TJ - Yes. Including housing costs. i suggest you look at the figures - its indisputable. Its not a matter of opinion. Its a fact.
I must live in a bubble then, because house prices in my town increased by 314% while Labour were in power - FACT!
As the government of the day, who could argue that they didn't have any control over a runaway housing market, or the reckless lending of the banks? If the government didn't have any control, then they were little more than a puppet show! The fact is that they had control, but they got their noses in the trough - more tax receipts -> more spending -> more bribery of the electorate!
Anyone who believes official inflation figures is daft. Housing costs were removed from the equation by the Conservatives before 1997. I can't remember, but I think it might have been Lawson that did that. Shameful! It allowed employers to get away with shortchanging their staff. The true cost of inflation has always been much higher.
As I recall, the first thing Gordon Brown did when he became chancellor was to hand the responsibility of setting interest rates to the Bank of England. We had a sustained period of low interest rates as a result. This fuelled house price inflation, which was no longer in the inflation equation.
Brown also slapped a tax on stocks yields, thus damaging the biggest investors - pension fund managers. Combining this with low interest rates, private pensions were forecast to perform as badly as mortgage endowments. What did people do to protect themselves in their old age? You've guessed it; Buy-to-let. This further added to the property boom.
Labour presided over a period of stability because it spent billions increasing the public sector. When there would have been a natuaral slow down in the economy, thousands got jobs in the public sector, thus skewing the picture. A genuine false economy!
Public confidence was increased by the apparent end to boom and bust Remember Gordon repeatedly proclaiming he'd finally sorted it? He was either arrogant, or stupid (both come to think of it!).
The influx of cheaper and cheaper good from the Far East gave people luxuries they would never otherwise have afforded. Holidays got cheaper as the budget airline business took off. What were Labour doing to stop the burgeoning damage to the environment? Nothing, they took the tax money for their greedy spending plans! These low prices kept the official inflation figures low, but Labour claimed this as their victory. It was nothing more than good luck in reality!
Life for the average person seemingly could be no better. Labour had done it, the magic solution. Stability and prosperity for all, forever. Anyone believing that nonsense was thick!
The government had plenty of warnings from expert economists about the mess we were headed for, but they naively carried, on convinced they were right to keep spending and allowing the public to take on more debt (this is the Labour way afterall). When the banking crisis struck, they were slow to act, costing you and me a fortune (Northern Rock). Darling was spectaculary useless!
I know there are many other layers of complexity in this situation, but those at the helm have a duty of care to steer us through. They failed in grand style!
Another thing that shocked was the lack of protest by the left wingers at Labour's bias against the working man, especially in the north. Prescott was bulldozing houses in the North whilst planning huge house building plans in the south. What did Labour do for the working man anywhere? They presided over the final demise of the steel industry and they continued to sell off public assets for a song (British Nuclear Fuels, BAA etc). They never managed it in time, but were going to flog the Port of Dover to a foreigner - mental!
The difference between Labour and the Conservatives over the selling off public concerns was that the Labour kept the money for it's out of control spending habits and the conservatives offered the public an opportunity to benefit from these. The Conservatives achieved better value for the tax payer, but I personally did not agree with all privatisation, especially allowing the utilities into foreign ownership.
The other shocker was a Labour government prematurely leading the country into a war in the middle east. They patently cowtowed to the Americans, but had no plan what to do after they had won the battle.
Sorry TJ, you are either barking mad, or deluded beyond comprehension if you think Labour did a good job from 1997-2010. Your unwavering highly polarised opinions shows you are not a rational thinker.
I am no big fan of the coallition, the Conservatives, or any party. I think the political system is corrupt. It's not much more than an expensive legitimised kind of bribery. We just can't afford the system as it stands and successive governments have proved that they are all useless! All democracy in this country gives us is the freedom once every 5 years to vote whoever we feel is the least useless party. That is all!
