The more I hear from the London government, the more I worry that their manifesto was a list of proposals written on the back of an envelope during a drunken night out with the lads.The latest to be shown to have been uncosted is the welfare cap. Whilst superficially supposed to cut costs, actually it adds to them, suggesting that it is political dogma rather than the necessity of deficit reduction is that motivation for the cuts.
Now a letter from Mr Pickles to the prime minister, leaked to the ‘Observer', draws Dave’s attention to some facts:
■ 40,000 families will be made homeless by the welfare reforms, putting further strain on services already "seeing increased pressures".
■ An estimated £270m saving from the benefits cap will be wiped out by the need to divert resources to help the newly homeless and is likely to "generate a net cost".
■ Half of the 56,000 affordable homes the government expects to be constructed by 2015 will not be built because developers will realise they will not be able to recoup even 80% of market rates from tenants.
Iain Duncan Smith has flatly refused to revise his policies up till now, but I suspect that a U-turn is only a matter of days away. What misery for the poor, the old and the sick this government has caused.
It was also revealed today that the number of summonses of Cabinet ministers and their lower level colleagues to Clarence House is becoming a matter of concern.We are not allowed to know what subjects are discussed at these meetings as there is an exclusion, brought in by this government on any matters relating to the Queen, Charles and William. However it is suggested that Charles is interfering far too much in the governance of the country. This follows revelations yesterday that Tony Blair was driven by frustration at Charles’ constant summonses to attend upon him and his interfering in the running of the country that he had occasion to complain to the Queen.
It seems nothing can be done with this man. Given the Queen’s strict adherence to her constitutional role over 60 years, it seems inevitable to me that she will have spoken to Charles about it, and that he has ignored her instructions or advice to stop poking his nose into things that are nothing to do with him.
This is the first aristocratic government for a long time. It has already enacted legislation that will greatly increase the value of the financial arrangements for the royals, and has protected their secrecy. Surely there can be no doubt that the prince of Wales will split the country after his mother’s death by insisting that the Archbishop crown Mrs Parker Bowles and by continuing to interfere in the running of the countries of the UK, and who knows, farther beyond this island.
Let’s hope that the split is somewhere around Berwick...
I strongly support IDS package, it is cross-party in its proposals and under no circumstances should it be changed.
ReplyDeleteWe've had enough concessions to meek liberal-types and their guilty conscience.
U-turns seem pretty much the order of the day with the coalition. Whatever happened to “muscular liberalism” by the way? Was that just yet another meaningless buzz-word in the constant ocean of gibberish and new-speak that these people trot out at the drop of a hat. I’m frankly amazed at Eric Pickles wanting to perform the proverbial about turn. Like all northern or working class Tories they are usually even more Tory than the real Tories, reference Mrs Thatcher and her crew of vegetables, Iain Duncan Smith and Willie Hauge, up till now the ex-leader of Bradford council (where no convention was safe) has been vociferous in his no backing down attitude to the destruction of English local government. So why all teary-eyed now about malingerers getting their benefit capped?
ReplyDeleteAs for Charles...well I think he will be the best thing for republicanism for a long time when he finally gets that crown on his bonce. So I wish him well, please lots of interference please and insist on being king with the Mrs princess Parker-Bowles as Queeen.
p.s. don't start playing with reverse-class snobbery, its very unbecoming.
ReplyDeleteDean: I think the point is that they know it is actually going to cost more to cause endless misery to people whose housing benefits will be reduced.
ReplyDeleteThe idea was originally quite laudable.
Landlords have taken and continue to take advantage of the fact that there is an upper ceiling for a particular size of property; and they charge it.
So a two bed house in my street is going for around £500 a month. In reality no one in their right mind would want to pay that kind of money to live here, and so virtually everyone who rents a house here is on benefits.
The idea is flawed though, because there is such a shortage of housing that landlords won't reduce their rents. They will simply go through the lengthy and expensive business of evicting people, and then they will let to desperate people, (only partially in their right minds) who, otherwise homeless, will have to pay the bumped up rents.
It's a mess caused by past governments, that needs sorting by this one. How? I haven't a clue, but I'm not paid £100,000 + a year to sort it. Pickles and IDS are, so they should get on with it.
Munguin: Branston is apparently now saying that the letter was written by an official and was nothing to do with him. However, strangely for Mr P, neither he (nor any of his ministers) was available for a radio interview this morning to put their point. Odd that.
ReplyDeleteYep, Charlie will ruin the monarchy within a couple of years with no one to restrain him from pretending he is le Roi-Soleil.
It's a pity he's such a mad fool. If he stood aside and let William take over, he and Mrs Parker Princess could retire to the country and spend the billions they have amassed from the people of Cornwall and the UK.
I know you dislike then intensely, but William and Harry did try to bring in a more casual approach to the monarchy once they grew up. Interviews on first name terms, behaving just like upper class, Eton Educated Englishmen, but not like stuffy old royals.
However, the Queen and Charlie knocked that on the head, because, I suppose, once you take away the glitter from the 2nd and 3rd in line, who is going to be prepared to kowtow to the lower ranks.
An independent Scotland will have to consider very carefully if it wants King Charles poking his nose in to our government's affairs when he does us the inestimable favour of spending one whole working week per annum in our capital.
NB: Correction to story. The Pickles tale was published in the 'Observer', not the 'Spectator' and a link is now provided.
ReplyDeleteThe Charlie story came from the Mail (and of course is subject to the usual conditions that apply to an article from that gossip sheet...ie, it may or may not be true, who knows. However, as the Mail is staunchly royalist (second only to being staunchly profitish), it is unlikely, in my opinion, to have over egged the pudding in this case.
Dean: there is nothing reverse class about it. Mrs Thatcher, the grocer’s daughter from Grantham, was totally ridiculous in her no U-turn attitude, no matter how wrong and loony her stupid policies were. Culminating in her mad introduction of the poll tax that caused her slumbering yes-men to wake up and realise what a terrible liability she was and stab her in the back. The next one along was another working class Tory and he continued her nutty agenda and privatised the railways, an acknowledged disaster, and then he allowed every tuppenny ha’penny polytechnic to become a university starting the dumbing down of tertiary education. All most all of these agenda led “reforms” were change for changes sake that have proved a disaster for the country.
ReplyDeleteNo matter how they appear to be reasonable, Tories usually pit themselves as Right-Wing pieces of filth who get an almost sexual frisson out of making the life of the poor and sick more miserable than it already is
ReplyDeleteDean's done that on the first post here. Always suspected as much of him
Only some I expect Anon.
ReplyDeleteBut there are certainly some people in the Tory party and definitely many in the government who have no earthly idea what their policies are doing to people... or they do, they don't care.
The misery that is being caused is truly horrendous. Most of it to people who didn't in any way profit from the great decade of greed, avarice and gluttony that was overseen by Blair and Brown.
Back in the old BWB days you could forgive Dean his youthful inexperience and ignorance. Not now. Now he is, by his defence and assumption of their values, complicity in the evil of this Government (some of which is continuing Labour nastiness)
ReplyDeleteNo calculations, just ideology to make people homeless
Lying about a report to justify attacking public sector. I can see they need to do this to avoid TUPE conditions when they privatise public services so we resemble the mess of poor services in the US.
Are you chronically sick? We will give you a year to die, after that no benefit, assuming you get benefit in the first place.
Had your legs blown off in Afghanistan! Tough, no DLA fir you
Do you own a media empire? Never mind that legal stuff, Sir, doesn't apply to you
You got a rise this year, disgraceful, oh, wait, you work in the City? That's only right and proper?
Public park? No no no. Charge to use it! In fact, our model council closed the football pitches and had ticket entry polo matches on them!
All this and more Dean supports, no more slack for him, he is as mired in the vileness as Pickles now
Aye, well, I can't deny any of these things Anon, and there are many more.
ReplyDeleteThe U-turn on a pledge made before the election to maintain pensioners' benefits comes to mind; reducing them after calling Labour liars for suggesting that they would, and bragging that they have given pensioners a better deal by reinstating the link between pensions and earnings, removed by Thatcher and now costing the average pensioner £30-40 a week;
The ability to find money to fight wars as a proxy for America; another piece of regime change with, I'll bet, absolutely no planning as to how to take the country forward after moving the ruling family;
The fact that, despite everything, there was enough money for the ridiculous extravaganza of the wedding, which the Windsors were supposed to pay for and we pay for the billion pound security. We now know that Charles charged the extra costs the wedding meant, to the tax payer;
The fact that there is enough money to give the royals the crown estate money that they have always wanted, thus privatising them at a cost to government income.
There are issues over child benefit and child tax credit too.
And more issues over councillors and top officials in some Tory administrations (in England, of course) being paid vast amounts, despite all the criticism of "people earning more than the prime minister".
Yes many unfair and unpleasant things the London government has done, most of which would probably have been done by Labour, have made the UK one of the least attractive places in Europe to live, unless of course you have pots of money, are royal, or are an MP.
The thing is anon. Who do we vote for ? They're all the same.
ReplyDeleteGlasgow votes for 70 years of Labour squalor and filth.Poor health and short lives still the norm despite Labour having had the power to improve things numerous times. Tories renege on promises to reduce EU powers and stop overseas wars. SNP continue with their windmill madness and mass immigration folly. Limp Dums are a laughing stock. Not fit to wipe your bum. Reneged on any promise they ever made to get their stinky snouts in the trough.
Apart from a mass cull of the useless vermin and a fresh start with a proper democracy what can we do ?
Monty
ReplyDeleteHate to tell you this but as the grandchild of Eastern European and Irish immigrants, I suspect I do not share some of your views, which seem akin to those swivel-eyed, dribbling loons of UKIP and parts right
Also I am no opponent of wind, wave and tidal power
I think you can see where this is going
Monty:
ReplyDeleteI certainly take the point you make. Liars aplenty in that bunch.
But I note that your accusations against the unionist parties involve the breaking of promises. Tories over the EU, and most other things, and the Liberals over everything and Labour over their promise to raise the poor out of the grinding poverty they are in, which they have not only failed to do this, but succeeded in making them poorer, while helping the rich (including themselves) to even more riches.
In the case of the SNP, what you accuse them of is doing exactly what they said they would do. Now, you may not agree with it, but it was in the manifesto, and they got an overwhelming vote from the Scottish people.
Whilst that may not make you like them any more, at least it doesn't involve breaking promises.
Tris.
ReplyDeleteI don't know which of the two party's are the worse.Labour keeps their core vote poor and along comes the Tory's and punishes them. However I do agree that welfare reforms do have to come in but Cameron and IDS have to be grown up about it and stop bashing the jobless in submission and blaming them for all the countries economic wows.
Over six billion in welfare payments has gone unclaimed, that could be earning the UK treasurer 300 million a year in interest. RBS etc cost us all over 30 billion! Just a thought.
Sorry for the typos. Nasty keyboard.
ReplyDeleteLOL Allan... I have one of these too.... horrid thing!!
ReplyDeleteYes, of course there must be less welfare wasted on people who are perfectly capable of work but won't get off their fat lazy backsides, but, as you say not the way this bunch of thoughtless goons are doing it.
Before you can make people work there have to be people... and there have to to be.....JOBS...
It's the government's job to provide the economic climate in which jobs can be created; it seems to me that they have failed to do that. As they always fail to do it.