Budget deficit (From The Northern Echo)

Budget deficit

11:01am Friday 20th November 2009

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THIS year’s Queen’s Speech was possibly the most political for a generation and one promise was more significant not for what was said, but what was left unsaid.

There will be legislation for halving the current budget deficit over the next parliamentary term.

At first glance, this is a concession to the reality that we are living beyond our means and mortgaging our children’s futures to do so.

The promise, though, is not to halve our national debt, which is now so great that the interest alone amounts to more than we spend on education or defence.

Instead, it is the far lesser ambition to reduce the current position where the government spends £175bn more a year than it raises to one where that deficit is “only” around £85bn a year.

The actual debt, however, would continue to grow under Labour’s plans.

What is clear for all to see is that another term of Labour government would mean another five years of increasing national debt. I always wondered if we could afford five more years of Gordon Brown. Now, I know we can’t.

James Wharton, Conservative Prospective Parliamentary Candidate, Stockton South.

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