Uncertainty kills business

[Cornish Steve]

Right now, business owners in Britain should be very thankful for a government that announces what it's going to do in advance. I may not agree with raising taxes, but at least you've all known well in advance that VAT will increase.

Compare that with the situation I am in, and other small businesses like me. Because of political games in the US, I have no idea what the tax rate will be in January. The government just delayed debate until after November elections, so I won't know until just weeks before the new year. If they do nothing, tax rates will increase very substantially - and it will really hinder my ability to pay for ongoing software development.

But that's not the half of it. Tonight, the idiots in power, with no advanced notice and purely for political gain before an election, announced they plan to push a bill this week that will penalize companies for outsourcing work overseas. All my development is performed overseas, and there's absolutely no way I could afford local rates - which are many times higher. How will they penalize me? I have no idea!

Add to this complete uncertainty about employer liability for universal health care, which most of the population don't even want. Then there's talk of raising the minimum wage. And then energy prices are going to explode because the idiots have banned oil drilling in the Gulf - even while they are giving Mexico and Brazil billions of dollars to drill their own oil for their own people. Because of the unsustainable debt these fools are racking up (they've added more debt in 18 months than was incurred in the previous decade), it's only a matter of time before interest rates soar - and the rate for outstanding business loans will rise with them.

Like other businesses, I'll do my best to adapt. The real problem, though, is not change; it's not knowing what those changes will be or when they'll happen. You can't plan when governments don't know what they're doing and come up with a different idea every week and try to pass laws in a matter of days with no debate, discussion, or consideration of their impact.

I hired my first salesperson this week. I had no option but to hire her as an independent contractor; it's too risky to hire an employee. So, what did I read earlier today? The US government now plans to clamp down on companies who hire contractors instead of employees. So what does that mean? A fine? Who knows! There's nothing illegal about hiring a contractor, but try telling that to this incompetent government.

Uncertainty. This is what kills business, and this is what's killing the US economy right now. Whether or not you agree with the new government in Britain, at least be grateful that they are predictable. Policies with which you disagree but at least you know about are far preferable to endless uncertainty.

 

[esh1esh1]

I supply a lot to the public sector and since the UK Governmnent threatened sweeping cuts in the October Spending review all Council wallets have shut until the announcement. I have no doubt they will open again following the announcements, it is just the threat that causes this super cautious behavior.
Eric

 

[Kernowman]

This is what you get when you have a government that manages by crisis

 

[luvbusiness]

Steve we have been told a few things like the coming increase in VAT but we are all still waiting for the budget announcement in october and how big the reduction is going to be in public employees and government contracts.So I would say still quite a lot of uncertainty in the UK too.

 

[akirk]

Agree - makes life difficult, but for those who are happy with change, it often presents opportunities and uncertainty will make some businesses dither, allowing us to push ahead, so it can give opportunity as much as anything else.

In fact I would go as far as to say that it is times like this that are good for the true entrepreneur, we found far more start up during the recession than before (people made redundant, cheque in hand, no-one hiring in their industry often start up with lower overheads and undercut), so times of uncertainty can be good, in fact times of consistency are often only good for the big stagnant corporates...

Alasdair

 

[Cornish Steve]

In fact I would go as far as to say that it is times like this that are good for the true entrepreneur, we found far more start up during the recession than before (people made redundant, cheque in hand, no-one hiring in their industry often start up with lower overheads and undercut), so times of uncertainty can be good, in fact times of consistency are often only good for the big stagnant corporates...

I do agree with that. Small companies tend to be more hungry and flexible and can "turn on a dime" as they say. Still, learning about a bill to penalize outsourcing just a few days before the government tries to pass it is simply ridiculous. Not knowing such basics as the tax rate starting in January means I must be cautious. Hiring someone as a contractor and then learning that the government plans to "clamp down" - whatever that means - on such hiring is frustrating. Yes, I carry on making the best decisions for my business, but it feels like living on the edge. Will I be penalized, or will I not? Will my development costs soar, or will they not? This is very basic stuff.

 

[Kernowman]

You have to make that call in deciding if it is a decision that will become a factual reality, or is it just some more political rhetoric designed to appease those that are clamouring for a parochial economy, citing overseas recruitment as the road to hell when there is more than enough domestic unemployment already

 

[estwig]

"they plan to push a bill this week that will penalize companies for outsourcing work overseas."

That's very worrying, it's protectionism, a dangerous path to start down which could lead to other 'overseas' companies, refusing to do business with compnaies in the US.

Tit-for-tat.

To say nothing of the fact it's just bad for business.

 

[Kernowman]

Protectionism is a knee jerk reaction used as a panacea to seemingly cure the economy woes of a country. It is however fuelled by businesses that cannot see beyond this year's profit figures and it has a horrendous socio/economic price to pay because those gains are short term and highly perishable.

In truth, exporting jobs only has a very short shelf life because what you are effectively doing is both cutting your costs and your market at the one and the same time, yet very few businesses realise what consequences their actions are having by creating a domino effect right through the entire market economy. The only variable in that inevitable downward spiral into decline, is time.

 

[estwig]

^^^^^^^What he said^^^^^^^^

 

[An Oasis]

All because the US government is leading the US down an undecided path. They don't know what they are doing and they can't make up their minds as to the path they think that they should go. QE has gone through the roof and produced squat. Looks like the US is just clinging onto the myth that it is a super power.

The US should rise up and kick out all the present political elite, they are nothing short of useless a blind dog could probably do a better job.

Here's a great rant from market ticker http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?singlepost=2185096 into the scam that has been told/sold to the US public.

 

[Kernowman]

What all this shows is that NOTHING has been learned since the great crash of the 30's.

It began with sheer greed, it caused an overheat and too much available easy credit plucked out of thin air, the realisation that the stock market was a house of cards, the plummeting value of business and assets, the behaviour of the banking sector, protectionism, parochialism, vilification of the "foreigners" that were bleeding the economy, then on to a world war for good measure. In germany the Jews were to be the convenient scapegoats to blame and we needn't repeat the outcome of that policy.

Beneath the surface here too there is an undercurrent of bubbling resentment of all the immigrants that have moved here to "steal our jobs" and that could become our worst nightmare in a heartbeat and all it takes is for the recession to bite deeper to the level where we too will need a wheelbarrow full of money to buy a loaf of bread, just like germans did in the 1930's. Our political masters by their sheer incompetence and ineptitude are creating the very same foundations that a little moustachioed corporal from Bavaria exploited effectively by telling the populace that there is a better way.

I have a deep hatred for the businesses that export jobs for that fast buck and no other reason. ANY idiot can do that and not bother about the consequences. The immediate problem they create is losing the communication with their customer base and when that happens it will come back and haunt you. What do you care though Mr Big Corporate boss? You slashed the costs, the stock market loved it, your shareholders wallowed in that extra money and your salary and pension was determined by those figures alone.

Hold on a minute though, all those workers you tossed out on their ears to make way for your sooper dooper outsourced business model now have no jobs. You have just put a dent in your customer base without realising it because they have no money to buy your products. When dozens of your compatriots are seduced by your "results" and do likewise, collectively they have put a MASSIVE dent in the customer base. Oh dear, where are your customers now. On benefits and guess what, all your taxes and NI will have to be increased to pay for all that unemployment you helped to create. Your short term profit jump has now disappeared, but what do you care old chap, you will hopefully be retired when the sh*t hits the fan.

Anyone listening? I doubt it.

 

[CSBob]

Very well put, Kernowman (although in my case you're preaching to the choir!).

There is of course the other side of the coin where outsourcing is concerned - the little guy is better able to take on some of the big boys (especially in the software market, for instance) by outsourcing abroad, allowing them to be extremely competitive and to take a slice of the market at home. In some niche fields this is almost the only thing keeping the cost to the end user under control, rather than one or two of the big boys virtually fixing the price between them (not that they would, of course, as that would be illegal...).

We just need to bear in mind that it's not all bad, and that there are both pros and cons to outsourcing.

 

[Kernowman]

I have got nothing against the small guy chucking his little pebble against the Goliaths at all and I have been very happy to see the small fry give the big boys a nose bleed - as I too have done so myself.

My bile is aimed at the British Gas's, the BT's and many others of their ilk that have exported hundreds of thousands of jobs overseas, not for expediency, not for efficiency, but for pure selfish greed. Behind all of them is a huge trail of human destruction in the very market that they have been cutting away at for years with that slash and burn policy, so it won't be too long before the crisis hits when nobody will have a job left and these corporate giants will finally reap what they have sown. Hopefully I will be in my wooden box by then.

At the same time there are countless millions of pounds leaving the country DAILY to the big overseas energy giants, countless millions going back to our EU cousin's families back home who have the right to live and work here, countless millions to the non-EU immigrant's families back in their homelands. It's not the rights or wrongs of that which concerns me, it is simply the fact that the country does not have an inexhaustable flow of money to allow to leak away at the rate it currently is, hence all around the world we have similar tales of countries raising the drawbridge with regards to overseas trade and immigration. History repeats itself while no lessons have been learned and just more empty rhetoric from our politicians.

 

As kernowman says expoting jobs and importing cheap goods is a certain road to ruin.

selling houses,hotdogs and insurance policies was a hoot while it lasted.

But now we pay.:|

Baggy Maggies idea that you make money anyway you can and to hell with the social consequences has come home to bite us on the bum.

Earl

 

[jeffbearcroft]

Uncertainty kills business. Yes very true.

In the UK some businesses are so worried about the future they have adopted a "bunker mentality" - don't take risks, don't try anything new and hope for the best.

Yes, consumers are very cautious at the moment and yes, lower retail spending in particular is likely to cause problems for some retailers but businesses needs to innovate to compete.

For some at the moment, it seems they are simply waiting for the axe to fall. Sadly this attitude can only lead to more job losses.

 

[Kernowman]

Uncertainty kills business. Yes very true.

In the UK some businesses are so worried about the future they have adopted a "bunker mentality" - don't take risks, don't try anything new and hope for the best.

Yes, consumers are very cautious at the moment and yes, lower retail spending in particular is likely to cause problems for some retailers but businesses needs to innovate to compete.

For some at the moment, it seems they are simply waiting for the axe to fall. Sadly this attitude can only lead to more job losses.

All it needs is some lateral thinking and adopting new ways of looking at difficulties. Most see a recession as a pathway of doom and gloom ahead of them, yet a recession could be a time of great opportunity if only they could change their mindset and prejudices. The set of words I really hate to hear is "Well we have always done it this way" firmly believing that there CANNOT be a better way of doing things because they haven't looked and it would be far easier to swim the Atlantic than to change someone's rigid dogma that an alternative could exist. Yet, by simply changing the mindset, attitudes, perceptions and prejudices, stunning results can be had - at no cost

I was talking to a guy not so long ago who ran an office postal system business and he was bemoaning the fact that sales have died up recently. I think he was hoping I would do everything for him to change the situation, but when someone wants me to do their job FOR them at my expense I take a different tack. I told him to stop thinking "office postal systems" and to give his products just a small tweak and see if they could perform a similar role in another industry entirely. That was all I told him. He now sells the product in the packaging industry doing a not vastly dissimilar job. He owes me a large beer methinks

 

[Kernowman]

As kernowman says expoting jobs and importing cheap goods is a certain road to ruin.

selling houses,hotdogs and insurance policies was a hoot while it lasted.

But now we pay.:|

Baggy Maggies idea that you make money anyway you can and to hell with the social consequences has come home to bite us on the bum.

Earl

Maggie has done an awful lot of damage to this country and the people that hail her as the great prime minister really do have rose tinted glasses on.

She was totally intoxicated by the idea of how the USA was run as a country and she wanted that exact model installed here, but the problem with that is she only cherry picked the advantages and none of the drawbacks for her grand plan.

She had the vision that the government would shed all of it's responsibilities in one fell swoop by selling it off and filling the government's coffers at the same time. Schools, the NHS, the Police force, railways, you name it, she wanted to sell it, so eventually the government had no state responsibilities at all to burden itself with and that lovely North Sea Oil revenue would drastically reduce our dependency on imported fuel from the Arab states, plus as a bonus she could spend less on military activity to protect the oil supply which on the surface we didn't need at the time.

The public and the financial institutions fell for it hook line and sinker, the clamour to get into the shares blinded people to what was really going on. Lovely money today, horror story tomorrow, nobody really bothered beyond that fistful of easy money. Windfalls left right and centre, happy times. "My building society is going to be a bank and look at the cheque I just got". What do we need industries for when the Stock Market was earning so much money for so many people and the handbrake was well and truly off in the City to do what they liked. Was it Harold MacMillan that said "We have sold off all the family silver"? We did more than that, we sold off our futures and our souls to the greed of easy money.

Maggie changed the employment laws to give big business the free rein to do what they liked, training costs money so we won't bother with that inconvenient expense any more, social housing was another massive government burden, so let's sell that off too and put a few bob more in the Treasury.

This is the legacy we have been left with and in truth there are only so many pips you can squeeze out of the lemon of society. Our actual national wealth disappeared a long time ago during Maggies' reign and another BIG alarm bell was ringing very loudly when that idiot Gordon Brown sold off our gold reserves. He didn't sell it because it was merely making the bank vault floor sag was he?

Before anyone thinks I am some form of covert Socialist leftie with undertones of communism having a rant about the capitalist system, I can assure you I have no political leanings whatsoever, because to me every single one of them are a bunch of self-serving incompetent buffoons who I wouldn't trust with yesterday's weather forecast, let alone running the country.

 

[Bri]

Before anyone thinks I am some form of covert Socialist leftie with undertones of communism having a rant about the capitalist system, I can assure you I have no political leanings whatsoever, because to me every single one of them are a bunch of self-serving incompetent buffoons who I wouldn't trust with yesterday's weather forecast, let alone running the country.

Bet youre a real draw down the pub K. LOL!!!


There is only one thing Maggies Farm can take credit for and its giving at least 70,000 people on here the will to get up off our backsides and be entrepeneurs.Although we are being screwed for the pleasure of it.

 

[Kernowman]

Bet youre a real draw down the pub K. LOL!!!


There is only one thing Maggies Farm can take credit for and its giving at least 70,000 people on here the will to get up off our backsides and be entrepeneurs.Although we are being screwed for the pleasure of it.

70,000 is an impressive figure Bri, but what happens to that number when the losses are offset against it? Have you ended up with a nett gain? Now take that subtotal and slide it up against the current jobless total and we have a long way to go yet.

What galls me the most is there are many thousands of people out there with some brilliant ideas that need a leg up from the dole and neither the govt nor the banks give any support at all to make that transition from a dole reliant to an entrepreneur. Business too turns their noses up at those same people and whine about a "skills shortage". Even when they manage to make a few quid with their new venture, there is a veritable army of organisations that pounce on them to relieve them of it. Councils, landlords, banks, utilities, HMRC and dozens of others only see them as a cash cow ready for the milking until they are dry. A payment holiday for a year would be the biggest leg up anyone could wish for. When this bozo Cameron asked for suggestions how to boost the economy I put forward these ideas but what does a silly old fule like me know about these things?

Maggie started the "dehumanisation" process with her short sighted policies, so the last thing we needed was the internet to accelerate that process at an alarming rate, so the human element now plays very little part in the business process. We have armies of people out there right now writing reams and reams of written specs for software to do just that and I shudder to think what next human activity or thought process that innocent looking PC in the corner is likely to do towards human isolation between each other. Society is insular enough as it is already, so should we abandon all human contact and be intravenously fed by this bloody machine?

The internet is only a medium, it is not the business itself.

 

[Bri]

Lager or Bitter? I'm guessing bitter. I'll get these.

 

The public and the financial institutions fell for it hook line and sinker, the clamour to get into the shares blinded people to what was really going on.

Or to put it in a nutshell.

When money is the most profitable product around.

Where is the incentive to create tangible wealth.

Earl

 

[Kernowman]

Lager or Bitter? I'm guessing bitter. I'll get these.

Cheers! Burp!

 

[Kernowman]

What galls me the most is there are many thousands of people out there with some brilliant ideas that need a leg up from the dole and neither the govt nor the banks give any support at all to make that transition from a dole reliant to an entrepreneur.

While on that subject, has anyone read about the guy who was made redundant and put on the dole, who then decided to go self employed as a carpenter and began distributing 5,000 leaflets in his area to get work, then got clobbered by the DWP and had his dole money stopped because he was "not looking for work". This guy should have been at least given his entire year's worth of dole money in one advance lump sum to help him on his way, not vilified by these sh*t-for-brains pen pushers

This is a prime example of what is WRONG with this country and I really feel for this guy because I too fell into that same trap and had the wrath of the DWP descend upon me because I too wanted to climb out of that same pit of despair.

 

[Bri]

This is a prime example of what is WRONG with this country and I really feel for this guy because I too fell into that same trap and had the wrath of the DWP descend upon me because I too wanted to climb out of that same pit of despair.

Yup been there on that too.I proved that I had a sure fire way of getting back to work and needed some help to fund it and that I would be able to return the money in 12 weeks, no we can give you money from the social fund to buy you essentials in relation to the job offer, like PPE etc, but not to fund a self employed venture. But this will mean I will be able to get off the unemployment register and stop claiming( that was a farce too, I didnt get a bean off them cos my partner was working more than 16 hrs a week) and be able to employ other people from here and get them back on the ladder of earning. No we're not allowed to do it.

Dont get me started on the DWP

 

[jeffbearcroft]

Kernowman

It's a bit late to start blaming Margaret Thatcher for our current economic problems. She left office 20 years ago! And Labour were in office for the last 13 years.

Labour could have regulated the banks and put controls on consumer debt. Instead, they let things get totally out of hand. "No more boom and bust". Remember?

Many millions of ordinary people are going to suffer for the mistakes of the last government. It didn't have to be this way.

Hindsight is easy. But to make a start on sorting things out, we have at least to be able to agree on what the problem is - an economy built on excessive debt.

Regards

Jeff

Maggie has done an awful lot of damage to this country and the people that hail her as the great prime minister really do have rose tinted glasses on.

She was totally intoxicated by the idea of how the USA was run as a country and she wanted that exact model installed here, but the problem with that is she only cherry picked the advantages and none of the drawbacks for her grand plan.

She had the vision that the government would shed all of it's responsibilities in one fell swoop by selling it off and filling the government's coffers at the same time. Schools, the NHS, the Police force, railways, you name it, she wanted to sell it, so eventually the government had no state responsibilities at all to burden itself with and that lovely North Sea Oil revenue would drastically reduce our dependency on imported fuel from the Arab states, plus as a bonus she could spend less on military activity to protect the oil supply which on the surface we didn't need at the time.

The public and the financial institutions fell for it hook line and sinker, the clamour to get into the shares blinded people to what was really going on. Lovely money today, horror story tomorrow, nobody really bothered beyond that fistful of easy money. Windfalls left right and centre, happy times. "My building society is going to be a bank and look at the cheque I just got". What do we need industries for when the Stock Market was earning so much money for so many people and the handbrake was well and truly off in the City to do what they liked. Was it Harold MacMillan that said "We have sold off all the family silver"? We did more than that, we sold off our futures and our souls to the greed of easy money.

Maggie changed the employment laws to give big business the free rein to do what they liked, training costs money so we won't bother with that inconvenient expense any more, social housing was another massive government burden, so let's sell that off too and put a few bob more in the Treasury.

This is the legacy we have been left with and in truth there are only so many pips you can squeeze out of the lemon of society. Our actual national wealth disappeared a long time ago during Maggies' reign and another BIG alarm bell was ringing very loudly when that idiot Gordon Brown sold off our gold reserves. He didn't sell it because it was merely making the bank vault floor sag was he?

Before anyone thinks I am some form of covert Socialist leftie with undertones of communism having a rant about the capitalist system, I can assure you I have no political leanings whatsoever, because to me every single one of them are a bunch of self-serving incompetent buffoons who I wouldn't trust with yesterday's weather forecast, let alone running the country.

 

Kernowman

It's a bit late to start blaming Margaret Thatcher for our current economic problems. She left office 20 years ago! And Labour were in office for the last 13 years.

Labour could have regulated the banks and put controls on consumer debt. Instead, they let things get totally out of hand. "No more boom and bust". Remember?

Many millions of ordinary people are going to suffer for the mistakes of the last government. It didn't have to be this way.

Hindsight is easy. But to make a start on sorting things out, we have at least to be able to agree on what the problem is - an economy built on excessive debt.

Regards

Jeff

Don't blame Maggie on her own it all started in the 60's with the importation of cheap goods,and the lack of complete lack of investment in British Industry ,Ironic in the extreme as we led the world in engineering excellence at the time.

She just took it to a new level of greed,like the right to buy starting the housing crisis.E.t.c

Like others I am non political .just an innocent bystander observing what I have seen in the last 50 years .

Something about brewery and urine come to mind.:|

Earl

 

[Kernowman]

Kernowman

It's a bit late to start blaming Margaret Thatcher for our current economic problems. She left office 20 years ago! And Labour were in office for the last 13 years.

Labour could have regulated the banks and put controls on consumer debt. Instead, they let things get totally out of hand. "No more boom and bust". Remember?

Many millions of ordinary people are going to suffer for the mistakes of the last government. It didn't have to be this way.

Hindsight is easy. But to make a start on sorting things out, we have at least to be able to agree on what the problem is - an economy built on excessive debt.

Regards

Jeff

Maggie isn't entirely to blame for sure, because those before her weren't the sharpest knives in the drawer either, but from from little acorns . . . .

It was her and her alone that tipped the country up at a sharp angle down which we all slid, with the "Me, me, me" brigade well out in front and have stayed there ever since.

There was an awful lot of rot that needed excising there is no dispute about that, but it was that same rot that prompted that massive slash and burn in both the 'public' sector (read nationalised here) and private industry was not exempt from it either, with that final objective of modelling this country on the USA example where there isn't one single nationalised industry, the health service runs in the private model (Goodbye NHS burden) schools, the police, energy, communications, the lot, all abrogated away off the government. As you may recall she wasn't exactly flavour of the month mid-term with Joe Public and she survived a few attempted coups within her own government, but sooner someone with purpose than the milksops who tried to oust her. Her biggest triumph in my view was to jump at the chance of having a ding-dong with the Argentinians over the Falklands. A year previously she wouldn't have wee'd on the islanders if they were on fire, but suddenly she had a handy diversion to deflect her deep unpopularity. Cute cookie.

"No more boom and bust" said the man. Who exactly benefited from the boom may I ask? It wasn't me that's for sure living down in the dead end of the country where NMW is the majority not the rarity. It is alleged that the government and the EU has poured many millions into the county, yet I cannot see any tangible evidence of change apart from a couple of bypasses and a proliferation of windmills. Maybe that money has been swallowed up in errrm, "administration". "Trust me, the banks will be well regulated" when he let them police themselves. Oh yes matey, YOU trusted your cronies in the city and we are paying for that unstinting trust right now. It wasn't enough that his entire outlook of how the economy was "booming" resulted in his rose tinted glasses seeing what the city fat cats were earning, so on the strength of that he introduced stealth tax after stealth tax and if that wasn't enough, this swine has left a huge trail of ticking financial time bombs in the background that even HE was forgotten about. That huge decline in earnings and reduction in disposable income started hitting us back in 2007, so we were already heavily weakened by the time the "credit crunch" came along.

"I will control the banks" he says after the event and pours BILLIONS into them to stop them going bust. "The banks will be forced to repay the public purse" they say, BUT WHERE EXACTLY IS THAT MONEY COMING FROM?????? Not the banks, that's for sure. The BOE rate is only 0.5%, so why do we see bank charges rising at astronomic rates almost monthly, why do we see overdraft rates double what they were last year and as for loans for business, they are about as rare as Loch Ness Monster eggs.

 

[Bri]

I was going to read all of your post but decided to wait for the series to come on ITV.

Youre absolutely right on every point K and everyone coming on here shopping for business should be made to read it.

When the mere mortals stop us on site every day and tell us we are so lucky to have our own businesses how we laugh, and laugh and laugh and laugh.

 

[Cornish Steve]

Maggie isn't entirely to blame for sure

She is definitely to blame for:

- Not being aggressive enough
- Not privatizing schools, the health service, and the BBC
- Not abolishing welfare and replacing it with genuine, temporary assistance
- Not cutting spending more than she did
- Not cutting taxes more than she did
- Not doing even more to restrict the destructive power of unions
- Not cutting unnecessary regulation when she was on a roll

Other than that, she didn't do a bad job (and spoken by someone who very much disagreed with her at the time).

Incidentally, I heard a nice quote on the radio last week: The goal of any government is to ensure equality of opportunity, not equality of reward.

 

[Kernowman]

She is definitely to blame for:

- Not being aggressive enough
- Not privatizing schools, the health service, and the BBC
- Not abolishing welfare and replacing it with genuine, temporary assistance
- Not cutting spending more than she did
- Not cutting taxes more than she did
- Not doing even more to restrict the destructive power of unions
- Not cutting unnecessary regulation when she was on a roll

Other than that, she didn't do a bad job (and spoken by someone who very much disagreed with her at the time).

Incidentally, I heard a nice quote on the radio last week: The goal of any government is to ensure equality of opportunity, not equality of reward.

Ah yes, but along with the cuts she had already made and was planning to make, she did not include cuts in TAXATION and NATIONAL INSURANCE commensurate with the reduced burden on the public purse. She wanted her cake AND eat it.

May I add too that it was the same woman that hoodwinked countless thousands of employees (Myself included) into opting out of the state pension system to invest in occupational pension schemes without ring fencing those contributions with legislation to protect that money. Ergo, during the deep manure she created by smashing up the economy with astronomical interest rates running at 15%+ so the more impoverished business owners were "borrowing" from the pension funds unchecked and then going bust. Thanks a bunch.