****The Official**** Cuts Thread

[madjackmcmad]

I've heard they're going to give free milk to schools so they can snatch it away again.

[WatcherZero]

Originally Posted by madjackmcmad

I've heard they're going to give free milk to schools so they can snatch it away again.

They dont need too, theyve already taken 500,000 free school dinners.


A new local taxation (possibly added to council tax) to pay for some of their community and local public sector governance schemes is possible though unlikely. They have had trouble trying to find money for their 'free' private schools however. They wanted to take it form the Building Schools for the Future fund but then they discovered the money had to be spent on capital schemes and couldnt be used for upkeep so I believe they were thinking of a more complicated pass the parcel of earmarked funding pots.

[gothicform]

Other measures known to be included in Mr Osborne's statement at 1230 BST (1130 GMT) will be a levy on banks and an increase in non-business capital gains tax.

The capital gains tax would rise despite a free market think tank, the Adam Smith Institute, warning it could actually cost the government as much as £2.48bn in lost revenues as people opt not to sell assets.

not only this but the velocity of my trading will decrease meaning they get less stamp duty too. the stamp duty on a single £10k trade is £50 quid... and if i am making a dozen of those a month you can see more lost revenue there straight away. i expect stamp duty revenue will slump as day traders switch to other things. the existence of stamp duty on shares but not derivatives just meant that traders switched to derivatives where they could margin trade more effectively so revenue in stamp duty actually halved.

if they want to boost CGT they should simply get rid of stamp duty and keep CGT how it is.

* Enhanced share values would provide an initial increase in Capital Gains Tax revenues of approximately £6 billion;
* The volume of UK companies' shares traded on the London Stock Exchange would increase by around 40%;
* Income and Corporation tax revenues would increase significantly;
* The FTSE All-share index would increase by up to 5%;
* There would be overall net efficiency gains to the economy of around £3 billion.

reading the scale of the cuts, if the tories get them wrong... oh dear. it appears they want to cut the budget by as much as the swedes did in the 90s, but they want to do it four times as fast. i suspect they will actually cause the economy to double dip and it will be quite messy - they are even using as justification of deep spending cuts old borrowing figures that are now out of date by talking about figures of 11% of GDP for borrowing and making it sound like they actually believe their own shit about how messed up the economy is when government borrowing is starting to fall as the economy is growing! it's not going to take much for people to see them as the nasty party again and if that happens they will never get a look in on power again. all the morons have to do is freeze, not cut government spending and we should have no deficit in five years anyway.

some of the cuts actually disturb me by how short sighted they are. the stonehenge visitor centre would be one example. £25 million quid. original design life of 40 years. 1.1 million visitors a year.

[WatcherZero]

And the £25m is the total cost of the centre, governments actually only contributing £10m!

[gothicform]

yeah. assuming the centre only leads to a very conservative 10% rise in visitor figures a year that's 4.4 million visitors for £10 million of goverment money over 40 years. average tourist spending is £66.96 a day. let's assume they spend a quarter of a day at stonehenge that's £16.74 per person x 4.4 million or £73.656 million giving a positive benefit cost ratio of £7.3656 to £1. assuming VAT of 19% that means it will cost the government £13.994 million just in that single lost tax revenue! none of this is adjusting for inflation of course but it shows how stupid it is to cancel it.

[Octoman]

I would rather they waited until they could afford to do the tunnel option. Thats a big cost but would offer genuine results. At the moment I get to see Stonehenge for Free every time I drive to the Southwest. Paying just gets you about 50ft closer with an audio headset telling you that they have no fucking idea what these stones are or where they came from.

This would have been a better project than the devils punchbowl tunnel on the London to Brighton road, a route that is already backed up by other major routes anyway.

[gothicform]

well it's clear that they aren't going to do that isn't it? none of that changes the fact that a new visitor centre will send visits through the roof along with revenue.

i want to know why we have to pay to visit stonehenge to start with. stonehenge is a religious site and it's against the law to charge entry to any religious site if you are a member of that religion (which is how you can actually get into st paul's for free).

[WatcherZero]

Do you? when I was last there you only had to pay for the carpark and there wernt any vistor facilities really and you couldnt get anywhere near them really. My parents reminisce that in their day you could walk much closer and touch them. I understand that nowadays you can get much closer again though not touch them.

I can understand this kind of eroding however, a local bronze statue considered lucky to touch its foot, the foots had to be replaced twice at least over the last 100 years as it eroded through.





image hosted on flickr

[gothicform]

you can go all the way in four times a year - pagans had to go to the european court of human rights to get that.

current prices -

Prices
Adult £6.90
Child (5 - 15) £3.50
Child (Under 5)
Concession
(student, over 60) Free
£5.90
Family Ticket
(2 adults + up to 3 children) £17.30

stonehenge was given to the nation by cecil chubb on the condition that...

* That the gate money for the remainder of the war should go to the Red Cross
* That there should be free admission for residents of local parishes (Shrewton, Netheravon, Durrington and Amesbury), later extended to the seventeen parishes of the old rural district of Amesbury,
* That the entry fee should be not more than a shilling, and
* That no buildings or erection other than a peg or similar should be located next to the stones.

they aren't enforceable any more because the will was done so many years ago. silly sod should have kept it in the family instead and made it a condition of inheritance.

[pricemazda]

Originally Posted by gothicform

well it's clear that they aren't going to do that isn't it? none of that changes the fact that a new visitor centre will send visits through the roof along with revenue.

i want to know why we have to pay to visit stonehenge to start with. stonehenge is a religious site and it's against the law to charge entry to any religious site if you are a member of that religion (which is how you can actually get into st paul's for free).

Try getting into Lincoln Cathedral without those stupid people 'suggesting' a £5 donation.

[Octoman]

I dont think you should have to pay to see it either. It really is a total and utter waste of money. I have done it a number of times with visitors and almost everyone agrees afterwards that we were just as well driving past.

Perhaps a visitors centre would enhance the experience but I think its just padding. A bit like Wookey hole. Hours for preamble and buildup followed by a shite cave.

Agree though that for the sake of £10mln its probably not worth the hassle if a lot of people are going to get upset.

[gothicform]

Originally Posted by pricemazda

Try getting into Lincoln Cathedral without those stupid people 'suggesting' a £5 donation.

i've done it no problem. did you know they don't even charge tourists for access when evensong is done so turn up from about 4pm onwards and you can just walk straight in? oh, and it's not a donation... non worshipers HAVE to pay.

[gothicform]

Originally Posted by Octoman

I dont think you should have to pay to see it either. It really is a total and utter waste of money. I have done it a number of times with visitors and almost everyone agrees afterwards that we were just as well driving past.

Perhaps a visitors centre would enhance the experience but I think its just padding. A bit like Wookey hole. Hours for preamble and buildup followed by a shite cave.

Agree though that for the sake of £10mln its probably not worth the hassle if a lot of people are going to get upset.

yeah i agree it's just padding... but it gets 1.1 million visitors a year. 1.1 million!!!!!!!!!!!! if tourists want to spend their money there let them. this is good, it means more jobs and more tax revenue. stonehenge constantly gets the vote for most disappointing tourist site by the way.

[pricemazda]

Originally Posted by Octoman

I dont think you should have to pay to see it either. It really is a total and utter waste of money. I have done it a number of times with visitors and almost everyone agrees afterwards that we were just as well driving past.

Perhaps a visitors centre would enhance the experience but I think its just padding. A bit like Wookey hole. Hours for preamble and buildup followed by a shite cave.

Agree though that for the sake of £10mln its probably not worth the hassle if a lot of people are going to get upset.

Don't go to visit the Sears Tower in Chicago. I waited an hour in a queue after paying to watch a 40 minute video just to go up to a skydeck. I did it on my last day in Chicago and had to rush to get back to my hotel to get to the airport. i wasn't impressed.

[Eastisleast]

Originally Posted by Erebus555

I've heard that they're going to reintroduce the poll tax.

Yippee! My personal liability dropped by 67% when the Community Charge replaced the rates. Then I got screwed again.

[gothicform]

Do you? when I was last there you only had to pay for the carpark and there wernt any vistor facilities really and you couldnt get anywhere near them really. My parents reminisce that in their day you could walk much closer and touch them. I understand that nowadays you can get much closer again though not touch them.

yeah, the stones only survived 5000 years before people weren't allowed to touch them! they are more at risk of natural erosion than anything else.

oddly english heritage don't seem bothered about people touching the heel stone. some bits of stonehenge are more protected than others. they haven't even bothered to correct the subsidence unlike the rest of the stones even though this and the altar stone are the two important parts of it as the sun lines up between them perfectly on the summer solstice.

[ill tonkso]

Originally Posted by Octoman

I would rather they waited until they could afford to do the tunnel option. Thats a big cost but would offer genuine results. At the moment I get to see Stonehenge for Free every time I drive to the Southwest. Paying just gets you about 50ft closer with an audio headset telling you that they have no fucking idea what these stones are or where they came from.

This would have been a better project than the devils punchbowl tunnel on the London to Brighton road, a route that is already backed up by other major routes anyway.

Thats the London to Portsmouth road not the London to Brighton road, and it was very much needed, the next major route is via Southampton! Last time I took the road it took me an hour to do the distance which the tunnel will cut down to about 6 minutes because of the traffic bottleneck at Hindhead.

[Erebus555]

I choked when I read the first few lines of this...

Budget will cost 1.3m jobs - Treasury
Exclusive: Leaked government data concerning next five years shows hidden costs of austerity drive
Larry Elliott, economics editor
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 29 June 2010 21.02 BST


Chancellor of the exchequer George Osborne holds Disraeli's original budget box.

George Osborne's austerity budget will result in the loss of up to 1.3m jobs across the economy over the next five years according to a private Treasury assessment of the planned spending cuts, the Guardian has learned.

Unpublished estimates of the impact of the biggest squeeze on public spending since the second world war show that the government is expecting between 500,000 and 600,000 jobs to go in the public sector and between 600,000 and 700,000 to disappear in the private sector by 2015.

The chancellor gave no hint last week about the likely effect of his emergency measures on the labour market, although he would have had access to the forecasts traditionally prepared for ministers and senior civil servants in the days leading up to a budget or pre-budget report.

A slide from the final version of a presentation for last week's budget – seen by the Guardian – says: "100-120,000 public sector jobs and 120-140,000 private sector jobs assumed to be lost per annum for five years through cuts".

The job losses in the public sector will result from the 25% inflation-adjusted reduction in Whitehall spending over the next five years, while the private sector will be affected both through the loss of government contracts and from the knock-on impact of lower public spending.

The Treasury is assuming that growth in the private sector will create 2.5m jobs in the next five years to compensate for the spending squeeze. Osborne said in last week's speech that tackling Britain's record peacetime budget deficit would help keep interest rates low and boost job creation. "Some have suggested that there is a choice between dealing with our debts and going for growth. That is a false choice." However, investors are increasingly nervous about the lack of growth in the world economy. The FTSE 100 fell more than 3% today as fresh jitters hit confidence.

The opposition and trade unions said the unpublished Treasury forecasts backed up their argument that the unprecedented scale of the cuts in public spending would hamper Britain's recovery from the deepest and longest recession since the Great Depression.

Alistair Darling, the shadow chancellor, said: "Far from being open and honest, as George Osborne put it, he failed to tell the country there would be very substantial job losses as a result of his budget.

"The Tories did not have to take these measures. They chose to take them. They are not only a real risk to the recovery but hundreds of thousands of people will pay the price for the poor judgment of the Conservatives, fully supported by the Liberal Democrats. It shows the risks they are prepared to take. If they get it wrong, those people losing their jobs will not get back to work."

Osborne said last week that his newly appointed panel of outside experts – the Office for Budget Responsibility – believed the jobless rate would soon start to improve.

"The unemployment rate is forecast by the Office for Budget Responsibility to peak this year at 8.1% and then fall for each of the next four years, to reach 6.1% in 2015."

This forecast was fleshed out in the Treasury's Red Book, which says: "The decline in employment appears to be coming to an end and we expect a modest recovery in employment in the second half of 2010."

From next year, officials believe stronger growth and a rising working population will lead to an acceleration in jobs growth. Over the five-year period from 2010 to 2015, the Treasury assumes that employment will rise from 28.8m this year to 30.1m in 2015, despite the loss of jobs caused by spending cuts.

The TUC general secretary, Brendan Barber, said: "With Treasury figures revealing that spending cuts will hit private sector jobs harder than those in the public sector, it is absurd to think that the private sector will create 2.5m new jobs over the next five years.

"This is not so much wishful thinking as a complete refusal to engage with reality. Much more likely are dole queues comparable to the 1980s, a new deep north-south divide and widespread poverty as the budget's benefit cuts start to bite. Many will find that a frightening prospect."

John Philpott, chief economist at the Chartered Institute for Personnel and Development, said: "There is not a hope in hell's chance of this happening [the creation of 2.5m new jobs]. There would have to be extraordinarily strong private sector employment growth in a … much less conducive economic environment than it was during the boom."

The CIPD has estimated that there will be 725,000 jobs lost in the public sector alone by 2015, although Philpott said the number could be lower if the government succeeded in pushing through pay cuts.

He added that Osborne was expecting a similar rise in employment over the next five years to that seen during 13 years of the last Labour government, when around a third of the employment growth came from the public sector. "This is a slower growth environment and there will be no contribution from the public sector."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/ju...ment-austerity

[WatcherZero]

600,000 public sector job losses, tad more than their budget estimate of 100,000!

[larven]

That's still less than Labour created. We don't need such an oversized and expensive public sector so I'm glad to see the jobs go. Although I would get rid of a lot of the deadwood managment and use the savings to employ more front line staff (policeman, nurses etc) and use the rest of the savings to pay down the deficit.