Budget March 16th

terry

At the Start
Joined
May 2, 2003
Messages
666
Gordon Brown - who will rid us of him?????????????

And did anyone read Robin Cook's column yesterday? What a load of old cock.
 
Brian, you are clearly so rich that you don't need to bother with a pension.

What Brown did to pension funds in 1997 was almost criminally insane.
 
Anyone who thinks Brown is a poor Chancellor clearly can't remember those clowns in Number 11 1979-1997, the billions pissed up a wall defending that daft exchange rate band, and the volatility the economy suffered due to wildly fluctuating interest rates and the house market crash of the late 80s.

From my limited experience of politicans, I tend to prefer civil servants (who actually know their subjects) but I can't speak highly enough of Treasury minister John Healey, who is incredibly hard working and seems on the ball.
 
As someone who was the trustee of a large company's pension fund at the time, I am well aware of the consequences of the change in advance corporation tax for funds. I am also aware of the effect on pensions caused by the mismanagement of a number of pension providers. I am also aware of the number of companies who used the changes as an excuse to reduce their own funding of schemes and the consequent slow death of the final salary scheme.

The words "over all" should be read. There has not been another chancellor who has presided over a strong and secure economy for longer than the current one in modern times. That is not to imply perfection, nor to defend him, but it is a provable fact.
 
I'm not saying he's the worst Chancellor I've ever seen, but I just can't see what the point was in clobbering pension funds (unless it was just to get some more tax revenue).

The death of final salary pension schemes has been inevitable for some years now. The golden age of people retiring in their 50s on fat pensions is now history.

Another huge problem is how public service pensions are going to be funded. Well, the answer is that they can't, either. People like teachers getting early retirement on some spurious pretext or other are going to have to keep working to 65 at least. The only bright spot is that a lot of other countries in the EU are in even more of a mess in this respect.
 
Venusian,

The nation gets the government it deserves and I'm afraid I see a nation which collectively has never grown up and prefers to believe in fairy tales about ''third ways'' involving lower taxes and allegedly better public services to the reality, namely that lower taxes results in crap public services, and good public services means higher taxes.

Labour continually failed to get re-elected with tax and spend manifestos so now they have to operate a taxation by stealth policy, eroding the value of things that won't affect most people until later life - like pensions.

As an aging lefty, I find it all very depressing even though I'm personally lucky enough to be modestly financially independent and non-reliant upon a pension.
 
Ian, high tax ('60s and '70s) or low tax ('80s onwards) - we still manage to make a bit of a mess of things, and not just with public services and pensions.

Maybe being the first country to have an industrial revolution has left us with such a terrible infrastructure with populations, roads, railways etc sort of "in the wrong places" that we're always going to be struggling. The Enclosure Acts have a lot to answer for, as I'm sure you'll agree.
 
Despite the worst fiscal actions of our governments, of whatever colour, I can't get overly excited as I'm constantly aware that half the world's population - nearly three billion people - have to survive on less than than two dollars a day.
 
True, Brian, but it's easier to avoid ''getting overly excited'' if you're financially well enough off (as I suspect you are, and I must confess I probably just about about am, too) to be unaffected by the shortcomings and failures of our governments.
 
Only if you are self-centred...

As for taking the nation into an illegal war, which, you may remember, some of us pointed out at the time to the extent of boredom - well, unlike the majority of people in Iraq and the Ukraine, I feel that I have no one to vote for.
 
Let alone a government with no respect for the rule of law that spends its time engaged in a racist Dutch auction with the Conservatives over immigration and allowing education policy to be dictated by the Daily mail .

I am disenfranchised .

I am however disturbed that the Conservatives have closed up - that is due to the incompetence of Milburn in failing to demolish their fantasy world policies .

Gordon Brown should be put in charge of the campaign at once
 
Brian,

I was opposed to the Iraq War too.

Ardross,

I've felt disenfranchsied ever since Tony Blair realised (1983, probably :lol:) he could take every Labour to the left of him for granted and just focus on appeasing those brain donors otherwise known as ''floating voters'' - we all know the sort I'm talking about, people who vote Tory when they're doing well and mortgaging themselves up to the hilt and going on two foreign holidays a year on their credit cards, and then vote Labour when they come home to a recession and get made redundant and their house value collapses. :lol:
 
I have to disagree with Ian regarding the Civil Service. It seems to me that you blame the politicians for the bad things and praise the civil servants for the good things that go on.

For me, Gordon Brown is a spent force. He doesn't seem to want to do his official job any more and is roaming around trying to rid the world of poverty or whatever it is that he's doing these days. That isn't the Chancellor's job.

He's made too many mistakes lately, or at least he's been badly advised.

The £10,000 '0%' Corporation tax rate was idiotic in the extreme. It was taken away after many businesses had incorporated to take advantage of it. He'll probably take further measures to hit small companies. A complete waste of time in the first place.

The freedom to use SIPPs to invest in residential property is downright stupid. That won't last long either. But in the meantime everyone will be running around filling in mountains of paperwork to take advantage of it.

He has maintained the stability in the economy which was established in the latter days of the Conservative regime.

He's done some good work in blocking tax planning loopholes and making sure that what the legislation intended to happen is what does actuallyhappen. Accountants have been taking the piss for donkeys' years. However he's still managed to balls things up, even without allowing these schemes, as previously mentioned.

I don't agree with the tax credit regime. This has become a joke. I'm all for looking after people who can't look after themselves, but this goes way beyond that.

But perhaps his worst legacy is what Venusian refers to. He's totally knackered the system of private pensions in this country. I can't help but think that this is what he intended. Like most socialists, he has a long list of things that he wants to get rid of, but a very short list of constructive ideas.
 
Terry,

I merely speak as I find - always the best way, IMO.

I've had very few dealings with government but, from those I have had - talking to DCMS, HM C&E, the Treasury, and the OFT mostly in the course of my work as a small-time exchanger operator - I've formed a very favourable impression of the civil servants as young, intelligent, hard-working, impartial chaps (and nothing like the ''Sir Humphreys'' I was half expecting) but found that politicans are often swayed by IMO grubby, vested, interests: Geoff Howarth on the William Hill payroll making an abortive and laughable 11th-hour attempt to get betting exchanges punitively taxed in 2003 being a notable example.

However, I do rather like John Healey, based on the fact he always replies to letters courteously, promptly and professionally and once even emailed me on a Sunday! :lol:

As for Brown, he has presided over a period of economic stability and steady growth - no Nigel Lawson/Norman Lamont he. B)
 
Ian, I'm sure that there are good civil servants out there. I'm also fairly sure that Brown is extremely capable, but he looks bored these days. Whatever else he does, he should quit this job, but he won't.

In a way he's a lot like the Conservatives were under Thatcher. She sold off the 'nationalised industries' and was right to do so, but she used the money to pay the bills, not to invest in anything useful. Brown is the same, using his ingenuity tospeed up tax flows but again this isn't being used for anything useful, just 'bribes' in the form of tax credits.

At the end of the day this lot are no better or worse than Thatcher was. The beneficiaries might be different but the concept is the same.
 
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