Debate 2 - What would you cut?

[davieG]

It's inevitably that cuts to central government and local government will happen, there's already suggestions filtering out from the respective parties. Apparently there needs to be a 20% just to keep our heads above water I'm not sure how many billions that is but you can be sure it's going to cut deep and affect everyone.

What would you cut and why and how would it save money?

[jonthefox]

The first thing i would cut would be overseas aid.charity start at home dont forget.

also, talking to the mrs last night (who`s a nurse btw), she was explaining the reduction of senior trust staff (ie, large salary, do feck all)..and this to me seems a step in the right direction.

[Tabou]

It's inevitably that cuts to central government and local government will happen, there's already suggestions filtering out from the respective parties. Apparently there needs to be a 20% just to keep our heads above water I'm not sure how many billions that is but you can be sure it's going to cut deep and affect everyone.

What would you cut and why and how would it save money?

Firstly, I would cut benefits for the long term incapacitated, who are able to perform other tasks.

I would then pull out every single last troop in Irag/Afghanistan, as sod all has come from it.

I would cut out the need for quangos. Pointless waste of money.

I would probably cut alot more things, after getting carried away with all the cutting I'd be doing...

[Bellend Sebastian]

I'd cut the billions spent on losing the 'war on drugs'

[jonthefox]

sorry to sound thick, but what are quangos ?

[Webbo]

sorry to sound thick, but what are quangos ?

Quasi Autonomous Non-Governmental Organisation.

Supposedly commitees who decide how to spend govt money but are at arms lenght from govt. In reality they are just cushy jobs for govt cronies.

[Big Ol' Bob]

I'D CUT THE SMALL TALK AND GET RIGHT DOWN TO BUSINESS.

KNOW WHAT I MEAN GORDON???

[Guest Bilo]

Quangoes have proved to be an horrific waste of money under Labour and need to go.

The benefits system needs to be modernised so those who need them can get access to them, and those who get them without deserving lose their benefits.

The NHS needs reforming, a vital service has turned into a money pit under Labour and the money squandered on managerial perks would be far better spent on frontline staff and equipment.

We need to pull out of Afghanistan as soon as is militarily possible, a wasteful conflict in terms of human lives and money.

Stop pretending that 50% of all children are capable of attending university and put money into vocational training for those who can't. That should stem the horrendous dropout rate in universities and enable those who shouldn't be at uni to find jobs and pay into the system earlier.

The courts are tied up with too many non-crimes like failure to pay Council Tax and the prisons are full to bursting. Less people should go to prison for such offences and community service schemes extended. I do however agree that those convicted of serious crimes should receive heavy prison sentences.

I actually don't feel savage cuts are needed, it's just that this government has wasted so much money on foolhardy projects and badly thought out ideas since 1997 that the money needs to be better directed.

[Tommy G]

''Managers'' who work at Hosiptals

PAH!

Get out. I believe the pay freeze on higher paid public sector worksers will be benificial. GP's already get paid far too much as it is for example..

[Dr The Singh]

Cut all luxuries in prisons!!

[Guest Bilo]

Cut all luxuries in prisons!!

That too.

Prison should never be seen as a desirable option but as something that should be avoided at all costs. Can you really say that about a place where you get three square meals a deal, free access to gyms and libraries and TVs in rooms?

[davieG]

Quangoes have proved to be an horrific waste of money under Labour and need to go.

The benefits system needs to be modernised so those who need them can get access to them, and those who get them without deserving lose their benefits.

The NHS needs reforming, a vital service has turned into a money pit under Labour and the money squandered on managerial perks would be far better spent on frontline staff and equipment.

We need to pull out of Afghanistan as soon as is militarily possible, a wasteful conflict in terms of human lives and money.

Stop pretending that 50% of all children are capable of attending university and put money into vocational training for those who can't. That should stem the horrendous dropout rate in universities and enable those who shouldn't be at uni to find jobs and pay into the system earlier.

The courts are tied up with too many non-crimes like failure to pay Council Tax and the prisons are full to bursting. Less people should go to prison for such offences and community service schemes extended. I do however agree that those convicted of serious crimes should receive heavy prison sentences.

I actually don't feel savage cuts are needed, it's just that this government has wasted so much money on foolhardy projects and badly thought out ideas since 1997 that the money needs to be better directed.

I think you'll find we do in essence all parties seem to agree on this.

The interest on the national debt will cost £42.9 billion a year. That's more than we spend on defence, and not much less than the entire education budget.

The European Commission forecasts that UK public spending will surge by 8.4% of GDP between 2007 and 2010. That's more than Germany, more than the USA and more than double the increase in France. It's more than during the recessions of the 80s and early 90s and even more than when Britain went cap in hand to the IMF in 1976.

Debt clock - http://cluaran.free.fr/debt.html

[hairy]

To cut 20% of government spending would have disasterous effects on the British economy.

Can they sell Northern Rock? We have little gold left to sell. Is there anything left they could sell? Maybe their second and third homes

It would be interesting to know what we have spent on the wars in iraq and afganistan

[hairy]

Cut all luxuries in prisons!!

Had this email the other day

SHERIFF JOE IS AT IT AGAIN!

You all remember Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Arizona , who painted the jail cells pink and made the inmates wear pink prison garb. Well.........

SHERIFF JOE IS AT IT AGAIN!

Oh, there's MUCH more to know about Sheriff Joe!

Maricopa County was spending approx. $18 million dollars a year on stray animals, like cats and dogs. Sheriff Joe offered to take the department over, and the County Supervisors said okay.

The animal shelters are now all staffed and operated by prisoners. They feed and care for the strays. Every animal in his care is taken out and walked twice daily. He now has prisoners who are experts in animal nutrition and behavior. They give great classes for anyone who'd like to adopt an animal. He has literally taken stray dog s off the street, given them to the care of prisoners, and had them place in dog shows.

The best part? His budget for the entire department is now under $3 million. Teresa and I adopted a Weimaraner from a Maricopa County shelter two years ago. He was neutered and current on all shots, in great health, and even had a microchip inserted the day we got him. Cost us $78.

The prisoners get the benefit of about $0.28 an hour for working, but most would work for free, just to be out of their cells for the day. Most of his budget is for utilities, building maintenance, etc. He pays the prisoners out of the fees collected for adopted animals.

I have long wondered when the rest of the country would take a look at the way he runs the jail system and copy some of his ideas. He has a huge farm, donated to the county years ago, where inmates can work, and they grow most of their own fresh vegetables and food, doing all the work and harvesting by hand.

He has a pretty good sized hog farm, which provides meat and fertilizer. It fertilizes the Christmas tree nursery, where prisoners work, and you can buy a living Christmas tree for $6 - $8 for the holidays and plant it later. We have six trees in our yard from the prison.

Yup, he was re-elected last year with 83% of the vote.

Now he's in trouble with the ACLU again. He painted all his buses and vehicles with a mural that has a special hotline phone number painted on it, where you can call and report suspected illegal aliens. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement wasn't doing enough in his eyes, so he had 40 deputies trained specifically for enforcing immigration laws, started up his hotline, and bought 4 new buses just for hauling folks back to the border. He's kind of a 'Git-R Dun' kind of Sheriff.

TO THOSE OF YOU NOT FAMILIAR WITH JOE ARPAIO..

HE IS THE MARICOPA ARIZONA COUNTY SHERIFF

AND HE KEEPS GETTING ELECTED OVER AND OVER.

THIS IS ONE OF THE REASONS WHY:

Sheriff Joe Arpaio (in Arizona ) who created the 'Tent City Jail':

**He has jail meals down to 40 cents a serving and charges the inmates for them.

**He stopped smoking and porno magazines in the jails. **Took away their weights.

**Cut off all but 'G' movies.

**He started chain gangs so the inmates could do free work on county and city projects.

**Then he started chain gangs for women so he wouldn't get sued for discrimination.

**He took away cable TV until he found out there was a federal court order that required cable TV for jails, so he hooked up the cable TV again.....BUT only let in the Disney channel and the Weather channel.

**When asked why the weather channel, he replied, "So they will know how hot it's gonna be while they are working

on my chain gangs."

**He cut off coffee since it has zero nutr itional value.

**When the inmates complained, he told them, "This isn't The Ritz/Carlton...... If you don't like it, don't come back."

More On The Arizona Sheriff:

With temperatures being even hotter than usual in Phoenix (116 degrees just set a new record), the Associated Press reports:

About 2,000 inmates living in a barbed-wire-surrounded tent encampment at the Maricopa County jail have been given permission to strip down to their government-issued

pink boxer shorts.

On Wednesday, hundreds of men wearing boxers were either curled up on their bunk beds or chatted in the tents, which reached 138 degrees inside the week before.

Many were also swathed in wet, pink towels as sweat collected on their chests and dripped down to their PINK SOCKS.

"It feels like we are in a furnace," said James Zanzot, an inmate who has lived in the TENTS for 1 year. "It's inhumane."

Joe Arpaio, the tough-guy sheriff who created the tent city and long ago started making his prisoners wear pink and eat bologna sandwiches, is not one bit sympathetic. He said Wednesday that he told all of the inmates, "It's 120 degrees in Iraq and our soldiers are living in tents too, and they have to wear full battle gear, but they didn't commit any crimes, so shut your mouths!"

Way to go, Sheriff!

Maybe if all prisons were like this one there would be a lot less crime and/or repeat offenders. Criminals should be punished for their crimes - not live in luxury until it's time for their parole, only to go out and commit another crime so they can get back in to live on taxpayers' money and enjoy things taxpayers can't afford to have for themselves.

[Guest Basildon Fox]

Remove 90% of the NHS think tanks saving a few billion and also get rid of the Community Support Officers who get paid nearly as much as a PC but have feck all powers of arrest rendering them less than useless. They are just a figure of fun for the youngsters round my way.

Also any immigrants that are convicted of serious crimes or persistently offend should be repatriated to their country of birth straight away to lower the prison population and cut costs of paying to have them in prison first.

[davieG]

To cut 20% of government spending would have disasterous effects on the British economy.

Can they sell Northern Rock? We have little gold left to sell. Is there anything left they could sell? Maybe their second and third homes

It would be interesting frightening to know what we have spent on the wars in iraq and afganistan

More like it.

As for the 20% I guess it's all about balance, it would have a disastrous effect both short term and long term not to make cuts so I guess the big questions are how much, how soon and where?

[Guest Bilo]

I think you'll find we do in essence all parties seem to agree on this.

The interest on the national debt will cost £42.9 billion a year. That's more than we spend on defence, and not much less than the entire education budget.

The European Commission forecasts that UK public spending will surge by 8.4% of GDP between 2007 and 2010. That's more than Germany, more than the USA and more than double the increase in France. It's more than during the recessions of the 80s and early 90s and even more than when Britain went cap in hand to the IMF in 1976.

Debt clock - http://cluaran.free.fr/debt.html

Cuts are needed but there's no need to savage public services, it's more that the waste needs to be cut out. Those figures show just how taxpayers money this government habitually wastes and how the next government (almost certainly Tory) will need to be ruthless. A fully functioning NHS, education system, benefits system and defence are all possible so long as Cameron has the balls to reform what are wasteful, outdated policies.

[Dr The Singh]

The only way were gonna get out of this debt is by going back to our british routes and reform the british empire and rape and pillage.........bagsy tahiti or honalulu first!!!

[Guest Bilo]

The only way were gonna get out of this debt is by going back to our british routes and reform the british empire and rape and pillage.........bagsy tahiti or honalulu first!!!

Brilliant, I like my world maps half pink.

[Jon the Hat]

The short answer is just about everything. The public sector needs some of the rigour of the private sector when it comes to managing their activites with minimal overhead so we can focus resources on the front line services. It is shocking the amount of waste in some areas, particularly procurement - whether it be the MOD or the NHS.

1) Cut 10% of back office / management staff across the board. Give managers the freedom to lose those who don't pull their weight regardless of role etc. Reshuffle those who are willing to change into the jobs remaining.

2) All quangos without exception fall back under the responsibilities of a government minister. They are tasked to bring back into their departments all of the workload with less than half the staff.

3) Local councils to wipe the slate clean on additional services. It is essential they cut back to the minimum mandatory services, then have to justify through a rigorous process every additional service. this shoudl require public consultation.

4) Cut the BBC license fee by 25%. They need to ditch the concept of Global news provider and concentrate on those who are actually paying.

5) Introduce a maximum level of benefit. Move people from incapacity benefit to jobseekers allowance unless they really cannot do any work at all. It is not enough to not be able to do that warehouse job you could do before. Train to do something less physical. Tweak tax bands so it actually is worth it financially to go back to work.

6) Public sector pay freeze for all employees earning more than £30,000. Scaled increases for the next 3 years so people get the actual same cash rises whether they earn £15,000 or £150,000.

7) End final salary pensions for public sector workers.

8) More power to parliamentary committees to oversee government spending. Also civilian and military people to sit on these also - get those with the actual qualifications and experience involved in the decisions. These should be cross party.

9) Scrap Tax credits. Possibly the most pointless job creation scheme in history. The tax band system is quite capable of managing people's tax, and the concept of tax credit when you pay no tax is nonsense. Scrap it and increase the tax free allowance so the lowest paid just pay nothing.

10) Cancel all government IT projects unless nearly complete and cost more to end than continue. Seriously they could not get two PC's networked for under £1m...

That will do for now.

[davieG]

Cuts are needed but there's no need to savage public services, it's more that the waste needs to be cut out. Those figures show just how taxpayers money this government habitually wastes and how the next government (almost certainly Tory) will need to be ruthless. A fully functioning NHS, education system, benefits system and defence are all possible so long as Cameron has the balls to reform what are wasteful, outdated policies.

From what I've heard cutting waste will have little overall impact on the size of the debt especially when it more often than not means making people redundant and all the pay-offs associated with it.

[Jon the Hat]

From what I've heard cutting waste will have little overall impact on the size of the debt especially when it more often than not means making people redundant and all the pay-offs associated with it.

Cutting requires spending up front to save over 2-5 years. On the plus side we will see the saving mostly in the cost of government debt. Lenders are nervous about our ability to repay at the moment - genuine action should see this improve and rates look better saving us a decent chunk of that £52Bn you mentioned above.

[Guest]

4) Cut the BBC license fee by 25%. They need to ditch the concept of Global news provider and concentrate on those who are actually paying.

Are you talking World Service, World News TV or both? WS is funded via the Foreign Office and not directly from the Licence Fee. World News as I understand it has made significant cutbacks already in duplicating x amount of content from the News Channel.

[davieG]

Cutting requires spending up front to save over 2-5 years. On the plus side we will see the saving mostly in the cost of government debt. Lenders are nervous about our ability to repay at the moment - genuine action should see this improve and rates look better saving us a decent chunk of that £52Bn you mentioned above.

I'm not disagreeing about the need to cut waste more that it'll need a lot more than that to have any real impact. Bilo was saying we don't need savage cuts but some areas will need significant cut backs and if you're involved they will be classed as savage.

[Jon the Hat]

I'm not disagreeing about the need to cut waste more that it'll need a lot more than that to have any real impact. Bilo was saying we don't need savage cuts but some areas will need significant cut backs and if you're involved they will be classed as savage.

Absolutley, and if you are living in working in some areas in the North-East, Scotland and Wales, where the proportion of public sector workers is over 50%, then you are in for tough times. Whoever you are, wherever you are and whatever you do there is some pain coming, even if it is just the hassle of relocating your millions elsewhere to avoid the insane 50% tax rate.