How Brown would get Darling out of the Treasury

JasonDB

I'm most intrigued by the policy to let those complaining of ASB bring civil claims for injunctions paid for by the local authority if the police fail to act swiftly enough. When, doubtless, most of the claims for injunctions are dismissed and the claimant is ordered to pay the defendant's legal costs, are the local authority (for which alternatively read the local council tax payers) then to be obliged to pay for the individual's misguidedness in bringing a failed claim for injunction?

Richard

So from the heading - one can only conclude you have given up the fight and now accept GB Will be the next PM and AD WILL be the next Chancellor!
Surely you have a bit more backbone than this?
Good job there are others willing to fight their corner...at least make a fist of it old boy!

Tyranosaurus

Intersting to see that though Brown states that he will set targets for each of his cabinet ministers, there are no similar targets for himself.

oldrightie

"Keeping on the road to recovery" whilst racking up even greater deficits, is the bit he missed out.

Cuffleyburgers

I still find it utterly surreal that this man still has millions of people who think he should remain as PM, I mean one person can be deluded, insane, a megalomaniac - but how can te people who support him posibly look themsleves in the mirror?

I mean we have to share pubs/motorways/ aircraft with them! The might meet them in the street!

There should be a forign office travel warning on going there

Pete Hoskin

Richard: headline duly corrected...

alexsandr

Beople dont understand the economics
They dont understand the difference between deficit and debt
They think we can fund billions of debt by taxing the rich more
and dont believe the cuts coming

mitch

Can I buy tickets to this lala land that Gordon lives in?.
He is totally delusional.

John Law

Unfortunately, 9 Million people, mostly on the payroll, still believe in the tooth fairy

Pete-s

What contract would McDoom write for himself:

I will always tell the truth!
I will stop living in Ga Ga land!
I will not surround myself by a group of sycophants!
et, etc, etc.

diane C - London

This cabal of shysters and crooks in the worst government ever, has somehow managed to brainwash a huge part of the country into believing that they are the only party able to get us out of the mess they created.

What is wrong with everyone? What's not to understand about a debt of £1.4 TRILLION which at the moment is costing us £43 BILLION every year in interest payments. And that is before we have repaid even £1.

And why can't Osborne find easy and simple words to explain this to them? The people of this country cannot be so dim that they can't understand the dire situation the UK is about to find itself facing if Labour is allowed to carry on in the way they have over the past 13 years.

What is wrong with the Tories that they seem so incapable of getting this terrifying message across to everyone?

Publius

Diane C London writes:
"What is wrong with everyone? What's not to understand about a debt of £1.4 TRILLION which at the moment is costing us £43 BILLION every year in interest payments."

-- See, even you can't do it! These monstrous numbers just mean nothing to people. They can't comprehend them. Many probably don't even know what a trillion is. Or a billion. So all they hear is blah blah blah disaster horror blah blah blah... and they just switch off and open a bottle of wine, or pop a pill, or take the dogs for a walk.

Ali C

Diane C, my mother was just saying this to me. You summarise it really well. So, how stupid is the British public? Or are they just burying heads in sand because they don't want to face the music and think it can drift on until some miracle happens?

Do they under stand the debt will continue to grow if there is any deficit? Do they know what a deficit is? Do they understand that if the debt gets beyond a certain point it will fry the UK?

Osborne/Cam need to put up a few simple posters/do a few talks/explain in small words the consequences of not tackling the enormous debt that 'iron' chancellor Brown has given the UK through his bloated public sector, spending on pfi and punishing the economically active (those who are not sponging but making the money that pays for the bloated public sector etc etc). It's not that difficult to understand. Unless the country makes enough REAL money through businesses, it will go BUST.

seb

alexsandr flags up what thousands of other bloggers have noted: millions of people must obviously have no idea what debt and deficit mean in the UK context. Millions of people most probably believe Kirkcaldy's Leading Autist can and will reduce 'the debt' in a few years if re-elected when, in fact, Labour has promised that the debt will nearly double in size. Eight hundred billion quid must be meaningless to even the few Labour voters who know the extent of treasury borrowing. What is it? The price of a yacht? The cost of the Afghanistan campaign? The price of lunch in a trendy London eatery?

Why don't polling organisations ask people simple questions to determine what, if anything, the typical Labour voter knows? We can't postpone forever the chore of explaining to simpletons just how deep a pit we're in.

Richard

@Ali C,

Hey cheer up it's not that bad honest!
If we could only persuad more people who can afford to, to pay ALL the taxes they owe. Maybe encourage a few business men that putting out UK jobs to india and China, whilst it may be good for them, is not in the public interest.
Perhaps stop driving down wages to the levels where the state has to prop up peoples earnings it's counter productive.
Telling people over 50 they are too old to work for modern companies..Next time you are on the train to work look at the age of the average commutor!!!
Stop parents from escaping their responsibilities to bring up their own children and to engage with their schools.
Maybe spend sometime on a short break in the UK and not abroad would help the economy a little.
Use your local shops and businesses instead of the huge vested interests like ASDA and TESCO's.
Walk your kids to school instead of driving them 1 mile.
Behave in a more neighbourly fashion to the people in your communities instead of leaving it to social services...dont put granny in a home because it impinges on your lifestyle. Do more with your kids and get the real hugs of affection not just the ones for buying the latest block buster video game.
Plenty of things we can do without much cost to ourselves if we want to.

Frank O'Connell

I have come to the conclusion-The Tories do not want to take on this mess.

A pensioner

Grodon Brunn (judging by his signature) has put forward fewer "pledges" than TB in 1997, but we all know how well they worked out, don't we? At least, those of us who are sentient, do.

TomTom

Maybe Brown will pledge a Referendum on a European Treaty...that lie worked fine in 2005

TrevorsDen

"I will set out" .... why did he not do that 3 years ago?

To those who are mystified by the electorate: People still in jobs are doing better - we have low interest rates (though this is not fully reflected in mortgage rates) .

The whole point being that everything humanly possible is being done to pretend that the situation is either normal or manageable or at least just needs a little tweak to get it right.
Darling has in fact been forced to admit the truth but even with that the line is that economies and efficiencies can resolve things.

And crucially no one has yet been touched by it - the 'rich' will pay for it all. So the budget on the surface was bland anodyne. The reality is that no matter how much Brown tries to say its only the tories who would implement cuts any govt would do the same. Labour just do not admit to it and as long as the finance markets prop up his mirage and the BoE prints money he thinks he can get away with it.

TrevorsDen

What a load of bland head in the sand rubbish, Richard.

But you do make a point - "Maybe encourage a few business men that putting out UK jobs to india and China, whilst it may be good for them, is not in the public interest."

So please explain why Brown put an extra million British workers out onto benefits and created 1 million jobs for imported cheap foreign workers.

TrevorsDen

PS
Diane c (london) err... Osborne did spell out the cost of debt interest repayments he did so in the party political broadcast the day after the budget. A number of observers (eg Gimson the Telegraph sketchwriter) have also commented on the excellence of his speech in the parliament debate.

But you have clearly not been listening - neither do the likes of Strapworld. And when it come to unpalatable news can we expect the Conservatives to drag the electorate to a place they do not want to be? If you are not listening why should you expect the electorate to be any different.

TrevorsDen

PS
'the road to recovery' yes this might make sense if we were on the road to recovery. But we are not. Brown was hoping that growth would have started in Q4 but the figures were pathetic, the depth of recession in 2009 even greater than first thought. Most 1Q figures out so far are depressing.

This is the slogan envisaged 6 months ago - but there is no recovery. The words are empty.

Ken

@TrevorsDen "get away with it" and he will until the week after he wins the election.

Then as the markets dump on sterling and gilts, and global debt collectors knock at the door of the UK Treasury, he will be forced to unveil the real deep cuts and huge civil service retrenchment.

If he fails to deliver, the sovereign rating will be downgraded, borrowing rates will soar along with interest rates, the over-mortgaged and the credit card-maxed will be hurt, the lights will go off, the shops will empty, the unions will strike and the UK will have been delivered unto the true 'forces of Hell'.

The IMF tanks will roll in and ... well we've seen that one before haven't we... The Conservatives under a new leader will then narrowly win an national emergency election and Brown will go to prison for high treason accompanied by a cohort of his disgraced bankster friends.

Labour should win and drink from its own poisoned well.

Sacre Bleu

I think the maths are sort of right. Crude generalisations: population 60 million, average wage 24,000 gross, no taxes etc deducted. If you take all that money, 24k from 60m people you will pay off the 1.4 trillion debt in a year. IF that is the size of the hole. Idiotic proposition I know but shows the extent of the problem with two very basic factors which anyone should be able to understand.

Richard

@Sacre Bleu

Yes not very practicle...try and express it another way. Take 100% off the top 3% of the earners in the UK and the rest would owe 50 quid each oveer 4 years.
I don't know anyone on over 150K who could not survive a year without wages if they had to....I know it's a silly argument too but puts things into perspective....especially when Cameron whats to hand these people cash back on inheritance tax.

2trueblue

Darling is an irrelevance, he blew it and will not get another opportunity. Brown will not get another opportunity. Ever wonder why he has not named the date? He has no manifesto and has enjoyed, and is enjoying seeing the Tories queried continually by his beloved BBC etc to garner their ideas.

He is also getting us to pay for their electioneering around the country until he declares the date. After the announcement Liebore themselves will have to foot the bill as it will then officially be electioneering. Whether you like it or not, the public are paying for these creeps to travel far and wide in the UK to spin their lies. It just never ends with Liebore does it?

Darling is toast, he had his opportunity, he stuck one leg in each camp and lost. Good joke of Mandys though, poor delivery.

What we all need is the media to do their work and disclose the budget and its little devious bits. Right now they are not doing their job.

Liz Brown

mandelbum writing gordo's manifesto? and we have waited 3 years (or 13 depending how you look at it) for this load of cobblers?

TrevorsDen

Dear all - ICM show a 2point increase in the Tory lead to 8 points. 39-31.

I await with interest how the usual suspects and dead beats can turn this into a disaster for the Tories and spin it all to be Osborne's fault.

Bring it on. Of course the poll by Mr Baroness Ashton might turn it all on its head and everyone can get off on it as per usual.

Helen Wright

Seriously - Isn't it only fitting that Gordon Brown is elected so that he has to reap what he has sewn? Or put bluntly - surely he deserves to wallow in his own shit?

We need another of Scottish Labour, so they take responsiblity for Scottish Labour policies and are then eterenally doomed !!

I for one am sick to death of the eternal circle, where Labour bankrupt the nation and the Tories tax us into the grave to pay off those debts, then Labour inherit a great economy, then bankrupt us again and so the circle goes on.

Put an end to it and vote Labour. They are responsbible for the mess. Let them clean it up.

AP

Annual Contracts in business? I think those are rolling contracts Mr Brown, you can't dump someone out of their job at the end of each year for missing targets, the rules YOUIR GOVERNMENT imposes on business prevents it.

But of course truth and rules don't apply to the Labour Parrty

Murray Knight

We don't just need a new government, we need a new people.

Sacre Bleu

Richard, the point I was trying to show was that everyone can associate with sums like 25k but the problem is getting people to recognise a million/billion/trillion bit. These words and numbers are just a switch off for most people and when you add interest rates/income expenditure deficits to the equation, forget it.

Martin

Do I believe a single word is saying? Emphatically, no. I think his potential audience is the 'politically illiterate' and he knows it. If he wins, all high-school children will be voting in the election after next under their teachers' supervision (and, it goes without saying, all teachers will be card carrying members of the NUT, pronounced 'nut').

Chris lancashire

Brown is to management what Genghis Khan was to peace. Having lately discovered that targets don't work, he's now added the threat of the sack to his honed management toolkit. Brown wouldn't last 5 minutes in any decent private sector company.

Dorothy Wilson

Chris lancaster: Brown would not be recruited by any decent private company

Dorothy Wilson

Sorry Chris! Got your name wrong. One of my neighbours is Lancaster!

echo34

Blimey Richard,

posting on a topic with Brown in the title, positive comments, are you feeling alright?

Tim Carpenter LPUK

@Richard

"If we could only persuad more people who can afford to, to pay ALL the taxes they owe."

That is done by lowering and flattening taxes, removing the incentive to avoid them.

"Maybe encourage a few business men that putting out UK jobs to india and China, whilst it may be good for them, is not in the public interest."

It is in the public interest to export low or negative margin work to where it is more profitable and focus on high margin activities. As long as the State persists in sucking the life out of those working to inject it into zombie sectors public and "private" the weaker we will all be.

"Perhaps stop driving down wages to the levels where the state has to prop up peoples earnings it's counter productive."

See above. We should not be propping people's earnings up, as that means those who hire them get them for less than they would otherwise have to pay at the expense of us all. The State is subsidising low wages, and subsidies encourage more of what they subsidise.

"Telling people over 50 they are too old to work for modern companies..Next time you are on the train to work look at the age of the average commutor!!!"

Direct your complaints at young people who do the discrimination. Forcing quotas on companies or making things illegal is not the answer, btw. The Left IMHO is as much to blame for "the cult of youth", for "modernisation" (irrespective of if it is an improvement or not). I doubt society would be discriminating against the older generations without agitation from certain political groups.

"Stop parents from escaping their responsibilities to bring up their own children and to engage with their schools."

End the de facto monopoly and get the State out of Education, then parents have to be responsible.

"Maybe spend sometime on a short break in the UK and not abroad would help the economy a little."

If the quality/value is up to it, why not. Until then, you are subsidising lower quality and so will encourage it.

"Use your local shops and businesses instead of the huge vested interests like ASDA and TESCO's."

See above.

"Walk your kids to school instead of driving them 1 mile."

Until we end Stamp Duty and get the Schools out from the dead hand of the State, good schools homes and indeed jobs are likely to remain some distance apart for many.

"Behave in a more neighbourly fashion to the people in your communities instead of leaving it to social services...dont put granny in a home because it impinges on your lifestyle. Do more with your kids and get the real hugs of affection not just the ones for buying the latest block buster video game.
Plenty of things we can do without much cost to ourselves if we want to."

In this last point and all of the above, the State is the very thing that is interfering in the solution. It is the friction, the dead weight, the obstruction. It is the tumour forcing the body politic to divert more and more resources to feed its every growing bulk.

Labour and the LibDems would be the usual suspects here but Cameron has, in trying to remove the social conservatism from the Tory party so he can win power, swallowed the Fabian, Statist mantra.

Richard

@TIM not so nice and very Dim,
Please don't take this the wrong way as I feel you do have some very good points....just a shame you didn't put them in your post.

Tim Carpenter LPUK

Richard, you resorted to ad Hominem. Enough said.