Sunday 20 February 2011

Hard times

These are difficult times for everyone. We know that Labour politicians are sick of us saying that they left us with a disaster to clean up but, as sick as it makes them, we have to keep on saying it. They would like everyone to forget the massive debts they built up and the deficit they left behind.
As a way of explaining it imagine a family where the weekly income is £400 per week, not unknown in Longbridge. Now imagine that the weekly outgoings are £500 per week, it would not take long for debts to mount up. First the bank loans, then the credit cards. after a while the amount having to be paid back mounts ever higher and no more borrowing is available, drastic steps have to be taken, you can decide your own course of action but first of all luxuries have to stop, cheaper food has to be bought, old clothes have to last longer. Most parents would make sacrifices for the sake of the children but eventually expenditure would be brought under control, debts would be reduced and a more stable financial state would be attained. Unless of course you were a Labour politician. In which case you could put off making the savings, continue borrowing and live the high life until your creditors pulled the plug and you find yourself without a home, without a car and without the ability to obtain credit
We know that all this debt has to be controlled at the same time prices all over the world are increasing. Oil, food, metals and raw materials are going up in price, largely through demand from China whose economy depends on them buying the world's resources, manufacturing goods from them and then exporting them to us at a time when our currency is weak due to the printing of money carried out under the Labour Government. To be fair they probably had little option due to the state their finances were in at the time.
So beware of the socialists peddling easy options and crying "Tory cuts!" They got it wrong then, they are getting it wrong now and they will continue to get it wrong because they don't know any better.
This month the Conservative/ Lib Dem partnership will present a budget that aim to save £330 million over the next 4 years, most of it in the first year. This has presented real dilemma s to all of us but it had to be done. Unlike Manchester's Labour Council it will not be a slash and burn budget but it will mean a lot of jobs will go and other staff will face reductions in their total incomes. Despite what Labour will say to paint us as cold hearted capitalists this is not a process that any of us have enjoyed and we all regret it's necessity but let us never forget who made it so necessary when we hear them talking so much Balls, Ed Balls that is.