Last week it was benefits, this week it’s the spring statement… problem is this government isn’t leaking so our newspapers are speculating and catastrophising… we know it’s going to be tough but the “sky is falling in” editorial line isn’t helping!
Vote for change get Austerity, trying to fix the country with the same medication that broke it is a special kind of stupid.
Reeves sadly is an economic robot stuck in the past .
Really sad to see how poor Labour have turned out to be
She has wasted billions with zero growth. Now she wants to balance the books because she has wasted so much money. She is useless and her growth plan is an utter failure. Her position is indefensible.
Really dodged a bullet with Corbyn eh. Keep electing wealth protectors you'll never get genuine change. Trillions hoarded by a few but its the poorest that must pay.
‘never met R Reeves but could pride be driving her refusal to think outside her self-imposed fiscal box? She’s on track to alienate not just the left but centre & all ‘progressives’ - ie @teamlabouruk.bsky.social ‘s base. & harm the economy & the poor. Who is impresed [email protected]
It's not 'since austerity', this IS also austerity. Labour are making a specific choice to refuse to tax rich people, in favour of further austerity. The Labour Party is dead, and now we have Tories wearing red rosettes.
Any of the Starmer cultists who try to argue this will be instantly blocked. I have zero desire to engage with economically illiterate arguments. You can continue shouting into a void all you, it won't change the facts of the situation.
This isn’t austerity. Public spending will still be rising by an average of 1.1% per year in real terms from 2026/27 to 2028/29. It’s much more than that in 2024/25 and 2025/26:
After 14 years, one kid at a food bank, one pensioner dying of cold in their own home, one mother skipping a meal to feed her kids, all in the 6th wealthiest country in the world. Spin it how you want, mate, that’s the fucking worst of the worst austere 14 years ago and it still is now.
You're not "on the left", you're not even progressive if you support these Tories. You're a handmaiden for a Farage win in 2029, and I've better things to do than quibble with a propagandist for yet another right wing government.
This incompetent buffoon is going bury Labour for good, thankfully. Noxious people who get a sick thrill out of hammering the vulnerable and making this country a more hopeless place.
One party cut inheritance tax, capital gains tax and the top rate of income tax when they were in office, and caused market turmoil when they tried to pass tens of billions more in tax cuts for the rich.
This Labour government has taxed the wealthy and boosted funding for public services:
There are always trade-offs. Corbyn and McDonnell were preparing to deliver £7 billion in Tory welfare cuts in 2017. But I am glad that 1 million low-paid workers will get sick pay, 4.5 million families will get a Universal Credit boost, and that people are coming off NHS waiting lists.
I really dislike such hyperbole. If that MP can’t figure it out, they shouldn’t be in Parliament because they’re clearly not across the detail of their Government’s policies.
Labour did raise taxation on the rich to the tune of £15 billion a year in the Budget.
We actually see tax rises on low and middle earners as a non-starter policy. The Nordic countries tax them more (and also set VAT at 25%, typically). That’s how they fund their services.
They’ve ended the onshore wind ban, expanded sick pay to 1 million low-paid workers, raised the minimum wage by 6.7%, taxed the wealthy to the tune of £15 billion a year to provide a real terms funding boost to all public services and NHS waiting lists are falling.
And all it took was the hiking of energy bills, water bills and council tax, the freezing of old people, the starving of kids and the immiseration of the disabled.
Energy prices are much lower than they were in 2022 and 2023. Old people did not freeze — mortality was historically pretty low this winter, energy prices were lower than last winter, and they got a 8.5% income boost. My council tax did go up by 4.99%, amounting to £3.88 a month. I’m happy to pay.
I am not. I am, however, concerned about what happened in the US this year, with millions of people who voted for Biden in 2020 staying at home or voting for third parties because his achievements weren’t highlighted enough and they didn’t think the alternative could be much worse.
Achievements like thousands of jobs going in universities, benefits cuts, increasing tax on working people via freezing the thresholds, eyeing further privitisation of the NHS with the closing of NHS England, taxing employers rather than wealth hurting jobs & care/charity sector etc etc
I am also concerned about the impact of worsening poverty on people choosing not to vote for Labour, or voting for Reform. Because 'Great British Energy' pales besides 'my Mum can't get carers allowance any more because Dad lost his PIP'.
All good stuff and I agree never given credit for. Unfortunately the world has turned on its head in the last four months and she needs to recognise that in the same way the incoming German government has. Effectively we're on a war footing both with trade and actual conflict.
To be fair, as the Institute for Government note, she did reverse the Tories’ planned cuts to capital investment, relaxing her fiscal rules to borrow an extra £25-30 billion a year for infrastructure.
And Germany do have much lower borrowing costs than us.
You're absolutely right, their fiscal position means they can do this much more easily, although they have still bent the rules somewhat to get it through.
I don't think there's an easy solution (wealth tax🙄) but she's going to have to do something not just squeeze the poorest
The Vulnerable punished more, as MPs continue to claw in expenses, Millionaires get richer, Companies continue to make record profits, PPE failed contracts go unchecked.
The politicisation of tax is pure Thatcherism. Starmer picks all the wrong battles, backs all the wrong horses. They’re losing us every single day, because their guidance system is corrupted. We want radical changes- to our economics and society. Choosing to reinforce the status quo is fatal.
Irrespective of well informed opinion in thread, public hear the bad stuff. Any good news isn't broadcast enough, anywhere. Bad stuff gets the press, particularly as most are Tory donors/millionaires. Labour will be out on their ear next election unless Reeves finds a pot of gold to share out.
We live in changing times. Trump is scaling back on military support for Europe and driving up uncertainty and costs with trade wars. The world has changed since Reeves set her fiscal rules but there appears no acknowledgement and adjustment for this. Seems to be CV before country. Not on.
Public spending is rising by a huge amount in 2024/25 and 2025/26.
The article concerns 2026/27 to 2028/29, when it will only be rising by an average of 1.1% a year in real terms. I don’t think that can be classed as austerity.
Comments
Reeves sadly is an economic robot stuck in the past .
Really sad to see how poor Labour have turned out to be
You said it far better than I ever could x
The definition of insanity is casting the same vote and expecting a different outcome..
WTAF of a car crash this is unfolding as.
Alas, we’re not much smarter or less emotional. And that’s why they win quite frequently.
https://inews.co.uk/opinion/labour-manifesto-return-austerity-keir-starmer-3107975
Mark my words, a far right Govt will be the next in power.
Hateful Tory lite bastards
This Labour government has taxed the wealthy and boosted funding for public services:
I'd prefer we just tax the rich instead of making the sick and disabled pay for it.
Labour MPs briefing anonymously seem to agree with me.
These also seem to be the two countries that most embrace neofeudalism (caste hierarchy) more than others.
Coincidence?
We actually see tax rises on low and middle earners as a non-starter policy. The Nordic countries tax them more (and also set VAT at 25%, typically). That’s how they fund their services.
However . . . that’s *exactly* why those countries DEFINE 1st-world modernity.
The Guardian, 28 June 2024
To be fair, as the Institute for Government note, she did reverse the Tories’ planned cuts to capital investment, relaxing her fiscal rules to borrow an extra £25-30 billion a year for infrastructure.
And Germany do have much lower borrowing costs than us.
I don't think there's an easy solution (wealth tax🙄) but she's going to have to do something not just squeeze the poorest
Cretins.
I did not & do not support austerity, cuts to social security & the ongoing 'make brexit work' shite.
Sort it out Labour because right now you are losing your supporters en masse, me included.
The article concerns 2026/27 to 2028/29, when it will only be rising by an average of 1.1% a year in real terms. I don’t think that can be classed as austerity.
Labour need to do better.
It sure was hell isn't spending cuts, reducing incomes, and refusing to invest!
Terrorising disabled people already living hand to mouth on benefits with the threat that they face destitution isn't a solution.