LONDON (AP) — Britain’s new left-leaning government said Sunday that the nation is “broke and broken,” blaming the situation on its predecessors ahead of a major speech on the state of the public finances that is widely expected to lay the groundwork for higher taxes.
In a sweeping assessment three weeks after taking power, Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s office professed shock at the situation they inherited after 14 years of Conservative Party rule, while releasing a department-by-department analysis of the perceived failures of the previous government.
The critique comes a day before Treasury chief Rachel Reeves is expected to outline a 20-billion-pound ($26 billion) shortfall in public finances during a speech to the House of Commons.
“We will not shy away from being honest with the public about the reality of what we have inherited,’’ Pat McFadden, a senior member of the new Cabinet, said in a statement. “We are calling time on the false promises that British people have had to put up with and we will do what it takes to fix Britain.”
Starmer’s Labour Party won a landslide election victory earlier this month following a campaign in which critics accused both major parties of a “conspiracy of silence” over the scale of the financial challenges facing the next government.
You mean the conservatives were – gasp – not the good fiscal stewards they claimed to be, and left leftists holding the bag for their profligate ways? What a weird fluke that I’m sure isn’t a common trend at all!
And people will be angry at the leftists for telling them that it will cost money to fix shit and they’ll vote the right back in power so they can fuck things up even more? 😱
I kind of hate that the US “founding fathers” were kind of right in their assessment that the “common person” is wayyyyyy too fucking stupid and too easily swayed by propaganda to be trusted to vote.
I can’t say I agree with their conclusion that only rich people deserve to vote though. Not sure what the right path is :(
It’s a very slippery slope. Clearly land/business owners, race, gender, etc are not the way.
Political fluency? A test to see if you’ve been following current events and can answer basic questions? The positives would be a more informed pool of electorates, but it would also substantially diminish the amount of voters, exclude those that have grievances but don’t have time for politics, and the questions could be manipulated by the current government to exclude voters likely to vote for the opposition.
I also don’t know what the answer is. I’m leaning towards this being a symptom of dysfunction rather than something that needs an easy workaround. If we can actually tackle poverty and bring education up people will be much more likely to vote rationally, but I don’t know how we get there WITH thr current system we have.
Political fluency? A test to see if you’ve been following current events and can answer basic questions? The positives would be a more informed pool of electorates, but it would also substantially diminish the amount of voters, exclude those that have grievances but don’t have time for politics, and the questions could be manipulated by the current government to exclude voters likely to vote for the opposition.
The test:
Exactly.
Given the state the last government was run by Tories, I hope it will be a long time before we see them get into power again.
It’s almost as if that was the plan all along
20 billion is what the NI tax cuts cost by the way. Deliberate sabotage by the outgoing government that knew they were not going to win.
The Tories took a shit on the desk before they left.
Alas. If only there were 165 billionaires in the UK you could get to kick in their share. If you had only 350 people/families holding a trillion in wealth, you could get out of this.
Nah, just cut more benefits from those struggling. /tories
You know damn well that after they go for the poor billionaires’ money, they will come for ours! /rightwinger.
And you know, I’m a bit of an optimist. Might as well vote in billionaires’ interests on the odd chance I become one.
Would be a shame only being able to afford 3 yachts instead of 5.
The funny thing is, lots of luxury goods are not priced based on costs, but on demand. That means that if the rich get lower taxes, the values of expensive art and fine wines just go up to match the extra money they have. They can’t buy more.
It’s the opposite with things the middle class needs. If more people can afford a washing machine, costs can actually decrease because of better manufacturing. There are many washing machine manufacturers, so there’s actually some competition.
London set itself up as an industrial and financial hub for an empire. Then the empire went…but they joined the EU, deindustrialized…but kept the tech industry and finance (some say money laundering) hub…now the children of deinstrialization took them out of the EU and the UK is now the financial heart of an empire without a major market to pump blood through…shit’s gonna be tough.
We pay some of the highest taxes in the world yet we are poor? Surely this is corruption.
See what 14 years of stories picking apart public institutions does to a country…
You paid taxes? Then you must not be a billionaire.
Yeah pretty much the root of it. I posted above that the UK has 165 billionaires. You’d think they could get money out of those people to help fund society.
Tax the people who have all the money.
‘What’s that? Austerity? Someone in the back said poverty. I mean austerity.’
