to be depressed about the Tories response to the latest news on the economy

[dikkertjedap]

How can you brush off such serious news? The pound is further plummeting, not really good news given how much we import ... All but two sectors are contracting, including finance to which tax payers are so exposed. Inflation is soaring, household budgets are under severe strain and there is a lot more to come. All the big cuts still have to bite, like all the planned public service cuts ... all the people who are going to be made redundant will not have spending power ... so we are all going to suffer even more: less spending/ less demand so less need for expensive home made products and more demand for cheap chines imports.

I feel so sad, are we heading for the worst and deepest recession in years????

Another thing to my list, land reform to stop supermarkets engaging in clearly anti-competitive practices (holding on to key land to prevent competitors building shops). Why do we pay so much for relatively poor quality food compared with the continent? I find that there is little choice the moment you are outside London. Also poor value if you have to rely on the big super markets.

UK governments always talk about competition, but often I think that there is very little will to address anti-competitive practices and the Competition Commission, Office of Fair Trading and the various regulators seem to be lagging behind everybody else.

Also, don't fool yourself that the UK is a low tax country, it is not. I have just calculated that I would pay roughly the same amount of tax in the Netherlands, have lower transport costs, get mortgage interest and insurance tax relief, possibly better health care, dd would get more affordable university education once she is old enough, better general quality of living (more flexible working). I am not saying that the Netherlands is all better and the UK terrible. There are lots of good things in the UK, but what I mean it could be a lot better and it is a pity if people give up on that. And I mean a lot better for the 'average' person, clearly the very well off will be much better off in the UK than in the Netherlands.

Good post dikkert - your last sentence is interesting. Is it any wonder that so many of our politicians are millionaires?

dikkertjedap - That position is to do with growth not total production. Which is important, but my point is we still make an awful lot of stuff and more that most other countries in the world.

AbsDuCroissant I think it's a great idea for a webchat with George Osbourne, although I expect he probably has better things to do.

MNHQ can you look into it please??

YADNBU. I am not only depressed but really quite frightened about the future.

I would be interested in a list we think the UK is really good at but these might be sectors which currently are disadvantaged in some way (for example compared with the Continent/Ireland):

• UK film industry - I don't think that many people doubt that the UK is outstanding both technically and creatively. But many big films are now no longer shot in the UK with its wonderful studios and brilliant technicians. Instead they go to Eastern Europe and Ireland as they will get tax advantages. Did you know that UK technicians are not allowed to work on films in Ireland as they cannot join the Irish Union (only heads of department are allowed to work there as they are labelled 'creative')

• pharmaceutical research - from what I know, most of that has now moved abroad as well

• Oxford, Cambridge, LSE, Imperial College etc. They are clearly famous institutions and their key degrees are head and shoulders above anybody else. However, they are unaffordable and unaccessible to many truly bright UK kids as has been documented in the past (like that girl with all the good A levels who was offered places at top US institutions but not here)

• UK has a truly beautiful country side, accessible to the public, unlike many Western European countries, however, tourist facilities can be quite disappointing and of course, public transport is shocking if you come from the Continent (both price and frequency/quality).

Well, most of you are from the UK so surely you will know many more things ... in which the UK either has an advantage or could develop an advantage.

Oooh yes - Please MNHQ invite George on for a webchat! Though I imagine he'll be too busy run away screaming

Well, in case of a web chat, it might be worthwhile to have a more focused list of things in which the UK can excel. Also, how to help these sectors to develop/redevelop their advantage given international markets. And then criteria on how to prioritise.

If you know anyone who works for CBI, Institute of Directors, surely there will be many other organisations as well, they might have some really good ideas ...

trouble is most of us Brits are used to spending more time moaning about our country than realising what we're good at.

dikkert you mentioned the British countryside, we could easily have a huge tourism industry with a bit more spent on facilities and transport links. However in the current economic climate our government would need to make even more drastic cuts to invest in anything.

As someone said earlier arts and culture is another area we could be focussing, however the government sees this as unimportant.

While GO is here (if we get a webchat) can we also try to save the libraries please?

Mervyn King just said on the seven o'clock something like that families would face the tightest time since 90 years. I have the feeling that there are more and more comparisons being made with the Great Depression ...

I have spent the day with 120 people who being made redundant in march. Going to be a busy day for signing on 1st April. I know over 500 people losing their jobs on 31st march.

Pretty sure that there will be a recession.

on the green/eco market...

we haven't missed the proverbial boat with tidal power. we have some of the best conditions in eurpoe for harnessing wave and tidal resource for energy and some of the big scandinavian and german companies have been very interested in bringing inward investment to this area. however, we have appalling short-sighted nimbyism when it comes to renewable technologies and some of this has blocked the possibility of developing further.

this is a good market for us to be operating in and would contribute (as was pointed out earleir) to bringing our dreadful energy providers into line.

also, with our wind farms, we're too slow because - we've nearly maxed out on grid capacity, so this needs developing and back to NIMBYs again as well. I think up until 2008, not one wind farm or turbine had been successfully erected without planning obstruction/complaint from local residents.

and it was me that mentioned culture. i completely agree that high class academic institutions can be an essential component of developing this economic centre. not to mention the huge volume of overseas students who want to study at our best universities and provide a very important income stream. why the government is so insistent on cutting the funding to this area and blocking overseas students idk, (apart from ideological reasons)because the benefits far outweigh the negatives.

Well this is what Mervyn King has to say at the same time the pound has gone down to about £1.159 still beats me how this is going to help given how much the UK imports ... It is going to be grim for everybody in the UK except the very well off (of which there are a significant number of course). The more I look at it the more I want to go home. I am sick and tired of hearing that everybody has to face the pain whereas in reality they mean everybody who isn't rich should face pain. Bankers are still getting huge bonuses whilst being bailed out by the tax payer. I find it a huge injustice. I have no time for people saying that they have to be paid this because otherwise all the good people leave, the problem is they weren't good at all, that is why we are in this mess. We are not dealing with a sudden wave of new fresh people, we are dealing with the same lot who caused this huge crisis. And the worst thing of all, our children and our grandchildren are going to pay for this all, through poor education, poor healthcare, having to pay for everything, absolutely everything, which previous generations either got for free or cheaply (education, first house, pensions). What a truly unjust place this has become. I feel furious on behalf of all young people. Rant over.

@pascoe...now who's scum?

@OP, well it could be a lot worse, you could be in Ireland.