Friday 10 March 2017

The Palace of Westminster is a symbol of a decaying Union.(Time to leave both).

I have admitted a number of times that Economics is a Mystery to me  and I am therefore  for Joseph Ogle and Daria Luchinskaya  over at Click on Wales for unpick the Budget announcement and what it means for Wales
It looks as though the additional money for the Wales budget will amount to £200 million (capital and resource) phased in over the next four years. On the basis of figures seen so far, the addition to the Resource DEL (day-to-day spending) would reach just over 1% by 2019-20 compared with 2017-18.Against this modest increase, there are two offsets. The Chancellor re-affirmed his adherence to austerity and last week’s letter from the Treasury asked Whitehall spending departments to find £3.5 billion of ‘efficiency savings’ by 2019-20. The letter excludes spending on NHS and schools and includes a provision for ‘reinvesting’ £1 billion on priorities. How this will impact on the Welsh budget is to be confirmed – but a straight Barnett consequential would amount to a hit of around £175 million a year. This would dwarf any good news from yesterday’s announcements.  The other offset is the impact of inflation. The Office for Budget Responsibility’s latest Economic and Fiscal Outlook published updated inflation forecasts, including GDP deflators and CPI measures. Adjusting government spending for inflation typically uses GDP deflators, while consumer-related items, such as wages, benefits, etc., are deflated by the CPI. The new CPI outlook is 2.4% in 2017, 2.3% in 2018, and 2.0% thereafter. These forecasts are still higher than those of March 2016, with CPI inflation likely to put pressure on the public sector pay settlement.

So we look to be loosing out  evrn if initially the additional money for the Wales budget  appeared to amount to £200 million 

Contrast this with the  plan for a “full decant” of the Palace of Westminster has been backed by the influential public accounts committee, with MPs and peers moving out for around six years while the work is carried out at an estimated cost of £3.5bn to £3.9bn.
The committee said this was the “most economical, effective and efficient” option for restoring the palace to a proper state. It warned “delay and indecision” would simply add to the final cost.
So it seems that the cost of repairing a building in London will be more than the entire money sent by our London Masters to a grateful nation
Carmarthen East and Dinefwr’s Jonathan Edwards said he
 “cannot consciously support expenditure of that amount on any building, particularly when Westminster is imposing such needless and harsh austerity on everyone else”.
“I have long been calling for another solution to this problem – to relocate from Westminster permanently. One of the great failings of the British state is that it has concentrated all its efforts on one city.
“Addressing the individual and geographical wealth inequalities of the British state should be the most important priority for politicians, not least because addressing those injustices would in itself be an economic driver. Supporting complete relocation would be a bold statement of intent for Westminster’s political class to show that they are serious about equalising wealth and prosperity.”
: “It would be wholly inappropriate, and frankly insulting for Westminster politicians to spend so much money on their own facilities when the people we serve are being forced to bear such pain.”

There is of course another option to Scottish and Welsh Voters and that it is to leave the Union and concentrate on our own  Parliament as Independent Nations.

The Palace of Westminster is a symbol of a decaying  Union and it is time to abandon it as Scotland looks likely to abandon the Union.


The Parliament buildings are in an appalling state, the survey said.
A decaying building for a decaying Union?

Indeed the Bill for the Westminster Repairs and the news that Buckingham Palace to undergo 'essential' £370m refurbishment, could be a factor in the referendum as Scots will be expected to contribute.

It also an insult to millions of English people who do not even seem to have the option of success

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

As a YES voter in Scotland, I hope Scotland's time is finally here - I'm just sorry there isn't any way we can help Wales other than act as an example for a future Welsh-independence campaign to follow. Hopefully once an independent Scotland has made a success of it, and the UK economy is down the toilet because of Brexit, Welsh self-determination will get the push it needs to join us as an independent nation in the EU.

England... well who knows how long its going to take them to realise the world doesn't revolve around them and their Empire (1.0 or 2.0) anymore.