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Original poster

Miliband fails to learn Labour spending lesson

87 replies

Niceguy2 · 14/03/2011 20:30

Telegraph article

BBC Article

I linked the BBC article as apparently "David Cameron has himself acknowledged the difference between Labour and the coalition over the scale of cuts is only £2bn this year."

So in other words for all their talk on how nasty the Tories are, in fact if Labour were in power, the only difference would be £2billion of spending. That's peanuts really in the context of a £160billion annual deficit.

OP posts:
smallwhitecat · 18/03/2011 23:18

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EdwardorEricCantdecide · 18/03/2011 23:20

Newwave

I'm with you just thought I'd show some support

Chil1234 · 18/03/2011 23:21

Well it just staggers me that anyone in their right mind, having lived through the last 13 years, still thinks that the Labour party represents the poor... Shock

smallwhitecat · 18/03/2011 23:23

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EdwardorEricCantdecide · 18/03/2011 23:24

No politician represents the poor they are all interested in lining their own pockets
But I believe labour to be the better of a bad bunch and lean more toward poor/working class than Tories!

newwave · 18/03/2011 23:27

hudd

Child poverty increased during the time of the Thatcher/Major governments and fell during the time of NL not far enough I would agree but it did go down which Dave & Gideon will now reverse.

I agree that not all single mothers are vulnerable but the Tories scapegoat those who are.

With regard to employment I have no time for anyone who can work but wont then again if no jobs are available how can they work, I realise this applies more in the North but the south is heading the same way. How can someone be "workshy" if no work is on offer.

Tories often claim that they have to sort out Labours financial mess well Labour always has repair the Toris deliberate damage to society which costs money.

newwave · 18/03/2011 23:28

SWC, you know I am right Tories are selfish.

newwave · 18/03/2011 23:31

Edward, thank you for your support, I dont claim Labour is perfect far from it but they dont have the spite of the Tory filth.

That said I have only once voted Labour (1997) I have always voted LibDem Angry Sad

Chil1234 · 18/03/2011 23:35

"How can someone be "workshy" if no work is on offer."

Over 1m migrants found work was on offer. And they took it. And I don't begrudge them taking those jobs one iota. At least they had the gumption to look outside of a 25m radius of home in the effort to make a decent living. Labour were totally happy to pay people to stay poor & unemployed because the poor & unemployed (ironically) vote Labour. I think it's the biggest confidence trick in the business - makes me very angry indeed.

EdwardorEricCantdecide · 18/03/2011 23:41

When did 1m immigrants find work though? There aren't 1m jobs now even including highly skilled/paid jobs AFAIK

newwave · 18/03/2011 23:51

decent living.

Thats the problem, minimum wage is not a "decent living".

Minimum wage and the travel costs of travelling over 25 miles dont add up.

One minute immigrants are an example of enterprise then they are welfare scroungers getting jumping the housing queue, both are mostly myths.

Save your anger for the Tories plans to screw the poor and vulnerable.

Chil1234 · 18/03/2011 23:58

They found the work in the last five or six years when the economy was growing. Of 2m jobs created - a lot of them in the public sector - about half went to newcomers.

newwave · 19/03/2011 00:02

Chil as I said I have no time for those who can work and wont if a decent job is available.

Please tell me your interpretation of a "decent living"

Chil1234 · 19/03/2011 00:25

My interpretation of a 'decent living' is not necessarily monetary. The 'decency' is doing an honest job and getting paid a fair wage for doing it - even if it's minimum wage and even if some extra help is required. When you've got employers in agricultural communities still having to pay extra to go via overseas agencies to find suitable staff despite there being many people locally who are unemployed, there has to be something wrong with that picture.

newwave · 19/03/2011 00:32

The 'decency' is doing an honest job and getting paid a fair wage for doing it - you need to have a word with Bob Diamond and his ilk.

My interpretation of a 'decent living' is not necessarily monetary. The 'decency' is doing an honest job and getting paid a fair wage for doing it

Sorry but poverty wages are never noble and the minimum wage is a poverty wage, A decent wage should cover your reasonable household bills including housing and clothing, a two week holiday once a years and a reasonable amount of leisure costs.

Chil1234 · 19/03/2011 00:48

The people who leave their country & travel hundreds of miles to do those agricultural jobs I mentioned don't regard the work as being demeaning or the wages as poverty wages. They're not running houses & families or taking two week holidays normally, they're typically younger single people happy to live on site, work hard, play hard and put some cash away for the future. What's wrong with that?

claig · 19/03/2011 01:03

There are people in the third world who earn less than a dollar a day. Do you think the employers should advertise for those workers and pay them a dollar a day, because they don't think those wages are poverty wages? Should we give them visas, so that the employers can keep their costs down? Or should we pay our young people a decent wage for a day's work? Should we tell the employers that there is not an endless supply of cheap labour abroad and that they will have to raise their wages in order to attract staff?

ttosca · 19/03/2011 01:18

Hi all. I'm new here.

The financial situation this country finds itself in right now is not the result of New Labour spending on public services - however prolific they may have been.

The deficit before the financial meltdown and subsequent bailout was at 3% of GDP. This is pretty average for the EU, even somewhat below average.

After the trillion pound bailout, and after the financial crisis caused a recession, massively decreasing tax receipts and putting more people on to welfare, the deficit shot up to over 11% of GDP.

The Tories (and the Lib Dems, for that matter) are propagating the narrative that the financial situation we're in was caused by New Labour. This is obviously useful to them, so they can both blame the opposition party, and because they can then claim that the ideological cuts they're putting through are necessary; if the deficit was caused by public spending, then it can be fixed by cutting public spending.

This is a narrative which must be fought, because not only is it false, but the welfare of the vast majority of the public is at stake.

ttosca · 19/03/2011 01:21

Alternative to ideological cuts to public spending:

Here is an article which discusses some of the many options to reduce the deficit besides the ideological Tory cuts which will not only harm society itself, but will be counterproductive in actually harming the economy.

www.leftfutures.org/2010/06/an-alternative-to-cuts/

claig · 19/03/2011 01:26

I agree with you, but I think it was caused by Labour's "light touch regulation", not by public spending. It was on Labour's watch. Labour knighted 'Fred the Shred' for his services to banking. Labour left a note saying 'there's no money left'. So after Labour's mismanagement, the chickens have now come home to roost, and cuts now need to be made, because it is too late and as Labour's Liam Byrne said 'there is no money left'.

Of course, there will be enough money to pay MPs' expenses and to increase the foreign aid budget, but for the rest of us "there is no money left".

ttosca · 19/03/2011 01:36

claig

Yes, on that point I agree with you. I just think it's disingenuous to blame New Labour and then call for public spending cuts.

There are plenty of people who still actually believe the huge deficit was caused by public spending, rather than the bank bailouts.

Just under half (49%) of the people polled said Labour was to blame for the cuts that are set to hit the public services, in contrast to the quarter (26%) who point the finger at the coalition.

This suggests the Government's argument that their predecessors overspent and "maxed out the nation's credit card" has hit home with a significant number of voters, despite Labour's claim they were forced to deal with a global financial crisis.

tinyurl.com/642wdyz

But yes, New Labour is definitely to blame for deregulating the financial sector.

claig · 19/03/2011 01:42

Yes you are right. But Labour themselves were going to make huge cuts in public services as well. Darling told us how bad it would have to be. Labour are no different to the Coalition. As the OP said, all the rest is merely acting by the thespians on the opposition benches. If you watch the Andrew Neil 'This Week' show, you can see the truth, and you will see ex-Labour ministers nodding along with Portillo and saying that cuts need to be made and that Osborne is being very 'bold', maybe too 'bold' and taking a great risk, but that they agree that cuts need to be made, but maybe they shoould be done more cautiously than the 'bold' Osborne is doing.

TwoIfBySea · 19/03/2011 02:21

Being in opposition is the best thing that could have happened to Labour. When you look at it there is such a difference from when Labour brought in rather crap ideas such as tuition fees and then when this lot have to put them up all of a sudden there are huge protests. Not the only example but one of many.

Miliband is awful, his attack dog Balls is even worse. It should have been his brother in charge but instead the unions got there way.

If Labour made the same cuts there wouldn't be the same fuss made at all, no strikes or anything. Maybe some mumblings or grumblings but nothing on the scale of what will happen because they are not in power.

It worries me that no one really seems to see this or expose them for this but I guess that is just the way it is. I've seen what they did to Scotland and the stranglehold they have with the sheeple voting for them because they are "working class". Yeah, right. The SNP have had constant bad press since they got into power albeit on a one seat majority and with the focus on what they haven't done then no one really sees what they are doing. I rue the May election because I know the idiots are going to vote Labour again, it will be so depressing to be back in the hands of Scottish Labour.

TwoIfBySea · 19/03/2011 02:22

Hells teeth, it is too late, excuse the spelling mistakes, grammatical errors and the inability to make my point clearly.

EdwardorEricCantdecide · 19/03/2011 06:07

I resent being called an idiot because I don't want to see the elderly, disabled and single parents of this country starving and/ or homeless sorry. I'm not quite that selfish to see my own gains as more important.

Obviously labour are not to blame for the financial crisis unless they were also running Greece, Ireland and many others.

No wait wasn't the financial crisis GLOBAL when did labour govern the whole planet?!