Budget

[Loz]

After a couple of disappointing attempts, I think ol' George got this one about right. Lots there for business/manufacturing and good stuff for pensions and savings.

I thought Miliband's response was pretty poor and didn't make any points about the actual budget, but apparently No 11 failed to provide them with the normal pre-speech copy. Naughty.

[????]

The pensions bit looks great on the face of it.

Good to see the lib dems ideas on threshold taken through to conclusion.

All the childcare stuff looks like a bribe to me - take away child benefit etc then do thid? typical politics

Business investment threshold good

ISAs makes sense

Stamp duty on company properties closes that loophole

7/10

haters gonna hate tho

[Otta]

I thought it was all pretty good.

[Otta]

Except the fags!

But beer good.

[Loz]

The ISA idea makes loads of sense provided you can still get your cash ISA and your stock ISA from different providers. Other than that possible issue, a great idea.

[????]

the thought of not having to buy an annuity...has genuienely cheered me up and enthused me, showing my age :)

[StraferJack]

No one ever "gets" a budget on day one surely?

Details take longer to come out

[womanofdulwich]

I think the pensions thing is big, if you are of " a certain age" when pensions loom larger than your life than childcare help.

[Coman]

For a quick round of the tax changes:

http://comanandco.co.uk/2014-budget

[ratty]

Lovers gonna love

[ultraburner]

The rise in basic tax threshold is good, but the recent class 4 ni rises almost negate it for the low earning self-employed (like me)

[numbers]

Just heard on radio that Labour are worried about people being 'reckless and irresponsible' with money. Their own money at that. Ah well, makes a change from them doing it for us I s'pose.

Thanks Mr Balls, if that wasn't so hapless it would almost be funny.

[StraferJack]

Ah the old "labour caused global financial meltdown" line again

Some people love that one

[numbers]

Don't put words in my mouth Straferjack. Who are these "some people love that one" that you are referring to.

So what if my opinion differs to yours. I do think that previous Labour government's have been irresponsible and reckless with other people's money. I didn't say, nor imply, that they were solely responsible for global financial meltdown. In fact, I don't think I said anything about global financial meltdown but there you go.

[StraferJack]

Without the global meltdown, the western economies were doing just fine

This prime minister and chancellor signed up to and agreed with labour spending policies at the time

After years of neglect, swathes of the infrastructure was being corrected

Since the meltdown the same duo have blamed everything on labour overspending when nothing of the sort was happening

[StraferJack]

You didn't mention global meltdown, but without it how does your accusation of overspending stack up?

[numbers]

ok straferjack whatever we had, gordon brown spent it. you name it. just one example he spent billions on the health service and what do we have to show for it? (I am a full supporter of the NHS and education for all before you accuse me of being I'm alright jack)

so when the storm arrived/shit hit the fan etc etc, we had nothing to brave it with. the money was all gone.

thats my view. cooking dinner at the moment will be back to this thread but honestly,if I am not allowed a chuckle at that remark on the radio well I'm speechless. for once.

edited: sorry used wrong name.

[StraferJack]

So in your example, if we spend billions on nhs what would you LIKE to show for it?

The implication in your example is we have nothing to show for it?

[Otta]

This is an argument you see all over the place, and from where I'm sitting you're both basically right. One side is not mutually exclusive to the other.

The whole western world suddenly went "oh shit", and realised that things were very wrong, largely due to the greed in the financial sector. The current gov trying to pin all that on Labour is ridiculous (although they have a lot of people buying it).

BUT, Labour did basically forget to save for a rainy day and spent too much and run up too much debt.

But health and education are the two areas where you can never spend enough IMO.

That's how I see it anyway.

[StraferJack]

That's more like it otta

That said how many governments saved enough for that particular rainy day? Basically you can't

Allied to this is the fact that this government is ideologically using the deficit to decimate the public institutions. I have them benefit of doubt for first two years but I think history will judge us mad to go along with them at this stage

Not sure how I feel about being called Sean on here tho ;-)

[the-e-dealer]

Yeah what we want. Cheaper Beer and Bingo. Yippee!

[numbers]

yes Otta I pretty much agree with that summing up. I am not one of the blame EVERYTHING on past governemnts, no government gets it right all of the time.

although strafer saying "thats more like it" comes across as unless he agrees with your viewpoint then you're in the wrong.

edit: and sorry meant to say strafer not call you any other name beginning with S. apologies for that.

[numbers]

StraferJack Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> So in your example, if we spend billions on nhs

> what would you LIKE to show for it?

a service that works better for a start. most of the extra money went on salaries.

> The implication in your example is we have nothing

> to show for it?

[Otta]

and in ED you'd need to drink around 400 pints to save enough for a pint.

[Loz]

StraferJack Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Allied to this is the fact that this government is

> ideologically using the deficit to decimate the public institutions.

That's a little over-emotive, unless you are using the original meaning of the word 'decimate' in relation to budgets.

The Tories generally believe in smaller government so, yes, they are using the cuts to idealogically shrink the state. That's really not surprising. I've always considered that Labour spend too much, the Tories too little. As long as you get regular changes of government, it tends to average out reasonably well.

Having said that, some reports had Labour planning cuts of about ?9 for every ?10 the Tories have planned anyway.