Some in the Trade Unions are alarmed by the spate of closures and job losses we are experiencing. 90% of farms have delayed or cancelled investment. 8 pubs a week are closing. 2 refineries are shutting down. 2 olefins petro chem plants are at risk. Half our steel industry only avoids closure with taxpayers paying the bills to keep it alive. 2 ceramics factories have shut this year.
The car industry is at a record low of output and under government orders to close all factories making diesel and petrol cars by 2030. Government plans to close all our oil and gas production are proceeding well with a ban on most new investment. We are importing more and more of our electricity as government fails to expand the grid and renewables fast enough to replace closing fossil fuel plants. All but one of our existing nuclear power stations will close by 2030.
Government should listen to the wise Trade Union voices arguing against this rapid de industrialisation and idiotic reliance on imports. They should also listen to the farmers and the hospitality industry who are suffering badly from the last budget.
August 27, 2025
Good morning.
Cannot say its all ‘Fatchers’ fault now, can they ?
August 27, 2025
No Mark bitvno doubt they’ll blame Brexit. Union membership must be plummeting as these industries close threatening there viability.
I’m amazed that no one in government is questioning the carnage besseting our industries.
Surely MPs in these constituencies must be fearful for their future.
Farage and company were spectacular yesterday putting a bomb under the uniparty arrogance.
Just wait until they turn their guns on Net Stupid. Nice has already warned the major players to keep their drills sharp ready for a Reform government.
Drill baby drill.
August 27, 2025
The Subsidy Junkies in the Intermittent-Unreliable-Energy Sector have been warned. It’ll be interesting to see how many want to risk “investing” in more occasionally fairly useful windmills.
August 27, 2025
They will keep on with “It is the previous Tory Government’s fault” until the next election. Equivalent argument.
August 27, 2025
@Mark B – It never was, it was self destruction the desire of something for nothing in a big wide world of competition
August 27, 2025
I listened to Liam Halligan, an economist of repute, yesterday evening. He drew comparisons between the state of the economy which led to Dennis Healey going cap in hand to the IMF, and the current national financial situation. On all comparative criteria we are in a much more perilous state than was Healey. Even the short life of the Truss government palls into relative insignificanse alongside the current financial state. It is not a question of if, but one of when our government follows Healey’s path.
Some of our unions may complain of the situation that stems from current government financial actions, or lack of them, but how many of them will accept the long overdue action on spending that is vital. Just to mention an inactive and growing rapidly 6.5 million unemployed. The cost is horrendous. Some unfortunates have no alternative to state support, but the current majority have found an alternative obscene lifestyle. Members of the ruling Labour Party in Parliament will not allow anything to be done to stem this outflow from the Treasury. Along with the insanity of the Milliband approach to energy you have an inevitable path to the IMF.
Incidentally, do the IMF have sufficient funds or inclination to perpetuate our basket case government. I do not see it without the imposition of a financial reality check that Labour are incapable of imposing themselves.
Reply I set out on GB News why it is unlikely the UK will ask for an IMF loan, but is in a doom loop of spending and borrowing too much driving up the costs of domestic borrowing to unaffordable levels. Watch the bond market.
August 27, 2025
Reply to reply. France is in a worse position than us. America is the largest donor to the IMF and I can’t see Trump sanctioning American funds to bail out welfare ridden Marxist governments.
August 27, 2025
Looks like France will have to go to the IMF before us. No doubt they’ll drain all the IMF’s lending facilities leaving nothing for us. It’s fish stocks all over again!
August 27, 2025
How can France go to the IMF? They don’t have a currency.
August 27, 2025
The IMF lends in 5 different currencies, including the Euro.
August 27, 2025
To put our host’s points into graphic form:
https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/sn02815/#:~:text=The%20full%20suite%20of%20indicators,(2.9%25%20of%20GDP).
Noteworthy is the Goods line, which is a steady decline, and with greater imports needed as described, will no doubt worsen.
This is why we will have high inflation and unreliable energy.
August 27, 2025
Indeed Denis Healey a supposedly intelligent man Double First Greats gave us 98% income tax rates. So he was quite keen on doom loop economics. But then we had over 100% taxation of landlords with Osborne’s non allowance of interest deductions and now over 100% with the 20% IHT taxation on small businesses and farms. This can easily be more than the farms make after income taxes over 20 years.
“Some ideas are so stupid only intellectuals believe them. … George Orwell. NHS Doctor too can work until they are 32 or so and only earn just enough after tax to repay their 100k+ training costs and interest on this student debt. Zero met pay from 18-32 zero for food, rent… yet they are accused of greed!
To reply indeed watch the bond markets and indeed the 10 fixed mortgage rates many people rates will jump from circa 2% to more like 6% at renewal. So you mortgage might jump from £1500 PCM to £4,500 if interest only!
August 27, 2025
@Lifelogic – … ah 98% tax rates. Torsten Bell is advising and urging our Rachael from complaints, that in this big wide competitive world we must return to those days. His Socialist doctrine is predicated of the ‘them & us’ he needs to create a decide to ensure that Socialism rules the roost.
The bit the all miss is the World, the big wide world in which we are just a small fish works differently
August 27, 2025
Yes the bond market suggests it is increasingly expensive for government to borrow money. However it won’t stop them because they see it as the next governments problem. Add to it quantitive easing, and tax rises that in their minds are not important, because at worst they will only be around for less than four years. Knowing their limited life span, from day one they have been laying a minefield that is a future governments problem.
August 27, 2025
Are they not citizens too?
August 27, 2025
We don’t need the IMF while our bonds are bought.
The markets will just demand ever increasing returns on this risky investment.
Borrowing costs and interest rates will increase.
A country that prints its own money does not need the IMF. Doesn’t mean we are not monumentally screwed by this Labour government and the preceding profligate Conservative ones since 2015
August 27, 2025
Plenty of countries which have had their own currencies have been bankrupted.
August 28, 2025
Technically because they have a worthless currency that they can’t borrow in. But a country that wasn’t borrowing would still function by printing its own currency.
Hence the point about while the bond markets demanding ever increasing returns for the risk of borrowing in sterling.
August 27, 2025
Put that way, you make the government sound bad. Goodness knows how they spin it!
August 27, 2025
The key areas in decline are all associated with policies driven by the Net Zero agenda fixation. That is an internationally geared policy across the western world. Until we cancel the legislation put in place without any public debate or indeed debate in the House of Commons we will continue down this bizarre path of self destruction.
Once we have destroyed our industrial base and thus our capacity to sustain the nation the end result will be total dependency on the charity of others. Think China and India.
We have to stop this madness.
August 27, 2025
Spot-on Rod. This ‘government’ are cloth-eared to reality, chasing Mad Millibands dream (or is that nightmare)
August 27, 2025
I agree with your sentiments but it’s difficult to see how ‘we’ can stop anything. Having said that I do wonder if the government appeal, and victory no doubt, against the Epping migrant hotel decision could precipitate an early general election. Government victory would surely be dynamite as they would almost explicitly be saying, ‘we don’t care about the concerns of English mothers and the safety of their children who attend 5 schools in a traditional English town and in other such towns’.
August 27, 2025
@Rod Evans – strange isn’t it in the World you have China and the USA all growing exponentially, growing their economies. They must be approaching 70% of the Worlds GDP and production volumes between them. Yet each of them have more so-called NetZero style green systems coming on-line pro-rata than the UK. But they do not have Government/Parliament imposed artificially high energy costs, they do not have their Governments banning production, off-shoring-industry, opening their Country to the Worlds criminals, maliciously causing job loses, the forced export of wealth.
Reply They are under 50% but are the two giants growing much faster than EU or UK. china is increasing output of CO 2 every year by burning a lot of coal and gas. US rejects net zero and is cancelling renewable subsidies.
August 27, 2025
China’s CO2 output has actually slightly reduced year over year. (Source: New Scientist, May 15th)
August 27, 2025
Correct but only because of a construction slump reducing demand for cement and steel. Emissions are expected to rise significantly due to greater use of coal.
August 27, 2025
Peter, the small decrease of around 1% is possibly a reflection of non fossil fuel power uplift or it may simply be a combination of population decline and trade activity.
The policy is China is to increase CO2 through to 2030 then to reduce through to 2060. We will see if any of that happens, and more importantly what effect it will have on the none existent climate crisis.
The increasing focus on nuclear energy production is a welcome development, it may become an example the rest of the world picks up….
August 27, 2025
I saw an interesting Chinese study. They calculate that the Chinese population could be as few as 500,000,000. It is definitely nowhere near the 1.4 billion floated.
August 27, 2025
@Reply .. and collectively only around 25% of the Planets population. Are the able to earn to fund tomorrow or do they have their hands tied by malicious taxes and laws that are causing rapid decline?
China might not be as free a society as the UK(or some might have us believe), and clearly the USA is leaps and bounds ahead on freedoms and liberty. But, both know there is no tomorrow, no change without the wealth creation to fund it. The UK suffers from vindictive ideological punishment for the sake of ‘personal’ self gratification of a few.
What is being programmed out of the UK is a tomorrow the ability to respond to issues known and unknown all for the sake of some illogical ego trait. The UK has also been handed over to the political whims of other Governments, that maybe pally with us today but what happens when the regime changes and the blackmail steps up a notch.
Did we vote to empower those that whose that refuse to keep the Nation safe?
August 28, 2025
Additional capacity, not replacement being the takezaway from that.
August 27, 2025
Let’s face it many of the current crop of politicians are not living in the real World, and are insulated from the affects of their own policies which are driving commercial businesses into the ground.
On their taxpayer funded salaries, taxpayer funded Gold plated pension schemes, and on their tax funded expenses, is it any wonder they are clueless, few have ever run their own business, where they would have had to finance and take responsibility for their own decisions, pay their own overheads, costs, insurance, office and factory equipment, business rates, rent, all whilst competing in the open market for work, whilst also complying with all new regulations, taxation, and legal responsibilities.
Most simply do not have a clue, so is it any wonder that we are now in a real mess.
August 27, 2025
A politician has been physically attacked by a mob of migrants in Sweden.
Looked very serious.
I hope he has survived.
August 27, 2025
Should, but won’t.
The Unions could of course stop funding the Labour Party, those outside the Public Sector, anyway. But the Union Leaders don’t appear to have the interests of their members as the priority.
Other than that we will just have to hope we get a Reform Government which will scrap the SCAM, since all the Not-a-Conservative-Party would do is slow down the speed of de-industrialisation and rate of destruction.
August 27, 2025
There is no chance of this Government listening to anyone. They are true believers and Miĺliband is messianic.
August 27, 2025
At the moment Trump’s tarrifs are more of a threat to the UK’s economy. We need to look at 3% Digital Tax (along with other country’s imposing this tax) to hit Trump in the cojones and to use this money to help boost our own High Tech economy (taking market share from the US). Not going to be easy. But US gov played key role in developing Silicon Valley (and Israeli government Tel Aviv as leading tech hub and German government with the superb German car industry over the decades)
Reply The digital tax is a good way of deterring more investment and jobs in tec here in UK
August 27, 2025
(so in normal situation I would agree with you but we are not in normal situations. Trump is no friend to the UK).
August 27, 2025
He’s no friend of Corporatism.
August 27, 2025
when the history of trade unions is written somebody should write the chapter on how much the trade unions participated in the replacement of the native UK workforce with cheap imported replacements from India, Bulgaria, and other places. and the movement of wealth creating capacity from the UK to other countries. there are some classic massive examples that I have seen first hand, which are kept very quiet by the trade union movement.
August 27, 2025
@iain gill – I don’t think you can hang that ideology on the trade unions. The people you refer to steal union jobs and work outside union structures, the unions are anti cheap labour for that reason. I don’t support Unions in anyway but I think you could be reading it wrong. The replacement of the UK workforce, the destruction of the UK’s wealth creation are those that sit as members of the UK Parliament. They have all had the power, we empowered them, to stop the issue of the UK’s decline, stop UK structures being destroyed, stop the malicious export of UK wealth, they have all failed to lift one single finger to change things – they have all failed in their job
August 27, 2025
Iain
Indeed with so much money being returned home by immigrants, there will be less to churn over and over in this country with what would have been tax on every purchase
August 27, 2025
The productive jobs are declining fast, mainly due to Net Zero policies, but the parasitic jobs, charities and those on welfare are growing rapidly. How much longer can those who create wealth support those who consume it? The problem we have is that those working in the public sector and charities continue to be protected from the reality of the dire straits this country is in. Until this Government is forced to change course by scrapping Net Zero, stopping immigration, cutting the welfare bill, wasting money abroad, and allowing crime to grow out of control, there can be no road to recovery.
August 27, 2025
Just like to say High Tech key to our great country’s future – including paying for crushing immigration and tax. And so we need to look at 3% Digital Tax as a start of reinvesting this money back into helping create world’s second Silicon Valley in Cambride / Oxford / London area. This will impact on the US High Tech industry where we win more of their market. Other countries will want to do the same. It’s going to be a tough race but with great results for our economy and to paying for crushing high immigration and lowering tax.
So please jump on board the 3% tax putting our great country in a stronger position and against those countries that would do us harm in particular Trump who is no friend of our great country.
August 27, 2025
Why do you want to pay for ‘crushing high immigration’?
August 27, 2025
Nigel Farage / Reform says it will cost £10bn over five years
August 27, 2025
So why do you want to pay for it?
Farage said that ‘absolutely all illegal immigrants will be detailed and deported’, today he says ‘he will not be deporting women and children’.
Musk points out that current British law that ‘anyone who is an accessory to aggravate rape or murder is guilty of a serious crime and must serve time in jail if a citizen or be deported if not’.
We don’t need more laws, enacting more laws is an excuse for not enforcing current laws.
Southafrica withdrew from the UN Migrant programme overnight, why can’t we?
August 27, 2025
I was missing the bit were Government/Parliament has expanded the size of the State, therefore Union membership. Meaning of course that more membership fees are now funded by the Taxpayer than ever before
August 27, 2025
I believe SirJ that you’re the first to publically air these views in a decade ….back in the 70s the unions, like labour, were against joining the EEC and immigration, today you never hear a labour MP arguing about the levels of UK unemployment ?
August 27, 2025
Today in the Telegraph, we have the Taliban suggesting they will take back the Afghan Criminals that enter the UK illegally and treat then with dignity.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2025/08/26/taliban-ready-and-willing-work-with-nigel-farage-migrants/
We all have views about the Taliban and the wars that have raged in that country. Then we forget the UK’s history, like who we (the UK) supported when the fight was with Russia and also the depictions in film as in the James Bond film where the mujahideen the precursors to the Taliban came to his rescue.
Know doubt the media and the Uniparty will have a ‘heyday’ with the spin. The real thought is that Government/Parliament as with all things that the should be doing is paralysed by its/their own very personal ego and political ideology. Choosing nothing in preference to serving the UK and its People
August 27, 2025
I’m sure the Taliban are men of honour and will keep their word.
Problem solved
August 27, 2025
Are they not just taking back their own?
If you doubt them in Afghanistan why not doubt them in Highgate?
August 27, 2025
Have you read Rosenberg this morning?
August 27, 2025
‘Germany deported 109 immigrants to Afghanistan in two flights: 28 in August 2024 and 81 in July 2025’ ….were there’s a will there’s a way
August 27, 2025
@glen cullen – and the UK many decades on, much water under the bridge and a Parliament that still fights its people. Everyone knows all you have to do,is do, not talk.
August 27, 2025
The Trade Unions should not only be concerned but also take action to stop the nonsense of Net Zero. That is driving our energy costs through the roof compared to our competitors, so no wonder energy-intensive industries are shutting down. Then we have tax everything until you kill it, Torsten Bell, preparing the next budget!
We have never had such an ignorant group of MPs. They are like sheep voting for anything with no concern as to what it does to the UK economy. Where are the firebrands of the past who stood up and shouted when the government was going wrong? Thank goodness for Nigel Farage and Reform, at least he reflects the concerns of the people.
Good article from Andrew Neil about the Net Zero nonsense in The Mail Online today.
August 27, 2025
So the Far Left’s Net Zero Trojan horse that PM May wheeled into Parliament in 2019 and PM Johnson supercharged with his Net Zero Strategy two years later is working as they intended to sabotage our energy, economy and national security through “rapid de-industrialisation and idiotic reliance on imports.” There is no economic argument against “saving the planet” and consequently so as long as this false belief persists we are on the road to ruin. PM Starmer, who before he was elected to Parliament, served on the executive committee of the Fabian Society, a far left movement, whose logo is a wolf in sheep’s clothing, and his Energy Secretary, Ed Miliband, surely cannot believe their luck in being able to use Net Zero to impoverish the UK for socialism depends upon making and keeping people poor.
August 27, 2025
@Original Richard – so very true. To think all these bright brains, intelligent people in the UK’s Parliament voted for this change. Not one that I am aware of, if they did they were drowned out, asked the cost. Not one before allowing the malicious cancellation of known to work operations ever asked what would be the replacement, has it been proven to work, is resilient does it make us self-reliant? Not one asked where does the money, the wealth come from when you cancel a countries future? How do you get to the future by removing the means for today before inventing what is needed for a sustainable resilient, self-reliant tomorrow.
‘socialism depends upon making and keeping people poor’ That’s its only creed, a divided Society of those have power and those they have as slaves. There are no equals just Rulers and Surfs
Reply I and some others talked about costs in the previous Parliament
August 27, 2025
How are we going to pay for all these imports?
August 27, 2025
OK my Trump rant over .. Thanks again. All the best.
August 27, 2025
Please stop ‘ranting’. It detracts from exploring the options and arguments rationally.
August 27, 2025
or maybe listen to the IMF if they take out a loan on rejoining the single market as frist step to recovery for UK.
That must be your worst nightmare John.
August 27, 2025
No that’s not the worst nightmare. The worst nightmare concerns the collapse of the Euro, a currency which is backed by no country, no government.
And now they are issuing bonds against this currency.
When it collapses who picks up the debt? How do bankrupted member states refloat their own currencies and what value within those currencies have?
What is the alternative to re floating their own National currencies when the member states have no ‘club’ in which to be a member?
You Rejoiners must have thought about all of this. What are the answers?
August 27, 2025
56 criminals were illicitly shipped, into the UK yesterday on the 26th August from France…
August 27, 2025
Let’s do some calculations. 50 x £500,000.00 = £25 million added to Rachel’s black hole just yesterday.
August 28, 2025
Even if a migrant were to end up costing £500k all usually intelligent people who look at the potential cost to the country say it would be over the migrant’s lifetime, ie over more than 30 years. So the Chancellor does not have to add up £500k per new migrant on the day they set foot in the UK.
August 27, 2025
From a tent to a 4 star hotel. It’s a no-brainer.
August 27, 2025
A lot of angry people on the roads this evening ….they must be competing with someone somewhere.So sad what constant competition does to people.