Remember Things Can Only Get Better? Now, it's Things Can Only Get Worse...

 

We have seen a host of economic data published over the last fortnight that shows where the country was at the end of the previous Conservative Government. It is important to note this data in order to benchmark how the economy performs from this point onwards under the Labour Government. The new government tried to gloss over this data as they don’t want you to hear it.

For both the months of May and June, it was very welcome to see to that inflation had fallen back to the Bank of England target of 2.0%. However, for the month of July, Labour’s first month of office, it crept back up to 2.2% and we are already seeing policy decisions from Labour that risk stoking inflation further. June also marked an entire year of average wage growth rising by more than inflation, helping people to be better off

Economic growth data was also released. For the quarter of April/May/June, we saw growth of 0.6%. This follows the previous quarter of 0.7% growth, meaning that the UK has the highest economic growth of all G7 countries in 2024 so far, even higher than the United States. This nice inheritance for the Labour Government left by the Conservatives is in stark contrast to what we inherited from Labour in 2010, when the UK’s economic growth was the lowest in the G7 and unemployment was at 8%.

Every Labour government there has ever been, has left office with unemployment higher than when it entered office. The unemployment data released last week showed a fall to 4.2% for the end of June, down from 4.4% the previous month. The key economic figures to remember for what Labour inherited are inflation at 2%, two successive quarters of growth at 0.7/0.6% and unemployment at 4.2%.

Labour’s claims of a poor economic inheritance are absolute nonsense. To make such claims as a reason to scrap the winter fuel allowance for pensioners is disingenuous. Thousands will be impacted in Crawley and the real reason is to fund inflation-busting pay rises for trade unions that donated to the Labour party. 

We are now being told that Keir Starmer will be giving a speech this coming Tuesday saying that things can only get worse. For once, Captain Flip Flop is right on the outcome, but he is wrong on the cause. He will continue to cynically blame the previous Conservative Government as cover for his Labour slash and burn policy program, which will be the real reason for things only getting worse.  Like many, I remember Labour last coming to power in 1997 and using the D-Ream song Things Can Only Get Better as their anthem at the time. They let people down then and they are doing the same now. I've seen it all before.     

Truth and accuracy matter - fake news is not free speech (Elon Musk's world)

 

In my weekly column for the Crawley Observer, I've written about social media spreading fake news, especially the sewer that is Elon Musk's Twitter or 'X' as he re-branded it. He is destroying that platform, with extremists given free reign to pump out lies, designed to indoctrinate and radicalise, all in the name of 'free speech'. We are seeing consequences in the real world and it's time to call out the purveyors of disinformation and misinformation. I feel strongly about this. The truth matters, whether or not it happens to support any given cause I may have. My column, which is limited to 350 words, is below.

"Access to information has never been easier, but at the same time knowing what is real and what is not, has become more complicated. I first heard the term “fake news” during the 2016 US presidential election, when it was claimed by the subsequent winner of that election, to describe mainstream TV news channels that he didn’t like. The irony is some of the alternative sources that Donald Trump promotes do exactly that, publish fake information in order to manipulate the electorate.

There has been a trend away from traditional news outlets for the consuming of news, with a move to social media. This has led to a rise in misinformation (accidental wrong information) and disinformation (intentional wrong information) being circulated. Unscrupulous political extremists and countries with hostile intentions to the west, push both, in order to sow discourse.

We’ve recently seen consequences in the real world. After the appalling murderous knife attack in Southport, a wholly incorrect name for the suspect spread rapidly on Twitter, alongside false claims that he had recently come to the UK on a small boat. The ‘source‘ for this was a bogus news website, which may have links to a hostile foreign state. Despite these claims being quickly rebutted by Merseyside Police, rioting broke out in Southport with the police saying many people behind the disgraceful violence had been fired up by social media posts.

Politicians from the respectable mainstream parties, including the Home Secretary, have called out social media platforms for allowing misinformation to spread. I think we need to go further. It is very clear that Twitter (rebranded as X) is out of control, with mis/disinformation being allowed to flourish, as well as personal abuse. The site’s owner is a big part of the problem and he seems to relish in promoting the far-right and misinformation.

I believe it would be good to get a mainstream political consensus to crack down on social media mis/disinformation and force them to better police their platforms, if they wish to freely operate here. In the meantime, I’d encourage financially boycotting social media sites like ‘X’."