Without wanting to make a party political broadcast (bit late for that) it is quite clear that Gordon is in fact a moron. Having made the Bank of England in charge of interest rates in his first day of power (good move), I fail to see a single good thing he has done since.

He has managed to tie business up in red tape, increase the tax burden with 66 different stealth taxes, and increase spending massively creating a considerable black hole, which means that taxes will have to rise further. The only jobs he has created are in the public sector (the least productive and most expensive to fund) and money has been poured into the NHS with no discernable benefits.

Even his sideline issues have been hopeless. He sold the Bank of England Gold reserves almost as they touched their low point (gold prices have subsequently soared)and has completely decimated pensions with his 5 billion yearly tax take.

So the question is, what can Gordon fcuk up next? I know, lets give him the top job so he can completely knacker the country.

After all, we probably deserve him!!

rgrds
gk

Brown inherited his stable economy and was careful with it in the first term--now it's all going pear shaped. we suffered under the conservatives because they inherited huge Labour debts--remember the IMF bailing us out?? we were the poor man of Europe an absolute disgrace!! Brown has robbed the banks and pension funds to keep spending--also he has squandered the billions he received from mobile phone licenses.
there's no more left to dip into except more speed cameras--higher and higher taxes or more stealth taxes! I agree with Hilary totally.
I'm not saying the tories were wonderful but who but mugs would want to take on running our country--the clever people go off and quietly make money!

I remember the IMF very well. I also remember the oil producing countries holding the entire world to ransom and our problems being caused by that and power mad unions. I also remember the arguments about squandering billions on tax cuts under Thatcher when all the countries interests were sold off and North sea revenues disappeared into nowhere. Nobody is saying anyone is perfect, and we may yet see recession, but we did that as well under successive tory rulers. The point is, and I suspect always will be, a me, me, me country where we all demand to pay less and want to see government spend more on our choices. The circle will never be squared. Given that all right of centre supporters argue that we have an economic black hole ahead of us, how can they then defend a party whose election pledge was no tax rises (perhaps even cuts) and greater public spending?
So we are left with a situation where the chancellor of any colour is damned if he does and damned if he doesn't. My original post was taking issue with the creeping anti northern sentiment that ignorant people are starting to display. Only a fool could possibly say that the north of this country wasn't made to suffer during the 80's and 90's so that the tories could look after their heartlands in the south east. Now we have a government that has redressed that balance to look after its own heartlands there are cries of foul.

ROFL, Politics and religion. Along with sex it stirs the emotion.

I think the economic turmoil is plain to see. Brown was very prudent to start with but had been pursuing ideological goals at whatever the cost since.

Faced with the prospect of a slowing economy taxes and borrowing rocketed which has been put to use in an unproductive manner. OK so it stopped the country sliding into recession but it was no economic miracle and we WILL have to pay for it.

Meanwhile house prices skyrocket and debt reaches astonishing levels. An economy based on overvalued assets, massive borrowing by the public and the government is not a stable economy. Economic reality always dawns later than sooner. I'm not a doom and gloom merchant though as economies can often suceed in spite of meddling. But I have taken measure appropiate to the possibilities.

there is another 60 miles of England North of Hadrians wall, its called Northumberland.

Any prime minister that will take a country to war on a lie, support a fellow minister who as a result of naming a weapons scientist, directly causes the suicide of the said weapons scientist just to save the parties skin, break 60% of the parties election manifesto via gordons stealth taxes is well worth your support and vote. IF YOUR A MORON.
Loadsa

Wassa matter then "cat got your tongue" ??
Loadsa

Look back hewitt it was labour who had the biggest inflation and interest rates ever and the tories had to sort it out.
Why you come out with this c--p that the Tories did nothing for the north amazes me. All Maggie did was take on the UNIONS who stifled this country.
Look at the new Tube Line it has all the tech know how to run automatically on its own, but no the Unions insist on it having a driver otherwise they all come out on strike. Don't know why we bother with technical advances.

actually this is a bare faced lie. the largest ever interest rates were seen during the ERM fiasco, as you well know. Further, in "taking on the unions" was it necessary to close entire industries? I think not. That just lead to us being completely reliant on foreign companies for fuel, power and raw materials that we could no longer produce ourselves. The industries concerned were not unproductive because of the unions (though they did not help), they were uneconomical due to the poor management put in place by the government. I realise that first hand knowledge and experience of these industries and events cannot hope to compete with the spin of the capito-centric press, but these are basic truths. What happened to the mine and steel industries is almost exactly what you are all bemoaning happening to UK PLC under Brown. Namely the sinking of vast sums of money into hopelessly uneconomic areas in order to make political gain. With Brown it is the immigrant population and the idle shirkers. With Thatcher it was a deliberate ploy to make these industries uneconomic in order to stamp out unions who were an antichrist to her dogma.
Huge areas of the country suffered for many years for her to make a point. All that was required was to close loss making areas, not the entire industry.
Get out a bit more and you will find that even after all these years she is hated with a bile you cannot even start to imagine, or is your next post about to tell us its because all northerners are thick, and dont understand what makes an economy tick, because we do, and we also have long memories. No-one has ever said that labour are perfect, and I would change much about them, but given the history of what has happened north of Watford, do not be suprised at the venom aimed at people saying the poor little mites in the south are subsidising the north. That is complete crap. Your last note even mentions tube trains!!! Who the hell outside your area gives a flying stuff about tubes or trains! They are a complete irrelevancy to the majority of theis country, for whom a train is an alternative for the rare journey to London.
On the subject of subsidy, local government receives about 80% of its income from national taxation. Why should I pay more so that key workers in London can be paid London weighting allowances and be offered low cost housing, subsidised by my northern earnings? Apparantly, from your strange perspective, this is not subsidising. I don't care whether nurses in London can afford a place to live. Not my problem. They can near me and they are the ones i use. If we stopped that subsidising then people would move out in droves, London prices would drop and we would all be happy, but we cannot sit by and see you people lose out on the divide can we, or you may throw your teddy out of the cot again.

HI tory wankers//no wonder we have Alabour goverment with supporters like you lot

Have you got a cloth cap, Hewitt?

I'm just curious.

Typical. are you a trans-sexual with a name like hilary, and do you wear a pinstripe and bowler with a horn handled umbrella all week and then chiffon and lace on a weekend? Strange, I thought everybody in London did. Just like all Frenchmen eat garlic, ride bikes, and look like Benny Hill wearing a hooped jumper and beret,

>>hewitt

You say with Brown it's the imigrants and idle shirkers. I would say it's the civil servants (although he has apparently trimmed back slightly here), NHS middle managers and the like.
With Thatcher I think you have got it the wrong way around. You say she tried to make industries uneconomic to stamp out the unions. I say the industries were already uneconomic because of the unions.

On the voting side it is true that more people in England voted tory than labour - but as you correctly say it is a UK vote. The problem is that Scotland and Wales now have their separate parliaments - and the English (both north and south) are not being fully represented - we need our own separate English parliament.

rgrds
gk

PS toss a bone to the whippets from me!

at last, humour!!!
we will agree to disagree on the way round of the uneconomic industries. Just to add substance to my point though, we watched as multi-million pound machines were sunk into pits already deemed unworkable, and the costs placed on the balance sheet of the rest of the mines in that field, making several mines unprofitable at a stroke.
On assemblies, it depends if you are a lumper or a splitter. If the argument is followed through to its logical conclusion, each ward would have its own mini parliament and I am not convinced that would either reduce waste or lead to better government. Do we really want regional assemblies for all areas? I am sure the Cornish do but in the North east and Yorkshire, referenda produced a resounding NO.
Can't throw a bone to the whippets, They've all hijacked my pigeons for hang gliding practice.
Got to go. Trouble at mill.
Alan

What mill?? Did we miss one
Loadsa

Alan,

Respect. The tranny comment had me in fits.

:o)

Anyway, I'm not going to alter your political persuasions just the same as you're not going to alter mine. I do happen to think that some of Brown's decisions will return to haunt him during this current term but, obviously, only time will tell. Also some of the issues are cyclical and would present a problem to whoever was in power.

In essense, the only issue that I do feel really strongly about is that of greater harmony with the EU and joining a single currency. Hopefully the French will themselves vote Non on the Constitution and the Labour blushes will then be spared. In that respect, I am quite concerned that Kenneth Clarke might sneak back in to control the Tories. That would be seriously bad news.

Not Minx for once, but the other half who occasionally looks in on htis bulletin board. From one who was born in London, married in Newcastle, lived as far apart as houston and singapore and presently live in Yorkshire I am often amused at the North / South perspective. The southerners are generally misguided and one only has to read the evening standard to see the narrow perception of the North (especially from that moron who looks like a black haired sheepdog whose name escapes me). I moved to Newcastle firstly in 1984, expecting whippets and brown ale and was quickly shut up when I saw more ferraris, porsches and disposable income than I had ever seen before. Different attitudes I suppose, fur coat and no knickers - or live life and enjoy - make your own mind up as to which area each relates.

Anyway - at least some of us poor Northerners still own chunks of Yorkshire -see you in the tent at Ascot in June - it's in York this year.

I agree wholeheartedly regarding the single currency, but a bigger nightmare may yet await. If the Euro does attain/maintain a powerful presence in world trade terms, and the dollar continues to rule as far asoil and the like are concerned, may we be on the brink of another trading bloc single currency to compete? may the pacific nations of asia and australasia find there currency too soft to compete and create an asian-dollar?
I know it may be some distance off but I would hate to be the chancellor left to choose between swimming alone with sterling becoming less and less of a player in the world, or joining a single currency trading bloc.
That really would be bad news. As our "frank exchange of views" has ably demonstrated, economic policy cannot be geographically right for a tiny island like this, for the whole of Europe it would be (and is) impossible.
Regards
Alan

Alan,

I think the "swimming alone" argument is all part of the spin that Boney Liar would have us believe.

All the time that the ECB is managed by a bunch of nambypambies who need permission to sit on the loo, the Euro will not attain a powerful presence in world trade terms. Too many countries, too many economies and too many needs ...... one size will never fit all and that is what has rendered the ECB as a totally ineffective body.

We will always be better equiped to compete against the US by maintaining our current status, be it the BoE or the Chancellor who is controlling interest rates. The Cable carry trade is nowhere near as attractive as it was this time last year and if the Fed hike rates once more and we cut our rates plus if oil holds around the $50 level through the driving season, you could easily see Cable back to $1.60 by year end. It is obviously far too early yet to call.

But hasn't the whole import/export argument been around for donkey's years anyway? A win-win scenario is totally impossible and one side will always be bleating.

I am certain the fed will up rates and ours will drop but I think oil has a little way to fall yet.
With very few exceptions the win-win scenario being impossible is impossible in any economic argument, there is no free lunch and that kind of gets to the heart of how this (and many other threads discussing economic policy) start.
I was merely postulating that no matter how ineffective the ECB is at present, economies of scale will kick in and the winner will not necessarily be the fittest, but the biggest bully on the block. We have watched America bully smaller nations using the might of the dollar (or guns if that doesn't work!!) and my theory goes that if the asian countries start to get a good economic kicking from TWO bullies, they might decide on a safety in numbers reply and all get behind a new pacific currency, or adopt the yen as a trading standard. My point then is, more bullies and less countries to be bullied. Do we go against our natural desires and join a gang of big boys, or do we try and hide away from them? There are no teachers to go and tell in this playground, and sterling sure as hell won't be big enough to fight back!!
Alan

Glad to see the stone throwing has stopped and humour is restored!! and no one mentioned ferrets-lol!
It's very interesting to follow the North / South debate and understand where some views begin--I still favour Hilary's points but I now understand that if you live through turmoil and change the bitterness can run deep for years.
I live in the far South West and we are forgotten completely unless someone wants a seaside break--the world ends at Bristol for most politicians!