Is this the same Labour party who have completely bankrupt the country,raped the private sector pension schemes whilst protecting public sector schemes and are the architects of all our present troubles.
I always classed myself as a typical labour voter but personally would NEVER trust or vote labour again.
The cuts in services will hurt,and nobody likes to see people lose their jobs,but what choice does ANY administration have when the books have to be balanced.
Messrs Brown and Blair should be hung drawn and quartered for what they have done to this country.

Exactly why I'm in Melbourne sat on a balcony sorting out my visa application. England is screwed and there's no light at the end of the tunnel!

Wish I were there!!!

I can't for the life of me understand how thousands of public sector jobs going nationwide is going to save us money in the long run. They'll be going onto benefits wont they? All their tax revenue will be lost, and their spending power in the economy will be cut.
I understand there has to be some cost saving measures, but up to now as far as I can see they have all been loaded at one end.

looks like you had a spare xmas cracker left over,better than the ones we had !

Wrong, and on so many levels its actually a good achievement.

That's right, turn your back on your country at the first sign of trouble. You should have your British passport and citizenship revoked.

Really ??
Care to elaborate as to who is exactly to blame for the present woes.Surely we cant pin this one on Agar !!
What was it the outgoing treasury minister left as a message to the present incumbent.
"Good luck,theres no money left" or words very much to that effect if I recall.

I think like Red Ed Millipede he is suffering from selective memory loss syndrome

so, do you believe the cuts have to come so quick and deep? There are other driving forces that control our economy, its not all a governments doing.

The Labour party didn't tell the banks to lend money they wasn't going to get back!

If you are referring to the recession, then yes that's not entirely the previous goverments fault but however, the reason there is no money is....

We have been through a MASSIVE financial boom with business and property, for example, over the last 10 years and the government went on a big spending spree, taking out loans and spending what they didn't have. Worse still, they encouraged us 'normal' people to do the same by allowing the banks to operate irresponsibly. The fleeced us by giving themselves massive pay rises and 'second homes' and now won't reduce those wages and the country is deep in debt (probably uncontrollably) and may take 10yrs+ to get out of this state.

So yes it's labour's fault IMO or at least 95% of it!!!

as one who would be classed as a 'floating voter' ie.I read the manifestos,listen to all the guff and make an independant decision,it is a fairly well known fact that when Mr Blair took over the economy was in pretty good shape !
True,the recession has hit almost every corner of the earth quite badly but a lot of the countrys' present problems are down to downright bad management of the economy over the past 13 years or so - I can't imagine the late John Smith would have allowed such mismanagement of GB PLC !

no, but pumping money we didn't have into creating public sector roles to give the illusion of a higher %ge of employed people was.

as was changing the education system to give people false degrees from questionable institutions.

as was changing corporation tax rules forcing companies to base their operations elsewhere.

as was selling our gold reserves at a record low of the market

as was engaging in two illegal and immoral wars to keep the "special relationship" with USA

do you want me to go on, or is it all still Thatchers fault in your household?

The banking crisis is only part of our woe's,the country was in the mire way before that.
If you need an example of Browns undoubted fiscal accumen you only have to look back to when,even against the advice of the Banking sector he sold off half of the Nations gold reserves when the price was at an all time LOW.This move alone is calculated to have cost the taxpayer 2 Billion pounds.
This happened way before the Bank crisis so ask yourself Why did he do it?Could it be that he realised we were already knee deep in the smelly stuff and had no choice.
As for his raid on Pensions it is estimated to have cost the country 100 Billion which is more than the deficit of the top 350 pension pots in the country.How anyone can try to blame ANYONE else other than labour for the present situation is beyond belief.

Ah, Standee, you always manage to let yourself down with stupid little comments that dismiss any valid points you may have had.

I certainly don't want to get into this argument again, its been done to death. However, can anyone see us being in a better position after this government has left office (probably in 18 months time).
Then who will people vote for? Labour are more than likely content to sit in opposition right now, the electorate have short memories and you probably won't see the Tories in power for 15-20 years after this tenure.

quite right Standee & FCDaze - common sense prevails



don't even attempt to go back to the woes of the pre-Thatcherite era - it was sheer hell in Britain in the late 70s - the least said about Mr Callaghan the better.....................

Well i disagree entirely!!

absolute cobblers IMO

Fair enough, its your right to be wrong.

Now that i agree with, it is opinions at the end of the day and that's why there's a vote... the majority opinion wins!!

All i know is, since Labour came to power, i've earned less and less and i've seen undeserving people get more and more off the back of my tax payments etc....

IMO The benefits system shouldn't be and never should've been put into place!! If you don't work, you don't get paid. If you have kids you can't afford to have, then tough.. This is the first area that needs changing, before redundancies!!!

Its called Socialism.

Labours 13 years of power are now unravelling and its clear that despite talking themselves up as capitalists and believing in market forces, rampant socialism was their overriding master, hence the spending spree. They used to be known as the tax and spend party, but that should be changed to the borrow and spend party.

The benefits system is there to help the most vulnerable in society, and we should be proud to live in a country that has one. It's the way the system is being abused that's the problem, with people being happy not to contribute and not being responsible for their actions.

Exactly, it's a good system in theory but as it now gets heavily abused they spoil it for everyone and it gets scrapped.. No i'm not proud to have a system where everyone around the world gets to come and live in luxury for free while i pay extortionate amounts of tax and get F-ALL back!!

If i could afford to leave this country tomorrow i would, like a shot!!

Your political intellect would be sorely missed!

Please stay?