"David Cameron tells porkies about Britain’s national debt"

Anyone might assume this headline was taken from a left of centre Labour Party supporting source. What is remarkable is that it is taken from the respected, right of centre Spectator.

The article accuses Cameron of being "so astonishingly dishonest" in last Wednesday's Conservative Party Political Broadcast and robustly refutes the claim made by Cameron in the broadcast that "...we are making progress. We're paying down Britain's debts".

The article attributed to the Spectator's Editor, Frazer Nelson, goes on:

“David Cameron’s policy is to increase Britain’s debt by 60 per cent, more than any European country. To increase it more over five years than Labour did over 13 years.  Just yesterday, we learned the national debt had hit £1,111 billion and it’s heading to £1,400 billion.

By no stretch of the English language can this be described as “paying down Britain’s debts.” What Cameron said is not an exaggeration. It’s a straight falsehood, and one that demeans his office. He has previously used different language, saying that he is “dealing with the debt”. The below graph says it all:

The day after the broadcast Labour’s Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury Rachel Reeves MP said:
"This suggests that the Conservative Party may be attempting to deliberately mislead the public about these statistics and the Government’s record"

Maybe what is equally worrying as the blatant falsehoods is that the national news channels and newspapers have made so little comment on this palpable untruth and they have in effect colluded with peddling this Tory led Government's propaganda.

There is little doubt since the 2010 election the Tory led Government have been effective in promoting the belief that the deficit was caused by an overspending Labour Government. This has been repeated so often that it rarely gets challenged by the media anymore. At this point Tory spokespeople omit to mention that as late as 2008 George Osborne was actually advocating sticking to Labour spending pledges.

When it comes to facts, with the one exception of the 1974-79 Labour Government, it is the Tory Goverments' record which makes Labour Government the low cost  option.




Government expenditure as percentage of GDP

The credibility of this Tory led  Government is rapidly dissolving before us.

The slogan "You can't  trust the Tories with the NHS" can now be supplemented with "You can't trust the Tories with the facts". 

Tories demonising poor as cover for dismantling welfare state

Councillor Peter Curling, Leader of the Hillingdon Labour Group, has hit out at Tory tactics to demonise low paid workers reliant on benefits as cover to dismantle the welfare state.

"The Conservative led coalition government continues to attack and dismantle the welfare state, something that my grandparent’s generation worked so hard to provide for us.  That generation suffered two world wars and really fought through hard times in the hope that their efforts would provide a better standard of living and better lives for future generations.

In order to dismantle and remove everything that was achieved by my grandparent’s generation the Conservative tactic seems to be to demonise benefit claimants as skivers and then trying to turn public opinion against them and effectively make the poor poorer whilst coaxing them to blame one another.

When George Osborne announced a real terms cut in the cash value of welfare benefits, and made reference to the workshy in bed with the curtains closed, he failed to mention that only 2% of the welfare bill goes to the unemployed. 

In Hillingdon there are over 6000 people in low paid jobs and claiming benefit, despite what a millionaire like George Osborne might think, these people are by no means workshy skivers in bed with the curtains closed.

It is also interesting to note that 83% of new housing benefit claimants are in work as are three quarters of all those who claim tax credit.

Meanwhile at the other end of the scale we see that people earning over £150,000 a year are getting a 5% tax reduction.  This really does prove that we are not and never have been all in this together.

Even locally the Conservatives are boasting that they are freezing council tax again this year, but the localisation of council tax benefit and the local Tory scheme means that the lowest paid and the unwaged will see around a 20% rise in their council tax.  So once again those that can least afford it have to pay more.

We are seeing more and more demand on charity run food banks with people in real need and struggling to put food on the table, and at the same time highly paid bankers, speculators and executives are still raking in their obscene bonuses.

We must not let the current government hoodwink us by pitching us against each other whilst they rip apart our welfare state that people like my grandparents fought so hard to provide.

Ed Miliband sets out plans to protect private rented housing tenants

As previously described in these pages there exists an unequal relationship between private landlords and their tenants which distorts the housing market and leaves too many tenants at the mercy of unscrupulous landlords and their agents.

Ed Miliband
Leader of the Labour Party

In a speech on Saturday, Ed Miliband outlined plans to rebalance the relationship between private landlords and their tenants.

“ Britain is in danger of having two nations divided between those who own their one homes and those who rent.  If we are going to build One Nation, people who rent their homes should have rights and protections as well.

That’s about rooting out the rogue landlords.  Stopping families being ripped off by letting agents.  And giving new security to families who rent.

So we will introduce a national register of landlords, to give greater powers for local authorities to root out and strike off rogue landlords.  We will end the confusing, inconsistent fees and charges in the private rented sector.  And we will seek to give greater security to families who rent and remove the barriers that stand in the way of longer term tenancies