Really? Didn't they learn from the solidarity tax and the 75% top rate?
Westminster Politics 2024-2029
- Thread starter Pexbo
- Start date
Really? Didn't they learn from the solidarity tax and the 75% top rate?
You don't even need to drop the policy just severely amend it so it impacts far less pensioners or it's tiered.
It feels like politically they don't want to U-turn in their first policy but I reckon a small adjustment to show they're listening would actually be good optics.
Personally I don't think the two should be conflated. The debt figure is rather ideological there's plenty of different ways it can be totalled and a lot of it discounted as true debt when you look at it in detail. The treasury and politicians know this, policy should never be dictated by that figure. That doesn't change the public spending budget though which whilst political it's at least a real value and one which has economic impacts.
I'll bite on this, knowing that @Pexbo is ready to pounce on me (love you really!)...
But! The uptick in people applying for Pension Credit has surged since this anouncement. This means that thousands, if not tens / hundreds of thousands will now get PC that they didn't know they were eligible for. If it wasn't for the outrage caused by this, these people might not have applied.
So he's technically right, although it's a warped view of the logic.
We are one of the few countries that includes QE losses in our calculations.
Changing it brings other risks but with lowish inflation it shouldn't be a big problem.
IF they did that, it needs to go on investment. No tax breaks, public sector freebies or any other giveaways. Currently their budget plans come from the religious school of economics i.e pray for growth. The nonsense over the £22b has been uncovered and it's time for them to stop politicking and do some real work.
The biggest positive thing Reeves could do is climb down from her naive and stupid declaration that national insurance wont rise.
It doesn't scream confidence in their messaging that they first went with "we have no money so here come cuts" and then pivoted to "actually we found a load of cash by using a different calculator"
Not often I agree with you but this is the first place the treasury should look for savings. It's one of those policies that everyone knows is absurd there's backing for it to change to tiered interest rates and yet silence. I don't think much of the BOE assets should be considered a debt to the treasury at all but that's a different matter.
It's too complicated and perhaps boring for the media to make a big public story so the tens of billions wasted a year is just ignored. It's money that could be used to make a big difference to the economy, namely the green transition.
Yeah, feck the little rich kids.
I was more taking the hypocrisy line.
But yeah God dam rich kids..
Great.
So what will they do now? Because the entire reason for stopping winter fuel payments was supposedly to save money.
If its not saving money, and if everyone is actually claiming even more as a result, as you claim, then they will need to save it somewhere else, right?
Or maybe just not bother with any of it?
Britain needing to import water might be the perfect example of neoliberal state building
Have they seen the rain though? Plenty of water lads!
I would be happy if they can find a way to reset the threshold so poor pensioners are properly protected, but that's as far as I'd go. That 2.8% is £1.4bn, or the equivalent of 1p on the basic rate of tax.
I think the govt has to be very disciplined about how they message how they going to borrow more. It HAS to be to fund growth generating investment, ie the creation of new income generating assets for the state. It can't be to plug
spending gaps, that just seems like asking for trouble from the markets.
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The Economist reckons they've got about £30b to play with already and £50b if they change the debt calculation.
Changing the calculation is easy. Writing off the debt the country owes itself is a different matter since there is a network of banks and investors in between who lend to the boe because of those interest payments.
I think I'd be kind to suggest Reeves doesn't want to go down that road.
Sadly it seems the rain falls in the UK free of charge.
That's a fair point.
I think the people that are extremely naive are the idiots who think influence is bought through registered donations. We live in Britain though so the stupidity of the general population is to be expected.
Complete non story. We spend thousands of hours a year on recon missions in the region. Take this from me, our war recon missions do not have transponders.
The messaging on this WFA is maddening.
1 in 3 pensioners are asset millionaires. They have money. They don’t need a winter fuel allowance. Release some equity from your homes ffs. The Tories fecked you.
23% of the UK is aged 60 or over. This problem will only get worse.
We can’t just keep throwing blanket payments to that cohort group. If you have money, work it out.
On the flip side, not acknowledging the huge % of pensioners in genuine poverty, by increasing the Winter Fuel payment for this entire parliament, with some adult messaging around it having a sunset clause… insane.
It’s all so boringly average.
1 in 3 pensioners are asset millionaires. They have money. They don’t need a winter fuel allowance. Release some equity from your homes ffs. The Tories fecked you.
23% of the UK is aged 60 or over. This problem will only get worse.
We can’t just keep throwing blanket payments to that cohort group. If you have money, work it out.
On the flip side, not acknowledging the huge % of pensioners in genuine poverty, by increasing the Winter Fuel payment for this entire parliament, with some adult messaging around it having a sunset clause… insane.
It’s all so boringly average.
Yeah, I can't imagine why anyone in this country would think that.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/article/2024/jun/27/public-contracts-companies-tory-donors
Such a stupid country
Meanwhile Huw Edwards gets 6 months for child porn.
He would have got two years if he spilled his soup on his phone screen.
Just pointing out they also caused £10,000 worth of damage to the frame, let's not forget that bit. The judge also said, "Section 63 of the sentencing code requires me, in assessing the seriousness of your offending, to consider not only the harm your offence caused, but also the harm it might foreseeably have caused" ie the damage that might have occurred if the soup had got in under the frame. The painting is worth around £100million.
Not saying I agree with the sentence, but that's why it was what it was.
I meant in the context of some free clothes, Arsenal tickets etc, not millions pounds of donations obviously which is what we and the media has been discussing, not blatant corruption.
He's only been PM for 2 months, he hasn't had time yet to build up millions of pounds worth of donations from rich people/companies looking for influence with the ruling party.
Probably won't have a chance now with all this scrutiny. I bet he's seething
I’m sure any senior politician is looking forward to £50k a night for an after dinner speech.
I don’t begrudge that personally I think people in senior positions should be paid a commensurate salary for leading the country.
Should be easily £1m for a prime minister, might stop them from trying to top themselves up with other freebies.
I don’t begrudge that personally I think people in senior positions should be paid a commensurate salary for leading the country.
Should be easily £1m for a prime minister, might stop them from trying to top themselves up with other freebies.
He's become PM so he's set for life. I don't think he needs a few quid while he's in power the money comes after.
The blatant open corruption happens at minister level the people you won't know the names of. They'll do the backroom deals and have a stash somewhere.
Registered donations aren't even the tip of the iceberg so not even considered corruption. They're a tiny snowflake.
Throw soup - JAIL
Huw the Peado - awww yeah let him off.
Huw the Peado - awww yeah let him off.
Going back to the days of Boris.
Indeed they were incompetent, inept and totally untrustworthy.
Labour must be careful to not be accused of saving one thing in opposition and another so early after the election. Trust is as important now as ever.
Can't really be mad about this until its confirmed, but someone is leaking it to the press and I'm pretty sure jones still has enough inside info on the party to know if its true or not.
A funding crisis 'solved' by students paying more. Even though universities would need something like a £12k annual fee to even approach dealing with the funding gap.
This will likely be in place for a few years until we go back to where we are now.
Steven Swinford is reporting it this way:
This doesn't even come close to a solution. Until the cost is covered by the state and taxation, this is a sticking plaster.
They seem completely trapped. Ministers seem fully aware of the issues that need fixing, but everything they do is hamstrung by reeves and her ridiculous fiscal rules.
TSo on one hand, she is subsidising this new AI business, because giving money to private companies is somehow good, but can't subsidise the education of the workforce to run the place. Which means those skills will inevitably come from abroad, where they do.
And they cannot consider a graduate tax because, well, tax. You are right. Given everything they have ruled out doing this is the only option (apart from reintroducing the student cap which would make sense).
Which doesn't give universities enough money meaning building will continue to crumble, courses will close, redundancies will continue and teaching quality will fall. Except now 18 years olds get to pay more for this experience.
Monthly reminder that whilst public funding went up for schools and universities recently, and it obviously didn't plug the gap, colleges actually had funding cut. Our entire education system is fecked.
Thank goodness the Labour leadership bent over backwards to accommodate her. Incredibly brave decision to do this right after an election when you have been elected as a Labour MP too.
Don’t know her background but what’s the nepotism she mentions in her resignation letter?
