General Politics Thread

[ayrmad]

1 hour ago, strichener said:

I don't disagree with the sentiment although it has noting to do with Baxter's claim that it was all caused by the bankers.  I do however call into question the part highlighted as this looks far too high.  What is your source for this amount as the latest figures from the Scottish Government is 2015/16 and stood at £2.8bln.  If it were as high as you are stating, Scotland would be paying over 12% of expenditure on debt interest.

Off the top of my head used £1.8t as debt and applied your 0.0573 figure and a rough population share.

Even at 3% it's £4.5 billion a year or £850 per head, that's £4.5 billion we could be putting towards a sovereign wealth fund, cutting deficits, fighting austerity or pishing it up against a wall etc.

[jmothecat]

10 years to the day since the great man departed and politics became steadily more miserable.

[pandarilla]

The first big blue spike was during the second world war.
The one in the 1992 was the impact of the pound leaving the ERM.
The final one was the aftershock of the financial crash.
I am unaware of a time when Labour had these sorts of challenges to clean up so a direct comparison is impossible.
This is yet another in a tedious line of abuse of statistics.

Is it not the case that the 1992 crisis was down to the failure of the Tory economic policy? The same can't really be said of the 2008 crash.

[Baxter Parp]

51 minutes ago, pandarilla said:

Is it not the case that the 1992 crisis was down to the failure of the Tory economic policy? The same can't really be said of the 2008 crash.

 

 

Absolutely, 1992 was a failure of Tory domestic economic policy while 2008 was a failure of financial regulation in the US and Europe as much as the UK.

[NotThePars]

10 years to the day since the great man departed and politics became steadily more miserable.

I'll be making the most of my membership by kicking your arse up and down our local CLP.

[D Angelo Barksdale]

1 hour ago, jmothecat said:

10 years to the day since the great man departed and politics became steadily more miserable.

[jakedee]

Just heard the word " telt" being used in the House of Commons, things are not as bad as they may seem [emoji2]

[strichener]

4 hours ago, Baxter Parp said:

Jesus Christ. Here, let me help you, as you can see below, historically Tory governments generally run higher deficits than Labour ones and surpluses are, in fact, rare in either case.  Note also that the Labour government was running a very moderate deficit until the financial crisis hit when it ballooned due to shrinking revenues and the vast sums handed to the bankers so that they could maintain liquidity and give themselves bonuses.  Get it yet?

Can you actually answer the question you were asked? 

Edited June 27, 2017 by strichener

[strichener]

2 hours ago, ayrmad said:

Off the top of my head used £1.8t as debt and applied your 0.0573 figure and a rough population share.

Even at 3% it's £4.5 billion a year or £850 per head, that's £4.5 billion we could be putting towards a sovereign wealth fund, cutting deficits, fighting austerity or pishing it up against a wall etc.

According to the Scottish government, the amount is £2.8bln.  Which is roughly the same as what it was in 2007 - £2.6bln.

[Baxter Parp]

1 minute ago, strichener said:

Can you actually answer the question? 

Fill yer boots.

[strichener]

3 minutes ago, Baxter Parp said:

Fill yer boots.

Ignoring the fact that you have extended the time period past the Labour administration that was in power at the time that you blame the bankers for everything, comparing Labour to the Conservatives is meaningless.  You stated that Labour did not overspend and anyway you look at it the clearly did:

Debt in 1997: £352bln
Debt in 2007: £527bln

Surplus: -£175bln

I am not sure how badly you failed arithmetic but clearly the Labour government overspent.

Edited June 27, 2017 by strichener

[pandarilla]

Maybe. I prefer to remember the speculators deliberately betting against the pound.
It is hard to imagine anyone being able to deal with that any better than Major's government. I remember 16% interest rates at one point as they desperately tried to prevent devaluation of the currency and hence an exit from the ERM. If I remember rightly, the flaw was in requiring member's currencies to remain within a certain value range. They fixed this using the Euro if my memory serves me correctly. I would say it was a failure of the ERM mechanism rather than the Tories.

I'm out my depth with economics but can many of these problems not be traced back to the city of London's so-called 'big bang' in the late 80s?

Thatcher unleashed the power of the city traders - and my take on it was that it came back to bite them on the arse?

[ayrmad]

6 hours ago, strichener said:

According to the Scottish government, the amount is £2.8bln.  Which is roughly the same as what it was in 2007 - £2.6bln.

Is there not also approximately 50% of that figure that comes off at source to pay the interest to the treasury on the QE?

[strichener]

10 hours ago, ayrmad said:

Is there not also approximately 50% of that figure that comes off at source to pay the interest to the treasury on the QE?

The last information I had on this was that the BOE QE program paid 0.5% on the money used in the QE program.  The government pays the BOE interest on the gilts that the bank holds and then the remainder is returned to the treasury.  If this is still the case and with the current QE amounts the total net interest on QE would be just over £2bln for the entire QE program.

[ayrmad]

45 minutes ago, strichener said:

The last information I had on this was that the BOE QE program paid 0.5% on the money used in the QE program.  The government pays the BOE interest on the gilts that the bank holds and then the remainder is returned to the treasury.  If this is still the case and with the current QE amounts the total net interest on QE would be just over £2bln for the entire QE program.

I just remember the ludicrous position from a few years ago where Scotland was getting tagged for paying interest on cash the UK borrowed from itself, it was certainly considerably more than a population share of £2b back then, it's not like there's much a wee diddy country like ourselves could do with a piddly £170 million on top of the other paltry £2.6 billion.

You're posting here like these figures are insignificant amounts, the large figure is 3 new QE hospitals in Glasgow, 2 Queensferry crossings, 100 secondary schools, scrapping the bedroom tax 50 times,a 50% increase in pensions,doubling working and child tax credits, building a bridge and doubling DLA & Attendance Allowance  etc etc etc.

Edited June 28, 2017 by ayrmad

[strichener]

5 hours ago, ayrmad said:

I just remember the ludicrous position from a few years ago where Scotland was getting tagged for paying interest on cash the UK borrowed from itself, it was certainly considerably more than a population share of £2b back then, it's not like there's much a wee diddy country like ourselves could do with a piddly £170 million on top of the other paltry £2.6 billion.

You're posting here like these figures are insignificant amounts, the large figure is 3 new QE hospitals in Glasgow, 2 Queensferry crossings, 100 secondary schools, scrapping the bedroom tax 50 times,a 50% increase in pensions,doubling working and child tax credits, building a bridge and doubling DLA & Attendance Allowance  etc etc etc.

I have already stated that I agreed with the sentiment.  Using realistic figures doesn't dilute the argument as you have clearly demonstrated by the above post.

[doulikefish]

Public workers pay cap remains,the tories have just voted down an amendment to lift the freeze

[Tamdunk]

33 minutes ago, doulikefish said:

Public workers pay cap remains,the tories have just voted down an amendment to lift the freeze

Stuart Dickson likes this

[NotThePars]

Puts to bed the laughable myth of "the decent Tories". Scum to a man and woman.

[jagfox]

3 hours ago, doulikefish said:

Public workers pay cap remains,the tories have just voted down an amendment to lift the freeze

I'm sure all of Theresa's weasel words of thanks to the emergency services over the last couple of months will help them pay their bills...