|
News from Amber
Valley Conservatives
April 2009 - Nigel Mills
responds to the Budget
6 months ago, after the Pre-Budget report, I wrote a piece
for this website (read
it here) looking at the country’s finances and the
potential ways forward. At that point I raised concerns about
the level of national debt.
We have since then delivered surveys across the constituency,
and
online, asking you what you thought the best way
forward was – the overwhelming reply was that you wanted the
government to reduce spending to reduce debt.
Even using the Government’s figures (now substantially
discredited) the budget showed what an awful state this
government has got our country’s finances in. If anything,
sadly, awful is an understatement.
We now know that their forecasts for growth, for tax revenue and
debt were appallingly bad. We know that the VAT reduction, at a
cost of £12 billion, has proved an expensive flop.
The Government claimed to be taking action to protect
businesses, to protect jobs, to keep people in their houses. But
we know that the government’s attempts to get banks lending
again failed. The last quarter showed the fastest rise in
unemployment on record. Most banks have shunned the government’s
repossession scheme as unworkable.
They were the self-styled government that was “doing things.”
Sadly, as usual, they were doing the wrong things, at the wrong
time. They were implementing them incompetently. And they were
very expensive.
It can be hard to appreciate just how expensive. To illustrate,
£12bn is 3 times the value of every house in this constituency.
So that cut was the equivalent of burning all our houses down 3
times.
The chancellor’s estimate of the cost of bailing out the banks
is around £60 billion. That is £1,000 for every person in the
UK. Independent estimates put the cost at 2 or 3 times that
amount. And they caused much of this loss by rushing in
nationalising banks without doing proper reviews of their
financing positions.
The Prime Minister thought he was saving the world. It reminds
me of the classical saying that “those whom the gods wish to
destroy, they first of all make mad”.
Last week in the budget the government had a choice to make:
They could start taking action to try and get the country out of
the mess they’ve created – cutting spending and starting to
tackle the debt black hole. They could apologise for their
incompetence, and start taking the responsible actions needed.
They could axe ID cards, abandon the NHS super-computer, slash
their quangos. These alone would not sort the problems out – but
they would help.
Or they could carry on regardless, raising spending and making
the position even worse.
They chose to engage in political stunts designed to boost the
Labour party, not help the country. They’re increasing spending
by nearly £20 billion and pouring billion after billion into
their black hole.
Who knows where we will be in 6 months time? Who knows what the
debt level will be? The Chancellor doesn’t know – he thinks
growth will be 3.5% in 2011 – nobody else thinks this is
remotely possible. Will he have to repeat Denis Healey’s
ignominy and go cap in hand to the IMF? I hope not.
People ask me why I want to be an MP – they say that the next
government will have an impossible job. Many say that the
country cannot recover from this mess.
I strongly believe that with the right actions, and the right
policies, we can make our country a success again. It is not
going to be easy. There will need to be difficult decisions,
there will be tough choices to make. Some necessary actions will
not be popular.
But restoring our country’s finances can be done. But we need to
make a start now. We need a government with the courage to take
the difficult decisions, to make the tough choices, and have the
determination to see them through.
We need a Conservative government. And we need it now.
|
