MegaSack DRAW - This year's winner is user - rgwb
We will be in touch
just watching the news.yet again someone from the coalition is blaming labour for the economic crisis.now i'm not saying for a second that labour shouldn't take some of the blame.but i am sick and tired of some smug tory sitting in their ivory tower wholly passing the buck. 😡 remember what maggie did to the banks in the 80's (gave them the green light to make as much profit as possible)no doubt i am now going to get flamed,but wanted to air my view.
coz they iz sarisun
It's called Politics, innit. Were you born yesterday or something?
all governments blame the last lot for as long as they can nothing new there.
some people will buy it that brown caused the world global recession that started in the american sub prime market.
Politicians , of all hues, are not very honest and always give a polemic answer to any question.
political parties passing the buck is hardly new is it?
That's exactly what Labour did when they came to power in 1997. But it was Labour that introduced the FSA as regulators in place of the Bank of England, which directly led to the boom in credit and lack of accountability that enabled the banks to do what they did.
And it's a coalition government by the way.
Well... they came to power with a broken economy, massive debts and a massive deficit.
What they're doing is trying to deal with that.
I'm sure Labour would be doing exactly the same thing (i.e. what Darling said the would do). But they're not doing it for fun, there isn't a choice and it's worth mentioning it's not their fault just in case people forget. Exactly whose fault is pretty irrelevant, but it clearly isn't [i]their[/i] fault.
junkyard +1.
Never thought I'd say [i]that[/i] 😉
It's not the fact that they are blaming Lab that worries me. It's the thought that enough people will believe them and elect them for another term.
trailmonkey +1
and the standard labour retort is that the tories F***** it all up in the 80's & early 90's, to which the die hards will remember the disgusting mess from the 70's
dont matter who you vote for, the politicians always win.
Never thought I'd say that
monkey at keyboard writes something wise shocker 😆
That's exactly what Labour did when they came to power in 1997.
No they didn't. Don't make stuff up.
In fact ....... the reverse is true. New Labour refused to blame anything on the Tory/Thatcher legacy.
They were very keen to be seen as continuing the Thatcherite agenda.
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monkey at keyboard writes something wise shocker
That comment could go both ways. 😆
You know, I'd never realised Blair had one leg shorter than the other before. Blimey, every day's a school day...
yes monkey would like to claim credit but it would be a lie
Ye Osbourne likes to start off with the blame rant 😆
Thing is though are they reducing the debt or deficit. I doubt they've reduced the debt. Id be surprised if they've even reduced the deficit.
http://www.ukpublicspending.co.uk/uk_national_debt_chart.html
Ive no idea if the above link is credible or not. If its anywhere near being close to correct then that means the debt is getting worse 😆
Yeah it's not just the banking crisis, Labour were spending more than we could afford anyway.
why do the tories keep putting the full blame on labour for the recession?
Surely they must know it was all Thatchers fault?
yes monkey would like to claim credit but it would be a lie
Well, that was witty........
Still better a monkey than a dullard 😆
Yeah it's not just the banking crisis, Labour were spending more than we could afford anyway.
Yep, while we can blame Labour, we also need to take a look at ourselves for that one also.
Yeah it's not just the banking crisis, Labour were spending more than we could afford anyway.
Whilst selling off the country's gold reserves at the bottom of the market..
Just remember that Labour got the economy growing again before they left - albeit weakly.
Osbourne's slash and burn policies are to blame for the current 2nd downturn.
Yeah it's not just the banking crisis, Labour were spending more than we could afford anyway.
It was everyone else's fault for buying too expensive a house, taking too many foreign holidays, buying luxury goods and spending too much on new cars. As I mentioned on the "How do I fit my Gaggia into my Audi Estate for my mountain biking trip to my chalet in the Alps next week?" thread.
It was everyone else's fault for buying too expensive a house, taking too many foreign holidays, buying luxury goods and spending too much on new cars. As I mentioned on the "How do I fit my Gaggia into my Audi Estate for my mountain biking trip to my chalet in the Alps next week?" thread.
Absolutely priceless.
I feel I should be paying money to hear stuff like that.
In answer to the OP : Its because if they say it often and loud enough thick people start to think its true even though the evidence to the contrary is glaringly obvious, (i.e. all of the worlds major economies being in similar shite order simultaneously being the most obvious)
It was everyone else's fault for buying too expensive a house, taking too many foreign holidays, buying luxury goods and spending too much on new cars. As I mentioned on the "How do I fit my Gaggia into my Audi Estate for my mountain biking trip to my chalet in the Alps next week?" thread.
Just because the general populace are living on credit does not mean the government should do the same!
Uncle Jeremy to the Forum!!! Repeat: Uncle Jeremy to the Forum!!!
Hurry up lad. Or do you have to consult Polly Toynbee before you give an answer 😉
The Tories will keep on blaming Brown for as long as they can get away with it. It detracts the blame from their mates in the banks. Which was indirectly Browns fault too as he failed to regulate them. However, the tories would have regulated them less. In which case Christ only knows what mess we'd be in!!
Brown or the banks? I reckon its six of one, half a dozen of t'other
well, Labour claim responsibility for the 10 years of 'sustainable' and 'stable' growth built out of debt, so it's only fair to blame them for the fallout afterwards.
i don't really blame labour completely for the economic cock-up, but they were in charge when they could have / should have done something about it.
Gordon's switch from using RPI to using CPI back in 2003 lead to 6 or 7 years of lower than required interest rates, basically allowing the economy to overheat and creating the perfect conditions for BOOM and BUST. This was obvious to anyone with a modicum of common sence, economical nouse and a view of history (why no other politician other than Vince Cable saw it happening is beyond me).
The Banking crisis was a symptom of the overheated economy, rather than the cause of the crash. The crash was coming anyway, they always do when economies are allowed to overheat. Some stricter regulation of the banks might have delayed the inevitable, although IMHO if it hadn't been a banking crisis it would have been something else (an increase in interest rates, meaning that all those leverages buyouts couldn't afford their repayments, leading to a market crash, or perhaps something else out of leftfield, prehaps a major earthquake seriously affecting the worlds third largest economy?)
The US economy and many of the european economies were following Gordon's model of growth economy based on cheap debt, it was the same model and therefore failed in the same way. Other economies such as Germany, Canada, NZ, were not following the same model, and while they have been affected by the global downturn caused by the banking crisis (which was a symptom of bad economic management) their economies are in a much better place to weather the storm and rebuild.
So in answer to the OP's question, the Tories blame Labour because it was their fault. (Would we have had a different outcome with a Tory rather than Labour government is another question)
[i]You know, I'd never realised Blair had one leg shorter than the other before. Blimey, every day's a school day... [/i]
I like how he's showing it to the queen.
"Look at that! One leg shorter than the other and I still got elected in.
Were you elected in or did you become queen by being born into the right family?"
I like how he's showing it to the queen
That isn't the Queen. It's Tory royalty, but no monarch. They are in until they die; Thatch was shifted by John Major.
why no other politician other than Vince Cable saw it happening is beyond me
Ah yes. Vince the sage that predicted 17 of the last 2 recessions.
The man's an idiot.
why no other politician other than Vince Cable saw it happening is beyond me
Vince Cable speaking in the House of Commons in 2008 :
[i]First, like most western Governments, [u]we believe[/u]—and the Government say that they believe—[u]in the need for a fiscal stimulus[/u]. Despite the severe financial constraints on the public sector, [u]we believe that such a stimulus is right and necessary[/u]
A few weeks ago, we proposed in the House that, assuming a belief in the fiscal stimulus, a much better use of that £12.5 billion would have been to introduce a series of public investment measures aimed at, for example, home insulation, social housing projects and public transport. We remain of the view that that would have been the correct way forward.
[u]Why is public investment so important in a recession?[/u] Partly because it creates employment. There is a big opportunity cost to the alternative of not investing: people remain unemployed. Some 100,000 construction workers have already been laid off in this recession. The figure was 300,000 at the peak of the last recession in the early 1990s, and there is a reasonable expectation that the number of unemployed construction workers in this recession will be even bigger than that.
My second basic point is that, [u]despite the Government’s commitment in principle to accelerating public investment[/u], a growing amount of evidence—anecdotal so far, but I hope that the Government will clarify the matter—shows that [u]many of their enhanced public investment projects are not happening or are severely delayed[/u].
[u]If we can sustain that level of public investment, it will be an important achievement in itself. The danger is that that investment will simply stop[/u]. If we look at what the Government have done in their public investment programme, we can see that they have brought investment forward; I think that the figures are £365 million for the current financial year—that probably will not happen—and £2.5 billion for the next financial year. [u]After that they want a big cut of £3 billion in public investment[/u] in the following year. That assumes a short, minor recession, [u]which seems utterly foolish[/u] in the current context.
It is worth while putting that in the wider context and considering the extreme cases, such as those of Italy and Japan. As far as I am aware, Japan has not had a currency crisis, yet it has public debt of well over 100 per cent. of GDP. It finances that comfortably by patriotic saving on the part of the Japanese and their lending their money to the Government. [u]Its high levels of debt are way beyond what we are currently contemplating and do not, by any means, necessarily create the kind of problems that some hon. Members are worrying about[/u], but clearly we must be cautious. That is why any public investment programme has to be carried out in a disciplined way.[/i]
So there you have it. In 2008 Vince Cable was passionately arguing for a government funded fiscal stimulus. He castigated the then Labour government for not going far enough and "severely delaying" it.
He then castigated them for wanting to cut public spending too soon which he describes as "utterly foolish".
Finally, he reassures everyone that the public debt can easily be managed, citing Italy and Japan as examples of much higher public debt which are "comfortably" been dealt with.
Today, Vince Cable blames everything on the Last government claiming they left us in a mess through debt.
I'm not sure whether Vince cable has a crystal ball, but he can certainly preform some impressive political acrobatics.
http://services.parliament.uk/hansard/Commons/ByDate/20090202/mainchamberdebates/part004.html
conqueror - I think they are saying they will get deficit (not the debt) in balance in this parliament. So by the end of the parliament we will no longer be spending more than we get in, and at that point debt will stop increasing, and yes - debt will continue to increase until that point.
It takes time for the spending cuts, extra tax, and (expected / hoped fop / guessed at) future economic growth to come through
They are pretty clever at mixing up debt and deficit I think
You know, I'd never realised Blair had one leg shorter than the other before.
I always said he only looked like he was leaning to the left.
Casting my mind back to 2001 i distinctly remember Blair saying "we've made a good start, let us finish the job" 😕 On that basis the Tory Party have got another 3 years at least of blaming Labour.
Almost as good as Labour saying its a world wide recession which they could not have done anything about. If i recall "prudent" Brown said there would be no more boom and bust. He did't add on any caveat if i recall.
Hey, I didn't say VC was a God, he was just the only Politician of note that didn't seem to think that 10+ years of economic growth based on cheap credit was sustainable. The fact that he does seem to speak large amounts of drivel is neither here nor there.
Cheap credit was and still very much is the elephant in the room of UK economics, until it is addressed (which will mean a contraction in our economy, a loss of jobs and reduction in living standards for the majority) our economy is on a one way ticket to disaster.
Almost as good as Labour saying its a world wide recession which they could not have done anything about.
You make it sound as if New Labour could have done things differently and Britain could have avoided an economic crises. The fact that New Labour would [i]eventually[/i] fail economically was a forgone conclusion - [i]all[/i] governments eventually fail economically.
Even the wealthiest most advanced and successful capitalist countries in the world eventually fail - it doesn't matter whether it's the US, Germany, or Japan, eventually they will hit an economic crises. The very most they can expect is 20 years of economic stability, but more realistically about 10 years.......and that, as I say, is for the most successful ones.
The reason governments throughout the world get get thrown out of office is almost always because of the state of the economy - and governments very rarely stay in office for very long.
The only surprising thing is that Gordon Brown deluded himself into thinking he was the messiah who had found the answer which everyone had been searching for....."no return to boom and bust" was a truly absurd claim to make.
But those who somehow feel that the Tories can provide the answers are equally deluding themselves.
Governments govern under conditions of almost constant crises management. The only thing anyone needs to worry about at election time is who do they trust most to manage the crises in their favour. I for one, wouldn't put my faith in a party which represents a privileged few who, whatever the crises, are always in a win-win situation.
Its the problem with democracy. Basically you have to get thick people to vote for you. All parties suffer equally from not having the nuts to believe that Joe Average can actually figure out that you can't have something for nothing, so they continually try to deliver that, generally in the lead up to an election thus boom and bust. Expect this lot to start handing out tax cuts in about 3 years.
Cheap credit was and still very much is the elephant in the room of UK economics, until it is addressed (which will mean a contraction in our economy, a loss of jobs and reduction in living standards for the majority) our economy is on a one way ticket to disaster.
It only means a "contraction in our economy, a loss of jobs and reduction in living standards for the majority" if you choose to follow certain economic policies which cause that. There is never "only one way" in economics.
30 plus years ago there comparably very little credit available, in fact there were strictly enforced government credit controls. Despite that, there were much lower levels of unemployment than there are today and people's living standards were increasing.
The reason for that was partly because wages as percent of GDP were higher. When the neo-liberals seized power one of their priorities was to drive down wages. To counter the obvious economic and political effects of such a move, they immediately abolished all credit controls.
They basically said to ordinary working people "the bad news is that everyone needs to be paid less, the good news is that you can borrow as much as you want". In other words, "we are going to pay you less, but you will owe us more".
Quite a handy little arrangement really - more profits due to less wages, and then more profit again from lending money to underpaid workers.
And it worked quite well too - it certainly fooled a lot of people. Plus they were still able to pay for their cheap consumer goods from China. Obviously the strategy was always going to have a limited shelf-life. So now people are been told that they can't borrow anymore and will have to tighten up their belts. The good news is that it's all Labour's fault.
There are no "truths" in economics - only choices. And the choices are endless......."There Is No Alternative" is a lie.