Sunday, May 16, 2010

Fire hose of ice cold water coming your way soon

Well we put it off as long as possible. ( Though to be fair two of the main political parties stood on a 12 months more denial platform. )

But the shocking facts are now a lot less ignorable than they were just a month ago.

The idea that Labour have been preparing for defeat by destroying the country's finances has been well known about, especially in blogging circles, for quite some time. But the general public has just not wanted to know - and the left wing media ( read BBC / Guardian / Independent/Mirror etc ) has been keen that they not consider the problem before the general election.

But now the new coalition has access to the books the full horror is starting to leak out.

And the happy fiction that the rich ( ie people richer than us ) would pay just can't be sustained. [ If you don't know why then it really is time you grew up. I'll leave it as an exercise for the reader to figure this out. ]

The middle classes and working people will pay.

And when people finally realise this they are going to get mad, very mad.

The general public have been like the investors in Bernie Madoff and his pyramid scheme - if they though about it they would ask themselves where all the money was coming from, but they just didn't want to look a gift horse in the mouth.

We can look at the insanity of Greek street protests against their government that knows to borrow more money it must make cuts and if it doesn't the government will just have a terminal heart attack. Only those in the crowd who want that apocalypse are thinking clearly. ( And never forget there are those of the left who want just that result. )

We can joke about BA Unite cabin crew striking whilst being the best paid the the industry working for a loss making airline - insane right ?

Yet as a collective group of people we let Brown and Labour carry on for years when we knew those warning us of the black holes in the nations finances were probably right.

Well its too late now. The bills must be paid and it will be very very painful.

The political battle over this time will be to pin the blame and make sure the public learns the correct lessons.

The left will try to say its the evil Tories and their love of pain for its own sake. Shortly we will hear their sound bite for this - and it will just get repeated mercilessly and their BBC contacts will put it in every question they can to coalition ministers. The left are desperate that the public doesn't understand what happened and blame the right for the bills that have fallen due now from the last 13 years of their reign.

The right needs to get its ducks in a row here. We could spend our time looking out for betrayal and fighting Cameron and co - but the long term battle and prize is to set the terms of the debate that will result from the unavoidable austerity and hopefully reform that will follow.

Think of how often the left try to use their myths about Thatcher - they will soon be trying to shirk their responsibility for our financial disaster and to blame the savage cuts on the Lib Dems and Conservatives.

If we lose this debate it won't matter who negotiated away the repeal of the Human Right Act because we won't get near power again for a generation.

Its a battle we dare not lose. We need a clear and consistent message communicated in a straightforward memorable framework.

The fire-hoses of austerity are about to be turned on all of us to wake us up from the trance Labour had Britain in - and we'd better be ready to pin the blame where it belongs - on Gordon Brown and Labour.

That will require the arguments and the courage to make them and repeat them again and again. ( Often commentators of the right seem to get bored with simple points and stop repeating them. the left never tires of their spin and deceit and we must counter every time. Never allow one of their assertions to go unchallenged - even if that means the interview must descend into chaos. ) We need to be aggressive, clear and relentless.

Because the general public is about to get a rude awakening and they are going to want someone to blame.

In addition we can make sure the right lessons are learnt and that the public sees why the state must be shrunk and reformed.

See also The Coming Middle Class Rebellion

The Sunday Telegraph thinks the tax rises to pay for the Labour years might cost £3000/yr for middle class families.

John Redwood thinks we aren't moving fast enough on cutting state spending and that the markets agree.

5 comments:

Mrs Rigby said...

Almost the biggest irritation is knowing that throughout the last thirteen years people who've been earning or trying to save have been paying their dues with little or no return, whilst some (not all) layabouts have had it very easy and some (not all) civil servants have made huge personal gain as a result of government largesse.

And now, who is having to pick up the pieces? The same people who've already had their pockets picked - but at least we're seeing some bonuses stopped, and some quangos closed, which is something. It's the tip of the iceberg though, the worst will come in the summer.

Moonraker said...

I wish someone would identify some of the waste you keep banging on about. How about means testing some of the largesse being handed out like child, mobility and fuel allowances and the state pension and why should the higher paid benefit more (40% tax relief) from pension saving than the lower paid (20%). And why on earth is the street lamp outside my house on after everyone has gone to bed. And why does a billionaire get fined the same for speeding than you and me who it hurts a good deal more.

Man in a Shed said...

@Moonraker - this isn't about waste, though there no doubt there's plenty of it, its about the ability to keep borrowing money faster and faster in ever bigger quantities to cover government spending having to stop.

Proleitician said...

Moonraker, google colorado springs budget cuts.

Will your politicians have the balls to do this?

Unknown said...

May i ask if your politicians have the balls to do this too?

Angelo H
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