Thought Id start this one going because its rather dead on this board at the moment and I suppose all my usual muckers are either at the Stella tennis event watching Dim Tim (lose again) or at Henly Regatta eating cucumber sandwiches (they wish,...NOT).

Anyway please feel free to just talk to yourself blast away and let it go on any company or subject you wish. Just wish Id thought of this one before.

cheers GF.

By Christopher Booker
10:00PM GMT 06 Dec 2014
It was on July 14 1998 that Gordon Brown announced that he planned to double public spending in 10 years, writes Christopher Booker.

Strangely missing from all of last week’s talk about the “government deficit” and Gordon Brown stepping down as an MP was any reference to the origins of what future generations will look back on as arguably the most catastrophic political blunder in our history.

The reason why Mr Brown for two years enjoyed a reputation as a “prudent” Chancellor was that he had been committed by his predecessor, Kenneth Clarke, to keep public spending under tight control under the “Maastricht criteria”. (It was not widely noted that Britain was bound by the Maastricht Treaty to comply with stages one and two of Economic and Monetary Union – it was only from stage three, the euro, that we had an opt-out.)

This had cut public spending to a mere 36 per cent of GDP, its lowest point for four decades. But on July 14 1998, carried away by the success of the economy he inherited from the Tories, Brown announced, with the aid of his economic adviser, Ed Balls, that he now planned to double public spending in 10 years. As the Economist memorably observed, he had “morphed from Scrooge into Father Christmas”.

The consequences of Brown’s hubris, as we now see, are that public spending has soared from £322 billion a year to £732 billion, still remorselessly rising every year. Despite the talk of “cuts” so beloved of the BBC, under this Government alone the national debt has more than doubled, having recently topped a mind-boggling £1.5 trillion.

George Osborne may talk airily of spending £2 billion on roads here, another £2 billion on flood defences there. But each of these sums represents only what he has this year had to borrow each week to plug the ever-widening hole in our finances. So dire is our plight that the £60 billion a year we now pay just in interest on our borrowings has risen to become the fifth-largest item in public spending, exceeded only by the ever-rising bills for welfare, education and the NHS.

Mr Osborne may now talk even more recklessly of how he hopes to cut the deficit to zero within five years. But so long as hundreds of council officials and NHS managers continue to pay themselves more than the £142,000 a year earned by the Prime Minister – let alone that £50 billion earmarked for HS2 – we know nothing is seriously being done to rein in a public-spending spree that continues to spray out our cash uncontrollably in all directions.

We can scarcely expect to be told about this by the BBC, when 91 of its executives have also arranged to pay themselves more than Mr Cameron every year. We live in a country where too many people in the public sector have totally lost contact with reality.

But the start of it was that day back in 1998 when Messrs Brown and Balls unleashed a monster that now threatens to swallow us all.

"oil prices could fall as low as $43 a barrel next year"

http://www.cnbc.com/id/102246693

"Without OPEC intervention, markets risk becoming unbalanced, with peak oversupply likely in the second quarter of 2015," Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Longson said.

In a report dated Dec. 5, the U.S. investment bank said oil prices could fall as low as $43 a barrel next year. The bank cut its average 2015 Brent base-case outlook by $28 to $70 per barrel, and by $14 to $88 a barrel for 2016.

Signs that the U.S. shale industry has yet to be hit by the slump in crude prices, adding three new oil-drilling rigs in the last week, further depressed the market.

"It was just a small increase, but nevertheless it was an increase despite the sharp price drop," said Carsten Fritsch, senior oil and commodities analyst at Commerzbank in Frankfurt.

My £60,000 in benefits helped build my house: Romanian migrant boasts handouts from the UK have helped him construct home for wife and children in his homeland
Ion Lazar says handouts are funding the property in a Romanian village
The 36-year-old said: 'It's like free money, thank you England'
The part-time scrap metal dealer receives £1,700 in benefits a month


Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2864952/My-60-000-benefits-helped-build-house-Romanian-migrant-boasts-handouts-UK-helped-construct-home-wife-children-homeland.html#ixzz3LJ7P0n2P
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and this gov is taking benefits off our disabled a bloody disgrace how people can support these actions is beyond me . we must get this evil people out

They are taking benefits away from people who turn out not to be disabled. Many 'disabled' people have been receiving benefits for years without being assessed again, which is clearly wrong.

the part-time scrap metal dealer receives £1,700 in benefits a month

of course the mail is a source of impeccable accuracy, but i bet this rumanian chappy is a pikey dealing in cash only for his scrap metal, and that being of questionable origin too

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=pikey

pikey

From the English "turnpike", the place where itinerent travellers and thieves would camp near a settlement.

Pikey is not a racial group, the term is used to describe anyone who lives in a caravan or shares the same values and "culture" of "the travelling community", and whose main sources of income are as follows:

Stealing cars, flogging roses in pubs for "childrens' charities", nicking lead off roofs, burgling garden sheds, blagging entry to old peoples house to rob them, doing dodgy tarmac jobs ("we've got some black stuff left over from a job up the road"), sometimes with mint imperials used as a substitute for white chippings, or, reportedly, using snow to lay slabs on when the sand ran out, stealing your bollocks if they weren't in a bag and anything else that's not nailed down and anything that is nailed down but will fit in the back of an untaxed Transit when nobody's looking.

Characterised by lurchers on a string, a unintelligible language that "isn't English, it isn't Irish, it's just Pikey" (source: Film: Snatch), a penchant for harecoursing, ketamine, lighter fuel, fighting in pubs and shopping at Lidl.

Best avoided.

Clinton Cards have had to apologise because of a Christmas card. It suggested that Father Christmas lives on a council estate as he has a history of breaking and entering and only works once a year.

"Shopping at Lidl"??! I've heard rumours that Lidl have upped their game. :-)

Clinton Cards - many a true word spoken in jest!

re: this Romanian character with his £25k pa benefits.


What is to stop retired people from going "self employed", dishing out leaflets etc, and claiming in work benefits?

Nothing, provided their total income including pension is low enough. In work benefits are not that much and only increase if you have school age children which would be unlikely if they are retired.

your nic as all your details you can not claim once you get your pension

Why not?

They are encouraging pensioners to work.

What a useless lot you are!

If you can't tell me how to claim some benefits on here, do you know another site that can?

Tanker is correct. But you can claim pension credit, housing benefit and council tax reduction if your total income is low enough.

Exec - we did at least try to help you with your door knob!

Are you encouraging Mauel to have more children.

God forbid!

8-)

Are you encouraging Mauel to have more children.

God forbid!

8-)

Exec. Try this. It will work out your entitlement.

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/family/benefits-check