2010 budget

[Aquaman]

this is madness atm

all this financial crisis sh*t is just giving them carte blanche to forward all these radical schemes for "saving money"

its even more bullshit when they still spending big chunks of budget on bullshit.

[Flojo]

Chancellor George Osborne has announced the government's four-year Spending Review to Parliament, revealing some of the deepest cuts in public spending in decades.

The key announcements:

About 490,000 public sector jobs likely to be lost

Average 19% four-year cut in departmental budgets

Structural deficit to be eliminated by 2015

£7bn in additional welfare budget cuts

Police funding cut by 4% a year

Retirement age to rise from 65 to 66 by 2020

English schools budget protected; £2bn extra for social care

NHS budget in England to rise every year until 2015

Regulated rail fares to rise 3% above inflation

Bank levy to be made permanent

Here, department by department, are more details.

Business, Innovation and Skills

Annual budget: £21.2bn

What's being cut: Annual cut of 7.1% or 25% over the period

Administration costs to be cut by £400m with 24 quangos axed. The Train to Gain programme to be axed. University funding to be cut and reform of student tuition fees building on Browne review. The science budget is to be frozen - in cash terms - rather than cut as had been feared. Funding for 75,000 adult apprenticeships a year.

Cabinet Office

Annual budget: £2.6bn

What's being cut: £55m cut in budget. Support for citizenship and "big society" projects. Cabinet Office officials to move into Treasury. Civil List cash funding for Royal Household to be frozen next year. New system of funding for Royal Household from 2013.

Communities and Local Government

Annual budget: £33.6bn

What's being cut: Councils will see a 7.1% annual fall in their budgets. But ring-fencing of local authority revenue grants will end and councils will have freedom to borrow against their assets. Funding for social housing to be cut by more than 60%, with new tenants having to pay higher rents. But the government hopes these changes will free up funds to build 150,000 new affordable homes over the next four years.

Culture, Media and Sport

Annual budget: £2bn

What's being cut: Budget cut 24% over four years. Administration costs to be cut 41% while core arts programmes will see a 15% fall in funding. Free museum entry to remain in place. BBC licence fee to be frozen for next six years. Corporation will also fund World Service and BBC Monitoring. Adds up to equivalent of 16% savings over the period.

Defence

Annual budget: £46.1bn

What's being cut: 8% cut over four years

The RAF and navy will lose 5,000 jobs each, the Army 7,000 and the Ministry of Defence 25,000 civilian staff. The Harrier jump jets and the Ark Royal aircraft carrier are being axed while the planned Nimrod spy planes will be cancelled. Key spending decision on Trident to be delayed until 2016.

Education

Annual budget: £57.6bn

What's being cut: Overall, a 3.4% real term fall over four years. Five quangos to be abolished. But direct funding to schools in England is to be protected, their budgets rising from £35bn to £39bn. Confirmed £2.5bn "pupil premium" for teaching for disadvantaged pupils. Educational Maintenance Allowances to be replaced. Sure Start budget to be protected in cash terms.

Energy and Climate Change

Annual budget: £3.1bn

What's being cut: 5% annual budget cut, equivalent to 18% over the period. Plan for tidal barrage on the Severn estuary scrapped. But £200m funding for wind power development and £1bn for green investment bank.

Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

Annual budget: £2.9bn

What's being cut: 8% annual cut, equivalent to 29% over the period. More money for flood defence.

Foreign Office

Annual budget: £2.2bn

What's being cut: 24% cut in funding over four years. Reduction in Whitehall-based diplomats.

Health

Annual budget: £106.4bn

Outcome: The NHS in England will get a 1.3% real terms rise in funding by 2015. New cancer drug fund to be provided. But £20bn in efficiency and productivity savings sought in NHS by the end of the parliament. An extra £2bn for social care by 2014-15.

Home Office

Annual budget: £10.2bn

What's being cut: Budget cut of 6% a year, equivalent to 24% fall over the period.

Police budget cut by 4% a year, focused on bureaucracy rather than manpower. Aim to maintain "visibility and availability" of officers on beat. But some experts believe 18,000 police jobs could be lost. UK Border Agency budget to fall 20%. Counter-intelligence budget to fall 10%.

International development

Annual budget: £7.7bn

What's being cut: The overseas aid budget is to be protected from cuts but not the department's other costs. Budget to rise to £11.6bn over four years to meet UN aid commitment. But aid to China and Russia is to stop and there will be a reduction in administration costs.

Justice

Annual budget: £9.7bn

What's being cut: Budget to fall by 6% a year, equivalent to 23% over the period.

Plan for new 1,500-place prison to be dropped. 3,000 fewer prison places expected by 2015. £1.3bn capital investment in prison estate.

Northern Ireland/Scotland/Wales

Annual budget: £55.5bn

What's being cut: Scotland's block grant to fall by 6.8% by 2014-5. SNP ministers have said that cuts to the Scottish budget will threaten 12,000 jobs. Central funding for Wales is to be cut by 7.5% - the Welsh Assembly Government says its budget will be cut by £1.8bn in real terms over four years. Northern Ireland funding to be reduced by 6.9% over four years, First Minister Peter Robinson has said cuts to be implemented in Northern Ireland are worse than he had anticipated.

Transport

Annual budget: £13.6bn

What's being cut: 21% budget cut over four years. £30bn set aside for capital spending, including £500m for Tyne and Wear Metro and Tees Valley bus network. Crossrail project to go ahead in London. Rise in regulated cap on rail fares to 3% above inflation for three years from 2012.

Treasury

Annual budget: £4.4bn

Treasury spending hard to quantify as current year's spending is expected to be negative as a result of repaid loans to the banks.

What's being cut: 33% cut in budget over four years. Bank levy to be made permanent. £900m to target tax evasion. £1.5bn in compensation to Equitable Life policyholders hit by its near collapse. 15% cut in funding for Revenue and Customs.

Watch: The Chancellor on the bank levy

Work and Pensions

Annual budget: £9bn in departmental spending

Separate welfare and pensions budget: £192bn

Outcome: State pension age for men to start rising from 65 in 2018 - six years earlier than planned - and reaching 66 by 2020. Rise in retirement age for women to accelerate, also reaching 66 by 2020. The measures combined will save £5bn a year. Reform of public sector pensions to save £1.8bn by 2015, with employees likely to contribute more. Winter fuel allowance, free bus passes and TV licences for 75-year-olds protected. Cuts to child benefit for higher rate taxpayers to generate £2.5bn. £2bn investment in new universal credit. Weekly child element on child tax credit to rise by £30 in 2012 and £50 by 2012.

What's being cut?: A further £7bn in welfare savings planned on top of £11bn already announced. A new 12-month time limit for the one million people on employment and support allowance to find work or face benefit cut. 10% cut in council tax benefit budget. New threshold on housing benefit. Maximum savings award in pension credit to be frozen for four years. Increased working hours threshold for working tax credits for couples with children. New total benefits cap per family.

[Flojo]

.

[Thun]

Always told people that they will have downgrade your standard of living to fulfil there agenda

[Guest Yilmaz]

Always told people that they will have downgrade your standard of living to fulfil there agenda

Not necessarily a bad thing. Ppl been living from some credit based dream.

[Flojo]

Always told people that they will have downgrade your standard of living to fulfil there agenda

didn't you also we'd being living under increased scrutiny in the form of more CCTV surveillance and the introduction of ID cards?

[Thun]

Always told people that they will have downgrade your standard of living to fulfil there agenda

didn't you also we'd being living under increased scrutiny in the form of more CCTV surveillance and the introduction of ID cards?

When we aint the world leader in CCTV surveillance then you may have a point. Thats one good thing this current government have done is scapping ID cards

[Mr Q]

They ran on this whole broken society thing, yet they are cutting from the very institutions that need to be improved to make their "broken society" work better.

f*ck you George Osborne, you smug c*nt.

[Mr Q]

And these cunts were cheering and patting this c*nt on the back, WTF?!

[Guest Yilmaz]

lol that was jokes

so co-ordinated

[Guest Triple XXX]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11595441

a nice article outlining the winners n losers in this

[Mr Q]

The coalition doesn't actually give a f*ck.

The migration cap (in particularly how it will impact students) is so retarded considering they have slashed the budget to uni's by 80%.

Universities warn migration limit cuts won't just hurt their finances. Cuts to migration limits will mean less of the £2.2bn overseas student share, universities warn, and a drop in research staff

They lack any type of forward thinking.

[Superstition]

If they cap international student intake LSE and Imperial are f*cked they line their nest extorting international students. And if there's a funding gap the costs will move onto UK students before the top unis scale back research faculty and reputation. Nice fees bump incoming. The march of the big society

[Guest Waka Flocka Dave]

i feel like im in some sort of Armando Iannucci satire

this sh*t aint f*ckin happening

but real talk this has to happen so that people see these people do not belong in power, but i dnt know if we could hack a whole 4 or however many years they want to extend the terms to

the co-olition wont last

[carpedeum]

If they cap international student intake LSE and Imperial are f*cked they line their nest extorting international students. And if there's a funding gap the costs will move onto UK students before the top unis scale back research faculty and reputation. Nice fees bump incoming. The march of the big society

the govt have said that the main students targeted are those studying sub degrees, so most of LSE and imperial's student's shoudlnt be affected. but once again they fail to address the real problem which is that they say students pay fees for one yr for a 2yr course to do english or Btech at a "college" then many disappear and drop out of the school, but still have a 2yr visa.

so why the hell give them a 2yr visa then, and not get it renewed somehow after 12 months, or contact the uni to confirm attendance. during the summer break in the US when i studied my masters i had to book an appt with the consulate office and get the uni to fax over forms that confirmed i was still in attendance. all done in 30mintues. watch them say it will cost 40 trillion to implement this here

[Supermalt]

lol @ thinking labour wont be doing this if in power

result of society's addiction to debt

[Guest Yilmaz]

lol @ thinking labour wont be doing this if in power

result of poor women always wanting sh*t they can't f*ck*ng afford like mortgages, gucci bags and louboutin shoes

FYP

[YesWeCain]

How comes we're in such a dire state yet still give money away to musicians who sing and write lyrics yet drive bentleys and sh*t on us.

Government needs to rob the music industry, rob the footballers, not rob the public, nhs,

[Guest Waka Flocka Dave]

he's gonna spend £2m to find out what makes us happy

Cameron's £2m quest to measure nation's happiness

How to measure happiness is the question being asked by David Cameron with the launch of a £2m consultation on how to best assess our well-being.

The prime minister will argue that economic growth is an "incomplete" way of calculating progress, and that it should also include quality of life.

The Office for National Statistics will lead the debate on what matters most to us, before launching a survey in April.

Mr Cameron believes the new measure will help focus policy.

Launching the consultation on Thursday, the prime minister will say: "From April next year we will start measuring our progress as a country not just by how our economy is growing, but by how our lives are improving, not just by our standard of living, but by our quality of life.

'Re-evaluate priorities'

"We'll continue to measure GDP as we've always done, but it is high time we admitted that, taken on its own, GDP is an incomplete way of measuring a country's progress."

Possible indicators to be included in next year's survey include health, levels of education, inequalities in income and the environment.

BBC home editor Mark Easton said Mr Cameron was determined to put his personal stamp on Britain's search for a new way of measuring social progress despite doing so in the midst of painful government cuts.

A new measure of well-being will, in time, "lead to government policy that is more focussed not just on the bottom line, but on all those things that make life worthwhile", he will say.

He will quote former US senator Robert Kennedy, who said GDP measured everything "except that which makes life worthwhile".

The information gathered would help Britain re-evaluate its priorities in life, he will add.

Mr Cameron will deny the changes will sideline economic growth just as the country tries to recover from the recession.

"To those who say that all this sounds like a distraction from the serious business of government, I say finding out what will really improve lives and acting on it is the serious business of government."

The UK government is not the first to seek better measures of progress than GDP - the World Bank, European Commission, United Nations, and Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development have all made the same commitment.

ONS head Jil Matheson said: "There is no shortage of numbers that could be used to construct measures of well-being, but they will only be successful if they are widely accepted and understood.

"We want to develop measures based on what people tell us matters most."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11833241

[Mr Q]

SMH.

Also, Tory MPs can't help but put their foot in it can they?

A Tory MEP today on twitter said, that Phillip Lawrence's killer should of been hung, for his previous robbery charge.

[Guest Waka Flocka Dave]

f*ckin knob

they think theyre funny

certain things politicians just shouldnt do

[Mr Q]

These cunts just play in a different field. Yet instead of forcing them to pay up they are cutting most of our frontline services.

All these politicans are wankers, just sleep in the same bed.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/feb/18/barclays-bank-113m-corporation-tax

Barclays Bank has been forced to admit it paid just £113m in UK corporation tax in 2009 – a year when it rang up a record £11.6bn of profits.

The admission stunned politicians and tax campaigners. It was revealed on the eve of a day of protests planned against the high street banks by activists from UK Uncut, a group set up five months ago to oppose government cuts and corporate tax avoidance.

The Labour MP Chuka Umunna, who lobbied Barclays' chief executive, Bob Diamond, to reveal the tax paid by the bank, described the figure – just 1% of its 2009 profits – as "shocking".

The current rate of corporation tax in the UK is 28%, although global banks such as Barclays – which has hundreds of overseas subsidiaries, including many in tax havens – do not generate all of their profits in their domestic market.

[Mr Q]

Lol, King saying what we bloody well know.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/mar/01/mervyn-king-blames-banks-cuts

Mervyn King has risked reopening the bitter argument over blame for the financial crisis by saying that government spending cuts are the fault of the City and expressing surprise there has not been more public anger.

The governor of the Bank of England said that people made unemployed and businesses bankrupted during the crisis had every reason to be resentful and voice their protest. He told the Treasury select committee that the billions spent bailing out the banks and the need for public spending cuts were the fault of the financial services sector.

"The price of this financial crisis is being borne by people who absolutely did not cause it," he said. "Now is the period when the cost is being paid, I'm surprised that the degree of public anger has not been greater than it has."

King has repeatedly pointed the finger at the City since the crisis erupted in 2007, but this was the first time he blamed bankers for the coalition's spending cuts.

It became clear during the hearing that King and his fellow members of the Bank's monetary policy committee, which sets interest rates, believe the crisis will have a lasting impact on the economy.

[Heero Yuy]

How could I hear on the news that we haven't even got aircraft carrier anymore!!

/

Tbh the banks know their in control, push them to hard and they'll just get up and set up shop else where.

Only person who loses is the country in that scenario.

[Mr. Martinez]

How could I hear on the news that we haven't even got aircraft carrier anymore!!

ahaha ITV took the piss with their report this evening. No aircraft carrier, just one tiny ass ship