The truth behind that 10 percent cut

Wily Trout

Front line services in Nottingham City were subject to cuts in March this year, when £20 million cuts in jobs and services were anounced. There have been Labour cuts going on for some time but apparently these are efficiency savings: they are only cuts if the Tories make them. Are people really stupid enough to believe that?

Steve Green (Daily Referendum Blog).

Wouldn't it be funny if a whole bunch of Labour MPs have worked this out. And being already pissed off with Brown decide to vote in favour of a dissolution of Parliament tonight?

Wily Trout

The leader of the new Conservative Nottinghamshire County Council is called Mrs Cutts.

The Bellman

Fraser: You are singing to the choir here. I think most people in the country with a double-figure IQ know instinctively that McSnotty is an inveterate liar and a bully who smarts visibly when challenged on specifics.

Now, I hate to sound like TGIF UKIP and Verity, but why can Dave and/or George not make the case as persuasively and as clearly as you have?

I say hang the convention of not calling other MPs liars. McSnotty shows nothing but contempt for Parliament week after week. He is misleading - and insulting - not only the House, but the country. Call him a liar, reap the headlines - heck, even retract it if required - but I bet there would be traction with the country.

Bob.India

Fraser: You really are on a winner here! Keep up the excellent work

paracelsus

There should be a concerted campaign, day by day, to show Brown's, and also the rest of this lying government's, lies, spin, and general deception before such claims against the Tories gain any traction. We need a campaign by the papers to show Brown for the liar, cheat, and general bully boy that he really is, and the pressure should not abate until a new government is in power.

TV news is all too often taken in by these lies and claims spouted by Brown. It needs to stop before we have no recognisable country left.

Publius

You are too decent for the likes of Brown, Mr Nelson. Brown will just lie and lie and lie, rather like those property developers who throw up ghastly flats overlooking the North Circular, and then present punters with sexy hoardings selling a "lifestyle".

The poor rubes buy into the lifestyle lie, and don't bother to look at the slum-to-be behind.

Hereford

And no newspaper will.

Jonathan

Now that the genie is out of the bottle, Cameron must stop trying to side-step this issue. Cameron has to get Labour’s 7% cut into the mainstream media narrative, and he can only do that IF he admits that the Conservatives will cut public services themselves. He doesn’t need to explicitly say which program/job etc… will be cut, but he should confirm cuts in discretional spending of around 10% (excluding health). Conservative spokesmen need to repeat ad nauseam that increased Debt repayments (8%) + larger welfare bills, from higher unemployment benefit claimants etc… will more than just wipe out the higher public spending totals that the GVN has announced. It will mean real cuts in discretionary spending, department by department…. Whoever is elected!

By being totally transparent about our own plans (and the real state of the economy) can Cameron

a) Deflect the power of Brown’s 10% cut jibe; which he will now deploy every day until Election Day.
b) Prepare the country for the cuts which will come. If we tell the truth now, it will be easier to implant the cuts after the election. Whereas if we pretend that we can cut the deficit with just efficiency savings and a few cancelled big ticket projects like ID cards, then the public will not accept the cuts that have to be made.
c) I think that the public mood is such, that they will reward the party for being honest about their intentions. The public understands that cuts are needed.
d) If we make the case before the election, then we can accurately portray the post-election cuts, as Brown’s cuts.

I’m not saying that this is going to be easy… The party will take a hit from some quarters (especially the BBC) but the real dangers lies in trying to back-track from Lansley’s statement. This is nota time for caution.

You started this....

Fraser, can we look forward to you covering this in your NOTW column? Your DT article was (excellent but) dangerously subtle, and that's what's allowing Brown to get away with this deception. What the country now desperately needs is for this to be nailed with red-top clarity and circulation.

Time to finish the job.

Fred

I don't get it - those cuts you highlight are 50% over 4 years.

Short the UK

It would be a positive if the FT actually started deconstructing New Labour and its mendacious fiscal accounting.

I personally think the FT (F****** Terrible) have let the business community down these past 12 years with their support for New Labour and its lousy fiscal management.

Shame on the FTers...

Peter |Buss

Can you clarify please Fraser - I do believe this to be the seminal moment of the political debate for the next election so congrats on your hard work on this. The point though I am uneasy about is the way you are defining cuts. If the current spending budget was to be cut in say the NHS then of course we are talking about losing staff.As I understand it from your figures Labour are NOT proposing to do that but basically to hold the line steady. Am I wrong on this interpetation please? However when it comes to your 22billion sum would it be fair to say that this is a mega decrease in the amount they will be spending on what I would call CAPITAL spending i.e new clinics/hospitals etc. In other words is that what one can call a REAL cut but rather fewer building programmes.

I know you won't agree but I thought Lansley was a complete political prat to talk in the way he did on the Today programme - this surely should have been left to Cameron or Osbourne to talk about overall expenditure especially on a matter which is political dynamite to the Tories. And yes I am a Tory - albeit a "One Nation" one and a very great admirer of David Cameron.

Peter from Maidstone

Why do the MSM choose not to do the maths? Why do they choose not to call Brown a liar in big letters over the front pages? What bargain have they struck, and what do they get out of Brown?

James

It will last ad nauseam. Anything more complex than 'Tories = cuts' is beyond most MSM hacks.

Nick Kaplan

The worst thing about PMQs was not Brown lying about his own cuts in public spending (although this was bad enough) but instead how he manipulated what Lansley said to imply the Tories would cut NHS spending as well!

He repeatedly went on about Tory cuts across ALL departments. He repeated his line about Tory cuts whenever he was asked a question relating to health, thereby implying the Tories would cut NHS spending. At one point he even talked about cuts in the number of teachers and nurses!

Brown is absolutely shameless!

Michael Sweeney

Fraser, this is as clear as mud. Where does 0.7% come from? Current expenditure goes up pretty sharply each year - do we know how much of this is debt interest? Also, it's really unclear why depreciation is taken out of the investment figures - does anybody know what that means? Certainly the Gross Investment figures are broadly the same in 2013 as last year. Reading this table, Brown can say he is planning to increase spending.

It may be a trick, but is remains far from clear how it is on this evidence - the current expenditure should be more clearly itemised. The scary deficits are easily traceable - at least this is clear, and I suspect rather optimistic too.

tenpin

Fraser you foolishly played into Brown's hands by recognising this and more so when you described what the Tories would have to do to maintain health spending. But good for you for trying to keep Brown honest in the news conference the other day and on the blog. Personally, I don't think Brown should be able to get away with this grandstanding - and as the Coffeehouse PMQs blog correctly indicates he effectively lied to Parliment today and he should apologise.

Tom Pride

Exposing Brown’s deceit and the extent of the inevitable Labour spending cuts and debt is fine. But, the killer to the Labour turn out and vote has to be keeping MP’s expenses and greed alive and at the forefront of the electorate’s mind for the next eleven months. It has really hurt the Labour vote.

Force a Commons vote on an Autumn General Election, with a sensible timetable, and have Labour MPs vote against it and deny the electorate their wish. Then keep bashing away about the base reason for their doing so – the extra £100,000 plus in salary (more for Ministers), expenses, pension entitlement and severance pay.

That’s the number we need Fraser, the average financial gain to be made by Labour MPs (including Ministerial salary) if the election is held in June 2010 and not September 2009. One simple number to be repeated again and again for eleven months. Something the electorate can understand, resent enough to remember until June 2010 and then punish by voting or abstaining.

Simon

I think some serious brainstorming needs to be done at Tory high command as to how to explain this clearly to the British People. For many mental arithmetic is not their strong point. How about keeping it simple with some oft repeated lines like.
"Labour debts create Labour cuts"

"Labour spend on government Tories spend on health"

"Labour forgets inflation Labour increase Lies!"

mart

It needs to be "the story".

Having it a prominent subject of PMQs is a start.

But the Conservatives need to keep saying something interesting on the subject to ensure it gets discussed in the broadcast news.

Robert Eve

I've never understood what the problem is with cuts.

Why continue to poor money into bottomless pits.

The electorate know that the country is in deep debt and they understand that cuts are required to sort it out.

Peter Buss

Michael you have out it far more eruditely than I have - but you concern is my concern - does the allegation really stack up.I

Do hope Fraser you can find time to answe both questions that Michael and I have posed.

Peter Buss

Michael you have out it far more eruditely than I have - but you concern is my concern - does the allegation really stack up.I

Do hope Fraser you can find time to answe both questions that Michael and I have posed.

Anand

Internet blogging asie, the majority of the electorate don't browse the web for political intrigue.

Cameron will have to counter Brown's likes in the mainstream media, specifically in PMQ's, Andrew Marr show, Jeff Randall Live and any other major MSM political show that will get snips aired on the evening news.

Fraser we all appreciate your number crunching and agree with the facts but joe public will never see this.

you are going to need to use the NotW front page to get your message to the masses.

Fraser

Does anyone actually think a cumulative 7% or 10% is going to be enough? The red book shows it isn't enough to get the budget even approaching balance and this relies on far fetched growth rates. The real cuts will not just be mood music they will have to be bold, involve upsetting a few people and possibly provide a framework for sustainable public finances in the future. In theory this would involve a return to government spending below 40% of GDP (given that tax receipts rarely rise above 35% of GDP it should be even less) which equates to cuts of approximately 20%, not cumulatively, but in one go.

dorothy wilson

I was half listening to Woollas on the World at One this lunch time. If that guy is the best Labour can wheel out they haven't got much in the way of talent to offer.

However, he seemed to be arguing that you have to look at both sides of the equation. Apparently, he has just discovered that the reserve of spending is income.

However, if Labour are now going to argue that they do not have to cut spending because income will increase - Woollas mentioned an increase in manufacturing output - they are living in cloud cuckoo land. There is no way government income will increase over the next few years to cover the debt.

The Conservatives should not be backwards in pointing that out.

Shaun

"Why do the MSM choose not to do the maths?"

I think because it's hard work and not many people are really interested in big articles on tricks hidden in the budget. One or two days of budget coverage is enough. I mean articles on the substance of policy are very rare, I think because they're not terribly interesting.

The leadership plots and rumours and smears are far easier and far more fun to read, I imagine they're also easier and more fun to write.

Shaun

Andy

Those of us who have run anything more complicated than a tap know that savings have to be made and the costs of servicing debt reduced. We can't afford to keep spending the way Labour has been hosing money up the wall for the last decade. There is no reason why cuts can't be targeted to minimise reduction in services. All it needs is a competent government.

luke

Fraser, the only problem with your argument above is that the Tories are also saying debt is out of control. If that is the line of the attack then surely it is also credible to believe they will in fact cut overall spending by more?

This is a pretty big hole in an otherwise solid analysis.

Nicholas

Having watched Lansley on QT I was not impressed and, however this was put across, it was an own goal. The Tories should know by now how Labour twist and manipulate the facts in order to blow the dog whistle as loudly as possible and how ready most of the stupid media are to swallow it. They need to be much more adroit in playing Labour at their own game. Sadly I don't think they have all the right people on the front bench for that - or the right PMQ tactics.

Brown lied about the facts. He quoted a percentage for the Tory "cut" and then gave his "rising investment" in amounts. Cameron made no effort to dissect this and put the facts straight. Every question he or any other Tory asks is used by Brown to slag them off. It is a blunt instrument of a tactic and not beyond the wit of man to counter.

Brown relies on his dodgy figures and his dodgy presentation of figures and that is where the Tories need to attack. They need to expose his lies.

And they also need to stop asking questions that give Brown the opportunity to attack them. Brown's defence is attack. When an enemy does that it is risky but relies in knocking the attack off balance and seizing the initiative (controlling the narrative) which is what Brown does almost every time. The Tories need to prepare their questions more carefully and link them week to week to expose him. Cameron needs to take the figures battered out by Brown today, dissect them and then ask a very detailed question about them next week. He should drive Brown into the minutiae of his own figures and not let the narrative become an attack on the Tories.

When Brown replies with an attack on Tory policy or lack of it DC must calmly remind him that the question was not about the policies of the opposition but those of the government and would he please answer, at the same time requesting the Speaker to remind the PM that he is there to answer questions not to ask them.

Lansley was stupid to shift the narrative from a lousy government that should be held to account to a Tory bogeyman. He did the same stupid thing on QT about his second job. When pressed for their economic policies Tory spokesmen and women should declare their complete lack of confidence in government figures as nothing less than false or misleading and say that it is impossible to formulate detailed policy on the basis of the current shambles. Their policy will be transparency and honesty about what is found in this governments dodgy books when it is found and an end to deceit, spin and irresponsibility in government. Knowing what we know those are the only policies we need to hear at this time.

No more own goals please, Mr C, and don't let your questions provide an attack on the Tories line for The Monster.

Rhoda Klapp

Labour will spend £4 for every £3 they get in. Tell it to the people in those terms. Say he is putting it on YOUR credit card. Because he is. People will understand that.

mac

@ Bellman. Fully agree.

Brown will always construct a dividing line between himself and the Tory party he hates. Facts are only what he wants them to be and shameless, unprincipled spin will paint anything and everything as "Tory cuts". He lies without compunction. It's a deliberate, dishonest and ugly strategy to con the soundbite voters who form the majority of the electorate.

It's long past gloves off time.

Brown lies. The Tory front bench should hammer that simple message home at every opportunity. Without delicacy, without subtlety and without euphemisms:

"Let's get one thing crystal clear at the start, Adam/Andrew/Jeremy/Tom/John/
Eddie/Caroline/ Kirsty/ Jim/Sean etc etc/
and that is that Gordon Brown lies . . . shall I explain how? No, you don't want me to? Fine, let's leave at that for your listeners, then; Brown lies."

Ian Walker

I see Nick Robinson has manageed to blog on this without bothering to inform his opinion. Perhaps if you bump into him you could appraise him of the situation.

Bocephus

If Cameron has committed to maintaining health & education spending and Brown has not, Cameron needs to make it clear it is Labour who intend to through nurses and teachers on to the scrap heap not the Conservatives. He also needs to remind the public he can save money by scrapping ID cards etc whereas Labour cannot.

Despite all Brown's lies it always feels as if the Tories are on the back foot when these discussions come up. Fraser's Telegraph column did not make it clear these cuts were from Labour's own Budget which didn't help.

Toby

Aren't you being slightly disingenuous in using the 'net' investment figure when you argue that investment will fall from £44bn to £22bn? The amount of gross investment (ie cash spent) only falls from £56bn in 2008-09 to £46bn in 2013-14 - still a 27% cut, but not as dramatic as the 50% number you cite...And it's flat in nominal terms from 2007-08.

Depreciation is obviously a real cost, but rising depreciation isn't the same as a cash cut, which is rather what you suggest. And given the investment we've seen in replacing the public sector's capital stock over recent years, you could argue that the need to maintain such high levels of investment is lower now than it was five years ago.

Roger

Fraser, you promised to look into how we can return the PSBR to <40% of GDP in 5 or 10 or 15 years. Did you manage to do the arithmetic?
What would be the options?

Gary Gimson

What's so wrong with making a 10% cut in spending? The Conservatives should be proud that they have the guts to do so and at least be honest about it.

seb

A prediction from Mystic Seb - Brown, parroted by some of the younger halfwits on SkyNews, will blame the predicted squeeze on post-2011 NHS spending on Cameron! This isn't just lying. This is J. Gordon Brown lying!

oldtimer

What people need is a simple message; the government is spending £4 for every £3 it is raising in taxes.

This means that there is a great big Brown hole to be filled this year; it is going to get worse. No one knows quite how much worse it is going to get over the next few years, even to the nearest £10 billion. All we do know is that Brown does not have clue and does not even pretend to have a clue. This is the road to disaster.

There is no point in getting bogged down in the minutiae of Darlings future projections of spending, taxes and borrowing. They are meaningful only in the sense that Brown/Darling have no clue what to do apart from get the Bank of England to print c£150 billion in a vain attempt to stave off the final reckoning. Once that is gone they are stuffed - and so are we.

A good place for Cameron to start would be to borrow Brown`s use of nominal spending and simply say that we cannot afford to let it increase over the life span of the next Parliament (as Brown proposes).

logdon

This is important stuff.

I noticed that even on the night of the wipeout, Labour was banging on about spending out of recession, helping hardworking families and the usual schtic whilst telling whoever was interviewing them that the Tories would cut until we bled.

That's the narrative. Lay low on their own curtailment of spending whilst doing a mindreader act on Cameron and Osborne.

Whenever the heat builds up that's the default, switch the narrative from their own misery and then Mystic Meg the opposition.

Quite shameful really because again it's all smoke and mirrors and deceit. They quite breathtakingly talk of honesty, clean up and transparancy yet in the next sentence revert to type.

Malik is a case in point. What actually does it take to hammer into Brown’s head that we’ve had enough of the closed door secrecy? Mr Massage Chair is whisked back with nary a nod to us poor saps who paid the £200 K he’s trousered.

I see Brown’s done a partial u-turn on that now but the doubt is back.

What were the findings of the inquiry? We forked out the dosh, surely we have a right to know the extenuating circumstances which enabled this creature to get off the hook? Or was it intimidation and threats of 10,000 henchmen descending into Brown’s back garden? Ahmed tried it so it’s not beyond the realms of possibility.

The reality is that nothing has changed. It’s all Brown blather and Mandy mendacity.

We deserve better.

David

There is a start on the BBC (yes really!!) today by the excellent Stephanie Flanders which makes much the same points but I totally agree that this is a complex point needing clarification and repeated ad nauseam until the election.

David Dee

Lansley was perfectly clear in what he said:

"We are going to increase the resources for the NHS. We are going to increase resources for international development aid. We are going to increase resources for schools. But that does mean over three years, after 2011, a 10% reduction in the departmental expenditure limits for other departments. It is a very tough spending requirement indeed."

But that's what happens when the person who would normally comment on such matters (Osborne) is not up to thr job and the person sent in to bolster this inefficiency (Lazy Ken Clarke) is still in hiding less he expresses his views on the EU !

Anand

To be honest, if David Cameron's front bench cannot even do the simple task of exposing Gordon Browns lies, they rather deserve to get pummelled in the media.

This is politics after all, not the boy scouts, you need to fight your corner tooth and nail, elections don't fall into your laps.

Come on CCHQ, get an attack plan sorted and implement it, as it stands we are all getting pissed off with the weak retorts the opposition front bench are fielding.

lawrence greek

Headlines on the BBC 6 o clock news? '10% TORY CUTS'

It is up to us all to make sure people know the truth. Hold everyone to account, every Guardian blog, every BBC phone in. These are Labour cuts.

strapworld

Fraser, please keep it up.

As for Lansley. He should have been sacked alongwith Gove, Maude and Co.

THAT will be Cameron's achilles heel!

Victor, NW Kent

Fraser

Take your table out on the street and show it to a few passers-by who appear to in no hurry. When you find someone who understands it then quickly get him put on the list of PPCs.

If you think this pernickety chart with reference to a mystic IFS will counter the trumpet call of "Tory Cuts" then you have forfeited your right to be regarded as a political guru.

Peter Buss quizzed you above but he is far more polite than I am.

Bocephus

Notwithstanding the BBC headline the actual report made it clear Labour intends to cut spending by 7% across the board according their own budget. Therefor, by implication, making it clear Gordon Brown is a blatant liar.

It will be interesting to see if Labour Ministers are thoroughly challenged by BBC presenters when they pipe up about "Tory Cuts."

sandy

The BBC in their 6pm bulletin also ,surprisingly,concede that Labour are-as Fraser says-committed to 7% cuts and have not ring fenced Health.

So, if they are talking about it,I'd say Brown is not going to get away with it this time.

Can't help wondering if Cameron's "Even the BBC" comment, in conjunction with Labour's election meltdown, hasn't concentrated minds at the Beeb on the possibilities for the licence fee a couple of years down the line.

Edward

One side of the House is incapable of truth, while the other side prefer to be economical with it.

Marian

Here in Scotland the SNP Government has said that the budget contained a hidden cut of £500million in the allocation to Scotland.

Very significantly the New Labour opposition at Holyrood and Jim Murphy (Secretary of State for Scotland) have never denied that the cut will be £500million and furthermore have advised the Scots government to grin and bear it instead.

Simon Stephenson

Anand 6.05pm

It's not quite as simple as that.

Labour is exploiting the human convention that adults are treated as adults. I can't immediately see a way of dealing with teenage sophistry in adults other than to start treating them like children - and this would be quite difficult to achieve even if the people concerned were outside positions of authority. Heaven knows how you go about applying it to the national government.

Marian

It’s clear that Brown’s war cry from now on to the election is “Expect Tory Cuts”.

The IFS and Fraser Nelson (and now CH4 at http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/uk/factcheck+who+is+cutting+spending/3204762) have already exposed the hidden 7% cut across the board cuts contained in Darling’s Budget.

We also know that the 10% cut mooted on radio this morning by the Tory spokesman amounted to the same gross total in cuts by New Labour as Darling tried to hide, and was simply the increased effect of the re-distribution on everything else because the Tories are going to exclude Health spending from cuts as opposed to Darling whose budget made it clear that New Labour are cutting health spending as well.

So why the hell did Cameron not point all of this out in his riposte to Brown?????????????????????

If Cameron continues to mess up on fundamental things like this then Brown will get away time and time again with his lies and deceptions at PMQ’s.

Cameron should be going on the offensive pointing out all of the above including the fact that Darling intends to cut Health spending.

Just watch how that goes down with voters.

Bored of it all

Did no one notice that we're broke? Where is the party that proudly announces that it will cut our cloth to match our funds? This sterile debate about Tory cuts vs Labour spending is like the proverbial two bald men fighting over a comb. It is extraordinarily depressing.

TGF UKIP

The Tories are now on the back foot and it's their own sodding stupid fault.

From late 2007 on they could have ditched their daft promise to match Labour spending as from that time the polls were consistently saying that a significant majority of voters believed Labour were spending and wasting too much.

Instead they stupidly stupidly continued with their spending line right into 2009 as the Marr/Cameron interview in late January evidences.

Had the Tories taken the wise and long view (which under a different and conservative leadership they would have done) they would now be reaping the harvest of being able to say "told you so." As it is they can't criticize the Labour spending which amassed the crippling debt because they not only went with it but promised to surpass it.

It really is a toss-up which is the nomenclature which better fits Dave and his gang, The Social Democratic Green Party or The Clueless party.

Simon Stephenson

Dorothy Wilson : 3.19pm

"However, if Labour are now going to argue that they do not have to cut spending because income will increase ..."

You can bet your house that Labour will wheel this one out in the not-too-distant future. Because no matter how ridiculous the projections appear, it's impossible to prove them wrong. It's just the sort of thing that will get a pointless argument blazing for a fortnight in the sure knowledge that at the end of it Labour will come out unscathed.

The Conservatives would do well to get some high-quality analysis done on the probabilities of various of the government's future income projections panning out. So that they can use as an opening gambit a question such as "Do you think it's prudent policy to plan future spending levels on the basis of an income flow that has only a 5% chance of being achieved". They must have an attack on cloud-cuckoo-land assertions that does more than just express incredulity. Because Labour has oodles of experience in asserting that their wild assumptions are reasonable AND keeping a straight face at the same time. And however much of a "mistaken forecast" they are, by the time this can be proved, it'll be far too late to do anything about it, and the public domain will have been presented with the Labour's next instalment of linguistic cobblers.

Simon Stephenson

There is a comment to Roger Bootle's article in last weekend's Telegraph from someone called Brendan Harris, who has been "in senior management in a well known global corporation"

Mr Harris makes this point:-

"as anyone who works in the public sector will freely admit, the colossal waste is effectively an untapped source of funding for the government. It would be relatively painless to take £50bn - £75bn out of public spending, and certainly possible to do so without touching a single school or hospital."

This is the point I've been making since I was in short trousers. You can buy a tin of kidney beans in Lidl for 29p, go to Sainsbury and its 50p, your local Co-op and it's 65p and I expect at Harrods it would be £1. At the end of the day you've still got one tin of kidney beans. It doesn't need to cost you more than 29p. You, personally, can choose to spend more than this because it's YOUR money that you're spending. But if you're spending someone else's money you should feel obliged to spend the minimum amount necessary, UNLESS you have been given dispensation to spend more.

Does this approach apply to public sector procurement. Don't make me laugh! There is a Parkinsonian process that works on the basis that costs will always expand to swallow up any budget made available, and the first objective of any spending department is to get through its entire budget by the end of the financial year.

Dreamers among us may believe in the nobility of public service provision where the ethos is in making the best use of the funds available to deliver a top-class service. Cobblers. There may be a vague ambition to provide top-class service, but the pre-requisite for this is always a bottomless well from which funds can be drawn. The mantra is ALWAYS "to do better we need more funding", and NEVER "there are some real efficiencies we can make here, which will free up funding for alternative use"

So, Mr Harris, you are right, but what you suggest can't be done without changing the ethos of the public sector. I fear that the painful truth is that this is impossible, and if so then I suggest that we have to look at public provision using pragmatic rather than idealistic cost-benefit analysis. Regrettably, this will mean that there will be areas of provision for which there is a solid argument for inclusion in the public sector, but where the realities of structural inefficiency make this unaffordable.

Paul

Fraser,
We are missing a much larger issue here - McBroon is increasing consumption spending by £66billion up to 2011.THis is not related to the recession.So why not drop that and save some of the pain. Couldn't DC play that card - the numbers are in the public domain.