I am not in Nottingham this weekend at the Tory Spring Forum. It's the first time for quite a few years I haven't been able to go, but the wonders of the internet mean that I can still follow what is going on. William Hague's speech this afternoon is not the normal Hague knockabout. It's not laced with the usual string of jokes. It looks to me a good indication of the tone of the event - a conference which has the air of a party serious about power. Of course Hague wouldn't be Hague without the odd bit of political banter, so I bring you this extract in which he lays into Gordon Brown for stealing £100 billion from Britain's pensioners......And when I say that the failure of Labour is absolute, that brings me to another typical day. Yes, it's the day each month when I have the great privilege of questioning the Deputy Prime Minister at the despatch boxes of the
House of Commons. It's not normally about foreign policy. The time he said he had come back from the 'Balklands' has put paid to that. Sometimes it's about post offices, since he is in charge of co-ordinating government policy on that subject, with the result that 4,000 of them have closed since Labour came to power.
But a few months ago I asked him a simple question. The question, the answer, and the real answer, tell you much of what you need to know about this Government. The question was, since Gordon Brown in his first budget took £5 billion from the pension funds of the nation, what is the total cumulative amount now? This is not of course, as easy as it looks, not just ten times five, because there is all the interest and all the dividends that pensioners would have earned which has also been lost. And the answer was, basically, 'you tell me the answer'. Well, there are two problems with that. One is that ministers are paid to answer questions in the House of Commons and after the next general election we will be only too pleased to answer them instead - but until then it's their job. The second problem is that John Prescott either knew the answer and did not want to reveal it or genuinely had no idea of the extent of Labour's damage to pension funds, and I don't know which is more worrying.
Eventually I did give him the answer, whereupon he, somewhat bizarrely, asked me for....the answer. Well the answer, according to the experts, is that the truly colossal sum of £100 billion has now been lifted from pension funds by the Chancellor. That means that those students at Leeds University can never enjoy the strength of occupational pension provision their parents enjoyed. And I do not believe that any man who did that to them should be our Prime Minister.If our country had, like a company, a balance sheet, it would show that that £100 billion had been removed from its assets. And it would also show, with the vast growth of public sector pensions at the same time, that even bigger numbers had been added to the liabilities. If someone did that to a company there is no way you would ever call them prudent. And if they spent all the money without improving the public services it was given to you would call them utterly incompetent instead.
I couldn,t agree more.Only the clever in 1997 realised what he had done to pensions in the future and rest are waking up.
ReplyDeleteWe now have a situation where people employed by the Government can retire at 55 or 60 or in my case even less!
Meanwhile those who pay my pension have to keep on working until they are 67 or thereabouts!!
Pension Aparthide now exists in this country and it cannot last!
this is the best post youve ever made. ever. you are just so right iain.
ReplyDeleteOh it's much worse than that Iain - much worse.
ReplyDeleteBy taking the dividend tax credit he reduced funds reinvested in the Stock Market thus lowering share prices.
The low share prices made British companies cheap for Spanish, German, French acquirors and Private Equity.
The Insurance Companies could raise cash by selling shares to Private Equity Funds they were funding themselves, and thus get two bites at the cherry.
The use of PFI has reduced Gilts yields which makes annuity rates very low for people forced to buy them by age 75.
Thus instead of issuing Gilts to prop up Pension Funds and Annuities Brown has sucked capital out of Pension Funds and forced them to look for Private Equity deals or PFI to compensate for low-rating on Equities and shortage of Gilts.
Using CMOs as a substitute for Gilts is dangerous as defaults increase from an over-priced property market as investors seek alternatives to Equities.
To add to this disaster, local authority pension funds are invested in equities so the shortfall has led to increases in Council Taxes
The other gem is that there are fewer and fewer companies in the FTSE, fewer blue-chips to invest in - compare the FT Index now compared to 1990 and the number of Industrials that have gone
The whole system is skewed towards LBOs and as they say 90% debt is <3 years old. When the crash comes there are a lot of equity thin companies which will be in Carey Street until cash-rich Chinese investors buy them out
Brown has destroyed the long-term capital base of the economy
"The rest are waking up".
ReplyDeleteWell, I think they can be woken up. And there are votes in this. Important that it is a situation entirely of Brown's making - it doesn't go away when Blair goes away.
The issue at the next general election? "It's the pensions, stupid."
With the excessive use of outsourcing encouraged by this government there is very little chance of anyone being able to work until aged 67. At aged 27 you’ll be well past your peak, aged 37 you would be very lucky to still be working and by the time you reach 47 you are finished.
ReplyDeleteBrown is cleaver enough to sell off the student loan company as he knows that the number of graduates being able to work long enough to pay off their student loans is going to collapse. The higher earning period will be about 5 years then they will be fighting for minimum wages like the rest of us.
In my opinion Hague is a gem - definitely the best prime minister we never had.
ReplyDeleteBrilliant Hague. I've asked it before and I'll ask it again. FTSE 07/97 and FTSE 03/07.What does the stockmarket tell us about the Greatest Living Chancellor's guardianship of the economy? How has this Enron type, micro managing, social engineer of an idiot been allowed to con everyone with his 'advertisements for myself' beggars belief. He has the social skills of a dysfunctional whelk, has railroaded the civil servants into introducing impossibly complicated tax credits and here we are supposed to be grateful. Mr Osborne get into the ring.
ReplyDeleteI've never been that great an admirer of Hague, but have thought for some time that in the predicted summer reshuffle, he should be given the Shadow Chancellorship.
ReplyDeleteI would be interested to see a left-wing defence of Brown's disastrous meddling.
ReplyDeleteCan we expect the Tories to promise a Chile-style pension system?
How on earth can we look at Hague and Davis , and then compare them to Cameron and his homunculus Osborne and not despair , i just hope labour win next time then they can finally cure us of socialism once and for all.
ReplyDeleteIts know as the "Captain Bob" Maxwell school of economics.He, you may recall, was a Labour supporter.
ReplyDeleteThank God the Tories have started to home in on the question of pensions. Not a moment too soon. They must hammer the point home, week in and week out, not least because Labour have not even begun to formulate a defence.
ReplyDeleteMoreover, it's a particular concern to the age groups most likely to vote.
Brown's borrowing from our future in a wide variety of areas - not just from our pensions - is short-termist electoral-winning economics at its most cynical, and will be absolutely disastrous for the future of the country.
ReplyDeleteWilliam Hague is absolutely correct to focus on it.
It's a measure of the weakness of the opposition that Labour has been allowed to get away with it for so long.
Its know as the "Captain Bob" Maxwell school of economics.He, you may recall, was a Labour supporter.
ReplyDeleteHe was a Labour MP.
One of his sidekicks was Helen Liddle MP - is she now Governor-General in Oz ?
Gordon Brown bought a London flat for £350k or so from Maxwell's remnants - quite a snip apparently
Oh William! You had it all. High intellect, beautiful wife, a top job, then you went to Notting Hill ... wearing that cap! What a waste! Luv Ya tho'!
ReplyDeleteGordon Brown's abolition of Advance Corporation Tax followed inroads made into it in 1993 by the last Conservative Government which operated in exactly the same way. While the abolition of Advance Corporation Tax had some impact, over-regulation both from the last Conservative Government and from the present Government has had a very substantial impact also, and while low interest rates and increased longevity are to be welcomed, they drive up long term pension costs also.
ReplyDeleteSo while I certainly agree that Gordon Brown has made a poor fist of pensions policy, he is not the only culprit, and the Conservatives are by no means blameless.
'Conservatives are by no means blameless'?
ReplyDeleteWhat kind of garbage is that? These moronic prats have had ten years to sort things out and have failed disastrously.
Worse, it will take decades to undo the economic, political, and social damage they have inflicted on this country.
'Prudence' Brown? You bet your sweet bippy!
Chuck Unsworth, it's the sort of garbage that happens to be true. I gave detailed reasons why, and if you care to consult an expert, you'll find that what I said is not particularly controversial.
ReplyDeleteAs I said in my comment, I do hold Gordon Brown responsible, but not exclusively. Since pensions are by their nature long term matters, it is hardly surprising that decisions many years ago are having their full impact only now. Two changes that the Conservatives introduced was particularly damaging: they made it illegal for employers and trustees to reduce accrued benefits in an ongoing scheme without member consent (making it impractical to do so); and they introduced compulsory levels of pension increases, which are now proving very costly. The Conservatives should accept the blame for introducing them, though Labour of course has had ample time to remove them.
Last night I appeared to be accused of being Iain Dale's stooge, tonight I'm being accused of being Gordon Brown's apologist. Fortunately, I am my own man.
When we discuss pensions let's forget state pensions which are an obscene joke and a government fraud on old people.
ReplyDeleteLet's recognize that pension accounting is a very tricky and controversial subject. Not only the size but the very existence of a so-called pension debt by the state towards future old-age pensioners is highly questionable.
But did Gordon Brown steal £100 billion just by withdrawing tax credit on dividends on pension funds investments or has he used some other more blatant and scurrilous means?
Either way what was the purpose of destroying self-provision for old age? And what conceivable claim can such a fraudster have to be prime minister of an ageing electorate?
Voyager
ReplyDeleteI think Brown bought a Westminster flat previously owned by Geoffrey Robinson whoce fortune was generated by servicing a Belgian Jaguar distributer who seemed to receive favours from Jag Boss one G Robinson. Mr R helped her set up an offshore arrangemnt Orion Trust which financed Robinson and Brown. You could say Brown has lived off immoral earnings but this Son of the Manse would not recognise a moral code if it fell on his head.
Anon 6:18 It's a measure of the weakness of the opposition that Labour has been allowed to get away with it for so long
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely right: Hague is at best making up for lost time. Peter Lilley was axed for not making more of this when Brown made his move 9 years ago, and the proof of Osborne's utter uselessness is that the public still does not automatically associate Brown with this crime.
Where is the 2007 analogue of the 'Milk-Snatcher' taunt??
Iain - why doncha run a competiton for a telling new taunt for pension-snatcher McBrown?
and how much did Mr Hague charge for his words of wisdom...?
ReplyDeletehttp://fairdealphil.blogspot.com/2007/03/how-william-hague-earned-30000-during.html#links
£100,000,000,000 is a figure no one can relate to.
ReplyDeleteFar better to express it as the cost to each of the approximately 9 million individuals in this country trying to put together a survivable pension for their later years and you come to an average figure of over £11,000 per individual - that's approximately £1,100 per annum of extra stealth tax from this one source since Labour came to power and it's increasing all the time with the compounding effect.
Iraq apart, this is the single biggest issue which will ultimately do for Labour and more particularly for Brown at the next General Election.
Did he ever really think he was going to get away with this?
Someone above asked: Either way what was the purpose of destroying self-provision for old age?
ReplyDeleteSurely to make retired people, who are very likely to vote, clients of the state who would be afraid to vote against Labour?
These are a nasty, vicious crew. As was obvious from even before the British were stupid enough to elect them. They voted for the slaughterhouse.
Socialism's legacy is the destruction of every industry that once made the country great.
ReplyDeleteAt the behest of their former soviet masters they destroyed the manufacturing sector through regulation interference and nationalisation. Now on the orders of their new masters in Brussels they are setting about the financial services sector, of which the pensions funds are a major part.
Sadly the Tory legacy is that the party was too timid to do anything and thus failed to undo the damage until it was too late.
Politicians of every hue should be crawling on their knees begging the British people for their forgiveness before doing the honourable thing by putting a service revolver to their temples and pulling the trigger.
"Hague Attacks Brown's Pensions Legacy"
ReplyDeleteIs it just me or is Hague looking and sounding more like Alf Garnett every day?
Anon
ReplyDeleteCompared to the bunch of worthless, con artists currently infesting the government benches like a plague of locusts, Alf Garnet was a philosopher of almost equal stature to those Greek chappies.
Even if he did support West Ham.
RM