I was sent this recently. I have not checked all the figures but thought it worth reproducing:
According to the ONS, in 1991, public sector employment was 5.985 million.
Now it is 5.76 million.
There has been plenty of outsourcing and contracting out over this period.
In 1991, public spending was 180 billion pounds. (central government)
This year it is projected to be 1062 billion pounds.
That is nearly six times as much.
This dwarfs inflation.
In 1991, GDP was 705 billion pounds.
It is now 2400 billion pounds or three times as much.
However the increase in GDP is dwarfed by the increase in government spending. Indeed, half of the increase is debt funded government expenditure.
In 1991, government debt was 154 billion pounds. Now it is 2200 billion pounds. 14 times more.
In 1991, spending on health was 27.5 billion pounds.
Now it is 210 billion pounds. This is EIGHT times more.
The population has increased by 10 million in that time or 20%. Mostly immigration. Half of it since 2010.
Average house prices have quadrupled.
There has been substantialĀ inflation over those 30 years, just not in the basket of items in CPI or RPI.
Comment
The general trends outlined here are right. Real public spending has climbed substantially. This has often not resulted in productivity or quality gains. There has been substantial inflation and large flows of migrants. Government debt has soared.
The last decade since 2007 has seen a poor productivity performance, the closure of too many industrial activities and too great a growing dependence on imports.
July 20, 2022
No government will address these trends. Some are never even mentioned.
July 20, 2022
The increase is exacerbated by the need for many more officials to deal with your mountain of brexit red tape and complexities, and also to do practical things like carrying out checks on goods at your beloved borders.
Then there are all the workers needed to deal with the health and social problems caused by Tory-led inequality, with some of the worst deprivation in Europe being now right here.
You voted for it, repeatedly, so own it and enjoy it.
July 20, 2022
Ridiculous NHL
The timescale is from 1991.
July 20, 2022
And your party and govt presided over the majority of it! Shows how long the scam of saying one thing when doing the exact opposite has been going on.
The Tory party has voted for defeat at the next election. So there is a silver lining. Labour will get in. Undoubtedly Sunak will try to buy welfare votes for 2024, however the workers, strivers, savers and prudent cannot afford your party any longer.
Perhaps by 2024 Sunak will give mortgages to illegal immigrants as well as those on welfare! Mass immigration has also soared when comparing your figures to 1991 another series of broken promises against the wishes of the public.
July 20, 2022
You’re well named, Hope. An ‘election’ will make no difference. The die is cast. A cross on a piece of paper will change nothing – it’s all pantomime with a script already written.
July 21, 2022
Reform Party.Lynne. I think Tice and Farage will see the opening that the former Tory party has left.
No one in their right mind would vote for Sunak after his appalling high tax and spend budgets and he states he wants more of the same! Truss a firm remainer who went to N.Ireland to plead a remain case. Now in charge of the N.Ireland protocol!
Both originally were not Tories, Sunak as a teenager and Truss at university. Both having received good educations demonstrates careerists who did not think they would get very far in high office in their preferred Lib Dem party.
July 20, 2022
Sadly Hope, I have to agree with every word you say. Sad times for this country.
July 21, 2022
‘The Tory party has voted for defeat at the next election’
Maybe, but they appear daft enough to think any of the candidates will win the next GE, because ruling is their right.
What a shock is coming…
July 20, 2022
Because we are well past the point of no return.
As Dr Tim Morgan of Surplus Energy Economics put it in his latest newsletter*:”the UK economy is at an advanced stage of falling to bits.”
(*#235.”The Afforability Crisis-What’s really happening”,15/7/22.)
See also Dr Michael Hudson’s latest piece:”Finance Capitalism’s Self-Destructive Nature”-Michael-Hudson.com,18/7/22.
(The works of both these sages are google-able and free to view).
July 20, 2022
This government tends to have spend & borrowing without a strategy or policy
We’re about to elect a new leader, but apart from lowering or highering taxes, staying in the ECHR, and following the mad policies of net-zero….what this conservatives party policies (the last manifesto policies went in the bin)
July 21, 2022
‘spend & borrowing’ !
Isn’t that what socialist parties do?
Oh – and SNP of course, but then whining at Johnson got the debts cleared.
9
July 20, 2022
Good morning.
Well what did you expect when you get rid of a PM and a government determined to control Public Spending and replace it with a pro-EU PM who supported the ERM and destroyed the Tories reputation for economic prudence, thereby allowing Labour (piss-borrow and a waste), followed by over tens years of the same from your own party.
Reading the comments from others there is a serious disconnect between we, the governed, and those (MP’s and the Establishment) that govern.
We feel your mistakes.
July 20, 2022
@ Mark B – the “you” in your comment means anyone presumably since it cannot reasonably mean Sir John whose record of course includes actively seeking to end Major’s doomed premiership.
There is always some measure of disconnect between the governed and the governors and that it can be lessened daily here is why this unique diary is such a marvellous resource.
July 20, 2022
Mark,
The point is no Government has properly controlled spending and borrowing since 1991. To be fair, Europe and the USA have done the same. In this time of all diversity being worshipped, Governments and central banks have largely show group-think and lack of any new ideas.
Shrink the state, allow the UK as entrepreneurial as possible and make borrowing cost money.
In the words of the 19th Century economist Walter Bagehot “John Bull can stand many things but he can’t stand 2% (interest rates)”. Bagehot’s point was that a 2% borrowing rate was too cheap and encouraged wasteful or speculative spending.
July 20, 2022
Inflation 9.4% last month – so well done tax, borrow, print and piss down the drain Rishi!
“a pro-EU PM who supported the ERM and destroyed the Tories reputation for economic prudence” I blame Thatcher for appointing someone who failed maths O level as Chancellor. A man who did not even appologise for his ERM fiasco.
Result Labour 418 – Conservative 165 result three terms of disaster from Blair and Brown.
July 20, 2022
Even this is understated for many poorer peoples real rates.
July 20, 2022
+100 Mark B and LL.
The Tories out socialising Labour! Sunakās record is appalling. 40 year high inflation today, as JR pointed he did not have to print the additional Ā£150 billion!
If he fails as PM I am confident he will be able to get his US green card and his wifeās non Dom status back ASAP. Why did he have this as a cabinet member? That is trust and loyalty to party and country for you. What did everyone imagine when he moved his family out of Downing Street weeks before his resignation?
July 20, 2022
Large falls in GDP per capita too since 2008 or so. Mainly due to bloated and inept government, open door low skilled immigration, more incentives not to work and fewer to work – due to higher taxes, the net zero insanity and OTT regulations.
July 20, 2022
Nice post Mark. It’ll take more than a couple of paracetamol to cure this headache.
July 20, 2022
Such figures are a damning indictment of Tory appeasement of Labour’s unionised power bloc that now controls all areas of the State. The Tories simply abuse the private sector taxpayer to throw cash at the Left to appease them and to keep them sweet at our expense. We are seeing this today with public sector workers now receiving ever greater levels of pay awards that cannot be justified by any standard but awarded under threat from strikes.
I am convinced that should the so called Left managed to get their hands on the taxpayer chequebook and the remaining levers of power they currently do not claim, they will embed a system of parasitism and anti-democratic authoritarianism that will make the Tories Socialist appeasement culture since 1991 look like the proverbial picnic
Inordinately high levels of debt financed public spending is both a failure and moral weakness of elected rightist governments and a success for the forces of the regressive Left who use their organised power to extract privileges or else…
The private sector employee is routinely abused to finance the now privileges of unionised State employees and it seems the Tories couldn’t give a toss just as long as they can silence the unions
Not one single Tory MP condemns public sector strikes or public sector privilege
July 20, 2022
Indeed.
The extended family of my husband are nearly all public sector employees.
What a jolly they are on.
One or two are aware of the waste of taxpayers money on non-jobs, various schemes here and there centred on trying to find problems that don’t exist. They relate stories of waste and all round incompetence of some in higher office with good humour because having never worked in the private sector they can’t imagine how this just cannot go on without everything collapsing.
Of course those in the non-jobs come up with all sorts of time wasting exercises to justify their salary.
July 20, 2022
+1 but not one Tory MP? Some do.
July 20, 2022
+many
They have virtually handed over governance to the unionsā¦masks, chevrons and all the Marxist controls so beloved of the Left.
July 20, 2022
Working from home in the public sector is an actual pay rise, cut cost of commute and get tax reduction for working from home and cut working hours! What is not to like in local authority or MoD land! Productivity is for the private sector to pay for the largesse.
July 20, 2022
I know nothing about economics, but wouldn’t some of these figures be accounted for by the Covid pandemic, and the War in Ukraine?
July 20, 2022
This when so much public spending is pure waste, producing little or nothing of any value and much doing net positive damage. The value delivered by most public services is abysmal and often non existent. The NHS is a sick joke killing and failing millions through delays and incompetence 6.5 million awaiting treatment and still rising. We have large excess non covid death currently. Even emergencies calls have to wait hours for ambulances. Defence procurement is appalling see the recent article on the aircraft carriers without catapult systems. Degrees and student debt for all, but most have little or no value. Schools very poor in general with much left propaganda on global warming and woke drivel thrown it to. Billions on rest and trace, eat out to help out and a huge bloated state sector or not remotely peerless civil servants. Border controls that are yet another sick joke. Transport seems to be about mugging motorists and blocking roads amd wasting billions on HS2. The police are rarely interested in tackling or deterring and real crimes below murder. Clear up rates are abasement, crime reporting fiddles and deterred.
July 20, 2022
“The population has increased by 10 million in that time or 20%. Mostly immigration. Half of it since 2010.” – so a 5 million increase since 2010 when the pledge of “tens of thousands” might mean around half a million. And still they come, swelled by the dinghy invasion.
July 20, 2022
Libido works naturally to maintain population and increases.
The Govt lost self-control and hooked itself on a spiralling population import frenzy.
Now they seek rehabilitation in Rwanda.
July 20, 2022
I’m tempted to say Rwanda may be preferable to the UK in a few years time. The UK isn’t such a good place to live and work these days, unless you are a public sector worker, or on benefits!
July 21, 2022
‘Libido works naturally to maintain population and increases’
are you referring to a run of our PMs – there is an exception as always.?
July 20, 2022
Well, you’re going to have to wield that fiscal red pen. I would suggest that you go further in backtracking from the Blairite push to send half of our children to study at university.
July 20, 2022
And in that period the Conservatives were in power for 18 years and Labour for 13 years so we know who to blame – both of you.
July 20, 2022
Who would have thought imported unskilled and alien third world migrants then giving them money and houses would have caused soaring government debt and massive rises in housing costs?
Isn’t it a good job that we have politicians to manage our economy so skillfully that the native population struggle to afford housing, power, fuel, and huge rises in taxation and now tell us we have to give up heating, lighting, travel and eating real food?
It’s such a relief that they can provoke wars so that blame for their gross incompetence and criminality can be shifted to Russia and China.
And now we have even more restrictions to free speech and freedom in general with yet another evil bill being railroaded through.
All good news for the great Reset so that we can own nothing and be slaves.
July 20, 2022
… and stop borrowing money to give away to other countries.
July 20, 2022
“Donors have poured $1.2 trillion [sic] of development assistance into Africa since the end of the Cold War, a figure that could double if it included unofficial charitable giving. While one might discount the value of aid before 1990 – given that the Cold War motives were strategic and ideological rather than primarily developmental — since then this rationale has failed. As such the development opportunity cost and wastage are staggering. ‘Aid has been more a disincentive to development in most cases; other than humanitarian aid in national disasters, foreign aid as an in instrument of development must be accepted as “tried and failed”.’ ”
from the book Expensive Poverty by Greg Mills, published by PanMacmillan SA
July 21, 2022
and exploitation by China.
July 20, 2022
Never, other countries take priority over the UK taxpayer.
July 20, 2022
Agree…..we’re just holding them back by funding dictatorships
July 21, 2022
“Holding them back”
That’s the whole point,always has been for the Anglo-American Establishment.The Japanese invested in their empire which is why former colonies of theirs-Korea and Taiwan-have subsequently been successful.
July 20, 2022
What an indictment of the Major, Blair/Brown, Cameron/Clegg, May and Johnson Governments.
And now the Globalists, British Establishment and 118 CON MPs want Sunak as Prime Minister, so he can continue with the destructive policies which have brought this country to its knees.
Not one of the last 3 candidates for PM will do anything to reform the Public Sector and cut public spending let alone implement any genuine reform of our Governmental Institutions – starting with the Civil Service and then the House of Frauds.
I will be voting for Reform … and if that means Labour “wins” the next GE so be it. The destruction will continue, just as it will if the CONs “win.”
July 21, 2022
Agreed.
Saying I forgive Cameron, I forgive May, I forgive Johnson, just will not wash anymore.
Does the electorate REALLY forgive THAT much?
If so ‘we are doomed Mr Mainwaring’.
‘Don’t panic has been poor advice to the Tory voters’.
July 20, 2022
An interesting addition to todayās blog:
the BoE inflation calculator @ bankofengland.co.uk
or in2013dollars.com > uk > inflation > 1991 āValue of 1991 British pounds todayā
According to the latter the Ā£ has lost 58% of its value since 1991.
Or as otherwise shown on fxtop.com, looking at the depreciation of various currencies between 01/01/1991 and 31/12/2021:
USD 100 becomes 209.08, EUR 100 becomes 180.62, GBP 100 becomes 199.97
July 20, 2022
This is all the dry bean counters stuff that seems to be the only thing many consider when it comes to the health and wealth of a nation.
Most of it is common sense anyway and yet an army of dry bean counters employed by the state to ‘state the bleedin’ obvious’ to many in the general public.
We have no industry, we rely too heavily on goods from abroad and from regimes who could cause untold trouble should they decide to cut up rough. We have a ruling class who seem averse to giving good quality education/training to our own people, the best asset a nation has is those with a deep rooted connection.
The same people want to rely heavily on foreign investment instead of investing the tax payers money in house. For some reason that is seen as a very bad thing, the money apparently is far more helpful if spent abroad!!!
Overspending especially to impress others leaves you with little to show except a huge bill at the end of it.
Borrowing more to continue compounding the initial error means whoever is controlling the purse strings is an idiot of epic proportions and should be removed.
So should all those in power and looking to be so, who want to run this country for the benefit of others, be it some big corporation or yet another minority grievance group.
They won’t remove themselves so it really is up to the electorate.
July 20, 2022
Plus inflation x millions of misery, suffering, anxiety, animal cruelty, unwanted noise, pollution and STRESS.
And all because governments canāt just do their jobs and LEAVE US ALONE!
July 20, 2022
And everyone said the introduction of computers would reduce administration costs.
July 20, 2022
Frightening, yet still many people crave for more Public spending and borrowing thinking that is the way forward.
Perhaps they should be reminded the Government has no money, only that which it takes from the people
July 20, 2022
We have all got used to living beyond our true means.
Easy credit and cheap money.
Artificially suppressed interest rates.
All banks do is dangle loans at ridiculously low rates.
We are living on the Never Never and have been doing so since the 1990s at least.
Look at SUVs parked on the concerted over front gardens of modest terraced houses.
Too much money chasing too few goods and services.
July 20, 2022
Please SJ can we be specific. Is the predominant lack of productivity in the public sector or the private sector. I find it hard to believe that the private sector is carrying gross lack of productivity and still managing to stay in business. It is long overdue that productivity figures are given separately for each sector. If we can produce rich lists and school performance lists why not productivity lists within each sector. We would then know where to aim improvement measures.
July 21, 2022
Agricola :
Would not the ECHR, if not our own courts, declare your suggestion as slavery?
July 20, 2022
I see that you are urging your fellow Tory MPs to switch their support from Rishi Sunak to Liz Truss.
I have no vote on this at any stage but I think that Liz Truss is most likely to pursue the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill because she introduced it. I do not trust her, but I trust both Rishi Sunak and Penny Mordaunt even less.
July 20, 2022
None of this will change with any of the candidates the Conservative party put up. As Tugendhat said, time for a clean start, but not in the way he meant. A really Clean Start. Right now it looks very difficult to see how this will be achieved.
The path which more likely is a PM who fights with the population for two years to keep pay down while still throwing money at benefits and overseas, EU, immigration whilst vowing to tackle them, followed by a Lab-SNP-Libdem alliance
July 20, 2022
Leadership electionā¦Pah!
More like miscarrying of a saviour!
Typical. Terror of right wing politics?
July 20, 2022
Good morning,
āThere has been substantial inflation over those 30 years, just not in the basket of items in CPI or RPI.ā
Quite true.āThere has been even more inflation over the 51 years since 1971 and the Nixon Shock.āSee how many charts show a change starting in 1971 or soon after at https://wtfhappenedin1971.com
July 20, 2022
Illegal immigrants now amount to around 120,000, all a nett burden on the UK economy. why can’t we put them to work. Their willingness to solve the seasonal labour shortage in the farming sector being the difference between the certainty of a trip to Rwanda and the possibility of permanent settlement. As things stand they are going nowhere but casting us a fortune. During WW2 we created a very successful Women’s Land Army why not an Immigrant Land Army. A step that moves from costing to producing sounds like productivity.
July 20, 2022
Agricola. I suspect the lefty woke lawyes would class it as slavery. Much better that the indigenous population are slaves to pay for it all.
July 20, 2022
Scary public spending by stealthy and off the Balance sheet sleight of hand.
July 20, 2022
Wow. Spending on health has gone up 8 times and the NHS is 10 times worse. Take the budget back to 1991 levels!
July 20, 2022
31 years of what can only be described as appalling governments. 13 years of Labour. 18 years of Tories.
Itās time for your party to do the decent thing and disband. You should be exiled really for, quite frankly, completely screwing this country. No tin pot 3rd world dictator has done worse.
July 20, 2022
Lessons that so very few in parliament seem to understand.
We have never asked for a huge nanny state, high spending and high taxing, big brother government — but that is what we have now.
To quote that famous phrase from a Tory PM, who failed us badly, when economic innovation started to become ideology:
Things could have been so much better if we’d had a PM. at that time, that fully understood the lessons so many still ignore today!
It is still not too late to put thee mistakes right.
July 20, 2022
The 1991 data is being highlighted because it celebrates(?) the Pound Sterling today, having half the purchasing power that it had in 1991; 2.3% per year inflation. The expansion to 511,000 employees in the Civil Service for March 2022, up from 416,000 at the time of the referendum. There are now 3.54 million persons employed by Central Government, out of the 5.74 million employed in the public sector. Local authority schools becoming academies are now on the central government payroll.
July 20, 2022
I note you keep saying Central Government and blatantly avoid allowing for the rise of Quangos and Quasi Government Authorities
July 21, 2022
Look up the definition of Central Government. It includes all public bodies.
July 21, 2022
Strange definition of Central Government if it includes all agencies quangos and authorities outside central government.
You learn something every day.
Catching up the public sector in terms of numbers emplyed is very worrying trend.
July 20, 2022
One significant factor in all this is the change in attitude of voters. In my view, the voting public have gone soft.
Margaret Thatcher towers above all other British politicians. She raised our status in the world like no other leader but her most important contribution, domestically, was her insistance that the population needed to be self-reliant and not dependent on handouts. In this she succeeded, and the result was a significant change in attitudes – for a decade we became a self-sufficient, can-do society.
Since she left office, as every new difficulty occures, voters have become used to hearing that “they” ( the government/local councils/charities) have to do something about it. Voters no longer think that they need to stand on their own two feet and solve problems themselves.
Sadly, I believe that things have become so bad that I don’t think that Margaret Thatcher, or any credible successor, could be elected today. Boris was elected to get Brexit done but for everything else, he had to just spend more and more money. That’s a pity because if he hadn’t been faced with the pandemic and Ukraine-fueled energy crisis, his 80 seat majority could have allowed some significant progress to be made, especially in the face of a pathetic group of opposition parties. But, with his over-generous Furlough scheme as an example, I don’t think a semi-socialist, Sunak-led Treasury would have allowed it.
No government has ever properly got to grips with the NHS, Defence procurement or any other big ticket public sector activity. Just look at the HS2 debacle !
July 20, 2022
“The population has increased by 10 million in that time or 20%. Mostly immigration. Half of it since 2010.”
In the same time period, the population aged 65 or over has increased at a higher rate than this (9 million to 11.1 million, or 23%).
How do the costs of paying more (triple-locked) pensions, healthcare and social care for the growing percentage of the population factor in to increased public spending?
How much does the fact that this part of the population is more likely to vote Conservative factor in to government decisions on spending in these areas?
July 20, 2022
Ah the Ponzi Scheme argument.
Younger new arrivals also get old.
July 20, 2022
And Peter you are assuming no recent arrivals are aged 65 or over.
July 20, 2022
The conservative party is intent on installing the architect of the problem into number 10š³
RIP Tory party ā°ļø ā°ļø
July 20, 2022
We need a Thatcherite reset which is impossible with our civil service and BBC
July 20, 2022
Cancel HS2.
Cancel EPR reactor plans, too late to cancel Hinkley C. Keep financing SMRs.
Reduce Overseas aid to Ā£3 billion for emergency use only.
Tax windfarms and solar by an amount equal to their subsidies. Force ‘renewables’ to guarantee a capacity factor of 90%+, now for new connections to the Grid, in five years for currently connected boondoggles.
If we go into depression (a few wrong decisions, not an impossibility with this shower, could do this) then big public works like extending the gas Grid, building a water Grid from NW to SE where all the immigrants want to live. If things get this bad then inflation will be less important than getting the wheels of commerce working.
But first: Frack, you fools.
JF
July 20, 2022
According to the ONS CPI inflation from 1991 to 2022 is 2.39 times, and CPI excludes House price inflation. The Bank of England Inflation calculator gives 1.857 times to 2021. Against either of these, Government Spending has ballooned, and a Conservative Chancellor was in charge (but cearly not in control) for 18 of these 31 years.
I cannot see we have received any benefits from all this extra money, except perhaps in Education, but the improvements here owed more to the Academy and Free School schemes than to extra money, and it is now evident that the Blob is doing all it can to throw these gains away.
It is very clear than money is no solution to the huge problems of the NHS, but failure by any politician to confront them.
It is so much easier to pursue unmeasureable objectives such as Net Zero, than it is to face up to what needs doing here and now.
July 20, 2022
What depressing figures. It shows we have been going in the wrong direction.
July 20, 2022
May I suggest that this Government starts listening to experts such as Henry Bolton OBE, getting him on board to deal with illegal migration.
He was on TalkTV providing solutions, yet no one in Government wants to listen.
With another 15k already here in 2022, it is an issue that is costing us an increasing amount to deal with.
Another issue, if not resolved, will help cost your party a victory at the next GE.
July 20, 2022
What about wages over that time.
July 20, 2022
Let us hope that the CP membership show more common sense than the members of the parliamentary party who have put Sunak in the lead to succeed Mr Johnson. He has done his share of damage, adding substantially to the numbers in your post today, to the dire financial situation of the UK without giving him free rein to completely destroy the economy with net zero.
In fact, I wonder if Conservative party MP’s even want to win the next election having started with such a poor selection of candidates and then dumped the only two with good conservative convictions, especially Badenoch. The candidates who could easily defeat Starmer.
July 21, 2022
Perhaps Tory party members will think ‘ we ought to lose the next election, and let Labour tackle the f*** ups, then we can grab power back’.
However, I doubt the electorate will vote Tories back in.
July 20, 2022
@Sir John Redwood,
We need you as Chancellor right now – to get inflation / borrowing / economy under control.
Hire someone such as Boris Johnson (seriously) to advise you (and then get Boris back in as PM as soon as possible). You and him would balance out well. A good team. He would see you as a task master but that’s exactly what Boris Johnson needs. Just as you would benefit from him in other ways). And supported by Jacob Rees Mogg. (And Wallace as Foreign Secretary).
July 20, 2022
Raab as Home Secretary and Deputy PM.
July 21, 2022
OMG.
July 20, 2022
You were doing alright till the GLOBALIST’S show up on the seen, high wages and dividend bonuses for top paid for shutting industries down and importing deflation of goods to go to landfill, 2.2 trillion pounds to keep the show on the road for top earners here and elsewhere, most going to the property bubble built on low slow wages hence the low mortgage rates and cheap imports, leader of a council 1991 50,000 pounds, now 300,000 and up without pensions and bonuses, on top. Government computerize has been one of the big waste of money over the years, with systems that do not work and cost hundreds of billions along with calling in experts. They spend 25 billion a year on tec companies and tec start ups in the budget as give away’s and show nothing for it, that over 4p off income tax, now if they had spent 2.2 trillion pounds on renewing the country infrastructure and training for new industries and up dating house for the new world that,s coming, instead people with influence chose to inrich themselves and friend and neglect the people and the country. Wages should double to what they are now with interest rates at 5% for saving and pensions.
July 20, 2022
Would be helpful to see this in real terms.
July 20, 2022
In 1992 I bought two houses for Ā£50 and 60k. The present value is 10 times the original. Of course, if I am forced to sell because of impossible government regulations, the 28% CGT will be welcome to the Treasury. They are experts in the fleecing department.
July 20, 2022
Controlling Immigration should have been higher on the agenda than Brexit .
The European Union will one day lightly flounder – and end. But you can’t reverse years of uncontrolled immigration into this country and the evidence seems to be that it is still uncontrolled.
The main problem of Brexit was all the time and energy and focus it took up of Parliamentary time when all that could have been used to improve our economy.
I 100% support Sovereignty. But at the right time. With the right leader. And a proper plan.
And that’s the lesson: you need a proper plan and strong leader to carry out big things like this.
July 20, 2022
“In 1991, public spending was 180 billion pounds. (central government)
This year it is projected to be 1062 billion pounds.
That is nearly six times as much.
This dwarfs inflation.”
How much of this change is down to the centralising nature of this and other governments?
For example, every school converted to an academy changes from being funded by local government to being funded by central government (with employee numbers transferring similarly).
Currently, over a third of all schools are funded centrally. In 1991 there were zero academies.
July 20, 2022
Education is just one of many draws on the central government budget.
July 21, 2022
In 1991 it was a draw on local government budgets.
When comparing spending levels, it’s wrong to ignore deliberate policy decisions which shifted expenditure from local budgets to Whitehall and just compare numbers.
July 21, 2022
But then funding for local authorities has change as a result too.
July 20, 2022
You have spent 30 years in westminister on a nothing burger for the poeple and still have no plan’s to inprove their lot.
July 21, 2022
Standard of living have greatly improved over the last 30 years paul.
Their lot as you put it, is much improved.
July 20, 2022
The science denying CAGW and Net Zero will deliver the final ācoup de graceā.
July 21, 2022
It will be better for the CP, but not the country, for the Lab/Lib/SNP/Green coalition to win the next GE so that they pursue the CAGW/Net Zero they started to its ultimate and unavoidable crash and thus repeat Labourās 1978/9 winter of discontent but many times worse.
In the meantime all the Lab/Lib/Greens who fraudulently reside in the CP will hopefully have left the Party.
July 20, 2022
I don’t know about government spending but I do know I’m shelling out a lot more for food now. Everything is going up and not by a few pence. No wonder the animal rescue centers are full. Last week a pack of dig food was Ā£8 that’s up from Ā£5.50 a few months ago. Today it is Ā£8.75. It’s a joke.
July 20, 2022
Donāt worry about the cats.
Their owners have directed them to my garden where they demolish quite a few sachets!
Nasty people just stop feeding their pets.
July 20, 2022
Now there are two candidates left, which one should I vote for? I am a party member. I want someone who will think and act like a Conservative. Your advice, Sir John, would be greatly appreciated.
July 20, 2022
Ah Pelican, I think that if you go back to recent.posts on this site since the start of this beauty contest , you may get a flavout of Sir John’s thinking……
July 20, 2022
Pelican. I doubt Sir John will answer directly. But I will.
Vote Truss !!
Sir John has, after all, constantly criticised Sunak’s wrong taxation and economic policies.
July 20, 2022
What you say today in your diary, Sir John, is correct.
Unfortunately the Conservative Party has become ANYTHING BUT, a CONSERVATIVE party.
It no longer CONSERVES the LOW TAX, SMALL STATE, ideals it once had.
It no longer supports FREEDOM and PROSPERITY.
You are doing your best to steer it back.
I hope you succeed.
July 20, 2022
What would happen if the Chancellor were to decide to tax dividends at the same rates as incomes? Catastrophe, I already hear you shouting.
Well things might not be that simple (they never are).
When President Hollande (and his Finance Minister) decided to do such a thing in 2012, the financiers and various companies shouted till they had lost their voice ā¦ But companies impacted by this measure decided to reduce the dividends they were previously distributing. That increased the money they could use for self- investment (about a third of it) was used that way. This self-investment allowed the majority of the companies that did it to grow both in terms of developing new products and/or getting to new markets or investing into new machinery, which made these companies grow. The rest of money appears to have been used to provide better credit facilities to their customers, which indirectly also help these companies to become more competitive.
Obviously no neo-liberal economist would have forecasted such a behaviour.
āDividend taxes and the allocation of capitalā, Ch.Boissel & A. Matray, July 2021, 46 pp, available on haas.berkeley.edu
July 21, 2022
Income tax comes from employment.
There is no investment by the employee.
No real risk to the individual.
Dividends come from transfering savings into a risky investment.
Not all shares declare dividends every year and some shares go down.
Some PLCs even fail and occasionally you can lose your money.
There is a risk.
The difference in tax treatment allows for that risk and encourages investors to invest.
July 20, 2022
Average annual wages from 2000 to 2021 in pounds, 21 years 22,238 pounds to 39,184, not even double in 21 years, in USA dollars, 2000 to 2021 dollars 40.689 to 51,724, that,s the shocker, bearly 25% in 21 years.
July 21, 2022
I am reminded of the words of Canadian Conservative Politician Pierre Poilievre, at the finance sub-committee meeting, which was asked to approve CDN$7 billion of extra spending (ostensibly in relation to ‘Covid’ Measures)…
“Where’s the money coming from?” .
“Anybody care to answer? How many representatives from the finance department are here?Anybody….?”
“Who’s paying? Is it the Tooth Fairy…..”……….
July 21, 2022
And the conclusion? That government spending needs to be cut drastically, not just a little bit. Health and welfare expenditure is out of control and the free-at-the-point-of-consumption system, with no demand management other than waiting lists, is responsible. When is the political class going to face up to the simple fact that people are more willing to spend money on their own health and that of their family than that of strangers? The current system is consistent with pure Communism: “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need”.
The country is spending way too much on the retired elderly. We should limit drug patents to 5 years – and to Hell with big pharma – and be willing to substitute patented drugs with generic drugs. When NICE says an expensive drug that prolongs life by a few months is bad value for money, it shouldn’t be overruled by some do gooding, trouble making judge – and if necessary parliament must legislate to this effect.
I have a measure of guilt is this matter. At a recent F2F bridge competition, I compared notes with two other elderly people. I have received 4 years of dialysis treatment, two hip operations including a designer antibiotic to remove an infection, and 7 weeks of hospital treatment for an infection that entered my body via my dialysis line. Another person has disseminated cancer, from a melanoma that had spread to the lymph glands, and is being treated with immunotherapy. A third has chronic arthritis and a degenerating spine, has had 11 operations and is being treated with a drug that costs Ā£1000 a pop. Between us, we have cost the NHS Ā£2 million. It can’t carry on like this.
To revert to my main theme, this is Liz Truss’s election to lose, both against Rishi Sunak and Kier Starmer. But she must cut public expenditure as well as taxes. otherwise she has no credibility.