Isn’t it high time we kicked this fiscally imprudent government out of office? Gordon Brown and his inner circle have shown us just how totally incompetent they are.
It is going to take us Brits years to get ourselves out of the mess that this Labour government, and Blair’s, have got us into. Shameful politics! Shameful economics! – © Mark
THE TELEGRAPH: Social security payments will cost almost £200 billion in four years time, accounting for one pound in every four that the Government spends.
Combined with a debt interest bill of more than £63 billion, items Gordon Brown once called “the costs of failure” will absorb more than a third of all Government spending.
Leaked Treasury documents have revealed the Government’s own bleak forecasts for rising welfare payments and debt interest costs.
The figures, which were not revealed in this year’s Budget, show the scale of the damage that will done to the public finances by rising unemployment and the soaring national debt.
The papers show that the Treasury expects to pay out £193.4 billion on social security benefits in 2013/14. Paying interest on the Government’s outstanding debts will cost £63.4 billion.
Total Government spending in the same year will be £758.3 billion. Welfare and debt interest will be 33.8 per cent of that total.
Around 6 million people in Britain are estimated to claim some sort of employment-based benefits, and the figure is set to rise.
Official figures released on Wednesday showed that unemployment reached has 2.47 million, the highest since 1995. Most economists expect the total to peak at around 3 million early next year.
In his 2000 Budget, Mr Brown described money spent on debt and welfare as “the costs of failure” and lauded Labour’s record in reducing those payments.
He said: "Our promise was to reduce the costs of failure – the bills for unemployment and debt interest – in order to reallocate money to the key public services."
Now, Mr Brown’s own figures reveal how those costs are set to grow dramatically. >>> James Kirkup, Political Correspondent | Wednesday, September 16, 2009
