Latest Moan From You and Me 2025

I dont think there is anyone who is able to turn this country round, we seem to be in a downward spiral and I definity think covid was the final straw.

We seem to have too much borrowing, 100billion just to pay the interest each year seems be the biggest problem and all those years ago the conservatives set about paying off the national debt.

Now the Labour party seem to want to borrow more.

None of this makes any sense to me.

And now we Have Reeves lying about the state of the finances so that she can raise taxes in order to pay for the extra benefits, when less than a year ago they were trying to cut benefits.
The "grown ups" have certainly taken over the purse strings.

 

But they have had two budgets now and have done nothing to help business, in fact everything seems to have been to destroy business.
I think people would have taken a 2p hit on income tax, rather than the fiddling around they have done, if the money had been spent on getting the economy moving.

 

@Fat Controller they could turn the existing premises into social centres - community café, small people play area, kids zone, teens area, knit and natter groups, repair café to get men out of their isolation.

In this part of France town centre car parks are free on Satruday and so are buses, the idea being to get people out into parks, cafés, resurants and shops instead of isolated at home. It keeps local money circulating locally too.

 

Its usually rates and rent that destroys shopping centres.
I doubt many of these low profit making things can survive in town centres these days.

Even pubs are struggling.

 

This was just posted on X about Jeremy Corbyn's new "Your Party" but I think it applies very well to Labour too.

 

For a minute I thought we was going to get a song.

 

I wonder if, having been part of the EU for so long, that all our current politicians have spent years basically behaving as if they are in opposition, rather than actually being required to govern? Having been given the reins of power, they all seem to be floundering around trying to work out what to do. Far easier to moan and object to someone else’s policies, and quite a shock to the system when they are being told that the Buck stops with them, and they’ve got to get on with it.
The current mob have really shown no common sense whatsoever. As has already been pointed out, delaying the withdrawal of the winter fuel payments for a year would have protected the most vulnerable. It couldn’t have been that difficult to introduce a tax clawback for the first winter targeted at slightly higher earners, and avoided the outrage caused by the method they used. Even if there had been a cost to do that, it would have been cheap at the price compared to the loss of goodwill.

I’m not going to forgive them for the introduction of VAT on private school fees halfway through the academic year. I’m sure they were aiming at what they saw as ‘Boris’ training schools, but the parents paying those school fees will hardly have batted an eye lid. The parents they would hit most would be people like myself, in my day, and my son, who have worked hard, and gone without fancy cars or expensive holidays to do what they thought was the best for their children. Did this government do their sums? The parents educating their children privately have been saving the country the cost of their education, out of taxed income. Given the drop out rate in the profession, I can’t see any big trend of teachers losing private school jobs gravitating into the state system, which has so many problems. I’m sure many would just give up teaching.

Why didn’t the government introduce a sliding scale of Vat introduction, with schools charging the lowest fees, many of them non profit making charities, continuing with exemption. Higher rates for what are seen as the ‘elite’ that the government are trying to punish, in their politics of envy.
They should be concentrating on improving state schools so that parents are happy to send their children there, not trying to force them. All this tends to do is reinforce the increased prices of houses in catchment areas of high achieving schools, making them even less accessible to those from low income families.
Sorry for the lengthy rant!

 

When the shopping Mall hit Britain it was a boom, now the one here is not full lots of empty places.
Rents are too high, wouldn't it be better to lower the rent and fill the place rather than keep high rents and run half empty.

 

I meant within the budget. Instead of tinkering ineffectively all over the place, pick one area and really reform it. Take council tax, for example. Instead of putting in a small change at the top, rebuild it from the bottom. Explain that those in larger houses have been allowed to freeload for yrs as everything above a certain value is lumped in one band. Then cries of "mansion tax - unfair - picking on the wealthy" would be seen for what they were - a method to perpetuate the growth of wealth for a very small minority at the expense of services for everyone else.

The argument taxes need to be raised to reduce NHS waits is frankly dead and buried. Those sums will never add up. Stop treating the NHS like some sort of religious entity.

 

I understand what you're saying but it still makes me feel rather uncomfortable. There are two of us living in a band 'F' house that we bought for £180k back in the 90's because we wanted a large garden. We consume far fewer council resources than a family of four in a band 'A' house. We never had any children so in what way have we ever been "freeloading"?

 

Our home has doubled in value since we moved here 20 years ago. But since we retired, our income has dropped to less than half. Our council tax is currently our highest outgoing. When they rearrange the council bands, will we be reliant on savings? I’d like to think that someone intelligent has gone through this proposal and identified all the possible outcomes, but I highly doubt it. Is this yet another example of envy and spite? Would not a rise in income tax for all but the lowest earners be a fairer way to ensure that the pain was evenly distributed, with everyone doing their bit, but those with the most income contributing the most?

 

You haven't! The freeloaders are those in Band H with giant mansions. If your house is worth 1 mill or 7 mill or 20 mill, you are in the same band. That is patently absurd. The bands should run from A-Z, so each one has a fair proportion of homes in it. The reason this is not the case is the wealthy would then have to pay more ... which they are not keen to do.

It is not envy or spite, @Ergates. It is about designing a fair system. The valuations need redoing, and that, in turn, would move the bands upwards. Then you just extend them to account for all the huge mansions with 10+ bedrooms, bathrooms galore, cinemas, pools, gyms, paddocks, etc.