If Starmer and Reeves fuck this budget, Labour will be out of power for ANOTHER generation.

[Ozgirl76]

I was hopeful when Labour came into power - I hoped a calm sensible bunch of economic policies that would help to level things out a bit was on the cards and given that they had so long to prepare, I assumed they would spring into action and at least have some plans.

But now I’m just reading more articles about the huge swing towards Reform and I can’t believe it’s coming to this.

I actually live in Australia but I run a business in the U.K. and we have just had a second term of a very boring and sensible labour government over here who aren’t fixing things yet but they aren’t actively making things worse and I just think, it is possible to have a Labour government who don’t actively hate the richer people, but also are trying to work towards a more equal society.

What do you think is causing the main swing towards the right? Is it all the immigration stuff? Surely that can’t be everything?

I’m 40s and I can remember:

• NHS dentist, where you could actually get on the list
• Doctors, where you could actually get an appointment with them, and they even did home visits if you were really ill
• Specialist special educational needs schools with enough places for the children who actually need them
• Hospitals where corridor care wasn’t considered pretty much normal these days
• ambulances that actually turned up without an 8 to 25 hour weight, and we didn’t think it was okay to leave some old person on freezing cold pavement for nine hours.
• police who actually seemed to do something-admittedly not a huge amount-and didn’t just shrug when a crime occurred.
• linked to that, police stations that were actually open so you could go and get some help.
• proper infrastructure planning, even if we thought it was ugly, to give us enough roads to move around on.
• fewer potholes, although by the 2000s these were just becoming quite common
• swimming pools that were not absolutely freezing
• Youth clubs, so the children actually had somewhere to go
• Libraries that were not just run by a bunch of volunteers who happen to have retired, but were recognised as being assets to a community.
• Town centres there were not just rows of empty dark shop windows, often boarded up and covered in graffiti.
• Schools where, if the pupils were misbehaving in public, you just had to tell the school and they all got bollocked the next day.
• politicians who actually had the decency to resign when they screwed up.

The enshittification of this country continues, and I don’t know how we get out of the doom spiral.

Thanks for those who've replied to my post. I do understand about those things, but for that to be 100% Labour's fault surely it would have to have only happened in the last 18 months and that doesn't tally with my experience.

Is it that we just expect more from Labour than the Tories, and expect them to be able to fix things quickly, when actually it's likely to take 5, if not 10 years after years of austerity?

For those who asked, I'm also in my 50s, and do remember the things cited above, but also negative equity, temporary classrooms, quite a lot of casual misogyny, and very low wages. I don't think things were always super rosy in the past.

For the PP who said immigration - I do get that feels like a huge issue, but surely that's down to global instability and climate change (also arguably Brexit and withdrawing from the Dublin agreement) rather than Labour policies over the last 18 months??

I just don't know how we can when we have so many millions of economically inactive working aged adults.

One problem for Labour is the idea they’d hike taxes once at the last budget and that was it. It turns out that was not true and Reeves / Starmer are ‘raising the UK’s taxes at the fastest pace in the G7, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF)’.

So if you and they can claim it’s all part of a plan which will work out why did they get it wrong about more tax rises?

Pensioners don't earn an income to pay National Insurance, and their state pension is often all they have. It's unfair to suggest they give up parts of their pension when there are no better alternatives for them to rely on.

How old are you? If you want to avoid being a burden on the state you value, it’s important to plan and take responsibility for your own future rather than depending on the state. If you’re truly dedicated to supporting the state, consider overpaying taxes, contributing extra for yourself, and even making voluntary donations. Also, avoid holding onto assets and consider giving everything to the state.

It's ageism to assume that older people and pensioners are a greater burden on the state than any other demographic group. I'm kind of sick of seeing so many comments on Mumsnet where people are supporting assisted dying to save money for the state—it's so ridiculous. If we go down this road, and it's a very dangerous one, it won't just be older people; it'll be anyone even remotely considered a burden to the state.

When examining the state's major expenses, accusations often arise about individuals abusing benefits, such as those with health issues who are said to rely on state support instead of working. Both legal and illegal immigrants are frequently criticized for taking advantage of state benefits without giving back. Politicians are perceived as overpaid and self-serving, while the public sector is often blamed for overspending. The concerns seem never-ending, with no clear solutions apparent.

Rather than pushing for increased wealth creation, the focus should shift to lowering taxes and ensuring public spending is both reduced and more efficient.

Thing is 1p on vat isn't anywhere near enough. More like 5% hike needed and that would crash the economy and spike inflation.

Mmm, why was it a £22bn black hole this time last year that needed to be filled with a one-off tax hike, only for another year to roll around and now we have a £30bn hole in the finances and here we go again - 41 days away from another wheel of misfortune tax hike day.

I would still vote Labour if it keeps out Reform. My Labour MP is great.

Nowhere do you justify why pensioners should be paying a lower rate than other taxpayers, when on the same level of income.

If you have a state pension, you won’t be paying NI as the way it has been proposed it to add it to income tax - so if below the threshold, you won’t pay it.

Saying pensioners cost more isn’t being discriminatory, it’s a fact - healthcare, pensions, social care etc. That’s the point in your life when you cost most to the state.

I pay masses of tax and will be funding my own pension - I’m under no illusion it will be available for me when I get there.

Labour will ‘fuck’ this budget - its a nailed on certainty.

The Greens are looking promising at the moment. Their no 1 priority is inequality and bringing in things like a land value tax.

June - August is hardly indicative of a trend.
That actually would have taken into account school and college leavers who were no longer on child benefit, not yet in work and who weren’t going on to university.

Maybe because the world has become a more unstable and scary place since July 2023? Don't get me wrong, I'm not a massive Labour apologist (in fact I didn't vote for them), but I still don't think they 100% deserve the kicking they seem to be getting right now, when it seems to me they are doing the best they can with a crap set of circumstances, a hostile press, a rising tide of populist fascism, and a population who all seem to want everything to be fixed and someone else to pay for it...

Sadly, the green party in my city are ruining it with pedestrianisations and an emphasis on bikes and buses, thus causing untold damage to the town centre as shoppers wanting to use cars (the majority) are being forced out and going elsewhere instead. Add in a stupid single park n ride system where it starts at the wrong end of town where few people live meaning the majority have to drive through the city centre to get to it! And crap unreliable bus service with some outlying small towns and villages only having a 2 hourly service to the city, nothing on Sundays and services that stop at 7pm evenings so useless for cinemas, restaurants, shift workers etc. If they were more realistic on a local level then they'd probably be a lot more popular.

They also think women can have a penis and other batshit ideas. They care more about Palestine than the environment

How much would putting all the mp's on minimum wage and 0% expenses save us?

Taxing the super rich more has never worked (ask France who did this a few years ago and actually raised less tax as the rich just moved overseas). The top 1%already pay a massive amount,but the problem is that over 50% of people are net takers rather than contributors and this has been exacerbated by allowing burgeoning amounts to not work (and they often receive more than people on minimum wage), whilst importing millions more low skilled, high cost people. They're is so much entitlement and we are competing with much more hardworking countries without welfare states and with cheap energy. No wonder we're sinking. And no there was no austerity - govt spending has gone up massively year on year since 2008.

Obviously you’re wedded to the idea that Labour are hard done by and they’ll be glad you don’t hold them to their pledge to only raise taxes once.

But it does show how easy it is to spiral with increasing taxes and become the fastest tax hiker in the G7. That is fiscal incompetence.

Our GP practice still does home visits. Some people are housebound.

They were a shit opposition and are a shitter government.

VAT is a poor tax, I would expect better from labour

Yawn 🥱

This budget in November is going to be a blood bath :(

Can you not see what this government have been doing? Do you understand what the term ‘narcissist’ means? If you don’t then I suggest you do some digging and you will see that our PM and a few others in government fit that description perfectly!
Constant denial of them fucking up so badly and manipulating people into thinking it isn’t that bad, blame shifting and blaming the tories for literally everything, dismissing the concerns of the general public and branding anyone who speaks out against them as far right and racist, constant lies, constant money grabbing and raising taxes after telling the public they wouldn’t do that, constant dismissal of the British public and how they are financially struggling, fleecing farmers, discarding the British people and the country for the world stage. Constant blame shifting for literally everything- it’s never them it’s always the tories or reform or the far right or some bugger else. Scandal after scandal. It’s just never ending! Not to mention that wooden, stoic appearance of Starmer and that he only seems to have the one deer in headlights facial expression! Public morale is at an all time low, he’s the most unpopular prime minister ever and people are desperate for another general election!
And here you are claiming they don’t deserve the kicking they are getting! My word!
Hostile press? Well they have spent years making the press hostile towards any opposition party and anyone who doesn’t agree with their views so that’s karma for you!
I’m so glad Trump made him feel so small the other day. And I’m not even a fan of Trump!

I'm not sure thst the electorate think that what anyone else will do that'll be any better.

If the Tories could have then presumably they would have. As for Reform they'll just annihilate it and no one's likely to be happy with them either.

It'll be like with Brexit when the NHS was to get shed loads of money and that's not happened either.

Basically the world economy is in the pan, noone appears to be in a good place.