Budget for growth or survival?

Budget Day was last week. The Chancellor of Exchequer, Mr A Darling, delivered his second Budget statement under very difficult economic circumstances as he had to juggle cutting public expenditure and raising both direct and indirect taxes and has borrowed to balance the book. Both he and Gordon Brown stressed fiscal stimulus to keep the economy running. The economy is in its deepest trouble since the second World War.

For the first time since the 60's we are in a deflationary situation as RPS has gone down to -2. With the co-operation of the Governor of the Bank of England, Mervin King, the Treasury has resorted to quantitative easing.

Let us hope the medicines prescribed by the current Chancellor will work. Let us hope the scandal of expenses claims by our lawmaker MPs are genuine and more transparent. They must give examples of honesty, sincerity and humanity. They must pause for a thought for the millions of underpaid workers, pensioners and people living in genuine hardship who have to live within their limited incomes.

Where there is fairness and genuine distribution of the national cake, the society benefits and we don’t need to create have and have not’s. We need to encourage business people to invest in Britain so that they can be wealth creators. This will support economic growth and could increase employment.

We can not go back to taxing and spending days.

The Isobel Plantation

'Earth has nothing to show more fair'. This quotation from Wordsworth said it all. The Isobel Plantation is a cordoned off area in Richmond Park about 500 metres wide and the same across. I came to the plantation on a coach trip from a ladies club.

When we alighted from the coach what a sight met our eyes. The Rhododendrons were in full bloom. They were tiered, one bush on top of the other like a great wall of vivid colour lining the sides of the path ways. All the colours of the rainbow stretching up to the sky.

The plantation was set in walkways intermingled with little streams of clear water. As you walked along these pathways you felt that God’s hand was in this panorama. That he had used his paint box to create this breath taking scene to magnificent effect. It was too wonderful to be the work of man and too perfect to be other than the hand of God! As you wondered along the pathways this scene assailed your senses.

Your eyes were dazed by the striking beauty of nature in it, vivid, most beautiful. Your ears were overwhelmed with the sweet melody of the little streams as they gambolled over the sparkling stones. You could taste the coolness of the clear water, the freshness of the vegetation so crisp and sharp. The songbirds added beautiful background music to this scene. The whole effect was dazzling as hues of reds, blues, pinks, purples and all the colours of the spectrum bombarded your eyes. You could touch the velvety smoothness of the petals.

I felt the peace and wonder that true beauty brings. I walked around the gardens in awe and silence almost on tiptoe so as not break the spell and spoil the magic. Then it was time to go and I was very reluctance to join the bus for the return home journey.

The spell stayed with me for long time to come, filling me with peace and joy. I used my camera but nothing could recapture the wonder of the real experience of The Isobel Plantation. I felt that I had met with God’s creation in the flesh.

Salutations

Happy Easter to all. A time of year to celebrate, poets greet the cheery blossoms, the magnolias burst into flower and the pigeons are noisy. Camden has attached nesting boxes on the trees in Brunswick square, bringing the country to the city. Proust describes this time of year in a burst of poetic ecstacy as "Winter falling into the arms of spring" Wally

VAN GOGH

Van gogh painting . I am going to publish it for everyone to see.

Thanks for your attention.

Mintu

Holiday in Ireland

When I was a nurse in the Navy just after the war had finished, a friend of mine, also a nurse decided we would have a really good holiday somewhere where there was no rationing and the dreaded food coupons! Eventually we decided on Southen Ireland and set about getting tickets and sorting our leave out. Of course tickets were free which meant we could travel any distance we wished!

When the time came, we caught a train from Plymouth to Fishguard changing at Cardiff on the way. We had a good crossing and disembarked at Rosslare where we spent the night to recover, and to give us energy for travels to come. We got a coach to Cork stopping at various towns on the way including Waterford where we visited the glass factory and eventually arrived at Cork which is a lovely city. I was thrilled to see my surname (no prizes for guessing!) in large letters on a hotel!

After exploring the city the one thing we simply had to do was to go to Blarney Castle and kiss the Blarney stone to make us 'full of the blarney' as they say! It is quite a difficult feat to accomplush. You lie on your back near the edge of the castle on the summit, lean over to reach the stone while someone holds your legs to stop you hurling down to your doom! Make sure you have a very good friend with you!!

After that adventure we got another coach to Glengarriff which is right down south and on the coast. We hired a boat and rowed ourselves out to an island called Garnish. which had a beautiful Italian garden on it. In the evening we went to a hop with some nice young men who were staying in the same hotel as us which was fun and useful as they told us places to see which were not on the map.

We got a train to Killarney which was simply lovely. We hired a jaunting car which is really a horse and governess car and drove around the lakes known as"The meetings of the waters"which were quite beautiful.

Our holiday was slowly coming to an end. We felt our last port of call had to be Dublin. So off we went. When we arrived we had difficulty finding a B&B for the two nights we intended to stay as the Dublin horse show was on. Eventually we found one. We sorted ourselves out and started to explore the city.

When we had seen all the main places, including Trinity College, we felt it was time to call it a day and return to the Navy and nursing. We packed all our "goods and chattles" and caught a train to Dun Laoghaire where we got the ship for Holyhead and so ended our adventure!

Difficult Times

Since the end of World War II, we have continually faced economic boom and bust, on average every 8/9 years. Sometimes we blamed current government policies and lack of an industrial base. Since the late 1960’s we have continually shifted our emphasis to service industries and insurance. We could get away with that as long as China, India, Thailand, Brazil, Philippines and other developing countries economic structures were not so strong. We always captured the lost markets and emerged from bust to boom. So whatever industries we had, we could satisfy domestic and overseas demand and bolster the economy again.

This time the economic outlook is very gloomy. India, China, Brazil and other nations have developed their economies. They can export their goods and services to the world market place cheaper without sacrificing quality and delivery. Bankers' bonuses and greed have destroyed the national coffers of the US, Britain, Ireland, Germany and other G7 countries. The Prime Minister and Bank of England have approved the quantitative easing approach to liquidity, so that Banks can start lending to businesses and home buyers. Effectively Britain has resorted to printing money, which means pound in our pockets has been devalued. The present government has blamed the world downturn but the bulk of blame must fall on Tony Blair and Gordon Brown as they borrowed money in good times and did not make any provisions for bad times. Gordon Brown, when Chancellor of the Exchequer, said that he had abolished boom and bust. His tax credits have benefited single parents and penalised couples living together. His policy means if you have worked hard and saved some money for the future, you are excluded from home help, tax credits and other support. If you have not saved anything and never worked you are entitled to all benefits. When he abolished the married couples allowances he devalued the institution of marriage.

Returning to the present recession, I think it will take more that 2 years to recover. Many jobs are taken by migrant workers on low wages. Some people do not want these jobs as they can get more money in benefits. In addition, we have lost or sold most of our manufacturing industry and are not in a position to compete.

North Sea oil and gas revenues have been squandered. A lot of the infrastructure needed to be updated or renewed. Whether it was Norman Lamont or Gordon Brown, they all put dogma before the country's needs. When one creates an economic bubble and then it bursts, it's always the people who put their faith and trust in the political parties who suffer most.

Parties of all colours should sit down together and formulate a plan of national recovery. They blame each other and again the slinging match has begun and we are back to square one!

Letter from Dryden

Dryden is a small town in N.Ontario, Canada. The main industry is a paper mill which is gradually shutting down resulting in widespread unemployment in the area.

In the summer Dryden is a tourist destination. It is famous for hunting (Moose and Deer) and fishing. The summer is attractive to nature lovers because of the numerous lakes and forests.
In winter the landscape is stunning. Everything is covered with snow. The only contrast is between the green conifers and the blinding snow. The outdoor temperature is often 20 degrees below zero. This is cold even with the proper clothing. I ventured to leave the house when it was sunny and the temperature just below zero. I slithered along after the snow plough had cleared a path and after 20 minutes returned to the house, painfully cold.

Ice fishing - that is boring a hole through the ice on the lake and fishing through this hole - is a favourite winter pastime for the locals. I have declined several invitations to try this or to ride on a ski-doo.

Life is healthy otherwise. All the germs have been killed by the cold and I have eaten Moose, Deer and lake trout. London will seem very warm and ordinary when I get back -- Walter