BUDGET IS A DAMP SQUIB.

Well, that's it for another year unless 'Boy George' decides to continue with the recent pattern by having a second Budget in November.

 

Given the economic state in which our country finds itself, it was hardly going to be a Budget that would appeal to many people. In the event, it was pretty much a non-event, and all we can expect is more of the same; the important figures really involve Government borrowing and the accumulated deficit, which is forecast to rise to an eye-watering 85% of GDP within the next few years. That this is a totally unsustainable level of debt is something that no politician ever mentions; it's equivalent to a houseowner having debts of £425,000 to set against a house valued at £500,000. Unless the real value of the property increases, in the case of the Government it's national GDP, the debt can never be resolved.

 

George did talk about cutting back on Government expenditure and very kindly promised that huge sums of money would be ear-marked to try to boost housebuilding and home ownership, but this is all a bit peripheral; if these measures have any effect, the effects are likely to be limited and a long way in the future. There was very little that would help the economy today. Things that he could have done, such as making real cuts in Government expenditure by abolishing whole departments and QUANGOs, are far too sensitive to  even consider and yet that is one of the places where real savings exist. Why do we need a Department of International Development or a Department of Culture, Media and Sport ? Why do we need a bloated 'Cabinet Office' which was only invented in recent years ? How many QUANGOs do we have ? There are bodies of which most of us have never heard that monitor and report on anything and everything - WHY ?

 

The social security budget, inflated out of all control by the Blair-Brown coalition, hands out vast sums of money to all and sundry, often in such a away that there is no point for recipients of this largesse to bother going to work. While the Government has some plans to change this system, it's been effectively hamstrung by the horrible complexity introduced by Gordon Brown and the expectations that he allowed individuals to have. Any Government that now tries to make real cuts to welfare spending will be most unlikely to win any subsequent election, making trying to deal with the situation virtually impossible and politically catastrophic.