The Covid Cash had to be doled out very quickly because the government decided to shut down the economy .Government bureaucracy is incapable of dealing with process in normal times so in a crisis situation the prospects of Hmrc handling anything efficiently would be zero.Hmrc have consistently shown an inability to operate efficiently.Political parties in opposition always talk about the huge savings they will make once they are in office.It will never happen…

The police available to look at bounce loan fraud! They are only available in their hundreds to escort the invading army from France to their Hotels.Do not wear a mask or you will be arrested but the UK will provide potential masks for the Invading armies, Trulls in the form of Hijabs.

When a FTSE 250 stock loses it's listing it is replaced within a very short period.

Changes in FTSE UK Index Series05 October 2026Subject to the court sanctioning the scheme of arrangement in relation to the cash acquisition of Senior (UK, constituent) by Zeus UK Bidco (non-constituent), please see details of affected indexes and effective dates below:Senior (UK, 0795823) will be deleted from the FTSE 250 index.Amaroq (UK, BTRG036) will be added to the FTSE 250 Index and deleted from the FTSE SmallCap Index.All changes effective from 08 October 2026.Full details of index changes are available on the FTSE Russell website.

Unsustainable. In my constituency the bill per claimant is £2,871 (up 25.4% in two years).The median local wage is £39,027 (up 3.2% in two years).With benefits far outstripping the rate of wage growth there is less and less motivation to work for a living!I hear that 'up North' in Burnham land, benefits are known down the generations as 'bennies'. Makes it all sound very cuddly.

PIP recipients in Glasgow are taking the piss, rent free flat virtually no council tax, maximum winter fuel payment, 3000 pound furniture grant when first moving in. I don't mind the genuine claimants who are disabled getting money but at least 70% of claims are now fraudulent there being nothing physically or mentally wrong just well versed good actors who top up their illicit benefit claims working on the side, selling tax free cigs and booze, always crying poverty and mostly voting SNP.

The paradox of IHT is that a majority of voters dislike the idea of the tax even though very few of them will actually pay it. Perhaps this is due to the lottery effect ie if the voter were lucky enough to get a windfall, they wd not want to surrender it at death, rather than pass it on to their heirs.

This is mind blowing. The benefits bill in Gillingham and Rainham(Kent) £235 million. £55 million in PIP. Total benefits per person £2200. up 20% since Labour came to power.Why am I claiming nothing? Stop PIP for a year slashing the benefits bill by nearly a quarter.Would that balance the budget? If not slash the benefits bill until the budget balances.A few people starving or freezing (allegedly) probably not much of a lose for the UK.Though the biggest boat load of criminal invaders, illegal migrants, to reach the UK had 230 on board they will cost the UK £230 million, so I suppose it puts in context.

A country that issues its own fiat currency does not strictly need to borrow in the same way a household, firm, or currency-user does, but it still issues debt for practical, institutional, macroeconomic, and political reasons.Core distinctionA sovereign government that issues its own floating fiat currency (e.g., the US, Japan, UK, Canada, Australia) can always create more of that currency. It cannot “run out of money” in its own unit the way a private actor can. Default in its own currency is a political or policy choice, not a technical necessity. This is a central insight associated with Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) and is also recognized in mainstream monetary economics when discussing a monetary sovereign.Yet virtually every such country still issues bonds (borrows). The reasons are not primarily “to fund spending” in the narrow sense.Why governments still issue debtInflation and demand management Creating new money and spending it injects purchasing power. If the economy is near capacity, this can raise inflation. Selling bonds drains reserves/money from the private sector, offsetting that injection. Bond issuance is one tool (alongside taxes and interest-rate policy) for managing aggregate demand and inflation.Interest-rate control Central banks target interest rates. Government bond markets and open-market operations are the main mechanisms for setting and transmitting those rates. Without a stock of government securities, the central bank’s ability to implement monetary policy would look very different.Institutional and legal constraints Most countries prohibit the central bank from directly financing the treasury (“monetary financing”). Governments therefore sell bonds to private buyers (or the central bank buys them in the secondary market). These rules exist to limit political pressure for excessive money creation and to preserve central-bank independence.Safe assets and financial plumbing Government bonds are the premier risk-free asset in the financial system. Banks, pension funds, insurers, money-market funds, and foreign governments hold them for liquidity, collateral, duration matching, and regulatory purposes. A continuous supply of these assets supports the functioning of money markets and the broader financial system.Credibility, politics, and signaling Markets and voters often treat bond issuance as more “disciplined” than pure money creation. Large-scale direct monetization can undermine confidence in the currency’s future value, raise inflation expectations, and trigger political backlash. Borrowing at market rates provides a visible price signal about fiscal sustainability (even if the signal is imperfect).Foreign-currency and external constraints Even a monetary sovereign may need foreign exchange for imports, debt denominated in foreign currency, or reserve management. Domestic money creation does not automatically generate foreign currency. Countries with large external deficits or histories of instability face tighter practical limits.What actually constrains spendingFor a pure monetary sovereign with a floating exchange rate and debt only in its own currency, the real constraints are:Inflation and real resource availability (labor, materials, productive capacity).Exchange-rate effects and imported inflation.Political willingness to tax or cut spending later if needed.Institutional rules and market confidence.Taxes do not “fund” spending in a mechanical sense for such a government; they create demand for the currency, help control inflation, and redistribute. Bond sales similarly serve macroeconomic and institutional functions more than pure financing.Exceptions and nuancesCountries that do not issue their own currency (eurozone members, dollarized economies, currency boards) genuinely need to borrow or earn foreign currency; they face hard budget constraints similar to households.Even monetary sovereigns can face self-imposed or market-imposed limits if inflation expectations become unanchored or if political institutions break down.Historical episodes of high inflation or hyperinflation usually involved large fiscal deficits financed by money creation amid collapsing real output, loss of tax capacity, or loss of confidence—not merely the technical ability to print.In short: the ability to issue fiat currency removes the pure solvency constraint in the domestic unit of account, but governments still borrow because money creation has macroeconomic consequences, because financial systems rely on government debt as a safe asset, and because institutional and political arrangements deliberately separate fiscal and monetary powers. The decision is about managing the economy and the currency’s value, not about whether the government can “afford” to spend in its own money.PS I only drink Bollinger.