Budget? What budget?

A big fat tax on second homes could be a start, plus additional council taxes (or a new under-occupation tax) for homes left unoccupied for great lengths of times.

Sarahellenwhitney, is that a north-south divide?
Up here oaks grow from acorns.

gilly you need to go to Rock in Cornwall. Multi-million £ houses, perhaps occupied for 2 weeks a year. Not in itself significant, but local people were pushed out years ago, as it has had an inflationary effect on house prices throughout the area.

3 videos on this link to watch.

voxpoliticalonline.com/2017/11/23/watch-mcdonnell-destroy-tories-after-they-tell-poverty-stricken-brits-youve-never-had-it-so-good/

Mark Steel says it all. Question Time will be interesting tonight. I hope there's someone as good as he is on the programme.

I'd watch it if McDonnell was on. I'd even buy popcorn.

My heart sinks when I take a peek at the political threads, the ability of Brexiteers to defend the idiocy of their stance beggars belief. Well here's yet another dire report and prediction from the IFS: average earnings in 2022 likely to be less than in 2008 and the UK is in danger of losing two decades of earnings growth.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-42096806

When you've read that, a bit of light relief - the UK won't allowed to enter the competition to host the European Capital of Culture in 2023.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-42097692

Are we surprised? Apparently the government are! I await the Pollyanna brigade tripping down the road to lalaland.

Lloyd Russell-Moyle from Btighton Kemptown talking about the budget on politics TV, saying about how much help the homeless need in Brighton, rather than another focus group to see how councils are spending their money.
Very passionate.

I'm afraid Rebecca Pow is exactly how I see some Tories and the comments reminded me of some we see on here. I think John McDonnell's reply - more in sorrow than in anger - was better than she deserved. Thanks for the link Jen.

Did anyone really expect a "Giveaway" budget, get real. That's what the Labour Party do and leave others to try and pay the bill! That's where we are now. Nurse near me off work for months with "bad back" but I have seen her heaving heavy furniture about. No wonder NHS is struggling.

Oh dear!

if the Tories are so competent at finance* Marieeliz* can you please explain to me HOW the 800BILLION deficit they inherited after the crash has turned into 1.95trillion in a few short years? They cant afford to even pay the interest on this never mind pay it off! Hardly inspires confidence .

I didn't expect a giveaway budget at all. I think we are kind of stuck between a rock and a hard place. I just wish this bloody brexit thing would crawl away and die. The people I know in the small business community and larger manufacturers too are terrified of what is to come .

I’ve been trying to work out why the NHS is facing such financial pressures and now I know - thanks marieeliz forvexplaining it’s all your neighbours fault. You have reported her I’m sure.

If you watch the Daily Politics, Dominic Raab keeps up today's attack on Labour quoting JM saying that "spending and borrowing pays for itself" over and over and over. He keeps saying it is just not credible, that can't be right, that can't be credible which to me showed he has the economic sense of the nursery.

Turning to Linda Yueh, the economist and not, I would suggest, left-wing or a Labour supporter, Jo Coburn reminded her of what she had said earlier, that perhaps this is exactly what Philip Hammond should have done. He should have thrown away the Red Box and the Red Book in terms of constraint and actually spent a lot more.

Linda Yueh's reply was "I would reconfigure the Red Box. So, one thing the government hasn't done is separate out current spending from capital spending. So what you can do, the only way to raise productivity and it is a big puzzle, but the key thing the bank of England identifies is you have to raise investment. So investment in hard and soft infrastructure, human capital, all of that, if you count that as capital spending you can borrow at very low rates and invest in something which will be paid off in the future and you can separate that from current spending so you don't scare financial markets and I think that is something where he probably could have done a bit more given how dire our productivity prospects are. But it is something that requires reconfiguring how we think entirely, about the deficit."

Linda Yueh went on to say that private firms are not investing, in part because public investment has been slashed to less than 2% of GDP. It used to be over 3% of GDP before the crisis. She commented that we can't have better jobs in the future unless there is more investment in STEM education and technical education. That is why there is a good argument for putting investment in human capital - people - as well as hard and soft infrastructure and that would go a long way without going into the more politically disputed areas such as nationalisation.

This is exactly what Labour has been suggesting we do. You can argue about nationalisation - I would - but I do want a party that understands economics, not a collection of book-keepers, running the country and the Tory party view of this doesn't come anywhere near economics they are still at the coffee pot stage with one for the rent, one for the 'leccy, etc.

It's a shame that the shadow chancellor can't say those things without his advisors or his iPad then. Linda Yueh isn't the shadow chancellor and we're not voting for her. John McDonnell has been laughable 3 times in the last couple of days and he certainly has not said that! He's the person you're advocating is in charge of the economy - the fiscal idiot that even Ken Livingstone sacked for bankrupting London.
It's ridiculous appropriating the comments of someone you think is credible and saying 'that's what Labour really means'. I'll believe Labour means what Labour says.

If I wanted to watch our politicians answer pub quiz questions then I am sure I would be disappointed that JM refused to be taken away from the detailed answer to the previous question that he was given in order to look up a figure the interviewer could have looked up for himself - it's public knowledge.

Do we really want these interviews to be at the level of a children's spelling bee? Personally I would rather we were employing someone who knows things in enough depth to know were to find the answer to such a simplistic question. Rather that than someone who can repeat things back to me like a six year old repeating their tables.

John McDonnell did not "bankrupt London".

Tellingly, one detail TV interviewers neglect to mention is that John McDonnell is the only front bench MP on both sides of the house who has prior experience of balancing the budget in a major public organisation. He was responsible for controlling the purse strings at the predecessor of the London Assembly. The Greater London Council (GLC) brought in budgets on budget every year.

The idea that Labour always borrows more, etc., is also an idea made up by the Tories and the right wing press. In actual fact, Labour invariably borrows less than the Conservatives. The data always shows that. Not just that, Labour has always repaid debt more often than the Conservatives, and has always repaid more debt, on average. The trend does not vary however you do the data.

The Conservatives have been the biggest borrowers over the last 70 years

They are one of the worst ever -look what austerity has brought us. Did you see the news gg so bloody depressing

Not public knowledge enough for the shadow chancellor to know it! And actually, our countries finances are not 'pub quiz questions' when you're looking to run the country. It's not a 'spelling bee' to ask how much money you're planning to borrow. He doesn't have a clue what he's talking about and can't manage without iPads or advisors.
I think you set the bar very low gg and McDonnell fails to meet it.

And the Tories do? primrose?

www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2017/11/23/fifteen-years-of-tory-economic-management/

This is interesting. How to get empty properties back on the market.

www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2017/11/23/philip-hammond-is-just-too-soft-on-empty-properties/

Stating the obvious about McDonnell is not the same as endorsing anyone else ww

Not public knowledge enough for the shadow chancellor to know it! Could you back this up in some way as it doesn't really make sense as it is.