As election time draws near in the UK , and the US presidential election campaigns start to get underway across the Atlantic, we’ll no doubt hear a lot about this topic shortly, if we haven’t already. Apologies if you’ve heard this all before but the political and economic mainstream still don’t grasp it. Political parties will accuse their opponents of making “unfunded promises”, and of having “black holes” in their budgets etc . Nations’ finances will be likened to a household.
Except that Sovereign Governments, like the USA and UK are issuers of currency. They aren’t at all like a household. If a household has a deficit of say £10k pa then, generally speaking, spending cuts of £5k coupled with an extra £5k of earnings will fix the problem. How many times do we see see the same logic applied to countries too? It never works. It can’t work. Governments…
There were some last minute shenanigans in the House of Commons today on the final day of this Parliament. The top brains in the Tory Party knocked their heads together and came up with a cunning wheeze to nobble Speaker John Bercow’s chances of continuing in the job in the next Party. They were counting on enough MPs being away from Parliament to ensure their plan went off without a hitch. Unfortunately, word got out and they had not counted on just how many of their MPs still had some principals left. Long story short, the plan failed and it looks like Bercow’s speakership will survive for another term. Here is the full story.
This story in many ways is a perfect sign-off for this Government. A group of over-educated knobs scheming to circumvent proper process to force through changes without proper debate. Not for the first time, these geniuses have failed spectacularly to get their way leaving themselves with egg on their faces. The look on John Bercow’s face as the result was announced suggests he won’t forget this in a while.
Many Tory MPs spoke out against the Government’s trick, with Charles Walker being credited with giving the most powerful speech. Here it is. It is very good. Short, sharp, scathing and emotional, it was received by a round of applause from the opposition benches.
As much as it was a good speech though, the though did come to mind “This is what draws you to tears?” The shenanigans today were around a rather technical matter of how the decision on whether or not to keep the Speaker is made. It’s not an issue that is going to have much impact on anyone’s live and yet in the debate we saw some of the greatest passion and most furious anger of the Parliament. Where were these people when we really needed them?
Anyway, that was the curtain call for this Parliament. Next week, candidates officially become candidates as we enter the short campaign. What fun.
Lib Dems – Draw a line for Labour, then a second half a millimetre away for the Tories, take out a magnifying glass and observe us slap bang in the middle:
alittleecon 