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And so to Sunak’s budget starting with an announcement that parts of the Treasury are moving to Darl

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  • Time_to_LeaveTime_to_Leave Posts: 2,547
    Leon said:

    Is this a Nat beating up Sturgeon?

    LibDem isn’t he?
  • FloaterFloater Posts: 14,207
    Leon said:

    Is this a Nat beating up Sturgeon?

    Lib Dem
  • StuartinromfordStuartinromford Posts: 17,196
    rcs1000 said:

    ping said:

    I think Andy Street is disappointed.

    Expected more for the WM than just a Freeport.

    He doesn't even get one of those. The only inland Freeport is East Midlands Airport which is well outside the West Midlands.
    Is this the Freeport which supposedly the EU was preventing us from having?
    So he said. I have no idea of the truth of that because I suppose it depends entirely on what he means as a Freeport compared to what the EU means.
    Personally... I think the age of Freeports is rather behind us. They are great for emerging economies with high tariff barriers looking to learn a little bit about the world. But given the UK has relatively low tariffs, and that stuff finished in free port manufacturing zones is often exempted from FTAs, I think they are likely to remain unused except for very low value add "putting stuff in boxes".
    So why the excitement about them? Is it mainly a shiny badge to give to local MPs and mayors?
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 57,054

    Budget: the CPI inflation assumption (that it stays at or below 2.0% until 2026) looks rocky to me. A 1% increase in RPI increases debt costs by £7bn, and 1% in gilts by £9 billion. Rather sensitive. This could budget could be out by £50-60bn by FY2025/26.

    The corp tax and income tax freezes yield £25bn a year by 2025, so that's big money. IHT also frozen for an extra 0.4bn yield. If it gets desperate he could up VAT to 22%, I guess to give an extra £10-12bn per year.

    Also, has he factored in a progressive degradation of fuel duty? I think he's just TBC'ed it in this. I'd have thought it'd be 10-15% below current levels by 2025, 25-35% by 2030 and 60-70% by 2040. That's probably a £3-4bn hole by 2026 alone.

    Carbon neutrality will have a serious fiscal cost, although cheaper than the environmental one of course.

    I think this is another area where he has to bite the bullet sooner rather than later. There is no longer a need to encourage drivers to take up electric cars - they are going to be forced to do so within 9 years anyway. So he should now look to move to payment per mile for driving with all cars being classed the same. Replace fuel duty and road tax with a completely new system based on how much you drive. If you are worried about the impact on rural areas then you can tinker with rates but basically it will be one system for all with perhaps some regional variation.
    If my clock is read once a year at MOT time, to reconcile my road tax bill for the next year, fine.

    But, I do not want to be satellite tracked and monitored for real-time road pricing.

    No way do I want any part of the Government knowing where I'm going, when or why, or for how long. Nor do I expect to have to explain myself to anyone: the prospects for abuse are legion.

    The fuzz would have dug all over it during this latest lockdown.
    You do know that when you buy a new car, and you turn it on, and there's that big screen about Terms & Conditions for using the in car systems (without which your car will basically not work), that you are agreeing they have the right to sell your location data to whoever they want, right?

    Anyone buying a new Ford, Tesla, GM, etc., today has already agreed to let Google and Amazon look at your location history so as to work out what things to sell you.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 57,054

    rcs1000 said:

    ping said:

    I think Andy Street is disappointed.

    Expected more for the WM than just a Freeport.

    He doesn't even get one of those. The only inland Freeport is East Midlands Airport which is well outside the West Midlands.
    Is this the Freeport which supposedly the EU was preventing us from having?
    So he said. I have no idea of the truth of that because I suppose it depends entirely on what he means as a Freeport compared to what the EU means.
    Personally... I think the age of Freeports is rather behind us. They are great for emerging economies with high tariff barriers looking to learn a little bit about the world. But given the UK has relatively low tariffs, and that stuff finished in free port manufacturing zones is often exempted from FTAs, I think they are likely to remain unused except for very low value add "putting stuff in boxes".
    So why the excitement about them? Is it mainly a shiny badge to give to local MPs and mayors?
    Yes.
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 50,117

    Taxing electricity use per kWh is better than per mile because it encourages people to buy as efficient vehicles as possible.

    Raising electricity prices further would be an interesting idea, politically.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,150

    Leon said:

    Is this a Nat beating up Sturgeon?

    LibDem isn’t he?
    He’s good

    Or, alternatively, she is now so tired and weakened she’s easier to hit

    Or both
  • MattWMattW Posts: 23,072
    MattW said:

    eek said:

    Towns Fund Deal. Spot the marginal:

    North East: Middlesbrough, Thornaby-On-Tees 46
    North West: Preston, Workington, Bolton, Cheadle, Carlisle, Leyland, Southport, Staveley, Rochdale 211
    Yorkshire and the Humber: Wakefield, Whitby, Scarborough, Grimsby, Castleford, Goldthorpe, Scunthorpe, Morley, Stocksbridge 199
    East Midlands: Newark, Clay Cross, Skegness, Mablethorpe, Boston, Lincoln, Northampton, Mansfield 175
    West Midlands: Wolverhampton, Kidsgrove, Rowley Regis, Smethwick, West Bromwich, Burton-on-Trent, Nuneaton 155
    East of England: Lowestoft, Colchester, Stevenage, Great Yarmouth, Ipswich, Milton Keynes 148
    South East: Crawley, Margate 43
    South West: Swindon, Bournemouth 41

    Isn't that because almost towns are marginals? The cities are Labour, the rural areas Tory and the towns are the marginals?
    That's how I'd spin it, yes ;-)

    The reality is that places like Fareham, Gosport, Alton, Wellington etc. could really use this money too. But, they're not key marginals.

    I get it, but it's a bit obvious (I have a bit of inside info on this btw, because I know there was a shortlisting)
    Distinct lack of North East towns such as those in Co. Durham away from Teesside and Northumberland. Have the Tories given up on them?
    The only town that qualified in Co. Durham was Bishop Auckland and their plan is a mad hotchpotch of expensive ideas that totaled £47m.

    I don't know why it failed but I suspect the answer was they asked for too much for too many bits as they couldn't decide on their priorities.
    Is this a new wave?

    Mansfield already had £10m iirc.

    What's Bournemouth doing on the list - they can introduce a Sandbanks Tax and a Grand Designs Tax instead.

    What is Cheadle doing in the North-West?
    I'm getting Cheadle muddled with somewhere else. Sorry.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 57,054
    Floater said:

    Leon said:

    Is this a Nat beating up Sturgeon?

    Lib Dem
    Ah, is that the Scottish LibDem?
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,726

    rcs1000 said:

    ping said:

    I think Andy Street is disappointed.

    Expected more for the WM than just a Freeport.

    He doesn't even get one of those. The only inland Freeport is East Midlands Airport which is well outside the West Midlands.
    Is this the Freeport which supposedly the EU was preventing us from having?
    So he said. I have no idea of the truth of that because I suppose it depends entirely on what he means as a Freeport compared to what the EU means.
    Personally... I think the age of Freeports is rather behind us. They are great for emerging economies with high tariff barriers looking to learn a little bit about the world. But given the UK has relatively low tariffs, and that stuff finished in free port manufacturing zones is often exempted from FTAs, I think they are likely to remain unused except for very low value add "putting stuff in boxes".
    So why the excitement about them? Is it mainly a shiny badge to give to local MPs and mayors?
    Yes.
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 28,380
    Leon said:

    My conclusion from this committee is that Sturgeon may be telling the truth, in part. She wasn’t involved in a conspiracy - she genuinely pursued it for the complainers and MeToo. However there WAS a lower level ‘conspiracy’ - call it ‘over-eagerness to please the Leader’ - which she discovered to her horror. Everything since has been cover-up

    Personally I don't think that for a second. I agree that simply wanting to block someone returning to frontline politics is not grounds for a plot to destroy and imprison them, but I think that's because there are more layers to this that both Salmond and Sturgeon are aware of, but the public is not. They are fighting to the death, but there's implicit agreement at the same time to do it within certain limits - many of them legal.
  • JohnOJohnO Posts: 4,290
    Leon said:

    Is this a Nat beating up Sturgeon?

    No, Lib Dem.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 60,341

    Budget: the CPI inflation assumption (that it stays at or below 2.0% until 2026) looks rocky to me. A 1% increase in RPI increases debt costs by £7bn, and 1% in gilts by £9 billion. Rather sensitive. This could budget could be out by £50-60bn by FY2025/26.

    The corp tax and income tax freezes yield £25bn a year by 2025, so that's big money. IHT also frozen for an extra 0.4bn yield. If it gets desperate he could up VAT to 22%, I guess to give an extra £10-12bn per year.

    Also, has he factored in a progressive degradation of fuel duty? I think he's just TBC'ed it in this. I'd have thought it'd be 10-15% below current levels by 2025, 25-35% by 2030 and 60-70% by 2040. That's probably a £3-4bn hole by 2026 alone.

    Carbon neutrality will have a serious fiscal cost, although cheaper than the environmental one of course.

    I think this is another area where he has to bite the bullet sooner rather than later. There is no longer a need to encourage drivers to take up electric cars - they are going to be forced to do so within 9 years anyway. So he should now look to move to payment per mile for driving with all cars being classed the same. Replace fuel duty and road tax with a completely new system based on how much you drive. If you are worried about the impact on rural areas then you can tinker with rates but basically it will be one system for all with perhaps some regional variation.
    If my clock is read once a year at MOT time, to reconcile my road tax bill for the next year, fine.

    But, I do not want to be satellite tracked and monitored for real-time road pricing.

    No way do I want any part of the Government knowing where I'm going, when or why, or for how long. Nor do I expect to have to explain myself to anyone: the prospects for abuse are legion.

    The fuzz would have dug all over it during this latest lockdown.
    Yep that is an issue but there really is no alternative that I can think of.

    That said if you carry a mobile phone then the ability to do that is already there.
    The alternative is an annual reading of the clock for a road tax bill, or a form of a self-assessment of mileage reconciled by the clock at the end. Just as we do for income tax.

    Road pricing can be used only for congestion zones or smart motorways.

    You can leave the phone at home, turn off the phone off, turn location services and data off on your phone, and, even if you don't do any of that the police/ Government need to pursue a legal route to access the data with a test.

    Real time tracking and pricing? No way. I'll just get an old car that doesn't have or it or avoid driving.
    I understand and share your views on this. But like Canute I have to point out the futility of trying to hold back the tide. Most new drivers are now opting for the black boxes in their cars which monitor everything they do and where they go to get themselves cheaper insurance. It is the only way most of them can afford to even get insurance.

    So the public view is changing. Combined with the ubiquity of mobile phones and other trackable devices I am afraid that people like us who still try to hold on to the illusion of living offline, away from governmental scrutiny, are becoming dinosaurs.
    Well, I think there's a world of difference between choice and compulsion. And public opinion can move both ways, it's not inevitable it goes in one direction. Most people are horrified when they realise how their data is abused.

    If the Government gave a choice - tax on the clock, or per KwH (at a slightly higher rate maybe) or real-time road pricing - I might accept it. But, I want that choice because monopolies are dangerous, and I simply don't trust them.

    The new technological/AI age cannot be one where all agency and control is stripped away from the citizen in the name of "efficiency".

    Some things are more important.
  • EndillionEndillion Posts: 4,976

    Budget: the CPI inflation assumption (that it stays at or below 2.0% until 2026) looks rocky to me. A 1% increase in RPI increases debt costs by £7bn, and 1% in gilts by £9 billion. Rather sensitive. This could budget could be out by £50-60bn by FY2025/26.

    The corp tax and income tax freezes yield £25bn a year by 2025, so that's big money. IHT also frozen for an extra 0.4bn yield. If it gets desperate he could up VAT to 22%, I guess to give an extra £10-12bn per year.

    Also, has he factored in a progressive degradation of fuel duty? I think he's just TBC'ed it in this. I'd have thought it'd be 10-15% below current levels by 2025, 25-35% by 2030 and 60-70% by 2040. That's probably a £3-4bn hole by 2026 alone.

    Carbon neutrality will have a serious fiscal cost, although cheaper than the environmental one of course.

    I think this is another area where he has to bite the bullet sooner rather than later. There is no longer a need to encourage drivers to take up electric cars - they are going to be forced to do so within 9 years anyway. So he should now look to move to payment per mile for driving with all cars being classed the same. Replace fuel duty and road tax with a completely new system based on how much you drive. If you are worried about the impact on rural areas then you can tinker with rates but basically it will be one system for all with perhaps some regional variation.
    If my clock is read once a year at MOT time, to reconcile my road tax bill for the next year, fine.

    But, I do not want to be satellite tracked and monitored for real-time road pricing.

    No way do I want any part of the Government knowing where I'm going, when or why, or for how long. Nor do I expect to have to explain myself to anyone: the prospects for abuse are legion.

    The fuzz would have dug all over it during this latest lockdown.
    Yep that is an issue but there really is no alternative that I can think of.

    That said if you carry a mobile phone then the ability to do that is already there.
    The alternative is an annual reading of the clock for a road tax bill, or a form of a self-assessment of mileage reconciled by the clock at the end. Just as we do for income tax.

    Road pricing can be used only for congestion zones or smart motorways.

    You can leave the phone at home, turn off the phone off, turn location services and data off on your phone, and, even if you don't do any of that the police/ Government need to pursue a legal route to access the data with a test.

    Real time tracking and pricing? No way. I'll just get an old car that doesn't have or it or avoid driving.
    I understand and share your views on this. But like Canute I have to point out the futility of trying to hold back the tide. Most new drivers are now opting for the black boxes in their cars which monitor everything they do and where they go to get themselves cheaper insurance. It is the only way most of them can afford to even get insurance.

    So the public view is changing. Combined with the ubiquity of mobile phones and other trackable devices I am afraid that people like us who still try to hold on to the illusion of living offline, away from governmental scrutiny, are becoming dinosaurs.
    This isn't in line with my experience. My view is that telematics has been a miserable failure, and other than cases where they physically can't buy a policy without one, drivers tend to opt out.

    It's worth remembering that telematics doesn't reduce insurance costs in aggregate - in fact it increases them, because the cost of the box and monitoring driving ability is non-zero. All it does is help the better drivers to prove they're deserving of lower premiums faster than they would normally (ie by not claiming over the course of several years). The worse than average drivers (50% of the population) will see no benefit from informing their insurer of the fact.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,923
    Prince Philip is "slightly improving", the Duchess of Cornwall has said, following his 15th night in hospital.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,150
    edited March 2021

    Leon said:

    My conclusion from this committee is that Sturgeon may be telling the truth, in part. She wasn’t involved in a conspiracy - she genuinely pursued it for the complainers and MeToo. However there WAS a lower level ‘conspiracy’ - call it ‘over-eagerness to please the Leader’ - which she discovered to her horror. Everything since has been cover-up

    Personally I don't think that for a second. I agree that simply wanting to block someone returning to frontline politics is not grounds for a plot to destroy and imprison them, but I think that's because there are more layers to this that both Salmond and Sturgeon are aware of, but the public is not. They are fighting to the death, but there's implicit agreement at the same time to do it within certain limits - many of them legal.
    Fair enough. And you probably know more than me, so that’s helpful, ta

    What I do know is that this day started well for Sturgeon but this last session has been dreadful for her. It is also absolutely gripping.
  • eekeek Posts: 28,354
    edited March 2021
    MaxPB said:

    rcs1000 said:

    ping said:

    I think Andy Street is disappointed.

    Expected more for the WM than just a Freeport.

    He doesn't even get one of those. The only inland Freeport is East Midlands Airport which is well outside the West Midlands.
    Is this the Freeport which supposedly the EU was preventing us from having?
    So he said. I have no idea of the truth of that because I suppose it depends entirely on what he means as a Freeport compared to what the EU means.
    Personally... I think the age of Freeports is rather behind us. They are great for emerging economies with high tariff barriers looking to learn a little bit about the world. But given the UK has relatively low tariffs, and that stuff finished in free port manufacturing zones is often exempted from FTAs, I think they are likely to remain unused except for very low value add "putting stuff in boxes".
    So why the excitement about them? Is it mainly a shiny badge to give to local MPs and mayors?
    Yes.
    Yep - our local MP can't explain any benefit that comes from it beyond jobs.

    When you ask how they plan to avoid the typical issue of local relocations into the area the answer you usually get is um, errr....

    However it's interesting that Teesside International is included as a few of the leasing firms have been setting up plane servicing / refurbishment hubs there - so it's not all bad as this will remove a lot of paperwork there.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 60,341
    rcs1000 said:

    Budget: the CPI inflation assumption (that it stays at or below 2.0% until 2026) looks rocky to me. A 1% increase in RPI increases debt costs by £7bn, and 1% in gilts by £9 billion. Rather sensitive. This could budget could be out by £50-60bn by FY2025/26.

    The corp tax and income tax freezes yield £25bn a year by 2025, so that's big money. IHT also frozen for an extra 0.4bn yield. If it gets desperate he could up VAT to 22%, I guess to give an extra £10-12bn per year.

    Also, has he factored in a progressive degradation of fuel duty? I think he's just TBC'ed it in this. I'd have thought it'd be 10-15% below current levels by 2025, 25-35% by 2030 and 60-70% by 2040. That's probably a £3-4bn hole by 2026 alone.

    Carbon neutrality will have a serious fiscal cost, although cheaper than the environmental one of course.

    I think this is another area where he has to bite the bullet sooner rather than later. There is no longer a need to encourage drivers to take up electric cars - they are going to be forced to do so within 9 years anyway. So he should now look to move to payment per mile for driving with all cars being classed the same. Replace fuel duty and road tax with a completely new system based on how much you drive. If you are worried about the impact on rural areas then you can tinker with rates but basically it will be one system for all with perhaps some regional variation.
    If my clock is read once a year at MOT time, to reconcile my road tax bill for the next year, fine.

    But, I do not want to be satellite tracked and monitored for real-time road pricing.

    No way do I want any part of the Government knowing where I'm going, when or why, or for how long. Nor do I expect to have to explain myself to anyone: the prospects for abuse are legion.

    The fuzz would have dug all over it during this latest lockdown.
    You do know that when you buy a new car, and you turn it on, and there's that big screen about Terms & Conditions for using the in car systems (without which your car will basically not work), that you are agreeing they have the right to sell your location data to whoever they want, right?

    Anyone buying a new Ford, Tesla, GM, etc., today has already agreed to let Google and Amazon look at your location history so as to work out what things to sell you.
    I don't have any of those cars but, yes, I do, and I have similar concerns about the use of my data by private companies too. I'd like to see that regulated by primary legislation.

    I don't see why I should "accept" the government - who have the power to arrest, detain or fine me - having access to all of my data in real-time just because it's increasingly a feature in the private commercial space.

    I want both regulatory spheres dealt with.
  • It will be interesting to hear from Salmond or his lawyers after this

    This has a long way to go
  • MattWMattW Posts: 23,072

    rcs1000 said:

    ping said:

    I think Andy Street is disappointed.

    Expected more for the WM than just a Freeport.

    He doesn't even get one of those. The only inland Freeport is East Midlands Airport which is well outside the West Midlands.
    Is this the Freeport which supposedly the EU was preventing us from having?
    So he said. I have no idea of the truth of that because I suppose it depends entirely on what he means as a Freeport compared to what the EU means.
    Personally... I think the age of Freeports is rather behind us. They are great for emerging economies with high tariff barriers looking to learn a little bit about the world. But given the UK has relatively low tariffs, and that stuff finished in free port manufacturing zones is often exempted from FTAs, I think they are likely to remain unused except for very low value add "putting stuff in boxes".
    So why the excitement about them? Is it mainly a shiny badge to give to local MPs and mayors?
    Do Freeports make any difference on origin shares for products going EU bound, or to the double tariff issue? I jus don't know on that one.
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826

    Taxing electricity use per kWh is better than per mile because it encourages people to buy as efficient vehicles as possible.

    Raising electricity prices further would be an interesting idea, politically.
    By my calculations you would need to raise electricity prices by less than 1p per kWh to much more than 100% replace fuel duty.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 95,999
    Floater said:

    Looking at her - this is not a politician who feels on comfortable ground and on top of the questioning

    Its not like she has been tested much in recent years. Makes a change.
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 17,373

    dixiedean said:

    50p increase in sick pay.
    Not really an incentive to isolate.

    Sick pay needs reform regardless of covid. At least the first week per year should be at full rate of pay paid in full by the employer. Good employers already do this and more.
    Absolutely. I get up to six months on full pay if I am sick.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,150
    kle4 said:

    Floater said:

    Looking at her - this is not a politician who feels on comfortable ground and on top of the questioning

    Its not like she has been tested much in recent years. Makes a change.
    I’ve never seen any leading British politician brutally interrogated like this. For hour after hour, as she visibly tires
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 78,124
    Sell of Millions and billions combined returned £37.
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 60,216
    Murdo's up!
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 50,117

    Taxing electricity use per kWh is better than per mile because it encourages people to buy as efficient vehicles as possible.

    Raising electricity prices further would be an interesting idea, politically.
    By my calculations you would need to raise electricity prices by less than 1p per kWh to much more than 100% replace fuel duty.
    There is a structural belief in Government, now, that road use needs to be priced down.

    The upset when you make calculations about the CO2 efficiency of some public transport vs ZEVs, is quite entertains. Also revealing.
  • Black_RookBlack_Rook Posts: 8,905
    rcs1000 said:

    Won't the simplest solution for replacing fuel tax ultimately be to just tax electricity? Its not as if people are going to avoid using electricity so a tax per kWh seems the simplest solution?

    Yes.

    Also, if you're going to tax driving in general, it's better to tax it in the places it does the most damage, not the places it does the least.
    Electricity tax is an interesting concept. Presumably, in terms of domestic consumption, it wouldn't be very difficult to identify and exempt all the old crusties (based on the precedents of protecting vulnerable users and the existing practice of doling out winter fuel payments) whilst it could be used to really soak working families for extra revenue, in a way that they could do almost nothing to avoid. I can see how a future Government might buy into that one.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,150
    She’s completely trapped in the lie about the meeting
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,509
    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    Floater said:

    Looking at her - this is not a politician who feels on comfortable ground and on top of the questioning

    Its not like she has been tested much in recent years. Makes a change.
    I’ve never seen any leading British politician brutally interrogated like this. For hour after hour, as she visibly tires
    Salmond survived it.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 57,054
    Endillion said:

    Budget: the CPI inflation assumption (that it stays at or below 2.0% until 2026) looks rocky to me. A 1% increase in RPI increases debt costs by £7bn, and 1% in gilts by £9 billion. Rather sensitive. This could budget could be out by £50-60bn by FY2025/26.

    The corp tax and income tax freezes yield £25bn a year by 2025, so that's big money. IHT also frozen for an extra 0.4bn yield. If it gets desperate he could up VAT to 22%, I guess to give an extra £10-12bn per year.

    Also, has he factored in a progressive degradation of fuel duty? I think he's just TBC'ed it in this. I'd have thought it'd be 10-15% below current levels by 2025, 25-35% by 2030 and 60-70% by 2040. That's probably a £3-4bn hole by 2026 alone.

    Carbon neutrality will have a serious fiscal cost, although cheaper than the environmental one of course.

    I think this is another area where he has to bite the bullet sooner rather than later. There is no longer a need to encourage drivers to take up electric cars - they are going to be forced to do so within 9 years anyway. So he should now look to move to payment per mile for driving with all cars being classed the same. Replace fuel duty and road tax with a completely new system based on how much you drive. If you are worried about the impact on rural areas then you can tinker with rates but basically it will be one system for all with perhaps some regional variation.
    If my clock is read once a year at MOT time, to reconcile my road tax bill for the next year, fine.

    But, I do not want to be satellite tracked and monitored for real-time road pricing.

    No way do I want any part of the Government knowing where I'm going, when or why, or for how long. Nor do I expect to have to explain myself to anyone: the prospects for abuse are legion.

    The fuzz would have dug all over it during this latest lockdown.
    Yep that is an issue but there really is no alternative that I can think of.

    That said if you carry a mobile phone then the ability to do that is already there.
    The alternative is an annual reading of the clock for a road tax bill, or a form of a self-assessment of mileage reconciled by the clock at the end. Just as we do for income tax.

    Road pricing can be used only for congestion zones or smart motorways.

    You can leave the phone at home, turn off the phone off, turn location services and data off on your phone, and, even if you don't do any of that the police/ Government need to pursue a legal route to access the data with a test.

    Real time tracking and pricing? No way. I'll just get an old car that doesn't have or it or avoid driving.
    I understand and share your views on this. But like Canute I have to point out the futility of trying to hold back the tide. Most new drivers are now opting for the black boxes in their cars which monitor everything they do and where they go to get themselves cheaper insurance. It is the only way most of them can afford to even get insurance.

    So the public view is changing. Combined with the ubiquity of mobile phones and other trackable devices I am afraid that people like us who still try to hold on to the illusion of living offline, away from governmental scrutiny, are becoming dinosaurs.
    This isn't in line with my experience. My view is that telematics has been a miserable failure, and other than cases where they physically can't buy a policy without one, drivers tend to opt out.

    It's worth remembering that telematics doesn't reduce insurance costs in aggregate - in fact it increases them, because the cost of the box and monitoring driving ability is non-zero. All it does is help the better drivers to prove they're deserving of lower premiums faster than they would normally (ie by not claiming over the course of several years). The worse than average drivers (50% of the population) will see no benefit from informing their insurer of the fact.
    Just Insure says "hello!"

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmrRMK84GU4&ab_channel=JustInsure
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 70,967

    Budget: the CPI inflation assumption (that it stays at or below 2.0% until 2026) looks rocky to me. A 1% increase in RPI increases debt costs by £7bn, and 1% in gilts by £9 billion. Rather sensitive. This could budget could be out by £50-60bn by FY2025/26.

    The corp tax and income tax freezes yield £25bn a year by 2025, so that's big money. IHT also frozen for an extra 0.4bn yield. If it gets desperate he could up VAT to 22%, I guess to give an extra £10-12bn per year.

    Also, has he factored in a progressive degradation of fuel duty? I think he's just TBC'ed it in this. I'd have thought it'd be 10-15% below current levels by 2025, 25-35% by 2030 and 60-70% by 2040. That's probably a £3-4bn hole by 2026 alone.

    Carbon neutrality will have a serious fiscal cost, although cheaper than the environmental one of course.

    I think this is another area where he has to bite the bullet sooner rather than later. There is no longer a need to encourage drivers to take up electric cars - they are going to be forced to do so within 9 years anyway. So he should now look to move to payment per mile for driving with all cars being classed the same. Replace fuel duty and road tax with a completely new system based on how much you drive. If you are worried about the impact on rural areas then you can tinker with rates but basically it will be one system for all with perhaps some regional variation.
    If my clock is read once a year at MOT time, to reconcile my road tax bill for the next year, fine.

    But, I do not want to be satellite tracked and monitored for real-time road pricing.

    No way do I want any part of the Government knowing where I'm going, when or why, or for how long. Nor do I expect to have to explain myself to anyone: the prospects for abuse are legion.

    The fuzz would have dug all over it during this latest lockdown.
    Yep that is an issue but there really is no alternative that I can think of.

    That said if you carry a mobile phone then the ability to do that is already there.
    The alternative is an annual reading of the clock for a road tax bill, or a form of a self-assessment of mileage reconciled by the clock at the end. Just as we do for income tax.

    Road pricing can be used only for congestion zones or smart motorways.

    You can leave the phone at home, turn off the phone off, turn location services and data off on your phone, and, even if you don't do any of that the police/ Government need to pursue a legal route to access the data with a test.

    Real time tracking and pricing? No way. I'll just get an old car that doesn't have or it or avoid driving.
    Yes, but those who do so will be at the margins. When they're looking at a total collapse of revenue, I doubt the Treasury will worry too much about that.
  • StuartinromfordStuartinromford Posts: 17,196

    rcs1000 said:

    Won't the simplest solution for replacing fuel tax ultimately be to just tax electricity? Its not as if people are going to avoid using electricity so a tax per kWh seems the simplest solution?

    Yes.

    Also, if you're going to tax driving in general, it's better to tax it in the places it does the most damage, not the places it does the least.
    Electricity tax is an interesting concept. Presumably, in terms of domestic consumption, it wouldn't be very difficult to identify and exempt all the old crusties (based on the precedents of protecting vulnerable users and the existing practice of doling out winter fuel payments) whilst it could be used to really soak working families for extra revenue, in a way that they could do almost nothing to avoid. I can see how a future Government might buy into that one.
    On the other hand, remember VAT on domestic fuel bills? I'd call it a third rail issue, except that people will say that we won't be able to afford the electricity...
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,150
    edited March 2021

    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    Floater said:

    Looking at her - this is not a politician who feels on comfortable ground and on top of the questioning

    Its not like she has been tested much in recent years. Makes a change.
    I’ve never seen any leading British politician brutally interrogated like this. For hour after hour, as she visibly tires
    Salmond survived it.
    He’s not in office like her. This is the first minister of Scotland being kneecapped
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,509
    Leon said:

    She’s completely trapped in the lie about the meeting

    Nobody is buying it.

    And she clearly knows it.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 23,072
    edited March 2021
    rcs1000 said:

    Won't the simplest solution for replacing fuel tax ultimately be to just tax electricity? Its not as if people are going to avoid using electricity so a tax per kWh seems the simplest solution?

    Yes.

    Also, if you're going to tax driving in general, it's better to tax it in the places it does the most damage, not the places it does the least.
    General Tax on electricity, or a more general carbon tax, is an interesting one. It would incentivise micro-renewables without need for an FIT subsidy.

    My solar array generates enough lecky for 15,000 Tesla miles per year. And a Tesla is like a Panzer.

    Far better than the hole the Spanish dug themselves into where they ended up taxing solar panels.
  • squareroot2squareroot2 Posts: 6,714

    It will be interesting to hear from Salmond or his lawyers after this

    This has a long way to go

    Popcorn shares to go up...
  • Leon said:

    She’s completely trapped in the lie about the meeting

    Nobody is buying it.

    And she clearly knows it.
    Just embarrassing and she has no way out of this meeting
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,509
    Not waving.

    Drowning.
  • NickPalmerNickPalmer Posts: 21,521
    Percipient comments in the Guardian blog:

    These measures also bury what was arguably George Osborne’s major legacy as chancellor; he dragged corporation tax down during his six years in office, but Rishi Sunak’s plans would largely reverse the Osborne cuts, with the rise generating an extra £16bn for the Treasury by the end of this parliament. This is much closer to Jeremy Corbyn’s policy for corporation tax at the 2019 election than Boris Johnson’s. Sunak’s plans would also raise an extra £6bn a year from income tax by the end of this parliament, through fiscal drag, with more people dragged into the higher rate. Disraeli once said the secret to a “sound Conservative government” was “Tory men and Whig measures”. Perhaps this is what they look like.

    And yet, as Sir Keir Starmer argued in his response, a Labour budget would be different. There was nothing on social care, little on welfare (the row about cutting the £20-per-week uplift has just been postponed) and little that sounded truly transformational in terms of work and learning.

    Sunak ended with an announcement intended about free ports to persuade the public there will be a Brexit dividend. This was the first budget since the UK properly left the ambit of the EU. During the 2016 referendum campaign Boris Johnson and Vote Leave said that, if the UK left the EU, VAT on fuel would go. Fuel duty has been frozen in this budget, but - like other Brexit promises - the pledge to scrap VAT on fuel seems to have vanished.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 60,341
    rcs1000 said:

    Endillion said:

    Budget: the CPI inflation assumption (that it stays at or below 2.0% until 2026) looks rocky to me. A 1% increase in RPI increases debt costs by £7bn, and 1% in gilts by £9 billion. Rather sensitive. This could budget could be out by £50-60bn by FY2025/26.

    The corp tax and income tax freezes yield £25bn a year by 2025, so that's big money. IHT also frozen for an extra 0.4bn yield. If it gets desperate he could up VAT to 22%, I guess to give an extra £10-12bn per year.

    Also, has he factored in a progressive degradation of fuel duty? I think he's just TBC'ed it in this. I'd have thought it'd be 10-15% below current levels by 2025, 25-35% by 2030 and 60-70% by 2040. That's probably a £3-4bn hole by 2026 alone.

    Carbon neutrality will have a serious fiscal cost, although cheaper than the environmental one of course.

    I think this is another area where he has to bite the bullet sooner rather than later. There is no longer a need to encourage drivers to take up electric cars - they are going to be forced to do so within 9 years anyway. So he should now look to move to payment per mile for driving with all cars being classed the same. Replace fuel duty and road tax with a completely new system based on how much you drive. If you are worried about the impact on rural areas then you can tinker with rates but basically it will be one system for all with perhaps some regional variation.
    If my clock is read once a year at MOT time, to reconcile my road tax bill for the next year, fine.

    But, I do not want to be satellite tracked and monitored for real-time road pricing.

    No way do I want any part of the Government knowing where I'm going, when or why, or for how long. Nor do I expect to have to explain myself to anyone: the prospects for abuse are legion.

    The fuzz would have dug all over it during this latest lockdown.
    Yep that is an issue but there really is no alternative that I can think of.

    That said if you carry a mobile phone then the ability to do that is already there.
    The alternative is an annual reading of the clock for a road tax bill, or a form of a self-assessment of mileage reconciled by the clock at the end. Just as we do for income tax.

    Road pricing can be used only for congestion zones or smart motorways.

    You can leave the phone at home, turn off the phone off, turn location services and data off on your phone, and, even if you don't do any of that the police/ Government need to pursue a legal route to access the data with a test.

    Real time tracking and pricing? No way. I'll just get an old car that doesn't have or it or avoid driving.
    I understand and share your views on this. But like Canute I have to point out the futility of trying to hold back the tide. Most new drivers are now opting for the black boxes in their cars which monitor everything they do and where they go to get themselves cheaper insurance. It is the only way most of them can afford to even get insurance.

    So the public view is changing. Combined with the ubiquity of mobile phones and other trackable devices I am afraid that people like us who still try to hold on to the illusion of living offline, away from governmental scrutiny, are becoming dinosaurs.
    This isn't in line with my experience. My view is that telematics has been a miserable failure, and other than cases where they physically can't buy a policy without one, drivers tend to opt out.

    It's worth remembering that telematics doesn't reduce insurance costs in aggregate - in fact it increases them, because the cost of the box and monitoring driving ability is non-zero. All it does is help the better drivers to prove they're deserving of lower premiums faster than they would normally (ie by not claiming over the course of several years). The worse than average drivers (50% of the population) will see no benefit from informing their insurer of the fact.
    Just Insure says "hello!"

    You have an interest mate ;-)
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,150
    Narrow escape there
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,509
    Leon said:

    Narrow escape there

    We'll get back to that.....
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 60,341
    Nigelb said:

    Budget: the CPI inflation assumption (that it stays at or below 2.0% until 2026) looks rocky to me. A 1% increase in RPI increases debt costs by £7bn, and 1% in gilts by £9 billion. Rather sensitive. This could budget could be out by £50-60bn by FY2025/26.

    The corp tax and income tax freezes yield £25bn a year by 2025, so that's big money. IHT also frozen for an extra 0.4bn yield. If it gets desperate he could up VAT to 22%, I guess to give an extra £10-12bn per year.

    Also, has he factored in a progressive degradation of fuel duty? I think he's just TBC'ed it in this. I'd have thought it'd be 10-15% below current levels by 2025, 25-35% by 2030 and 60-70% by 2040. That's probably a £3-4bn hole by 2026 alone.

    Carbon neutrality will have a serious fiscal cost, although cheaper than the environmental one of course.

    I think this is another area where he has to bite the bullet sooner rather than later. There is no longer a need to encourage drivers to take up electric cars - they are going to be forced to do so within 9 years anyway. So he should now look to move to payment per mile for driving with all cars being classed the same. Replace fuel duty and road tax with a completely new system based on how much you drive. If you are worried about the impact on rural areas then you can tinker with rates but basically it will be one system for all with perhaps some regional variation.
    If my clock is read once a year at MOT time, to reconcile my road tax bill for the next year, fine.

    But, I do not want to be satellite tracked and monitored for real-time road pricing.

    No way do I want any part of the Government knowing where I'm going, when or why, or for how long. Nor do I expect to have to explain myself to anyone: the prospects for abuse are legion.

    The fuzz would have dug all over it during this latest lockdown.
    Yep that is an issue but there really is no alternative that I can think of.

    That said if you carry a mobile phone then the ability to do that is already there.
    The alternative is an annual reading of the clock for a road tax bill, or a form of a self-assessment of mileage reconciled by the clock at the end. Just as we do for income tax.

    Road pricing can be used only for congestion zones or smart motorways.

    You can leave the phone at home, turn off the phone off, turn location services and data off on your phone, and, even if you don't do any of that the police/ Government need to pursue a legal route to access the data with a test.

    Real time tracking and pricing? No way. I'll just get an old car that doesn't have or it or avoid driving.
    Yes, but those who do so will be at the margins. When they're looking at a total collapse of revenue, I doubt the Treasury will worry too much about that.
    I don't think that's born out by the polling, as @Malmesbury says.

    Besides which several alternatives have already been outlined on this thread.
  • FloaterFloater Posts: 14,207
    Leon said:

    Narrow escape there

    She is on the ropes hanging on for dear life
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,150
    ‘My recollection is not as good as I’d like it to be, not least for me’

    Well, yes, Nicola
  • FloaterFloater Posts: 14,207
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    Floater said:

    Looking at her - this is not a politician who feels on comfortable ground and on top of the questioning

    Its not like she has been tested much in recent years. Makes a change.
    I’ve never seen any leading British politician brutally interrogated like this. For hour after hour, as she visibly tires
    Salmond survived it.
    He’s not in office like her. This is the first minister of Scotland being kneecapped
    in ultra HD in slow motion
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,150
    Floater said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    Floater said:

    Looking at her - this is not a politician who feels on comfortable ground and on top of the questioning

    Its not like she has been tested much in recent years. Makes a change.
    I’ve never seen any leading British politician brutally interrogated like this. For hour after hour, as she visibly tires
    Salmond survived it.
    He’s not in office like her. This is the first minister of Scotland being kneecapped
    in ultra HD in slow motion
    Another uppercut
  • Black_RookBlack_Rook Posts: 8,905

    Sunak ended with an announcement intended about free ports to persuade the public there will be a Brexit dividend. This was the first budget since the UK properly left the ambit of the EU. During the 2016 referendum campaign Boris Johnson and Vote Leave said that, if the UK left the EU, VAT on fuel would go. Fuel duty has been frozen in this budget, but - like other Brexit promises - the pledge to scrap VAT on fuel seems to have vanished.

    True, of course, but the havoc caused by Covid has provided a blanket excuse for practically everything.
  • FlatlanderFlatlander Posts: 4,650
    edited March 2021

    Budget: the CPI inflation assumption (that it stays at or below 2.0% until 2026) looks rocky to me. A 1% increase in RPI increases debt costs by £7bn, and 1% in gilts by £9 billion. Rather sensitive. This could budget could be out by £50-60bn by FY2025/26.

    The corp tax and income tax freezes yield £25bn a year by 2025, so that's big money. IHT also frozen for an extra 0.4bn yield. If it gets desperate he could up VAT to 22%, I guess to give an extra £10-12bn per year.

    Also, has he factored in a progressive degradation of fuel duty? I think he's just TBC'ed it in this. I'd have thought it'd be 10-15% below current levels by 2025, 25-35% by 2030 and 60-70% by 2040. That's probably a £3-4bn hole by 2026 alone.

    Carbon neutrality will have a serious fiscal cost, although cheaper than the environmental one of course.

    I think this is another area where he has to bite the bullet sooner rather than later. There is no longer a need to encourage drivers to take up electric cars - they are going to be forced to do so within 9 years anyway. So he should now look to move to payment per mile for driving with all cars being classed the same. Replace fuel duty and road tax with a completely new system based on how much you drive. If you are worried about the impact on rural areas then you can tinker with rates but basically it will be one system for all with perhaps some regional variation.
    If my clock is read once a year at MOT time, to reconcile my road tax bill for the next year, fine.

    But, I do not want to be satellite tracked and monitored for real-time road pricing.

    No way do I want any part of the Government knowing where I'm going, when or why, or for how long. Nor do I expect to have to explain myself to anyone: the prospects for abuse are legion.

    The fuzz would have dug all over it during this latest lockdown.
    The problem is that all polling on the matter has shown that road pricing is a Fuel Strike moment. No one trusts the government on this.

    This is one of the reasons that hydrogen was the promoted clean fuel solution - when the time was right, you would shift the fuel taxes to hydrogen.

    Problem is that electricity is everywhere.

    The resistance to rebalancing the anti-road structural plans in the light of ZEVs being universal is strong. But it is needed - and it is quite interesting to see some public transport plans in that light....
    You get billed for KWH in your home. The Government doesn't snoop to see what you're using it on, or when, except at a very macro level - and it's wholly commercial.

    The thing is Governments have different policy agendas, supreme power, aren't in competition with anyone, so you can't choose, are able to join lots of dots and are this perfectly corruptable: they could also use this to do you for speeding, as much as pricing per mile, and you could be blackmailed. Or petty personal vendettas could be pursued with it.

    I will be making my thoughts known on it to my MP.
    In theory smart meters could be used to work out what people use their electricity for. Most devices have a recognisable signature.

    They could even work out which TV channel you are watching.

    https://arxiv.org/abs/2007.00326
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 42,878

    Percipient comments in the Guardian blog:

    These measures also bury what was arguably George Osborne’s major legacy as chancellor; he dragged corporation tax down during his six years in office, but Rishi Sunak’s plans would largely reverse the Osborne cuts, with the rise generating an extra £16bn for the Treasury by the end of this parliament. This is much closer to Jeremy Corbyn’s policy for corporation tax at the 2019 election than Boris Johnson’s. Sunak’s plans would also raise an extra £6bn a year from income tax by the end of this parliament, through fiscal drag, with more people dragged into the higher rate. Disraeli once said the secret to a “sound Conservative government” was “Tory men and Whig measures”. Perhaps this is what they look like.

    And yet, as Sir Keir Starmer argued in his response, a Labour budget would be different. There was nothing on social care, little on welfare (the row about cutting the £20-per-week uplift has just been postponed) and little that sounded truly transformational in terms of work and learning.

    Sunak ended with an announcement intended about free ports to persuade the public there will be a Brexit dividend. This was the first budget since the UK properly left the ambit of the EU. During the 2016 referendum campaign Boris Johnson and Vote Leave said that, if the UK left the EU, VAT on fuel would go. Fuel duty has been frozen in this budget, but - like other Brexit promises - the pledge to scrap VAT on fuel seems to have vanished.

    Reducing VAT on home energy was the effing poster child for Brexiters. Now of course they "could" have zero rated (sovereignty - huzzah!) it but no sane person thought they ever would.

    As @RochdalePioneers keeps pointing out - we voted to allow men to become pregnant. That they can't become pregnant is neither here nor there.
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 42,878
    Blimey sounds like I'd better get over to BBC Parliament.

    How, out of interest, are people listening otherwise - is it live on LBC?
  • TOPPING said:

    Blimey sounds like I'd better get over to BBC Parliament.

    How, out of interest, are people listening otherwise - is it live on LBC?

    On Sky
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 35,960
    Nicola can't remember clearly enough.

    It's a shame there are no written notes.

    Oh...
  • MattWMattW Posts: 23,072

    Leon said:

    She’s completely trapped in the lie about the meeting

    Nobody is buying it.

    And she clearly knows it.
    I can't find a stream. Link?
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 60,341

    Percipient comments in the Guardian blog:

    These measures also bury what was arguably George Osborne’s major legacy as chancellor; he dragged corporation tax down during his six years in office, but Rishi Sunak’s plans would largely reverse the Osborne cuts, with the rise generating an extra £16bn for the Treasury by the end of this parliament. This is much closer to Jeremy Corbyn’s policy for corporation tax at the 2019 election than Boris Johnson’s. Sunak’s plans would also raise an extra £6bn a year from income tax by the end of this parliament, through fiscal drag, with more people dragged into the higher rate. Disraeli once said the secret to a “sound Conservative government” was “Tory men and Whig measures”. Perhaps this is what they look like.

    And yet, as Sir Keir Starmer argued in his response, a Labour budget would be different. There was nothing on social care, little on welfare (the row about cutting the £20-per-week uplift has just been postponed) and little that sounded truly transformational in terms of work and learning.

    Sunak ended with an announcement intended about free ports to persuade the public there will be a Brexit dividend. This was the first budget since the UK properly left the ambit of the EU. During the 2016 referendum campaign Boris Johnson and Vote Leave said that, if the UK left the EU, VAT on fuel would go. Fuel duty has been frozen in this budget, but - like other Brexit promises - the pledge to scrap VAT on fuel seems to have vanished.

    Jeremy Corbyn wouldn't have balanced the budget; he would have dealt with the security services and our armed forces with such suspicion and contempt that Russia, China and Iran, and other extremists, would have had a field day. So we'd have got an inflationary boom, with an almighty crash, coupled with nasty security incidents, and lots of general incompetence and nasty culture war aggro along the way.

    Where I agree with you is that the Budget was unambitious on post-Brexit reforms, except the NIB, some cosmetic and some straws in the wind on financial services.

    I want to see a top-to-toe regulatory review of everything. Is it coming? Will it ever come?
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,509
    Ooooof!
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,150
    TOPPING said:

    Blimey sounds like I'd better get over to BBC Parliament.

    How, out of interest, are people listening otherwise - is it live on LBC?

    I googled sturgeon and inquiry. Lots of livestreams

    I’m afraid you’ve missed the best. Absolutely compelling
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 42,090
    edited March 2021
    Leon said:

    My conclusion from this committee is that Sturgeon may be telling the truth, in part. She wasn’t involved in a conspiracy - she genuinely pursued it for the complainers and MeToo. However there WAS a lower level ‘conspiracy’ - call it ‘over-eagerness to please the Leader’ - which she discovered to her horror. Everything since has been cover-up

    That has the beginnings of a credible take.
  • MattW said:

    Leon said:

    She’s completely trapped in the lie about the meeting

    Nobody is buying it.

    And she clearly knows it.
    I can't find a stream. Link?
    Try Sky
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826
    There is no way tax per mile will work because it will show people how much tax people are actually paying, which is precisely what fuel duty is designed to avoid. People buy fuel and when they pay the bill they think they're paying for fuel, even if they're aware of the fact they don't really think too much about the fact that most of what they're paying is pure tax and not fuel.

    Take the tax alone and present that as a bill, not buried alongside fuel or anything else, and people will not accept that. It will be even more unpopular than fuel duty.

    A tax per kWh works for the same way fuel duty works which is why it seems to me the only viable replacement: it buries the tax so that when people pay their tax they think they're paying their electricity bill, not tax.
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 43,288
    really scraping barrel with Edinburgh airport:
    Edinburgh airport thing smear again.

  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,509
    TOPPING said:

    Blimey sounds like I'd better get over to BBC Parliament.

    How, out of interest, are people listening otherwise - is it live on LBC?

    https://www.scottishparliament.tv/channel/committee-room-1
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 60,341
    TOPPING said:

    Percipient comments in the Guardian blog:

    These measures also bury what was arguably George Osborne’s major legacy as chancellor; he dragged corporation tax down during his six years in office, but Rishi Sunak’s plans would largely reverse the Osborne cuts, with the rise generating an extra £16bn for the Treasury by the end of this parliament. This is much closer to Jeremy Corbyn’s policy for corporation tax at the 2019 election than Boris Johnson’s. Sunak’s plans would also raise an extra £6bn a year from income tax by the end of this parliament, through fiscal drag, with more people dragged into the higher rate. Disraeli once said the secret to a “sound Conservative government” was “Tory men and Whig measures”. Perhaps this is what they look like.

    And yet, as Sir Keir Starmer argued in his response, a Labour budget would be different. There was nothing on social care, little on welfare (the row about cutting the £20-per-week uplift has just been postponed) and little that sounded truly transformational in terms of work and learning.

    Sunak ended with an announcement intended about free ports to persuade the public there will be a Brexit dividend. This was the first budget since the UK properly left the ambit of the EU. During the 2016 referendum campaign Boris Johnson and Vote Leave said that, if the UK left the EU, VAT on fuel would go. Fuel duty has been frozen in this budget, but - like other Brexit promises - the pledge to scrap VAT on fuel seems to have vanished.

    Reducing VAT on home energy was the effing poster child for Brexiters. Now of course they "could" have zero rated (sovereignty - huzzah!) it but no sane person thought they ever would.

    As @RochdalePioneers keeps pointing out - we voted to allow men to become pregnant. That they can't become pregnant is neither here nor there.
    Goodness, be glad you didn't say that on Twitter.

    You'd be brandished with the transphobic stick - by hordes.
  • GadflyGadfly Posts: 1,191
    .
    MattW said:

    Leon said:

    She’s completely trapped in the lie about the meeting

    Nobody is buying it.

    And she clearly knows it.
    I can't find a stream. Link?
    https://www.scottishparliament.tv/channel/committee-room-1
  • EndillionEndillion Posts: 4,976
    rcs1000 said:

    Endillion said:

    Budget: the CPI inflation assumption (that it stays at or below 2.0% until 2026) looks rocky to me. A 1% increase in RPI increases debt costs by £7bn, and 1% in gilts by £9 billion. Rather sensitive. This could budget could be out by £50-60bn by FY2025/26.

    The corp tax and income tax freezes yield £25bn a year by 2025, so that's big money. IHT also frozen for an extra 0.4bn yield. If it gets desperate he could up VAT to 22%, I guess to give an extra £10-12bn per year.

    Also, has he factored in a progressive degradation of fuel duty? I think he's just TBC'ed it in this. I'd have thought it'd be 10-15% below current levels by 2025, 25-35% by 2030 and 60-70% by 2040. That's probably a £3-4bn hole by 2026 alone.

    Carbon neutrality will have a serious fiscal cost, although cheaper than the environmental one of course.

    I think this is another area where he has to bite the bullet sooner rather than later. There is no longer a need to encourage drivers to take up electric cars - they are going to be forced to do so within 9 years anyway. So he should now look to move to payment per mile for driving with all cars being classed the same. Replace fuel duty and road tax with a completely new system based on how much you drive. If you are worried about the impact on rural areas then you can tinker with rates but basically it will be one system for all with perhaps some regional variation.
    If my clock is read once a year at MOT time, to reconcile my road tax bill for the next year, fine.

    But, I do not want to be satellite tracked and monitored for real-time road pricing.

    No way do I want any part of the Government knowing where I'm going, when or why, or for how long. Nor do I expect to have to explain myself to anyone: the prospects for abuse are legion.

    The fuzz would have dug all over it during this latest lockdown.
    Yep that is an issue but there really is no alternative that I can think of.

    That said if you carry a mobile phone then the ability to do that is already there.
    The alternative is an annual reading of the clock for a road tax bill, or a form of a self-assessment of mileage reconciled by the clock at the end. Just as we do for income tax.

    Road pricing can be used only for congestion zones or smart motorways.

    You can leave the phone at home, turn off the phone off, turn location services and data off on your phone, and, even if you don't do any of that the police/ Government need to pursue a legal route to access the data with a test.

    Real time tracking and pricing? No way. I'll just get an old car that doesn't have or it or avoid driving.
    I understand and share your views on this. But like Canute I have to point out the futility of trying to hold back the tide. Most new drivers are now opting for the black boxes in their cars which monitor everything they do and where they go to get themselves cheaper insurance. It is the only way most of them can afford to even get insurance.

    So the public view is changing. Combined with the ubiquity of mobile phones and other trackable devices I am afraid that people like us who still try to hold on to the illusion of living offline, away from governmental scrutiny, are becoming dinosaurs.
    This isn't in line with my experience. My view is that telematics has been a miserable failure, and other than cases where they physically can't buy a policy without one, drivers tend to opt out.

    It's worth remembering that telematics doesn't reduce insurance costs in aggregate - in fact it increases them, because the cost of the box and monitoring driving ability is non-zero. All it does is help the better drivers to prove they're deserving of lower premiums faster than they would normally (ie by not claiming over the course of several years). The worse than average drivers (50% of the population) will see no benefit from informing their insurer of the fact.
    Just Insure says "hello!"

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmrRMK84GU4&ab_channel=JustInsure
    I do need to remember to add "in the UK" to a lot of my posts.
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 43,288
    MattW said:

    Leon said:

    She’s completely trapped in the lie about the meeting

    Nobody is buying it.

    And she clearly knows it.
    I can't find a stream. Link?
    https://www.scottishparliament.tv/channel/committee-room-1
  • Richard_TyndallRichard_Tyndall Posts: 32,463
    Endillion said:

    Budget: the CPI inflation assumption (that it stays at or below 2.0% until 2026) looks rocky to me. A 1% increase in RPI increases debt costs by £7bn, and 1% in gilts by £9 billion. Rather sensitive. This could budget could be out by £50-60bn by FY2025/26.

    The corp tax and income tax freezes yield £25bn a year by 2025, so that's big money. IHT also frozen for an extra 0.4bn yield. If it gets desperate he could up VAT to 22%, I guess to give an extra £10-12bn per year.

    Also, has he factored in a progressive degradation of fuel duty? I think he's just TBC'ed it in this. I'd have thought it'd be 10-15% below current levels by 2025, 25-35% by 2030 and 60-70% by 2040. That's probably a £3-4bn hole by 2026 alone.

    Carbon neutrality will have a serious fiscal cost, although cheaper than the environmental one of course.

    I think this is another area where he has to bite the bullet sooner rather than later. There is no longer a need to encourage drivers to take up electric cars - they are going to be forced to do so within 9 years anyway. So he should now look to move to payment per mile for driving with all cars being classed the same. Replace fuel duty and road tax with a completely new system based on how much you drive. If you are worried about the impact on rural areas then you can tinker with rates but basically it will be one system for all with perhaps some regional variation.
    If my clock is read once a year at MOT time, to reconcile my road tax bill for the next year, fine.

    But, I do not want to be satellite tracked and monitored for real-time road pricing.

    No way do I want any part of the Government knowing where I'm going, when or why, or for how long. Nor do I expect to have to explain myself to anyone: the prospects for abuse are legion.

    The fuzz would have dug all over it during this latest lockdown.
    Yep that is an issue but there really is no alternative that I can think of.

    That said if you carry a mobile phone then the ability to do that is already there.
    The alternative is an annual reading of the clock for a road tax bill, or a form of a self-assessment of mileage reconciled by the clock at the end. Just as we do for income tax.

    Road pricing can be used only for congestion zones or smart motorways.

    You can leave the phone at home, turn off the phone off, turn location services and data off on your phone, and, even if you don't do any of that the police/ Government need to pursue a legal route to access the data with a test.

    Real time tracking and pricing? No way. I'll just get an old car that doesn't have or it or avoid driving.
    I understand and share your views on this. But like Canute I have to point out the futility of trying to hold back the tide. Most new drivers are now opting for the black boxes in their cars which monitor everything they do and where they go to get themselves cheaper insurance. It is the only way most of them can afford to even get insurance.

    So the public view is changing. Combined with the ubiquity of mobile phones and other trackable devices I am afraid that people like us who still try to hold on to the illusion of living offline, away from governmental scrutiny, are becoming dinosaurs.
    This isn't in line with my experience. My view is that telematics has been a miserable failure, and other than cases where they physically can't buy a policy without one, drivers tend to opt out.

    It's worth remembering that telematics doesn't reduce insurance costs in aggregate - in fact it increases them, because the cost of the box and monitoring driving ability is non-zero. All it does is help the better drivers to prove they're deserving of lower premiums faster than they would normally (ie by not claiming over the course of several years). The worse than average drivers (50% of the population) will see no benefit from informing their insurer of the fact.
    Well my experience with my daughter is exactly as I set out. She had the black box fitted when she passed the test and her initial year's insurance was £1300. It more than halved when she renewed for the second year based on her performance during that first year. The incentives were so large she was more than willing to pay attention to how she drove.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,150
    She’s making error after error now
    https://twitter.com/afneil/status/1367144586867597317?s=21
  • FloaterFloater Posts: 14,207

    MattW said:

    Leon said:

    She’s completely trapped in the lie about the meeting

    Nobody is buying it.

    And she clearly knows it.
    I can't find a stream. Link?
    Try Sky
    I'm watching on Telegraph via You tube
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 42,090
    rcs1000 said:

    ping said:

    I think Andy Street is disappointed.

    Expected more for the WM than just a Freeport.

    He doesn't even get one of those. The only inland Freeport is East Midlands Airport which is well outside the West Midlands.
    Is this the Freeport which supposedly the EU was preventing us from having?
    So he said. I have no idea of the truth of that because I suppose it depends entirely on what he means as a Freeport compared to what the EU means.
    Personally... I think the age of Freeports is rather behind us. They are great for emerging economies with high tariff barriers looking to learn a little bit about the world. But given the UK has relatively low tariffs, and that stuff finished in free port manufacturing zones is often exempted from FTAs, I think they are likely to remain unused except for very low value add "putting stuff in boxes".
    Rees Mogg's eyes have a glint when he mentions them and this for me obviates the need to do any further research on the topic.
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 42,878

    TOPPING said:

    Blimey sounds like I'd better get over to BBC Parliament.

    How, out of interest, are people listening otherwise - is it live on LBC?

    On Sky
    Thanks Big G. Licence fee money well spent by those watching.
  • Jackie Baillie and Murdo Fraser taking Sturgeon apart and it is difficult to watch as she sinks in disarray
  • dr_spyndr_spyn Posts: 11,300
    Sturgeon also live on BBC News Channel .
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,150
    I don’t see how she survives this. But this is Scotland
  • FloaterFloater Posts: 14,207

    Jackie Baillie and Murdo Fraser taking Sturgeon apart and it is difficult to watch as she sinks in disarray

    Not that difficult to watch - she is getting her true desserts
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 42,878
    Leon said:

    TOPPING said:

    Blimey sounds like I'd better get over to BBC Parliament.

    How, out of interest, are people listening otherwise - is it live on LBC?

    I googled sturgeon and inquiry. Lots of livestreams

    I’m afraid you’ve missed the best. Absolutely compelling
    Is there anyone on here, perhaps with a literary bent, who might be able to give me a summary?
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,509
    When did you decide Salmond was a liar and a fantasist?
  • FloaterFloater Posts: 14,207
    Leon said:
    or - the lies are unravelling

  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826
    Just tuned in, seems to be back to all about how bad that mean Mr Salmond is now.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,150
    Jesus, she’s crying
  • dr_spyndr_spyn Posts: 11,300
    Fabiani suspending the session to save Sturgeon once again?
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,150
    edited March 2021
    TOPPING said:

    Leon said:

    TOPPING said:

    Blimey sounds like I'd better get over to BBC Parliament.

    How, out of interest, are people listening otherwise - is it live on LBC?

    I googled sturgeon and inquiry. Lots of livestreams

    I’m afraid you’ve missed the best. Absolutely compelling
    Is there anyone on here, perhaps with a literary bent, who might be able to give me a summary?
    It ended with her close to tears. Or actually crying
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 42,878
    edited March 2021
    Leon said:

    TOPPING said:

    Leon said:

    TOPPING said:

    Blimey sounds like I'd better get over to BBC Parliament.

    How, out of interest, are people listening otherwise - is it live on LBC?

    I googled sturgeon and inquiry. Lots of livestreams

    I’m afraid you’ve missed the best. Absolutely compelling
    Is there anyone on here, perhaps with a literary bent, who might be able to give me a summary?
    It ended with her close to tears. Or actually crying
    Pithy, descriptive, dramatic. Thanks v much.
  • FloaterFloater Posts: 14,207

    Leon said:

    I don’t see how she survives this. But this is Scotland

    I have seen children with jam and sugar all over their face give a more convincing argument as to why they haven't eaten the missing donuts....
    Post of the day
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 60,216
    MattW said:

    Leon said:

    She’s completely trapped in the lie about the meeting

    Nobody is buying it.

    And she clearly knows it.
    I can't find a stream. Link?
    https://www.scottishparliament.tv/channel/committee-room-1

    Suspended until 16.30
  • TheuniondivvieTheuniondivvie Posts: 41,938
    Leon said:

    Is this a Nat beating up Sturgeon?

    Your membership of the Fraternity of PB Scotch Experts is hereby withdrawn.
  • FrankBoothFrankBooth Posts: 9,821
    I'm not sure this is the sort of thing that will change minds vis a vis Scottish independence. The fundamental problem for unionists in Scotland though is that the Nats have been united whereas they haven't. That could change now. Leaving aside the differences over Salmond/Surgeon there has to be conflict over when, say, to call another referendum. As soon as possible strikes me as complete madness in the current economic climate and surely there are quite a few Indy sympathisers who would agree?
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 42,878

    TOPPING said:

    Percipient comments in the Guardian blog:

    These measures also bury what was arguably George Osborne’s major legacy as chancellor; he dragged corporation tax down during his six years in office, but Rishi Sunak’s plans would largely reverse the Osborne cuts, with the rise generating an extra £16bn for the Treasury by the end of this parliament. This is much closer to Jeremy Corbyn’s policy for corporation tax at the 2019 election than Boris Johnson’s. Sunak’s plans would also raise an extra £6bn a year from income tax by the end of this parliament, through fiscal drag, with more people dragged into the higher rate. Disraeli once said the secret to a “sound Conservative government” was “Tory men and Whig measures”. Perhaps this is what they look like.

    And yet, as Sir Keir Starmer argued in his response, a Labour budget would be different. There was nothing on social care, little on welfare (the row about cutting the £20-per-week uplift has just been postponed) and little that sounded truly transformational in terms of work and learning.

    Sunak ended with an announcement intended about free ports to persuade the public there will be a Brexit dividend. This was the first budget since the UK properly left the ambit of the EU. During the 2016 referendum campaign Boris Johnson and Vote Leave said that, if the UK left the EU, VAT on fuel would go. Fuel duty has been frozen in this budget, but - like other Brexit promises - the pledge to scrap VAT on fuel seems to have vanished.

    Reducing VAT on home energy was the effing poster child for Brexiters. Now of course they "could" have zero rated (sovereignty - huzzah!) it but no sane person thought they ever would.

    As @RochdalePioneers keeps pointing out - we voted to allow men to become pregnant. That they can't become pregnant is neither here nor there.
    Goodness, be glad you didn't say that on Twitter.

    You'd be brandished with the transphobic stick - by hordes.
    LOL sound advice. About anything for that matter.
  • FloaterFloater Posts: 14,207
    Leon said:

    Jesus, she’s crying

    " I should be leading Scotland to Independence, it wasn't meant to end like this"
  • EndillionEndillion Posts: 4,976

    Endillion said:

    Budget: the CPI inflation assumption (that it stays at or below 2.0% until 2026) looks rocky to me. A 1% increase in RPI increases debt costs by £7bn, and 1% in gilts by £9 billion. Rather sensitive. This could budget could be out by £50-60bn by FY2025/26.

    The corp tax and income tax freezes yield £25bn a year by 2025, so that's big money. IHT also frozen for an extra 0.4bn yield. If it gets desperate he could up VAT to 22%, I guess to give an extra £10-12bn per year.

    Also, has he factored in a progressive degradation of fuel duty? I think he's just TBC'ed it in this. I'd have thought it'd be 10-15% below current levels by 2025, 25-35% by 2030 and 60-70% by 2040. That's probably a £3-4bn hole by 2026 alone.

    Carbon neutrality will have a serious fiscal cost, although cheaper than the environmental one of course.

    I think this is another area where he has to bite the bullet sooner rather than later. There is no longer a need to encourage drivers to take up electric cars - they are going to be forced to do so within 9 years anyway. So he should now look to move to payment per mile for driving with all cars being classed the same. Replace fuel duty and road tax with a completely new system based on how much you drive. If you are worried about the impact on rural areas then you can tinker with rates but basically it will be one system for all with perhaps some regional variation.
    If my clock is read once a year at MOT time, to reconcile my road tax bill for the next year, fine.

    But, I do not want to be satellite tracked and monitored for real-time road pricing.

    No way do I want any part of the Government knowing where I'm going, when or why, or for how long. Nor do I expect to have to explain myself to anyone: the prospects for abuse are legion.

    The fuzz would have dug all over it during this latest lockdown.
    Yep that is an issue but there really is no alternative that I can think of.

    That said if you carry a mobile phone then the ability to do that is already there.
    The alternative is an annual reading of the clock for a road tax bill, or a form of a self-assessment of mileage reconciled by the clock at the end. Just as we do for income tax.

    Road pricing can be used only for congestion zones or smart motorways.

    You can leave the phone at home, turn off the phone off, turn location services and data off on your phone, and, even if you don't do any of that the police/ Government need to pursue a legal route to access the data with a test.

    Real time tracking and pricing? No way. I'll just get an old car that doesn't have or it or avoid driving.
    I understand and share your views on this. But like Canute I have to point out the futility of trying to hold back the tide. Most new drivers are now opting for the black boxes in their cars which monitor everything they do and where they go to get themselves cheaper insurance. It is the only way most of them can afford to even get insurance.

    So the public view is changing. Combined with the ubiquity of mobile phones and other trackable devices I am afraid that people like us who still try to hold on to the illusion of living offline, away from governmental scrutiny, are becoming dinosaurs.
    This isn't in line with my experience. My view is that telematics has been a miserable failure, and other than cases where they physically can't buy a policy without one, drivers tend to opt out.

    It's worth remembering that telematics doesn't reduce insurance costs in aggregate - in fact it increases them, because the cost of the box and monitoring driving ability is non-zero. All it does is help the better drivers to prove they're deserving of lower premiums faster than they would normally (ie by not claiming over the course of several years). The worse than average drivers (50% of the population) will see no benefit from informing their insurer of the fact.
    Well my experience with my daughter is exactly as I set out. She had the black box fitted when she passed the test and her initial year's insurance was £1300. It more than halved when she renewed for the second year based on her performance during that first year. The incentives were so large she was more than willing to pay attention to how she drove.
    That's great to hear!

    The questions are: 1) will she be happy to keep the box long term, or will she get rid as soon as the incentive is no longer meaningful, and 2) is the proportion of young drivers who'll benefit to a similar extent high enough to make the tech widespread?
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,150
    Well, that was a day well spent. The best real-life political drama I have ever seen

    And it started so boring

    It was like a script, the cool calm woman slowly crumbling, then finally collapsing into tears
This discussion has been closed.