Labour and the Budget
This is important so worth quoting in full:
"In a joint press conference this morning Ed Miliband and Ed Balls said the Conservative-led government must think again on the speed and scale of cuts which go too deep and too fast, are choking off growth, increasing unemployment and making it harder to reduce the deficit in the long term.
They called on David Cameron and George Osborne to repeat last year’s bank bonus tax to support the jobs and growth Britain badly needs in 2011.
With the £2 billion that could be raised this year from repeating the bank bonus tax, Labour says the government should:
• Provide £1.2bn to fund the construction of more than 25,000 homes across the country. This would generate more than 20,000 jobs and several times more in the supply chain, and as many as 1,500 construction apprenticeships at a time when demand for construction apprentices has fallen by 31%;
• Establish a £600m fund for youth jobs. This would help more than 90,000 young people into work at a time when youth unemployment has reached almost one million;
• Boost the Regional Growth Fund by £200m. With the first wave of the fund over-subscribed several times over, this would be a quick way to drive new investment. The Regional Growth Fund represents a two-thirds cut from the funding for Regional Development Agencies, which were abolished last year.
Labour will also force a House of Commons vote on Wednesday on reversing George Osborne’s VAT rise on petrol, which is helping to push up petrol prices to their current record levels and adding to the growing cost of living for families on low and middle incomes. Labour’s Opposition Day Debate motion will call for the VAT rise – which has added £1.35 to the cost of filling up a 50 litre tank – to be reversed immediately on road fuels, using the extra £800m from the bank levy."
posted by Luke Akehurst at 11:44 am
8 Comments:
The Unite led Labour opposition has so far oppossed £ 50 billion in cuts and suggested £12 billion in additional spending.
Fantasy econimics or just balls?
12:37 am, March 15, 2011
Yet the tories are lowering taxes for businesses that are already making billions in profits.
If you take £50 billion out of the economy then you dont save £50 billion. It impacts on the private sector as well, it means job losses, loss of orders and the businesses that rely on these peoples wages lose income. The end result will be lower tax revenue and higher unemployment.
It is a very short sighted view to hammer public spending at a time when we are already facing rising unemployment and falling wages. Where are the growth driving enterprises at the moment?
The UK should not rely on a low wage economics to drive growth. This sort of economics is what Thatcherism encouraged and resulted in the mess we have today.
6:32 pm, March 15, 2011
Two points :
Raise two billion in a new tax, fine but why not use it to cut the deficit?
Second - if spending two billion pays for itself with all these new jobs then why not raise 100 billion and basically have no unemployment and no need for the private sector. Government does not by itself create wealth.
7:47 pm, March 15, 2011
'This sort of economics is what Thatcherism encouraged and resulted in the mess we have today.'
Wow, still blaming Thatcher 20 years after she left office!
Surely you can come up with something slightly better than that?
Or are you just admitting the impotence of New Labour over 13 years?
12:50 am, March 17, 2011
We are getting some idea of the extent of the cuts in Nottingham. Not only is it local authority shedding jobs but it's colleges universities, housing associations and hundred of private firms struggling with the current climate.
There are tens of thousands of jobs at risk and I'm very worried about the future of many British towns.
We are heading towards a disaster.
9:37 pm, March 18, 2011
Government can create wealth and it's a myth to say it can't, but I do agree the balance must be right.
However, cut too much and the result is the creation of an army of unemployed. Tories constantly moan about
the unemployed yet they waging war on alarm clock Britain. I don't the private sector filling the gap.
All the Tories want to do is pass public services to the
private sector so they can sleep well knowing
that some poor worker is getting paid less for doing the same job. This is the alarm clock Britain this party promised to protect.
10:51 pm, March 19, 2011
I agree that Britain has a bleak future but not necessarily for the same reasons as other contributors. We are seriously in debt, have debts piled into the future from PFI and pension commitments we probably will not be able to meet, yet neither main party seems to have an answer.
If the Conservative cuts and latest budget will not work what is Labour's alternative. That is invariably just more debt accumulation. It all has to end in tears one day, like Ireland or Greece, yet too many people are stuck with their heads in the sand blindly following party dogma and loyalties.
Frankly our political leaders are a shower, lacking in real life experiences, devoid of true leadership qualities and engaged in highly dangerous point scoring and posturing.
7:33 pm, March 25, 2011
Take the debt take the deficit because lets be honest the financial crises crippled the world, lets say OK we will repay all this over 20 years not four years of five, like it or not it's going to affect our children whether we like it or not, OK say it will take 60 years now get on with running the country and stop acting like children who cannot count past ten,
7:42 am, March 28, 2011
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