UK Economy shrinks by 0.5%... government blames weather

[Leonid Brozhnev]

The UK's economy suffered a shock contraction of 0.5% in the last three months of 2010, figures have shown.

The severe weather hit activity in the quarter, but the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said even if the weather impact had been excluded, activity would have been "flattish".

The Chancellor, George Osborne, said the numbers were disappointing.

But he added the government would not be "blown off course" from its austerity programme.

The figures are set to raise concerns over prospects for the economy, with large public spending cuts expected to come in this year.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-12272717

Shock horror... the Private sector fails to provide again. It's such a hard pill to swallow George Osbourne isn't even trying to, instead he's is being a typical stubborn bullshitting Tory prick, carrying on his pro-business agenda and cutting off benefits to those who most need it. I smell another recession.

[Ocean Seal]

You see snow is the reason that you're losing your jobs and these damn eco-nuts are preventing global warming from taking place. What we need is shift the blame off the upper class and start blaming the snow. That's capitalism for you, apparently they're running out of scapegoats.
Right Wing List of Used Up Scapegoats
Immigrants
Other Countries
Ethnic Minorities
Feminists
Homosexuals
Anti-war advocates
Socialists/Communists

[Hexen]

The Tu Quoque fallacy is capitalism's specialty.

[ed miliband]

Don't really see the use in going "hah! look George Osbourne, you're wrong!!" as if simply replacing the chancellor would result in a different set of affairs.

[Tommy4ever]

This really is a major embarassment for the government. :cool:

I realise that we cannot entirely blame the Tories for this as the economy is still rather weak in general. However everyone admitted that fiscal austerity would inevitably hamper growth. Suprise, suprise. Tory confidence in the private sector to power us forward has not entirely been successful. I'm sure that this is going to worry the markets, yet I still doubt that we shall re-enter recession.

Still the government's popularity has been in sharp decline since the onset of the Autumn. It will take some real heroics for them to recover. This should be a golden period for Labour to attack the government, yet they seem to be remaining rather timid.

[scarletghoul]

loooool

How long until they round up snowmen and put them in concentration camps, or start deporting them to the arctic

[Dimentio]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-12272717

Shock horror... the Private sector fails to provide again. It's such a hard pill to swallow George Osbourne isn't even trying to, instead he's is being a typical stubborn bullshitting Tory prick, carrying on his pro-business agenda and cutting off benefits to those who most need it. I smell another recession.

Of course it's failing. Didn't he lay off like 20% of the public employees?

Public employees are also buying stuff from the private sector, ain't they?

How are the opinion polls in the UK looking right now?

[Obs]

Public employees are also buying stuff from the private sector, ain't they?
Not anymore they ain't. Heh! That'll teach them to be a drain on society! :rolleyes:

[Hit The North]

loooool

How long until they round up snowmen and put them in concentration camps, or start deporting them to the arctic

By 'eck, you Stalinists are quick off the mark.


Originally posted by aufkleben
Don't really see the use in going "hah! look George Osbourne, you're wrong!!" as if simply replacing the chancellor would result in a different set of affairs.

But chancellor's are the bearers and drivers of certain policies, priorities, strategies. Ed Balls, from Labour, warned that the Tories were intending to repeat the mistakes of the 1930s and it looks like he was dead right.

Osbourne is cutting services to the bone, throwing half a million public sector workers onto the dole, raising regressive taxation like VAT whilst cutting Corporation tax, all in order to win back confidence among the global financiers who got us into this shit in the first place, and it ain't working. Going "hah! look George Osbourne, you're wrong!!" is putting it mildly.

[Hit The North]

How are the opinion polls in the UK looking right now?

YouGov’s daily poll for the Sun newspaper, taken on Jan 25th, has topline figures of CON 37%, LAB 43%, LDEM 10%.

So a pretty steady five point lead for Labour with the LibDems crashing.

[rednordman]

I think the main irony about using the weather as an excuse is that it is down to the tory run government to sort out what alot of other countries do easially. In this sence they may totally blame the weather, but they still got what they deserved because they predictably decided to 'sweep it under the carpect and hope everything turned out ok' rather than putting money and time into making sure roads where properly gritted around the clock.

I mean ffs, every other week, i have to be in work for six in the morning. When it was snowing no wonder nobody turned up for work when the gritters didnt even start gritting the roads untill 6:15!

[TheGeekySocialist]

You see snow is the reason that you're losing your jobs and these damn eco-nuts are preventing global warming from taking place. What we need is shift the blame off the upper class and start blaming the snow. That's capitalism for you, apparently they're running out of scapegoats.
Right Wing List of Used Up Scapegoats
Immigrants
Other Countries
Ethnic Minorities
Feminists
Homosexuals
Anti-war advocates
Socialists/Communists

so true, next up will be aliens no doubt!

[Fulanito de Tal]

You couldn't make this up!! :laugh:

[Mather]

I see that Germany had much worse weather this winter and the extreme weather lasted a lot longer there than in Britain, yet Germany has a projected 2.3% growth rate for 2011, Britain went for massive cuts, Germany didn't.




Don't really see the use in going "hah! look George Osbourne, you're wrong!!" as if simply replacing the chancellor would result in a different set of affairs.


Your right, before the 2010 election, the Conservatives, Labour and the Lib-Dems all agreed about cuts and selling off the welfare state (or parts of it) in secret, though it seems the Conservatives wanted to cut the most, in the harshest way possible. But this point is important in that it shows the government position and their policies to be wrong, backed up with the facts about a double dip recession. The ruling class want to slash and maybe even sell off the whole welfare state, so any point we can make to undermine theirs and to cut across the pro-cuts/austerity propaganda that the ruling class push through the BBC, SkyNews and the newspapers, is a good one.

[ed miliband]

But chancellor's are the bearers and drivers of certain policies, priorities, strategies. Ed Balls, from Labour, warned that the Tories were intending to repeat the mistakes of the 1930s and it looks like he was dead right.

Osbourne is cutting services to the bone, throwing half a million public sector workers onto the dole, raising regressive taxation like VAT whilst cutting Corporation tax, all in order to win back confidence among the global financiers who got us into this shit in the first place, and it ain't working. Going "hah! look George Osbourne, you're wrong!!" is putting it mildly.

Focusing purely on Osbourne implies that he is sitting alone in the Treasury making all these cuts with no input from other ministers, civil servants, British business, etc. Just sitting there cutting away as he likes. If that was the case then it'd make sense to focus anger solely at Osbourne, but it isn't, and suggesting that Osbourne is singularly responsible for this drop is no more helpful than blaming Gordon Brown or The Bankers for the whole financial crisis (given you clear respect for Ed Balls I'm sure you were careful not to do the former).

[TheGeekySocialist]

But chancellor's are the bearers and drivers of certain policies, priorities, strategies. Ed Balls, from Labour, warned that the Tories were intending to repeat the mistakes of the 1930s and it looks like he was dead right.



Osbourne is scum, Balls is typical ruddy Labour, talks some good rhetoric at times, but you can bet anything good he or his party do will be packaged with a load of neo-liberal shit too, buggers began the dismantling of the education system and the NHS which has left the door open for the media and Tories to finish it off and pretend its "progressive" fml

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Ed Balls coined - in the political arena - the term 'neo-endogenous growth theory'. As any economist/economic historian knows, neo-endogenous growth theory is in fact a neo-classical economic perspective. The man is most certainly not a friend of ours.

I understand the anger being directed more to the coalition, though, as whilst all the parties would have cut, attacked workers and our services, the coalition have certainly done it harder and faster than Labour would have.

Having said that, it's shoddy analysis to blame one party. This should be seen as a class attack, not a party attack, on our class, by them.

I'd like to see the SWP (as the most sizeable and active left group by a country mile) on the streets more. I'd like to see them out in unity with Trade Unions, alliances of pensioners, students and the unemployed. I'd like to see a more obvious presence in universities, the workplace, schools etc. We seem to have lost some momentum over christmas.

[TheGeekySocialist]

I'd like to see the SWP (as the most sizeable and active left group by a country mile) on the streets more. I'd like to see them out in unity with Trade Unions, alliances of pensioners, students and the unemployed. I'd like to see a more obvious presence in universities, the workplace, schools etc. We seem to have lost some momentum over christmas.

well at my Uni we had a SWP meeting on monday and were spreading the word and making sure people get tickets for saturday, plus today we are having a day school with talks and workshops (though the later is EAN not SWP)

also, Mark Bergfeld is standing as the Student Broad Left Candidate for President, he is a member of the SWP (he gave a talk and had drinks here on monday) and seems like a really good candidate to replace that little rat Porter

[Hit The North]

Focusing purely on Osbourne implies that he is sitting alone in the Treasury making all these cuts with no input from other ministers, civil servants, British business, etc. Just sitting there cutting away as he likes. If that was the case then it'd make sense to focus anger solely at Osbourne, but it isn't, and suggesting that Osbourne is singularly responsible for this drop is no more helpful than blaming Gordon Brown or The Bankers for the whole financial crisis (given you clear respect for Ed Balls I'm sure you were careful not to do the former).

Attacking Osbourne for the state of the economy as a consequence of his government's policies does not imply that he is solely responsible. This is why I claimed he is the "bearer" of policy. Nevertheless, Osborne is one of the chief architects of the economic policy and it is his job to drive it through the other government departments.

As for me "clearly respecting Ed Balls", you're wrong again. As far as I'm concerned he's just another New Labour suit. Nevertheless, his argument during the Labour leadership election that there was no need to cut government spending, that this would in fact depress the economy, and that raising the top rate of tax would be preferable, is clearly the most progressive proposal of any mainstream British politician. Of course, now he's the shadow chancellor, he's fallen in behind Miliband and is arguing for cutting half the deficit in four years.

I have no illusions in Ed Balls or the Labour Party, but this is not an excuse for avoiding the most vigorous attacks on the present ConDem coalition.