UKIP winning the Euro election will have come as no surprise to anyone who has been out canvassing these past few weeks. The mood of the electorate was very apparent and an anti-establishment/Westminster vote was always going be registered.
What was surprising was the decimation of the Liberal Democrat vote, and is ‘just reward’ for a string of broken manifesto promises and for taking a pro EU line that was bordering on the ridiculous. I suspect that there is more woe to come for the Liberals at next year’s general election.
The opening up of our borders to immigration from new member states in the EU was always going to lead to a backlash from voters especially at a time when the economy has more room to recover. While unemployment is significantly down and important economic indicators are all pointing in the right direction it will nevertheless take time for the full effects of this recovery to filter through especially to those areas which were hurt the most during the recession under Labour.
While the principle of freedom of movement of persons between EU members is a sound one, it only works effectively when this movement is between people in states with similar living standards and similar incomes. Where there is a divergence in these factors between nations, then the movement of persons primarily in one direction with an obligation to also provide benefits to those arriving will inevitably create difficulties and tensions within communities. Those arriving and settling in specific areas of the country also leads to pressure on the education and health services and can lead to additional problems, and when a political party incessantly highlights these concerns then it is inevitable that its message will resonate with voters which is what UKIP has effectively done.
As things stand the hands of any government are tied in dealing with this problem. Either there is an effective re-negotiation with other EU states in this and in other areas where there is a plethora of diktats and legislation emanating from Brussels or we simply pull out of the EU -anything else is simply tinkering at the edges. The Conservative Party is the only party committed to re-negotiation and to holding an in/out referendum and unless it gains a majority at the next general election we’ll be having more or less the same debate and discussion at the next Euro election.
Unemployment increased by 281,000 to hit 2.38 million in the three months to May and is the largest rise since records began in 1971. It seems highly likely that the total number of unemployed will get close to 3 million within the next 12 months with the new Conservative Government in 2010 will have to deal with the issue of getting people back in to work.
Unemployment has topped two million for the first time since 1997 and is confirmation of how severe the current economic slump is and how devastating its effect has been on working families. The consequences of unemployment are truly tragic with social breakdown, welfare dependency, family tensions all adversely increasing.
The number of jobless people is set to increase with the IMF predicting that the recession in the UK will last longer than any of the world’s other major economies. Already there are ten jobseekers for every vacancy advertised with this figure increasing to as many as 30 in some parts of the country.
The Labour Government promised to spend its way out of recession by undertaking huge public works programs but there seems to be little evidence of this actually happening as we see the unemployment figures rising rapidly on their march to the three million mark.
Fraser Nelson at the Spectator has produced this excellent analysis of the effects of all the economic measures announced by Gordon Brown in recent months. It’s essential reading and another indicator to show the ineffectiveness of Brown’s economic stimulus and proves that Brown has no idea what he is doing except announcing measures for the the sake of a few days publicity and in the hope of an increase in the polls.
The UK economy is now officially in recession after the release of growth figures this morning which show a 1.5% decline in GDP in the last quarter. This follows a drop in GDP in the previous quarter of 0.6% which means the official definition of two consecutive quarters of negative economic growth has been met.
The 1.5% fall is the largest since 1980 and shows what a perilous state the economy is now in. Gordon Brown refuses to accept that he has put an end to boom and bust but these figures make him look even more foolish when he continues to make claims that this recession is different to previous ones and that he is not to blame. The public won’t buy these feeble excuses. He was very keen to take credit for the ‘unprecedented growth’ as he put it of the UK economy during the first ten years of a Labour Government but is even keener to distance himself from the negative growth in the UK economy. When thousands of people are losing their jobs and their homes each week, it’s embarassing for the PM of this country to give interviews to the press and media and blame the United States and anyone else he can think of at the time and completely try and absolve himself of any blame for the current economic crisis. He should have the decency to be a little honest – but I suppose if he could he wouldn’t be Gordon Brown.
Just to make matters worse, the pound is trading at $1.35 this morning which is the lowest its been for about 25 years.
‘The number of unemployed people increased by 131,000 over the quarter and by 290,000 over the year, to reach 1.92 million (the highest figure since the three months to September 1997).
More worryingly ‘there were 530,000 job vacancies in the three months to December 2008, down 69,000 over the previous quarter and down 153,000 over the year. This is the lowest figure since comparable records began in 2001.’
We now have uncontrolled debt, rapidly rising unemployment, sterling losing value on a daily basis, property prices down by 20% and Government introducing policies such as VAT cuts and bank bailouts that simply aren’t working. Gordon Brown has made a complete mess of the economy and his claim that the UK economy is well placed to weather the ‘global downturn’ is palpable nonsense.
Today’s announcement by the Government of the £20bn loan guarantee to small and medium-sized firms to help them deal with the recession is a watered down rip of Tory Policy announced by David Cameron a few weeks ago. This follows fast on the heels of the Tory policy to subsidise employers to take on people who have been out of work being adopted by the Government a few days ago.
Admittedly the Conservatives are calling for loan guarantees of £50bn but its very odd that the the Government accuses the Conservatives of being the ‘do nothing party’ (repeated again at PMQ’s by Brown today) when facing the most serious economic downturn this country has seen for decades yet is prepared to steal adopt policies put forward by the Conservatives.
If Gordon Brown and his team are unable to come up with ideas and policies of their own and are simply going to adopt everything the Conservatives propose – obviously after criticising them first, why don’t they just ask the Tories to take over and do everything to deal with the recession?
Posted by Imtiaz Ameen 
Imtiaz Ameen's Blog 