Never Had it So Good

At least, that's what Lord Young tried telling us shortly before he was forced to resign. But was he actually right in what he said? Not about the never having had it so good bit - unless you are a banker with a fat bonus, of course - but in another telling phase he used, when he described the current economic situation as "this so-called recession". Was he admitting what most us know already - that the supposedly dire economic situation the last Labour government allegedly left us in is nowhere near as severe as Cameron and Co. are claiming? Don't get me wrong here - I'm not denying that there has been a very severe global economic downturn, that can't be denied. But the important word here is global - it hasn't just been confined to the UK, therefore cannot be blamed upon the previous government. Unless, of course, Gordon Brown and Alastair Darling were going around the world wrecking the economies of countries as diverse as Ireland, Greece, Portugal and Japan, for instance. If they were, then they should be congratulated, as this would indicate that under New Labour the UK had colossal overseas influence - on a scale not seen since the days of Empire, in fact.

Getting back to the point, more or less, the reason why the Tory leadership got so upset about Young's remarks was precisely because he had let slip the truth: that the economic situation in the UK is nowhere near as severe as they are claiming. Certainly not severe enough to justify the massive cuts in public spending being implemented and the virtual dismantling of the NHS. No, it is just a convenient smokescreen for the Tories to implement their extreme right-wing economic policies. Not that any of these cuts are ideologically motivated, they claim. But if that's the case, how come the likes of 'Gorgeous' George Osborne were merrily talking about massive cuts to public expenditures when they were in opposition, long before the economic downturn? But we shouldn't be surprised - this whole coalition government has been built on lies. Most glaringly, the lie that the Liberal Democrats were only in it it to act as some kind of restraining influence on the Tories. Well, I'm still waiting for them to start restraining...