why not not ? I saw them in concert last february and they still looked good though Rick Parfitts' voice was a little strained !

The idea had we continued to run a surplus it would have put us in a better position to cope is another myth. It is yet another simplification of government economics to that of credit card or personal loan type scenario. What happened was way beyond the normal economic cycle.



No government in history has started to run a surplus because it felt there was about to be a financial crisis of any kind. They have their economic policies and their spending is tied to those. What Labour did deficit-wise was nothing out of the ordinary. It is only hindsight that lets you say what you do.



But the "boom" did not end in the sense we went through a dip in the economic cycle. We had a banking crisis not a simple downturn in the economic cycle which is a vastly different thing.

No government, Labour or Tory, could have anticipated that and taken preventative measures beforehand.

Your first paragraph is inaccurate - property is not a depreciating asset - it cannot be viewed as a piece of machinery or a car that becomes obsolete as new technology overtakes it. It will always have a value and given the supply is exceeded by demand its value will increase. In a set of accounts you would typical depreciate a building over 50 years but you then have it revalued every 5 years the gain is then stuck in a revaluation reserve in the balance sheet. More often than not the increases in the reserve account are greater than the accumulated depreciation.

As standards of living/material desire increase people's aspirations also grow, owning your own home is an aspiration to millions these days - you cannot simply turn the clock back 30 years because society isn't the same as it was 30 years ago. There is no logic in renting if you can buy a property - especially as the costs of doing so are only going to go one way and as a % of your income it will remain at a fairly constant level. If you buy a property you feel some pain years 1-5 which gradually eases as inflation takes over by year 20 the mortgage is significantly smaller % of your income.

I never said there would be a housing crash what I said was there would be a property crash if you implemented your land tax. If as you hoped your tax would force people to sell one thing would happen - prices would fall. As a result assets values would be significantly reduced much of which will be used to secure borrowed working capital in the form of loans and overdrafts. The banks would then start asking for their monies back and companies would go bust.

An aspiration that is getting more remote for an increasing number of our society. How do you propose to address that fact? You have already stated your objections to people receiving sufficient remuneration to enable them to start on even the lowest rung of the property ladder.

For the totally unrealistic aspiration of 100% home ownership to happen, one of two things must happen first: either wages of the lower paid increase to the level where they can then afford to buy a home or prices of property drop to levels sufficient to enabled the lower paid to obtain a mortgage on their current meagre income.

Or do you have some other magic solution?

Cameron approval rating now at 48%

Clegg 33%

Ed M 32%

Source: The Guardian

Does the Labour Party really care at the moment??.....I mean, who would seriously want to be in power at the moment - Leave it to the useless coalition to screw it up and then when the smoke has settled on this economic mess in 5 or 6 years, get a decent leader installed and get voted back in.

Most sensible Labour supporters realise young Milliband is out of his depth, but similar to when Hague, Duncan-Smith and Howard were incompetent Opposition leaders, on a hiding to nothing, against a strong PM, he will be allowed a few more years before things are rectified.

Cameron is simply the best of a very bad bunch of leaders at the moment.

You see, the less fookwitted thing to do is to read what the polls are saying, well actually, the less fookwitted thing to do is to disregard anything that any poll says, but if you really must excite yourself over a poll then you should read what the poll is saying.

In this case the first point is that its a poll conducted by The Guardian of Guardian readers, that is, its not representative of the whole of the population eligible to vote in an election.

The second point is that the question asked of those Guardian readers was "Is Cameron doing a good job ?" and 48% said "Yes" which is where your headline "Approval" rating came from - now even the most simplistic of analysis would not instil a warm feeling of wellbeing into me if I were David Cameron and less than half of the Guardian readers polled thought I was doing a good job when by my own admission I haven't even led the country through the worst bit of the elected term-length financial woes that we're facing - if I were Cameron going into 2012, potentially the shittest year in financial history, and only 48% of polled Guardian readers thought I was a fine chap, then I'd be watching my back for long knives.

Thirdly, another question asked of The Guardian readers was "Is the coalition doing a good job ?" of which 47% replied "No" and 39% replied "Yes", if this coalition breaks down then the game is up for Cameron for he could not lead his own party through a full term on his slender majority, not the way that the Libdems are so prepared to mock him even while in Coalition.

Ultimately the only polls that matter are the ones the public go to en masse and the one thing that sways the majority of votes in those circumstances is how each one of those voters feels at the time, how better they feel about employment, the cost of living (just plain living, petrol, food, housing), and how smarmy the leaders of those party's come across on TV, going to the polls now would be a disaster for the Tory party.

save the pound

Get banks to start lending again especially to first time buyers - once that starts then you would see more rented property becoming available to buy. You would also builders start building new houses again as they would have a chance of selling them.

I have never stated what people should should not earn - most people could afford a mortgage - their rent will be as big as a mortgage repayments. What i have said is firms can only spend on wages what they can afford. Yes there are many instances where directors pay themselves huge bonuses and staff don't get an increase - the firm I work for is one such company. Life is not fair and we all have choices. I will be leaving this company in Feb.

you certainly live up to your name as it must be 'Paradise' where you are ! You must be at an age where choices are available and job-hopping is a possibility - I am currently on a two-day week shortly to e reduced to one-day week for a few months tlll orders hopefully pick up - with my 58 th birthday approaching what choices do I have ? who wants a 58 year old ?
You're right,life isn't fair but you just have to get on with it but how can your average young couple get on that first rung when the banks will only lend the money if a big enough lump sum can be found which is just a distant dream for many kids today.The 'credit crunch' has a lot to answer for so why should banks be allowed to just give money away ? that's what contributed to our current problems a few years ago ! Money was too easily available and look at where we are now ? Just getting on to the first rung of the job 'merry go round' is becoming more difficult for the record levels of unemployment in the under 25s - Employers want 'experience' if you can't even get a job how can you get an income to pay off a mortgage ? or ever hope to put down any kind of deposit ? How many banks will give you a 100% mortgage nowadays to those lucky enough to have work ? You can't expect banks to give away money to no-hopers ? the latest scheme to use the parents or grandparents as guarantors sounds a disaster waiting to happen.
I can't see any light at the end of the tunnel and I don't have a problem with directors payoffs or 'fat cat' bosses - that's only jealousy by the masses who wouldn't give a toss about the rest if they received the same amounts,good luck to them...