PopCon Head of Campaigns, Andrew Allison, says the truth is that public spending and taxes are too high. Both need to be reduced to allow the economy to grow. But will Labour do anything about it?

Older readers will remember power cuts in the 1970s. At the tender age of 53, my recollection of those events is hazy to say the least, but I do remember my mother guiding me with a torch to a kitchen cupboard to find candles and matches. Now that Ed Miliband oversees the nation’s energy policies, I have started to wonder if those days are about to return. The answer, my friend, is not blowing in the wind when the wind isn’t blowing. And even though we live on an island, it is surprising how many days in a year there are when the wind doesn’t blow. It is usually during the dark winter months when energy consumption increases. But that doesn’t stop Ed the eco-warrior/eco-zealot/eco-nutter (delete as appropriate) from risking our energy security which will also push up the costs for families across the land.  

Those older readers will also tell you about rampant inflation and the Labour Government going cap in hand to the IMF for a bailout. I was thinking about that yesterday when I read that GPs had voted to go on strike. It was hardly surprising news; about as surprising as Rachel Reeves saying that she may be forced to increase taxes (it’s what all Labour Chancellors do – although not usually less than a month after a general election) or hearing the news that Huw Edwards’ wife has left him. The reason I was not surprised that GPs plan to go on strike is because Reeves has offered junior doctors a whopping 22% pay rise costing taxpayers billions of pounds. What’s good for the goose is good for the gander. GPs now want a piece of that particular cake.  

Nurses must now feel very aggrieved. They settled for a much lower pay rise, so I wouldn’t be surprised if they start agitating for more money. And before you know it, the whole public sector will be wanting more. 

After Edward Heath called a general election in February 1974, asking the question, “Who runs the country?” (the voters decided that it wasn’t him), Labour’s new Employment Minister, Michael Foot, immediately ended the long-running miners’ strike by awarding miners a whopping 35% pay rise. A year later, in February 1975, miners were awarded another 35%. And some people wonder why British coal could not be mined at a competitive market rate! Those massive pay rises helped fuel inflation. 

Back to the present day. The Bank of England, which has been asleep at the wheel in the past few years, has eventually managed to get inflation down to the target rate of 2%. Rachel Reeves has constantly accused Liz Truss of trashing the economy in 2022 (Truss did not), but by trying to squeeze more money out of an already overtaxed economy, coupled with increased spending and massive public sector pay rises to please her union bosses, she really is going to crash the economy. The truth is that public spending and taxes are too high. Both need to be reduced to allow the economy to grow. But will Labour do anything about it? Of course not. Same old Labour. It never learns the lessons of the past. Or to phrase it more eloquently, in the immortal words of Eugene O’Neill, “There is no present or future - only the past, happening over and over again - now.” 

Photo Credit: Rachel Reeves, Keir Starmer and Angela Rayner  (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported)