Vocal Voices

Possibly always a bit of a zealot, our Mr Duncan Smith .....

I'm not sure that I particularly like the guy and his overarching welfare to work philosophies, but as a Brexit heavyweight, he has my attention if not my support.

I suspect that a long game is being played here. Damage Osborne in order to get into rival leadership candidate Boris's good books, and then hope the mop-haired one wins the Tory battle in due course .....

Osborne would do for the Tories what Brown did for Labour. He does not have much of a personality and what there is comes over as smug and condescending.

As for IDS resigning, I thought that he was the architect of the welfare budget so shouldn't he have been fighting the disability cuts before the budget or is it all just a show for the Brexit troops?

I think that James Kirkup in the Telegraph has it right.

If you look at it in that light, think about the budget. Cameron has gone to extreme lengths to appear to the public as a reformer of the Tory party and a PM who has the welfare of the people directly in his heart through this attempts to get the budget deficit down and deal with the nations debt.

So in every budget someone has to be the loser. In the EU referendum, there are ministers who are standing against Cameron on the EU. So if you are going to make someone the loser, why not make it the biggest opposition to your EU stance the loser and then tell him, bluntly, "get behind it".

This has a bonus Impact of making IDS someone the people won't listen to, which poisons his EU message.

This has now backfired on Cameron and given IDS even greater credibility on the EU and damaged Cameron himself in the eyes of the people. Had IDS stayed, then Cameron would have won greatly on most fronts. However, I believe, this is one of Cameron's greatest mis-steps in his premiership. I've noticed that Cameron has made more mistakes since tying his colours to the EU mast than he has in his entire premiership. Does he really believe in what he is saying? Is there some unbearable pressure being brought to bear on the UK to stay which he does not agree with? How he believed that IDS, a former leader of the Tory party, would stand for this, I have no idea.

I notice that I haven't seen one single press article asking how David explained this piece of budget legislation to his wife. Given their own history with disabled, I imagine that this is causing quite a bit of hostility at home. The press has a very short memory.

Osborne, on the other hand, has just proved he is a technocrat and not fit to be the PM. Just as Brown was. I doubt, greatly, that the Tory party will take that risk....

Personally, I have always thought that IDS was a very capable politician
and would make a good PM.

Regarding the budget, I think that cutting payments to the disabled and
giving more to top earners is morally wrong, and typical Tory methods.

I think Cameron is on the slide, and this is more to do with the stance on Brexit than any moral opposition to the welfare cuts of the part of IDS. The knives are out, several days too late for the Ides of March but you get the picture

It couldn't happen to a nicer guy, bring it on!

Well the FT has had another say on this and it is (somewhat), topical...

This may not be paywalled, I didn't get stopped but I have had to complete a survey today, which they are doing in preference to paywalling everything.

The first part of the article is quite revealing of how IDS' actions are viewed.

It was not only a resignation; it was also a suicide bombing, by a man who has a short fuse, and accumulated resentments.

I'm not sure how suicidal it was, although he may never be a minister again, depending on the next PM.

But other points in the article are highly revealing. Especially as the FT has been after Cameron for the entire 6 years he's been in the post.

Mr Duncan Smith has claimed that very poor people are having their benefits cut to fund tax concessions for the rich. Many voters are always ready to believe the Tories are cold-hearted. There is a paradox here. No Conservative leader has tried harder to counter that than Mr Cameron.

This I have said over and over again but perceptions, as the article goes on to say, are what they are and no amount of actions, it would appear, can overcome them.

But then we come to this absolute cracker.

Abolishing the 50 per cent rate increased the tax yield, and the same would be true of the 45 per cent impost

So now we come to a truth which is never told. Remember Clegg and his tax the middle classes to destruction??? Reducing the 50% tax Increased revenue, it did not reduce it.

So let's go back to Clegg and Corbyn and The Scottish Labour and the Scottish Lib Dems. They all want to increase tax rates. For which the eventual reality is that the government will get less return and the economy will shrink. Unless you watch/listen to the Scots news you might not know that the SNP voted down a 1% increase in taxation to fund their spending. Clearly the SNP know the same truth.

It's odd that you _never_ hear the Tories telling the people that the supposed "Fair" taxes of hammering the rich and the middle classes would net them less money. It never fails to amaze me what they are allowed to get away with.

IDS has always wanted tp reform the welfare state. He has probably sat tight and endured George Osborne in order to fulfill his ambition. The disability cuts seems to have been the final straw, but the Out campaign probably persuaded him that the time was now right to resign. George Osborne made a mess of tax credits which were in place to make it worth while for the low paid to get back into work and he has done something similar with disability payments. Has he amy idea at all how the other half live. I hope he doesn't last much longer as chancellor. He is worse than Gordon Brown.

Have always thought Dunkers to be a sound dependable chap with the country`s interests at heart unlike many others. I wish they would come clean and admit that the present level of spending on health, education, welfare and admin is not sustainable without a large reduction somewhere or a massive increase in revenue also from somewhere or both.

So now we come to a truth which is never told. Remember Clegg and his tax the middle classes to destruction??? Reducing the 50% tax Increased revenue, it did not reduce it.

So let's go back to Clegg and Corbyn and The Scottish Labour and the Scottish Lib Dems. They all want to increase tax rates. For which the eventual reality is that the government will get less return and the economy will shrink. Unless you watch/listen to the Scots news you might not know that the SNP voted down a 1% increase in taxation to fund their spending. Clearly the SNP know the same truth.

It's odd that you _never_ hear the Tories telling the people that the supposed "Fair" taxes of hammering the rich and the middle classes would net them less money. It never fails to amaze me what they are allowed to get away with.

The thing is, Suff, you are falling into exactly the same mind-set trap that Osborne has fallen into. For him and for you, it's all about the money, the holy grail of reducing the deficit. But perhaps it's not just money that matters. Perhaps having a social conscience matters more than money. Perhaps you should forget the yield and just tax the wealthy more, so that we are "all in this together", as the Conservatives are so fond of saying.

If the giving of tax breaks to the rich and ring-fencing pensioner benefits is going to be funded by hitting the poorest and most disadvantaged in our society, that is not a society in which most moral people would want to live. It was totally unnecessary for Osborne to raise the personal and higher rate thresholds, and give tax breaks to landlords and companies while seeking welfare cuts elsewhere. That's reverse Robin Hood economics and purely aimed at winning votes. Social justice, it ain't.

IDS was right, it's time the automatic pensioner benefit increases were scrapped - and I speak as a pensioner. Forget means-testing benefits, it's far too unwieldy, bureaucratic and time consuming. Just up the top rate of tax for pensioners and have done with it.

Not the point Ossie.

The point is that if we tax the middle classes higher we need to hit the unemployed, pensioners and handicapped even HARDER because we simply don't have the money to give away.

If we want to give money away then we need to make more of it and keep more of it in the government. That requires growing the economy and increasing tax receipts.

Your analogy is that we can all wallow in the same mud hole and sling the same mud by using ideology instead of brains.. Mine is that if we use our brains then we don't need to be in the mud hole in the first place. Forget the ideology.

The reason that the most vulnerable in our society are being impacted is because of the ringfences around services which some can well afford to pay for.

That should be some food for thought...