Is Ed Miliband A Man Of Yesterday?
Ed Miliband the Labour leader has stated that "David Cameron is squeezing the living standards of ordinary families, he wants to make it easier to sack workers and he is letting the banks off the hook."
Dealing first with the Banks, this is absolute balderdash because the man who ruined the UK banks by taking the power of regulation away from the Bank of England was none other than Gordon Brown. The Old Lady of Threadneedle Street as the Bank is known clearly knew a lot more about banking supervision than Ed Milband's predecessor as leader of the Labour party ,Gordon Brown.
Dealing with the point about letting go employees all that has been mooted is a simple return to where legislation used to be. It was for many years that an employee could only bring a claim for unfair dismissal if they had worked for an employer for more than two years as opposed to one year which it is now. Many employers are put off taking people on due to the high incidence of what are often less than genuine cases of unfair dismissal. What is wrong with a two year period? I would say nothing to a genuine employee.
Dealing with the squeeze on living standards I assume he is referring to the recent VAT increase from 17.5% to 20%. The last Labour chancellor Alistair Darling had not ruled out an rise in VAT. One of the biggest financial pressures is that on petrol and the fuel multiplier was introduced by Labour.
I think that the time has come for Ed Miliband to face the truth that his party when in power introduced a much relaxed system of banking supervsion with terrible results. It was his party who Knighted Sir Fred Goodwin the previous CEO of The Royal Bank of Scotland now some 80% owned by the British tax payer.
When Labour was in government they sold 400 Metric Tonnes of Gold at US $275 an oz compared to a market price today in excess of US $1,375. This represents a loss at todays value of just under 10 Billion pounds. That is the cost of keeping the army in Afghanistan for two years.Guess whose initials appear on the memos relating to this disposal none other than Ed Miliband's!
Labour at their first budget in 1998 did away with the ability of pension finds to recover the tax on their investment income. In so doing they struck a massive blow at the ordinary working man. When they came to power the UK pension industry was one of the strongest in the world it is now one of the weakest.
Labour sent British troops to Afghanistan with out the proper armoured vehicles and a lack of helicopters,
Gordon Brown the ex Prime Minister goes down in history as the only PM to give misleading information to a Government enquiry (The Chillcot Enquiry). He was forced into a very harmful retreat after he finally admitted that he had misled the Iraq Inquiry and Parliament about the funds handed to the armed forces. Senior military figures complained bitterly after the Prime Minster told Sir John Chilcot's inquiry that the budget for British troops had risen above the rate of inflation every year for the last decade. Mr Brown later repeated the claim in the Commons. He was wrong and had to admit that figures increased only in cash terms. An even bigger criticism is that no war budget was set.
This problem over calculations seems a common failing in the Labour party as only last week, Mr Johnson, Ed Miliband's shadow chancellor said the VAT rise will impact on food prices where as that tax is not applied on most foods. What an elementary error to make!
On televison he said that National Insurance was 20% where as it is 12.8%!
Johnson whilst on Sky Television calling for the employer contribution of National Insurance to be raised from 20 to 21 per cent as he did not know what the correct rate was!
He had to be corrected by the interviewer that it is in fact 12.8 per cent.
Ed Miliband is the leader of a failed party having brought the economy of the UK to the worst recession in living memory to have them involved in the future economy would be like asking the Captain of the Titanic to organise the rescue.
To sum up I have to ask Is Ed Miliband a man of Today? No it is clear that he is very much yesterday's man.
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The author writes a great many articles on politics and for more information please go to http://www.ed-miliband.blogspot.com
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