Congratulations, Gordon

[Guest]

Brown, that is.

Not only did you contrive an unworkable triumvirate system (which failed) to regulate our financial sector

Not only did you sell a large part of our gold reserves at a time of record low prices.

No. it would appear now that you overpaid for all those bank shares.

Thank God, you and Darling are no longer in power !

Oh, and congratulations for putting in an appearance in the Commons after 14 months. Long holiday, was it?

[teamsaint]

if this is going to be a "have a go at politicians who did/do a terrible job" thread, it will make the Sibelius BAL thread look like a throwaway one liner......
probably better tempered though !

[decantor]

Brown, that is.
Not only did you contrive an unworkable triumvirate system (which failed) to regulate our financial sector
Not only did you sell a large part of our gold reserves at a time of record low prices.
No. it would appear now that you overpaid for all those bank shares......

I do not understand, RM, why Gordon escapes your reproach for his 1997 raid on private pension provision, thereby seriously weakening it at a time when he was busy bolstering public sector pensions to levels now proving unsustainable. Was not this his most unkindest cut of all?

[johnb]

And, of corse, he was solely responsible for the fall of Lehmans and the whole financial crisis.

[cloughie]

And, of corse, he was solely responsible for the fall of Lehmans and the whole financial crisis.

...and of course Gideon has done a wonderful job in sorting it all out. What temperature does he like his pasty?

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I do not understand, RM, why Gordon escapes your reproach for his 1997 raid on private pension provision, thereby seriously weakening it at a time when he was busy bolstering public sector pensions to levels now proving unsustainable.

The public sector pensions are perfectly sustainable. The fact that David Camerom repeatedly says that they are unsustainable is a blatant untruth. The fact is that the government of the day (of any party) raids the contributions paid by public sector workers and uses it to pay for other things. Just remember how gleeful was that Tory minister was, when they took over the Royal Mail pension fund, enabling them to spend more money on a pet project.

[ahinton]

I do not understand, RM, why Gordon escapes your reproach for his 1997 raid on private pension provision, thereby seriously weakening it at a time when he was busy bolstering public sector pensions to levels now proving unsustainable. Was not this his most unkindest cut of all?

Perhaps he does but simply happened not to mention it at this point.

[ahinton]

And, of corse, he was solely responsible for the fall of Lehmans and the whole financial crisis.

Of course he wasn't, but he and his henchpersons nevertheless did little to reduce its adverse effects.

[ahinton]

...and of course Gideon has done a wonderful job in sorting it all out. What temperature does he like his pasty?

And of course he hasn't; not that it necessarily can be sorted out, just like the Brown pension raid mentioned above cannot now be sorted out properly because it's too late and too much irreparable damage has been done.

[teamsaint]

The public sector pensions are perfectly sustainable. The fact that David Camerom repeatedly says that they are unsustainable is a blatant untruth. The fact is that the government of the day (of any party) raids the contributions paid by public sector workers and uses it to pay for other things. Just remember how gleeful was that Tory minister was, when they took over the Royal Mail pension fund, enabling them to spend more money on a pet project.

spot on . Divide and rule.
(i don't have a public sector pension).

[ahinton]

The public sector pensions are perfectly sustainable. The fact that David Camerom repeatedly says that they are unsustainable is a blatant untruth. The fact is that the government of the day (of any party) raids the contributions paid by public sector workers and uses it to pay for other things. Just remember how gleeful was that Tory minister was, when they took over the Royal Mail pension fund, enabling them to spend more money on a pet project.

Are any pensions any longer genuinely and demonstrably "sustainable" for any useful amount of time? I think that Mr Cameron's assertions here are less of a blatant untruth than a half-truth at best (which is, however, no better than the blatant untruth of which you accuse them). All pension funds require - and always have required and always will require - three fundamental things, namely a growing market at least for part of the terms of most contributors' contributions, wise investment on the part of pension trustees and, above all, affordability on the part of the contributors, be they employees, employers or the self-employed; that there is (a) no guarantee of any, let alone all, of these things on a permanent basis and (b) a situation in which at least some of those who have vested such pensions as they can lay their hands on are living longer add up to an ever greater likelihood that increasing numbers of people, whether or not in receipt of some kinds of pension, will continue to need sources of income in order to sustain themselves that may not be provided by any forms of pension. There are other investment vehicles that can be used for retirement saving purposes in any case but, more importantly, the very idea of "retirement" as some kind of inevitability has already been ebbing away for some people for quite some time and looks set to continue to do so for increasing numbers of people, so let's hope that at least some of us will be fit enough to continue working at the age of 103 like Elliott Carter did.

[teamsaint]

I am not in the business of supporting the labour party, but another lie put about is that labour was reckless with public spending.
The truth is that until the banks crashed, they broadly kept public spending at the long term average for governments of both parties.In fact for most of their tenure, it was well below the important 40% of GDP level.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2010/apr/25/uk-public-spending-1963

[Resurrection Man]

I do not understand, RM, why Gordon escapes your reproach for his 1997 raid on private pension provision, thereby seriously weakening it at a time when he was busy bolstering public sector pensions to levels now proving unsustainable. Was not this his most unkindest cut of all?

I forgot that one!

[Resurrection Man]

Are any pensions any longer genuinely and demonstrably "sustainable" for any useful amount of time? .....

You are right, of course, and belies my stated belief that there are too many people on the planet and especially in the UK. That is the one thing that I can't square within myself. We need more and more people of younger age to earn money to pay tax to fund the pensions and the drain on the NHS of the ever-increasing number of elderly.

[teamsaint]

Other than boosting public sector employment, (and that was in the context of keeping public spending well under control), what did Gordon do to "bolster public sector pensions?"

Teachers pensions were made more restrictive (working to age 65 for new entrants) under labour, for example. This was later than their raid on private pensions, but the fact remains that they took action on the cost of that particular pension scheme.