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Osbourne's petrol U-turn

Incredible as it my seem, the Mighty Milipede's mouthpieces are accusing chancellor George Osbourne of doing a U-turn on petrol duty!

Their bleet relates to the Consevative promise to introduce a fuel price stabiliser mechanism in their election manifesto. They accuse the government of going back on this promise.

The price of petrol has hit £1.35 a litre due to the price of crude and the increases in VAT to 20% so Osbourne - as far as I can see in an effort to keep his promise - is considering reversing Alistair Darling's increase of 1p per litre due to come in in April.

It will come as no surprise to you to know that the Milipede is not anxious to describe this 1p change as a U-turn!

The scrapping of Labour's post dated tax rise is seem as an opportunity to be shown willing to find a working system and to allow time for the mechanics of that system to be ironed out. Business Secretary Vince Cable told reporters at Westminster that while a fuel stabiliser ‘could be made to work’ it would be difficult, ‘because what is the price around which you set the ups and downs (of the oil price)?’ He added: ‘There are real technical difficulties in operating such a system.’

Mr Osborne is determined to use his Budget on March 23 to respond to public disquiet about petrol prices.

For Labour, shadow transport secretary Maria Eagle said: "The Conservative-led government is all over the place on fuel prices. Each week ministers raise expectations of action but they've still done nothing. Warm words from George Osborne about a 1p change on fuel duty are all well and good, but families are paying 3p a litre more at the pump because of the VAT rise he chose to bring in."

Here at least is one senior Labour figure who fails to remember that it is Labour's 1p it is proposed to scrap and that Labour intended to raise VAT to 19%.

People who live in glass houses, really shouldn't throw stones...

New Balls!

"iTalk" has been at it again - a full blown attack on George Osbourne in the Daily Mirror. Let's look at what he had to say :

What matters most when times are hard is whether the government is trying to shield you from the storm, or leaving you to fend for yourself.

When Osborne or his Lib Dem lackeys say: “It’s all Labour’s fault, we inherited a mess” .... what they’re really saying to the British people is: “We’re not responsible: don’t ask us for help.”

Well, that's all very well, Binky, and it makes a nice soundbite. Where was your government when the shit was hitting the fan? Oh, out spending money we hadn't got because you emptied the coffers. You created this mess. You were responsible or we would not have the scale of problems we have, so to accuse the coalition of not trying to sort it shows a distinct lack of grip on reality.

And "LibDem lackeys"? That's just downright insulting. Name calling is the last resort of an immature mind.

The Tories say that because Labour was not tough enough in regulating the banks, the economic crisis is our fault.

They forget that every time the Labour government tried to tighten regulation, it was the Tories who protested we were strangling enterprise with red tape, and David Cameron who accused Gordon Brown of being The Great Regulator.

There goes that grip on reality again. Labour destroyed regulation of the banks. Balls himself was the very man calling for a 'light touch' in dealing with financial regulation. The regulation Labour tried to tighten was on small and medium size business who were destroyed by a sea of red tape. It was this red tape that Cameron was referring to, not the banks. Labour let the banks get away with murder. In fact, the first thing Tony Blair did when he left office was to join the board of a merchant bank.

The Tories want you to believe Labour spent too much money on services like schools, hospitals and the police, and that is why we have today’s budget deficit.
That way they can justify drastic cuts in those services in order to bring down the deficit, and say it is all Labour’s fault.

If you define 'too much' as money we don't actually have, then that's exactly what Labour did. Cutting spending and raising taxes is the only way to reduce a structural deficit.

Cameron has been forced to match some of Labour's spending plans in some areas because this is a COALITION, Ed. The LibDem 'lackeys' do actually have some say and are actually more left wing than the Conservatives. It's called prioritisation and compromise, something you seem to know little about.

When the financial crisis hit, we were badly affected by the loss of tax revenues from the City, and we had to inject huge sums of money to protect people’s mortgages and savings and stop the British banking system from collapsing.

On top of that, we cut VAT for a year, introduced the car scrappage scheme, funded apprenticeships and job creation schemes, and subsidised mortgages – all to stop people losing their jobs, homes and businesses.

That is what caused the deficit, not spending on schools, hospitals and the police.

You didn't regulate the banks properly, then you had to bail them out. The money you threw at the economy was to buy votes. Spending actually did make the deficit worse. That's not even economics - it's called basic housekeeping.

Every time they take an unpopular decision, the Tories say the same thing: it’s not our fault, we inherited a mess.

In reality, they inherited an economy which was beginning to recover strongly, with unemployment falling, interest rates at historic lows, and the public finances better than the Treasury’s forecasts

Actually, the Coalition say that we need to sort it out. The economy was recovering, but not strongly and interest rates at historic lows has crippled the very people who have the disposable income to boost the economy - people living on their investments. It has also helped inflation to rise. It appears we learnt nothing from the Japanese experience of punitively low interest rates.

And just because the public finances outperform the Treasury forecasts doesn't necessarily mean that they are performing well, does it?

The Labour Party has a responsibility to stand up for millions of Mirror readers across the country who are already being hit by rising unemployment, rising inflation and the rise in VAT.

Bank lending has strangled investment and caused job losses. That includes the banks you bought and then failed to control. Low interest rates and taxes introduced by you have cause infation to rise, coupled with the false readings in the figures when VAT went back to 17.5% - and let's not forget that you were intending to raise it to 19%. Oh, and then there's those fuel tax rises you introduced. They had no effect on inflation, did they?

You can read his full article by clicking here, but in the words of the song "You say it best when you say nothing at all"...

Absolute Balls

Frankly, it beggars belief that the Mighty Milipede should appoint as Shadow Chancellor the very man who, under Gordon Brown at the Treasury, played such a major part in the economic woes currently bestting this country.

Ed Balls is a disaster waiting to happen. But does this matter to the Milipede? No, not at all it seems. The Labour Party is already hailing this appointment as a return to the combatative politics they long for after being crushed at the last election.

The fact is that the Milipede has no policies - at least none he is prepared to admit to. So far - and I may be proved wrong - his strategy seems to be to take the party back to the bad old days before 'New' Labour. This is, of course, what his masters at the TUC want from him - a return to power for a Union movement which has been losing control ever since the days of Thatcher and the miners' strike.

So where does Balls fit in?

Balls is a bruiser in some ways reminiscent of John Prescott but with a little more grooming. He's quite happy to get stuck in and likely relishes the idea of having a go at George Osbourne. The problem is he lacks depth when it comes to economic policy - amply proved by his contribution in the last government - and he's not a particularly eloquent speaker.

If he was an Apple product, he would likely be known as 'iTalk' Balls.

And the Milipede needs to remember one thing about Balls - Rotweillers have been known to bite their masters as well...

Why petrol prices are so high (2)

Nothing like a bit of scaremongering to sell newspapers...

I was horrified the other day in the supermarket to see this headline on the front page of the Daily Mail : "£70 to fill up with petrol: Families hit by yet another stealth tax and soaring oil prices."

Apparently this is due to the escalating price of oil (True - it hit a 27 month high of $98 a barrel this week) and George Osbourne's forthcoming budget increases.

This latter is patently untrue. Nobody, except perhaps the government's innermost circle, knows what's going to be in the budget. But this doesn't stop the Daily Mail. Oh, no! "Petrol retailers have written to George Osborne urging the Chancellor to abandon the next automatic ‘escalator’ rise in fuel duty in his Budget, which will see up to 5p a litre added to the cost of fuel."

At this point I would like to point out that the Fuel Price Escalator in question was actually abandoned in 1999. It is true to say that increases have been applied in sucessive budgets, but it is patently untrue to say that it is 'automatic'.

And the claim of 'up to 5p added'? Well, I take that with the same pinch of salt that I take when I look at adverts offering 'up to 50% off' because, let's be honest, bugger all is 'up to' whatever figure you want to highlight!

But this doesn't seem to matter to the Mail. "The cost of filling a saloon with a 50-litre tank will soar to about £70" Frankly, I don't think that will worry anyone who can afford a car with a 50 litre tank. I filled both my cars this week and neither of them took more than 36 litres. Still, it makes a nice soundbite.

But the thing that irritated me most about this piece of scaremongering non-news is the headline that describes this as a "stealth tax". I find it hard to understand how something that hasn't happened - much less been proposed - can be described as stealth, especially when it is trumpetted two months in advance on the front page of a national newspaper.

My conclusion must therefore be : If you want real news, then don't buy the Daily Mail on a slow news day...

How to solve bankers' bonuses

OK - let's cut through the bullshit...

Here's the problem : how do we solve the problem of bankers paying themselves fucking great bonuses whilst at the same time allowing them to carry on paying themselves fucking great bonuses?

Simples, init? This is how we do it :

The income tax rate at £100,000 plus is 50%

Employer's NHI contributions run at 12.8%

Corporation tax is payable on profits at 28% - which incidentally is too low!

What we do is this - we make bankers bonuses non-deductible when calculating corporation tax and subject to employers' NI whether they are paid in cash or not. This means all bonuses over £100,000 will return 90.8% to the country.

Frankly, we could put large company corporation tax back to 40% (which is where it was under Gordon), and leave small companies paying 20%. Then the taxpayer would get 102.8% - which is much more like it! So a £1m bonus would mean the recipent still gets £372,000 but the exchequer gets £1,028,000 in tax and NI.

Also this takes CT from big companies that can afford it and gives incentives to smaller companies who are stifled by it. So a boost for the economy and job creation as well...

So there you go Vince and George! Problem solved!

Got the balls to go for it?

The Quango Song (What a Waste!)

Look - just 'cos I'm out flying somewhere over the ocean doesn't mean that I can't just interject the odd nugget...

Here's a song I did with my favourite backing group, the Blockheads, to commemorate, hopefully, burning (or in this case drowning) all those quangos - although I'll believe it when I see it

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Ring-fencing the aid budget

Sorry, Mr. Osbourne, George, Mr Chancellor, Sir - but what the fuck are you talking about?

You have just been telling us at some length that this country is in the deep shite and that we all need to make sacrifices for the good of the country. Apparently, you keep telling us ad nauseum, we can't spend money we don't have.

So as you are so fucking clever, please explain to me how a country that has no money (i.e. us) is able to give money we don't have to other countries that have no money either?

I seriously suggest that you take the ring fence from around the overseas development budget and shove it up your arse - which at least will stop you talking out of it...

READ MORE » Ring-fencing the aid budget

Government talks CRAP!

Yesterday, at the O2 Arena in London, Chancellor George Osbourne unveiled his strategy for today's emergency budget.

"The options before us are simple," said Mr Osbourne. "What this country desperately needs is a damn good C.R.A.P. - a Cost Reduction Action Plan - and I've called you all here today to emphasize that the Coalition Government's number one priority is to cut out waste and unnecessary costs.

"The previous Labour government left us a legacy of Super High Increased Taxation, and if we are to pre-empt any further avoidable build ups of S.H.I.T., it is absolutely essential that we have a really thorough C.R.A.P. right now!

"Unfortunately, " he went on, "I have to tell you that there is a distinct possibility that one C.R.A.P. will not be enough if we are to save this country from being flushed right down the toilet."

Mr Osbourne was met with rapturous applause from the capacity 23,000 delegate crowd and at the five course lunch afterwards, was praised for his honest approach to the problem of keeping costs to an absolute minimum.

VAT - what next?

VAT will go up in tomorrow's emergency budget.

Let's look at the history :

VAT was introduced in the early 1970's, replacing various sales taxes that had existed until then.
Rates were increased in Geoffrey Howe's first budget, paying for income tax reductions and attempts at budget deficit reductions (sic).

Rates were increased again in 1991 to pay for John Major's cuts in the the poll tax.

The VAT tax base was also extended in 1984 to hot take away food, and building improvements. A particularly controversial extension to domestic fuel spending was made in 1994.

Initially, the basic rate of VAT was set at 8% with a higher rate of 12.5% on luxuries, but this didn't last long and in 1979 a single rate of 15% was introduced. The current rate of 17.5% was introduced in 1991 where it has pretty much remained ever since.

I reported recently on the problems in Greece where the rates have gone from 8%/18% to 10%/21% in the last few months. Also, current EU law stipulates that the basic rate cannot be less than 15% and the lower rate not less than 5%, so we aren't much over those minima at the current rates.

Denmark, Hungary and Sweden lead the table with 25%. Only Cyprus and Luxembourg (15%) and Spain (16%) have lower rates than the UK and I wouldn't bet on Spain staying that low. In general then, most European rates are higher than ours.

My bet is on a new rate of 20% and I wouldn't bet against reintroducing the luxuries rate of 25% again either - as long as the luxuries they cover don't include the everyday basics of life.

Whatever happens, let's at least look the public straight in the face and tell them how it is. We had enough of stealth taxes from the last prat...

CGT - What's all the fuss about?

What's all this bloudy nonsense about Capital Gains Tax reform?

I'm an ex-accountant (is there such a thing?) and I have a long memory.

Before the 13 years of LieBore misrule, it was nice and easy.

You calculate your chargeable gain after taking off all your allowances and reliefs, add it to your taxable income and then work out the tax as if it was all income tax.

It's known as "top slicing". So if your top tax rate is 40%, that's the rate you pay. If you are a basic rate taxpayer and the gains tip you into the 40% band, you pay part at basic and part at higher rate. Just like you do with income tax.

It isn't difficult. It's how we used to do it. It's fair and proportionate.

So if a divvy like me can work this out, why can't George bloudy Osbourne??

Why petrol prices are so high

Today, petrol prices at the pump hit £1.20 a litre with a warning that it might hit £1.50 this summer.

Much has been said about the reasons for this, but here is the truth behind the main ones :

(1) Exchange rates : "The pound used to be as high as $2, but now its only $1.50" - True in it's own way, but not so long ago it was down to $1.15, so if the rate has improved, why have prices still gone up?

(2) The price of crude oil : "Brent crude is at a high of $86 a barrel" - Also true, but it used to be over $150 a barrel and prices weren't this high.

Strangely enough, one of the main contributing factors never seems to get mentioned : Tax.

In the last twelve months, Alistair Darling has added 6p a litre to your petrol bill - and that's without the extra 2p he's had to postpone until later this year in case it loses votes.

And, of course, let's not forget that there is VAT on top of those increases - so that's another penny....

Look-a-like zyder drinkers...

Has anyone noticed the remarkable similarity between our Right Honourable Chancellor of the Exchequer, Alistair Darling and that lovable, cider swigging, country bumpkin singer Pete Budd of the Wurzels?

In view of the tax changes in the budget, surely they are not related?

I think we should be told....

A personal message from Alastair Darling

Hello everybody. My name is Alastair Darling and I just wanted to take this opportunity to talk to you about the reasoning behind my latest budget.

As you all know, there is a General election coming shortly, so naturally I cannot say anything in my Budget speech that would jeopardise the chances of Ed Balls becoming Chancellor in Gordon's next cabinet. Equally, of course, I must give Ed every opportunity to start with a clean slate by being able to use me as a scapegoat.

Unfortunately, public finances are in such a poor state that I have found myself unable to buy the numbers of your votes that I would like, but I have done my best by concentrating on the following key areas :

(1) Fuel tax

In my last budget, I announced that fuel tax would increase by 3p, When I announced this, I hoped that by the time it came into effect, you would all have forgotten the announcement and you would not notice.

Now I have decided that in order to make it look as if I am actually cutting fuel tax, I will phase in the increase more slowly, leaving most of it until after the election.

(2) Alcohol taxes

You were all expecting increases in alcohol duties, so I felt I could get away with this. In addition, I have decided that I will dramatically increase duty on cider as it has been pointed out to me that most people who drink cider are too young to vote.

(3) Inheritance tax

I was forced to do something about inheritance tax for a number of reasons :

the Tories have said they will reduce it, so naturally I have to do the opposite,
most Labour supporters do not earn enough - with the exception of Civil Servants and union leaders, obviously - to pay inheritance tax,
there is little sympathy amongst our core vote for people with lots of money, and
most importantly, dead people can't protest and don't vote

(4) More lending by banks

I have taken measures to ensure that an extra 1 million people have access to bank accounts. This means that there will be and extra 1 million customers for our banks to refuse to lend money to and that money laundering will become much easier. I believe this will be of particular benefit to those of you wishing to divert funds to our party.

(5) Income tax

I have left headline tax rates the same, but have effectively introduced a 60% rate for people earning just over £100,000. Again this only applies in the vast majority of cases to Tory voters with mansions and duck houses.

It is true that I have increased National Insurance, but this really only effects those of you who have jobs. Therefore, I have effectively taken 3 million people out of the National Insurance net altogether. We are the only party that can claim to have done that!

(6) Cost savings

I have to say that this has been an area where I really have to dig deep to find anything good to say. Naturally, any cuts to public spending will lead to large numbers of people not voting for us, so I am going to leave these for Ed's first budget after the election.

Bearing in mind we have bought large numbers of votes by employing lots of extra civil servants since we came to power and have ensured these votes were retained by awarding larger than average wage increases, you will understand that it is difficult to know what else I can do.

But I do believe I have come up with a vote winner! We will relocate 15,000 civil servants out of London, and rest assured you all will be given generous relocation allowances and will all be able to afford to buy much nicer houses. Indeed, if you follow your MPs' examples, you can even avoid paying stamp duty altogether by flipping your purchase to your partner if he/she is a first time buyer.

The only stipulation is that you must be prepared to live in marginal constituencies.

I am sure you will appreciate why these steps are essential to ensure our party's - sorry, I mean our country's - future prosperity.