Economy Safe In Osbornes Hands ?

[mikey4444]

Government borrowing worst October figure in six years

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-34877455

Osbornes been in Office as a Tory Chancellor for over 5 years, so why is he still not able to make the books add up ?

[ToraToraTora]

Labour have already lost 2020, they need to aim for 2025 at best.

[Canary42]

That same old tired "flogging off the gold reserves cheap" still being trotted out by supporters of the party which sold off at really knock-down prices lots of public services (Mail, Trains, Buses, DWP sections, NHS subsets, Probations Service, Gas, Water, Electricity etc) which are now mainly providing a worse and/or more expensive service in the hands of the French, Germans, Chinese, Americans......

[ToraToraTora]

on the bright side this will be the plane for the next Labour PM:
http://static.ddmcdn.com/gif/01-future-airplanes-lead-image-670.jpg

[Zacs-Master]

i wonder if Mikey knows how many seats Labour need to win in 2020 to gain a majority?

[ToraToraTora]

well they've got a bucket load they lost to the sweaties for a start.

[mikey4444]

TTT...I don't expect the SNP vote to hold up north of the Border in 2020.

When the Scots realise that the SNP can't give them independence, at least anytime soon, a lot of seats will come back to Labour and the Liberals.

But we shouldn't forget that the SNP are essentially a centre-left Party, and is part of Her Majesty's opposition and will continue to be a thorn in the side of dave for a few years yet.

[ToraToraTora]

what do you think of the new plane?

[mikey4444]

I am not in principle against the British Prime Minister having an official plane, as long as it doesn't cost the earth, especially when it can be used by other important people.

Steve Bell had his usual interesting take on the news :::

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/picture/2015/nov/19/steve-bell-david-cameron-personal-jet-cartoon

[jim360]

I don't think I've ever seen a Steve Bell cartoon that is even remotely amusing. Ah, well. I prefer the ones in the Times.

Osborne's entire approach to cutting the deficit is going to fail. The state is not easy to dismantle without, in the first place, disrupting key services -- so it ends up hitting the wrong people. It costs money to take these services apart anyway. The people you lay off from public sector jobs still end up still being a drain on public finances due to pensions (or even claiming unemployment benefits).

And finally -- as the Tories discovered in the early 1980s -- it's very easy to make savings but very hard to sustain them. Prior to the Falklands War various attempts to cut the defence budget ended up costing even more because, as it turned out, having a naval patrol near territory the Argentines wanted was a good way of discouraging an invasion -- who knew? As a second example, 1981 also saw a large recruitment drive in the Civil Service -- because all the jobs cut in the two previous years turned out to be kind of important for, well, running the country.

Public sector cuts are possible, but will never be effective at reducing the deficit in the short-term or otherwise. Not sure anything else will be either, if it comes to that.