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Post by davwel on Aug 27, 2022 19:32:35 GMT
johntel:
That statement about public-sector v private-sector earnings was TOTALLY flawed because the ONS explicitly ruled out taking account of past contributions by public-sector workers - it was too hard a task for them to calculate.
How could they work into the balance sheets what many of us had had removed from our salaries to pay for future pensions. They simply hadn`t got the data on life longevity of us former staff; some of us very fortunate to be still alive now but having lost 15% of our salaries in the 1960s, 12.5% in the 1970s till Thatcher scrapped the system. But the undoing was slow in actually happening since she deliberately lowered public-sector pay in comparison to inflation in every year of her reign.
The ONS also ignored perks like facilities in-house, lunch vouchers, company cars, in their flawed analysis.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 27, 2022 19:48:00 GMT
crofty The word "peripatetic" was a word the meaning of which escaped me for a while. I used to have a notion it meant someone whose habitual bad temper was caused by suffering from chronic indigestion. Its association with the word teacher didn't disabuse me of my mistaken notion either. It rather reinforced it actually. Then I discovered the word dyspeptic. Ah…… that’s what I meant Batty - I was a dyspeptic teacher. However, to be fair to me I think even a good natured bloke like what you probably are would have got that way if you if you had had to teach children. Luckily it only lasted thirty years or so - though I’m still in recovery. Barbara had the right idea, working in education but one step removed from the enemy as it were. Better paid as well, oddly enough.
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Post by davwel on Aug 27, 2022 19:56:08 GMT
@ crofty:
I am sure you would have had some scares and worries travelling to teach in Northumberland from Alston in your 10 years there. But Whitfield wasn`t as bad as Hartside, or that top-altitude-UK road from Nenthead over to Weardale.
I remember a May-Day c.1964 that had come with a major dump of snow, and finding 3/4 motorists halted at the foot of the first very steep hill out of Nent, when I was heading for Durham. Where`s the plew? hast seen it? they asked of me when I got out to join them. I also have vivid memories of "sleeping" in my vehicle near Nent after having come over the hill from Weardale - hill on East side is not so steep, but descending to Nent on the 1 in 5s in thick snow so worrying that I decided getting to Garrigill was foolish.
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Post by mercian on Aug 27, 2022 20:17:39 GMT
I lived in a farmhouse above the town of Alston between 76 and 86 and had some horrendous winters often snowed in at Easter. Was teaching in Northumberland schools at the time as a peripatetic music teacher and then doing the North East clubs at weekends so I had some very fraught journeys to contend with - and no mobile phones if I broke down or got stuck in snow. 🎻
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oldnat
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Post by oldnat on Aug 27, 2022 20:31:51 GMT
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pjw1961
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Post by pjw1961 on Aug 27, 2022 20:32:13 GMT
Sorry, but I get annoyed about non-issues being talked up because they fit particular agendas but which are not supported by the facts. I have also been known to argue with left wing commentators on here when the facts don't fit the narrative (for example over the main cause of NHS backlogs being Covid rather than 'Tory cuts'). Anyway the whole FRS17 change was an unnecessary disaster in my opinion and killed private sector index-linked pensions which were in fact viable except for the daft requirement to account for the whole (theoretical) future liability while not being allowed to recognise any future fund income. It has been annoying me for years. An excessive use of the 'prudence' concept that caused real social damage. SSAP24 was far too vague . And abused. FRS17 forced companies to recognise the cost of the promise to pay a future pension related to then pay-and indexed. There is a calculable present value for that as there is for the future income stream from contributions. Triennial actuarial valuations provide both and forced companies to properkly account for fund deficits-and/or do something about them. Pity Governments dont have to do the same thing. FRS17 was more correct in 'purist' accounting terms but its social effects were disastrous, leading to massive retrograde steps in company pension provision from which we have not recovered. And the same accounting bodies were happy not long afterward to allow banks to vastly overstate the value of the complex financial instruments packaging and repackaging sub-prime loans in their books, leading directly to the financial crash of 2008. Where was their accounting purity then? I would hazard a guess that if a SSAP24 style regime had been maintained, few of the old pension schemes would have actually got into difficulties - it is the theoretical future deficits that have driven company behaviour and that is not the purpose of accounting rules to my mind. By the way, point of detail - the Local Government Pension schemes are funded schemes, not pay as you go as with a lot of the central government schemes, so that distinction should be noted. I will leave you to believe that 0.2% of government expenditure represents a serious threat to the UK economy if you wish.
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oldnat
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Post by oldnat on Aug 27, 2022 20:37:51 GMT
Not sure that telling the SDLP to bugger off is the cleverest idea that Labour has ever had.
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Post by alurqa on Aug 27, 2022 20:40:01 GMT
I lived in a farmhouse above the town of Alston between 76 and 86 and had some horrendous winters often snowed in at Easter. Was teaching in Northumberland schools at the time as a peripatetic music teacher and then doing the North East clubs at weekends so I had some very fraught journeys to contend with - and no mobile phones if I broke down or got stuck in snow. 🎻 Haha. I know Alston well. Well, as well as one can in the 30 seconds it took to drive through it. (I seem to remember there was a railway station there.) I used to take the short cut from Penrith to Hexham, going up on a Monday and coming back down on a Friday. I did that for nearly 18 months, and I can tell you the Jag I had at the time was shit in snow!! But once you got to the top of the hill from Penrith the drive was amazing and the views stunning.
Anyway it beat going via Carlisle.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 27, 2022 20:51:23 GMT
I lived in a farmhouse above the town of Alston between 76 and 86 and had some horrendous winters often snowed in at Easter. Was teaching in Northumberland schools at the time as a peripatetic music teacher and then doing the North East clubs at weekends so I had some very fraught journeys to contend with - and no mobile phones if I broke down or got stuck in snow. 🎻 Just cos you’ve never seen ten feet high snow drifts in the Middle Lands. I expect you have exciting stories of your own though: ”Oooooooooh…. I remember once it were raining really heavy and I got a bit wet.” etc etc.
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Post by graham on Aug 27, 2022 21:02:02 GMT
Not sure that telling the SDLP to bugger off is the cleverest idea that Labour has ever had. There is a big difference between 'formal Coalition' and 'Confidence & Supply' should a Hung Parliament arise . The latter would imply an arrangement on the lines of the Lib-Lab pact of 1977 - 78 or the Con- Dup pact 2017 - 2019.
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Post by crossbat11 on Aug 27, 2022 21:05:12 GMT
Isn't the cliche about featherbedded and cushy public service employment as opposed to plucky and hard-done-by private industry employment a classic right wing wedge issue? Public bad, private good. Britannia Unchained was a homily to this sort of silliness and the canard thrives in the right wing media too.
Index linked pensions, unionised workplaces, glacially moving red-taped festooned bureaucracies, overpaid slackers, redundancy free over staffed blobs etc. Cummings got off on this sort of stuff, as did Gove, and it looks like Truss loves this right wing red meat too.
Right wing politics, which seems to have colonised the once ideology free and pragmatic Tory Party, needs this sort of employment culture war. It nurtures grievances against the public sector amongst those who slave away diligently and unheralded in the heroic private sector. Hey presto, you generate grievance fuelled right wing voters. The state equals socialism. Do not be enslaved and marched off to the gulags. North Korea is coming. Fight back.
"Look at those freeloaders over there. Doing non-productive jobs and pick-pocketing your taxes as they go." The honest hard working grafters versus the state sponsored loafers. That's the narrative right wing politicians love and it's a poison they are happy to both plant and cultivate in our public conversation. Mega-phoned by their client press when not too busy scouring the bins of trade union leaders, looking for evidence that they own expensive designer polo shirts.
Johnson sycophants attempted to get him off the partygate hook with this sort of stuff too. Bloody civil servants living high on the hog while our brave boys in government were developing vaccines.
But, of course, what they won't want anyone to know is that our public services make this country work. Social capital as opposed to profit and shareholder value.
The pandemic showed us who our real friends were. Well, more than friends, actually. People we rely upon to make life worth living. Not the enemy or a blob at all.
Real enemies lie elsewhere and I suspect the rolling economic crisis is bringing them into view.
And they don't look anything like public service employees to me at at all.
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Post by robbiealive on Aug 27, 2022 21:11:15 GMT
News from the Front
I live close enough to Old Trafford to hear the roar from the Cricket when an enemy wicket falls. Today there was a lot of noise. To show that life becomes more & more diverse: one sometimes gets two roars in v quick succession: the second louder than the first. This must be when VAR or whatever it is called in cricket confirms the original decision.
Living in Manchester one gets used to hearing abuse whenever the Tories are mentioned, although I didn't hear any from O Trafford. I was taking part in a quiz in a southern Brexit/Tory stronghold when Johnson's name was mentioned re a question. Forgetting where I was, I immediately began to barrack, in the automatic Manchester way, only to notice a general silence. Autre Temps, Autre Moers/
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oldnat
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Post by oldnat on Aug 27, 2022 21:11:51 GMT
Not sure that telling the SDLP to bugger off is the cleverest idea that Labour has ever had. There is a big difference between 'formal Coalition' and 'Confidence & Supply' should a Hung Parliament arise . The latter would imply an arrangement on the lines of the Lib-Lab pact of 1977 - 78 or the Con- Dup pact 2017 - 2019. True. SLab promised before the local elections not to go into "formal coalition" with any other party, but subsequently went into sharing power with Tories in many councils - so it may well be just a bit of silly posturing. However, I was thinking of SDLP taking the Labour whip at Westminster. You can't get much more formal than that.
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Post by davwel on Aug 27, 2022 21:20:35 GMT
A weakness in that ONS comparison of public- v private-sector earnings is that they don`t deal with the continuing activity of many (perhaps most) senior staff after they "retire". These persons get called emeriti, fellows, or similar, and often are given small rooms, or keep their pre-retirement ones.
Activities are varied and often prestigious - editing journals, leading inquiries, talking to the media, leading or supervising research, going to seminars and making sure that the visitors or in-house aspiring PhDs/MScs are doing careful and intelligent work, also and importantly for their outfits, they add to the apparent productivity with papers and reports.
So these perks of rooms, libraries, stats help, may benefit the public-sector retirees, but in practice ageing brings more working from home and less use of the facilities. Also the employing body may take advantage, by charging people paying for research being carried out, or led, by the "retired" at the salary they were getting prior to "retiring" whereas these folk are costing the outfits only the pension being paid.
Possibly there are fewer of these emeriti in the present strained circumstances, and the decline in age-imposed retirement may be having the same effect.
I also should have said (this edited 20 min after posting) that Whitehall department staff very likely have different practice than what I have experienced in the Scientific Civil Service and universities.
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Post by alec on Aug 27, 2022 21:20:52 GMT
Have been away and pondering on the energy crisis. I can't help feeling that what we are seeing is the end point of the neo-liberal orthodoxy that has dominated economic and political thinking for far too long now.
When inflation hits, 'common sense' dictates that working men and women should accept below inflation pay rises, otherwise inflation bites. When the banks crash and the government bails them out, working men and women have to accept lower public spending and higher taxes, because reducing public debt is 'common sense'. In an external energy price shock, if the government wants to keep prices down, then it's 'common sense' that the costs should ultimately be borne by consumers through higher future bills and through some complex tax on profits that allows multiple loopholes to reduce the cost to business owners.
At no point in any of this is the legitimacy of the market pricing mechanism questioned, as neo-liberal orthodoxy dictates that market mechanisms are sacrosanct.
This is a relatively recent attitude. During the war years it was seen as a criminal activity to manipulate prices and exploit shortages for financial gain, and right up until the early 1960s there was legislation previously supported by both Labour and Conservatives to prevent landowners getting excess gains from the sale of development land. In the 1970s inflationary shock, price controls were used and were not seen as constitutionally outrageous.
I've been away, and not following news stories that closely, so may have missed something, but what I'm not seeing here is any kind of forensic examination of why we are seeing price gouging on a massive scale in the domestic energy production market. I heard one analyst suggest that because domestic renewable generators have not seen their costs rise, the government should negotiate lower price contracts with them, but this is a weak response, based on conventional market operations.
Logically, domestic renewable energy and UK oil and gas production has not experienced excessive input cost inflation, (some cost pressures, but not huge) yet they are selling their output at the massively inflated unit costs set by global commodity markets. I can't see any reason why a sovereign government doesn't legislate to cap wholesale energy prices for UK produced energy to benchmark levels based on 2021 prices plus a modest inflation uplift to take account of the general inflation rise. This would keep consumers and businesses from bankruptcy and destitution, keep general inflation down, and would not require high costs to the government or to future bill payers. It would affect energy producers profits, which would be forced to remain normal, and so shareholders wouldn't be in for such an unwarranted bonanza, and it just seems such a simple, 'common sense' thing to do.
That neither Labour or Tories are talking about capping wholesale prices is a sign of how deep the neo-liberalism now runs. Approaches that were previously considered perfectly acceptable in certain circumstances are now deemed beyond the pale, and this is something I really think we need to fight very hard against. One of the greatest mistakes of Thatcherism was to confuse the completely acceptable business motivation of profit seeking with a mantra of profit maximisation, something that can be counter productive and which should, in a functioning democratic system, be controlled.
There is no excuse for UK wind energy prices to be rising alongside global gas prices, and this is basic price gouging. We are inventing all manner of complex initiatives to sidestep these price rises, the cost of which will ultimately fall on consumers and taxpayers, except for the one simple measure of forcing limits to price gouging on the parts of the wholesale energy market that we can control.
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Post by c-a-r-f-r-e-w on Aug 27, 2022 21:21:13 GMT
Liz Truss considers ‘nuclear’ option of five per cent VAT cut
Largest ever reduction could save families £1,300 a year in £38bn boost to economy
“Liz Truss is considering a “nuclear” VAT cut of five per cent across the board to tackle the cost of living crisis, The Telegraph can reveal.
The Treasury will present the next prime minister with plans modelled on Gordon Brown’s response to the 2008 financial crisis as part of a series of options to offset soaring energy bills.
The headline rate of VAT could be cut by up to five per cent – the largest ever reduction – which would save the average household more than £1,300 a year.
Officials believe it would also protect businesses from collapsing and could come alongside more targeted measures to help the worst-off with energy bills following Friday’s price cap increase to £3,549 from October.”
Telegraph
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Post by c-a-r-f-r-e-w on Aug 27, 2022 21:33:01 GMT
I've been away, and not following news stories that closely, so may have missed something, but what I'm not seeing here is any kind of forensic examination of why we are seeing price gouging on a massive scale in the domestic energy production market. Yep, it’s not unusual for capital to try and do that as it gets more powerful. Same as with the item on food pricing posted the other day, big companies taking the mick there too. And with housing, where they control the rate of house building to keep prices higher to maximise profits. Corner the market in essentials then take the mick with pricing. It can happen with other essentials like pharma etc. And then use their market and financial muscle to influence the political process to stop governments reigning them in. Buying lots of lobbying, employing regulators, and putting ex-politicians on the company boards etc. Then as they become more multinational, they can pressure governments to do their bidding or else they’ll go elsewhere. Meanwhile modern trade deals also seek to marginalise the state and lock in the advantage for capital in the drive to cement globalisation. “Rules-based organisations” hijacked by the right. And the right wing domination of the media keeps an examination of left wing alternatives out of sight. Politics becomes like in the US: Dems vs Republicans, but either way the hegemony of capital is largely unchallenged. (And they buy off a chunk of voters to this end with big house price gains. For now…) The need to do more to contain capital is something that used to be more widely known but it got somewhat locked out of the media and academia to some extent.
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Post by mandolinist on Aug 27, 2022 21:38:33 GMT
Liz Truss considers ‘nuclear’ option of five per cent VAT cutLargest ever reduction could save families £1,300 a year in £38bn boost to economy “ Liz Truss is considering a “nuclear” VAT cut of five per cent across the board to tackle the cost of living crisis, The Telegraph can reveal.The Treasury will present the next prime minister with plans modelled on Gordon Brown’s response to the 2008 financial crisis as part of a series of options to offset soaring energy bills.The headline rate of VAT could be cut by up to five per cent – the largest ever reduction – which would save the average household more than £1,300 a year.Officials believe it would also protect businesses from collapsing and could come alongside more targeted measures to help the worst-off with energy bills following Friday’s price cap increase to £3,549 from October.”Telegraph And that will help my food bill. ..said no one ever.
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Post by c-a-r-f-r-e-w on Aug 27, 2022 21:39:41 GMT
That said, the media and politicians and their supporters might not talk about it much, but the public do have more awareness of issues with capital. Hence the recent polling, carried out just a few weeks ago: “ In its largest ever poll on the topic, Survation polled 4300 people on the question “do you think the following services should be run in the private sector or the public sector?”. A majority of people want water, energy, rail, buses, Royal Mail and the NHS to be run in the public sector.
Our survey comes as the government is feeling the pressure on rocketing energy prices and 100,000 people have pledged not to pay their bills. In recent days, former prime minister Gordon Brown has called for temporary nationalisation as a solution. The Times and the Telegraph have both run articles explaining the track record of privatisation, while the Guardian has come out in favour of nationalising water.
66% of the public want to see energy in public ownership, including 62% of Conservative voters. We Own It is calling on the government to turn Bulb into a publicly owned supply company instead of paying Octopus £1 billion to take over the failed private company. This company could also generate renewable energy. In France, publicly owned EDF has limited bill rises to 4%.
68% of Conservative voters want water to be nationalised. The privatised water companies in England are under fire over introducing hosepipe bans while leaking away up to a quarter of water and pouring sewage into rivers and seas. If England had public ownership like Scotland does, an extra £28 billion would have been spent on infrastructure to cut leaks and protect rivers and seas.
The survey shows public ownership is popular across all education and income levels, ages and gender, across all political parties, in all regions of the UK. It’s popular with Leavers and Remainers.” weownit.org.uk/blog/biggest-ever-poll-shows-huge-support-nationalisationwww.survation.com/new-poll-public-strongly-backing-public-ownership-of-energy-and-key-utilities/
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Post by c-a-r-f-r-e-w on Aug 27, 2022 21:43:24 GMT
Liz Truss considers ‘nuclear’ option of five per cent VAT cutLargest ever reduction could save families £1,300 a year in £38bn boost to economy “ Liz Truss is considering a “nuclear” VAT cut of five per cent across the board to tackle the cost of living crisis, The Telegraph can reveal.The Treasury will present the next prime minister with plans modelled on Gordon Brown’s response to the 2008 financial crisis as part of a series of options to offset soaring energy bills.The headline rate of VAT could be cut by up to five per cent – the largest ever reduction – which would save the average household more than £1,300 a year.Officials believe it would also protect businesses from collapsing and could come alongside more targeted measures to help the worst-off with energy bills following Friday’s price cap increase to £3,549 from October.”Telegraph And that will help my food bill. ..said no one ever. Yes, I thought it rather underwhelming. (Esp. since there’s not always a guarantee that even where it does apply, the effect of the cut won’t be trousered before reaching the public). If you can stomach the more right wing radio, and admittedly many days I can’t, they quite often talk about the need to cut green levies to cut fuel bills, as if it were inevitable these cuts would all be passed on. Yeah right… Digging around further… There’s a plan to extend the duration of the cut in fuel duty (wow), and “ Covid-era relief for businesses, including a much larger temporary reduction in VAT for the hospitality, tourism and agriculture sectors”
… “She is understood to have changed her mind after initially declaring there would be “no handouts” under her leadership, and is planning to appoint an economics adviser in Number 10 to help deal with the cost of living crisis.”
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Post by domjg on Aug 27, 2022 22:45:47 GMT
News from the Front I live close enough to Old Trafford to hear the roar from the Cricket when an enemy wicket falls. Today there was a lot of noise. To show that life becomes more & more diverse: one sometimes gets two roars in v quick succession: the second louder than the first. This must be when VAR or whatever it is called in cricket confirms the original decision. Living in Manchester one gets used to hearing abuse whenever the Tories are mentioned, although I didn't hear any from O Trafford. I was taking part in a quiz in a southern Brexit/Tory stronghold when Johnson's name was mentioned re a question. Forgetting where I was, I immediately began to barrack, in the automatic Manchester way, only to notice a general silence. Autre Temps, Autre Moers/ Other than Essex and Kent the south east is relatively free of brexit strongholds thank goodness (though quite a few 50/50s give or take) but it is full of erstwhile Tory strongholds, many of which look like they will therefore be breached by the Lib Dems (and in some cases Labour) at the next general. The Tories internal contradictions look like they may finally be coming home to roost. btw you don’t have to go very far from Manchester to find places where Johnson’s Tories especially are/were revered far more than anywhere in the south east (other than the east coast counties)
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Post by domjg on Aug 27, 2022 22:54:33 GMT
crossbat11 re Cricket. It’s not really a class thing but more that Cricket seems linked (for me) to British (English) exceptionalism and Empire, something I’d rather were forgotten. But then I even think it’s ridiculous that we never moved to driving on the right (and in fact downright dangerous considering the large number of Britons driving on the continent and vice versa). Sweden switched over in the 60s I believe.
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Post by graham on Aug 27, 2022 22:56:12 GMT
There is a big difference between 'formal Coalition' and 'Confidence & Supply' should a Hung Parliament arise . The latter would imply an arrangement on the lines of the Lib-Lab pact of 1977 - 78 or the Con- Dup pact 2017 - 2019. True. SLab promised before the local elections not to go into "formal coalition" with any other party, but subsequently went into sharing power with Tories in many councils - so it may well be just a bit of silly posturing. However, I was thinking of SDLP taking the Labour whip at Westminster. You can't get much more formal than that. Given that the SDLP takes the Labour whip , its MPs would surely be covered by the Labour umbrella - so no need for any arrangement at all.
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Post by leftieliberal on Aug 27, 2022 23:15:04 GMT
Liz Truss considers ‘nuclear’ option of five per cent VAT cut And that will help my food bill. ..said no one ever. Standard VAT-rated foods (from Wikipedia): Alcoholic drinks Biscuits (chocolate covered only) Bottled water (inc. mineral water) Carbonated (fizzy) drinks Cereal bars Chocolate Confectionery/sweets Food & drinks supplied for consumption on the premises (at restaurants, cafes etc) Hot take-away food & drinks (inc. burgers, hot dogs, toasted sandwiches) Ice cream Fruit juice & other cold drinks (not milk) Nuts (shelled, roasted/salted) Potato crisps Judging from the supermarkets I go to, many of these items are prominently displayed, so I guess their sales are quite high. The bigger supermarkets also usually have cafes.
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Post by bedknobsandboomstick on Aug 27, 2022 23:17:58 GMT
And that will help my food bill. ..said no one ever. Standard VAT-rated foods (from Wikipedia): Alcoholic drinks Biscuits (chocolate covered only) Bottled water (inc. mineral water) Carbonated (fizzy) drinks Cereal bars Chocolate Confectionery/sweets Food & drinks supplied for consumption on the premises (at restaurants, cafes etc) Hot take-away food & drinks (inc. burgers, hot dogs, toasted sandwiches) Ice cream Fruit juice & other cold drinks (not milk) Nuts (shelled, roasted/salted) Potato crisps Judging from the supermarkets I go to, many of these items are prominently displayed, so I guess their sales are quite high. The bigger supermarkets also usually have cafes. So you're saying....there might be 10p of the price of a packet of Chocolate Hobnobs? THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING!
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Post by RAF on Aug 27, 2022 23:28:29 GMT
And that will help my food bill. ..said no one ever. Standard VAT-rated foods (from Wikipedia): Alcoholic drinks Biscuits (chocolate covered only) Bottled water (inc. mineral water) Carbonated (fizzy) drinks Cereal bars Chocolate Confectionery/sweets Food & drinks supplied for consumption on the premises (at restaurants, cafes etc) Hot take-away food & drinks (inc. burgers, hot dogs, toasted sandwiches) Ice cream Fruit juice & other cold drinks (not milk) Nuts (shelled, roasted/salted) Potato crisps Judging from the supermarkets I go to, many of these items are prominently displayed, so I guess their sales are quite high. The bigger supermarkets also usually have cafes. So let's say your weekly shop is around £100, of which standard rate VAT is paid on £20 worth. This tax cut would give you a weekly saving of £1. It will also take £38bn a year out of Treasury funds at a time of national emergency, when the Government may need to radically intervene in various sectors.
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Post by c-a-r-f-r-e-w on Aug 27, 2022 23:37:35 GMT
A bit more on the possible plans of Truss, this time in The Times:
“Allies of the frontrunner for the Tory leadership believe that the personal allowance, the level above which people begin paying income tax, should be lifted several years ahead of the Treasury’s schedule. It is £12,570 at present.
Others in her team have proposed raising the point at which people tip into the higher rate of tax, 40 per cent, which now stands at £50,270. They are also considering cutting the basic rate below 20 per cent.
The first two measures would help to address the problem of fiscal drag, in which millions of taxpayers have been pulled into higher bands by rampant inflation.
While critics are likely to argue that the cuts would lead to billions of pounds of extra borrowing and further fuel inflation, a Truss ally said that Rishi Sunak had already drawn up plans to cut income tax by 2p by 2024. While personal allowances and income tax thresholds typically rise in line with inflation, last year Sunak was accused of imposing a £21 billion “stealth tax” after he chose to freeze the personal allowance and higher rate threshold for four years.”
…
“The Centre for Social Justice think tank, founded by the Truss backer Sir Iain Duncan Smith, is proposing significantly increasing universal credit from October to give 8.5 million households an additional £219 on average over a three-month period.”
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Post by RAF on Aug 27, 2022 23:42:48 GMT
A bit more on the possible plans of Truss, this time in The Times: “ Allies of the frontrunner for the Tory leadership believe that the personal allowance, the level above which people begin paying income tax, should be lifted several years ahead of the Treasury’s schedule. It is £12,570 at present.
Others in her team have proposed raising the point at which people tip into the higher rate of tax, 40 per cent, which now stands at £50,270. They are also considering cutting the basic rate below 20 per cent.
The first two measures would help to address the problem of fiscal drag, in which millions of taxpayers have been pulled into higher bands by rampant inflation.
While critics are likely to argue that the cuts would lead to billions of pounds of extra borrowing and further fuel inflation, a Truss ally said that Rishi Sunak had already drawn up plans to cut income tax by 2p by 2024. While personal allowances and income tax thresholds typically rise in line with inflation, last year Sunak was accused of imposing a £21 billion “stealth tax” after he chose to freeze the personal allowance and higher rate threshold for four years.”
…
“The Centre for Social Justice think tank, founded by the Truss backer Sir Iain Duncan Smith, is proposing significantly increasing universal credit from October to give 8.5 million households an additional £219 on average over a three-month period.” So Truss's people believe cutting taxes will lead to higher inflation but are going to do it anyway?
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Post by c-a-r-f-r-e-w on Aug 28, 2022 0:09:06 GMT
A bit more on the possible plans of Truss, this time in The Times: “ Allies of the frontrunner for the Tory leadership believe that the personal allowance, the level above which people begin paying income tax, should be lifted several years ahead of the Treasury’s schedule. It is £12,570 at present.
Others in her team have proposed raising the point at which people tip into the higher rate of tax, 40 per cent, which now stands at £50,270. They are also considering cutting the basic rate below 20 per cent.
The first two measures would help to address the problem of fiscal drag, in which millions of taxpayers have been pulled into higher bands by rampant inflation.
While critics are likely to argue that the cuts would lead to billions of pounds of extra borrowing and further fuel inflation, a Truss ally said that Rishi Sunak had already drawn up plans to cut income tax by 2p by 2024. While personal allowances and income tax thresholds typically rise in line with inflation, last year Sunak was accused of imposing a £21 billion “stealth tax” after he chose to freeze the personal allowance and higher rate threshold for four years.”
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“The Centre for Social Justice think tank, founded by the Truss backer Sir Iain Duncan Smith, is proposing significantly increasing universal credit from October to give 8.5 million households an additional £219 on average over a three-month period.” So Truss's people believe cutting taxes will lead to higher inflation but are going to do it anyway? Well, my admittedly rather sketchy understanding, having read some of what Professor Minford has been saying, supposedly an influence on Truss, is that inflation doesn’t result in practice if the Bank of England signals a serious intent to bear down on inflation. This might normally involve swingeing interest rate rises, but according to Minford, in practice these won’t be necessary so long as there’s a clear intent to act on inflation, as that will in turn cause people and businesses to change their spending habits, with the consequence that the inflation won’t actually happen. E.g. if people think big interest rate rises might be on the way, they will reign in borrowing and spending, which will in turn limit inflation. So you don’t need the big interest rate rises after all. Assuming of course that we can trust this method…
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oldnat
Member
Extremist - Undermining the UK state and its institutions
Posts: 6,097
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Post by oldnat on Aug 28, 2022 0:39:31 GMT
True. SLab promised before the local elections not to go into "formal coalition" with any other party, but subsequently went into sharing power with Tories in many councils - so it may well be just a bit of silly posturing. However, I was thinking of SDLP taking the Labour whip at Westminster. You can't get much more formal than that. Given that the SDLP takes the Labour whip , its MPs would surely be covered by the Labour umbrella - so no need for any arrangement at all. Taking the whip of another party in HoC doesn't mean that the SDLP isn't a Nationalist party, but with such a constitutional amendment that is to be discussed, could Labour agree to a formal coalition with a Nationalist party - SDLP - by their taking the Labour whip? Even if they were to, would the SDLP wish to do so, given that the constitution of the Labour Party would then, at the very least, imply that the SDLP were unwelcome?
What would the implications be for Llafur? They already have a working arrangement with Plaid, and results in the Senedd might make a formal coalition with Plaid very desirable.
When writing or amending a constitution (unless it is but silly posturing) it is usual for the words used to have some defined meaning. What would Labour define as a "Nationalist party"? If it is merely parties that advocate the dissolution of the UK as the current political union, then Labour defines itself as a UK Nationalist party intent on maintaining the current UK as at present.
Perhaps it might require these parties to have adopted some other aspect of Nationalism like vesting sovereignty in the hands of politicians, their leaders regularly appearing in front of large national flags demanding that the territorial unity of the state be upheld.
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