Ringfence-a-rama
Peter Hoskin 11:04pm
Just watching Newsnight, and the show's economics editor, Paul Mason, has said we can expect several budgets to be ringfenced from spending cuts in tomorrow's PBR – hospitals, schools and perhaps even the social security budget. If so, it's another sign of how political the document is set to be. Ringfenced budgets are the other side of the soak-the-rich coin: sending out the twin message that Labour will batter the "City fat cats," while also "investing" in public services "for the many". Just a shame that it's all insufficient to the scale of the debt crisis.
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Percy
December 8th, 2009 11:18pm Report this commentIf you ever needed to know how barking the current lot are just listen to Gordon's mate and the Monetary Policy Committee's resident loony David Blanchflower; his performance on Newsnight showed just how worried we should all be.
Mucker
December 8th, 2009 11:59pm Report this commentYeah I have noticed Blanchflower's barmy coments over the last 12 months. He really winds me up. What does he know that allows him to make such comments???
J H Holloway
December 9th, 2009 1:57am Report this commentQuite right, Percy.
How did that looney get anywhere near the levers of power?
He said the problem wasn't spending 'it was a lack of revenue'.
An what sort of supercharged taxes and simultaneous supercharged growth would cover the £180bn gap?
Another dangerous student union Marxist.
Tiberius
December 9th, 2009 8:51am Report this commentAnd so the politics of the Tories' current position on 50p tax and the NHS becomes clear.
Chuck Unsworth
December 9th, 2009 9:54am Report this commentAnd it's a 'lack of revenue' which will see our triple 'A' rating being trashed and the IMF at the doors of Downing Street.
No one belives that the banker's bonuses get anywhere near to the enormous deficit. If Darling was to place a 100% tax on these bonuses for the next decade he'd hardly touch the mounting debt.
Meanwhile, in the real world, the City is preparing to move abroad.
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