Still paying a decade later...

The time is drawing nearer and nearer where Tony will have to finally announce he is stepping down and the long, long awaiting "-leadership contest-" can finally begin. Since the Labour conference last year where Blair had them screaming in the aisles, this government has been completely paralysed and achieved next to nothing. As I have argued before, this is probably better than what they normally do, but it does beg the question what have we been paying for all these months? Gordon Brown will not kick start any of his "big ideas" for fear of Blair stealing them as his own so it looks as though we will have to wait until after Conference season in September before this country actually has a policy making government again. In the meantime we will just have to put up with the legacy and ongoing failures of previous policy initiatives - one of which almost came back to haunt Brown yesterday...

Gordon Brown faced a vote of no confidence, motioned by the Tories of course, for the pension funds crisis. No surprises that he won through, but the real surprise is that this was about a decision taken 10 years ago! This was sparked by news that has recently come to light that Brown was specifically warned that it would shaft a whole load of workers yet ignored the advice. George Osborne announced "-In his first budget, this chancellor introduced a stealth tax on pension funds which his own civil servants warned him would blow a big hole in their finances-." And, revelation of revelations, that is what has happened. The reason this has come out ten years later is that the Treasury, using tax payers' money, have been desperately trying to block the documents that show the advice despite freedom of information laws. The Tories are of course using this issue as a way of discrediting Brown - it was a measure that Osborne would have probably done himself (he has virtually admitted so). It does raise the question though, will we be paying the price in ten years time for any other of Mr Brown's economic ideas and has the stable world economy been keeping him afloat for too long now. When he is coronated PM in the next few months we might get to see what Brown is really made of - and I fear for him.