So why did Kwasi Kwarteng and Liz truss campaign against Treasury orthodoxy? And why did Liz truss then give a win to that same Treasury orthodoxy by sacking her Chancellor and imposing a business tax rise just as the fans of Treasury orthodoxy had always said?
     We cannot be sure. One of the strangest things was the absence of a definitive speech by either on what Treasury orthodoxy was, or why it was wrong. I think I know what they meant, but maybe my view was more conventional and restrained than theirs. The problem with challenging the establishment without explaining why or what you replace it with was you could end up losing, devoid a clear alternative. Nor was it any good sacking a High Priest of Treasury 0rthodoxy , the Permanent Secretary ,without having a ready replacement who did know what you meant and what changes you wished to make.
     I have argued for some time that the Treasury and Bank are necessary institutions to impose discipline. The Treasury should do a better job at securing value for money in the many public services we do want, and at resisting demands for those extensions of state services which we cannot afford. The Bank needs to concentrate on its prime aim of keeping inflation down to 2%. Both need to sharpen their models and forecasting abilities, as in recent years they have given bad policy advice based on worse numbers.
     The Treasury/OBR overstated the central government deficit by £121 bn last year. The very high number was used by Mr Sunak to justify unhelpful tax rises we did not need. Watching their model and forecasts over the years it has always had a tendency to understate revenues in an upswing and overstate them in a downswing, allied with an inability to see turning points in good time. They also do not credit revenue forecasts for some of the taxes with sufficient Laffer effect when rates are lowered, inducing more taxable activity. How can a Chancellor make good decisions when revenue can be so wrongly forecast from existing taxes? They need to amend their models to recognise the sensitivity of revenues to rates of growth and to allow that some taxes provide more revenue at lower rates.
     The Treasury was at its worst over social care. It needed to make the case that the state cannot afford to take on all the costs of residential stays for elderly people who can afford to pay for them out of their savings or money released from selling their old home they no longer need or use. That has been our system for many years. Of course all healthcare is and should be free, but board and lodging is for most people with means a cost on their own resources. Instead the Treasury reached a compromise which did not guarantee to protect the full inheritance for the children whilst entailing extra costs for taxpayers which led to the hated NI rise and social care tax. These were also insufficient to pay for all the potential liabilities being unleashed.
      The Bank was far too optimistic about inflation. For much of 2021 as it was busy creating £150bn more to spend on depressing interest rates on bonds the Bank assured us inflation would stay within the 2% target. Then as the year wore on it said any uptick would be transitory. As inflation prepared to hit 10% or five times target this year the Bank told us this was because of the unexpected Ukraine war hitting energy prices. So why then was inflation already at 5.5% or 2.75 times target before the war broke out? The Bank needs to take an interest in rates of change in money and credit. It does not believe that creating more money leads to more inflation, pointing out velocity of circulation or how frequently the stock of money is used can change as well. It should nonetheless be required to tell us if money and credit is growing quickly and provide a commentary if they think this is not inflationary to avoid them making the same mistake again.
      Which brings us to the question what should be the controls? There are currently three. There is the inflation control. This is crucial and needs to be better enforced. The government needs to adopt it as well as the Bank. As the government spends so much in the economy it needs to take the impact on inflation into account in all its actions. There is the target to keep interest charges down as a percentage of GDP or public spending. We need this, which should be based on the cash cost of interest payments made regularly to service the bonds. It should not include the extra eventual repayments on index linked bonds which will in practice just be rolled over , nor should there be any credits for the big devaluation of repayments of nominal bonds brought on by the current high levels of inflation . Cash is what matters. There is then the Maastricht left over, debt as a percentage of GDP. This leads to bizarre decisions. As it relates to later years the figures will doubtless be well out given the poor forecasting record. Instead of this the tough inflation requirement which will constrain public spending and borrowing should be complemented by a growth target. I think 2% would be stretching compared to where we currently are, though this government has gone for 2.5%.
      What the PM and Chancellor seemed to be saying was they wanted to break out of the debilitating cycle of low growth brought on by high  taxes, heavy regulation and an anti enterprise culture. The world does not owe us a living and finally last year the proponents of the Orthodoxy discovered their luck had run out in simply printing more money and keeping interest rates too low. We certainly need a new orthodoxy to replace that and to get on top of the inflation it has delivered. Growth is the way out. Growth does need lower tax rates, more investment, and a stronger spirit of enterprise. It also needs more control over spending, whilst ensuring great quality core services like health and education.
October 18, 2022
An excellent summary. So from this appalling mess, created by Osborne, Hammond, Sunak, the Treasury, the BoE, Bailey, the duff Tory MP’s coup and the blob how do we now avoid the disaster of Starmer & Sturgeon?
October 18, 2022
The PM and the now ex-Chancellor tried to do the right thing. They just went about it the wrong way.
October 18, 2022
That’s my view too. The right principles badly acted upon. Now where are we; frozen with high taxes heading into a bad recesion with too much debt and a european war. Worse than austerity under Cameron.
We’ve got to get back to real conservative principles, PCP have lost the book on that one. One thing is for sure, higher interest rates are coming, no matter what Sir J thinks is ‘right’.
October 18, 2022
Dear Peter–I thought that it was “Which austerity?” under Cameron. Truss was delusional about her policies. Wanting (who doesn’t?) low taxes and higher growth does not mean that you can abruptly go straight to the former and expect thereby to beget the latter. She is of course also delusional, but this time totally, about her future as PM. We do not have to be cruel but she has to go and go now. I think the less of her for not having quit last night. She has failed comprehensively. What is there to talk about? The idea of carrying along some kind of passenger PM is preposterous.
October 18, 2022
Hunt announced breaking your manifesto by raising taxes! Bear in mind he was in govt when repeatedly his govt promised to balance the structural deficit and pay down the debt, by 2015! Why is Hunt to be chancellor when he was in govt failing to honour several manifestos?
Who put him there JR? What are leavers going to do now?
October 18, 2022
Itâs a good question â âwho chose Huntâ as its wasnât Liz
October 18, 2022
Truss cannot stay. She will be seen as weak around the world. She will not be able to stand up for country or she will have to ask Huntâs permission everything. Her biggest mistake was her u-turns. She should have faced down the Gove type reptiles with threat of general election.
October 18, 2022
@Peter Wood +1 and now the naysayers are baying for blood in case any one else gets the idea of rocking the boat. Tax, more tax to feed massive bloat of the State, with no responsibility or accountability applied to any of it, it must be protected at all times.
October 18, 2022
Peter, the conservative party in Parliament are at odds with the Conservative Party outside. The divide is so great that their election hopes are zero.
I would suggest that each constituency chairman meets with his members and makes a judgement as to the degree their member is in fact Conservative. Those who fail the expectations of their membership should be told that their services will not be required beyond 2024. This I estimate to be between 30 and 50% of the current parliamentary party. There must be a re-adjustment of where power is centred. To achieve this before 2024 and to convince the electorate of a seed change in thinking is an enormous ask. The alternative is too appalling to contemplate.
October 18, 2022
Agricola, EXCELLENT plan! I would only add that the replacement for the encumbent be selected by the constituency, NOT Conservative Central Office – who have given us most of these flawed characters.
October 19, 2022
Absolutely. I am sick to death of democracy (and the electorate) being manipulated and destroyed by ALL the main parties. Democracy is a sham in the UK. It all started with Heath, the liar, and has gone downhill ever since! However, I am sure the EU will be very proud of having taught our politicians so well!
October 18, 2022
We ought to be putting pressure on Russia and Ukraine to end the European War. NATO could make a clear statement that it will not allow Ukraine to join it and will not place nuclear weapons in that country. With Putin threatening the use of nuclear weapons, we need to give him a way out of what he has started. Instead, we are spending billions stoking up the conflict. It’s very worrying.
October 19, 2022
But DB, the problem is that that doesn’t give NATO a way out of its campaign to ‘weaken Russia’ (US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin). Allowing Russia a peaceful existence with security guarantees is not the goal here.
October 19, 2022
NATO started it and NATO doesn’t want to end it (unless forced to) because the Eurasian coalition is destroying what NATO is there to protect (and that’s not the citizens of it’s member states;it’s the parasitic,neo-colonial financial system – or,as they disingenuously like to call it,the Rules-Based International System).
October 18, 2022
Lizâs plan and schedule was acceptable to the Tory MPs that voted for her and detested by the Tory MPs who didnât âŠand Iâm convinced that they threw a few spanners in the works
October 18, 2022
Iâve heard a number of financial economists say that, Mark B . Right thing, bad timing, not enough explanation, too much at once
Hunts new âbudgetâ has been described as a socialist one. Liam Halligan said the markets had factored in Kwarteng and Trussâ changes, so why did Hunt reverse them all?
October 18, 2022
Who told/instructed Liz to sack Kwarteng
October 18, 2022
They had no chance anyway as the Blob, Treasury, BoE and many Tory MPs seem determined to destroy Truss and her agenda.
Sir Edward Leigh asked âwhat is our vision?â If the goal is merely to manage decline, âwhat is the point of the Conservative Party?â
What indeed. To serve some Conservative MPs personal and their vested interests (who gives a damn about the public, voters or the country) seems to be the answer.
October 18, 2022
Well the markets didn’t believe them. That was the main error.
If the sales director comes to me saying “if I bought this machine I could increase sales by 30%” my first question would be to show me the customers who will buy product and when they will buy it. What are the margins, what are the ongoing costs? What’s your predicted cashflow? Will the demand survive an ongoing recession? What is Plan B if it all goes belly up and the machine sits there doing nothing?
To say “just sign the contract to buy the machine, we’ll borrow the money and worry about everything else later” is basically what happened here to and the company’s shareholders and creditors have a right to wonder whether the company will be around next year with that type of CEO/CFO behaviour. As a shareholder I’d want them out.
October 18, 2022
Mark B
Agreed, they knew the answer, but had no idea financially or politically, how to get there, and how best to move forward.
Thus no proper preparation or planning, and that inevitably leads to failure.
What a price we are now all paying because a past Prime Minister, popular around the World could not admit to a few minor mistakes, because few people and the media thought some meetings in Downing street, (a workplace for over 170 people and a home for the Prime Minister) was a party and a huge crime.
I was not a huge fan of Boris, but at least he looked the part, and you listened when he spoke.
October 18, 2022
I didn’t have a problem with the way they were doing it. Announce cancellation of tax rises – fine. So I await statements on how they will reduce public spending on waste. No need to reduce services.
I did think it was premature to announce a reduction in income tax. That ought to have waited until they demonstrated a reduction in the deficit.
Right way, wrong objections.
October 19, 2022
Agreed. Why the rush of the herd to say the same wrong thing?
October 18, 2022
Yep – she didn’t consult, she didn’t persuade, she didn’t ‘wargame’ and some of her prioritisation was poor. But the intent was good. Who has won? Sunak: the man who destroyed our economy and public finances.
October 18, 2022
Throughout the election everyone knew her policies and what she was going to do âŠso why so shocked
October 18, 2022
@Mark B +1 The critics, or more correctly âlook at meâ I am on the TV brigade. The best suggestion from them is to keep us under the thumb of the corrupters, the high tax and spenders. Or in other words they have no alternative plan just sore losers.
October 18, 2022
‘The PM and the now ex-Chancellor tried to do the right thing’ – a lot of what they were trying to do wasn’t rock science. Although a chunk of it was too focused on the super rich which would have had minimal impact on the economy whilst just annoying mainstream middle class Tories.
‘They just went about it the wrong way’ – which is the art of political leadership and leadership in general. Both useless.
October 18, 2022
I wonder the outcome if every Tory MP backed the plan
October 19, 2022
But Tories outside Parliament in business and so on were attacking this budget.
October 18, 2022
She was stitched up from day one.
October 18, 2022
+1
October 18, 2022
Whichever way they went about it the Bank and the Treasury would have combined to bring them down. Can you think of a single other country whose central bank has attacked its own government on behalf of foreign powers?
October 18, 2022
Agree
October 19, 2022
Correct, this was a planned operation.
If you follow the markets, the EU economy and the Euro are tanking even quicker than ours. The Globalists and International Bankers (in cahoots with the BoE) didn’t want a competitive UK on the periphery of the EU.
So they stopped it and got Hunt, a rabid Remainer installed, to prevent it. We will remain only semi-detached from the EU and forced to comply with their socialist economic model. Something approaching genuine Conservatism is not allowed in the UK.
October 18, 2022
It’s yet more wordy diversion if you ask me.
And to think that some here used to ridicule Italy for their changes of government.
Oh my days. At least they have elections when they do that.
October 19, 2022
They may have elections, but if the EU doesn’t like the winner it removes them and installs a puppet.
October 18, 2022
LL
As this CON party has lit its own funeral pyre, we can only hope that there will be a genuine conservative party with sufficient appeal to the electorate, to vote for. Currently, that is Reform.
October 18, 2022
Indeed but we have the FPTP voting system!
October 19, 2022
+ many. UKIP got millions of votes. It sent a very clear message to the non-democrats! They forced change without becoming a government. We need to do that again, and again, and again, until we get politicians who work FOR our country, and not against it!
October 18, 2022
We’re doomed to the endless spiral of decline. The once great Tory Party has at last shed its ski to reveal a socialist Party in hiding.
Nothing short of an implosion will change things.
Where’s Farage when you need him.
October 18, 2022
Today gas and nuclear providing 74% of generation. Wind 2.9%.
I bet Hunt wants more windmills.
National grid warn us of power cuts 4 to 7pm this winter. Your absolutely finished after the first one.
Chickens coming home to roost.
October 18, 2022
+1
October 18, 2022
Ian Wragg
+ 100s
October 18, 2022
+1
October 19, 2022
+ 1 Billion (Pootling small change for this Government)
October 18, 2022
Ian. I think Farage will make himself more in the public limelight very soon.
October 19, 2022
Farage: He is conducting a “People’s Forum” this week, GBN tomorrow evening 20/10, broadcasting live from the Kent coast town of Deal. ( 7- 8 pm although starts from 6 pm )
October 18, 2022
One thing is for sure: if the Conservatives do not get rid of Hunt with his fantastically ‘Tin eared to the public worries about energy costs and other things’, cooked up by the Treasury, policies then the the Tories are toast.
October 18, 2022
Martin Lewis reports that the middle classes will suffer worst from energy bills with little help. That pay/benefit gap getting ever closer… benefits are effectively index linked and wages will be chasing them if they aren’t already.
If a doctor can be expected to be cold why not a welfare recipient ?
October 18, 2022
Atlas
They are already toasted
October 18, 2022
LL,
Labour will be in power after the general election, get used to it. It is quite some feat to put Labour back in charge after they lost Scotland and seemed doomed forever.
Even if Conservatives lose badly, events may mean they are not completely finished. How voters break out from this two or three party malaise is the big question.
October 18, 2022
You say âWhat the PM and Chancellor seemed to be saying was they wanted to break out of the debilitating cycle of low growth brought on by âlowâ (high?) taxes, heavy regulation and an anti enterprise culture.â
Also brought on by high and hugely over complex taxes, heavy and misguided regulation, the insanity of the net zero expensive and unreliable energy agenda (letâs export whole industries agenda and the (increased) CO2 with them), complex & over restrictive employment laws, endless government waste, generally dire amd misdirected public âservicesâsuch police, the NHS, social care, schools, universities with endless duff & largely pointless degrees, transport, border force, criminal justice, HMRC, refuse, local authorities, planning system, agriculture regulations, water, the mess in Northern IrelandâŠ
October 18, 2022
+many
The whole horrible nightmare package!
You forgot HS2âŠ
And apparently the landings on beaches are far greater than they are letting on!
October 18, 2022
Well given the choice between a tent in wet cold Northern France or a warm country house spar hotel in the UK plus ÂŁ40PW which would you go for?
October 18, 2022
I predict there won’t be any spending cuts made to the Criminal Migrant Importation Fund: “free” ferry rides; “free” luxury accommodation; “free” GP surgeries/dentistry; “free” legal aid; “free” mobiles; “free” money; “free” criminal defence; and possibly in due course a “free” holiday in one of HM Prisons.
All absolutely essential and wise/efficient spending of our money.
October 18, 2022
Donna
You are sĂČooooo right
October 19, 2022
Donna: Yes, let’s see if Mr Hunt’s requirement for “serious cuts” impacts this particular fund, or are they just for the rest of us. The State just got bigger with 502 on 12 boats welcomed yesterday 18/10.
October 18, 2022
I’d add one thing to this list: Why is 2% inflation the right figure?
2% inflation still means the value of money falls by 2/5th over 25 years. Why not welcome a lower inflation rate whilst also setting a sensible cost to borrow money?
October 18, 2022
Truss at least get on the right side of the dangerous vaccines for the young debate. Excess deaths are currently running at about 200 per day 1500 per week many are of young people. Investigate the possible causes but surely the vaccination of the young who are at almost zero covid risk anyway is criminal so stop it?
See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil is not the way to go.
October 18, 2022
It’s a bit odd, that MPs who talked of nothing but âthe will of the peopleâ for years are deafeningly quiet on the subject now, don’t you think?
October 19, 2022
The will of the people was Boris and Cummins do you want them back?
October 18, 2022
Charles Moore in the Spectator asks:-
Why should Tom Watson be given a peerage and not Paul Dacre?
No sensible reason at all. Though he could do much good promoting his dieting tips for the obese or over weight I suppose:- Downsizing: How I lost 8 stone, reversed my diabetes and regained my health â by Tom Watson
October 18, 2022
ok so remove the word ‘hugely’.
October 18, 2022
Good morning.
We here have been warning about what the government has finally realised. You cannot live indefinitely beyond your means. A lesson politicians seem unable to learn.
Yesterday I made a quip about throwing my hat into the ring regarding being the next PM. Obviously it was not serious and I would be the first one to admit that I would make a terrible PM but, that is the point, I know my own limitations and can adapt and adjust.
There is simply too much government, and big government has to be paid for. I find it ironic that, the man who is now the Chancellor and calling for spending restrain and cuts, is the same man who wanted even tighter and longer lockdowns, equalling greater State debt.
Even from an outsider and someone who relies on people like our kind host to explain the inner workings of Westminster and Whitehall plus, other economic matters, even I could see that not all was right in the state of Denmark (Shakespeare). If I could see so too could the markets which, as Mrs.T once said to Harold Wilson, you cannot fool.
Soothing oil has been poured over troubled waters and let us all pray that, whatever we think of the Chancellor that he is able to steady the ship.
PS Thank you Mr. Speaker for allowing the Chancellor to speak to the markets rather than to just Parliament. A wise decision.
đ
October 18, 2022
The markets were apparently terminally horrified by the tax etc proposals.
Why not similar horror when entire economies were forcibly shut down?
Not to do with the enormous wealth transfer brought about by new pastures of opportunity?
October 18, 2022
+1 the long and pointless lockdown and the largely ineffective and dangerous Covid vaccines and the vast Sunak tax grab are a main causes of the current problems. Manifesto ratter Sunak the main cause of the current problems.
October 18, 2022
@Cuibono, The markets, read the US were concerned that a competitor to their already low taxes would give others the idea that competition was good and forward thinking. Their orthodoxy of getting others to subsidies their life style was seen to be a threat. It wasnât that a lowly UK would on it own cause much affect, but it we forward the idea to others that it works.
October 18, 2022
And the horror of expensive intermittent energy & the deluded net zero. Economic vandalism by government design and with no upside.
October 18, 2022
The markets were horrified by the Labour lead.
October 18, 2022
+1
October 18, 2022
A typically nice and logical summary.
HoweverâŠI suspect skullduggery!
Fight your way up to PM and then cede power within days?
There were no doubt always global longings there.
October 18, 2022
Sad
October 18, 2022
Cheer up. The public are cottoning on.
October 18, 2022
What a state this parliament has got itself into with all this back stabbing and skullduggery that is going on.
What a wake up call for the whole political structure.
If the UKIP, Reform and other pressure groups and come up with a joint agreement to actually work together then that will cause even more uncertainty. It is reported that a third of Labour members and supporter will shun them if they go in with the SNP.
Politics as we once know it are in for a seismic shift.
October 18, 2022
Turbo. I do hope the public are waking up to the fact that the 3 main parties will only give us more of the same rubbish. We desperately need a new beginning.
October 19, 2022
+ many. They have betrayed us far too often! Time to clear the stables!
October 18, 2022
Ann Widdecome suggested that the local conservative organisations should take their MPs to one side and threaten them with de-selection if they donât get behind Liz Truss. They have the power and should use it.
October 18, 2022
Unfortunately the people running the local Conservative organisations in many cases do not have views representative of either the membership or Conservative voters.
This is why there are so many Conservative MPs who do not represent their voters, who are not Conservatives and have no intention of fulfilling their manifesto promises and if they were honest would move across the floor to the Opposition benches.
October 18, 2022
My interpretation of all that is that Truss doesn’t have the wherewithal to communicate or understand that before dismantling she needs a solid replacement.
I’m not even sure about that, seeing as how she is a WEF/Liberal.
The Conservative party has only the intent to conserve the global corporate communism we seem to be sinking into.
People here are but mere economic counters on a board to be shuffled around or swept aside and replaced. Their pockets rifled through endlessly to shore up some other over spend and misspend.
A country run only as a business park to attract the big money, has to whore itself endlessly to keep pace.
What a sad and pathetic land this has become. A land of lying and cheating to be elected, all the while working against the very people who are the nation for a place at the top table of the outside corporate entities who deal only in money and misery it seems.
There is more to life than consumerism and economic spreadsheets and much more to national life which sadly has been thrown away.
Not until we have people running the show who actually care about the whole package and not some technocrat with an eye to their career after politics in one of the big supranational bodies, will we ever turn this mess around.
Wealth comes in many forms and a happier more secure nation of people who felt valued would bring riches.
I don’t expect dried up bean counters to grasp that.
October 18, 2022
What does Hunt hope to achieve? It appears he wants to drive all our industry and jobs abroad? What then?
October 19, 2022
Is he making the decisions? Isn’t he a puppet as Mr Sunak was? What can he know about it all?
October 18, 2022
It’s pitiful to see and she looked so content just sitting there surrounded by government ministers while her new chancellor shred her mini budget to pieces – she just sat there with vacant countenance – hard to believe we’re talking about the PM and the house of commons / maybe more like the house of horrors
October 18, 2022
Beautifully written and excellent content as ever. It is a fact that most political careers end in failure, many deserved, some a hostage to fortune. The Conservative Party is no longer the one you have served so well over many years and they are ignoring you with zero chance of a move back to the Right being in the clutches of the One Nation group, actually Social Democrats aligned with the centre left in Europe.
This means supportingâ things diametrically opposite to your beliefs. Sadly It is time to resign and leave with your reputation and honour in tact.
October 18, 2022
The gas and electricity support, National Insurance reversion and Corporation tax being held at current rates had been pre-announced and priced in by the markets without too much fall out.
The gas and electricity support was for too long as it turned out and was too comprehensive (furlough style monies being given away with no means of clawing it back) and the Chancellor’s rabbits of tax, stamp duty and further spending were more than was needed and smacked of profligacy, especially when not backed up by the increased take of forecasted growth.
This was amateur hour, six form debating and had the stench of hubris more often associated with the Brown era.
1p off income tax makes little difference to anyone but costs a fortune. Silly. And now a government must prop up the housing market to avoid a collapse. I suppose that is what the boat people are for.
October 18, 2022
Mid-range PAYE serfs will be paying this down for along time while benefits recipients get inflation matching increases.
Harly worth going to work – there is your productivity conundrum.
October 18, 2022
Some Conservative MP’s have made it clear that they are unhappy that the membership did not choose Mr Sunak, their preferred choice, and now continue to seek her dismissal.
What they should not be doing is trying to humiliate her.
They are a disgrace!
October 18, 2022
You lost, get over it
October 18, 2022
As someone very wise once said “The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples’ money.”
We’ve had 25 years’ of Socialism under Blair/Brown; Cameron/Clegg/Osborne/Cable; May/Hammond and Johnson/Sunak. The last 10 years of them with moronic “green” policies tacked on for good measure.
The money ran out a long time ago, so the Socialists printed more and more and now the wheels are coming off.
The people who created the mess in the first place have destroyed any hope of repairing the damage and are insisting “more Socialism” will work this time.
Welcome to Weimar Britain.
October 18, 2022
Good morning Sir John
I would suggest the Treasury/OBR over estimate was nothing more than political manipulation to justify unwarranted taxes rises.
No independent thought just the politics of ego.
October 18, 2022
” …..though this government has gone for 2.5%”. That’s surely out of date ? Nothing Hunt has done suggests he’s in the slightest bit interested in meeting a growth target of 2.5%, in fact quite the opposite as he’s engineered a deeper recession through his actions.
October 18, 2022
I was disappointed to see Hunt appoint such a large proportion of his new Economic Advisory Council from the ranks of asset managers rather than from businessmen who, you know, actually produce goods and services.
October 18, 2022
Not another Quango
October 18, 2022
In all this mess all we ever hear of is higher and higher taxes. Want more money just raise tax.
What we never hear of is the reduction of âbloatâ in the machinery of State. There is never a suggestion that the State is over grown and wasteful of âourâ money. There is never a suggestion of achieving âvalue for moneyâ in taxpayer funded entities.
The Quangoâs have been reduced as promised they have grown. Quangos all though taxpayer funded still have no political over site, accountability and no one is responsible for their output. Just jobs for the boys who couldnât find employment elsewhere, just like the HoL.
October 18, 2022
It would appear the OBR is a recent invention, previously the Treasury was responsible in ensuring budgets and expenditure was kept balanced.
Conclusion, just an invention to create another tier of taxpayer funding. More jobs-for-the boys
October 19, 2022
Just another device to sidestep responsibility.
October 18, 2022
John,
Well done , all good, with one exception.
Re “It needed to make the case that the state cannot afford to take on all the costs of residential stays for elderly people who can afford to pay for them out of their savings or money released from selling their old home they no longer need or use” dont agree at all. Because we need incentives in the system for people to “do the right thing”, eg save, look after their family, maintain their property so that it potentially can go to their children, etc. The costs of encouraging people to go on cruises, run down their savings, party, and do everything to make sure that they end up with little wealth when the time comes for them to need residential old age care are far higher than you realise. You encourage people to make sure they have no wealth, and spend on other things before the times comes, and they can and do adopt the party approach (and use various means to make sure the wealth is in their childrens names before the time comes).
It also class divisive, as most of the upper class use accountants, lawyers, and trust funds to avoid such costs, so its only the middle and working class taking the hit.
To say nothing of the reality that buying a run down shell of a property, and doing it up into something that is habitable for the family to live in… is often a family effort. Done over years of hard work in evenings and weekends. If youre just going to have the state take this away from the family when the nominal owner reaches old age, then you remove any incentive to put any effort into producing this nice house. Again the results of the stupid state incentives cost more than you think you save.
But apart from that one point well said.
October 18, 2022
I don’t agree with the approach of public money going to protect children’s inheritances. Individuals should as far as possible pay for their own care home costs. This really needs an insurance scheme that people can take out while they are well, if they want to protect inheritance. The 25% tax free pension allowance would be a good source of revenue for it.
Give credit to people whose medical conditions have prevented them working and building up a pension, but those who have squandered all they had, and the bone idle don’t deserve anything. Time for the charities to step in, if anyone has sympathy.
October 18, 2022
Mr. Redwood – can I ask – how are mortgage rates and the BoE base rate linked?
As I understand it banks create the money they loan as mortgages out of thin air. Each night all the lending by all the banks is totalled up and the net difference is paid from Bank A to Bank B. Itâs only this difference that is actual money. So, in no way are banks lending out customer deposits that they have to pay interest on.
Why, in that case, couldnât the mortgage rate be separated from other interest rates and simply be fixed, forever, at, say, 2%?
October 18, 2022
Health: I heard yesterday that 40% of the NHS was not in front line jobs. Yesterday I went to the local hospital for a minor check up. The number of staff there was astronomical. But we were kept waiting for about an hour as the only doctor sort of wandered round looking for some help. Efficient it was not. But all the front line staff were very good. What I did not see were any white British doctors. Why ever not? Lots of nurses, poreters and receptionists – just no doctors.
Education: I wonder of 40% of people who are in education are not actually classroom teachers?
Pay seems to favour Diversity Managers and so on. Why?
October 18, 2022
the main lack of diversity in the NHS is a lack of white people with working class accents in senior roles.
I was in hospital in a big city recently. The city has a population which is approx 80% white working class. Inside the hospital staff there is less than 5% white working class, and there mostly cleaning jobs etc. The nursing and medical workforce is almost entirely ethnic minorities, or public school.
there is nothing diverse about this.
October 18, 2022
An insightful article SirJ, which I endorse
We need to break the mould, currently there isnât a political party that promotes cutting taxes âŠ.and as Dom said thatâs âsadâ
October 18, 2022
From the MsM
âI want some more independent, expert advice as I start my journey as Chancellor,â Mr Hunt said.
Who pays for this â the taxpayer? Who holds them to account â no one.
Then what is the Treasury for, the BoE, the OBR for with a back up of the ONS, are they not independent experts. No one holds them to account
It is all a fudge to justify High Taxes with no one not even the Chancellor to be held responsible. The new TAX and spend Tories â Conservativism is lost
October 18, 2022
I note the BBC1 political correspondent was reporting on Parliament via a home webcam in his scruffs.
What is this about ? WFH now a BBC perk ? Or is it to perpetuate the atmosphere of lockdown crisis and emergency ? Almost as bad as using mood music to manipulate emotions during news items.
October 18, 2022
Not only do we see a coup that forced Truss to sack Kwarteng and appoint Hunt, but it would appear that our Government is now being ‘guided’ by the Economic Advisory Group and every single one of the four appointed Council members is a fund manager (including Blackrock) or as Hunt prefers to call them ‘an esteemed group of economic experts’. I’ve no doubt they are expert at lining their own pockets and those of their global masters. ‘Acting independently but not privy to market sensitive information’. Are we expected to believe this? Is anyone, anyone going to challenge this? I would be very interested to hear our host’s take on this.
October 19, 2022
Yes TOC, this was actually the most depressing element in Mr Hunt’s depressing package.
October 18, 2022
Look at the list of Tory chancellors of recent years, Cameronâs mate, P Hammond a remainer, Sajid another jobsworth, Rishi an establishment croney asleep at the wheel. The next two didnât get long enough or have the team they needed. Truss should have put J Redwood in or at Financial Secretary but she too made bad choices. Itâs probably too late now to avoid disaster at the next general election. Boris just needed to not break his own lockdown rules but clearly too much a fool. Wonât get settled now for a decade.
October 19, 2022
Sir John has ZERO chance of getting a responsible role in Parliament. He is a Brexiter. Need I say more?
October 19, 2022
Boris was not brought down because “he broke his own lockdown rules” (he didn’t), any more than Mr Kwarteng was brought down because “he went too fast” and “didn’t consult the [not fit for purpose] OBR”. Or Miss Truss because “she made mistakes”. It is the project of Brexit which is being brought down by very powerful forces.
October 18, 2022
Although “Growth does need lower tax rates, more investment, and a stronger spirit of enterprise” we are not getting that from Chancellor Hunt, are we?
Worse, the Truss-Kwarteng maladroit bumbling has discredited the preferred non-orthodox alternative. Brace for impact, as is said in aviation circles.
October 18, 2022
The Blob has won.
The Tory Party were the problem all along. They were in existence merely to give the impression that we have democratic choice but as soon as a *real* choice (outside of The Blob’s parameters) is made the country is made ungovernable.
The Tory Party are the biggest part of the whole charade. They have stolen the name ‘Conservative’ from us and pose as our representatives.
There is nothing ‘Conservative’ about what this 12 year rule has done to us. The country is beyond recognition and not in a good way. Around here it looks as though there has been a break out from every prison in the county.
General election now please, you bunch of fakes (JR excluded.)
I want to give the Tories such a kicking that BLM will take the knee in sympathy to them.
October 18, 2022
Our fate is sealed.
A Red/Green coalition will have no compunction in legislating in any manner they choose to stop the Tory Party gaining power in the foreseeable future.
The right ideas, appallingly badly executed.
October 19, 2022
The main cause of the Conservatives’ demise is the dissolution of loyalty and conviction within their party. Now we are in the absurd position of witnessing a reamainiac coup but with Brexiteers being sent out every day to justify the sabotage.
October 18, 2022
While I admire your loyalty and propogation of true Conservatism your energy and enthusiasm is wasted on the current conservative party of predominant globalist wets. They are somewhere between the Bounty and the Marie Celeste. Time to get off and leave this rebellious crew to the judgement of the electorate and the yardarm.
October 18, 2022
I’m afraid he’s right Sir John – the PCP is suffering from dissociative personality disorder and I don’t think the DrJekyll side can control Mr Hyde anymore, if it ever could.
October 18, 2022
It will not matter whose orthodoxy is used if the economy and consequently the country is destroyed as a result of the CCA/Net Zero Strategy to zero our 1% contribution to global CO2 emissions.
There is no climate emergency/crisis. Average global temperature is increasing by only 0.13 degrees C per decade and the Antarctic Vostok Ice Core Data shows CO2 follows temperature and not vice versa as claimed. CO2 levels are at their lowest for 500 million years since the start of the Cambrian explosion and came down at the last ice age, which ended just 11,000 years ago, to 180 ppm just 30 ppm above the minimum below which plants cannot survive. We need more CO2 in the atmosphere to promote plant and hence food growth and not less.
October 18, 2022
Correct
October 19, 2022
I get the impression there are more people daring to say this now.
October 19, 2022
Correct, but the idiots in Parliament …. hardly a STEM degree amongst the 650 members ….. have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about. They’re as brainwashed as the kids in school and the drones in our “universities.”
October 18, 2022
Excellent summary. The mini budget was approved by the CBI, IOD and FSB. Unfortunately it was too far too fast, but the right direction. Public spending has to be controlled, but an increase in corportation tax will repress the growth which provides the tax. The chancellor has yet to show how he will encourage growth to provide tax.
October 18, 2022
Just wait for the next stage when the globalists take people’s life savings from their bank accounts as they did in Cyprus. Bank bail-ins will be the norm. The small print in banks’ terms and conditions has already been amended to facilitate this.
At the same time, we will see a concerted attack on our food production as is happening in the Netherlands, New Zealand, and Canada.
Can’t people see the plan yet? This is a war against the people. Concentrate peoples’ minds on one problem whilst planning further catastrophes for down the line.
Create so many problems that democracy is removed and we have a dictatorship imposed on us. All for our own good of course.
October 19, 2022
+1 They need the chaos to justify seizing power ….. we have just seen an example in Westminster.
October 18, 2022
180930Z
My thoughts exactly, Sir John. I’d add however that Miss Truss’s (and presumably Mr. Kwarteng’s) understanding of the timing of events in the real economic World seems to have been woefully short.
In addition to having a ready replacement for the P.S. she ought to have had an Austrian-school actor in place at the Bank before launching her campaign. It was absurd to have H.M.G. pulling one way and the Bank the other.
But the biggest thing, as you imply, is their failure to bring Bernard and Sir Humphrey along with them!
Î Î
October 18, 2022
LL
As this CON party has lit its own funeral pyre, we can only hope that there will be a genuine conservative party with sufficient appeal to the electorate, to vote for. Currently, that is Reform.
October 18, 2022
The Tory leadership election process took a number of weeks and everyone knew what Liz had planned, her schedule for implementation and desire for growth
The markets knew her plan and during the final couple of weeks when Liz was ahead in every poll, didnât indicate their dissatisfaction; in fact the Tory majority where in favour of her lower tax plans
I believe that the higher taxation lobby and the disgruntled MPs that didnât like the election outcome have nobbled the markets
October 18, 2022
No government can exist without effective and experienced leadership ; effective communication is also essential if public trust is to be won . Electing Truss as PM was wrong and the events that have followed have now placed the Conservative Party in a terrible dilemma . Cabinet colleagues who make comments of support are simply wasting time of the inevitable and Brady must now act fast to effect a replacement with his eyes focused on the election in 2 years time .
October 18, 2022
Liz was – Environment secretary (2014â2016), Justice secretary and lord chancellor (2016â2017), Chief secretary to the Treasury (2017â2019), International trade secretary (2019â2021), Foreign secretary (2021â2022)
I can’t recall anybody questioning her experience & leadership before
October 18, 2022
Certainly agree with most of this Sir John – I didn’t see mention of cutting/removing much of the red tape that small business has to cope with but assume that you would agree with that too. There seems to be no understanding of SME’s in this country – either in terms of what they need to prosper or how important they are to our economy. I frequently thank my lucky stars that I no longer have to worry about where the money is coming from to pay for salaries and premises, as I am fortunately long retired.
The PCP has thrown the baby out with the bathwater and we now have the ‘Establishment’ completely in control. These are the same people who thought it made tremendous sense to keep printing money and nailing interest rates to the floor since 2008. Easy to blame L&K for recent events but Gilts are creeping up again this morning and there no real reason to think that anything has really changed globally. A great debt ‘spring’ has been fully wound and it has to unwind sooner or later.
October 18, 2022
Why has Liz Truss given up? Gone from fighting and determined to a silent withdrawn zombie? What has been going on? What is the hold that the globalists have over the Conservative party?
October 18, 2022
Democracy itself is in grave danger if third parties are controlling & manipulating top levels of government
October 19, 2022
Democracy has already died, killed by the undemocratic remainers. There are too few democrats left in Parliament to give hope of a return. We need to clear out the Augean stables! It wouldn’t surprise me if they made Verhofstadt PM! Maybe not quite yet, but we are getting there! The anti-democratic corruption is so blatant now!
October 18, 2022
John C.
The PM in her Monday morning press conference looked like she was a hostage in a recording set up by her captors.
October 18, 2022
In the mean time the morale of the wealth creators in the U.K. is in the sewer. Germans are âstealingâ trees out of the forests to burn for basic purposes (so weâll done the German Green Ministers who have engineered this deindustrialization for Germany) and we continue to find BILLIONS for someone elseâs war – the Western politicians backing the losing side again!
Isnât it time we looked for winners to represent us? The whole Tory Parliamentary Party and Machine needs to be stripped. We need a new crew freely selected by the membership. We need the Parliamentary Party to know their place. Frankly if you donât know, in principle, how the Bond Market works, how can you vote on the Financial packages?
As for Labour and Sturgeon – at this point how could they be worse? PS itâs instructive that with 4.4% of the vote Sturgeon would be the main opposition – time for the Boundary Commission to reset ALL THE CONSTITUENCIES IN THE U.K. Any special privilege for one person means someone else is specially disadvantaged. In this case, itâs the English disadvantaged at every turn! It canât go on! The majority will have its way, one way or the other. I prefer the majority get its way at the ballot box.
October 18, 2022
Dear Sir John,
It is horrible to see hopes shattered, vision blinded, KK’s career wrecked and our prime minister humiliated.
Before the “not-a budget”, sadly, Liz Truss had already shown a tendency to espouse policies without thinking them through: eg. regional public sector pay (what about levelling up), pausing the green levy but no energy price cap (not enough to get people through winter), protecting the Doncaster-Sheffield airport and its infrastructure (now “a matter for the local authority”).
Obviously, we could not have big tax cuts at the same time as heavy new spending on price subsidies. They would at least have to wait to see what was happening to energy prices come Spring.
The Truss / Kwarteng dash for growth was to cut taxes, raise the already high state deficit and boost demand at a time when we have full employment, the trade deficit is running at 7 per cent of GDP (half of which is chronic), ex-gas inflation is well above target and Bank Rate was still at a semi-permanent emergency low rate. It was obvious that interest rates would rise and this would have to be allowed for and mitigated as part of a thought-through plan.
The only question was whether the Bank of England would belatedly switch to a credible anti-inflation level of short-term Bank Rate or investors/speculators would raise the long-term interest rate by selling gilt-edged and creating an inflationary fall in sterling. Thanks to the Bank of England’s current and previous incompetence, we now have both.
October 18, 2022
Blundering on by the BOE has been a feature of the BOE. Last week’s contradictory statements were just the latest to upset markets. The FT statement on the selling of QE bonds is now contradicted by the BOE so more chaos occurs.
The OBR never seem, apart from here by our host, to be reported as inaccurate in their numbers.
October 18, 2022
Yes, Sir John, growth is the way out. But it has to be sustained growth in productivity, which often requires higher investment. Boosting GDP though more demand and more cheap imported labour is just to continue the old failure. Creating a shortage of labour by ending net migration would powerfully encourage higher productivity. Double UK training of doctors for instance.
October 19, 2022
Cheap imported labour is a liability, not an asset! STOP using excuses to flood our count with incompatible foreigners. There is NO attempt at integration. NONE. In fact it appears we are expected to change the country and our people to suit the immigrants.
Companies who will not train UK people, or employ them on half decent wages, should NOT have their profits propped up by the taxpayer, providing benefits, housing, NHS, etc. for their low wage immigrants. It would be better for the country for them to go out of business than bring in low paid immigrants when we have UK people to train and employ. We have insufficient housing for the people already here.
The CONS are immigration addicts, and they LIED when they promised to reduce immigration, didn’t they?. The CONS manage to make Blairs immigration policy look positively FEEBLE!
October 18, 2022
There is only one answer to why Truss changed her mind about the budget — She was forced into a corner and made to comply with the bullies in her own party.
I accept she was trying to do the right thing.
Tory left has clearly got the numbers on its side to easily dispose of another PM that has different ideas to them.
So, a paralysed administration, overseen by those that couldn’t win an election because the public do not trust their heavy-hand tax plans, and all to fall in line with WEF doctrine.
It is not just that we have a rogue parliament – that description applies to HMG, most certainly
October 19, 2022
yep she is hoping to keep the Job. However it is clear for all to see that ‘it’s not me, it’s them to blame’
October 18, 2022
Tory MPs â Just slightly right of Centre
LibDem MPs â Centre left with Green leaning
Labour MPs â Just slightly left of Centre
Green MPs â Centre left with Communist leaning
Globalist Elite MPs â Transcend & infiltrate the Right, Centre & Left
Our new Chancellor fits snugly into the âGlobalist Eliteâ grouping âŠthe grouping, which has many MPs, in all parties and the grouping I fear most
October 18, 2022
Everyone contributing here should read this by Bernard Ingham :
https://www.express.co.uk/comment/expresscomment/1684351/nuclear-war-vladimir-putin-Liz-Truss-Joe-Biden-future-of-Britain-democracy-Bernard-Ingham
The problem is that the Conservative MPs that really should read and take note won’t…….
October 18, 2022
That article is a tour de force but let’s concentrate on the main points:
We don’t have ‘unfunded tax cuts’; we have a lot of unfunded public expenditure and have done for years.
“If you’re spending too much, spend less” (John Boehner). A little trimming here and there won’t do. We need to shrink the State. That involves recognising that there are many things that the State doesn’t do very well. It means that by and large the people paying for services should be the people receiving those services. Targeting of help on ‘the poor’, while worthwhile to some extent, should not be implemented in a way that buggers up whole markets.
If the OBR doesn’t produce accurate forecasts, there is little point in having the OBR. Bring modelling and forecasting back into the Treasury and get someone like Sir John or Patrick Minford to review its techniques.
The Bank of England’s control of monetary policy has been dire in most years since 2001. Two things should happen (a) inflation targetting should include items that richer people spend money on, such as house prices and other asset prices (b) It should made clear to the BoE that unless its performance improves either it will lose its control of base rate (no more QE, please) or its Governor will be sacked.
October 18, 2022
When announced, commentators suggested that the energy price cap subsidy, as written, would dramatically reduce inflation. Figures of as much as a 5% reduction were mentioned.
Nobody since has been talking about this at all. Not one word. Yet, if the government caps energy bills as planned, inflation is bound to come down because energy costs make up part of the inflation calculations.
So what effect will it have ? Hunt now fixing the scheme only until April will blunt the effect over the full calendar year but by how much, depends on what he does. I expect to have to pay the full cost of our household energy demands from April and I guess a lot of others posting here will as well.
October 19, 2022
Chris, I can’t cite where I read it recently, but I believe the OBR has signalled it would regard the energy subsidy as a further inflationary stimulus, since it would promote discretionary spending in other sectors of the economy.
October 19, 2022
From our own example, I just received our bill today from Shell Energy. It included an estimate for our energy costs for the next year which is in excess of ÂŁ6,200, after government subsidies. That is double what we paid last year. I cannot see how anyone could call that inflationary ! But then the OBR are usually wrong, aren’t they ?
October 20, 2022
Not ‘often’ but invariably! đ
October 18, 2022
Once again, the financial tail is wagging the government dog. Once again, the poorly regulated spiv city took too many speculated risks with debt derivatives destined to fall like a row of dominoes, just like 2008.
Meanwhile, it looks like we have commissioned about 9 TWh (900 mcm) of gas storage, probably a few wells in the Rough field. Gas and LNG together circa 40 TWh (3,800 mcm), that can output at a rate of, guess, 230 mcm/day. A few cold winter days together could peak at 350 to 400 mcm/ day. So stay very friendly with the Norwegians.
We have been trying to work up a futures price for a average dual fuel energy bill for next April (ÂŁ5,000/year). Forward contract pricers are worried about US LNG exports being limited to keep US domestic prices down. It’s all looking a bit tight.
October 18, 2022
“The Treasury was at its worst over social care. It needed to make the case that the state cannot afford to take on all the costs of residential stays for elderly people who can afford to pay for them out of their savings or money released from selling their old home they no longer need or use.”
Wrong. It is for politicians to make such cases, not civil servants. Any failure to make that case lies entirely with the politicians.
October 19, 2022
As we have already seen in this administration, Treasury civil servants are quick to question the affordability of any government policy they are expected to implement but dislike. Not to have done so in this case smacks of self-interest, as they belong to the social group that gains from it financially.
October 18, 2022
Dear Sir John,
So long as we spend about 10 per cent of GDP on health and social care via taxation, it is not realistic to pin any hopes on the UK being a true low tax country.
According to the OECD , the UK’s tax take from incomes is marginally below its members’ average. Korea is the only comparable country to take a lot less. The UK is also just below the OECD average on total tax as per cent of GDP, but the USA, Turkey, Australia and Korea are 5 or more points lower thanks to lower taxes on goods and services. So there is room for improvement, for instance if higher low-end wages tempt more people off long-term means-tested benefits.
Given that tax cuts have now been shelved sine die, perhaps your party could instead draw up and propound a specific long-term tax aim. Once the current spending books have been balanced, it should be possible to move to a regime with a standard rate of 20 per cent for all the main taxes: Income Tax, National Insurance (10 plus 10), VAT, Capital Gains and Inheritance taxes. That would be easy to understand and, I suggest. much more acceptable, without seriously curbing any Chancellor’s Budget options.
October 18, 2022
It’s the first time I’ve read ConservativeHome for a long time. Since Goodman took over. How it is still called a ‘Conservative’ Home? I don’t know lol.
“The north of England is not about to become a land of mid size champion exporters of industrial goods – that ship has sailed.” says one conservative at home there. We are the 9th largest manufacturer in the World. The UK’s manufacturing output is now worth ÂŁ192 billion. If Theresa May hadn’t given France our Passport manufacturing, the NW would be making them; these passports have been reported recently not to be working correctly at egates!
30 Jun 2022 â The North East has topped the list of UK regions for new job creation from inward investment successes, following annual statistics by DIT. …https://investnortheastengland.co.uk âș News
15 May 2022 â British manufacturers are bringing back production to the UK in a âreshoringâ push FT
âThe trade body Made UK says manufacturing is returning to Britain from across the world. 40% of reshoring is returning from China, over 30% from Eastern Europe and almost 20% is returning from India.
October 18, 2022
The wrost part of higher interest rates, from the point of view of renters hoping to find a way of saving and buying a property, is that their rents will rise to the extent that they’ll never be able to save enough, while the banks (with the connivance of politicians) will find a way of extending-and-pretending so that improvident mortgage borrowers will be able to hang onto properties they have not earned and cannot really afford. The market will droop but never become a real buyer’s market. Zombiedom ‘in saecula saeculorum’.
In this property bazaar overstuffed with risk-free foreign BTL investment serving high unskilled immigration and financed by taxpayers via local authorities, even those genuine 100% buyers who need no mortgage will find no roof over their heads of acceptable standard, except maybe in very remote parts of the country, suitable only for those who need not seek work.
The laziest benefit recipient gets a far better standard of life than this.
October 18, 2022
I doubted the wisdom of Liz Truss making her close friend Kwasi Kwarteng Chancellor of the Exchequer, but having done so I cannot understand why he alone and not the Prime Minister deserved the sack. Even worse was Liz Truss throwing in the towel and not then appointing a Chancellor who would actually genuinely try hard to salvage a lower tax policy geared to growth. Why wasn’t john Redwood appointed then or failing that Jacob Rees-Mogg or Suella Braverman (who like Priti Patel before her is being blocked from much effective action at the Home Office)?
In normal times I would think Liz Truss should be sacked now and she is so bad and electorally unattractive to voters that she can’t be allowed to fight a General Election. However just now there is no sense in appointing another Prime Minister as during the Winter fuel prices, inflation and mortgage rises will take a horrific toll that would soon sink a new Prime Minister. Better let Liz Truss remain for now and be the fall guy who takes the blame for all that and wait until next year to change the Prime Minister so her successor can then get the credit for beginning to improve the economic position!
October 19, 2022
Dear Geoffrey Berg, That looks a very sound plan if the Consrvatives are to make a decent showing at the next general election.
October 18, 2022
I see it is being reported that the Government are looking at scrapping the triple lock again for State Pensioners.
Do that again, and I forecast you will lose millions of votes, including mine.
May I remind you that policy was not in your manifesto !
October 18, 2022
You really cannot believe a word the government says. Just two weeks ago the commitment to the triple lock was still there. Now itâs gone. Whatâs the point of anyone asking politician a question? All you get are lies or obfuscation.
October 18, 2022
It all started with net-zero ….I don’t trust anybody or any government that wants to take away my petrol car
October 19, 2022
you misunderstand. You can keep the car, you just cannot use it !
October 19, 2022
Well they’ve got to maintain the level of spending on the Importation of Criminal Foreigners Fund. How else are they going to do it, except by punishing British pensioners?
October 19, 2022
+many – politicians and political parties are allowed to deliberately lie with impunity these days. Their skill in this areas may even get them a higher ranking within their party (Bojo did ok out of it for a while).
October 18, 2022
Well R Curry says most important rule is ” Don’t spook the markets”
October 18, 2022
Edwina i.e.
October 18, 2022
The price of oil has dropped 28% since the peak and gas by 73% since the peak. What is the problem? The politicians, without any reason, without public support, without declaring War, SANCTIONED Russia, the world biggest commodities supplier. The USA blew up the Nordstream pipelines so that Europe could not reverse its mad net zero lunacy.
This is NOT a worldwide problem, itâs a problem manufactured in the west by the totally irrational and out of control hysterical political class. Present company excluded.
October 19, 2022
As told on freenations or is it KGB News?
October 18, 2022
Sir JR
Why, has Brexit failed?
October 18, 2022
Brexit hasn’t failed, this government never started Brexit
October 19, 2022
+ many
October 19, 2022
Glen
That of course assumes it was the right decision and it was not
October 19, 2022
NBill, Brexit is only just starting to happen. We were tied in during the withdrawal period, we left January 2021 in the middle of a pandemic.
The payments are reducing, the EU’s accounts are already talking of being 40bn EUR less because of our departure.
Hunt isn’t talking about the ÂŁ20bn he has extra from not remitting to the EU to spend on UK priorities, not what we are told to spend it on.
Covid closed the country down, much lower turnover for the country with half the people on furlough payed for by those who carried on working and big loans that need to be prepared, no-one expected a free breakfast, lunch, tea and roof over their head forever did they Bill?
October 18, 2022
Truss cancels triple lock. Another example how Mp’s work to make people’s lives better. Defence killing machine budget is more important than saving pensioners lives. Explain how cancelling the triple lock makes people’s lives better.
October 18, 2022
I feel a shudder in the force. Zimmer frames rattling all over the country.
October 19, 2022
Stephen
Obviously wrong again
October 18, 2022
Energy companies looking to secure funding from the Bank of Englandâs support package must produce climate-related risk disclosures and Net Zero plans. Our energy companies are in serious trouble
https://www.businessgreen.com/news/4058259/bank-england-attaches-climate-conditions-energy-markets-financing-scheme
October 19, 2022
If they were honest they would admit that net zero will make energy permanently unaffordable. I see it is now fashionable in net zero circles to complain that we aren’t seeing enough constraints in the energy system. Such constraints of course imply failure to meet demand, and sky high prices that are then used to try to justify madcap schemes such as green hydrogen. The lunatics are running the asylum.
October 18, 2022
Its always someone else’s fault
October 18, 2022
I am fully supportive of holding increases in pensions and benefits (especially) to average wage rises. I see know reason why those in receipt of money from the government should be more protected from cost of living increases than average wage earners.
If your new Chancellor wishes to make some real cuts without affecting output there must be huge swathes of the diversity budget begging to be not spent. A pseudo workforce to be edged out. Stonewall’s gingerbread and mermaid’s membership and consultancy fees can go to start. If diversity professionals need more help they shouldn’t be employed ( an argument about the whole government consultancy spend) BLM can also follow into the withdrawn funding pool. And recruit no more diversity specialists just employ as few HR people as absolutely necessary.
October 18, 2022
Just reading about First Minister Drakeford losing his temper in the Welsh County Council.
Barnett – there is another area for quick, easy and fair savings.
October 18, 2022
Project Fear was right all along.
Not my words but the Daily Telegraph’s.
What do we do now?
October 18, 2022
Just to clarify. I’m sensing no appetite for Brexit anymore. Just a glum acceptance.
October 19, 2022
I am not seeing a rapturous welcome for the idea of increasing our problems through being shackled to the EU. Indeed it seems the EU bureaucracy is meeting serious resistance to its proposals all across its lands. The only ones crying out for rule by Brussels are not competent to govern themselves, and therefore long to be able to pass the blame elsewhere again.
October 19, 2022
Agreed. Brexit is in a difficult place. We are damned if we do, damned if we don’t.
October 18, 2022
What a tragedy that no sooner has the Conservative Party found a leader prepared unashamedly to argue for small state, free market policies than that same leader and her chancellor behave with such cack-handed – and by all reports arrogant – incompetence that their good ideas are now off the table and must remain so for several years. Now we are back to managerial Labour-would-be-slightly-worse arguments in order to hang on at the next election. My feeling is we have no chance with Liz Truss so may as well make the change sooner rather than later.
October 18, 2022
âThe very high number was used by Mr Sunak to justify unhelpful tax rises we did not need.â
A very high level of tax is necessary to achieve Net Zero â the unilateral strategy to reduce our 1% contribution to global CO2 emissions.
– High carbon taxes to curb fossil fuel use and force âconsumer transformationâ.
– Money to subsidise non-fossil fuel energy for both domestic and industrial use.
– Money to subsidise consumer take up of evs and heat pumps.
– Money to pay for unemployment as the UK de-industrialises and factories move to (coal powered) China.