I went to a local shopping centre in an attractive town near my constituency yesterday. With just a few Saturdays to go before Christmas, the shops were practically empty. Sales assistants stood around talking to each other, and the tills were little used. One shop employee told me of the problems they were having with suppliers going bankrupt.It was a good reason for tax cuts, to put more money into people’s pockets so they might go and spend.
The cuts in interest rates will have some beneficial impact for those with tracker mortgages. Looking yesterday at the best buys in the money section of a leading paper, I saw that most of the mortgages on offer were for rates below 6%, whilst in the column of best savings rates most were above 6%. That dos not augur well for stronger and more profitable banks, and shows us just how damaged the banking sector remains. The truth behind the best buys is more sanguine. There are not many new mortgages on offer, and there are not many people who want to take one out.People are too worried about their job prospects and meeting all the other household bills.
Labour’s latest challenge to the Tories shows they still think attacking the Opposition is more important than governing well. They ask us if we would dare borrow to finance tax cuts, knowing that George Osborne has just made a good speech on the need to control borrowing. It is juvenile Labour nonsense, and the media are pathetic to go along with it as the story.
The answer is simple. Of course we need tax cuts to stimulate spending and help limit the downturn. Of course we also need more discipline on public borrowing, otherwise the strain on longer term interest rates and sterling will too great. The way you do both is to abandon Labour’s ruinously expensive bank nationalisation policy. Banks should be made to raise their own capital and get their own balance sheets into trim. Government should make cash,guarantees and if necessary short terms loans available to any bank in trouble, as of course no major bank should be allowed to go under.
The 1964 Labour government spent and borrowed too much, triggered a sterling crisis, had to devalue the currency in 1968 and then had to cut spending to get some confidence back. The 1974 Labour government spent and borrowed too much, and had to go to the IMF for a loan in 1976. The IMF made them cut spending. This Labour government when it came to power in 1997 seemed to have learned that lesson. It started by adopting cautious Conservative spending plans, and repaid some debt. Now it seems to have forgotten past disasters, and is throwing caution and Prudence to the wind.
Yes we need tax cuts. No this government cannot afford them. Yes we might afford them if they abandoned their crazy ideas of owning large Scottish banks. After all, the by election has now been won, so why not find another cheaper way to keep those banks going?
November 9, 2008
And deregulate. I have had the pleasure of reading part of the regulations relating to the interviewing potential employees. To be honest if I was a foreign investor I would stop reading and invest elsewhere.
November 9, 2008
Like you John, I spent yesterday in a shopping mall, they fascinate me. My favourite pass time there is looking at the names on, and the number of, shopping bags people are carrying. There was definitely less bags per person on average; some retailers were doing better than others by this metric. I was not the only one counting bags. A lady at the front entrance with a "clicker" in her hand, was doing what I was doing and getting paid for it. (If you undertake this activity, make sure you are sat down at a coffee counter or similar; otherwise you will no doubt get arrested as a suspected; terrorist; paedophile; loiterer with intent, pick-pocket; bag snatcher; etc, etc).
Can you explain this one (bit nerdy I know). The day before the MPC dropped the base rate to 3% they issued this bit of stock. Notice it was issued at base rate – then 4.5% – less 150 bps – 1.5% that is. Was this meant to send a message to the market that the base rate was going to drop to 3%?
http://www.dmo.gov.uk/documentview.aspx?docName=/…
November 9, 2008
Mr Redwood, any sane individual benefiting from any TAX cut would be best advised to reduce their debts and not spend.
People in Britain have racked up so much debt on loans and credit cards that the total now borrowed exceeds the entire value of the economy, GDP now stands at around £1.8 trillion, which is less than the £2 trillion which is outstanding on mortgages, credit cards and personal loans.
That means 60 million people owe more to the banks than the value of everything made by every office and factory in the country
November 9, 2008
As I have heard it is one trillion not two, do you have a source?
Thank you.
November 9, 2008
Not to sound like the Today program, but will not tax cuts mean spending cuts?
reply: In my book yes – spending cuts in cutting out buying all those bank shares.
November 9, 2008
John,
I agree that tax cuts very important, they are in fact more important than dropping the base rate. Why, because the banks need to rebuild their balance sheets to 'weather the storm' of non-performing loans that will rise during the 3-4 quarters of negative growth, so the Government's act of forcing the banks to pass on the base rate cut will only prolong the agony. As already posted the personal sector needs to save, rebuild the savings ratio to over 10% before you can expect consumption to rise to help the demand side of the economy. Until then I am sorry it is the wrong thing to encourage, and the retail sector has to grin and bear it, if not we will have a Japanese style depression. The faster we can accelerate the 'process of pain' the quicker we can get through to stimulate the economy from a more sustainable position. The are no easy options I am afraid. We have to live within our means again and get back into position of 'credit' again, there are no short cuts!
November 9, 2008
Labour only briefly "leaned the lesson" of excessive spending and borrowing. Brown's last balanced budget was 2001-2002! There has been nothing less than a £20bn defecit since and the increase in national debt, even before the credit crunch, was over £200bn. That figure is likely to double as the recession plays out.
I'm afraid the medicine is going to be horrible to take, but nothing short of a three year cash freeze on Government spending will reduce spending sufficiently to allow the room for the private sector to begin growing again. At £550bn pa, this represents £15-20bn pa real term reduction, creating room for tax cuts and reduction in debt, or at least a lower borrowing requirement.
Using that to be radical and raising personal allowances substatially and creating a flat income tax rate above it – so creating a straight-line "progressive" marginal tax rate, would also make tax simpler to adminster, (more savings), and fairer.
We had to figuratively spill blood in the period from '79 to '83 to get the UK economy out of the mess Labour left then. This time is going to be harder, but we will not be favoured if we flunk it!
November 10, 2008
For income I think flat rate tax is the only way to go (to cover NI and all the rest in one figure).
The problem is the switch over (it will be seen as a massive give away to top earners) — however if the government had the nerve to legislate that the change must be take home pay neutral…
The overhead of every company recalculating everyones pay (to preserve/limit take home pay) – sorting out pension contrilbutions, pay multiple loans etc would not be insignificant, but would be worth it for the simplification…
November 11, 2008
I devised a scheme for this whereby welfare was paid only up to the point at which you started paying tax, on the basis of a household's need.
It worked like this:
Say your "need" was assesed at £5,000pa. You would get a personal allowance of £10,000pa, and be paid welfare at 50% of any amount of this figure that you did not earn. So, if you earned £5,000, you would receive a further £2,500 in welfare. This gave an incentive to get a job, rather than just sit at home and collect your £5k.
NI as we know it would disappear, replaced by 50/50, hypothecated payments for health insurance, income protection and pensions. However, the income protection element was limited only to that income you earned up to the £10k allowance. After that, you would be expected to pay for this yourself.
The variables were the level of personal allowance, which would be based on number of dependent children and disability only, and the rate of tax above the personal allowance. I calculated that to replace current income tax and NI income, the tax rate above £10k pa would be 26%, plus 18% for the health insurance and pension contributions, as against the then figure of 22% and 23.8% NI. So not that much difference.
Somebody earning £15,000pa would be better off by about £1k a year, somebody earning £35k would be neutral and above that, only single people would be penalised as they would not get the benefits of the additional allowance for dependent children. As now, the hypothecated health insurance and pension contributions would be limited to about £40k of eranings.
However, this assumed no dynamic effects from the simpler system, the incentives to work etc. which ought to result in efficiency savings and allow those tax rates to be reduced. I did suggest that it ought to be introduced in a "big bang" reform, but that the option existed to phase it in. Brown of course has started to align Tax and NI thresholds, but I can't see him going this far, can you?
November 9, 2008
We owe a Trillion to the Global Banks because we have borowed it from them, we should take control of our own money supply, IE Print it free of charge instead of borrowing at interest.
No loan, no debt, no interest to pay back, no Govt debt, no need for Income tax.
It's not rocket science, we should, with due caution, coin and print our own money.
http://forums.hannity.com/showthread.php?t=886031
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=execut…
November 9, 2008
Consequence , inflation !
November 10, 2008
Yes I'm aware that Printing money has to be done with caution, but equally Borrowing too much simple indebts us, similarly decreasing the value of our earnings.
Either way, caution has to be excercised.
Govt wants to Borrow £100billion.
It can Print Gilts for the Banks to buy, who will give us £100 Billlion in essentially worthless fiat money.
but we have to pay back, £100 billion + £5 billion in interest per annum.
or we could simply do without the banks and Print the £100 billion worth of Useless fiat money and say this is legal tender.
No loan to pay back, no interest, therefore no National Debt.
But we do not need to work, to repay this totally unnecesary 'debt'.
However we get hold of this stuff, it's still worthless paper.
November 10, 2008
Financiers, like everyone else, like to use difficult and obscure words to restrict their business to themselves. So let us demystify inflation.
Paper money, bonds, gilts are, at the end of the day IOUs.
If you don't repay, then people will cease to trust you.
If you offer too many IOUs without repaying, people will cease to trust you.
Inflation happens when people cease to trust you.
And, witness Rhodesia/Argentina/Germany in the 1920s/Harold Wilson(see above), it can happen to the nicest people.
November 10, 2008
No inflation…
Instead of borrowing money you print it.
Instead of repaying money you burn it.
The only difference is cutting out the middle man and his cut (the banks).
November 10, 2008
Erm…
I am afraid I cannot go along with this one.
Paper money is just an IOU really. You trust me as a fairly well off chap and all that.
If I go round offering ridiculous amounts of IOUs to every one (ie printing lots more promissory notes), surely people will cease to trust me?
Not?
November 11, 2008
I do agree that in practice there is a problem of trust.
While governments tend to honour their obligations to banks, they have a poor record on honouring their obligations to the public.
This being the case, the interest that the government pay on debt is actually the price that we (the taxpayer) pay to the banks to act as 'regulators' on government borrowing!
(The print/burn scenario, relies on you being confident that the government will actually eventually burn them, and not print endlessly more. Because, to burn them they would first have to retrieve them – which means buying them back from you, and so honoring the IOU).
November 9, 2008
Ps the Money they say we owe, was not backed byanything of real value like Gold, esentially it's worthless paper, tell them we will pay for them to print some more, but that's it and wipe out the 'debt'.
It was only monopoly money anyway.
Money is a means of trading like for like, that is why it should be backed by Gold and Silver.
They severed this link so they could keep the Gold, the Bank of England, just like the Fed is a Private Corporation,
they Kept the Gold,
We are left holding unredeemable receipts. We've all been conned.
Our monetary system is a fraud. Credit is simply thin air, a debt they conjure up into existance the moment we sign on the dotted line.
Fractional Reserve Banking is also a Fraud, they lend out 10 times more 'money' (which is really worthless paper anyway) than they hold on reserve.
IE they lend out nothing of any real intrinsic value.
All Mortages should be forgiven, all loans, debts and credit card debts forgiven.
People are forced to pay interest on thin air.
The Private Banks lower interest rates, get people hooked on this thin air credit, then they raise the rate again, deliberately so they can haul in the assets of those who cannot afford the new interest rates.
November 9, 2008
If there is a giant collapse of the western economy and we enter a new dark age, any chance we can get them to put ID cards on hold.
I know thats a big ask n all, what with how vital it is I dont know how im surviving without one, but it might help people spend money in the real economy where its needed. A tax cut.
November 9, 2008
Tax cuts are a wise idea ! As a shop assistant I favor giving the punters more cash so that they spend more money – as the President Elect has found for every $1 given to the poor in tax cuts 95c's gets spent. You can thus secure social justice by helping those who need extra cash while boosting demand too !
Raising the basic personal allowance would get money to the hard-pressed low paid and the suffering coping classes and thus help productivity & social mobility.
I wonder if a refund for basic rate payers of £400 and a top rate rebate of £200 would help in the UK as such a policy has in the USA ? That is fair as £200 is chicken feed for those on £200,000 a year – but £400 would be a massive boost for those on say £10,000 p/a . We all merit tax relief – but lets give most help to those who need it from April 2009 – as public spending growth slows from 2010 the basic personal allowance & top rate threshold can start shooting up as less government makes it affordable. Age Related Allowances can be replaced with a bigger personal allowance for all taxpayers meaning we all pay less to reward work & wealth creation and taxes are simpler.
So we can have a one -off rebate a la Brown in 2009-10 to boost the economy and then funded tax cuts of a permanent nature a la Cameron from 2010-11 onwards (i.e. a bigger personal allowance & higher top rate threshold funded by fewer QUANGO's ). This will pave the way to a long term low tax future while rescuing the economy in the short-term. Interest rates at 3% mean that the MPC can do little more to fight recession so fiscal policy needs to be part of the mix in the face of mounting deflation. Public works will not slash unemployment – helping retail spending via a big rebate for tax payers might shore it up !
We need the Brown policy first and then the Cameron approach thereafter – as logic surely suggests…..
November 9, 2008
To spend these tax cuts on foreign imports? It's a bit like supporting the strong British car industry by buying a five door family hatchback made in Britain by a British company. Impossible. Small sports cars are amazing from Britain and their accomplishments in this area should be applauded. Like British sausages. Marvelous! Until you try German that is…Interesting…and cheap.ish.
November 9, 2008
Whilst there is without doubt a need for sound money policy, which for me would mean no government debt except at times of war and spending never, never above 15% of GDP as a maximum, those making the siren calls for a return to the gold standard might want to cast an eye at why it collapsed last time.
November 10, 2008
I don't know what "large Scottish banks" we're referring to.
RBS certainly.
Llyods? English. HBOS? English. Northern Rock? English
November 10, 2008
The civil service is a behemoth, do away with income tax, there is no need to pay these people, we could give them unemployment benefits, till they can engage in something that is actually beneficial to the country.
Do away with all taxes except on purchases, further massive reductions in the civil service that we have to pay for.
It would also mean that there would be no need to fill in tax returns, because you would only pay tax when purchasing, so this side will be taken care of by the Vendors doing tax returns.
Vastly slashing the civil service again.
We even have a mechanism to accomodate taxing only purchases, its called VAT.
Simply do away with all taxation, except VAT and raise this to 20%.
No massive state civil service to support and pay for.
The people are freed from the cancer that Govt has become, they will have more money, they will spend, this will stimulate the economy, providing productive jobs for all those out of work civil servsants.
As a one off, Wipe out all Mortgage debt, loans, credit card debts, they are all thin air anyway, what exactly did the bank lose.
Let the banks fail. let the People have their homes, cars, businesses.
This alone would free up £500 per home in the UK.
They would spend, and save some, so stimulating the economy, new banks, hopefully better thought out would rise up to accomodate this.
by doing this, people can go out to work and get to keep, most of their money, that is all the incentive most people need to get out there and start being productive.
My vision would be a minimalist Govt. a currency backed by Gold.
no taxes except on Purchases.
Since this would free up lots of money for people, I would expect there to be lots of purchases, hence lots of Tax for things like the Armed forces, police.
November 10, 2008
Tax Cuts? No you can't.
As the Leader of the Libertarian Party, I suppose that I should be pleased that David Cameron has finally admitted that Libertarian ideals are not for the Conservative Party.
But I am not. I feel sorry for those Conservatives who have spent so much time and effort trying to convince the Tory leader that the voting public in the UK are not just sick of NuLabour, but are also sick of the massive levels of state interference in their everyday lives, and the massive levels of taxation that we all suffer under.
Cameron has give an interviews where he has undertaken to scrap the ID Cards, the NIR and the childrens database, but much like Osborne's financial promises, we know the EU wont let him.
They may let him make changes to the window dressing, to put an acceptable face on it, because an EU directive is an EU directive not a request.
Dave of all people should know, does know, that because successive Conservative and Labour governments have now given away so much of our sovereignty, that unless he confronts the EU directly and takes us out of the union, he as a Conservative Prime Minister of the UK cannot really change a damn thing.
A Conservative government will unfortunately mean more of the same, state interference, big government, high taxes, because the EU has directed it so.
Reply: If you are anti Conseravtive then you clearly wish to live with ever more state intervention , as the choice at the next election will be Labour or Conservative for government.
November 11, 2008
JR: "If you are anti Conseravtive then you clearly wish to live with ever more state intervention , .. "
When the Tory party still has people like Kenneth Clarke in it and the Leader of the Tory party is deliberately ambiguous of his true intentions, despite being hamstrung in his policy goals by the European Union. When the leader of the Tory party has only made one promise in relation to the EU and broken that, when one conservative has said he is in faviour of leaving the EU, and Mr Cameron takes him aside and 'has a little chat'. When we know and discuss daily that the EU is a regulatory monstrosity anti democratic to boot, knowing all those things, to come out and say 'if you are anti conservative then you clearly wish to live with ever more state intervention' leads me to think apart from it being untrue, you are actually deluded. But this is the fellow who claims to be able to effect change from within the Tory party.
By the way, I am not anti conservative, I just recognize the Tory party is not an instrument of conservative action or reaction. It is uncomfortable to have come to that conclusion, because I have deluded myself too for so long. But it is an unavoidable conclusion looking at the behavior of the Tory party 'upper ranks'.
November 10, 2008
Mr Acorn's disclosure that his favourite pastime in shopping centres is to look at the shopping bags people are carrying is very worrying. Methinks he needs to get out less.
November 10, 2008
I find it extraordinary that the Conservative party has not changed with the coming of this terrible recession.
Remember when Oliver Letwin had to go into hiding when he mentioned cutting back on State expenditure? "What? You mean Schools'n'Hospitals?" cried Labour. Lesson learned: do not attempt to cut State expenditure.
Then came the promise to match Labour expenditure (as the Labour had done for the Conservatives) for a couple of years. This is now disastrous: it keeps being quoted back at the Opposition by the loyal BBC.
State expenditure – not just the Banks, although that cannot be wrong, – must be cut back urgently.
And the Conservatives need to keep repeating ad nauseam that, now the economy has changed so much, that they, too have changed.
Labour understands this well: if you are going to tell a lie, make it a big lie and keep repeating it as if it were the truth. (e.g. Freeing up the Bank of England. e.g. Gordon Brown is the Iron Chancellor).
Meanwhile, more and more money is being simply poured down the drain as our national debt increases very, very fast. Even Ruth Lee was worried about it this morning!
November 10, 2008
Interesting that at the ginormous new 'Cabot Circus' development in Bristol, beneath the facade of a hugely successful, brand new, busy shopping centre, still riding the tide of novelty, I spotted this..
A 'Hardy Amies' shop with a small, A4 computer printed piece of paper stating 'This shop is in administration.. ' followed by the name and address of the administrator.
Worrying times. But the fact is Mr Redwood your plans will just try and get us into the DeLorean to back to the failed eighties Tory policies that got us into this unsustainable boom and bust.
The fact is that we are going to have to live more sustainably, with less consumption, and no politician is brave enough to bite that bullet…
Reply Delorean was a failed government backed project which I opposed. I want us in a decent car travelling at a sensible speed – we have just gone from superfast to stopped, which is why we have all been hurled through the windscreen.
November 10, 2008
Eleven years of incessant meddling by our current prime minister has got us into the current mess.
How about just not doing anything?
November 10, 2008
Hmmm doesn't Dave support the takeover of HBOS?
November 10, 2008
Touche pussycat !!
You have certainly provoked some debate on this topic…
November 10, 2008
Also, and to provide a smidgin of the 'fair and balanced' coverage which Fox News aims for, it is worth my confessing to now seeing the light in respect of the 'de-regulation' which caused the fiasco in America..
Yes, this bonfire of regulation did indeed start under the Clingon administration, so there are probably lessons to be learned in Britain and America for BOTH sides of the political spectrum..
I mention this because it amuses me that in America the solution to their woes lies, not unreasonably, in a 'move to the left', but in Britain the call for change will result in a lurch to the right…
November 10, 2008
Tax cuts for the poor or tax cuts for the rich?
November 11, 2008
Rich people can provide the employment that the poor people crave (have you personally been unemployable?). A job as a croupier/ waiter/ receptionist is better than the dole. Lehman Bros paid an awful lot of salaries.
Middle people spend, spend, spend in the shops/schools/BUPA/holidays/cars and keep the economy going. That gives jobs to people who are both rich and poor and middle.
Poor people are already getting a LOT of money out of the two above. I mean dirt poor people who live (as I have) on benefits and hand-outs. And, yes, Bazman, you do come to depend on it as your "right".
This is in no way a "no brainer".
November 12, 2008
It's not something I dreamt up by myself.
"We have given the People of this Republic the greatest blessing they have ever had – their own currency to pay their own debts." No privately owned Federal Reserve Bank or other central bank to borrow from, at interest.
PRESIDENT ABRAHAM LINCOLN – 1867
"The high office of the President has been used to foment a plot to destroy the Americans freedom and before I leave office I must inform the Citizen of his plight."
PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY (10 days before he was murdered)
Ask yourself this question, "If you were given a monetary printing press and a legal contract to print and issue all the money you would ever need to run your household at no cost to you, would you, instead, give that printing press and contract to a banker and agree to borrow your money from him, to be repaid in full with interest?" NEVER !!!!!
"PERMIT ME TO CONTROL THE CURRENCY OF A NATION AND I CARE NOT WHO MAKES ITS LAWS!" Baron de Rothschild
"The death of Lincoln was a disaster for Christendom. There was no man in the United States great enough to wear his boots and the bankers went anew to grab the riches. I fear that foreign bankers with their craftiness and tortuous tricks will entirely control the exuberant riches of America and use it systematically to corrupt modern civilization."
Bismark, the Chancellor of Germany
"If this mischievous financial policy (of creating a debt-free currency), which has its origin in the American Republic, shall become permanent, then that government will furnish its own money without cost! It will pay off its debts and be without debt. It will have all the money to carry on its commerce. It will become prosperous without precedent in the history of the world.The brains and the wealth of all countries will go to America. That government must be destroyed or it will destroy every monarchy on the globe!"
The Times.
"The money powers prey upon the nation in times of peace and conspire against it in times of adversity. It is more despotic than a monarchy, more insolent than autocracy and more selfish that a bureaucracy. It denounces, as public enemies, all who question its methods or throw light upon its crimes. I have two great enemies, the Southern Army in front of me and the bankers in the rear. Of the two, the one at the rear is my greatest foe."
Abraham Lincoln.
http://www.elimadebts.com/FederalReserve.html
November 13, 2008
He tried to Do away with the Private Federal Reserve and warn us about the shadow Govt(s), secret societies, throughout the Western World and asked for help.
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=_WSGwnz7XpY
So did this man in his farewell address.
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=8y06NSBBRtY
Body Gaurd Stood Down
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=XY02Qkuc_f8&feature=related
December 11, 2008
Once again, another tory politician, i have no love of those uber socialists that are running the country into the ground right now, believe me,but this article has glaring omissions for me, one being that he never mentions the lunacy of the ability of banks to create credit from nothing.There’s no mention of it whatsoever! and it’s something that is omitted in every article by every comentator (except for max keiser) that you ever see when talking about banks. The treasury in a letter to greg clark mp state that “There is nothing at all new in this process of credit creation by the banks. The same process operates in much the same way in banking systems the world over, and its origin goes back centuries.” As though this is a ringing endorsement of the practice! that’s like saying that we,the treasury should continue borrowing money from the boe, paying them £32billion a year in interest alone (according to the center for policy studies)because it’s something that’s been going on since 1694. Which brings me to this idea that there should be a central bank and that they are good because they “The Bank sets interest rates to keep inflation low, issues banknotes and works to maintain a stable financial system.” Well if there was ever a better use for “not fit for purpose” than the imf or world bank this has to be it. How many economic catastrophies have they resided over in your lifetime alone? think about it.Even if you delude yourselves over the true purpose of the central banks by accepting their take on it you would have to conclude that they’ve completely failed you and they’ve become megawealthy in the process of doing so. which brings me back to mr redwood and his ilk (self serving, career politicians) What we truly have in britain today is a one party dictatorship with two opposing management teams vying for the job of managing This “third way” system which they’re forcing down our throats, where the only socialism is for banks and we get to pay an income tax to these bankers (b.o.e) for the privelage. Where are the thomas jeffersons, ben’ franklins, andrew jacksons, abraham lincolns and john kennedy’s who all stood up to these parasites,the central bankers? Are there any politicians out there who have the courage to speak the truth and act upon it? if so please do step forward and be counted, your country is depending on you!