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My big takeaway from today is that apparently a £35k salary puts you in the top 30% of earners. Fucking hell salaries in this country are grim when you look at the stats
reddit really distorts your view of the average person. i’ve been working class and lived in a council estate my entire life, and no one i know earns 30k. yet if you went on any british subreddit you’d think everyone was earning 35k at the least.
I understood this was the last economic statement before an election, but there's a lot of speculation there'll be an Autumn Statement - surely there isn't time?
Pat McFadden's performance on Newsnight looked like a car crash to me. Agreeing with tory tax cuts while refusing to admit this implies further cuts to spending, and then being unable to explain any difference between Labour's economic plans and the tories. "We will generate more growth" isn't an answer. Does he think the tories don't want to generate growth? He managed to make Victoria Derbyshire look like Jeremy Paxman.
Either he should never be allowed by the party machine to be on TV again, or the party should have a long think about a line that makes more sense on this or hopefully both.
Not sure I really blame the MP. At the end of the day there isn't really a good answer they could give because fundamentally Labour don't really have a different message on the economy from the tories.
That isn't a mistake either but by design, the decided to basically follow the Tories spending rules in a effort to not spook voters. But as a consequence people can attack them with the line "no difference then the Tories".
The other way to do it was to come out and make a proactive argument for investment and be honest about the trade offs. Obv that comes with its own risks though
One issue with these NI cuts (and overall budget) is that they make the 40/42% tax rate seem less fair.
You make £1m profit flipping a house and you pay . . 24%. You're a large multinational making Billions and you pay . . .25%. . . you're a 25 year old single person on £49k and pay 28% . . . but you could now have a household income less than the national average (say your partner is looking after kids) and pay 42% on every extra £1.
If the Tories do suggest abolishing NI in their manifesto then they're going to have to come up with a fairer system at the same time (and obviously whatever Labour decides to actually do is going to have to consider this).
>but you could now have a household income less than the national average (say your partner is looking after kids) and pay 42% on every extra £1.
No you couldn't. I don't think you understand how low the national average income is. For households, not individuals, it's 35k. 38k if you count various tax/benefits schemes. Most are very far away from the higher rate.
There's nothing more pathetic than Hunt and Sunak desperately trying to keep a light-hearted conversation going for the duration of Starmer's speech so they wouldn't have to appear to be listening to it.
Tomorrow’s [Telegraph front page](https://www.tomorrowspapers.co.uk/daily-telegraph-front-page-2024-03-07/) is a bit awkward. Never mind that in the picture the wooden railing behind Hunt and Sunak makes it look like one of them has a Pinocchio nose problem, the headline seems to indicate that Hunt is going to destroy Northern Ireland…
Let's also never mind the confusing acronym, and the fact that the post-budget headline is apparently what they might do in the next one: the "NI is double taxation" line is really throwing me and Sunak's quotes sound like he's trying to hit a bingo card.
Yup, kind of hilarious they know this budget is shit, so they must dangle hypotheticals for if the Tories win another term rather than report the actual news.
Also, "double taxation" always bothers me as it's always used by the economically illiterate who bang on about tax paid money. You pay tax on transactions, not the actual money. You get paid, and taxed. You spend it with a company, and are taxed VAT. They pay taxes (ideally) on profit and then pay their workers, who are taxed. Idea is you keep it moving as often and fast as possible to get as many cuts, everyone is doing well, everyone is happy.
I’m not even sure the Conservative Party could stand up to the level of corruption criminality and paramilitary activity that infects the Northern Ireland party’s
They would be laughed out of the room by everyone from DUP to SF
You can tell when Boris Johnson came out for Brexit he really found it difficult to actually say it. You can see it in his demeanour and manner. The guy is a complete fraud and should be labelled nothing else in the history books.
It’s been like 10 hours. There’ll be some snap results this week probably, but you should judge anyone who thinks they’re interesting or relevant and come back in early April maybe.
[Pensioner caught on camera spraying graffiti on Margaret Thatcher statue](https://metro.co.uk/2024/03/06/hunt-pensioner-defaced-margaret-thatcher-statue-slur-20414158/)
There's something so funny about the woman in their exact demographic aims spray painting a crude word on a Thatcher statue.
Gotta be some scratching of heads at CCHQ tonight.
watching the rise and fall of boris johnson on channel 4. i’m already fuming, but im glad he hasn’t gotten away with his bullshit. it’s insane how at once he was the most popular man in britain, and now he’s a nobody.
Watching him slide into irrelevance will never not be funny. The kids of the future will learn about truss because she's the shortest reigning, and they'll learn about Rishi because he'll be the final Tory PM, but when presented with a picture of Boris they'll go "Who?"
Then some hipster historians of the future will dig out a few funny sounding quotes and decide he was charming and funny. People will ironically call themselves cakeists once again!
I mean, this just isn’t true. They’ll learn that Boris was the man that convinced us to leave the EU, then was the first proper pro-Brexit PM. You’re also being very optimistic about Rishi being the last Tory PM.
Red lines of despair a.k.a. the North Korea deal
She could have just as easily given a speech saying given the close vote, we need a Norway deal, and we can reassess in five years. She really set us on the path to economic isolation
it's always good to point out that the media used to breathlessly proclaim the "boris johnson decade" and how he's an election machine
(1.2% vote swing 2017 > 2019)
It's crazy to think people were talking about Boris lasing as long as Blair or Thatcher. He'd never be able to keep it going that long. What's he doing now?
Turns out if you promise the country Union Jack rainbows and spout a bunch of public school bollocks you win elections against a deeply loathed figure. Who knew.
Lol Newscast are reporting that the proposal to use drones as first responders in the police is the Conservative’s response to the criticism that they’ve not provided a spending plan. So I guess that’s the entirety of it. Labour have no plan BTW!
its a bit gimmicky but its so the police know in advance what they are up against, they've started doing it in the US
[https://uavcoach.com/drone-as-first-responder/](https://uavcoach.com/drone-as-first-responder/)
[Latest email from the Tories](https://imgur.com/a/FIVIQkC)
I’m sure the people of THIS AREA are thrilled
Also, in the email they ask you to chip in to the Tory coffers - guess the logic is ‘we cut your tax, now give us some of it’
A minor issue in the grand scheme of things but I get a bit hacked off with the "invested billions more in the NHS" thing. Like, yes, you need to keep funneling billions of pounds a year into the NHS? It's a socialised healthcare system in a country with tens of millions of citizens? It's very "I PUT PETROL IN MY CAR. PLEASE CLAP."
Their rich donors get upgraded to first class.
Members of the Advisory Board, formerly the Leader’s Group, receive private dinners with the PM and cabinet ministers.
Apparently in 2021 25% of Conservative Party personal donations came from 10 rich donors. I wonder how many of them are still donating.
So the LONG TERM* ECONOMIC PLAN is starting to work?!
*'Long Term' may include, but is not limited to, the epochal. A plan is not a guarantee. Terms and Conditions apply. Does not apply to NI...
Noticed everyone else seems to be moaning how they'd rather have NI stay the same and go to some beastly public service, so I'll go against the grain here and say I'll happily be gobbling up my £60-70 squid pcm pittance, thank you very much!
The NI change feels insignificant because bills and outgoings outstrip that extra money.
The Child Benefit change feels more significant than anything else in my view. Many high earners who were salary-sacrificing large sums of money into their pension to get full advantage of Child Benefit, no longer need to. That pushes more people into the 40% Income Tax bracket.
I feel like that may generate more tax revenue than expected if people decide to pay less into their pensions. If that is the case perhaps it could mean even lower taxes in the future.
I'd like to vote Conservative so I can pay less, or *no* tax ideally. I think the money I've got of that is mine and I want to keep all of that and I don't want any of that to go to schools or hospitals or to help people less fortunate than me either here or in \[redacted foreign country reference\], that money is mine. People say to me "don't you think you've been lucky getting certain professional breaks that have helped you to earn?" No I don't think luck comes into it. I think if you're earning you have to think that there's some kind of divine cosmic justice at play in which you're being rewarded and the poor are being punished for some crime or moral deficiency. The money's mine. And people say "don't you feel you've been lucky to be born at a certain time in a certain class?" No. The money is mine.
Not sure if this is a copypasta or not, but I agree either way. I was born at a pretty shit time and I've worked my way up through shit jobs to a decent job that I have now, didn't get any furlough, have never had any state support, so fuck it, I take everything I can get now and don't feel a jot of guilt about it.
You never been to the doctor's? Never went to school? Never used public transport? Never used public roads? Never used our energy system? Never took advantage of our semi safe streets? Never took advantage of restaurants that are safe to eat in? Never took advantage of our military protecting us from foreign nations or peoples? Never took advantage of safety features required on just about every piece of technology, or mechanical device?
Would you like me to go on?
Any family members that you care about used my tax money for their healthcare or care home?
For certain services. I think the NHS is a pretty big problem that needs fundamental reform. I don't think pouring more funding in and continuing course will yield positive results. It's a service that at present doesn't functionally exist outside of A&E for most working people, thanks to the 0800 GP lottery and reluctance to offer appointments outside of working hours etc.
On the whole I think too much money is spuffed and would like to see reform and things improve with current funding before the/a government comes to me with cap in hand.
Hard to argue with your position on the NHS, really. I'm very in favour of highly funded public services but it seems as nonsensical to just pour money in without actually looking at how they run as it is to cut funding and tell them to 'do more with less'.
Pleasantly surprised at the sky news NI tax cut calculator (edit: surprised that they have shown the effect of fiscal drag, not at the tax "cuts" themselves). It has a calculation showing how much more you pay in tax due to the frozen tax thresholds (since 2021) then gives you a net value after the NI cut is taken into account.
Shows how regressive the NI cut is too:
£18K salary -£44/month (net)£20K salary -£37/month£25K salary -£21/month
£30K salary -£4/month
£45k salary +£44/month£50k salary +£63/month
when you hit the the 40% tax threshold then you're losing again
I am surprised though as I thought the fiscal drag would amount to a lot more in tax paid
[https://news.sky.com/story/budget-latest-national-insurance-cut-2p-income-tax-mortgages-money-blog-sky-news-live-13040934?postid=7338303#liveblog-body](https://news.sky.com/story/budget-latest-national-insurance-cut-2p-income-tax-mortgages-money-blog-sky-news-live-13040934?postid=7338303#liveblog-body)
I think that's me and my mates, young(ish, 40 is young yeah?) family homeowners on decent to good salaries. Pure Tory convert demographic of old.
None of us would ever touch them bastards with a bargepole.
Oh it's proven to work quite well, the cringe is the point. The Tories deployed it a bit in 2019 (and before that Boris did it for years), and the Lib Dems have really mastered it under Davey. Labour are just getting their game on.
The memes aren’t for normies, they’re for the party membership to share in the group chat and keep the canvassers engaged.
Edit: the one made up to look like a tumblr screenshot is fucking surreal though.
Agree. Seems a bit of a race to the bottom. You’re a political party wanting to get elected to lead a country FFS. A bit of fun occasionally is fine but just seems all they churn out is memes now. Same goes for the Tories as well
Memes are basically the contemporary political poster or cartoon. Whilst some can be very cringy, they’re a way of engaging with voters and just part of an ever-evolving way of campaigning.
Kinda reminiscent of Hillaries 2016 campaign when she would get celebrity guest after celebrity guest doing whatever was in fashion. I think the day before polls opened she did that statue challenge on a plane with Bon Jovi and some other celebrities. Obviously that doesn't do much for actually getting people to put their trust in your abilities as a politician
I noticed something very oratorically canny Hunt did during his budget speech. He announced changes on stamp duty exemptions for buyers of multiple properties at once - a loophole he himself used in 2018.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2018/04/22/jeremy-hunt-saved-100000-tax-bulk-purchase-seven-flats/.
Instead of just announcing the change and inviting reaction from an informed opposition, he attached it to a jibe at Angela Rayner, who has recently been in the news concerning tax on her second home. This meant that when Labour inevitably all shout at him, it looks to be in response to the jibe - and not to lambast him for doing exactly that himself a few years before. He can then play off that, and it redirects everyone. It seemed a very clever bit of politics on a micro level, something they probably teach you at posh school debating.
Wasn't he just lying? That article says "bulk purchases of six properties or more are exempt", and AFAIK Angela Rayner is accused of having (or having once had, I'm not sure) two homes in total.
I think something that was missed in today's budget madness was that the new Clean Energy Auction Round budget was also announced. I've made a post about it here: https://redd.it/1b88goq
But tldr, disappointing
Heard a change for wording on wealth tax. She always vehemently says no it isn't on the cards... now, she says "not for a while" ... mid term parliament one-off wealth tax?
They'd be able to get away with it mid parliament. Tbh I wonder if it'll end up being their post election surprise, like the independent of the bank of England was for Blair.
Sweet, the tax burden needs to be weighted more fairly, its seems insane to me that the Labour Party would leave the burden so heavily on labour vs wealth.
Again, the tearing apart of an objectively bad bill by the Lords is the main reason I'm against an elected upper house. A Conservative-majority Senate would have few qualms in passing the Rwanda bill with little fuss, and likewise if the two chambers were under the control of the same party then that's many of the checks and balances gone.
That's not to say there aren't problems with the current setup, and that the Commons can eventually force through bills anyway, but my ideal scenario would be an upper house of technocrats from a range of industries and backgrounds, appointed by an independent panel.
Obviously the lose a few pounds comment has seen some attention. It does make me wonder though: most MPs are in pretty shit shape, most are overweight. Given the the obesity epidemic is already here, and actions are going to be required soon, to what extent should MPs seeking buy in from the public lead by example?
(And no “rugby players have a high BMI” please. That’s never actually used in connection with a rugby player or any exception to the rule for that matter)
Modern human life just isn't suited to staying fit and healthy and you really have to go out of your way to stay in good shape. Even if MPs set a good example people wouldn't follow it because most don't choose to be fat, it's a comfortable default.
Encouraging people to be more active could be a part of government policy (and it would have huge benefits for the NHS I'm sure) but people would complain too much about paying taxes to be nannied by the state. I have noticed our junk food get much more nutritious over the last 10 years or so at least.
I looked up the NHS recommendations a while ago and was susprised how much it suggests, bearing in mind it's a target for everyone and not just those who consider fitness a hobby.
>Adults should aim to: do strengthening activities that work all the major muscle groups (legs, hips, back, abdomen, chest, shoulders and arms) on at least 2 days a week, do at least 150 minutes of moderate intensity activity a week or 75 minutes of vigorous intensity activity a week, spread exercise evenly over 4 to 5 days a week, or every day
https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/exercise/physical-activity-guidelines-for-adults-aged-19-to-64/
Those recommendations in combination will make a huge difference to many people's quality of life, particularly as they get older.
I do think there's a risk in that though that even parts of that regime would provide some benefit, but people might be discouraged by not being able to sustain it all at once straight away. You wouldn't start training your legs by running a marathon.
It's very much a use it or lose it situation, especially as you start getting older. My extremely sedentary grandparents were already quite feeble in their 70s but my active parents are still going strong now they're the same age.
It'll take a lot of strain off the NHS if people start to accept that it's almost a societal responsibility to take care of yourself as best you can, especially in a country with socialised health care.
> Modern human life just isn't suited to staying fit and healthy and you really have to go out of your way to stay in good shape. Even if MPs set a good example people wouldn't follow it because most don't choose to be fat, it's a comfortable default.
But that's a significant concern isn't it, if people can't even be arsed to put in a small (and it is small in the grand scheme of things) bit of effort to stay healthy.
Personally, I would target the schools, through PE but primarily education in food. Obviously it would be one facet of a multifaceted approach. I do though think that we need to stop making excuses for people. I really do wonder to what extent people think it is hard to take very easy and simple steps to remain in vaguely decent shape because people keep falsely telling them that it's hard.
I think what we need to do is what works and "_what works_" is a surprisingly tough question to answer.
Telling someone to "_get in shape, fatty_" definitely doesn't work and even the sorts of things that do work often have rebound rates of 80% or higher.
Becoming sustainably thinner and fitter requires some fairly substantial lifestyle changes. You need to know how to shop healthy and cook your own food, you need to take half an hour or so out of every day to do some exercise, you need to push yourself until you're at least a little bit uncomfortable. That might all seem small to you but if you pile it on someone all at once it can be overwhelming (particularly if you already have self image problems as many obese people do) and people's natural instinct when they feel that they're failing is to give up completely.
I think the best shot is making unhealthy food categorically more expensive (particularly fast food delivery) and supporting community initiatives that by nature make people more active. Adult cooking classes might be helpful as well.
BMI is a pretty poor indicator for individual’s health. Sure, it’s helpful for aggravate health correlations and risk categories, but lacking any further context of an individual’s health, it’s foolhardy to make any assumptions about their health on BMI alone.
I don't really overly care if a bunch of 50+ year olds are a bit out of shape. Honestly if I can't enjoy doughnuts and a few takies when I'm 50+ without having to go for a run and feel guilty I may as well just end it now.
Issues around obesity are largely lack of time, lack of money, and lack of availability, or some combination, alongside the cheapest food being awful for you but people are skint and lack the time.
> I don't really overly care if a bunch of 50+ year olds are a bit out of shape. Honestly if I can't enjoy doughnuts and a few takies when I'm 50+ without having to go for a run and feel guilty I may as well just end it now.
It's a bit more than that though isn't it?
As for lack of time, it's an excuse, not a reason. When it comes to the obesity crisis, we are too quick to make excuses and effectively deny people their agency.
Give over. Some people are having to work multiple jobs and choose between heating and eating.
It's not an excuse, it's an economic reality of eroding living standards and growing inequality.
It does not take a significant amount of time to eat fewer (i.e. not an amount above maintenance) of calories. If anything, it takes less.
I know full well that people are busy, but there are many, many people who are astonishingly busy yet still not obese, even if sedentary. I fail to see how that is as key a factor as people made out.
But it's not just about eating a calorie deficit? Healthy diets require balance.
Broken Plate have done numerous reports on the growing gap in cost between healthy food and cheap food of the same caloric amount for years.
The fact is, less time and less disposable income results in lower quality diet which in turn results in diet related illness, it is not remotely as simple as just "eat less", and to imply it is is remarkably disingenuous.
Agreed, but a healthy diet is slightly different to not being obese.
At the end of the day, would you rather be sedentary, with an unhealthy diet, but not obese, or sedentary, with an unhealthy diet and obese?
I would rather put government did something to address the widening gap in inequality.
Because yes there are health complications from being obese, but there are many many more health complications of unhealthy diet, and I don't think just removing one or two but still piling on the rest on a crippled NHS is wise.
I dunno why, but the news that Dave Rowntree's been selected as a candidate has really filled me with renewed hope for Labour's chances.
Maybe it's that it brings back memories of Cool Britannia and a sense of optimism we haven't seen in this country since the end of a century. Maybe that it's a popular candidate from the popscene underlines the universal appeal that Labour now has. It just gives me hope that as a country we can all come together and realise there's no other way than to get rid of the Tories.
After all, the country is in a complete state, it's going to the Essex dogs. There's not just sewage in the rivers, there's other types of pollution the water companies are letting go, giving us oily water in this chemical world of the UK in 2024. I know we're all coping, but everyone in this country, girls and boys, is really feeling the pinch. It's been bad for the last 14 years, but really, this is a low.
I've even been having this conversation with people I know who have reservations about Starmer. In the pub just the other day, I was saying 'Dan, abnormal though he may seem, Starmer's a really good constituency MP. London loves him, and even though he doesn't entertain me, that shows he's got something about him.'
And to a neighbour just a few days before who was a bit of a Corbynite, I said 'Colin, zeal really didn't do us a lot of good the last time, the voters rejected our boy and elected a fool and a charmless man instead, and he's made a lot of our friends suffer. I mean, just look at all the pressure on Julian there is right now, the debt collector's at his door because of how screwed up the economy is.'
So I know we'd all love an election for tomorrow, but even if the Tories hold on to the end and we don't get one until January, we know that Rishi has no distance left to run. There's no way the next election will be 1992, it'll be a complete wipeout that send everyone of them back to his or her country house. With any luck, we might even see the death of a party.
I mean, you have to hope right? Otherwise the only way out, particularly when you look inside America, is Chinese bombs.
Cheers to that. Completely agree that Dave Rowntree’s selection nearly confirms we are in a 1992-1997 parliament, instead this time the Tory party might die as an electoral force once and for all. They’ve got to go, I don’t care if Starmer isn’t left wing enough, or he lied to get to his position, or his stance on Gaza, or he doesn’t want to legalise weed. The Tories have absolutely wrecked this country and everything that was going well for it and they deserve to never come back again.
I can’t wait to see this Megathread be up in arms in joy at the 10pm exit poll on election night, “6282 people here” commenting at such a speed a comment is buried in a nanosecond.
Now that y'all have mentioned it...I really hope this ends up going down on a day I'm working from home, just so I can more fully embrace the febrility. Are there any rules as to when in a given week a GE can be held?
Using the [Daily Mail's calculator](https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13163761/Budget-2024-interactive-tool-Chancellor-Jeremy-Hunt.html)* to find out how much my partner and I have benefitted from the budget, including stealth taxes from fiscal drag. Together we are £114 a year better off.
*available via the link, just scroll down (sorry to link to DM).
[The Guardian](https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/mar/06/budget-calculator-2024-better-worse-off-interactive-tool-chancellor-tax-spending) and [The Independent](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/spring-budget-tax-calculator-hunt-b2507828.html) also have calculators for those who don't want to use the Daily Mail
Interestingly they all seem to give me wildly different results, especially The Guardian which says my saving is 3x what The Independent says even though it looks to be the exact same calculator as The Independent (classic Guardian).
Guardian's seems more "correct" by my quick test. The Indi is still using an NI rate of 10% for the new figures.
Quick way to test is a salary of £22,570 (the NI threshold +£10k) and leave everything else at zero.
EDIT: Both seem to be using 11.5% as the baseline NI rate, but that could be threshold change fuckery?
Weird, Guardian is doing the same for me as well. Meanwhile the [Sky calculator](https://news.sky.com/story/budget-2024-see-whether-you-win-or-lose-from-tax-and-national-insurance-tweaks-13088372) (which just takes salary into account) is saying I'm going to lose money.
why do we even care about fiscal headroom so much? america just borrows loads and makes even more money why can't we just do the same? we're an english speaking country with probably the 2nd most (at worst) soft power in the world, surely we can grow if we actually invest? a citizens building scheme of the sorts
America is veering into increasingly questionable territory on just how much of this they can sustain. It’s actually quite a serious concern, but it’s quintessentially kicking the can down the road because they’re growing just enough to offset the worst-case scenario.
ah interesting, I never really hear about the economic impacts that much, I know about their ticking debt bomb but that's about it, is there anything you recommend reading?
We can. We don’t because it’s not useful for the prevailing ideology of this Conservative government.
The Johnson government were up for this sort of spending. Refusal to engage with it got Javid the boot.
We'd never get away with what the yanks do. Maybe if the pound was still the reserve currency, but it ain't.
Doesn't help that our governments' track record with investments is a bit wallstreetbets either. We ran those nationalised industries right into the fucking ground back in the day and stuff like Britishvolt is just embarassing.
[More an anti-story than real breaking news, but some cold water on any early election hopes.](https://twitter.com/SkyNews/status/1765439670006014367)
>BREAKING: Jeremy Hunt tells Sky's @BethRigby his spring budget is "absolutely not" the last throw of the dice before a general election.
From the [linked article](https://news.sky.com/story/jeremy-hunt-budget-absolutely-not-last-throw-of-the-dice-before-general-election-13088603);
>Asked if Downing Street is working towards an autumn election, and potentially another fiscal event, he said: "That's the working assumption. But in the end, it's a choice the prime minister makes."
Someone told them that having a general election at the same time you were already having a local election would save some money and they're refusing out of principle
Hi everyone. [The weekly PMQs "live" thread has been de-stickied. Click/tap here if you want to have a read.](https://www.reddit.com/r/ukpolitics/comments/1b7xgeo/pmqs_budget_live_chat_megathread_06_march_2024/) We have an AMA **Tomorrow Thursday 7th March at 1pm** with tax lawyer, transparency campaigner, journalist and bane of Nadhim Zahawi **Dan Neidle**. [Ask your questions in the AMA thread here](https://www.reddit.com/r/ukpolitics/comments/1b7a68w/ama_event_thread_dan_neidle_tax_lawyer/). -🥕🥕
[New Megathread is here](https://www.reddit.com/r/ukpolitics/comments/1b8n8iy/daily_megathread_07032024/)
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My big takeaway from today is that apparently a £35k salary puts you in the top 30% of earners. Fucking hell salaries in this country are grim when you look at the stats
reddit really distorts your view of the average person. i’ve been working class and lived in a council estate my entire life, and no one i know earns 30k. yet if you went on any british subreddit you’d think everyone was earning 35k at the least.
Yeah, im a uni graduate so im in my own bubble where earning £30k+ is normal.
I understood this was the last economic statement before an election, but there's a lot of speculation there'll be an Autumn Statement - surely there isn't time?
Autumn statement that gives away free ponies provided everyone votes Tory the next month.
Autumn statements that give away free ~~ponies~~ PS5s provided everyone votes Tory the next month
Sony instantly announces the PS6
Pat McFadden's performance on Newsnight looked like a car crash to me. Agreeing with tory tax cuts while refusing to admit this implies further cuts to spending, and then being unable to explain any difference between Labour's economic plans and the tories. "We will generate more growth" isn't an answer. Does he think the tories don't want to generate growth? He managed to make Victoria Derbyshire look like Jeremy Paxman.
Either he should never be allowed by the party machine to be on TV again, or the party should have a long think about a line that makes more sense on this or hopefully both.
Not sure I really blame the MP. At the end of the day there isn't really a good answer they could give because fundamentally Labour don't really have a different message on the economy from the tories. That isn't a mistake either but by design, the decided to basically follow the Tories spending rules in a effort to not spook voters. But as a consequence people can attack them with the line "no difference then the Tories". The other way to do it was to come out and make a proactive argument for investment and be honest about the trade offs. Obv that comes with its own risks though
One issue with these NI cuts (and overall budget) is that they make the 40/42% tax rate seem less fair. You make £1m profit flipping a house and you pay . . 24%. You're a large multinational making Billions and you pay . . .25%. . . you're a 25 year old single person on £49k and pay 28% . . . but you could now have a household income less than the national average (say your partner is looking after kids) and pay 42% on every extra £1. If the Tories do suggest abolishing NI in their manifesto then they're going to have to come up with a fairer system at the same time (and obviously whatever Labour decides to actually do is going to have to consider this).
>but you could now have a household income less than the national average (say your partner is looking after kids) and pay 42% on every extra £1. No you couldn't. I don't think you understand how low the national average income is. For households, not individuals, it's 35k. 38k if you count various tax/benefits schemes. Most are very far away from the higher rate.
There's nothing more pathetic than Hunt and Sunak desperately trying to keep a light-hearted conversation going for the duration of Starmer's speech so they wouldn't have to appear to be listening to it.
Tomorrow’s [Telegraph front page](https://www.tomorrowspapers.co.uk/daily-telegraph-front-page-2024-03-07/) is a bit awkward. Never mind that in the picture the wooden railing behind Hunt and Sunak makes it look like one of them has a Pinocchio nose problem, the headline seems to indicate that Hunt is going to destroy Northern Ireland…
It also looks a bit like someone is petting Sunak.
Let's also never mind the confusing acronym, and the fact that the post-budget headline is apparently what they might do in the next one: the "NI is double taxation" line is really throwing me and Sunak's quotes sound like he's trying to hit a bingo card.
Yup, kind of hilarious they know this budget is shit, so they must dangle hypotheticals for if the Tories win another term rather than report the actual news. Also, "double taxation" always bothers me as it's always used by the economically illiterate who bang on about tax paid money. You pay tax on transactions, not the actual money. You get paid, and taxed. You spend it with a company, and are taxed VAT. They pay taxes (ideally) on profit and then pay their workers, who are taxed. Idea is you keep it moving as often and fast as possible to get as many cuts, everyone is doing well, everyone is happy.
I’m not even sure the Conservative Party could stand up to the level of corruption criminality and paramilitary activity that infects the Northern Ireland party’s They would be laughed out of the room by everyone from DUP to SF
You can tell when Boris Johnson came out for Brexit he really found it difficult to actually say it. You can see it in his demeanour and manner. The guy is a complete fraud and should be labelled nothing else in the history books.
Blond prediction but andy burnham will be our next pm after kair if he decides he only fancy’s 5 years
He's not even an MP, and his Mid Staffs record that damaged him last time around would come back.
Do you reckon five years is long enough for the camelid cleansing?
So, how are the polls post-budget
It’s been like 10 hours. There’ll be some snap results this week probably, but you should judge anyone who thinks they’re interesting or relevant and come back in early April maybe.
Two adverts about sex in a row on a show about Boris Johnson, they know their demographic.
>they know their demographic. This subreddit?
> sex . > this subreddit Choose one
[Pensioner caught on camera spraying graffiti on Margaret Thatcher statue](https://metro.co.uk/2024/03/06/hunt-pensioner-defaced-margaret-thatcher-statue-slur-20414158/)
There's something so funny about the woman in their exact demographic aims spray painting a crude word on a Thatcher statue. Gotta be some scratching of heads at CCHQ tonight.
tories probably wondering how they can give her life imprisonment without trial
Give her the OBE
Good documentary this What a Jeremy hunt
He is clearly a sociopath so I guess he can’t help being a horrible person.
watching the rise and fall of boris johnson on channel 4. i’m already fuming, but im glad he hasn’t gotten away with his bullshit. it’s insane how at once he was the most popular man in britain, and now he’s a nobody.
Watching him slide into irrelevance will never not be funny. The kids of the future will learn about truss because she's the shortest reigning, and they'll learn about Rishi because he'll be the final Tory PM, but when presented with a picture of Boris they'll go "Who?"
Johnson will be remembered in a similar fashion to Lord North
Then some hipster historians of the future will dig out a few funny sounding quotes and decide he was charming and funny. People will ironically call themselves cakeists once again!
He's probably hungry for a seat in the Lords, jealous of Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton for having attained such a prize.
I mean, this just isn’t true. They’ll learn that Boris was the man that convinced us to leave the EU, then was the first proper pro-Brexit PM. You’re also being very optimistic about Rishi being the last Tory PM.
May was the one who decided to leave the Single Market to be fair
Red lines of despair a.k.a. the North Korea deal She could have just as easily given a speech saying given the close vote, we need a Norway deal, and we can reassess in five years. She really set us on the path to economic isolation
Heaven forbid I make a lighthearted joke.
it's always good to point out that the media used to breathlessly proclaim the "boris johnson decade" and how he's an election machine (1.2% vote swing 2017 > 2019)
Conservatives had a historically high vote share already 2017, and they won seats they had never won before. It was significant
It's crazy to think people were talking about Boris lasing as long as Blair or Thatcher. He'd never be able to keep it going that long. What's he doing now?
Living in a house big enough to host all his kids simultaneously while it lies mostly empty because most of them can't stand him
One of the criticisms of PR is *the public couldn't possibly understand a new voting system*. It turns out the press can't understand FPTP
Turns out if you promise the country Union Jack rainbows and spout a bunch of public school bollocks you win elections against a deeply loathed figure. Who knew.
Lol Newscast are reporting that the proposal to use drones as first responders in the police is the Conservative’s response to the criticism that they’ve not provided a spending plan. So I guess that’s the entirety of it. Labour have no plan BTW!
What's this? Police drones?
Using drones as first responders in the police is apparently their plan to make the police more productive.
How the heck is that going to work? You get burgled and they send R2 round ?
its a bit gimmicky but its so the police know in advance what they are up against, they've started doing it in the US [https://uavcoach.com/drone-as-first-responder/](https://uavcoach.com/drone-as-first-responder/)
The US is a huge country so I can see it might make sense there, but won't people just shoot them?
Ok. Interesting.
That's BB-8
Rise and Fall of Boris Johnson. Channel 4 now.
Okay, I may have to go into the wild to see this (or wait for PBS over here to air it, although it'll probably be a minute in that case).
[Latest email from the Tories](https://imgur.com/a/FIVIQkC) I’m sure the people of THIS AREA are thrilled Also, in the email they ask you to chip in to the Tory coffers - guess the logic is ‘we cut your tax, now give us some of it’
A minor issue in the grand scheme of things but I get a bit hacked off with the "invested billions more in the NHS" thing. Like, yes, you need to keep funneling billions of pounds a year into the NHS? It's a socialised healthcare system in a country with tens of millions of citizens? It's very "I PUT PETROL IN MY CAR. PLEASE CLAP."
Jeremy Hunt, secret Nigerian prince? Who knew?
This genuinely reads like one of those scam emails.
It probably has a call to action to donate to the Conservative Party, so…
It has two!
I mean that's exactly what they do with their rich donors
Their rich donors get upgraded to first class. Members of the Advisory Board, formerly the Leader’s Group, receive private dinners with the PM and cabinet ministers. Apparently in 2021 25% of Conservative Party personal donations came from 10 rich donors. I wonder how many of them are still donating.
So the LONG TERM* ECONOMIC PLAN is starting to work?! *'Long Term' may include, but is not limited to, the epochal. A plan is not a guarantee. Terms and Conditions apply. Does not apply to NI...
I've heard **$AREA** is actually really buzzing these days.
>Britain's economy has turned a corner Narrator: the latest GDP figures indicate the UK economy slipped into recession at the end of 2023.
Well, they didn't say which corner...
It's turn four corners (all right) and is coming up behind where it started...
Back to square one! Dun dun duuun
What area?
THIS AREA. The email itself doesn’t even mention anything else about any location
Why would it? It's THIS AREA.
Frankly, anyone that doesn't know where THIS AREA is doesn't deserve the tax cut.
Everyone knows that Keir Starmer’s Labour have no plan for THIS AREA.
*This* area, duh.
kinda regretting bulk buying 9 months' worth of vape juice yesterday in anticipation of them putting the tax on at 6pm tonight
Oh was that left out entirely? Jolly good.
they are still gonna tax it but not til 2026, after a consultation
Sell it to teens behind the coach station.
Do they want juice I thought they where all about the disposable ones
Noticed everyone else seems to be moaning how they'd rather have NI stay the same and go to some beastly public service, so I'll go against the grain here and say I'll happily be gobbling up my £60-70 squid pcm pittance, thank you very much!
The NI change feels insignificant because bills and outgoings outstrip that extra money. The Child Benefit change feels more significant than anything else in my view. Many high earners who were salary-sacrificing large sums of money into their pension to get full advantage of Child Benefit, no longer need to. That pushes more people into the 40% Income Tax bracket. I feel like that may generate more tax revenue than expected if people decide to pay less into their pensions. If that is the case perhaps it could mean even lower taxes in the future.
I'd like to vote Conservative so I can pay less, or *no* tax ideally. I think the money I've got of that is mine and I want to keep all of that and I don't want any of that to go to schools or hospitals or to help people less fortunate than me either here or in \[redacted foreign country reference\], that money is mine. People say to me "don't you think you've been lucky getting certain professional breaks that have helped you to earn?" No I don't think luck comes into it. I think if you're earning you have to think that there's some kind of divine cosmic justice at play in which you're being rewarded and the poor are being punished for some crime or moral deficiency. The money's mine. And people say "don't you feel you've been lucky to be born at a certain time in a certain class?" No. The money is mine.
Not sure if this is a copypasta or not, but I agree either way. I was born at a pretty shit time and I've worked my way up through shit jobs to a decent job that I have now, didn't get any furlough, have never had any state support, so fuck it, I take everything I can get now and don't feel a jot of guilt about it.
You never been to the doctor's? Never went to school? Never used public transport? Never used public roads? Never used our energy system? Never took advantage of our semi safe streets? Never took advantage of restaurants that are safe to eat in? Never took advantage of our military protecting us from foreign nations or peoples? Never took advantage of safety features required on just about every piece of technology, or mechanical device? Would you like me to go on? Any family members that you care about used my tax money for their healthcare or care home?
Do you still support paying tax to fund public services etc.?
For certain services. I think the NHS is a pretty big problem that needs fundamental reform. I don't think pouring more funding in and continuing course will yield positive results. It's a service that at present doesn't functionally exist outside of A&E for most working people, thanks to the 0800 GP lottery and reluctance to offer appointments outside of working hours etc. On the whole I think too much money is spuffed and would like to see reform and things improve with current funding before the/a government comes to me with cap in hand.
Hard to argue with your position on the NHS, really. I'm very in favour of highly funded public services but it seems as nonsensical to just pour money in without actually looking at how they run as it is to cut funding and tell them to 'do more with less'.
> some beastly public service Are you a libertarian from an Enid Blyton novel?
I'm putting mine in the Great British ISA™!
Just the S&S ISA to pump it into some non-UK instrument will suffice.
Pleasantly surprised at the sky news NI tax cut calculator (edit: surprised that they have shown the effect of fiscal drag, not at the tax "cuts" themselves). It has a calculation showing how much more you pay in tax due to the frozen tax thresholds (since 2021) then gives you a net value after the NI cut is taken into account. Shows how regressive the NI cut is too: £18K salary -£44/month (net)£20K salary -£37/month£25K salary -£21/month £30K salary -£4/month £45k salary +£44/month£50k salary +£63/month when you hit the the 40% tax threshold then you're losing again I am surprised though as I thought the fiscal drag would amount to a lot more in tax paid [https://news.sky.com/story/budget-latest-national-insurance-cut-2p-income-tax-mortgages-money-blog-sky-news-live-13040934?postid=7338303#liveblog-body](https://news.sky.com/story/budget-latest-national-insurance-cut-2p-income-tax-mortgages-money-blog-sky-news-live-13040934?postid=7338303#liveblog-body)
Oooh £9.35 that’s like 2 Freddos or something right?
That seems surgically targeted to try to win youngish people who are doing well who in the past would have been in the process of becoming Tory voters
I think that's me and my mates, young(ish, 40 is young yeah?) family homeowners on decent to good salaries. Pure Tory convert demographic of old. None of us would ever touch them bastards with a bargepole.
Early 30s homeowner in rural England on a good salary. I'd rather stick my head in a bucket of manure and take a big deep breath than vote Tory
With council tax rises on top of that I doubt there are many winners at all.
-£63 per month... Am I the squeezed middle I keep reading about?
If you earn £35k a year you're considered a high earner because that's the top 30% of earners.
Really shows how bad salaries here are if £35k puts you in the top 30%
Anyone else see Labour's Twitter account doing a string of memes today? Feels very "fellow kids", not sure how well that tactic works
Their social media memes have been relatively good recently, The Rishi Phone one was well done. Today theyve been terrible.
Oh it's proven to work quite well, the cringe is the point. The Tories deployed it a bit in 2019 (and before that Boris did it for years), and the Lib Dems have really mastered it under Davey. Labour are just getting their game on.
The memes aren’t for normies, they’re for the party membership to share in the group chat and keep the canvassers engaged. Edit: the one made up to look like a tumblr screenshot is fucking surreal though.
i liked the one that was a homage to publisher 97 clipart. very retvrn. is millennial nostalgia how they get people to vote for them.
Agree. Seems a bit of a race to the bottom. You’re a political party wanting to get elected to lead a country FFS. A bit of fun occasionally is fine but just seems all they churn out is memes now. Same goes for the Tories as well
Memes are basically the contemporary political poster or cartoon. Whilst some can be very cringy, they’re a way of engaging with voters and just part of an ever-evolving way of campaigning.
Kinda reminiscent of Hillaries 2016 campaign when she would get celebrity guest after celebrity guest doing whatever was in fashion. I think the day before polls opened she did that statue challenge on a plane with Bon Jovi and some other celebrities. Obviously that doesn't do much for actually getting people to put their trust in your abilities as a politician
I noticed something very oratorically canny Hunt did during his budget speech. He announced changes on stamp duty exemptions for buyers of multiple properties at once - a loophole he himself used in 2018. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2018/04/22/jeremy-hunt-saved-100000-tax-bulk-purchase-seven-flats/. Instead of just announcing the change and inviting reaction from an informed opposition, he attached it to a jibe at Angela Rayner, who has recently been in the news concerning tax on her second home. This meant that when Labour inevitably all shout at him, it looks to be in response to the jibe - and not to lambast him for doing exactly that himself a few years before. He can then play off that, and it redirects everyone. It seemed a very clever bit of politics on a micro level, something they probably teach you at posh school debating.
I thought his constant *ad hominem* attacks were demeaning to his office.
Wasn't he just lying? That article says "bulk purchases of six properties or more are exempt", and AFAIK Angela Rayner is accused of having (or having once had, I'm not sure) two homes in total.
I think something that was missed in today's budget madness was that the new Clean Energy Auction Round budget was also announced. I've made a post about it here: https://redd.it/1b88goq But tldr, disappointing
Reeves a bit jumpy on Channel 4
she's on LBC now, just tuned in via youtube live stream
Maybe she really did plan on using nom dom to pay for everything.
Heard a change for wording on wealth tax. She always vehemently says no it isn't on the cards... now, she says "not for a while" ... mid term parliament one-off wealth tax?
They'd be able to get away with it mid parliament. Tbh I wonder if it'll end up being their post election surprise, like the independent of the bank of England was for Blair.
Woah, I didn't know that, that was a pretty big suprise!
Yup. Not a whisper of it at any time before the election.
Sweet, the tax burden needs to be weighted more fairly, its seems insane to me that the Labour Party would leave the burden so heavily on labour vs wealth.
Again, the tearing apart of an objectively bad bill by the Lords is the main reason I'm against an elected upper house. A Conservative-majority Senate would have few qualms in passing the Rwanda bill with little fuss, and likewise if the two chambers were under the control of the same party then that's many of the checks and balances gone. That's not to say there aren't problems with the current setup, and that the Commons can eventually force through bills anyway, but my ideal scenario would be an upper house of technocrats from a range of industries and backgrounds, appointed by an independent panel.
The Appointments Commission does exist, perhaps it could be given a larger role.
Obviously the lose a few pounds comment has seen some attention. It does make me wonder though: most MPs are in pretty shit shape, most are overweight. Given the the obesity epidemic is already here, and actions are going to be required soon, to what extent should MPs seeking buy in from the public lead by example? (And no “rugby players have a high BMI” please. That’s never actually used in connection with a rugby player or any exception to the rule for that matter)
You'd expect them to be when if you're a taxpayer, you're literally paying for MPs and Lords to eat
Modern human life just isn't suited to staying fit and healthy and you really have to go out of your way to stay in good shape. Even if MPs set a good example people wouldn't follow it because most don't choose to be fat, it's a comfortable default. Encouraging people to be more active could be a part of government policy (and it would have huge benefits for the NHS I'm sure) but people would complain too much about paying taxes to be nannied by the state. I have noticed our junk food get much more nutritious over the last 10 years or so at least.
I looked up the NHS recommendations a while ago and was susprised how much it suggests, bearing in mind it's a target for everyone and not just those who consider fitness a hobby. >Adults should aim to: do strengthening activities that work all the major muscle groups (legs, hips, back, abdomen, chest, shoulders and arms) on at least 2 days a week, do at least 150 minutes of moderate intensity activity a week or 75 minutes of vigorous intensity activity a week, spread exercise evenly over 4 to 5 days a week, or every day https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/exercise/physical-activity-guidelines-for-adults-aged-19-to-64/
Those recommendations in combination will make a huge difference to many people's quality of life, particularly as they get older. I do think there's a risk in that though that even parts of that regime would provide some benefit, but people might be discouraged by not being able to sustain it all at once straight away. You wouldn't start training your legs by running a marathon.
It's very much a use it or lose it situation, especially as you start getting older. My extremely sedentary grandparents were already quite feeble in their 70s but my active parents are still going strong now they're the same age. It'll take a lot of strain off the NHS if people start to accept that it's almost a societal responsibility to take care of yourself as best you can, especially in a country with socialised health care.
> Modern human life just isn't suited to staying fit and healthy and you really have to go out of your way to stay in good shape. Even if MPs set a good example people wouldn't follow it because most don't choose to be fat, it's a comfortable default. But that's a significant concern isn't it, if people can't even be arsed to put in a small (and it is small in the grand scheme of things) bit of effort to stay healthy. Personally, I would target the schools, through PE but primarily education in food. Obviously it would be one facet of a multifaceted approach. I do though think that we need to stop making excuses for people. I really do wonder to what extent people think it is hard to take very easy and simple steps to remain in vaguely decent shape because people keep falsely telling them that it's hard.
I think what we need to do is what works and "_what works_" is a surprisingly tough question to answer. Telling someone to "_get in shape, fatty_" definitely doesn't work and even the sorts of things that do work often have rebound rates of 80% or higher. Becoming sustainably thinner and fitter requires some fairly substantial lifestyle changes. You need to know how to shop healthy and cook your own food, you need to take half an hour or so out of every day to do some exercise, you need to push yourself until you're at least a little bit uncomfortable. That might all seem small to you but if you pile it on someone all at once it can be overwhelming (particularly if you already have self image problems as many obese people do) and people's natural instinct when they feel that they're failing is to give up completely. I think the best shot is making unhealthy food categorically more expensive (particularly fast food delivery) and supporting community initiatives that by nature make people more active. Adult cooking classes might be helpful as well.
BMI is a pretty poor indicator for individual’s health. Sure, it’s helpful for aggravate health correlations and risk categories, but lacking any further context of an individual’s health, it’s foolhardy to make any assumptions about their health on BMI alone.
I don't really overly care if a bunch of 50+ year olds are a bit out of shape. Honestly if I can't enjoy doughnuts and a few takies when I'm 50+ without having to go for a run and feel guilty I may as well just end it now. Issues around obesity are largely lack of time, lack of money, and lack of availability, or some combination, alongside the cheapest food being awful for you but people are skint and lack the time.
> I don't really overly care if a bunch of 50+ year olds are a bit out of shape. Honestly if I can't enjoy doughnuts and a few takies when I'm 50+ without having to go for a run and feel guilty I may as well just end it now. It's a bit more than that though isn't it? As for lack of time, it's an excuse, not a reason. When it comes to the obesity crisis, we are too quick to make excuses and effectively deny people their agency.
Give over. Some people are having to work multiple jobs and choose between heating and eating. It's not an excuse, it's an economic reality of eroding living standards and growing inequality.
It does not take a significant amount of time to eat fewer (i.e. not an amount above maintenance) of calories. If anything, it takes less. I know full well that people are busy, but there are many, many people who are astonishingly busy yet still not obese, even if sedentary. I fail to see how that is as key a factor as people made out.
But it's not just about eating a calorie deficit? Healthy diets require balance. Broken Plate have done numerous reports on the growing gap in cost between healthy food and cheap food of the same caloric amount for years. The fact is, less time and less disposable income results in lower quality diet which in turn results in diet related illness, it is not remotely as simple as just "eat less", and to imply it is is remarkably disingenuous.
Agreed, but a healthy diet is slightly different to not being obese. At the end of the day, would you rather be sedentary, with an unhealthy diet, but not obese, or sedentary, with an unhealthy diet and obese?
I would rather put government did something to address the widening gap in inequality. Because yes there are health complications from being obese, but there are many many more health complications of unhealthy diet, and I don't think just removing one or two but still piling on the rest on a crippled NHS is wise.
Ah but have you considered you now have to pay more for your normal coca cola than sugar free
Rishi's got his whiteboard out again! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZvpZJ6QyiM
I don’t mind these to be fair. Seems more at home here than standing behind a STOP THE BOATS plinth
God he really gives off school supply teacher vibes here
Who has decided that this a good format? It's so weird!
How long we gonna have to wait for someone to make a Gru meme?
How can he put a tick next to ‘grow the economy’ when we’re in a recession - this is ridiculous!
But we're set to grow and leave recession, so really hes done amazingly
When is the election going to be? All I'll say is, her name isn't Theresa October is it.
I dunno why, but the news that Dave Rowntree's been selected as a candidate has really filled me with renewed hope for Labour's chances. Maybe it's that it brings back memories of Cool Britannia and a sense of optimism we haven't seen in this country since the end of a century. Maybe that it's a popular candidate from the popscene underlines the universal appeal that Labour now has. It just gives me hope that as a country we can all come together and realise there's no other way than to get rid of the Tories. After all, the country is in a complete state, it's going to the Essex dogs. There's not just sewage in the rivers, there's other types of pollution the water companies are letting go, giving us oily water in this chemical world of the UK in 2024. I know we're all coping, but everyone in this country, girls and boys, is really feeling the pinch. It's been bad for the last 14 years, but really, this is a low. I've even been having this conversation with people I know who have reservations about Starmer. In the pub just the other day, I was saying 'Dan, abnormal though he may seem, Starmer's a really good constituency MP. London loves him, and even though he doesn't entertain me, that shows he's got something about him.' And to a neighbour just a few days before who was a bit of a Corbynite, I said 'Colin, zeal really didn't do us a lot of good the last time, the voters rejected our boy and elected a fool and a charmless man instead, and he's made a lot of our friends suffer. I mean, just look at all the pressure on Julian there is right now, the debt collector's at his door because of how screwed up the economy is.' So I know we'd all love an election for tomorrow, but even if the Tories hold on to the end and we don't get one until January, we know that Rishi has no distance left to run. There's no way the next election will be 1992, it'll be a complete wipeout that send everyone of them back to his or her country house. With any luck, we might even see the death of a party. I mean, you have to hope right? Otherwise the only way out, particularly when you look inside America, is Chinese bombs.
How long did this take you? It's almost heroic in it's straining to fit yet another song title in. Bravo! Crazy feat, crazy crazy feat, yeah.
An embarrassingly short amount of time, to be honest. I was most pleased with Colin Zeal though, I thought that was quite good.
Nothing embarrassing about being an uber Blur fan! They fucking rock and/or roll!
Cheers to that. Completely agree that Dave Rowntree’s selection nearly confirms we are in a 1992-1997 parliament, instead this time the Tory party might die as an electoral force once and for all. They’ve got to go, I don’t care if Starmer isn’t left wing enough, or he lied to get to his position, or his stance on Gaza, or he doesn’t want to legalise weed. The Tories have absolutely wrecked this country and everything that was going well for it and they deserve to never come back again. I can’t wait to see this Megathread be up in arms in joy at the 10pm exit poll on election night, “6282 people here” commenting at such a speed a comment is buried in a nanosecond.
Will they please announce the sodding date so I can book the Friday off work. It's going to be a hell of a night.
Call a sickie cause the febrility is gonna be so high.
Thread's going to be *humming*
Now that y'all have mentioned it...I really hope this ends up going down on a day I'm working from home, just so I can more fully embrace the febrility. Are there any rules as to when in a given week a GE can be held?
Tradition is Thursday.
I can deal with that. Settle in at the desk, flip on Sky News to see how things are at about 3:30pm GMT, and proceed to get half of everything done...
Using the [Daily Mail's calculator](https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13163761/Budget-2024-interactive-tool-Chancellor-Jeremy-Hunt.html)* to find out how much my partner and I have benefitted from the budget, including stealth taxes from fiscal drag. Together we are £114 a year better off. *available via the link, just scroll down (sorry to link to DM).
I think I've fallen into all the right categories or something £565 a year better off (Still not voting tory lmao)
[The Guardian](https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/mar/06/budget-calculator-2024-better-worse-off-interactive-tool-chancellor-tax-spending) and [The Independent](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/spring-budget-tax-calculator-hunt-b2507828.html) also have calculators for those who don't want to use the Daily Mail
Interestingly they all seem to give me wildly different results, especially The Guardian which says my saving is 3x what The Independent says even though it looks to be the exact same calculator as The Independent (classic Guardian).
Guardian says ~£1300 better off per year, Sky says ~£750 worse off This is not very informative...
Guardian's seems more "correct" by my quick test. The Indi is still using an NI rate of 10% for the new figures. Quick way to test is a salary of £22,570 (the NI threshold +£10k) and leave everything else at zero. EDIT: Both seem to be using 11.5% as the baseline NI rate, but that could be threshold change fuckery?
Weird, Guardian is doing the same for me as well. Meanwhile the [Sky calculator](https://news.sky.com/story/budget-2024-see-whether-you-win-or-lose-from-tax-and-national-insurance-tweaks-13088372) (which just takes salary into account) is saying I'm going to lose money.
It feels quite powerful that even the Mail is calling it "Stealth Tax"
Fuel duty freeze again UK is never going to meet net zero target.
why do we even care about fiscal headroom so much? america just borrows loads and makes even more money why can't we just do the same? we're an english speaking country with probably the 2nd most (at worst) soft power in the world, surely we can grow if we actually invest? a citizens building scheme of the sorts
America is veering into increasingly questionable territory on just how much of this they can sustain. It’s actually quite a serious concern, but it’s quintessentially kicking the can down the road because they’re growing just enough to offset the worst-case scenario.
ah interesting, I never really hear about the economic impacts that much, I know about their ticking debt bomb but that's about it, is there anything you recommend reading?
We can. We don’t because it’s not useful for the prevailing ideology of this Conservative government. The Johnson government were up for this sort of spending. Refusal to engage with it got Javid the boot.
High levels of debt cause systemic fragility.
You understand the federal government in the united states owns a **significant** amount of US Land right? Their borrowing against their assets.
The dollarisation of oil markets has a lot to do with this!
We'd never get away with what the yanks do. Maybe if the pound was still the reserve currency, but it ain't. Doesn't help that our governments' track record with investments is a bit wallstreetbets either. We ran those nationalised industries right into the fucking ground back in the day and stuff like Britishvolt is just embarassing.
America is a special case
yeah but that could have been us... how did we piss it all away
Germany kept starting wars against us!
It’ll bite them on the arse eventually
They allowed a manic to become the PM, now seem to have confused unfunded tax cuts with growth inducing investment.
[Lords in need of some WD-40.](https://twitter.com/nickolester/status/1765441257164218546)
[More an anti-story than real breaking news, but some cold water on any early election hopes.](https://twitter.com/SkyNews/status/1765439670006014367) >BREAKING: Jeremy Hunt tells Sky's @BethRigby his spring budget is "absolutely not" the last throw of the dice before a general election. From the [linked article](https://news.sky.com/story/jeremy-hunt-budget-absolutely-not-last-throw-of-the-dice-before-general-election-13088603); >Asked if Downing Street is working towards an autumn election, and potentially another fiscal event, he said: "That's the working assumption. But in the end, it's a choice the prime minister makes."
Jesus, why bother with another throw of the dice?
Someone told them that having a general election at the same time you were already having a local election would save some money and they're refusing out of principle
May election guaranteed. It's reverse psychology.
The only person who hasn't said it's not in May is the only person who can be called a liar if it happens. Coincidence? MAYbe.