There Hasn’t Been Any Austerity So How Can The Cabinet Be Split On Reversing It?
There hasn’t been any cut in real terms government spending. There has been a fall in spending as a percentage of GDP. All the way down to around what Gordon Brown was spending just pre-recession.
That’s what austerity is, a return to Brown’s penny pinching ways.
Hey, that’s what people are saying, don’t blame me.
No actual cuts but a complete “narrative” handed over to the scum of the left. Including the “division in Cabinet” crapola.
BluLabour on the job.
When are the Tories going to learn that they are going to be painted as baby eating bastards whatever they do, so they might as well eat some babies? Ie if they are getting the flack for slashing the State to the bone when they aren’t at all, they should just do it anyway?
Jim: That was exactly the strategy behind the election manifesto. It didn’t work very, did it?
Indeed. Perhaps the Tories should learn that pleasing your enemies does not turn them into friends.
Matthew
They should have lied in their manifesto like every other political party, ever. They thought they’d get credit for ‘taking tough decisions’, but their opponents are not in the credit game.
Matthew L–In what way was May’s pinched-off turd of a manifesto about cutting back the state.?
She wanted to charge for doing stuff nobody asked the state to do in the first place,
“That was exactly the strategy behind the election manifesto. It didn’t work very, did it?”
Mays manifesto was hardly a ‘Small State, low taxes’ one was it? If anything it was a cut and paste job of Ed Milliband’s one from 2015. There wasn’t a free market small state bone in its body.
They were trying to slow the pace of spending down a bit, and possibly increase the amount of tax, hopefully so no-one would notice in order to get the public finances back on track. Admirable aims no doubt. But if slight reductions on spending are going to be painted as ‘Austerity the like of which has never been seen’ etc, why bother? Just take a pen to vast swathes of public spending, abolish massive parts of it (as an aside I heard on my local radio yesterday that Oxford has been granted about £13m by some part of central government for ‘arts organisations’ – what price austerity eh?) and use the savings to abolish the deficit and return the rest as tax cuts.
Might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb.
You’re all right of course, it wasn’t a small state/free market manifesto. It was, however, a “we can do what we want because we’ll win anyway” one. Clearly that approach wasn’t the right one. Interested has the right approach
It was the right manifesto for the time.
If its in the manifesto and you win then can push things through easier than kicking them into the long grass for next parliament or the one after that.
However the voters decided they didn’t like that manifesto enough and voted accordingly – so now no majority at all.
Are per capita figures adjusted for changing demography? Standard left wing defence of ever rising % is aging population.
Demography matters but it doesn’t change that much over 5 or 10 years.
Demographics have changed enough to make a difference. The proportion of oldies in the population has risen a bit. Since total spending is constant but oldie (pension & social care) spend is rising, other departments are suffering cuts.
When people complain about “the cuts”, they’re moaning that is money is being taken away from teachers & nurses’ pay rises and being given to pensioners.
If the voters don’t like it then clearly it’s not the right manifesto!
Tim, across the total population, yes. Not so sure about individual segments/cohorts tho’.
“When people complain about “the cuts”, they’re moaning that is money is being taken away from teachers & nurses’ pay rises and being given to pensioners”
I think that’s actually quite a good way of putting it, although I’m not sure how consciously people realise this.
We know that there hasn’t been any significant austerity in the UK. We also know there is a widespread perception that there has been significant austerity.
Apart from the normal tax-my-neighbour-to-pay-me bleating, this is mostly explained by the split between government departmental budget expenditure, which has been cut back in many cases (NHS a major exception) and so-called ‘annually managed expenditures’, which is mostly pensions and similar social transfers.
Every single penny saved from the first category has simply gone into the second category, which is why total expenditure has not fallen.
But no-one wants to talk about it, the fact that the state pension crisis is here and the root cause of much of the pain we are taking.
Jim,
“When are the Tories going to learn that they are going to be painted as baby eating bastards whatever they do, so they might as well eat some babies?”
I keep saying this over and over to people in the party. Stop apologising for being the party that keeps taxes down. Stop holding back on cuts. Explain that every pound taken is a pound of someone’s freedom taken. Ignore Labour narratives about cuts and push your own about how much richer people are.
And also, go after every last bit of Marxist state that is left. Wipe out the BBC, stop funding the Guardian via ads, put the Labour unions out of business, privatise every bit of the NHS that you can. Shrink universities down to a sensible level.
If Damian Green had made his “surrender to Corbyn” statement about university fees while I was PM, I’d have had his fucking balls in a vice.
The nasty party did a lot fucking better than this fucking shower.
Andrew M,
“When people complain about “the cuts”, they’re moaning that is money is being taken away from teachers & nurses’ pay rises and being given to pensioners.”
Are nurses quitting? Is there a shortage of well-educated people trying to get into nursing college? So why the fuck does anyone think we need to give them a pay rise?
I’m sick of this romantic crap about some people. “Oh, the firefighters deserve a pay rise, they’re such heroes, saving all those lives”. That’s their fucking job. Same as nurses making you better. Where’s the weepy fucking romantic requests for blokes at Ronseal getting a payrise for doing exactly what it says on the tin, or the people at Kwik-Fit fitting an exhaust a bit quicker?
I wouldn’t mind, except I feel like a get better service when I walk into Matalan than most arms of the NHS. Miserable cunts.
Exactly what I’ve been saying since 2010 – austerity means reducing expenditure not increasing it.
Idiot Osborne announcing “austerity” necessary, then not implementing it meant the sadistic fool created a rod to beat himself and party with.
It ranks with May’s “…we’re the nasty party…” as one of the most suicidal statements by a Conservative MP about Conservative party.
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@Jim, July 2, 2017 at 11:36 am
+1 … or even better a flock of sheep
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@Bloke Anon, July 2, 2017 at 6:51 pm
+100
I’ve been saying same for years and many agree. Show strong leadership, ignore the MSM howling, once they realise they are being ignored they will give up.
Same applies on Twatter – ignore moonhowlers’ “cultural appropriation” rants etc
POTUS Trump understands and does it.
Never happens with the conservatives. I wonder why?