Putting the "public" into "public spending cuts"

Ray

I am minded to recall another of Fraser Nelson's many illuminating graphs, this one demonstrating how, for much of the New Labour decade, tax revenues have failed to keep pace with public spending. The moral: Gordon Brown has sought to hoodwink the British people into believing that they really can have super-duper, all-embracing, free-at-the-point-of-use public services and low taxes at the same time.

However, the Conservatives under Cameron need to discover the balls to tell the voters that there really is no such thing as a free lunch. Either taxes have to go up or a way has to be found of delivering better services for less money. And if governments can't deliver them (and the track record does not exactly suggest optimism on that score) then taxpayers must be given their money back and urged to go look for other providers that can.

Olaf Rye

A very good article, indeed. I was in Canada during those dark years and there was broad agreement that the nation was in grave danger of condemning many to decades of impoverishment or would drive out the more dynamic and better educated people. Indeed, before they grasped the nettle many had left for the US which contradicted the leftist argument that the 'brain drain' was a fabrication of the right. Look at how many Canadians live abroad still: most left during those tumultuous years and are still wary of returning. It will take decades of a sustained level of responsibility in public finances to lure them back.

We are facing precisely the same problems here in Britain but there does not seem to be the public willingness to grapple this enormous problem. I do not know if this unwillingness is a result of a belief in the competence of the government, class resentment which sees a balanced budget as an assault on the less affluent, or just indifference, but if we do not pull our head of the sand we face being relegated to the position of 'sick man of Europe' with regards to the economy as we were before Thatcher turned the nation around.

Nick

Very simple.

1. Doomsday book of public debt, listing all the debts.

2. Introduce a tax to appear on people's payslips to go to paying off the debts (pensions included). A good name would be a labour tax, without a capital letter so that it doesnt get confused at all with the Labour party, capital L.

Nick

Very simple.

1. Doomsday book of public debt, listing all the debts.

2. Introduce a tax to appear on people's payslips to go to paying off the debts (pensions included). A good name would be a labour tax, without a capital letter so that it doesnt get confused at all with the Labour party, capital L.

Roger

A good name for such a tax would be "the Brown burden".
Gov. has to do less, not just look for lower cost ways of doing the same. Do 20% less for starters.

Wyndham

The thing is that it can be achieved without massive frontline cuts.

The Audit Commission for example spends over £200 million pounds per year and yet has evidenced little improvement in public services. It is a blunt tool that has actually damaged improvement. They go and no damage has occurred to front line services. next ....

Alfred T Mahan

Most people have no idea how much tax they pay through the PAYE/NI system, which was designed exactly for that purpose. Payslips should be made to have two figures in large type: net pay, and the total of taxes paid on the individual's behalf, including Employee's and Employer's NI. People would soon wake up to how much "free" government services are actually costing them.

Fergus Pickering

Alfred T Mahan, I don't understand you. I have a payslip here from my employer; it has a figure for Total Pay on the left and on the right, in big bold letters, a figure for NET PAY, which is (ahah!) lower. How do other people's payslips differ?

saddleworth

The Canadian example is useful to us, but unlikely to be followed. British politics these days exemplifies cowardice. It is is easier to avoid hard decisions (borrow a bit more here, tax a bit more there, fudge a principle, duck an issue)and then try to spin the consequences - Brown's wrecking of UK pensions is a shameful example as is Blair's utter funk when it came to planning future energy policy or owning up to immigration issues.
The Conservative party will fail as the next government unless it starts to face up to this and stop running scared of Labour cries of "Tory cuts". Get all the bad information out there so voters can't escape where this country is heading (and why)without leadership and delivery.
P.S and sack any shadow front bencher who tries to say there will be no cuts in his area.

Tim Carpenter (LPUK)

Two things.

We are not talking about "public spending" but "Government Spending", which in truth is "Spending Taxpayers Money".

Words are everything and if the Tories are to have a chance they must stop playing on the Left's turf because that is right next to their own goal!

Secondly, if one wants PAYE to have any effect, tax should be a direct debit on the bank account - so the gross pay goes in and the tax is then taken out.

Of course, the biggest effect is for people to have to physically write out the cheque.

Such a mechanism would not be needed under a Libertarian government, for that would abolish Income Tax and cut Government expenditure by 50%.

Steve Expat

There's a good reason why in the US, public spending is constantly referred to by the media as being "Tax Dollars" - the phrase itself keeps alive the notion of where the money comes from, it's not their money, it's OUR money.

Dave should be honest and say that spending needs to be reduced massively, pay will fall and there will be redundancies in the public sector, just as there have been in the private sector. The pain needs to be seen to be shared by everyone during tough times, start will a 5% cut for all those earning as much as an MP and a 10% cut for all those earning as much as a Minister (£60k and £140k respectively, make sure the politicians are included in those taking cuts)

All public spending should be subject to review and no departmental budgets should be satrosanct - Health and Education especially are where most of the pointless jobsworth bureaucrats hide from view, as well as the pointless quangos and council busybodies.

There are also massive savings to be made by simplification of tax rates and credits - why take with one hand only to give back with the other? Raise the tax threshold to more than a full time minimum wage job, giving those on the dole more of an incentive to go to work.

These are all measures that would enjoy broad public support, we here must remember that it is not the safe Tory vote that will win the election, it is the votes of those who have voted Labour since 1992 or 1997 that need to be convinced.