The Chancellor in the UK is set to launch his final Budget of this Parliament on Wednesday – and because he belongs to the political party that has got the country into the financial mess it is in in the first place, and that political party is not odds on favourite to win the next election, funnily enough - he is not expected to rock the boat any more and upset anybody with what he plans.
In other words, don’t bank on the forthcoming Budget to show Britain’s bleak black hole of debt – the truth will only out after the election is done and dusted. This is what we’ve been saying for weeks, and now the popular press in the UK is backing our point all the way to the polling stations in May.
But how is this of relevance to you? Well, if you’re planning on moving abroad to escape the state of the UK, you may want to leave sooner rather than later – i.e., before the truth is revealed at which point our currency could sink even lower and our housing market could be back on its knees. Or if you’re thinking about repatriation to the UK, take your rose coloured glasses off, because chances are, things in Britain are a lot worse than when you left.
There was a conspiracy theory doing the rounds at the time of the last US election – it said that the Republicans purposefully pulled aged, fairly useless McCain and the embarrassing Sarah Palin out of the hat to run against the Democrats’ exceptionally strong candidate Obama. Why? Because there was no way the Republicans wanted to be back in power for the following term whilst America sank into the depths of its economic black hole – created of course by the Republicans!
In other words, the Republicans were very happy for Obama to win and take on the terrible situation that they had created under George W Bush…after all, Obama could barely make it worse could he? So the conspiracy theory plays out as follows - once Obama has dragged America through enforced change and been forced to watch millions of Americans lose their homes and jobs because of the debt-laden state of the nation he inherited when he became President, Obama will be forced out of office at the next election by Republicans reminding Americans that they’ve never had it so bad have they? And it’s all the Democrats fault! And you can bank on the fact they’ll have binned McCain and Palin when it comes to election time – and have new, shiny, powerful and charismatic candidates. They bank on Americans having no political understanding or long-term memory…which is a dangerous game to play.
However, a similar scenario could be at play in the UK – I mean, who in their right mind is going to vote for blundering Brown and darling Alistair at the next election? Was it Tony’s plan all along – ruin the nation but make Brown and Darling the scapegoats? Bring the Conservatives in then, and make them the party to reveal the terrible news to the British public about how dire the state of the nation really is? Then, after one term of the Tories when the UK suffers it’s harshest winter of financial cuts, job losses, debts, repossessions and tax hikes ever, bring back a fresh faced Labour Party again to put some sparkle in to our lives!
Hmmm – all too far fetched?
Perhaps?
But what about this week’s budget then?
There’s a whole piece of analysis about it in this week’s Times – stating quite categorically that there will be no harsh changes, required spending cuts, desperately needed tax hikes or even truth in this Budget. No. This Budget will be all about ‘pandering’ to the public in a last ditch effort to deflect attention from the terrible mess the Labour Party has left us in. There may be legislation proposed to stop tax avoidance, there could even be positive news about tax-free savings…but there won’t be much truth laid bare.
Rather a post election Budget is what we need to be steeling ourselves for – a post Election budget, delivered by whichever party is in power will be the one where the true state of the nation finally becomes clearer. I can just picture the Chancellor delivering it with a black executioner’s hat on his head…because you can bet your bottom dollar on one thing, we really haven’t seen how bad things are going to get in great Britain yet.
For those of us fortunate enough to be living abroad and watching from a safe distance it is as fascinating as it is desperately sad…but for those still stuck in the UK or being forced to return, it’s akin to being abroad the Titanic as she began her rapid descent to the bottom of the ocean.
