Politics

25 April 2009

Fraser Nelson reviews the week in politics

All Labour budgets are essentially works of deception, and Alistair Darling’s speech on Wednesday was no exception. Once again, the Chancellor deployed the normal, tiresome formula: pyrotechnics intended to distract voters from an ugly truth lurking in the small print. Except this time, the distractions were obvious fakes. No one seriously believes the British economy will be helped by a bribe for buying an imported car. And the truth was the ugliest Britain has been told in its peacetime history: that the nation’s finances are in freefall.

By the time you have finished reading this sentence, the national debt will have increased by some £14,000 — rising by £175 billion this year and £173 billion next. It is a bowel-loosening sum, and will be followed by comparable figures in subsequent years. Gordon Brown has no intention of suddenly abstaining from the state spending he worked so hard to drive up. The Budget protects government from any serious cuts, and proposes to saddle us with a collective debt of £1.3 trillion. This will be the Prime Minister’s leaving present to a miserable public.

And make no mistake: it is a leaving present that will transform Britain. Mr Brown’s legacy is to have taken charge of a low-debt economy and turned it into a debtors’ hell. As the small print of the Budget makes clear, interest payments alone will soon overtake the costs of educating our children or defending the realm. Within a few years, debt repayments will be the biggest single cost to the British government — aside from the National Health Service. This Budget may have taken 50 minutes to read, but it will take decades to pay off.

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Mike

April 23rd, 2009 2:45pm Report this comment

...and still 30% vote for these dummy's. It's enough to make you weep.

Fed Up with Labour governments

April 23rd, 2009 3:32pm Report this comment

Labour should be put on trial for what they have done to us.

End off.

Robbit

April 24th, 2009 11:40am Report this comment

Brilliant summary of the situation, Mr. Nelson!

Yes, Mike, 30% of our fellow citizens are quite happy to be marching in lock-step down the not so long road to serfdom.

And yes, Fed Up, if there were any justice in this world and any real leadership in this country this lot would be in the Tower of London awaiting the Axe.

PT

April 24th, 2009 12:40pm Report this comment

Labour should be thrown to electoral oblivion for all time for this. Their spendathon hasn't ended poverty, or made life easier for their constituency either - rather it's lined the pockets of various advocacy groups and members of the "state sector", which no longer includes anything that could be called productive industry. We despirately need to bring Gladstone back from the grave - his sort of economies are now needed more than ever. All funding for "social engineering", these ubiquitous NGO's which seem to be really ruling the country and other pet projects of the new left should all be forthwith abolished. The biggest step towards getting the budget back into the black.

Watervole

April 25th, 2009 11:57pm Report this comment

Thank you Fraser for telling it like it is. I don't envy Osborne his task. I do feel though that despite his detractors, he may well be one of the few men in the country smart enough to sort it out. For all our sakes, may the gods help him. Brown and his minions should be held up for treason. It is unsconscionable that they should be allowed to get away with cheap political tricks at the expense of the public good. They should be made to pay for this. It is deliberate malfeisance.

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