Thursday, March 3, 2011

I don't think that was Labour.

Personal debt has risen £3.3billion in January to the extent that the consumers in the UK owe about £1.4 trillion.

Express.

HOW LABOUR LEFT US ALL OVER A TRILLION IN DEBT

BRITONS now owe £1.4trillion in personal debt – more than the country produced over the past year.
Total lending in January rose by £3.3billion, including a rise of £1.8billion in secured lending.
After more than a decade under Labour, the average UK household is now £8,416 in debt, not including mortgages and unsecured loans.
When mortgages are included, the figure is £57,635, the charity, Credit Action, said yesterday.
Debts led to 337 people being declared bankrupt or insolvent every day, the figures revealed.
Property repossessions reached 87 each day. Meanwhile, each day last year 474 new people had been unemployed for over 12 months.
Redundancies hit 1,589 people every day in the three months to the end of December. And debt is continuing to grow with 24.1 million credit card purchases daily, with a total value of £1.15billion.

Now I blame Labour incompetence for a lot of things from the pensions grab, the gold sell off, the green energy scam to underfunding the army. But I don't see how they can be to blame because people were silly enough to get themselves in over their heads in personal debt. Sure they made cheap credit available via their economics, but they didn't make people take out credit on anything, though they didn't help the economic conditions in which people have ended up out of work.
No this is down to personal choice, though many people will no doubt be coping or struggling, that's one of the risks of ramping up your debts whilst the going is good and often enough you can take out insurance which will help a little in hard times, though it's often only for 6 months, after that you're facing bankruptcy.
Even bankruptcy is nothing to be really feared any more, yes it blights your credit records, but you can recover if you keep your head down and simply save up and spend what you earn rather than buy things on credit. Plus there are often enough ways around getting stuff you really need if anything important breaks. About all that will happen is that credit will be a lot harder to get and more restrictions will be put on it, but that's the fault of going mad on spending money that wasn't really theirs, or at least those who are stuck with debts they can't pay back and who will have made it more difficult for others to get a loan or a credit card.

So no, on this the Express is wrong, Labour might have set up the conditions where cheap credit was on offer, but they didn't make people borrow, that was purely down to the people themselves.

10 annotations:

Michael Fowke said...

This is true. I've always been poor, but never in debt.

Captain Ranty said...

I agree in principle, but is there not a case to be made for the power of advertising? And the subtle creation of envy, and a burning desire to keep up with the Joneses?

Much of it was/is down to stupidity, but not all of it, surely?

CR.

Anonymous said...

Agreed. I'm sick of hearing that we are ALL responsible, we ALL ran up debt etc.
Bollocks, I didn't, but then again I haven't got a 52" TV either.

All Seeing Eye said...

If you see a government taking careful aim and pissing away cash it doesn't have with reckless abandonment and no apparent consequences then you tend to imagine that you're bulletproof too.

Changes in the law made bankruptcy (and newly created lesser variations) no more than a minor roadbump instead of the massive kick in the goolies that it used to be. So the mind is less, how can we put it, focussed on the consequences of it all going tits.

13 years of telling people that someone else is to blame, that the State will support you no matter your own fecklessness, that other people are responsible for us...

Labour put the bottle into the hand of the alcoholic. Is it any surprise that many took a swig?

Quiet_Man said...

Not too surprising no, but that was their choice. Labour might have made it easier, but no one made them actually take on the debt.

microdave said...

I'm in agreement with QM - I use a credit card for most of my purchases, but mainly for convenience. I don't buy something unless the money's in my bank account to pay for it. I'm actually one of the 10% who use the card company, by paying in full each month.

I've only taken out one loan, to buy my first motorbike 38 years ago, and I paid that back in less than the agreement period (which got me penalised as a result!).

I get pissed off when I see yet another statement that everybody in the country owes such & such an amount - I BLOODY WELL DON'T!!!

All Seeing Eye said...

Good points microdave, and that perhaps clouds my judgement. I don't have any credit cards or loans - apart from the mortgage - and my life is less complicated and stressful as a result.

If you choose not to live within your means then you shouldn't bleat when it all goes horribly wrong. But I'm still of the opinion that if you hand a man a loaded gun, you're partly responsible when he shoots someone.

Furor Teutonicus said...

XX Captain Ranty said...

I agree in principle, but is there not a case to be made for the power of advertising? And the subtle creation of envy, and a burning desire to keep up with the Joneses?

Much of it was/is down to stupidity, but not all of it, surely?

CR. XX

If they are stupid enough to fall for it, it is STILL their fault.

Otherwise we would all have twenty different sorts of toothpaste standing in the bathroom.

subrosa said...

The 'instant' society that's been created is partially to blame. People don't learn to plan their spending anymore because they can buy a settee tomorrow and pay for it in two year's time. Budgets, like when mothers used to have a jam jar containing rainy day money, don't exist.

Young people don't save. Most say they can't afford to. From the day I started work I put 10/- in the bank every week and was able to put a deposit on my first car when I was 17. My father was the guarantor (as I was under 21) and I knew that I had to repay that loan or else - and the else wouldn't be pleasant.

I still keep money (nowadays it's £40) tucked away in my handbag for emergencies. Have done that for 49 years.

All these little lessons we learned when young don't happen now. Children I'm told are taught about personal finance at school. I'd really like to sit in on one of those lessons to see the content.

microdave said...

"Young people don't save. Most say they can't afford to."

And yet they all walk around staring into their iPhones....

"Children I'm told are taught about personal finance at school. I'd really like to sit in on one of those lessons to see the content."

So would I, it's clearly not working!