Next time someone tells you that Labour and the Conservatives are identical

[andrewducker]

Notice the trend up throughout the 90s as things got worse and worse, and then the trend down shortly after Labour took office?

They may have done a lot of things wrong, but the NHS is a lot better off than it was.

From

Comments

[the-locster.livejournal.com]

I have to take issue with your reasoning - apart from all the questions about massaging of statistics and comparing apples with oranges, the fact is that much of the money that was used to get where we are was borrowed and will need to be payed back with interest.

[andrewducker]

What's the money got to do with whether waiting lists have gone down?

[the-locster.livejournal.com]

It takes money to train and employ the army of surgeons, nurses, support staff and buy equipment, buildings, etc. If we have to pay back the money then we'll have to make massive cuts which means laying off staff, closing wards, not replacing aging/failing equipment, etc. Hence waiting lists go right back up and beyond where they were.

The chinese and others lent us their savings and they want them back.

[andrewducker]

If this happens, yes. But we shall have to wait and see where we are 5 years from now.

[sigmonster.livejournal.com]

The OECD is international, independent of the UK government, and makes an attempt to produce comparable figures across countries. (However these are not necessarily comparable to government's own reckonings as published by ONS and in the annual budget...) On these figures, the UK national debt went from 52% of GDP in 1997 to 40.4% of GDP in 2001 - down by 12% of gdp in four years! -, 46.9% in 2007, and 71% this year. Germany stands at 77.4% this year, France at 84.5%, the USA at 83.9%. In short, past spending was entirely affordable at the time, and so far from investors wanting their money back gilt auctions remain oversubscribed and interest rates are remarkably low.

The problem with the annual public sector deficit is that it is forecast to remain high in the short-to-medium term unless there are cuts in spending or increases in taxes or both, and this might cause a future blow-up of national debt. But this wouldn't be due to the cost of servicing the current national debt, but to spending on real goods and services in the future.