Autumn Statement

Ah, the Autumn Statement; that recently minted mini-budget bodge and an opportunity to electioneer for all the Chancellor is worth. A bit of a tinker with this tax a bit of a smidge off that, a tap of the magic wand and - poof! – all’s wonderful again. A few hundred people better off by a bob or two, a few hundred worse off by a handful of shekels and the economy cured by a sleight of hand most amateur of conjurers would immediately recognise. “Where’s the tax cut?” shouts the audience plant. “It’s up his sleeve!” replies the audience and then they all gasp in unison as he produces a bunch of flowers from up his arse.

It’s an undignified spectacle during which one man tries to make the numbers tell one story and a few well-rehearsed adversaries try to convince us it’s all a pack of lies. At the end of the performance we all turn back to our mundane lives, turn out our empty pockets and realise that money truly does talk; in our case it says "goodbye". Nothing has changed at all. Ed Balls, Chuka Umunna, Danny Alexander and Uncle Tom Cobley and all were cued up across the news channels, eager to claim credit, disparage, chide or challenge and yet not one of them had anything genuinely useful to say.

Labour’s only real response to the statement, along with all their legions of creepy activists, was to take to social media to decry the failure of the coalition to balance the books and then foolishly to suggest that Labour could do better. Even most Labour supporters know that their blighted stewardship of the economy - even during a boom - was ideologically feckless, wasteful and downright incompetent. And come on, even if you honestly believed Ed Balls had it in him to reject all that he supported in government you still have to face the reality that if you vote for Balls there’s the horrible possibility you’ll get Miliband. As Prime Minister. Think about that for a moment.

Has that moment of madness passed? Good. To even suggest for one minute that any sane country could hand back the reins to a party that pioneered policy finagled by carefully selected focus group and that embarked on the biggest, most disastrous social engineering experiment this nation has ever seen is infantilist delusion beyond risibility. Don’t even dare. The mere fact that the opposition has suddenly shifted focus back from the NHS to the economy and their beloved ‘cost of living crisis’ line is surely evidence that they have absolutely nothing positive to offer.

None of this is real...

So jump up and down and wave your banners, whoever you support, whoever you believe. Then when the euphoria subsides, when the two-minute hate/joy/delirium passes, trudge back out into the cold, wet dark winter streets and have a good look around. Budgets are for selling newspapers and keeping commentators in work; they are not for the likes of us. No government is going to solve your life for you, least of all any government that fervently believes it can. If you haven’t decided which way to vote – for make no mistake the election starts here – vote for the party which promises to do as little as possible to interfere with your existence. That’s your job and yours alone. 

Praise Be!

Well the Autumn Statement, as expected, brought news of yet more financial doom and gloom. The weather has taken a sharp turn for the wintry, pushing up petrol bills and making the roads even more treacherous than a Marxist Europhile. And the charging of Stuart Hall for sex offences is a knockout blow for Ho-ho-ho, prompting @davidtristram to deliver the brilliant "It's a Cockout" punchline on Twitter.

What else have we here? Pressure on the UK's AAA credit rating, the loss of the great jazz genius Dave Brubeck, albeit for a magnificent innings of 91, and yet more leaked plans for EU supremacy over national budgets... because the Eurozone is doing so well for all its internees, isn't it? Insane Green levies are going to put further pressure on winter heating bills, we are going to give away yet more billions to countries which don't need it, who squander it on government instead of aid and our deficit is yet to be reined in, without which our debt can only continue to grow.

All of which means it is even more likely that the turkeys will vote for a short-lived Christmas-future by electing back into power the very cause of our indebtedness in two year's time. Ed Balls may have looked a twat yesterday in Parliament, but the good old left-wing press will back his disastrous stances all the way to meltdown and enslavement by the state for all who remain. (Two years to pack your bags, workers.)

It's not all bad news though. A Russian oligarch's Polish builders have bulldozed to the ground a chateau in France, which is internationally hilarious, those cheeky Aussies raised a grin by posing as The Queen and Prince Phil on the telephone all the way from 'dairn-anda' and the grin has been wiped off the face of smug tech giants Apple to the tune of $35bn. We love a bit of schadenfreude, innit?

But I save the best news until last. A bid by a hideous, medieval, ignorant hate machine posing as a pseudo-religious authoritarian sect has had its plans for an enormous Jihadi training centre in the heart of Londonistan turned down by the planning authorities. It's only a matter of time of, course, before appeals based on their ethnic sensitivities mounted by human-wrongs lawyers sensing a fast buck will overturn the ruling and facilitate one more step along the way to an entirely Islamic Britain.

America shows the way...

But - silver lining time - at least the rabid Mussies might just have the balls to tell Europe to go and fuck itself up a camels' backside... after they've robbed it blind, of course.

Foul! Ref!

Like drunken fans watching the football in a crowded pub, jostling for a view, proffering their views, the press, the public and the politicians were all watching different games yesterday. And as usual the post-match discussion went into extra time with some confusion as to who had won, or indeed lost..

"We wuz robbed!" declared the ageing defender, Vince Cable, "The game should have favoured the older ones, but we all got left out at the back."

"I wouldn't have played the four-five formation." commented brutish mid-fielder Balls, "I'd have gone five-five, catch them off guard, then hit them with a counter-attack where it hurts." he explained. "Then kick 'em in the bollocks!" he added, unnecessarily, as the interview was already over. Adenoidal Ed, the away team coach, had nothing to of value to contribute to his familiar, repetitive whine.

England Manager, Shiny Dave "charisma" Cameron said, "The lads done good and we come away wiv a point each, so, you know... like..." He ended in characteristic, enigmatic fashion, leaving it to others to provide cover for a lacklustre performance.

Team captain, Georgie "boy" Osborne summed up the game*, "Well, like, it was a great game, like, you know. And , er... it was all, like neck and neck for the first fifteen minutes, then, you know, we hit our stride, like... and from then on it was, you know, 45% for the next half hour... When the final whistle come, like, we wusn't sure where the score was and all... There was that, er own goal and everyt'ink, so in the final analysis the lads done good and we'll have to wait for the, erm, er.. next round, like," he concluded. "Innit."

(*Works best if you imagine he's using Steven Gerrard's voice!)

Following a protracted discussion after appeals were raised, the game was declared a draw, with both sides claiming the moral victory.

 How much on a packet of fags? Bugger!

Don't ask me what to make of it - I was at work all bloody day! For what it's worth, just like every budget there has ever been there, there is little room for anything other than tinkering at the margins and the outcome for almost everybody will be genuinely insignificant. (We all have income ups and downs and can control our spending to suit.) Yet, all we'll hear about for the next year will be the fourteen people who can genuinely claim to have been denied a livelihood because they represent an incalculably small and statistically negligible demographic whose circumstances were impossible to factor into the national accounts.

Next topic, please!?

Black Wednesday

With apologies to Lewis Carroll, I done a pome!

T'was Wedders, and the slimy coves
Did tax and gamble with my pay.

All flimsy were the proffered oaths,

Not to give it all away. 

"Beware the Treasury, my son!

The jaws that bite, the clause that catch!

Beware the Osborne bird, and shun

The furious Moneysnatch!" 

With ill intent he counts his take 

And gives it to the harpie who, 

Without a care how much I make, 

Breeds fifteen children in a shoe. 

Calloo callay it’s Budget Day 

And all my money's gone away. 

Now, by law, the gov’ment will 

Take my dosh to pay their bills 

Fee fi fo fum... 

There goes the home of an English man.

(With thanks to Messrs Brown and Co, for spending all my fucking dough!)