Andrew Hawkins @Andrew_ComRes 54s ComRes/ITV News Index: public trust in Osborne's econ competence hits 2.5-year high #autumnstatement http://ht.ly/rtd15
Bad news for the PB Kinnocks..
Nobody usually takes those seriously as they aren't past vote weighted, but if you'd bothered to read before posting what you don't understand you'de have seen this
"The poll, however, found that 39% of people did not agree with the statement that Osborne has turned out to be a competent Chancellor compared with 29% who thought he had."
And yet for all your bluster he's still beating Ed Balls hands down. Just how crap is that ? And why hasn't scaredy EdM got the guts to change Balls and try someone half decent ?
This time from Bloomberg, on continued constraints upon government spending:
U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne wrote to ministers [yesterday] saying he’ll cut the amount of money their departments can spend in the next three years by 1 billion pounds ($1.6 billion) each year.
The government will reduce central departmental spending over the three years through 2015-2016, the Treasury in London said in an e-mailed statement late yesterday. The annual reserve of 3 billion pounds will be cut by 1 billion pounds in 2013-14, with cuts to resource budgets over the following two years. Full details will be announced in the chancellor’s end-of-year financial statement to Parliament later this morning.
Today’s Autumn Statement “will show how the government’s long-term economic plan is securing a responsible recovery,” the Treasury said. “Departments are currently forecast to underspend significantly on their budgets,” allowing the government to make the cuts.
Osborne has pledged to continue focusing on cutting the deficit as a strengthening recovery enables him to argue his austerity plan is working. With 17 months to go before elections, he will for the first time since 2010 present higher forecasts than predicted earlier in the year.
My bolding on forecast departmental underspend this financial year. This was the "missing piece" from Chote's OBR predictions of the likely deficit this year. To date, departmental spending has matched the March EFO forecast, but Chote has been reluctant to forecast a revised year end deficit until further information was available on second half departmental spending. See his comment in the OBR commentary on the last Public Finances Bulletiin
The combination of less strong spending in October and downward revisions to previous months has reduced growth in central government current spending for the first seven months of the year to 2.1 per cent, in line with the full year forecast.
Within this total, net social benefits are showing an increase for the year to date of only 1.1 per cent, which is below our EFO forecast of an increase of 2.0 per cent for the whole year.
However, debt interest payments and other central government current expenditure are showing increases for the year which are above our EFO forecasts for the whole year. Other current expenditure is being temporarily increased by the front loading of payments to EU institutions.
The critical issue for our full-year forecast will be the extent of departmental underspending this year.
It is all beginning to look rather good for St, George.
this state pension age increase sends the wrong message. The tories have a significant part of their vote from the already retired (and doing well thanks) Labour have a significant part of their vote from benefit claimants (who are doing quite nice considering they contribute nothing) Lib dems have a significant part of their vote from public sector middle class workers (who are doing VERY WELL -and will do even more when they retire)
Now who wants people who are not doing well but grafting in jobs that don't have pensions and under threat from immigration ? At the moment UKIP take a significant part of their vote from these people . The tories NEED this vote to win
The continuing drive to reduce departmental expenditure is key to George being able to support the various political offers such as removing green taxes from energy, free school meals, transferable married persons relief etc AND having an aggressive and faster reduction path in public borrowing. It shows that, for all the talk of giveaways, money is still very tight.
As of course it should be for a government borrowing £100bn this year. Having stolen from our children we wouldn't want to waste it, would we?
The continuing drive to reduce departmental expenditure is key to George being able to support the various political offers such as removing green taxes from energy, free school meals, transferable married persons relief etc AND having an aggressive and faster reduction path in public borrowing. It shows that, for all the talk of giveaways, money is still very tight.
As of course it should be for a government borrowing £100bn this year. Having stolen from our children we wouldn't want to waste it, would we?
And amazing how much can be cut with relatively little notice. Just think how high the personal allowance could have been if the last government had been as focused on controlling admin costs
One of Darling's great talents in government was to make whatever he was put in charge of incredibly boring and not newsworthy. For someone repeatedly being handed hot potatoes it was a real gift. He couldn't quite manage it in the Treasury but that was probably the fault of the lunatic next door and the small matter of the roof coming in.
He has made Better Together quite dull too. Dull and safe. Dull and reliable. Dull and sensible. It is killing the yes vote and tories who criticise him really do deserve to have their heads put on sticks.
MoE stuff. The 32% probably mostly won't vote I'd expect.
Turnout of only 68%? I very much doubt it.
I'm backing the 75.01 Percent or Greater band over at Betfair (current price = 4.1).
68% would be a pretty high turnout for a referendum within the UK. There has only been one referendum in the UK that has achieved a turnout above 70% and that was in Northern Ireland on the Good Friday agreement where the turnout was 81.1%.
I think the turnout in the 1979 Scottish devolution referendum was the next highest, at 63.8%.
In short, I would be gobsmacked if the turnout in 2014 is above 75%. Around two-thirds is far more likely, and I reckon you have been robbed blind on Betfair.
SNP voters: Yes 52% No 18% DK 29% Lab voters: Yes 14% No 59% DK 27% Con voters: Yes 3% No 81% DK 16% LD voters: Yes 12% No 63% DK 24% oth voters: Yes 14% No 48% DK 38%
you have to laugh when 48% of SNP voters do not want independence!!!
You misunderstand the data.
The No side always amuse me when they assume that people saying "Don't Know" are really all opposed to independence. You can imagine the fuss if the Yes side always assumed that DKs were all really Yes voters. We'd never hear the end of it.
The continuing drive to reduce departmental expenditure is key to George being able to support the various political offers such as removing green taxes from energy, free school meals, transferable married persons relief etc AND having an aggressive and faster reduction path in public borrowing. It shows that, for all the talk of giveaways, money is still very tight.
As of course it should be for a government borrowing £100bn this year. Having stolen from our children we wouldn't want to waste it, would we?
And amazing how much can be cut with relatively little notice. Just think how high the personal allowance could have been if the last government had been as focused on controlling admin costs
yes Labour really made three huge mistakes in government :- the wasteful massive increase in public spending with little gain in beneficial output. the terrible slide in education standards that has dropped us to a shameful position in world education leagues the too fast ,too high levels of immigration that has pushed down labour wages for most basic jobs.
Each one should be enough to not vote them back in but the tories need to be bolder and braver in many areas
One of Darling's great talents in government was to make whatever he was put in charge of incredibly boring and not newsworthy. For someone repeatedly being handed hot potatoes it was a real gift. He couldn't quite manage it in the Treasury but that was probably the fault of the lunatic next door and the small matter of the roof coming in.
He has made Better Together quite dull too. Dull and safe. Dull and reliable. Dull and sensible. It is killing the yes vote and tories who criticise him really do deserve to have their heads put on sticks.
Quite. The SNP are struggling to get any issues to liven the campaign and Darling is playing them long, boring and slow. SE tory halfwits should find something else to rant about. How about criminality in banks ?
SNP voters: Yes 52% No 18% DK 29% Lab voters: Yes 14% No 59% DK 27% Con voters: Yes 3% No 81% DK 16% LD voters: Yes 12% No 63% DK 24% oth voters: Yes 14% No 48% DK 38%
you have to laugh when 48% of SNP voters do not want independence!!!
You misunderstand the data.
The No side always amuse me when they assume that people saying "Don't Know" are really all opposed to independence. You can imagine the fuss if the Yes side always assumed that DKs were all really Yes voters. We'd never hear the end of it.
yes but people who don't know if they want independence by definition do not want independence!!
SNP voters: Yes 52% No 18% DK 29% Lab voters: Yes 14% No 59% DK 27% Con voters: Yes 3% No 81% DK 16% LD voters: Yes 12% No 63% DK 24% oth voters: Yes 14% No 48% DK 38%
you have to laugh when 48% of SNP voters do not want independence!!!
You misunderstand the data.
The No side always amuse me when they assume that people saying "Don't Know" are really all opposed to independence. You can imagine the fuss if the Yes side always assumed that DKs were all really Yes voters. We'd never hear the end of it.
yes but people who don't know if they want independence by definition do not want independence!!
'Want' is a positive thought not an undecided option
The continuing drive to reduce departmental expenditure is key to George being able to support the various political offers such as removing green taxes from energy, free school meals, transferable married persons relief etc AND having an aggressive and faster reduction path in public borrowing. It shows that, for all the talk of giveaways, money is still very tight.
As of course it should be for a government borrowing £100bn this year. Having stolen from our children we wouldn't want to waste it, would we?
And amazing how much can be cut with relatively little notice. Just think how high the personal allowance could have been if the last government had been as focused on controlling admin costs
We should have been running substantial surpluses from 2002 onwards. Had we done so we would have entered the recession with far less public and almost certainly significantly less private debt with room for manouvre. A tighter fiscal policy would have led to a tighter monetary policy and less of a bubble.
We would probably have had lower growth but it would have been sustainable growth, much more private sector orientated and wealth creating.
This government is going to cut 1m off the public sector head count over 5 years. The question Labour really needs to answer is what they were doing there in the first place.
Good morning. Still a newbie here but compelled to post by being utterly bemused by today's statement. Please tell me where I've got the following wrong.
There are two headlines coinciding at the moment: a raising of the state pension age, and a big spend on infrastructure.
If a politician announces a money-raising scheme in one breath and then a spending scheme in another, many people will link the two, not unfairly: "if you weren't spending so much on X, you wouldn't have to tax me with Y".
So the message for a significant part of the electorate today is: you'll have to retire later, so that we can afford to build a new A14 and give kids free school meals.
To me - and this is why I'm bemused - this seems like really odd politics. On the one hand it's "we're still in austerity, so you'll have to work longer". On the other, it's "we can afford to start spending". I really don't see what extra votes Osborne hopes to get from this - to the contrary, it seems that he's alienated a large slice of the electorate.
This time from Bloomberg, on continued constraints upon government spending:
U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne wrote to ministers [yesterday] saying he’ll cut the amount of money their departments can spend in the next three years by 1 billion pounds ($1.6 billion) each year.
The government will reduce central departmental spending over the three years through 2015-2016, the Treasury in London said in an e-mailed statement late yesterday. The annual reserve of 3 billion pounds will be cut by 1 billion pounds in 2013-14, with cuts to resource budgets over the following two years. Full details will be announced in the chancellor’s end-of-year financial statement to Parliament later this morning.
Today’s Autumn Statement “will show how the government’s long-term economic plan is securing a responsible recovery,” the Treasury said. “Departments are currently forecast to underspend significantly on their budgets,” allowing the government to make the cuts.
Osborne has pledged to continue focusing on cutting the deficit as a strengthening recovery enables him to argue his austerity plan is working. With 17 months to go before elections, he will for the first time since 2010 present higher forecasts than predicted earlier in the year.
My bolding on forecast departmental underspend this financial year. This was the "missing piece" from Chote's OBR predictions of the likely deficit this year. To date, departmental spending has matched the March EFO forecast, but Chote has been reluctant to forecast a revised year end deficit until further information was available on second half departmental spending. See his comment in the OBR commentary on the last Public Finances Bulletiin
The combination of less strong spending in October and downward revisions to previous months has reduced growth in central government current spending for the first seven months of the year to 2.1 per cent, in line with the full year forecast.
Within this total, net social benefits are showing an increase for the year to date of only 1.1 per cent, which is below our EFO forecast of an increase of 2.0 per cent for the whole year.
However, debt interest payments and other central government current expenditure are showing increases for the year which are above our EFO forecasts for the whole year. Other current expenditure is being temporarily increased by the front loading of payments to EU institutions.
The critical issue for our full-year forecast will be the extent of departmental underspending this year.
It is all beginning to look rather good for St, George.
Your endless propaganda is wearing. Try discussing why wages have fallen in real terms in pretty much every quarter since the anointed saint came to power. Then we might be getting somewhere
This time from Bloomberg, on continued constraints upon government spending:
U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne wrote to ministers [yesterday] saying he’ll cut the amount of money their departments can spend in the next three years by 1 billion pounds ($1.6 billion) each year.
The government will reduce central departmental spending over the three years through 2015-2016, the Treasury in London said in an e-mailed statement late yesterday. The annual reserve of 3 billion pounds will be cut by 1 billion pounds in 2013-14, with cuts to resource budgets over the following two years. Full details will be announced in the chancellor’s end-of-year financial statement to Parliament later this morning.
Today’s Autumn Statement “will show how the government’s long-term economic plan is securing a responsible recovery,” the Treasury said. “Departments are currently forecast to underspend significantly on their budgets,” allowing the government to make the cuts.
Osborne has pledged to continue focusing on cutting the deficit as a strengthening recovery enables him to argue his austerity plan is working. With 17 months to go before elections, he will for the first time since 2010 present higher forecasts than predicted earlier in the year.
My bolding on forecast departmental underspend this financial year. This was the "missing piece" from Chote's OBR predictions of the likely deficit this year. To date, departmental spending has matched the March EFO forecast, but Chote has been reluctant to forecast a revised year end deficit until further information was available on second half departmental spending. See his comment in the OBR commentary on the last Public Finances Bulletiin
The combination of less strong spending in October and downward revisions to previous months has reduced growth in central government current spending for the first seven months of the year to 2.1 per cent, in line with the full year forecast.
Within this total, net social benefits are showing an increase for the year to date of only 1.1 per cent, which is below our EFO forecast of an increase of 2.0 per cent for the whole year.
However, debt interest payments and other central government current expenditure are showing increases for the year which are above our EFO forecasts for the whole year. Other current expenditure is being temporarily increased by the front loading of payments to EU institutions.
The critical issue for our full-year forecast will be the extent of departmental underspending this year.
It is all beginning to look rather good for St, George.
Your endless propaganda is wearing. Try discussing why wages have fallen in real terms in pretty much every quarter since the anointed saint came to power. Then we might be getting somewhere
The continuing drive to reduce departmental expenditure is key to George being able to support the various political offers such as removing green taxes from energy, free school meals, transferable married persons relief etc AND having an aggressive and faster reduction path in public borrowing. It shows that, for all the talk of giveaways, money is still very tight.
As of course it should be for a government borrowing £100bn this year. Having stolen from our children we wouldn't want to waste it, would we?
And amazing how much can be cut with relatively little notice. Just think how high the personal allowance could have been if the last government had been as focused on controlling admin costs
yes Labour really made three huge mistakes in government :- the wasteful massive increase in public spending with little gain in beneficial output. the terrible slide in education standards that has dropped us to a shameful position in world education leagues the too fast ,too high levels of immigration that has pushed down labour wages for most basic jobs.
Each one should be enough to not vote them back in but the tories need to be bolder and braver in many areas
You missed their total incompetence in setting up regulatory bodies who did more that tick boxes and justify their own existence in shiny new offices. This was widespread but most of the failings of the government lead back to it. They failed to adequately regulate banks, hospitals, care homes, schools...the list just goes on and on.
Good morning. Still a newbie here but compelled to post by being utterly bemused by today's statement. Please tell me where I've got the following wrong.
There are two headlines coinciding at the moment: a raising of the state pension age, and a big spend on infrastructure.
If a politician announces a money-raising scheme in one breath and then a spending scheme in another, many people will link the two, not unfairly: "if you weren't spending so much on X, you wouldn't have to tax me with Y".
So the message for a significant part of the electorate today is: you'll have to retire later, so that we can afford to build a new A14 and give kids free school meals.
To me - and this is why I'm bemused - this seems like really odd politics. On the one hand it's "we're still in austerity, so you'll have to work longer". On the other, it's "we can afford to start spending". I really don't see what extra votes Osborne hopes to get from this - to the contrary, it seems that he's alienated a large slice of the electorate.
What am I missing? Genuine question.
Raising the pension age cuts the bill every year forever - and also helps today by improving the long term outlook.
Investing in roads etc costs us once - then we reap the benefits over many years.
You need to look beyond the tired BBC - PB Kinnocks line of only looking at a single data point.
Good morning. Still a newbie here but compelled to post by being utterly bemused by today's statement. Please tell me where I've got the following wrong.
There are two headlines coinciding at the moment: a raising of the state pension age, and a big spend on infrastructure.
If a politician announces a money-raising scheme in one breath and then a spending scheme in another, many people will link the two, not unfairly: "if you weren't spending so much on X, you wouldn't have to tax me with Y".
So the message for a significant part of the electorate today is: you'll have to retire later, so that we can afford to build a new A14 and give kids free school meals.
To me - and this is why I'm bemused - this seems like really odd politics. On the one hand it's "we're still in austerity, so you'll have to work longer". On the other, it's "we can afford to start spending". I really don't see what extra votes Osborne hopes to get from this - to the contrary, it seems that he's alienated a large slice of the electorate.
What am I missing? Genuine question.
The Lib Dems will get my colleague's vote from the free school meals. Sample size of one and all that but she is a retained 2010 Lib Dem.
This time from Bloomberg, on continued constraints upon government spending:
U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne wrote to ministers [yesterday] saying he’ll cut the amount of money their departments can spend in the next three years by 1 billion pounds ($1.6 billion) each year.
The government will reduce central departmental spending over the three years through 2015-2016, the Treasury in London said in an e-mailed statement late yesterday. The annual reserve of 3 billion pounds will be cut by 1 billion pounds in 2013-14, with cuts to resource budgets over the following two years. Full details will be announced in the chancellor’s end-of-year financial statement to Parliament later this morning.
Today’s Autumn Statement “will show how the government’s long-term economic plan is securing a responsible recovery,” the Treasury said. “Departments are currently forecast to underspend significantly on their budgets,” allowing the government to make the cuts.
Osborne has pledged to continue focusing on cutting the deficit as a strengthening recovery enables him to argue his austerity plan is working. With 17 months to go before elections, he will for the first time since 2010 present higher forecasts than predicted earlier in the year.
However, debt interest payments and other central government current expenditure are showing increases for the year which are above our EFO forecasts for the whole year. Other current expenditure is being temporarily increased by the front loading of payments to EU institutions.
The critical issue for our full-year forecast will be the extent of departmental underspending this year.
It is all beginning to look rather good for St, George.
Your endless propaganda is wearing. Try discussing why wages have fallen in real terms in pretty much every quarter since the anointed saint came to power. Then we might be getting somewhere
Good economic news really doesn't agree with you does it Bob ? You could always move to France or read Zerohedge.com if its Doomp*rn you are after.
Good morning. Still a newbie here but compelled to post by being utterly bemused by today's statement. Please tell me where I've got the following wrong.
There are two headlines coinciding at the moment: a raising of the state pension age, and a big spend on infrastructure.
If a politician announces a money-raising scheme in one breath and then a spending scheme in another, many people will link the two, not unfairly: "if you weren't spending so much on X, you wouldn't have to tax me with Y".
So the message for a significant part of the electorate today is: you'll have to retire later, so that we can afford to build a new A14 and give kids free school meals.
To me - and this is why I'm bemused - this seems like really odd politics. On the one hand it's "we're still in austerity, so you'll have to work longer". On the other, it's "we can afford to start spending". I really don't see what extra votes Osborne hopes to get from this - to the contrary, it seems that he's alienated a large slice of the electorate.
What am I missing? Genuine question.
You are not missing anything.
It is always a mistake to assume that politicians are clever. Most of them are not.
Good morning. Still a newbie here but compelled to post by being utterly bemused by today's statement. Please tell me where I've got the following wrong.
There are two headlines coinciding at the moment: a raising of the state pension age, and a big spend on infrastructure.
If a politician announces a money-raising scheme in one breath and then a spending scheme in another, many people will link the two, not unfairly: "if you weren't spending so much on X, you wouldn't have to tax me with Y".
So the message for a significant part of the electorate today is: you'll have to retire later, so that we can afford to build a new A14 and give kids free school meals.
To me - and this is why I'm bemused - this seems like really odd politics. On the one hand it's "we're still in austerity, so you'll have to work longer". On the other, it's "we can afford to start spending". I really don't see what extra votes Osborne hopes to get from this - to the contrary, it seems that he's alienated a large slice of the electorate.
What am I missing? Genuine question.
The infrastructure spending is not new government money, it is previously budgeted money that is now being assigned to specific projects.
The only new money is coming from Insurance companies who are now being allowed to invest directly into infrastructure projects as part of some EU rule changes that the coalition pushed for.
Any other new spending that is going on is through cuts that have happened else where in the overall government budget.
This time from Bloomberg, on continued constraints upon government spending:
U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne wrote to ministers [yesterday] saying he’ll cut the amount of money their departments can spend in the next three years by 1 billion pounds ($1.6 billion) each year.
The government will reduce central departmental spending over the three years through 2015-2016, the Treasury in London said in an e-mailed statement late yesterday. The annual reserve of 3 billion pounds will be cut by 1 billion pounds in 2013-14, with cuts to resource budgets over the following two years. Full details will be announced in the chancellor’s end-of-year financial statement to Parliament later this morning.
Today’s Autumn Statement “will show how the government’s long-term economic plan is securing a responsible recovery,” the Treasury said. “Departments are currently forecast to underspend significantly on their budgets,” allowing the government to make the cuts.
Osborne has pledged to continue focusing on cutting the deficit as a strengthening recovery enables him to argue his austerity plan is working. With 17 months to go before elections, he will for the first time since 2010 present higher forecasts than predicted earlier in the year.
However, debt interest payments and other central government current expenditure are showing increases for the year which are above our EFO forecasts for the whole year. Other current expenditure is being temporarily increased by the front loading of payments to EU institutions.
The critical issue for our full-year forecast will be the extent of departmental underspending this year.
It is all beginning to look rather good for St, George.
Your endless propaganda is wearing. Try discussing why wages have fallen in real terms in pretty much every quarter since the anointed saint came to power. Then we might be getting somewhere
Good economic news really doesn't agree with you does it Bob ? You could always move to France or read Zerohedge.com if its Doomp*rn you are after.
Wrong. Dead wrong. I work on the cutting edge of the economy and we have just had our best ever year, after three years of depression. I am a higher rate taxpayer and hope to get a decent rise at Christmas. So I can see the recovery working. Yet wages are not keeping up with prices for most of the workforce - a severe problem. The Tories would be wise to see it.
The continuing drive to reduce departmental expenditure is key to George being able to support the various political offers such as removing green taxes from energy, free school meals, transferable married persons relief etc AND having an aggressive and faster reduction path in public borrowing. It shows that, for all the talk of giveaways, money is still very tight.
As of course it should be for a government borrowing £100bn this year. Having stolen from our children we wouldn't want to waste it, would we?
And amazing how much can be cut with relatively little notice. Just think how high the personal allowance could have been if the last government had been as focused on controlling admin costs
yes Labour really made three huge mistakes in government :- the wasteful massive increase in public spending with little gain in beneficial output. the terrible slide in education standards that has dropped us to a shameful position in world education leagues the too fast ,too high levels of immigration that has pushed down labour wages for most basic jobs.
Each one should be enough to not vote them back in but the tories need to be bolder and braver in many areas
You have omitted what many would argue to have been the biggest Labour mistake in government, of all-time: Scottish devolution.
How on earth Donald Dewar managed to hoodwink his boss is one of the great unanswered questions of modern Scottish political history.
You need to look beyond the tired BBC - PB Kinnocks line of only looking at a single data point.
Sure, but it's not the policy I'm interested in so much as the politics. We can debate the policy all day; I'm more puzzled by why this is meant to be appealing to the electorate.
The Conservatives' appeal (since Thatcher) has been as much self-interest as ideology: "vote for us and we'll make you richer". Changing this to "vote for us and we'll make you work longer" seems really, really curious. I can't believe this has been done without Lynton Crosby's clearance - I just don't get what his reasoning might be.
This time from Bloomberg, on continued constraints upon government spending:
U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne wrote to ministers [yesterday] saying he’ll cut the amount of money their departments can spend in the next three years by 1 billion pounds ($1.6 billion) each year.
The government will reduce central departmental spending over the three years through 2015-2016, the Treasury in London said in an e-mailed statement late yesterday. The annual reserve of 3 billion pounds will be cut by 1 billion pounds in 2013-14, with cuts to resource budgets over the following two years. Full details will be announced in the chancellor’s end-of-year financial statement to Parliament later this morning.
Today’s Autumn Statement “will show how the government’s long-term economic plan is securing a responsible recovery,” the Treasury said. “Departments are currently forecast to underspend significantly on their budgets,” allowing the government to make the cuts.
Osborne has pledged to continue focusing on cutting the deficit as a strengthening recovery enables him to argue his austerity plan is working. With 17 months to go before elections, he will for the first time since 2010 present higher forecasts than predicted earlier in the year.
However, debt interest payments and other central government current expenditure are showing increases for the year which are above our EFO forecasts for the whole year. Other current expenditure is being temporarily increased by the front loading of payments to EU institutions.
The critical issue for our full-year forecast will be the extent of departmental underspending this year.
It is all beginning to look rather good for St, George.
Your endless propaganda is wearing. Try discussing why wages have fallen in real terms in pretty much every quarter since the anointed saint came to power. Then we might be getting somewhere
Good economic news really doesn't agree with you does it Bob ? You could always move to France or read Zerohedge.com if its Doomp*rn you are after.
Wrong. Dead wrong. I work on the cutting edge of the economy and we have just had our best ever year, after three years of depression. I am a higher rate taxpayer and hope to get a decent rise at Christmas. So I can see the recovery working. Yet wages are not keeping up with prices for most of the workforce - a severe problem. The Tories would be wise to see it.
Not such a problem out here in Bumpkinland, now stop chatting and get back to work, George needs the money so he can pay us some more benefits.
Good morning. Still a newbie here but compelled to post by being utterly bemused by today's statement. Please tell me where I've got the following wrong.
There are two headlines coinciding at the moment: a raising of the state pension age, and a big spend on infrastructure.
If a politician announces a money-raising scheme in one breath and then a spending scheme in another, many people will link the two, not unfairly: "if you weren't spending so much on X, you wouldn't have to tax me with Y".
So the message for a significant part of the electorate today is: you'll have to retire later, so that we can afford to build a new A14 and give kids free school meals.
To me - and this is why I'm bemused - this seems like really odd politics. On the one hand it's "we're still in austerity, so you'll have to work longer". On the other, it's "we can afford to start spending". I really don't see what extra votes Osborne hopes to get from this - to the contrary, it seems that he's alienated a large slice of the electorate.
What am I missing? Genuine question.
The infrastructure spending is not new government money, it is previously budgeted money that is now being assigned to specific projects.
The only new money is coming from Insurance companies who are now being allowed to invest directly into infrastructure projects as part of some EU rule changes that the coalition pushed for.
Any other new spending that is going on is through cuts that have happened else where in the overall government budget.
Good luck explaining that to the public in a simple sentence.
You need to look beyond the tired BBC - PB Kinnocks line of only looking at a single data point.
Sure, but it's not the policy I'm interested in so much as the politics. We can debate the policy all day; I'm more puzzled by why this is meant to be appealing to the electorate.
The Conservatives' appeal (since Thatcher) has been as much self-interest as ideology: "vote for us and we'll make you richer". Changing this to "vote for us and we'll make you work longer" seems really, really curious. I can't believe this has been done without Lynton Crosby's clearance - I just don't get what his reasoning might be.
Raising the pension age reduces future liabilities - which helps our rating and keeps debt interest rates lower (as we are a safer bet to lend to) - which frees up cash for spending now/reducing the deficit.
SNP voters: Yes 52% No 18% DK 29% Lab voters: Yes 14% No 59% DK 27% Con voters: Yes 3% No 81% DK 16% LD voters: Yes 12% No 63% DK 24% oth voters: Yes 14% No 48% DK 38%
you have to laugh when 48% of SNP voters do not want independence!!!
You misunderstand the data.
The No side always amuse me when they assume that people saying "Don't Know" are really all opposed to independence. You can imagine the fuss if the Yes side always assumed that DKs were all really Yes voters. We'd never hear the end of it.
yes but people who don't know if they want independence by definition do not want independence!!
'Want' is a positive thought not an undecided option
It suits the Yes campaign just fine if the No side wants to delude itself that all those DK respondents are really planning on voting No. Complacency is by far your greatest enemy, and yet, despite endless warnings from Darling et al, you just ooze complacency.
Good morning. Still a newbie here but compelled to post by being utterly bemused by today's statement. Please tell me where I've got the following wrong.
There are two headlines coinciding at the moment: a raising of the state pension age, and a big spend on infrastructure.
If a politician announces a money-raising scheme in one breath and then a spending scheme in another, many people will link the two, not unfairly: "if you weren't spending so much on X, you wouldn't have to tax me with Y".
So the message for a significant part of the electorate today is: you'll have to retire later, so that we can afford to build a new A14 and give kids free school meals.
To me - and this is why I'm bemused - this seems like really odd politics. On the one hand it's "we're still in austerity, so you'll have to work longer". On the other, it's "we can afford to start spending". I really don't see what extra votes Osborne hopes to get from this - to the contrary, it seems that he's alienated a large slice of the electorate.
What am I missing? Genuine question.
The infrastructure spending is not new government money, it is previously budgeted money that is now being assigned to specific projects.
The only new money is coming from Insurance companies who are now being allowed to invest directly into infrastructure projects as part of some EU rule changes that the coalition pushed for.
Any other new spending that is going on is through cuts that have happened else where in the overall government budget.
Good luck explaining that to the public in a simple sentence.
Labour screwed us all so we're going to have to work longer.
This is from the BBC Autumn statement ticker - is the info right??????
Illias, London How can the Chancellor justify increasing the state pension age to 68 when the healthy life expectancy in this country is 63.2 for men and 64.2 for women according to the latest figures from National Statistics?
SNP voters: Yes 52% No 18% DK 29% Lab voters: Yes 14% No 59% DK 27% Con voters: Yes 3% No 81% DK 16% LD voters: Yes 12% No 63% DK 24% oth voters: Yes 14% No 48% DK 38%
you have to laugh when 48% of SNP voters do not want independence!!!
You misunderstand the data.
The No side always amuse me when they assume that people saying "Don't Know" are really all opposed to independence. You can imagine the fuss if the Yes side always assumed that DKs were all really Yes voters. We'd never hear the end of it.
yes but people who don't know if they want independence by definition do not want independence!!
'Want' is a positive thought not an undecided option
It suits the Yes campaign just fine if the No side wants to delude itself that all those DK respondents are really planning on voting No. Complacency is by far your greatest enemy, and yet, despite endless warnings from Darling et al, you just ooze complacency.
I am not in the 'no campaign ,personally as an Englishman and no 'statist' , I think we would be better off without Scotland. I just found it funny that nearly half of people who voted for a party that has independence as its raison d'etre do not actually positively want independence!!
This is from the BBC Autumn statement ticker - is the info right??????
Illias, London How can the Chancellor justify increasing the state pension age to 68 when the healthy life expectancy in this country is 63.2 for men and 64.2 for women according to the latest figures from National Statistics?
This is from the BBC Autumn statement ticker - is the info right??????
Illias, London How can the Chancellor justify increasing the state pension age to 68 when the healthy life expectancy in this country is 63.2 for men and 64.2 for women according to the latest figures from National Statistics?
This is from the BBC Autumn statement ticker - is the info right??????
Illias, London How can the Chancellor justify increasing the state pension age to 68 when the healthy life expectancy in this country is 63.2 for men and 64.2 for women according to the latest figures from National Statistics?
This is from the BBC Autumn statement ticker - is the info right??????
Illias, London How can the Chancellor justify increasing the state pension age to 68 when the healthy life expectancy in this country is 63.2 for men and 64.2 for women according to the latest figures from National Statistics?
'healthy' sounds like the Wooly Mammoth in the room to me here. Life expectancy is way over 64.
It's illegal to possess or traffic class A drugs, but is it against the law to specifically consume or use them?
Only illegal to possess. I guess you could argue that you are in possession of it if its in your blood stream, but that'd be a case for the courts to decide!
This is from the BBC Autumn statement ticker - is the info right??????
Illias, London How can the Chancellor justify increasing the state pension age to 68 when the healthy life expectancy in this country is 63.2 for men and 64.2 for women according to the latest figures from National Statistics?
A tighter fiscal policy would have led to a tighter monetary policy and less of a bubble.
The central tenet of George Osborne's stated policy approach has been that a tighter fiscal policy allows for a looser monetary policy.
Are you saying that he is wrong?
No. Not at all. At the moment and after the crash when credit is extremely scarce and the velocity of money in the economy is slow a tighter fiscal policy allows the government to take what would normally be completely unacceptable risks (QE, 0.5% interest rates etc) without confidence being lost in the currency or the ability of the government to pay all this money back.
Pre 2008 we had a completely different scenario with an ever increasing velocity of money being driven by froth in the city and crazy lending policies by banks which was being aggravated by absurdly loose government fiscal policies and the pumping of additional demand into a system that was already over heating. In that scenario the government could and should have been acting counter cyclically by taking excess demand out of the economy instead of pumping it in.
Almost certainly nothing was going to save the shareholders of RBS from the incompetence of Fred Goodwin but by being counter cyclical the size of the credit bubble would have been reduced.
This is from the BBC Autumn statement ticker - is the info right??????
Illias, London How can the Chancellor justify increasing the state pension age to 68 when the healthy life expectancy in this country is 63.2 for men and 64.2 for women according to the latest figures from National Statistics?
'healthy' sounds like the Wooly Mammoth in the room to me here. Life expectancy is way over 64.
I'm surprised the govt want to use life expectancy as a marker, wouldn't that mean the rich retiring later?
The rich wouldn't really need to rely on a state pension to dictate when they retire.. they don't now.
This is from the BBC Autumn statement ticker - is the info right??????
Illias, London How can the Chancellor justify increasing the state pension age to 68 when the healthy life expectancy in this country is 63.2 for men and 64.2 for women according to the latest figures from National Statistics?
is a bit more relevant. Staggering that HLE for males in Manchester = 55 years.
Healthy life expectancy has no absolute definition that anybody would relate to though. Like poverty in a way. Another politic word to suit an argument . I am all for a lower state pension age but would feel a bit of a prat mentioned this
SNP voters: Yes 52% No 18% DK 29% Lab voters: Yes 14% No 59% DK 27% Con voters: Yes 3% No 81% DK 16% LD voters: Yes 12% No 63% DK 24% oth voters: Yes 14% No 48% DK 38%
you have to laugh when 48% of SNP voters do not want independence!!!
You misunderstand the data.
The No side always amuse me when they assume that people saying "Don't Know" are really all opposed to independence. You can imagine the fuss if the Yes side always assumed that DKs were all really Yes voters. We'd never hear the end of it.
yes but people who don't know if they want independence by definition do not want independence!!
'Want' is a positive thought not an undecided option
It suits the Yes campaign just fine if the No side wants to delude itself that all those DK respondents are really planning on voting No. Complacency is by far your greatest enemy, and yet, despite endless warnings from Darling et al, you just ooze complacency.
I am not in the 'no campaign ,personally as an Englishman and no 'statist' , I think we would be better off without Scotland. I just found it funny that nearly half of people who voted for a party that has independence as its raison d'etre do not actually positively want independence!!
Lots of people who vote Tory are not public school twits.
Lots of people who vote Labour are not petty crooks.
Lots of people who vote Lib Dem are not pot-smoking hippies.
Lots of people who vote UKIP are not racists.
If political parties are successful, they attract a lot more people than simply their core support. In fact, the more successful they are (eg. the SNP), the more non-core supporters they attract.
It's illegal to possess or traffic class A drugs, but is it against the law to specifically consume or use them?
Unless your drink is spiked or you otherwise do not have the mental intention to "possess" how do you consume drugs without possessing them?
In Scotland Nigella would have the benefit of the law of corroboration which means even her confession on oath would not be enough to convict her without another source of evidence. As I understand it you English are not so fortunate.
This is from the BBC Autumn statement ticker - is the info right??????
Illias, London How can the Chancellor justify increasing the state pension age to 68 when the healthy life expectancy in this country is 63.2 for men and 64.2 for women according to the latest figures from National Statistics?
Life expectancy at birth is not as relevant as life expectancy at current age. But these can be surprising. My actuarial acquaintances tell me that on fairly reasonable actuarial assumptions, a 3 year old girl is more likely to live to 100 than a 97 year old man.
Life expectancy at birth is not as relevant as life expectancy at current age. But these can be surprising. My actuarial acquaintances tell me that on fairly reasonable actuarial assumptions, a 3 year old girl is more likely to live to 100 than a 97 year old man.
Get away !! not true surely? unless they factor in assumptions about health innovation that is just guesswork really
Good morning. Still a newbie here but compelled to post by being utterly bemused by today's statement. Please tell me where I've got the following wrong.
There are two headlines coinciding at the moment: a raising of the state pension age, and a big spend on infrastructure.
If a politician announces a money-raising scheme in one breath and then a spending scheme in another, many people will link the two, not unfairly: "if you weren't spending so much on X, you wouldn't have to tax me with Y".
So the message for a significant part of the electorate today is: you'll have to retire later, so that we can afford to build a new A14 and give kids free school meals.
To me - and this is why I'm bemused - this seems like really odd politics. On the one hand it's "we're still in austerity, so you'll have to work longer". On the other, it's "we can afford to start spending". I really don't see what extra votes Osborne hopes to get from this - to the contrary, it seems that he's alienated a large slice of the electorate.
What am I missing? Genuine question.
A very good question and sound observations, El Capitano.
The conflicting messages of increased infrastructure expenditure and reduced spending are a difficult sell, even if they do make sense to economists.
Net Investment (capital investment in infrastructure) is excluded from calculation of a government's current budget.
So "balancing the budget" or "eliminating the deficit" means getting current 'consumption' expenditure to equal current (i.e. regular and recurring) revenues. And the aim is to do this at a stage in the economic cycle which is midway between peak and trough (i.e. "cyclically adjusted"). Balancing the "Cyclically Adjusted Current Balance" within a five year rolling forecast period is Osborne's "Primary Fiscal Mandate".
The OBR's responsibility is to advise the government on whether it is meeting this Primary Fiscal Mandate and its Economic and Fiscal Outlook (EFO) published today after the Autumn Statement will do this. In March, the OBR concluded the government would meet the target in financial year 2016-17. Today's EFO is likely to bring this forecast compliance date forward to the 2015-16 year.
A balanced cyclically adjusted current budget would mean that a government over a full economic cycle would not add to or reduce the national debt through accumulation of annual deficits. Any borrowing in downturns would be matched by surpluses in up periods.
Because Public Sector Net Debt as a proportion of GDP (currently around 75% excluding bank interventions) is too high there is a strong argument that the CACB will need to more than balance and run a period of surpluses at equilibrium in order to reduce the debt ratio to the international norm of 60%. We should hear more of this in today's Autumn Statement.
Pension liabilitiies are part of regular expenses and therefore need to be managed as part of the Current Budget. Retirement age adjustments are part of this process.
Infrastructure investment is not part of the current budget (although interest payments on borrowing to invest is). Investment does however impact borrowing and debt. So it is no surprise that net investment has been reduced in the early stages of fiscal consolidation and increased in plans for future years when the current budget is balanced and borrowing to meet deficit needs eliminated. As the government begins to generate cash surpluses (will happen earlier than current budget in balance), so investments can be increased. Increasing investment is essential to sustaining economic growth: this cannot be achieved on increases in household consumption alone.
All this means that a £375 bn forward investment plan is entirely compatible with extending retirement ages to reduce current exoenditure.
But as you point out, this is not a easy sell to the general public.
The idea that the state try to press drug charges against Nigella is completely mad. In that case anyone who has ever admitted taking drugs could be liable for a jail term. If that is the law, as some on here are saying, it is even stupider than I thought.
The idea that the state try to press drug charges against Nigella is completely mad. In that case anyone who has ever admitted taking drugs could be liable for a jail term. If that is the law, as some on here are saying, it is even stupider than I thought.
yes surely it encourages lying under oath (a far more serious offence I would of thought)
West (ex Glasgow) 52% South 49% Lothians 43% Highlands & Islands 40% North East 40% Mid Scotland & Fife 38% Central 37% Glasgow 37%
This directly contradicts the findings of the non-BPC PSO poll published on Sunday, where support for the Union was strongest in Mid Scotland & Fife.
But is the difference statistically significant?
Well, as Progressive Scottish Opinion are not a member of the British Polling Council they do not follow the disclosure rules respected by other more reputable pollsters, so their methodology and detailed findings remain a mystery.
Life expectancy at birth is not as relevant as life expectancy at current age. But these can be surprising. My actuarial acquaintances tell me that on fairly reasonable actuarial assumptions, a 3 year old girl is more likely to live to 100 than a 97 year old man.
Get away !! not true surely? unless they factor in assumptions about health innovation that is just guesswork really
Any prediction about the future is by definition guesswork, though actuaries use mathematical techniques to structure those guesses. Mortality has improved at a fairly constant rate for a very long time, and women live longer than men. I have to say I find it hard to believe too, but what do we employ mathematical gurus to do if not to baffle us?
What constitutes unhealthy? On blood pressure tablets, legs dropped off?
"Since 2001, the World Health Organization publishes statistics called Healthy life expectancy (HALE), defined as the average number of years that a person can expect to live in "full health", excluding the years lived in less than full health due to disease and/or injury" from wiki. Not helpful. I would think freedom from conditions which a. are expected to last >3 months and b. substantially affect day to day living and enjoyment of life.
Off topic both I and 3 of my, say, 20 closest friends, all in our early 50s have been diagnosed with various cancers this year, with no obvious links or causes like smoking etc. Beginning to look like the start of an epidemic.
Life expectancy at birth is not as relevant as life expectancy at current age. But these can be surprising. My actuarial acquaintances tell me that on fairly reasonable actuarial assumptions, a 3 year old girl is more likely to live to 100 than a 97 year old man.
Get away !! not true surely? unless they factor in assumptions about health innovation that is just guesswork really
Any prediction about the future is by definition guesswork, though actuaries use mathematical techniques to structure those guesses. Mortality has improved at a fairly constant rate for a very long time, and women live longer than men. I have to say I find it hard to believe too, but what do we employ mathematical gurus to do if not to baffle us?
Over the next 97 years we may well have health innovation but we may well have nuclear wars (we have had in the last 97 years ). Not sure if actuaries take this into account. very sceptical!!
A tighter fiscal policy would have led to a tighter monetary policy and less of a bubble.
The central tenet of George Osborne's stated policy approach has been that a tighter fiscal policy allows for a looser monetary policy.
Are you saying that he is wrong?
In that scenario the government could and should have been acting counter cyclically by taking excess demand out of the economy instead of pumping it in.
I accept counter-cyclical activity as a good idea, no question.
However, there are monetary and fiscal components to this. If Brown was too loose with fiscal policy then surely the argument is that the Bank of England should have been tighter with monetary policy?
If Osborne is right that fiscal and monetary policy effectively exist on a seesaw, then isn't it likely that if Brown had deployed a tighter fiscal policy, taking demand out of the economy, then the Bank would have responded by cutting interest rates?
I just don't understand how you expect that tighter fiscal policy would have lead to tighter monetary policy in 2002-2007. By the size of the bubble I can accept that tighter policy in both would quite likely have left us in a better place now, but I think your argument is false. Under the logic prevailing at the time, tighter fiscal policy from Brown would have lead to looser monetary policy at the Bank, and likely a larger bubble in private debt.
For sure Brown got things wrong, but so did many others in charge of economic policy, or private companies, at the time.
To update all on my own property moves, I am sitting on an offer on my flat which would represent a fourfold increase in price since 1999 and which is £175,000 more than my downstairs neighbour sold her nearly identical flat for in June. I'm currently considering whether to hold out for more.
A few months ago I was picked up by a cabbie who lived on the next street until the early 1990s. His parents had sold their flat for £50,000.
Over the next 97 years we may well have health innovation but we may well have nuclear wars (we have had in the last 97 years ). Not sure if actuaries take this into account. very sceptical!!
They probably do, but the chance is so small that the difference in expectancy is probably negligible.
Someone from an ordinary background would probably never dare to stand up in court and announce that they'd taken class A drugs because they'd probably correctly be wary of being charged with possession. But it seems members of the 1% have the confidence to believe the law on drugs won't be applied to them.
Apply the law or change it. The current situation is making a mockery of justice.
What constitutes unhealthy? On blood pressure tablets, legs dropped off?
Off topic both I and 3 of my, say, 20 closest friends, all in our early 50s have been diagnosed with various cancers this year, with no obvious links or causes like smoking etc. Beginning to look like the start of an epidemic.
Sorry to hear that.
I was in the same boat myself a few years ago, diagnosed with cancer in my early 30s, with no obvious links or causes like smoking etc.
It went very well for me and I hope that it does for you and your friends too. Mind you, the disease took a year of my life. Two years if you count the long period of unexplained declining health before the diagnosis.
(A pet theory of mine revolves around proximity to creosote and/or 2-stroke fuel as a child/teenager/young adult. But why the cancer should occur many years later is odd.)
That's a good article Sean. Enjoyed reading that. You might develop it at a later date and ask why such areas as NW1 are soundly left wing despite their extreme wealth.
Comments
I'm backing the 75.01 Percent or Greater band over at Betfair (current price = 4.1).
This time from Bloomberg, on continued constraints upon government spending:
U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne wrote to ministers [yesterday] saying he’ll cut the amount of money their departments can spend in the next three years by 1 billion pounds ($1.6 billion) each year.
The government will reduce central departmental spending over the three years through 2015-2016, the Treasury in London said in an e-mailed statement late yesterday. The annual reserve of 3 billion pounds will be cut by 1 billion pounds in 2013-14, with cuts to resource budgets over the following two years. Full details will be announced in the chancellor’s end-of-year financial statement to Parliament later this morning.
Today’s Autumn Statement “will show how the government’s long-term economic plan is securing a responsible recovery,” the Treasury said. “Departments are currently forecast to underspend significantly on their budgets,” allowing the government to make the cuts.
Osborne has pledged to continue focusing on cutting the deficit as a strengthening recovery enables him to argue his austerity plan is working. With 17 months to go before elections, he will for the first time since 2010 present higher forecasts than predicted earlier in the year.
My bolding on forecast departmental underspend this financial year. This was the "missing piece" from Chote's OBR predictions of the likely deficit this year. To date, departmental spending has matched the March EFO forecast, but Chote has been reluctant to forecast a revised year end deficit until further information was available on second half departmental spending. See his comment in the OBR commentary on the last Public Finances Bulletiin
The combination of less strong spending in October and downward revisions to previous months has reduced growth in central government current spending for the first seven months of the year to 2.1 per cent, in line with the full year forecast.
Within this total, net social benefits are showing an increase for the year to date of only 1.1 per cent, which is below our EFO forecast of an increase of 2.0 per cent for the whole year.
However, debt interest payments and other central government current expenditure are showing increases for the year which are above our EFO forecasts for the whole year. Other current expenditure is being temporarily increased by the front loading of payments to EU institutions.
The critical issue for our full-year forecast will be the extent of departmental underspending this year.
It is all beginning to look rather good for St, George.
The tories have a significant part of their vote from the already retired (and doing well thanks)
Labour have a significant part of their vote from benefit claimants (who are doing quite nice considering they contribute nothing)
Lib dems have a significant part of their vote from public sector middle class workers (who are doing VERY WELL -and will do even more when they retire)
Now who wants people who are not doing well but grafting in jobs that don't have pensions and under threat from immigration ? At the moment UKIP take a significant part of their vote from these people . The tories NEED this vote to win
I note that the Fieldwork dates (20th – 27th November 2013) mostly took place before the White Paper launch.
http://www.tns-bmrb.co.uk/assets-uploaded/documents/som-data-tables-27-nov-2013_1386178151.pdf
http://vote-2012.proboards.com/post/118418/threads
Profiles from the excellent Andrew Teale:
http://blog.englishelections.org.uk/2013/12/by-election-previews-5-december-2013.html
http://blog.scottishelections.org.uk/2013/12/by-election-preview-5-december-2013.html
http://blog.welshelections.org.uk/2013/12/by-election-previews-5-december-2013.html
As of course it should be for a government borrowing £100bn this year. Having stolen from our children we wouldn't want to waste it, would we?
SNP voters: Yes 52% No 18% DK 29%
Lab voters: Yes 14% No 59% DK 27%
Con voters: Yes 3% No 81% DK 16%
LD voters: Yes 12% No 63% DK 24%
oth voters: Yes 14% No 48% DK 38%
Lol...
And amazing how much can be cut with relatively little notice. Just think how high the personal allowance could have been if the last government had been as focused on controlling admin costs
He has made Better Together quite dull too. Dull and safe. Dull and reliable. Dull and sensible. It is killing the yes vote and tories who criticise him really do deserve to have their heads put on sticks.
I think the turnout in the 1979 Scottish devolution referendum was the next highest, at 63.8%.
In short, I would be gobsmacked if the turnout in 2014 is above 75%. Around two-thirds is far more likely, and I reckon you have been robbed blind on Betfair.
The No side always amuse me when they assume that people saying "Don't Know" are really all opposed to independence. You can imagine the fuss if the Yes side always assumed that DKs were all really Yes voters. We'd never hear the end of it.
the wasteful massive increase in public spending with little gain in beneficial output.
the terrible slide in education standards that has dropped us to a shameful position in world education leagues
the too fast ,too high levels of immigration that has pushed down labour wages for most basic jobs.
Each one should be enough to not vote them back in but the tories need to be bolder and braver in many areas
So are the two servicemen who were acquitted.
Madness.
We would probably have had lower growth but it would have been sustainable growth, much more private sector orientated and wealth creating.
This government is going to cut 1m off the public sector head count over 5 years. The question Labour really needs to answer is what they were doing there in the first place.
There are two headlines coinciding at the moment: a raising of the state pension age, and a big spend on infrastructure.
If a politician announces a money-raising scheme in one breath and then a spending scheme in another, many people will link the two, not unfairly: "if you weren't spending so much on X, you wouldn't have to tax me with Y".
So the message for a significant part of the electorate today is: you'll have to retire later, so that we can afford to build a new A14 and give kids free school meals.
To me - and this is why I'm bemused - this seems like really odd politics. On the one hand it's "we're still in austerity, so you'll have to work longer". On the other, it's "we can afford to start spending". I really don't see what extra votes Osborne hopes to get from this - to the contrary, it seems that he's alienated a large slice of the electorate.
What am I missing? Genuine question.
Cos Labour broke the economy?
Investing in roads etc costs us once - then we reap the benefits over many years.
You need to look beyond the tired BBC - PB Kinnocks line of only looking at a single data point.
It is always a mistake to assume that politicians are clever. Most of them are not.
Are you saying that he is wrong?
The infrastructure spending is not new government money, it is previously budgeted money that is now being assigned to specific projects.
The only new money is coming from Insurance companies who are now being allowed to invest directly into infrastructure projects as part of some EU rule changes that the coalition pushed for.
Any other new spending that is going on is through cuts that have happened else where in the overall government budget.
How on earth Donald Dewar managed to hoodwink his boss is one of the great unanswered questions of modern Scottish political history.
The Conservatives' appeal (since Thatcher) has been as much self-interest as ideology: "vote for us and we'll make you richer". Changing this to "vote for us and we'll make you work longer" seems really, really curious. I can't believe this has been done without Lynton Crosby's clearance - I just don't get what his reasoning might be.
simple really.
Illias, London How can the Chancellor justify increasing the state pension age to 68 when the healthy life expectancy in this country is 63.2 for men and 64.2 for women according to the latest figures from National Statistics?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_life_expectancy
https://www.google.co.uk/#q=life+expectancy+uk
'healthy' sounds like the Wooly Mammoth in the room to me here. Life expectancy is way over 64.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/oct/23/qanda.markoliver
West (ex Glasgow) 52%
South 49%
Lothians 43%
Highlands & Islands 40%
North East 40%
Mid Scotland & Fife 38%
Central 37%
Glasgow 37%
This directly contradicts the findings of the non-BPC PSO poll published on Sunday, where support for the Union was strongest in Mid Scotland & Fife.
http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/disability-and-health-measurement/healthy-life-expectancy-at-birth-for-upper-tier-local-authorities--england/2009-11/stb-hle--at-birth-for-upper-tier-local-authorities--england-2009-11.html
is a bit more relevant. Staggering that HLE for males in Manchester = 55 years.
Pre 2008 we had a completely different scenario with an ever increasing velocity of money being driven by froth in the city and crazy lending policies by banks which was being aggravated by absurdly loose government fiscal policies and the pumping of additional demand into a system that was already over heating. In that scenario the government could and should have been acting counter cyclically by taking excess demand out of the economy instead of pumping it in.
Almost certainly nothing was going to save the shareholders of RBS from the incompetence of Fred Goodwin but by being counter cyclical the size of the credit bubble would have been reduced.
Horses for courses.
er no it hasn't.
Lots of people who vote Labour are not petty crooks.
Lots of people who vote Lib Dem are not pot-smoking hippies.
Lots of people who vote UKIP are not racists.
If political parties are successful, they attract a lot more people than simply their core support. In fact, the more successful they are (eg. the SNP), the more non-core supporters they attract.
In Scotland Nigella would have the benefit of the law of corroboration which means even her confession on oath would not be enough to convict her without another source of evidence. As I understand it you English are not so fortunate.
Thanks v much.
What constitutes unhealthy? On blood pressure tablets, legs dropped off?
The conflicting messages of increased infrastructure expenditure and reduced spending are a difficult sell, even if they do make sense to economists.
Net Investment (capital investment in infrastructure) is excluded from calculation of a government's current budget.
So "balancing the budget" or "eliminating the deficit" means getting current 'consumption' expenditure to equal current (i.e. regular and recurring) revenues. And the aim is to do this at a stage in the economic cycle which is midway between peak and trough (i.e. "cyclically adjusted"). Balancing the "Cyclically Adjusted Current Balance" within a five year rolling forecast period is Osborne's "Primary Fiscal Mandate".
The OBR's responsibility is to advise the government on whether it is meeting this Primary Fiscal Mandate and its Economic and Fiscal Outlook (EFO) published today after the Autumn Statement will do this. In March, the OBR concluded the government would meet the target in financial year 2016-17. Today's EFO is likely to bring this forecast compliance date forward to the 2015-16 year.
A balanced cyclically adjusted current budget would mean that a government over a full economic cycle would not add to or reduce the national debt through accumulation of annual deficits. Any borrowing in downturns would be matched by surpluses in up periods.
Because Public Sector Net Debt as a proportion of GDP (currently around 75% excluding bank interventions) is too high there is a strong argument that the CACB will need to more than balance and run a period of surpluses at equilibrium in order to reduce the debt ratio to the international norm of 60%. We should hear more of this in today's Autumn Statement.
Pension liabilitiies are part of regular expenses and therefore need to be managed as part of the Current Budget. Retirement age adjustments are part of this process.
Infrastructure investment is not part of the current budget (although interest payments on borrowing to invest is). Investment does however impact borrowing and debt. So it is no surprise that net investment has been reduced in the early stages of fiscal consolidation and increased in plans for future years when the current budget is balanced and borrowing to meet deficit needs eliminated. As the government begins to generate cash surpluses (will happen earlier than current budget in balance), so investments can be increased. Increasing investment is essential to sustaining economic growth: this cannot be achieved on increases in household consumption alone.
All this means that a £375 bn forward investment plan is entirely compatible with extending retirement ages to reduce current exoenditure.
But as you point out, this is not a easy sell to the general public.
http://www.progressivepartnership.co.uk/our_services/so_omnibus
Off topic both I and 3 of my, say, 20 closest friends, all in our early 50s have been diagnosed with various cancers this year, with no obvious links or causes like smoking etc. Beginning to look like the start of an epidemic.
Indeed. I don't have the numbers but presumably such a law makes potential jail birds of the majority of the population?
Unemployment 7.0% in 2015 and 5.6% in 2018!
Where is Danny Blanchflower?
However, there are monetary and fiscal components to this. If Brown was too loose with fiscal policy then surely the argument is that the Bank of England should have been tighter with monetary policy?
If Osborne is right that fiscal and monetary policy effectively exist on a seesaw, then isn't it likely that if Brown had deployed a tighter fiscal policy, taking demand out of the economy, then the Bank would have responded by cutting interest rates?
I just don't understand how you expect that tighter fiscal policy would have lead to tighter monetary policy in 2002-2007. By the size of the bubble I can accept that tighter policy in both would quite likely have left us in a better place now, but I think your argument is false. Under the logic prevailing at the time, tighter fiscal policy from Brown would have lead to looser monetary policy at the Bank, and likely a larger bubble in private debt.
For sure Brown got things wrong, but so did many others in charge of economic policy, or private companies, at the time.
To update all on my own property moves, I am sitting on an offer on my flat which would represent a fourfold increase in price since 1999 and which is £175,000 more than my downstairs neighbour sold her nearly identical flat for in June. I'm currently considering whether to hold out for more.
A few months ago I was picked up by a cabbie who lived on the next street until the early 1990s. His parents had sold their flat for £50,000.
Apply the law or change it. The current situation is making a mockery of justice.
"Where is Danny Blanchflower?"
I think he's still dead, but he was a bloody good footballer.
I was in the same boat myself a few years ago, diagnosed with cancer in my early 30s, with no obvious links or causes like smoking etc.
It went very well for me and I hope that it does for you and your friends too. Mind you, the disease took a year of my life. Two years if you count the long period of unexplained declining health before the diagnosis.
(A pet theory of mine revolves around proximity to creosote and/or 2-stroke fuel as a child/teenager/young adult. But why the cancer should occur many years later is odd.)
He has done it!
The Supplementary Target of a falling PSND:GDP ratio is now forecast to be met in 2015.
Both fiscal targets are now forecast to be met.
Time to pop the corks!
don't let labour wreck it (again)
that's the battleground for the next election.
That's a good article Sean. Enjoyed reading that. You might develop it at a later date and ask why such areas as NW1 are soundly left wing despite their extreme wealth.