As The Guardian reports this morning:
UK employers laid off staff in April at a faster pace than the previous month as the combination of higher employment costs and shock waves from Donald Trump's tariff war sent boardroom confidence levels plummeting.
The human resources association, CIPD, said employer confidence levels slumped to an all-time low, prompting job cuts and a widespread hiring freeze.
Higher national insurance contributions (NICs) and the rise in the national living wage, which both came into effect in April, and the uncertainty created by the US president's import duties were blamed by employers for ending signs of optimism earlier in the year.
And as the FT has noted:
A slowdown in the UK jobs market is hitting hiring in education and healthcare as government spending cuts bite, according to surveys that point to headcount reductions across the public sector.
The economy and the quality of public services remain where elections are won and lost.
The UK economy is out of control, partly because of Labour's failings, and partly because of Donald Trump's. Given that Labour has aligned with Trump, it makes very little difference who you blame.
Labour's failures are due to Rachel Reeves's obsession with fiscal rules. They can only blame themselves for the absurd decisions that they have made. Every mistake they have made can be laid at her door, and Starmer's inability to comprehend the economy.
And what is Labour doing about this? Precisely nothing.
We have a government that said it was going to deliver growth that is going to deliver a recession, and all because it believed growth can only be generated in the private sector, and then only if the government balances its cash flow.
Rarely have people so stupid done so much harm, and I spent fourteen years writing about the crass policies of Tory Chancellors in this blog.
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Clearly making money out of the lack of money in the economy (pushing credit creation) is now the sole economic policy of this government. And, since they Labour Party sees some of the profits made from that turn up as funding contributions, it all makes perverse sense in Starmer Land.
That’s the bankruoptcy that Aristotle spoke about a little while ago….
And I’ve spent fourteen years commenting (though, admittedly, I had a year when I didn’t add much) 🙂
But seriously, doesn’t this just illustrate the point that you covered in an earlier blog about left and right and the Overton window: What was to the right of centre, Tory, 14 years ago under Cameron and Osborne is now mainstream centre Labour (as Starmer and co would have us believe). That’s how far Labour under Starmer and McSweeney have moved, fairly rapidly, to the right now. Which means that by definition, Blair’s Labour governments (not to forget Brown’s few years), were decidedly left of centre – which isn’t something many of us would have said at the time.
Pretty shocking development really, but given what’s going on I don’t see it changing. It seems to me that Starmer and many members of the government are more than happy to have become the replacement Tory party. Indeed, whether under the guidance of McSweeney and his ilk, or not, surely what we have – which is a hybrid of the more right of centre approaches of the Blair years, combined with the economics and Cameron/Osborne, with the anti-immigrant policies added into the mix for good measure – is exactly what Starmer’s Labour Party wants to be. That’s it. And thinking it might change is, frankly, a waste of time and effort.
I have to hope it might change, Ivan.
Despite it all, I have to do that.
But why isn’t this more widely understood ? There are plenty of commentators /analysts who say this and there are plenty of ‘ordinary people’ who understand it – but it is almost completely absent from the ‘national conversation’ on BBC and main media.
No curiosity this morning on BBC – just parroting Starmers message.
‘Manufacturing Consent’.
In the modern era, it has been rare occasion when an up and coming journalist has helped their career by asking difficult questions.
I wonder why this is? Is it managerial pressure, a lack of curiosity or are the journalism and media degrees just bloody useless? We know the right-wing media has been hollowed out by lunatics funded by malignant billionaires, so I suppose that explains some of it. And, of course, we know where the loyalies lie for those directing the reporting of news and current affairs at the BBC.
Some of the editorials from The Telegraph would be considered ridiculous if they were attempts at satire, which shows just how far we’ve gone from reality.
Quite they are very stupid, worse than Liz Truss. They should do the honourable thing, realise that they are not up to the job and resign.
Raising employer NI has done the damage. Would you reverse it?
Yes, of course.
We do not need it.
Read the Taxing Wealth Report 2024.
According to the Telegraph, the reason for the employment downturn is Rayner’s proposed employment legislation! Yeah right!
An opinion page in the Telegraph is not reliable enough to be turned into loo paper.
Hypothesis: Starmer & his controller, McSweeney, know little about economics & thus defer to Reeves (you – RM- have forgotten more than she knows). She is clueless ref the political impact of her actions (or inaction) – which for the most part follow the neo-libtard play book. This leaves the open question, when does change come? Or do they (the LINO crew of PM+cabinet) hold on long enough to secure themselves positions with e.g Blackrock & others? Where does that leave the YK & its serfs?
The word “corruption” is wholly inadequate to describe the crew of grifter, liars, scammers that is the LINO cabinet and its appointees such as Mandelsohn.
Thats more or less my hypothesis. Reeves is a product of her very conventional economics background with little knowledge of the real economy outside banking and the City. Those are the people she seems to consult and want to please. None of the rest of Starmer’s crew seem to have either the knowledge or courage to challenge her.
It’s a disaster for the rest of us. At best the economy will go sideways, whilst Reform reap the benefits.
Agreed
Starmer’s dog whistle announcement on immigration this morning is only going to compound the problem, by starving the economy of the people it needs to support growth. At the same time he’s doing little to improve education and training. Apparently we’re going to reserve visas for ‘top’ applicants — which makes sense if you’ve decimated the higher education sector.
Is the new world one in which the low-paid jobs are filled by Brits, whilst the highly skilled positions go to migrants?
This seems to be the plan.
Doesn’t hammering the poor also mean the economy won’t grow?
Yes
About 2 months ago, I started a rant on LBC with the words:
“Never have so many prepared for so long to deliver so bloody little”
Tom Swarbrick asked me to repeat it in case anyone had missed it.
🙂
He is good
The question is, is there actually any evidence that they prepared for so long? It was obvious for some years that they would win a landslide as the Tory ineptitude piled up, yet when they got into power, they weren’t seeming ready to do anything. As the ‘plans’ have finally trickled out, they have tended to be absolutely bloody useless nonsense.
I can’t believe their policies could deliberately be so useless if they had been planning well in advance. Everything is a poorly-thought out reaction to something in the news, or something that Farage and his flunkies have claimed/misrepresented. Apart from that, I find it absolutely baffling that people who have such terrible a terrible understanding of politics have come to dominate the party in government. In the old days, you at least knew that some canny political operators were working behind the scenes of both parties, but the current bunch for all parties seem to be absolutely hopeless. With the Tories melting down towards the Earth’s core under Badenough, it ought to be an open goal for Labour, but Starmer instead seems to be trying to turn himself into a pound shop Farage. How did such useless people get where they are today?
I thought with all the bad news coming out at the moment that we needed some suitable music! This one is eminently suitable for Trump, but also Starmer and Reeves and the rest of our cabinet too!
Mr Bad Example by Warren Zevon.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DkpS1oXBQI
And here are the lyrics.
https://warrenzevon.fandom.com/wiki/Mr._Bad_Example_(song)
I started as an alter boy, working at the church
Learning all my holy moves, doing some research
Which led me to a cash box, labelled “Children’s Fund”
I’d leave the change, and tuck the bills inside my cummerbund
I got a part-time job at my father’s carpet store
Laying tackless stripping, and housewives by the score
I loaded up their furniture, and took it to Spokane
And auctioned off every last naugahyde divan
I’m very well acquainted with the seven deadly sins
I keep a busy schedule trying to fit them in
I’m proud to be a glutton, and I don’t have time for sloth
I’m greedy, and I’m angry, and I don’t care who I cross
I’m Mr. Bad Example, intruder in the dirt
I like to have a good time, and I don’t care who gets hurt
I’m Mr. Bad Example, take a look at me
I’ll live to be a hundred, and go down in infamy
Of course I went to law school and took a law degree
And counselled all my clients to plead insanity
Then worked in hair replacement, swindling the bald
Where very few are chosen, and fewer still are called
Then on to Monte Carlo to play chemin de fer
I threw away the fortune I made transplanting hair
I put my last few francs down on a prostitute
Who took me up to her room to perform the flag salute
Whereupon I stole her passport and her wig
And headed for the airport and the midnight flight, you dig?
And fourteen hours later I was down in Adelaide
Looking through the want ads sipping Fosters in the shade
I opened up an agency somewhere down the line
To hire aboriginals to work the opal mines
But I attached their wages and took a whopping cut
And whisked away their workman’s comp and pauperized the lot
I’m Mr. Bad Example, intruder in the dirt
I like to have a good time, and I don’t care who gets hurt
I’m Mr. Bad Example, take a look at me
I’ll live to be a hundred and go down in infamy
I bought a first class ticket on Malaysian Air
And landed in Sri Lanka none the worse for wear
I’m thinking of retiring from all my dirty deals
I’ll see you in the next life, wake me up for meals