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15-Sep-2025

Bollards!

It’s Monday - and the start of a new week for Westminster politics. The big event planned for this week is the state visit of the US President tomorrow. But when the invitation was made - by our Prime Minister hand delivering a letter from the King - things were very different.

WhitehallBollard Then the UK government was falling over itself to be “pals” with Trump - not just by this unprecedented second state visit but also by breaking protocol and making a political “pal” the US ambassador.

Now the Westminster bubble is threating to burst as dismissals, resignations and reshuffles rock the boats of senior Labour politicians - and their special advisors. These failures all ultimately lead back to the the PM and his wide-ranging inability to make decisions that in our best interests.

Lord Mandelson is already sacked as US ambassador - even though the political flack around why / how he was appointed in the first place will still be flying all week (or until the next farcical disaster). In fact it could be serious enough for either the PM or one or more of his advisors to resign. [Ups .. one of the advisors - the Director of Political Strategy - has just gone]

We may never know what Donald T and his team really think about UK politicians - but the view amongst an increasing number of Brits is they are little more than blocking bollards. Obstacles squeezing out every worker’s last pound for their own political objectives.

But it is the PM that is “chief bollard” with his ever growing list of wrong decisions - starting within weeks of gaining control. Everything from the Chagos Islands surrender, to pandering to the EU, to the boat arrivals, to the cabinet appointments, to the teams of special advisors, all cause alarm bells in both Whitehall and the private sector.

Many workers spend little of their time on political issues but the accumulated effects of so many wrong decisions cannot be ignored ...

tags: spending, state, finances, debt, weak, faulty judgment

30-Aug-2025

2025Crew720A

19-Aug-2025

Back to Basics Revisited

It was back in 2015 that Grandad last pondered here on the issue of our National Debt.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer at the time was George Osborne. And he was promising (attempting) to limit Government spending to what actually is collected in tax. A basic objective that Chancellors should have always had at the top of their priorities list. But one that was being made more difficult by our growing debt mountain.

The debt story then and since has been ... don’t worry it’s being offset by our growing GDP [Gross Domestic Product] - and is no worse than other leading economies.

Moving forward to the present day a glance at the National Debt Clock shows our debt total is 3,206,142,000,000 pounds.

Trying to be a bit more optimistic the Debt-Clock website estimates the total as 2,734,384,000,000 pounds

And better still the Tax Payers Alliance web counter goes for 2,682,479,000,000 pounds.

StocksD_120 But even the lowest estimate represents a big increase over the 1,278,200,000,000 pounds that George O struggled with in 2015.

Now those with more experience in dealing with such vast amounts just express these huge figures as percentages of the nation’s GDP. So if the debt has doubled over ten years there’s not a problem as long as the GDP has increased in proportion.

Expect to hear something similar whenever Rachel from Accounts has to address the debt issue.

But .. things are not quite so trouble-free when the PR layer is scraped off. First - what should be included in the Debt figure? There are hundreds of billions between the National Debt Clock and the Tax Payers Alliance counter- which is right?

Second - this critical GDP figure used to calm concerns and make spiraling debt look normal is simply a made-up number. A number that is supposed to represent the value of all the goods and services sold or provided by the UK economy. But in reality includes a whole range of activities that don’t have a clear price tag. This is especially true for public sector workers.

For example, recruiting a thousand new nurses would boost total GDP by whatever the nominal value has been assigned to each nurse by the statisticians. So the stats would show a larger GDP. But in the real world those new nurses would be a net cost that would require more taxes or more debt to pay for.

Third - using percentage of GDP as a base misses an important element .. the actual people of Britain. And even though our total population is an estimate .. it is a far more accurate figure to use as a base. In other words the debt per person is a figure that is much less prone to creative accounting.

Hence if we revisit the 2015 figures we see that the national debt then was equivalent to 20,616 pounds per person. Doing the same for today’s stats gives a figure 38,568 pounds per person. So even the lowest of the three debt estimates means everyone’s debt burden has almost doubled in ten years.

This seems so much closer to reality than percentages of GDP. Can you really believe that the value of our goods and services has almost doubled in ten years? Especially when the population has increased by 15% or so over the same 10 years.

But then ... who cares? These are just stats. And we don’t have to pay anything no matter what they are ..

Dream on everyone!

Paying the interest on our national debt has grown to become the third biggest item of government expenditure. The country is only surviving through a belief by the markets that the government will pay the monthly interest bill.

Not the time for having a trainee in 11 Downing Street.

tags: spending, state, finances, debt, interest, deficit

17-Aug-2025

Sell Out #2.1

TrumpBB3 Last week’s media frenzy in Alaska made it easy for the world to see just how vomit inducing were the US President’s words and actions. A red carpet, air force fly-past and a warm welcome on US soil .. for a war criminal.

Clearly Trump is going all out to tick the box marked Peace Prize Winner. But apparently cares very little about Ukraine’s future as an independent country or what will happen to the Ukrainian people if (when) Russia takes control.

The only potential game changer was the rather obvious re-emergence of Putin’s disguised health problems. And speaking as an 80 year old Grandad really would welcome some younger and more honest political leaders taking over power .. now!

Instead tomorrow will see a mass pile-on of European leaders in Washington. Sadly none of whom carry much weight with Trump ... so don’t expect a sensible outcome

tags: weak, dishonest, corrupt, sell-out

26-Jun-2025

Sell Out #1.2

VillaMauritius-202501

Today sees the final nails put in the coffin of UK national credability as we have the publication of the UK-Mauritius treaty on the Chagos Archipelago - by the House of Lords Library.

As such it is a relatively clear and accurate reflection of the sorry saga. But it makes the whole sell-out deal come across as an academic exercise with little in the way of long-term implications. Given that this is a 99 year treaty the long term really should be assessed. Also lacking is any credible security assessment ... or the suitability of the Mauritian Government as the islands’ new owners.

You can read all the details via the above link - but Grandad comes away from the whole shoddy episode with a feeling that our politicians have been out played by a lower ranked team through a combination of incompetence and a loathing of Britain’s historic achievements.

However the villas in Mauritius do look lovely for those that escaped the UK tax regime ...

Update 3-Jul-2025
Why do we bother with the House of Lords? Yesterday they went through a well practiced ritual of expending a lot of totally ineffectual hot air - in this case the need to surrender Chagos and blow billions in tax-payer cash to fund a third world regime and to protect our continued use of land we already control.

It seems like all the puffing and blowing will make no change to the bill - and so it will be passed to the KIng to be rubber-stamped through. And that’s even with the last minute disclosure that the US will not pay anything towards the inflated costs! No wonder The Donald was happy with the deal. And the UK defense will take a hit it can ill afford.

History will show just how wrong our useless Prime Minster has been. But then it is looking increasingly likely that the Chagos surrender will be a mere margin note in the Labour Government’s ledger of expensive mistakes ... Will the UK economy even last until 2029? Or be so far run down that no one will care?

Update 11-Aug-2025
Evening Standard headline - Revealed: Britain's Chagos Islands surrender to Mauritius '10 times what Sir Keir Starmer has claimed in public' Giving away the Indian Ocean archipelago to the east African nation will cost £35 billion, Whitehall estimates suggest ...

Update 10-Sep-2025
Express website - Keir Starmer reported to court for ‘crimes against humanity’ over Chagos surrender

tags: weak, dishonest, under cover, sell-out, gutless

21-Jun-2025

Midsummer Night’s Dreams

Sadly today’s mid-point to 2025 is a date when not many in the world are realizing those dreams that we all aspire to - peace, food, shelter and freedom. Instead we hear and see that Russia is still attacking Ukraine, Israel is still punishing Gaza and trying to remove the nuclear threat from Iran while China constantly harasses Taiwan - along with countless other unjust actions that stain the planet.

puck1954 Back in the UK any similar dreams are tempered by the knowledge that we voted in the wrong politicians last year and still have four more years of poor management still ahead. Even though the management of the nation’s finances is so clumsy and misdirected that events may stop the government reaching its full term.

Meanwhile in the USA we have a president who seems to get personally involved in too many things - from domestic to world-wide. Throwing both world politics and national finances into a new convulsion with each pronouncement. If the world gets through 2025 without a nuclear disaster it will be a good result.

Here in Grandad Towers the mood is one of reluctant acceptance that time and tide wait for no man and soon the responsibility for making dreams turn into reality will pass on to the next generations - assuming that none of the current generation blow it all away before they can take over ...

How different it was in the 1960s ...

tags: war, false peacemakers, debt mountains

6-Apr-2025

Mad World

World economies have been battered over the past few days - and face the prospect of crashing into bankruptcy under mountains of unsecured debt.

TedHiVis2a The instigators being chiefly the US president and his hit squad - the Capital Hill-Billies. They have gained so much power so quickly through the excessive use of presidential executive orders. A method allowed under the constitution to get a bill passed without going through any checks or debates by elected politicians. When used to bypass all the checks and balances of a democratic system it means that the US president becomes a de-facto dictator. And given that over 100 orders have already been issued by our golfing buddy don’t be surprised if some massive unintended consequences appear shortly.

But it’s not just the USA creating trouble for itself. The UK’s big protest vote against the Conservative government has provided the numbers in parliament to push through any bill that the Prime Minister and his team want. True there are more controls than in the US system - but with a big majority that just means they take a little longer to start.

And just like the USA the UK is dependent on the honesty and competance of its politicians.

Sadly some of the current ministers seem to lack the skills or judgement needed when appointed to high office. Having our national finances controlled by someone who seemingly fails to grasp the implications of her policies and having our energy policies set by a short-sighted fool are just a couple of examples. Throw in the obvious wrong decisions - for example giving away the Chagos Islands - and we will be very lucky to avoid a massive fall in living standards; or worse ...

But at least the sun is shining - for now.

tags: world trade, power, dictatorship, depression, foolish

Earlier postings ...

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