I like how cuts to defense is waved away with “But the Americans won’t be happy!” As if that means anything to British voters.
Because OF COURSE, defense cuts are a huge part of fixing the budget.
Scrap both aircraft carriers, along with Trident and nuclear subs. Britain doesn’t need them, and though British politicians will loathe to admit it, they’re a very expensive leftover from when Britain was a world power. It hasn’t been for decades, and it can’t afford pretending.
Defence spending needs reforming and the military needs changing, but destroying what little military power we have left is not a good idea.
A renewed Britain internally can and should become a sovereign power in its own right with an independent foreign policy. Plenty of smaller countries than GB manage this to one degree or another.
More practically, defence is a relatively small part of government spending compared to the behemoths of health, welfare and debt servicing.
That’s the thing about both the UK carrier fleet and nuclear arsenal.
It’s made and designed to be used only as an extension of American power, and in conjunction with the US, not to carry out any independent action.
The UK navy for example is too small to carry out any independent carrier action without the Americans.
At the end of the day, Britain is a small country with enough internal problems. It needs a small military that can keep the UK safe, not some weird, fanciful “projection of UK (non existent) power.”
With a population of ~40 million in 1913 the peacetime Navy was vastly bigger in terms of Ships and about 4x bigger by personnel. The Army, while relatively small compared to Europe was at about 200-250k, three times larger than today's. All while still being a very civilian society on the whole.
Obviously we don't need standing forces that big now, but those examples go to show decline of the military and the industries that support them is a choice, not a consequence of us being 'a small country'.
Even in 1980, the armed forces were approximately twice the size as today's. In the present, France, with a similar population and internal problems to us manages to have an almost as large Navy and Air Force and much larger army without spending any more than us.
Having capable armed forces is an insurance policy if you(or allies/interests) get attacked, and gives a country greater options in times of crisis.
England actually had an empire in 1914, before Churchill threw it away. It needed a large navy.
Likewise in the 1980ies, Britain didn’t just have troops in for example Northern Ireland, debt in relation to GDP was far lower. It could afford that army.
It can’t afford it today.
Also: Who is threatening the UK today? There’s no IRA or dangerous foreign threat.
The army is a huge waste of money, unless you’re suggesting we should send troops abroad to Ukraine or the Baltic countries because let me stop you right there.
No young man in Britain wants to go die for Poland or Riga or wherever.
I'd prefer for us to not be tethered to the USA either but it would be good to keep them on side if we're looking at a President JD Vance in 2029. If Britain is going to reform itself totally then we'll need all the friends we can get.
Hard veto on us ever giving up our nukes. They may be an anachronism now with morons like Starmer in charge but they really are a useful, and exclusive, thing to have on hand.
Vance will retreat from Europe no matter what, so I don’t think it matters.
British nukes aren’t just an anachronism, and a huge waste of money, they also make the UK LESS safe.
Consider a situation where Poland gets nuked… Should the UK respond and risk total nuclear annihilation?
The chances of someone launching a preemptive nuclear strike to take out the few nukes that the UK has, also makes the UK less safe. Especially since the UK nuclear arsenal is too small to be a genuine threat.
The key stumbling block is that UC is now deeply embedded in all groups in our society, including in those who claim disabilities, such as mental health. The old 'get on your bike and get a job' mantra will be political suicide, especially for Reform if they took loudly vocalise it before 2029. It is now a deeply felt entitlement for many 'working' class British people. I see it on many pages where they gather or those they know.
I'm aware that it's not a Pimlico-favoured policy, but I believe more attention should be given to considerations around Sovereign Money, as outlined by people like Adair Turner and Richard Werner, as a complement to traditional bank credit. A transition period with a ten year plan.
And a remigration policy, which both opens up more lower level employment, whilst marginally raising wages.
We should also look at General Public Services spending (£158bn. compared to £242 for health and £384 for social protection). We have an inflated public sector administrative class (high in positive discrimination) that manages the Byzantine processes, laws, regulatory demands and entitlements of the sclerotic central government. If Reform's DOGE unit is up to anything, it should be looking to halve this.
It's clear that pensions aren't going to last much longer. So tax breaks for savings will have to featherbed people's retirement. Private pensions make up about 40% of peoples retirement, state pensions about 35%. Most people don't have private pensions, those who do it's under £100,000.
This is directionally correct, the welfare state - at least in its current form - is the major financial issue (indeed the American deficit issue is fundamentally the issue of a ballooning social services cost, as is the joke that is the French pay-as-you-go system where pensioners are getting more money then the working age population.) however I simply do not see the political movement or actor that can change this trend. I genuinely think a France or some other country being rejected by the bond market - and the consequent shock this will cause - is what will open up the space for a program of seriousness economic reform. The same with the fertility crisis, you need dramatic events in a developed country to help concentrate minds. People will continue to highlight things that won't substantially stop the trend, e.g., less defense spending, wealth tax, efficiency, pay politicians less, etc.
What happens to those who have never worked (and therefore not contributed)? Or still can’t find a job after 15 weeks? I can’t see the country tolerating leaving them to fend for themselves. What do likes of Singapore do in these cases?
Interesting article, thanks. I emigrated several years ago, and made notes here predicting a disaster: https://bit.ly/UK_collapse - if anything, I was too optimistic!
I also recommend Policy Exchange's recent paper, "Beyond Our Means", a report published last week proposing a series of measures to reduce UK public spending by £115 billion annually by 2030, which would lower public spending as a percentage of GDP to just over 40%. It suggests reforms such as charging for certain hospital accommodations, ending national pay bargaining for general practitioners, and designing a new social insurance system for the NHS to achieve these savings. See https://policyexchange.org.uk/publication/beyond-our-means/
I don't think it will work, however. The public are stupid and lazy. Witness the whinging every time that cut are proposed. They're parasites, confused and angry by their host organism dying. The fate of all 20th century redistribution fantasies.
Blunt, welfare throws evolution into reverse: Welfare states are tumbling chaotically towards bond market crises. Practically, it is impossible to gatekeep entitlements. Welfare inevitably becomes a one-way ratchet: ever more confiscated from the productive for the unproductive. Post-WWII fantasies of welfare and healthcare for all, regardless of contribution, was never sustainable. It institutionalised moral hazards, rewarding people for taking more from the system than they put in, fostering a culture of entitlement among the unproductive, while punishing the productive.
Redistribution disincentivised productivity, innovation, and personal responsibility. It laid the foundations for stagnation, and now decline. Globalisation enabled the skilled to vote with their feet and move where success is not penalised. Plundering the productive to buy votes from the unproductive offers short term emotional catharsis, but long term fiscal suicide. Productive net contributors opt out, by declining promotion, going part-time, retiring early, or, in growing numbers, emigrating. This fuels discourages ambition, throttles economic vitality and fuels deficits.
Collapse is not ideological: it is inevitable. No society can survive the long-term consequences of penalising value creation while subsidising parasitism. Welfare states are buckling under the weight of over-promised benefits and collapsing productivity: barely one lifetime into the experiment. The solution is not reform but cessation. Cease redistribution, replacing it with voluntary charity. If people genuinely want to fund others’ lifestyles, no tax collection machinery would be required; donations would suffice. State coercion is necessary because people will not voluntarily fund strangers.
It will take a major economic crash, and/or a war, to bring people to their senses. Economic reality, however upsetting to the left, is reasserting itself. The collapse is coming: https://bit.ly/UK_collapse
Another field is devolution - it all needs to go. The whole Blairite Project mote gone, even if it risks upheaval. The Fact that USA has 50% the GDP we habban , and that such an slide by UK began within an few Years of Tony Blair coming to might, clearly tells all!
*Scrap the convention on refugees, send all boats back and deport all recent arrivals. (5-10 years?) No more refugee hotels.
*Cut foreign aid. Not a single pound. (Tbf it mostly goes towards the NGO class.) Scrap the BBC.
*Cut the aircraft carriers, nuclear subs and Trident. Cut airforce and land forces too. UK military should be small and only used to protect Britain. (And turn away refugee boats!)
*Remittance tax of 30%.
*Cut all carbon neutral nonsense. Make a deal with Russia* or whoever (Qatar?) for cheap gas and oil.
Use the lower energy costs to reindustrialize.
There ya go! Fixed the budget without touching welfare!
*Im sure Russia will give the UK a good deal if we recognize Crimea and Donbas as being Russian.
I like how cuts to defense is waved away with “But the Americans won’t be happy!” As if that means anything to British voters.
Because OF COURSE, defense cuts are a huge part of fixing the budget.
Scrap both aircraft carriers, along with Trident and nuclear subs. Britain doesn’t need them, and though British politicians will loathe to admit it, they’re a very expensive leftover from when Britain was a world power. It hasn’t been for decades, and it can’t afford pretending.
Defence spending needs reforming and the military needs changing, but destroying what little military power we have left is not a good idea.
A renewed Britain internally can and should become a sovereign power in its own right with an independent foreign policy. Plenty of smaller countries than GB manage this to one degree or another.
More practically, defence is a relatively small part of government spending compared to the behemoths of health, welfare and debt servicing.
That’s the thing about both the UK carrier fleet and nuclear arsenal.
It’s made and designed to be used only as an extension of American power, and in conjunction with the US, not to carry out any independent action.
The UK navy for example is too small to carry out any independent carrier action without the Americans.
At the end of the day, Britain is a small country with enough internal problems. It needs a small military that can keep the UK safe, not some weird, fanciful “projection of UK (non existent) power.”
With a population of ~40 million in 1913 the peacetime Navy was vastly bigger in terms of Ships and about 4x bigger by personnel. The Army, while relatively small compared to Europe was at about 200-250k, three times larger than today's. All while still being a very civilian society on the whole.
Obviously we don't need standing forces that big now, but those examples go to show decline of the military and the industries that support them is a choice, not a consequence of us being 'a small country'.
Even in 1980, the armed forces were approximately twice the size as today's. In the present, France, with a similar population and internal problems to us manages to have an almost as large Navy and Air Force and much larger army without spending any more than us.
Having capable armed forces is an insurance policy if you(or allies/interests) get attacked, and gives a country greater options in times of crisis.
England actually had an empire in 1914, before Churchill threw it away. It needed a large navy.
Likewise in the 1980ies, Britain didn’t just have troops in for example Northern Ireland, debt in relation to GDP was far lower. It could afford that army.
It can’t afford it today.
Also: Who is threatening the UK today? There’s no IRA or dangerous foreign threat.
The army is a huge waste of money, unless you’re suggesting we should send troops abroad to Ukraine or the Baltic countries because let me stop you right there.
No young man in Britain wants to go die for Poland or Riga or wherever.
The world is increasingly unstable and our allies increasingly less reliable and/or capable.
I'd prefer for us to not be tethered to the USA either but it would be good to keep them on side if we're looking at a President JD Vance in 2029. If Britain is going to reform itself totally then we'll need all the friends we can get.
Hard veto on us ever giving up our nukes. They may be an anachronism now with morons like Starmer in charge but they really are a useful, and exclusive, thing to have on hand.
Vance will retreat from Europe no matter what, so I don’t think it matters.
British nukes aren’t just an anachronism, and a huge waste of money, they also make the UK LESS safe.
Consider a situation where Poland gets nuked… Should the UK respond and risk total nuclear annihilation?
The chances of someone launching a preemptive nuclear strike to take out the few nukes that the UK has, also makes the UK less safe. Especially since the UK nuclear arsenal is too small to be a genuine threat.
The key stumbling block is that UC is now deeply embedded in all groups in our society, including in those who claim disabilities, such as mental health. The old 'get on your bike and get a job' mantra will be political suicide, especially for Reform if they took loudly vocalise it before 2029. It is now a deeply felt entitlement for many 'working' class British people. I see it on many pages where they gather or those they know.
I'm aware that it's not a Pimlico-favoured policy, but I believe more attention should be given to considerations around Sovereign Money, as outlined by people like Adair Turner and Richard Werner, as a complement to traditional bank credit. A transition period with a ten year plan.
And a remigration policy, which both opens up more lower level employment, whilst marginally raising wages.
We should also look at General Public Services spending (£158bn. compared to £242 for health and £384 for social protection). We have an inflated public sector administrative class (high in positive discrimination) that manages the Byzantine processes, laws, regulatory demands and entitlements of the sclerotic central government. If Reform's DOGE unit is up to anything, it should be looking to halve this.
It's clear that pensions aren't going to last much longer. So tax breaks for savings will have to featherbed people's retirement. Private pensions make up about 40% of peoples retirement, state pensions about 35%. Most people don't have private pensions, those who do it's under £100,000.
I see a future where CBDCs will fill the gap.
This is directionally correct, the welfare state - at least in its current form - is the major financial issue (indeed the American deficit issue is fundamentally the issue of a ballooning social services cost, as is the joke that is the French pay-as-you-go system where pensioners are getting more money then the working age population.) however I simply do not see the political movement or actor that can change this trend. I genuinely think a France or some other country being rejected by the bond market - and the consequent shock this will cause - is what will open up the space for a program of seriousness economic reform. The same with the fertility crisis, you need dramatic events in a developed country to help concentrate minds. People will continue to highlight things that won't substantially stop the trend, e.g., less defense spending, wealth tax, efficiency, pay politicians less, etc.
What happens to those who have never worked (and therefore not contributed)? Or still can’t find a job after 15 weeks? I can’t see the country tolerating leaving them to fend for themselves. What do likes of Singapore do in these cases?
Interesting article, thanks. I emigrated several years ago, and made notes here predicting a disaster: https://bit.ly/UK_collapse - if anything, I was too optimistic!
I also recommend Policy Exchange's recent paper, "Beyond Our Means", a report published last week proposing a series of measures to reduce UK public spending by £115 billion annually by 2030, which would lower public spending as a percentage of GDP to just over 40%. It suggests reforms such as charging for certain hospital accommodations, ending national pay bargaining for general practitioners, and designing a new social insurance system for the NHS to achieve these savings. See https://policyexchange.org.uk/publication/beyond-our-means/
I don't think it will work, however. The public are stupid and lazy. Witness the whinging every time that cut are proposed. They're parasites, confused and angry by their host organism dying. The fate of all 20th century redistribution fantasies.
Blunt, welfare throws evolution into reverse: Welfare states are tumbling chaotically towards bond market crises. Practically, it is impossible to gatekeep entitlements. Welfare inevitably becomes a one-way ratchet: ever more confiscated from the productive for the unproductive. Post-WWII fantasies of welfare and healthcare for all, regardless of contribution, was never sustainable. It institutionalised moral hazards, rewarding people for taking more from the system than they put in, fostering a culture of entitlement among the unproductive, while punishing the productive.
Redistribution disincentivised productivity, innovation, and personal responsibility. It laid the foundations for stagnation, and now decline. Globalisation enabled the skilled to vote with their feet and move where success is not penalised. Plundering the productive to buy votes from the unproductive offers short term emotional catharsis, but long term fiscal suicide. Productive net contributors opt out, by declining promotion, going part-time, retiring early, or, in growing numbers, emigrating. This fuels discourages ambition, throttles economic vitality and fuels deficits.
Collapse is not ideological: it is inevitable. No society can survive the long-term consequences of penalising value creation while subsidising parasitism. Welfare states are buckling under the weight of over-promised benefits and collapsing productivity: barely one lifetime into the experiment. The solution is not reform but cessation. Cease redistribution, replacing it with voluntary charity. If people genuinely want to fund others’ lifestyles, no tax collection machinery would be required; donations would suffice. State coercion is necessary because people will not voluntarily fund strangers.
It will take a major economic crash, and/or a war, to bring people to their senses. Economic reality, however upsetting to the left, is reasserting itself. The collapse is coming: https://bit.ly/UK_collapse
Another field is devolution - it all needs to go. The whole Blairite Project mote gone, even if it risks upheaval. The Fact that USA has 50% the GDP we habban , and that such an slide by UK began within an few Years of Tony Blair coming to might, clearly tells all!
Fix the budget?
I got ya.
*No more billions of pounds for Ukraine.
*Scrap the convention on refugees, send all boats back and deport all recent arrivals. (5-10 years?) No more refugee hotels.
*Cut foreign aid. Not a single pound. (Tbf it mostly goes towards the NGO class.) Scrap the BBC.
*Cut the aircraft carriers, nuclear subs and Trident. Cut airforce and land forces too. UK military should be small and only used to protect Britain. (And turn away refugee boats!)
*Remittance tax of 30%.
*Cut all carbon neutral nonsense. Make a deal with Russia* or whoever (Qatar?) for cheap gas and oil.
Use the lower energy costs to reindustrialize.
There ya go! Fixed the budget without touching welfare!
*Im sure Russia will give the UK a good deal if we recognize Crimea and Donbas as being Russian.
Excellent article