George Osborne

Elfin – I might be 😀

http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/education/inflation/timeline/chart.htm

http://www.whatsthecost.com/historic.cpi.aspx

2006 2.30%
2005 2.10%
2004 1.30%
2003 1.40%
2002 1.30%
2001 1.20%
2000 0.80%
1999 1.30%
1998 1.60%
1997 1.80%
1996 2.50%
1995 2.60%
1994 2.00%
1993 2.50%
1992 4.30%
1991 7.50%
1990 7.00%
1989 5.20%
1988 4.90%
1987 4.20%
1986 3.40%
1985 6.10%
1984 5.00%
1983 4.60%
1982 8.60%
1981 11.90%
1980 18.00%
1979 13.40%

Just to stoke the fires a bit more, how many managers of private companies are rubbing their hands with glee that they will soon be able to pick up cheaply, some highly trained, highly motivated ex public sector staff to drive their businesses forward during this period of economic recovery?
Thought not. Not one person I know in the private sector would consider employing ex public sector staff. So it looks like unemployment will remain high for quite a while. It’s like trying to mix oil and water. It’s ideological, it is just not going to happen.

Really? you must know some very blinkered people then! Unless you’re just stoking fires, in which case ignore the rest of this contribution!

Many of the people I know and work with (in the public sector) come from both backgrounds, and when I did private sector work I experienced something similar.

I thought everyone loved the whole “tranferable skills” thing, particularly managers, in pretty much all the industries I’ve worked in this has been the case for the past decade at least.

As predicted public sector spending is rising as the cuts cause increased unemployment benefits and decreased revenues.

The reason spending is not going down (and quite worrying point) is that the cuts have barely started yet. Unemployment etc has not gone up much since the election. Most cuts begin in April and are then phased in (ramped up) over the four years to 2014/15.

I haven’t voted Tory in any of the six GEs I’ve been elegible to vote in but I think its wrong to describe him as a lightweight. By many accounts he is the ‘brains’ behind the Tories and Cameron is just the more presentable front man. Rather like Brown and Blair. Osborne appreciates he is cack at presentation, looks and sounds awful and comes accross as smug and aloof.

FWIW I reckon the next year and probably 3 years are going to be tough for most people but there won’t be a double dip recession – just a verly slow and prolonged recovery that feels like a recession. There is too much crap that needs sorting out before the economy can grow properly again. Personal and corporate debt, bad but hidden bad bank loans and so on are the main issues still to be resolved.

Genuine thanks for the figures TJ. Looking at those figures, they are hard to argue with. On the other hand, anybody looking to buy a house over the last decade will tell you how prices have escalated out of control, and you must admit that you cannot argue with that (irrespective of who the government is)

The thing with the inflation figures is that they can be massaged by changing the basket of goods, and as we all knows stats can be used to prove anything. My main bugbear was how GB took mortgage costs out of the CPI measure as house prices were booming and he wanted to keep inflation low. This only made matters worse, as it meant that interests rates were not raised to control inflation, and the housing boom got worse.

Wife works for NHS I work in the manufacturing sector. I’m not being flippant either. I think these people are blinkered that’s the point. There are some highly talented people and some incompetent people in both sectors but I think the whole transferable skills thing is just tosh. I hope I’m wrong but I just don’t think it’s going to happen.

Just enough cuts to save plenty for a tax cut in time for the next general election i reckon.

Daves mum – cpi started in 1996 nefore Brown

Housing costs add around a % point to the figures without generally but not always.

the cost of housing per week has not gone up hugely as interest rates fell. My mortgage is 70% of what it was in 94 due to the fall in rates

I am guessing you were not an adult in the 70s and 80s with high inflation or you woud remeber what high inflation was like

So TJ – you’re telling us that the start date for Gordon’s historic low interest rates was in, what 1993? 😆

Did I write any of that zulu – no I did not – but once again you have to make things up to discredit people you don’t agree with

All I said was the simple truth – under labour we had low inflation, steady growth and low interest rates – a period of unprecedented financial stability.

This is an absolute fact.

And, by your own data, That trend and the period of stability began under the previous government – When Major first set an inflation target of 2.5% – So, the very best you can accuse Labour of is continuing a successful Tory policy, whilst borrowing money on an enormous scale to expand the public sector and applying a anti inflationary downward wage pressure by opening the borders to mass immigration…

Fair play, I can’t be bothered arguing anymore! 😀

Wife works for NHS I work in the manufacturing sector. I’m not being flippant either. I think these people are blinkered that’s the point. There are some highly talented people and some incompetent people in both sectors but I think the whole transferable skills thing is just tosh. I hope I’m wrong but I just don’t think it’s going to happen.

Fair enough, I hope you’re wrong too, otherwise I could be on the dole for the foreseeable coming from a public sector post that isn’t likely to be around in the future.

I’m not too concerned about finding work again in the private/public or third sectors, but it does worry me that there are folk that don’t think these perceived gaps can be bridged by motivated, skilled people from all backgrounds. Oh well, I guess time will tell…

This is an absolute fact.

And again you ignore the ‘what came next’, and i quite expect you to say it is all the banks fault. We are now paying for labours idiological politicies, fact.

Nope Si – that is an opinion.

It was also a world wide issue affecting many countries – and was mitigated in the UK by labours policies

Low inflation. Thats the simple fact. Including housing costs – the numbers are all there.

3 bed semi.

Bought in April 2000 = £70k

Sold in September 2002 = £124K

I guess some prices of electrical goods in the CPI had to seriously deflate a tad to offset this…

I hate to pick holes in one of TandemJeremy’s statements because he comes across pretty well, but that one I can’t agree with.

It was also a world wide issue affecting many countries

So, was the economic boom and low inflation rates not also a “world wide issue affecting many countries ” as well then TJ? or is it a case of take the credit and lay the blame?

Lets look at the Facts now – by early 2000 the UK economic boom was already the longest in history, despite the vast majority of that period being under a Conservative government, indeed GDP had been rising since mid 1992! And guess what, the US economy was a record breaker too, also entering its longest ever period of expansion!

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/economic-boom-is-longest-in-uk-history-727514.html

So, down to Zanu-NL policies, or down to being handed the best looking economy ever given to any government entirely due to Tory policies, or just down to global shifts in the money markets – which was it?

ahwiles – Member

Woody – Member

Can I be the first to congratulate chewkw on his most excellent use of the word ‘shite’.

is it just me? or does chewkw finally seem to be making some sense?

no offense meant Chewie, your posts are almost always entertaining, and almost always completely baffling. [/quote]

None taken. All comments welcome good or bad.

“The value of your investment can go down as well as up.”

I hate to pick holes in one of TandemJeremy’s statements

How very dare you. What he posted weren’t just facts, they were absolute facts……..

TandemJeremy – Member

Nope Si – that is an opinion.

It was also a world wide issue affecting many countries – and was mitigated in the UK by labours policies

nope, it’s a western issue, india/china/africa/everywhere else other than europe/america aren’t really affected in the same way*.

and labour were at the wheel during the good times, good times fueled by debt and some really very creative banking.

i’m a natural labour voter, i just can’t bring myself to vote for them when they’re clearly incompetent**.

so i vote green.

(*watch this space, they seem to be making many of the same mistakes ‘we’ made)

(**they elected the wrong brother, and it’s all i can do to stop myself from exploding with rage when i hear the name ‘alan johnson’)

PJM1974 / woody – so the bank of England is wrong with what it states as inflation? All the various sources of inflation figures are wrong? Or its just you refuse to believe the truth?

Inflation is not a matter of opinion. Its hard facts and the fact is that inflation was low for all of labours rule. You can bluster all you like but that is a fact.

Or do you know better than the bank of England?

inflation was low for the five years preceding and throughout labours rule

TFTFY

http://www.statistics.gov.uk/downloads/theme_economy/RP04.pdf

1979 13.4
1980 18.0
1981 11.9
1982 8.6
1983 4.6
1984 5.0
1985 6.1
1986 3.4
1987 4.2
1988 4.9
1989 7.8
1990 9.5
1991 5.9
1992 3.7
1993 1.6
1994 2.4
1995 3.5
1996 2.4
1997 3.1
1998 3.4
1999 1.5
2000 3.0
2001 1.8
2002 1.7
2003 2.9
2004 3.0
2005 2.8
2006 3.2
2007 4.3
2008 4.0
2009 ?0.5

inflation was low for all of labours rule

Not strictly true, CPI was low for New Labour‘s rule, and as others have pointed out this was a global phenomenon. If we look at the last Labour government things are a little different:

1978 8.30%
1977 15.80%
1976 16.50%
1975 24.20%
1974 16.00%

I remember 1975, I was a student on a fixed income. Not a happy time.

Of course, TJ, the low inflationary environment in the UK is nothing to do with Chinese productivity is it? Oh no. That was just an amazing coincidence:

Ooh! A graph! 🙂

I like graphs, me.

Si, your bikes may be progressive but your mental processes certainly are not……..Now I’m no fan of the Labour Party, because unlike you I believe that us ordinary folk deserve more than jingoistic pro-capitalist politics dressed in Mondeoman (or Worcesterwoman) clothing. The reason Labour has always failed to go anywhere is because it is as bound to the system as the Tories and Lib Dems are – ultimately they all believe in relation to the market that ‘there is no alternative’ (remember Thatcher’s famous words.) Hence when the market worldwide screws up, we all have to pay the price. For you to say this is down to ‘Labour’s ideological policies’ gives Labour far more credit than they’re due – Her Majesties loyal opposition just wants to manage capitalism not overturn it. They may be inept and they may be cowards and turncoats, but actually they did realise that public spending had to rise to offset the worst effects of a world capitalist crash and indeed in Autumn 08 to keep money coming out of holes in the wall for us all to live. Now that part of the crisis is over, the ‘masters of the universe’ have gotten bold again and are trying to have us believe that actually their system can save us and the public sector caused the recession, the opposite of the truth. Faced with this, Labour can do nothing – it is impotent because it has been too complicit in its support for bankers, industrialists and the (filthy) rich. Infact it lacks the ideological tools for the job of defending us (even you, dear Si and Stoner and Zulu) from the onslaught of job cutting, wage cutting and scapegoating that Cameron, Osborne and their rich friends around the world intend to visit upon us………..and when they force us to sell our bikes, will we be prepared to fight them then, or will it all be too late???!!!

Been watching this thread with some bemusement, But finally dekadanse comes out with what needed to be said.

Stoner zulu and co, you can defend this lot as much as you like, fools. You mean nothing to a cabinet full of millionaires.

the low inflationary environment in the UK is nothing to do with Chinese productivity is it?

It has everything to do with Chinese productivity. But it’s not something which monetarist are keen to admit.

As it’s also something which has a limited shelf-life…….the Chinese will not be producing cheap stuff for us, like the Japanese also once did, forever. And the global credit crunch will almost certainly have had the effect of bringing that date further forward. The Chinese learnt a valuable lesson on the perilous consequences of over reliance on unreliable world markets. They dealt with it to a certain extent by inward investment in their infrastructures. They will be now concentrating much more on developing their own internal markets, specially as the political consequences/pressures of their lopsided development (urban/rural) become more apparent. The days of cheap Chinese consumer goods are drawing to a close I fear.

@Zulu-Eleven

Zanu-NL policies

Idiot.

Crikey, so has it gone pear shape yet? where to start? Who to blame … hmmm … let’s see. Not all gloom & doom but when talking to mates the general impression is:

Financial sector = the loan shark of the world and only few will benefit.
Manufacturing sector = outsource everything to other countries except the guys at the top. We are sophisticated. Design in UK but made in …
Chemical industry = like the world is not catching up …
Biotech = like the world is not taking notice.
Farming = supermarkets run them …
Car industry = owned … by others. Need more subsidies please.
Aircraft engineering = eeermmmm … still ok-ish … I think.
IT = Information superhigher way at Reading silly-con valley? Game industry perhaps but I don’t game.
Medicine = I demand Harley Street wage or died you suckers.
Shipbuilding = hmmm … design in UK made in …
Petroleum = let’s harvest the world so long as we fly the flag we should be ok.
Higher Education = “consumers” demand higher grades so give them.
“Service” industry = it’s disposable …
Entertainment = Oh me god (scream in excitement in tears etc), worship, worship, worship, they are my heroes. WTF! Oh no … they are artists … we are cultured, worship, worship worship …
Work attitude = the computer say NOooooo …
Export = how dare you. No way that’s dirty work.
Import = Yes, we can. It’s cheap look at those buggers working for pennies.

So are we turning into cannibals yet that is the question?

PJM1974 / woody – so the bank of England is wrong with what it states as inflation? All the various sources of inflation figures are wrong? Or its just you refuse to believe the truth?

I know how much my own house was bought and sold for. We didn’t do any improvements per se, that’s simply house price inflation at the time.

PJM1974 / woody – so the bank of England is wrong with what it states as inflation? All the various sources of inflation figures are wrong? Or its just you refuse to believe the truth?

I’m trying to work out why I was included in that but as you mentioned it…….

Inflation is not a matter of opinion. Its hard facts and the fact is that inflation was low for all of labours rule. You can bluster all you like but that is a fact.

….so you are saying that’s a fact, just a wishy washy fact, I much prefer it when you use absolute facts – absolute facts are the only ones I really trust, especially from the Bank of England who are absolutely the the only trustworthy source of absolute facts aren’t they?

The fact is however, that while inflation is not a matter of opinion, the method of calculating said inflation can vary according to the opinion and desire of those manipulating the figures, therefore rendering the calculation on a decade by decade basis unreliable.

Are facts the new pledges?

Absolutely 😉

You mean nothing

Indeed. But I think it’s going to bite them on the rear travel. AL doesn’t seem to have a plan for the NHS other than unleashing chaos and inviting United, Serco etc in to take over care budgets (with lip service paid to GPs being in the driving seat) and grab the lovely assets. Meanwhile, frontline care is pretty much being overwhelmed. The report in today’s Grauniad about elderly patients being stuck in acute hospital beds (as social care budgets are cut) is bang on – it’s snowballing and it’s going to make for ugly scenes. If they were attempting a carefully considered transition to a European social insurance system (with – natch – increased investment), I’d have quibbles, but I’d understand the logic. That’s not how it’s shaping up.

Big society, my arrse.

Edit: CG, I know you are up to the job. The required quantities of tea and cake will need industrial-scale production, mind. 😀

it’s snowballing and it’s going to make for ugly scenes.

I’ve been on for the last 4 nights and can tell you the ugly scenes have already begun.

I don’t think you can blame this government as the problems have been caused by a multitude of factors and previous changes in the NHS, particularly in primary care, which has had a huge effect on front line care. GP’s ‘in the driving seat’ scares the crap out of me!

I don’t think you can blame this government

I agree – entirely – that the problems in primary care/capacity long precede the ConDems – and I wouldn’t want to be seen as blaming everything on the coalition. But one thing’s for sure, if I was Health Sec, I wouldn’t choose this particular moment to unleash the kind of changes that are underway. And if I was a Tory politico, I sure as hell wouldn’t waffle on about the bleedin’ Big Society and “Creative Chaos” whilst the grim scenes unfold…

that the problems in primary care/capacity long precede the ConDems

Good point the tories managed to create the probs without the libs help last time