Guest 645- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,463
#1
The Treasury has asked govt departments to prepare for 40% cuts rather than the 25% announced in the last budget. Obviously the Unions feel that this will lead to massive staff cuts and the only opposition, the Labour party, fear that a number of front line services will have to be cut.
Is this too much too soon? The word around parliament is that if Osbornes axe is wielded as planned that it could lead to the end of the coalition.
Their fragile relationship is akin to Jordan and Peter Andre but far less interesting and stable but just about the same amount of sordid sex details being released each week to keep the Sun readers amused.
Marek
I think therefore I am (not a Tory supporter)
Guest 645- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,463
#2
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Here is the only decent smiling shot of Osbourne I could find.The cuts if implemented could result in a further 800,000 job losses that's on top of the predicted 600,000 already destined to go because of the budget .That's 1.500,000 not paying tax and the same amount claiming benefit even the Tories own employment guru Lord Frued said the govt will have to find an extra £6.5 billion to fund the benefits coupled with the loss of tax revenue.
Marek
I think therefore I am (not a Tory supporter)
Guest 645- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,463
#3
Here's one journalist interesting take on the above
There's nothing superhero about ConDem duo Vatman and Robbing, George Osborne and Iain Duncan Smith.
Tax raiser and service cutter Osborne's lies about the Budget being fair make him look a bigger villain every day.
To clobber the poorest more heavily than the rich is regressive politics, dishonest Vatman returning to the traditional Tory values of looking after wealthy chums and leaving everyone else to suffer.
Sidekick Robbing Duncan Smith snatching cash from the most vulnerable is
plain nasty, pandering to
prejudices.
I've always believed those who can work should work or look for a job or brush up their skills.
Yet we also have a duty to support those who can't find work or are physically unable to work.
Robbing's targeting of the sick and disabled will soon have wheelchairs blockading Downing Street.
And to tell the 2.5m unemployed to get on yer bike and find work is to blame them for their unemployment.
Duncan Smith's own department counts only 500,000 constantly changing vacancies. Do the sums and that's five people chasing every opening. But incompetence vies with vindictiveness as the hallmark of this regime
Marek
I think therefore I am (not a Tory supporter)
Brian Dixon
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 23 Sep 2008
- Posts: 23,940
#4
any one for a double dip suiside misson.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
#5
i think brian is right about the double dip thing, most businesses are of the same mind.
i doubt if the 40% figure is correct, sounds to me like a government thing where they say a frightening figure, then when 25% is reality everyone is relieved.
however they have given the public service unions ammunition to get their members out on strike.
#6
Just think , it didn't have to be like this. Thirteen years of financial mis-management, running a country's finances on borrowings, having sold off the gold reserves at rock bottom prices, is tantamount to suicide, whichever the country is.
IF Labour had managed finances properly we wouldn't be in this dreadful mess now.
So, all you squealing socialists, get used to the medicine YOUR party has caused us to take now. I hope you are all proud of keeping Blair/Brown at the helm for so long. It ensured the financial mess would last for generations to come.
My grandkids want to say "thanks, for nothing" too!
Guest 655- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,247
#7
Look face a few facts.
Massive cuts need to be made and it would be silly to cut each department at 25%. Some will find it difficult to find 10% cuts without touching front line services while we would not notice 40% cuts in other departments.
Needing to find, say 25%, means it is sensible to tell each department to identify 40%. Then there can be some proper cost/benefit analysis done on what projects/spending should actually be chopped. Some departments in that way will be cut more than others. The alternative may be that just to meet its figures a valuable project is chopped in one department while in another money continues to be wasted. (I would chop 100% of the overseas aid budget personally.....)
This suggestion is logical however some may choose to spin it.
There is massive waste in Government and it also undertakes projects and gets involved in things it should stay wellm out of. We are setting out on a massive transformation of The State and what it does and of what we expect it to do.
You need only to take one recent example exposed. £20bn spent to 'narrow the health gap between rich and poor' and what happens, the gap widens.... better to have not spent that money at all.
Only too often public spending is the problem.
Brian - do you know what a 'double dip' actually is? I have been saying for 3 years that we are likely to have a double dip recession. I hope I am wrong and cutting public spending and relieving the private sector of that massive burden is the best way to mitigate that and get long term prosperity. I still believe it is likely to happen.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
#8
sid
you will still be blaming the "socialists" for all the countries ills after the blue/yellow coalition collapses or lose the next election.
incidentally the only left wing party is in this coalition.
Guest 655- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,247
#9
Sid is absolutely right.
The situation has been caused 100% by a spendthrift Labour Party with its dogmatic government know best, throw money at everything approach.
Howard - the LDs may have some who are more left than many in Labour but they were not screwing things up in government. maybe they will learn in coalition a bit of sense and drop their left.
Guest 644- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 1,214
#10
There most certainly is waste in the civil service, but it tends to lie at senior management level, i.e. expensive high-grades who run small units often with minimal or esoteric functions. No matter if government departments are tasked with huge job losses, the recommendations on who to cut will always fall to these same senior managers who will, of course, select the defenceless front line staff, the ones who actually do the job. What this results in is a protected clique of high grades who will always ride out the storm no matter what high quality of service the poor front-line worker delivers to the public. The point is, the recommendations on who to cut will come from these very people who are out to protect their own careers, bonuses and pensions - and they are the very ones the government should be looking to trim. The public ultimately suffers.
Sadly ministers (of whatever party) are never truly fed the true impact of job cuts on local delivery as they do not receive information from front-line level. If only there was some way of having a true objective appraisal of the civil service fed to the top.
Guest 655- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,247
#11
You are right there Phil and I am sure that Ministers know that. This. I suspect, is another reason behind the 40% level, to drag out ideas deeper into budgets.
But there is more going on behind the scenes.
I would start from a zero base. In other words expect every single job and function, along with the way a functuion is carried out, to be justified in cost/benefit terms. That will be forced on reluctant departments by the 40% demand because they simply will not be be able to default to an easy route cutting the easiest things only. It is very clever tactics.
i just wish they did not ring fence health and overseas aid. Both would benefit from this exercise, even if the actual budget leveles did not end up being cut the money would be spent more effectively.
Guest 693- Registered: 12 Nov 2009
- Posts: 1,266
#12
Marek
I'm truly amazed that knives are being sharpened for insertion into George Osbourne's back after two months in the job. Shouldn't you be questioning the antics of his predecessor as the perpetrator of all this rather than the man who's trying to stop the country from going bankrupt?
True friends stab you in the front.
Guest 645- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,463
#13
Andy
I am only stating facts and reports from their own camp.I, like everyone else (I hope) wants to see the country back on it's feet and prospering. However it's the Oppositions role in Parliament to highlight any pitfalls in the governments policies not just blindly accept what 'they' say as the truth.
For instance why didn't Osbourne mention 40% cuts in his budget? and as pointed out so many more people claiming 'rock n roll' therefore increasing the benefit budget rather than decreasing it as they first set out to do.
Marek
I think therefore I am (not a Tory supporter)
Guest 693- Registered: 12 Nov 2009
- Posts: 1,266
#14
I think that expecting honesty from any politician is ideology gone mad, Marek. They believe that the people who voted them are incapable of being told the truth; far from being the end of the reforms required, I believe that the expenses scandal has unearthed a requirement for a Parliamentary Ombudsman to monitor what is said in Parliament, including what is said under Parliamentary privilege.
Lying to Parliament, and its lesser cousin, being economical with the truth, is an affront to the nation as a whole and should be against the law.
That issue aside, I think your first paragraph in the last post conveniently overlooks the fact that providing opposition to the current Government's attempt to stem the tide of economic crises is barely credible when one considers that Her Majesty's Opposition are the very people whose economic policies caused the bloody problems in the first place.
True friends stab you in the front.
#15
I think we need to get over that, Andy - Marek is right: the job description for opposition states clearly that it is the buffer for bad ideas and has the duty to flag up challenges and risks. It is irritating that the opposition can claim to be largely responsible (with the rest of the Universe) for the current economic troubles, but if we are all to get on with repairing the damage we need to work together - that means respecting the oppositions job!!
#16
I almost agree Bern. However, not too many of those responsible have put their hand up for it. Hutton, Reid, Blunkett have at least been honest on that score.
It's always difficult to swallow criticism from those who created the problem and were clueless in how to solve it. As for pulling together, we at least see the Tories and LibDems trying to do that.
I am confident the coalition will succeed and last much longer than some on this forum and elsewhere hope. And the country certainly won't be able to afford another Labour adminstration for at least 20 years.
Lastly, it was reported last week that there was £1trillion sitting ready to be invested in our economy by private enterprise. They are just waiting for the right signals to move. I figure the markets knowing this will ensure we don't see a double-dip.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
#17
sid
people are cheesed off with the continual slagging off of the last government by the new coalition.
what people want to hear is what will be done to alleviate the situation, i have not heard about the trillion nicker waiting to be invested, please furnish more details.
the government will last for 5 years, the rules have been changed to allow this, sadly the coalition will not.
we are about 2 months in and the majority of yellow supporters have signalled they are ready to desert their party, the lotus eaters in the commons will be forced to leave the coalition leaving the keys to their ministerial cars behind.
this will leave the government in limbo, the opposition will probably abstain in votes on unpopular measure, knowing that they need at least a year to regroup then another year or two for the blues to deliver more unpopular measures.
Guest 655- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,247
#18
Howard - the present policies need context, that context cannot be ignored and that means it is right to remind people of Labour'sresponsibilities for it, Remember Labour were blaming Mrs T 20 years after she left office....now that was idiotic.
40% cuts were not mentioned because there will not be 40% cuts. I have explained the rationale behind getting departments to draw up such plans. It is simple and logical, a sensible way to proceed.
#19
Dear Barry W,You sure come across as a hard hearted Statistician. There is obviously not a single gramme of compassion for the poor people who despite all there efforts to keep their/there?? heads above water will have there/their?? lives ruined by the boys in blue, and I am not referring to the police.
I am struck by the sudden rise of the multiple of wise men who have suddenly materialised on the forum .
One half are telling us "Yea Mr Osborne I would have recommended this course of action before now, you only had to ask" and the other group of wise men knew all along that labour had screwed up,despite the multitude of good ideas which were easily avaliable if they had only asked.
Brings to mind the sketch by John Cleese ,Ronnie Barker, and Ronnie Corbett
"I KNOW MY PLACE"
As far as I can see tory or labour it wont make one iota of differance we are all gonna be screwed.
P.S.
I know my place, so I shall leave it to wiser brains than mine!!
Guest 655- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,247
#20
Jimmy - I have been warning on this forum for many years of the abyss Labour was leading us into.
Hard hearted, maybe - realistic, yes. We are in the position we are in and it is in all our interests that it is dealt with. Have you never heard the expression cruel to be kind?
As for your 'multitude of good ideas' - a good idea that is neither successful or sustainable is not a good idea. That is what we have now, the aftermath of a Labour government that knew only how to throw money at everything and had no thought of how it could be sustained and paid for, let alone results.
Why dont you try spending more than you have in income very year, covering the surplus with borrowing, right up until for every £3 you earn you are spending £4 - what would the result be? It is no different to government. We are now faced with paying the price.
