| > Can Britain really afford to cut taxes ? It has already cut services to the bone, while running a large twin deficit. Britain has absolutely not cut services to the bone - that claim in incredibly hyperbolic. More could be done, but in general no-one goes hungry, people are not homeless, garbage is collected, clean water is provided, the rule of law is enforced, the court system is healthy, public transport is good, schools and universities are doing fine, pensions are paid and health care continues to be rather good and excellent value for money. Cash budgets have increased every year in the past twenty. It's not perfect but don't let the resentful wailey-wailey nature of those who want more public spending from 'moral' conviction convince you that the UK is anything other than a well-functioning first world country with good public services and a well-educated population. Public services are about the best that they have ever been. That will continue to be true even if the rate of corporate tax is reduced. > Ireland can afford lower tax rates because its such a small country - Dublin is nothing like London and can survive on low investment, and Ireland does not have complex public health service like the NHS. Other people have already told you that Ireland spends more and achieves less on health care. There are many large countries with lower taxes than Britain that are doing more or less just fine. There is much, much more to investment than tax-and-spend governmental intervention. > Also lower rates really doesn't mean anything if you are unable to access customers. What Brexit represents is a demand shock to British business, a kind of deflation that has caused the collapse of society in the past. I'd love to have an example of British societal collapse in the recent past as a consequence of demand shock, but you won't be able to give me one because it doesn't exist. At worst, we have the union-backed strikes in the seventies causing a collapse of public services, but there was no revolution, no breakdown in law and order and no termination of any major political entity. The current global system is undergoing something of deflation with almost all major currencies undergoing 'quantitative easing' to attempt to address it. This is not a Brexit phenomenon and affects the Euro area and the EU worse than it affects sterling. That will likely continue to be true. > A market of 55 million people is too small for doing any serious 21st Century type globalized business. In accordance with the rest of your claims, this is both subtly incorrect in fact and hyperbolic in claim. Your population figure is low by 15%, but the main point is that Brexit doesn't mean building a Trump-style wall around the island or pulling it into the mid-Atlantic. Cross-border trade will function just fine outside of the EU and Britain will continue to be a tier-2 globally trading nation behind the US, China and perhaps Japan, but on a par with or ahead of everyone else. Brexit does not mean a severing of all ties with the rest of the world and the breathless discussion of what it means really pisses me off. Some (not all) of the UK's interaction with European countries will change in some subtle ways. New accommodations will be reached. Predicting 'societal collapse' is chicken-little-style doom-mongering and hysteria - if you took the same approach to your regular life, you'd never go outside for fear of being hit by a meteor, catching SARS, being hit by lightning or some other flouncey, drama-queen, childish panic. In short: Brexit - some stuff will change, but most of it won't be as bad as you think, and perhaps some of it might be good! :-) |
Use of foodbanks is at record levels. Families in poverty are at the highest they've been for years; often those families are in work.
> people are not homeless,
If by homeless you mean "rough sleeping" then rates of homelessness are at the highest they've been for years. (numbers for 2015 are double the number for 2015) If you mean statutory homelessness then they're at the highest they've been for years. (But counting rough sleepers, statutory homeless, and vulnerably housed people in the UK is tricky).
> garbage is collected,
Amount of fly-tipping appears to have increased, although that might just be better reporting and recording. Most councils have moved from weekly collections to fortnightly collection, and some are thinking of moving to once every three weeks.
> clean water is provided,
This is a commercial service provided by tax avoiding private companies.
> the rule of law is enforced, the court system is healthy,
Legal aid has been cut from many many people, leaving a lot of people without access to justice. This is especially the case in family law. There's a risk that children's human rights to a family life are being interfered with.
> public transport is good,
Mostly private companies. Public transport is good in large cities; somewhat good in large towns; pretty lousy outside large towns.
> schools and universities are doing fine,
Cost of loans has increased, amount of debt that students leave university with is highest it's ever been
> pensions are paid
Tell that to the 50something women who've been fucked over by governments increasing retiring age several times, leaving those women thousands of pounds out of pocket. Or tell that to C&A workers.
> and health care continues to be rather good
A&E 4 hour targets aren't being met; consultant-led waiting times aren't being met; UK has pretty terrible outcomes for cancer; MH is not good.
Children with mental illness find it very hard to get a bed, and those beds may be hundreds of miles away from their home. Community care for children with mental illness has always been rough, but with the Young People's Transformation Plan we were supposed to see things get better. Some CCGs took that money for young people and spent it elsewhere.
Last month there were zero in-patient beds for adults with mental illness. This means that very sick people (because rightly nowadays you have to be very ill to get an in-patient place) are at increased risk of death and severe harm. Out of county in-patient treatment for adults with mental illness is at record levels.
Politicians lie if they say the NHS has had increase in spending. NHS deficits are at record levels; NHS budgets have been cut in anyway you define budget and cut. It isn't possible to look at current NHS budgets and say they've been increased.
Cutting wages (and removing bursaries) means there are many posts that are unfilled, and some of those are substantive posts.
> and excellent value for money.
We do a lot for not much money. But there are a lot of things that have excellent "spend to save" numbers that we don't do because they're too expensive, so we save today but spend tomorrow.
Austerity has had massive impact on public services, especially the NHS.