At the Autumn Statement in December last year, the extent of the failure to reduce the deficit was laid bare. The Chancellor took a political hammering for the extent of future cuts that he had planned to set matters right (leaving aside the implausibi…Read more…
did the chancellor really raise the income tax threshold for 2016-18?
The personal tax allowance will increase to £10,800 pounds in the 2016/2017 tax year, George Osborne told parliament, up from the £10,600 announced for 2015/16. The allowance will rise again to £11,000 in 2017/2018. This year’s increase is a real one, but the rates announced for subsequent…Read more…
#Budget2015 Roundup
The TUC’s economic and social affairs team has been working flat out to pick apart, scrutinise and analyse the final budget of this Parliament. Here are some of the most popular posts: 1. Welfare cutsThe Chancellor referred to £12 billion of welfare cuts. Nicola Smith crunches the numbers to…Read more…
#Budget2015 Real talk about regional employment growth
Regional employment growth is a pretty simple statistic. The ONS helpfully publishes a clear analysis every month. In fact, they did this just yesterday morning. In his budget announcement yesterday afternoon, Mr. Osborne boldly proclaimed: “Today’s figures show that since 2010, 1000 more jobs have…Read more…
Staggering rise in our carbon trade deficit
The somewhat dismayed reaction to the Budget from both sides of the steel industry – unions and employers alike – to the meagre £25m compensation for industrial energy costs reflects a harsh truth about the government’s manufacturing strategy. We are shedding jobs, plant and investment at an…Read more…
Where could £12billion of welfare cuts come from?
How could £12 billion of welfare cuts be achieved? We have previously looked at the sorts of changes that would be needed to raise the revenues the Chancellor has set out. These proposals make clear the enormity of changes being considered. For example (with all changes concerned with the position…Read more…
The UK is the only major G7 economy where taxes have not helped to close the deficit
In Box 4.5 of their Economic and Fiscal forecast the OBR set out a few helpful home truths about the UK’s deficit reduction plan compared to competitor economies over 2009 to 2014. Their conclusions are striking: The UK was the only country where the deficit has not been reduced by having…Read more…
The Budget changes nothing: the road from austerity has led only to more austerity, not to prosperity
My budget reaction has been published on Left Foot Forward. I take issue with the Chancellor’s statement: “This is a Budget that takes Britain one more big step on the road from austerity to prosperity” (Chancellor’s Budget Speech) Austerity has not led to prosperity; it has led only to more…Read more…
#Budget2015: Osborne’s ‘savings culture’ provides more bonuses for the already wealthy
George Osborne concluded his Budget speech today with a crescendo: the Chancellor aims to create a “savings culture”, and announced four major new steps in “our savings revolution”. However this rhetoric will not mean much at all to so many of the population for whom the concept of saving is simply…Read more…
But what benefits are they planning to cut?
In his Budget Speech George Osborne repeated that he intends, if re-elected, to cut £12 billion in benefits (plans first announced in January of last year), but you’ll search the Budget documents in vain for any indication of just how he plans to go about this. These cuts have to be implemented,…Read more…
Total spending set to fall MORE in years ahead than Chancellor previously planned
Hidden away in the OBR’s charts are some important figures on ‘Total Managed Expenditure’ – essentially all of the money government spends on services, pensions, help for low income workers and capital investment. These data show that in the years immediately after the…Read more…
Housing: #Budget2015 spins “signs of normalisation”
“There continue to be signs of normalisation in the housing market” says the government (Budget Report 2015, 915, para 124). With home ownership in retreat, rents rising and 1.3 million on the social housing waiting lists, the situation seems much more like an entrenched crisis than…Read more…
#Budget2015: Growth of good jobs? Good luck!
When it comes to jobs growth figures, one would expect the Chancellor to, at minimum, get his speech to agree with his own analysis, better still for that analysis to be accurate. When presenting at the despatch box this afternoon, Mr Osborne stated: “Today’s figures show that since 2010, 1000 more…Read more…
#Budget2015: No Budget for a sustainable industrial future
A classic Osborne Budget: a further £1.3 billion in tax breaks for North Sea oil and gas (and presumably onshore shale) but precious little of substance for the green economy. Measures to welcome include the £25m compensation scheme for energy intensive industries, brought forward to this October….Read more…
#Budget2015: The worst public spending cuts are still to come
There was much pre-Budget speculation that the Chancellor was going to use today’s Budget to ease off on austerity and reduce the scale of planned public service cuts in the year ahead. But although he’s made some minor changes to his future forecasts, the scale of spending reductions…Read more…
#Budget2015: Did it lay the foundations for longer term growth?
Today’s Budget contained a range of measures to support industry, infrastructure and science. Among the highlights were: £400m up to 2020-21 for the funding of cutting-edge scientific infrastructure. The government will also provide further strategic science and innovation investments to make the…Read more…
Today’s Labour Market Statistics
My post on today’s labour market statistics is up at Left Foot Forward – Once again we are remined this will not feel like a recovery for everyone
The post Today’s Labour Market Statistics appeared first on ToUChstone blog.Read more…
The lowest gain in living standards in post-war history
According to the Chancellor today: To the question of whether people are better off at the end of this Parliament than they were five years ago we can give the resounding answer “yes” This is certainly questionable use of the word ‘resounding’. Real household disposable income per head…Read more…
After the Israeli election
We now know that despite the polls, Prime Minister Netanyahu’s right wing Likud party has won the largest number of seats in the Knesset. As is the way in Israeli politics fragmented by proportional representation, he now has to put together a workable coalition. Given the political complexion of…Read more…
Unsustainable budget cuts leading to self-service policing
By imposing swingeing cuts to the budgets of police forces across the UK, the government has put policing in crisis and placed neighbourhoods and communities at risk. The growing, and increasingly public furor over the impact of spending cuts to police…Read more…