Do you think the Tories will get a majority in 2015?

We need to start living within our means, as a nation, rather than keep banging on about how we are one of the richest nations in the world when that is patently not the case anymore. At some point politicians can't offer any more freebies to entice voters because there's nothing more to give. All they can offer is either small government low taxes or big government high taxes. And I believe given that choice, most people will opt for the former.

ttosca…..SO THERE IS YOUR PROBLEM, you still believes that we are a rich nation; that was before Gordon Brown’s stewardship of our economy, silly.
www.taxpayersalliance.com/economics/2009/09/new-book-reveals-the-total-cost-of-gordon-browns-mishandling-of-the-economy-as-3-trillion-or-3000000.html

Brown threw vast sums of money at the NHS — rising from £33?billion a year when Labour came to power in 1997, to £96?billion when they left in 2010.

Yet the standards of care and mortality rates of 14 NHS trusts, 11 of which were so bad they are being put into special measures – how many died at the Mid Staffs Trust – how many budgets were screwed by Brown’s Public Finance Initiative’s overpaying the Private Sector for decades to come?

This represented an annual real terms increase of a breathtaking 7 per cent per year.

However, the money was often poorly directed (£20?billion, notoriously, was wasted on a flawed computer system), and leadership and management were so poor at almost every level that it was seldom spent sensibly or effectively. Most went on wages and bureaucracy. By 2011, as bureaucracy mushroomed, 1.43 million people worked in the English NHS, of whom only 50.5 per cent were clinically qualified.

That compared with a total of 1.06 million, including just 180,000 office staff, when Labour came to power in 1997. By comparison, the number of actual beds fell from 194,000 in 1997 to 147,000 in 2011.

And what about the standards of care and mortality rates of 14 NHS trusts, 11 of which were so bad they are being put into special measures – how many died at the Mid Staffs Trust – how many budgets were screwed by Brown’s Public Finance Initiative’s overpaying the Private Sector for decades to come?
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2363808/Labours-NHS-denial-machine-Experts-verdict-ministers-covered-problems-failing-hospitals-thousands-died.html

And yet in cancer care, England's coalition ran NHS still appears to perform better than the Labour ran Welsh NHS.

Welsh cancer patients flock to England for treatment because they are being forced to wait weeks for life-saving scans

• A decade ago 3,471 crossed the border for treatment, now it is 15,450
• Movement is fuelled by lack of access to the National Cancer Drugs Fund
• Half of Welsh patients wait more than six weeks for vital cancer scans
• The figure for England is 1 per cent

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2586622/Welsh-cancer-patients-flock-England-treatment-forced-wait-weeks-life-saving-scans.html

In ttoscas world, every cancer sufferer’s situation is ALL the coalitions fault and NONE of those using food banks smoke, drink alcohol, or have a better TV set than I do.

Just think if Brown hadn’t blown all the money on a wasteful fat State, with a £170 billion Quangocracy, how much money COULD be spent on those that really need help now.

Your money goes into paying of the national debt. Public sector net debt was £1,231.7 billion last year, equivalent to 76.6% of GDP.

So for every pound we net as a country, 76p is owed.

'We cannot continue to live beyond our means'

Bwahahaha!

Yeah - one of the richest countries in the world can't afford to pay for tuition fees, or social security payments for cancer sufferers.

Give me a break. Where do you think all our wealth has gone? Social security? Does it look to you like we live in a socialist paradise? Do we appear to you to operate like one of the nordic countries?

Is that why we have such great social conditions in the UK? You know... like the second largest wealth inequality in the West, tens of thousands of people using foodbanks, sick people dying because they've been denied their rightful benefit payments...

That's o.k. People move on from these debates - I don't mind.

I wasn't suggesting you become a pussy cat, just that you put your reasoned arguments across without necessarily making it personal (even if some people are incapable of hearing the truth).

Perhaps you won't win, but keep fighting the fight, and expressing a contrary opinion (that's what I try to do). Take comfort that Mumsnet isn't representative of society as a whole. It seems to have a lefty metropolitan vibe - which is fine if at times misguided.

When all is said and done, we cannot, as a country, continue to live beyond our means.

Hi Contrarian...since your last post here, all I've seen is tumble weed pass it by.lol

Thank you for your advice and I will try and become a pussy cat, using ttosca as my example (ahem).

Seriously, I tried that on the MP 2nd jobs over the last few days, asking others nicely for their facts to back up their opinions and apparently I'm still the 'know nuffin, about nuffin' overbearing ogre...I can't win either way.

Shrek.

I'm not a moderator, but isitmebut you make good points but would benefit from altering your style a little bit. Just try and make it a little less personal - it'll help advance your argument - which I broadly support.

That said, regardless of the facts most people won't understand the arguments as well as some here Labour still aren't trusted on the economy. I recently watched Question Time and Diane Abbott I have to confess to not being able to stand the sight of that woman said that (in relation to the pension reforms) the Tories were "simply bribing people with their own money" Labour though have a reputation for bribing people with other people's money.

TTT...there is so much misinformation on here, if I over reacted and/or I am factually incorrect, I will apologize to you - I have been called far worse by people who were incorrect and LOSING the debate.

Based on the definition of GDP, and the pre 2010 structure of government spending £157 bil more than what we earn, very little business investment, exports decimated by the 10-year decline in manufacturing and growing weakness of our largest export market AND Consumption that had seen Household debt rise from 97% of income in 1997 to 168% in early 2008 - how will that 'growth' formula reduce the national debt, rather than increase it?

How does low interest rates lower our national debt, other than our benchmark 10-year Gilt yields were far higher under 'what deficit?' Brown, than 'the man with a plan' Osbourne?

The £175 bil (or is it £200 bil?) QE was I believe done during Labours term, but if a government comes in with a £157 billion annual deficit and the bills are still being paid, we WOULD be printing more money, unless we sell the remainder of our gold.

You're rude and maybe because of that I feel obliged to correct you. The debt does not automatically rise if there is a budget deficit. This also depends on interest rates and growth. Most of the money printing has been done under the current government even after the PM said in his speech at the party conference before the election that he would stop it.

People should be allowed to put opposing views on here without receiving insults.

Labour produced 'the wrong type' of GDP as it was not sustainable and was going to cause huge imbalance problems at the first recession, never mind one caused by a financial collapse and fall of the £60-£100 bil annual City tax receipts.

Hiding behind 'debt to GDP' on that structure is disingenuous or ignorant, as it HAD to change from 2010.

Labour did not build enough homes in the boom times, any argument on that?.

Passed over around 2 million people needing social housing, according to Shelter, any argument on that?.

Yet Osbournes 'right to buy' and not Labour's supply/demand problems relating DIRECTLY to their policies? Don't make me larf.

If you have a budget deficit each year the national debt will rise; and what is real/sustainable GDP, Labour's declining Private Sector tax receits/investment, the then 1 million new Public sector workers and Quangocracy on £100 k salaries consuming, with £157 bil plus annual overspends, with record high consumption and tax receipts on speculation and debt?

When the coalition weans the economy off of that GDP debt high and Europe our main export market crashes, GDP falls, but every policy brought in has worked - including unblocking the mortgage log jam so people can move if the want/have to.

Brown started QE printing money, numbnuts, the portion of 'right to buy' in new buyers is relatively low.

Tories who had a Flat Stamp Duty of 1% didn't have a housing bubble, but then again they didn't have 2.2 million new citizens to house over so few years.

Tories are always telling Labour to cut penal taxes, especially if either a pretence to 'correct' something or it raises less money than before.

In other words you agree with all the facts I've put forward. The national debt as a proportion of GDP is still rising.

The government realised soon after they came into office that their policies weren't working. Instead, they encouraged printing a shed load of money and kept up an annual overdraft. They've pushed the benefits cuts so much to give themselves some camoflage for being exactly the same as we had before. I remember at the height of the last housing bubble, it was the Tory housing adviser, Kirsty can't-remember-her-name, who was pushing for a reduction in stamp duty. Did I mention 'Help to buy (a bubble)' yet?

"Housing bubble".....if Labour had built more than just over 100,000 homes a year, before inviting in 2.2 million new migrants and allowing bank mortgage lending to go up by 5x from 1997 - THERE WOULD NOT BE A HOUSING BUBBLE, then or now.

"No changing of policies".........Labour thought that INCREASING the fat 100% tax funded State and TAX RISES was the way to 'growf', not boosting the Private Sector that pays for it - Osbourne and anyone with a clue, had the opposite view - so where would have been now under Labour?

TTT...THAT is the most stupid, ill informed comment I have read on these boards, and I've read a few.

There has been a massive restructuring of our debt profile...if Labour supporters want Osbourne, who inherited a £157 bil over spend from Labour to CUT another £108 billion (currently) without whinging on little micro cases of welfare, THEN TELL HIM.

Otherwise the national debt will grow each year. D'uh.

I agree with you about the housing, especially as I live in a currently very beautiful rural area that is to be sacrificed to create houses that it doesn't even seem clear that we actually need in our county. Very cynical ploy by the govt.

Britain's finances have not improved since the government took office. The debt has continued rising and each year we have continued to spend more than we earn, this includes the government which has not been restrained in spending money despite statements to the contrary and people, us, who are saving less and borrowing more to fund the current increase in spending. That really is the long and the short of it. The government is funding a housing bubble in the South East to bring on a feel good factor at the expense of many others with older children who come back from uni. with a debt the size of house prices in North Shields.

There has been no change in mentality in government at all. Policies are still short term and designed to keep bums on green leather seats. Don't get me started on printing money ...

The welfare state got hugely out of hand when Labour were in and needed radical reform. It should always be there to provide the basics to people in need but it changed to supporting people's lifestyle choices and that's where it all went wrong.

Then of course it's all the big bad governments fault that they now are expected to work etc. Few seem to take personal responsibility for their own situation.

Learning to budget, seeing work pays etc are what our children and their children need to do to break the cycle. We all have budgets and can't have everything we want in life but that's just life.

There is only question you need ask yourself when voting which is would they vote for me?

If there are little or no women at the head of a party, they will not get my vote, otherwise you are just selling yourself short.

The policies may seem tough, but a lot of people in Britain are still blind as to what is going on in the world. Regardless of who wins the election, it's probably never going to be as good here in the UK as it was or seemed to be six or ten years ago. Not in our lifetimes. We were living in a kind of fantasy world then, a lot of us (and I count myself in that group).

This could well be as good as it gets again. The new reality. I was chatting to a distant family member who's a professor of economics in the States. He told me not to be deceived by apparent improvements in the UK finances.

You can tax one group more or less to try and balance it out, but you can't override the basic problem that it is not sustainable to run a welfare state of the size we once had.

I'm not sure that things would look radically different under a Tory government rather than the coalitiion we have. Clegg ended up spending his magic beans on electoral reform, ratherher than tuition fees.

I just struggle to buy this image of the Tory's being the nasty party. I tend to think of running the country in terms of running my own life: There are lots of things I'd like to do, but becasue of constraints (be they financial, academic, geographical) I can't. I think I read somewhere that the govt. were looking to put people in charge of their own budgets. Would that not be useful?