PotG?]

 

[Titanic]

Us Labours Buzzword bingo

 

[BLOCK F]

Also from that:

The chancellor cited top economists as backing the move including Mark Carney and Andrew Haldane, as well as former Conservative Treasury minister Jim O’Neill.

Don’t forget the cautionary comments made by Paul Johnson, director of the IFS, who said that using a broader debt measure called public sector net financial liabilities could have downsides, including potentially spooking financial markets, which fund government’s borrowing.
Just saying….

 

[Giraffe]

Wait, so you turned against the Tory party because they decided they wouldn’t see hundreds of thousands of people lose their livelihoods and cause a massive economic crash?

I know for a fact that SOME milked this. Not all, absolutely not all. But there were businesses that took it because they didn't know what was going to happen but who could easily now pay it back. There should have been a mechanism to recover some of the money rather than make it so easy for a business to take several millions of pounds and then in future be super profitable and have no requirement to give the money back.

Additionally they could have reduced the furlough %. People were doing nothing, their costs had reduced. I know people that saved more sitting at home during covid and getting 80% of their salary than they'd ever saved in their lives. It contributed to inflation later.

Most countries supported at at 50%-60% level, to go in at 80% was too generous. And we are talking billions of pounds more debt than was needed which is largely why we are now living in one of the highest taxed countries in the world and it will get worse next week.

 

[Kinky Gerbil]

I know for a fact that SOME milked this. Not all, absolutely not all. But there were businesses that took it because they didn't know what was going to happen but who could easily now pay it back. There should have been a mechanism to recover some of the money rather than make it so easy for a business to take several millions of pounds and then in future be super profitable and have no requirement to give the money back.

Additionally they could have reduced the furlough %. People were doing nothing, their costs had reduced. I know people that saved more sitting at home during covid and getting 80% of their salary than they'd ever saved in their lives. It contributed to inflation later.

Most countries supported at at 50%-60% level, to go in at 80% was too generous. And we are talking billions of pounds more debt than was needed which is largely why we are now living in one of the highest taxed countries in the world and it will get worse next week.

The state stopped me from working and earning

I'm taking everything I can just in case, I had a mortgage to pay as well.

 

[nevergoagain]

In an interview during a Commonwealth leaders' summit, the prime minister was asked whether those who work, but get additional income from assets such as shares or property, would count as working people.

He replied that they "wouldn't come within my definition"

Reminds me very much of a Cyndi Lauper song.

 

[Bozza]

In an interview during a Commonwealth leaders' summit, the prime minister was asked whether those who work, but get additional income from assets such as shares or property, would count as working people.

He replied that they "wouldn't come within my definition"

Reminds me very much of a Cyndi Lauper song.

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun?

 

[Is it PotG?]

Reminds me very much of a Cyndi Lauper song.

Money Changes Everything?.
Change of Heart?
Lies?
I Don't Want to be Your Friend?

 

[beorhthelm]

In an interview during a Commonwealth leaders' summit, the prime minister was asked whether those who work, but get additional income from assets such as shares or property, would count as working people.

He replied that they "wouldn't come within my definition"

Reminds me very much of a Cyndi Lauper song.

Girls Just Want to Have Fun? i think Reeves is taking it quite seriously.

 

[nevergoagain]

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun?

Shattered Dreams - Featuring Allen Toussaint actually! (unnecessary emoji).

 

[dsr-burnley]

In an interview during a Commonwealth leaders' summit, the prime minister was asked whether those who work, but get additional income from assets such as shares or property, would count as working people.

He replied that they "wouldn't come within my definition"

Reminds me very much of a Cyndi Lauper song.

To be fair, he said before the general election that people who could write a cheque when something goes wrong were not working people. That pretty much covers everyone with say £10,000 in savings, if we take as a guide that "something going wrong" is perhaps the cost of replacing a roof.

It's clear that someone who spends what they have is a worker, someone who saves for a rainy day is not.

 

[The Clamp]

I’m sure the man who sups from a golden chalice at lunch will look after the “working people”

 

[Chicken Run]

What a wanker