Back in Wollaton

I'm back campaigning in Nottingham after spending virtually a month of my time in Newark. Yesterday I spent the evening knocking on doors on and around Runswick Drive in Wollaton. The weather was perfect and we got a lot of surveys done with a lot of issues raised which Jane and the Conservative Wollaton Cllrs will be tackling. Pavements again was raised as an issue. Perhaps Nottingham City Council should put some money into this? It seems to be a massive problem in Wollaton, I hope this can gets sorted.

It was good to see a lot of Conservative support yesterday I hope all the votes Jane is garnering really pays off come election day. I also met a fair few Green party voters, very interesting. Mind you the Green Party's first candidate for the recent Euro elections was from Wollaton, I hope you like that plug Duncan.

It was also good to see yesterday that 2 million more people are now employed by the private sector than under the last Labour Government. In fact more people are employed in this country now than have ever been before. In my opinion this is an outstanding achievement and the amount is more than I expected would happen. I would also like to say to counter act the moaning minnies of the left-wing that around 90% of these jobs are full time, not zero hours contracts or part time work. Furthermore the vast majority of the 2 million figure are British workers. Unlike what UKIP has said in trying to scaremonger, there are not 2 million more Bulgarians and Romanians 'after your jobs' in the UK.

All in all a good day, and to top it off Jane bought us a drink in the local pub. Cheers to Jane and to the Chancellor who has cut beer duty.

Cheers George for your cut in beer duty.

Economic Resurgence and Roadblocks

I don't think anyone in the Conservative Party is in any doubt that if we're going to win in 2015 the main reason for this will be the economy. We've got to make sure the economy is healthy or well on the way to being so by 2015 or we have no chance of victory. Since my last economic post the picture has got a lot rosier but what are the big roadblocks to a stronger economy.

UK economic pigs on the increase.

The good news is that we are predicted to grow more than anyone thought this year. The OCED, who said that we would grow at most by 0.8% this year, has massively increased their prediction to the UK growing by 1.5%. Indeed it gets better when you look at the annualised rate of growth which is 6% meaning we're growing faster than France, Germany and America (pretty good going). Of course we shouldn't be too optimistic because these are predictions we must wait for the results until we starting patting each other on the back and celebrating an end to a depression. 

The UK in real terms is out preforming Germany and probably will continue to in the future.

This growth is also pretty sustainable, built on the increases from all sectors of the economy. Factory production is seeing a boom that could only be compared to one that took place 20 years ago. Car production is soaring as well (which Top Gear has tooted a lot). The Service Sector is really getting some pace now on the back of increased high street sales (despite threats from the interweb and out of town shopping). Construction figures are the best they have ever been for 6 years. And most importantly Lego has seen a 17% rise in sales. All sectors of the economy are growing, which, apart from last month, has only happened in 1991.

Lego is on the increase.

The best news however is twofold. Unemployment is down and will continue to fall. Expect an increase in the 1.3 million jobs that that have been created in this country since 2010, a good record for the Conservatives in government. The growth in the economy also means tax revenues are up for the government which is good for deficit reduction because the shortfall of tax has led to the deficit falling less than expected by the Chancellor in 2010. Perhaps we will pay off more of the deficit than expected?

All areas of the economy are growing creating more jobs in ares like the car industry.

But this actually leads onto the start of the bad news because the days when cheap government lending is over. The small window we had to pay back or debt with the least cost has virtually closed because yesterday the cost for the UK government to borrow reached over 3%. This is an international rather than a purely UK problem and is an inevitable shift where bankers and other countries realise that governments are not very good at paying back loans. So now each Pound in debt is a bigger weight on the future of the UK. 

Interest Rates are likely to be at an all time low for a very long time.

Also we may see a problem caused by the Bank of England keeping the rates of interest at 0.5% for 3 years (despite some caveats). This move is good for stability as businesses have a pretty clear picture of what to expect of the future, but it's not as brilliant a move for lending as people may think. Although we have started to create more wealth with economic growth, we have a capital problem still in the UK. Cutting taxes would aid this partially but we really need to be encouraging people to save so their money can be leant out, this can be done by raising interest rates. Although a low interest rate will make people want to borrow more it is impossible to do so when there is very little money. If I was Governor I'd start thinking about raising interest rates sometime in mid to late 2014. 

Inflation is something to watch out in case there is a big increase.

Inflation may become a big problem too because the government is going to start trying to get rid of as much as this debt as possible by decreasing the value of money. It has already done this quite a lot with almost 25% of the deficit that paid off by printing more money. With more quantitative easing possibly on the way, the government increasing energy bills and interest rates remaining at a standstill inflation is likely to increase. Bad for business and for people's buying power. Inflation is not something that any government wants to increase and especially before an election which Labour will fight on the cost of living.

Cue Union Flag piggy bank surrounded by money.

So there we are, lots of good news about growth, profit, jobs and deficit reduction but things to watch out for in the next coming years and possibly some mistakes made by the Bank of England and the Government.

Also, what do you think to the new look of the Blog? If you like it then good, if you don't well you'll just have to put up with the blue, red and white combined with a new logo.

Weekly Poll Lowdown

Well it seems after calls last week from the UK opposition, only before they found out that councils controlled by Labour employ people on 'zero contract hours', you agree that zero contract hours should be abolished. Just over half of think this should be the case and this is pretty much dead on what the public thought when polled about it last week. So well done for being highly representative.

Should 'zero hour contracts' be abolished?

Yes.	53%
No.	38%
Unsure.	9%

Total votes: 34

I think getting rid of zero contact hours is a stupid idea because it gets rid of economic freedom of both employers and also of employees. 

 Its not just Sports Direct that uses zero hour contracts, the NHS, caring businesses, Charities and most government departments use them too.

Firstly, just so everyone is clear about this, a zero hour contract is where a person is employed but there isn't an amount of set hours they do. The business would call up a person and say 'can you do X amount of hours at this time' and the employee can accept or decline to do it. Zero contract hour workers are subject to other employment legislations because the law sees them as employees and not just workers. Also as another side point, it's not just big business who use zero contract hours. 24% of those who are on a zero hour contract work in the public sector and 34% work for charities. 

The idea behind zero hour contracts have been around for a very a very long time. It's essentially to give flexibility for businesses and staff. People are able to work for as much as they want because they individually want to be flexible. For example those who can only physically work short hours or want the potential of more money than a 9-5 job often use Zero hour contracts.

Employers too have the bonus of being able to have more staff when needed without having to spend lots of money on longer contracts. Indeed if zero contract hour jobs did not exist it is debatable that they would be replaced by full time jobs as the cost would be too great, especially true in small a medium size business because they have less money.

  

 Vince Cable wants tighter regulation of the zero hour contracts because people are willingly working on them and its up to him to decide what people should do.

So what is the cumulative effect for employers and employees, let's forget the obvious benefits to the consumer at this time? Well people who would otherwise be unemployed have a job because it's cheap enough for employers to provide positions for labour. Therefore employees have more choice about what job they can do, and that's on top of the flexibility they get in accepting the work when asked to do it. Employers too get a benefit of potentially saving costs and gaining productivity. This in turns creates more money for them and then leads to an expansion with more jobs and so there are even more people employed, which is what people want at the moment.

 People on the left don't actually realise that people just want to work to have more control over their lives. Employees are winners from their trade of labour too.

So what is all this nonsense about? It comes from two ideas espoused by the loony left of the UK. Firstly that somehow everyone is entitled to full employment. These are the sort of Marxist ideas that Owen Jones espouses which ends up with the country being bankrupt and no one in employment. This hasn't been peddled in the media because it doesn't make sense, but be sure that many of the hard core lefties who bring these to light believe in this. 

A much more used argument then is that people are not getting enough hours to work and therefore can't afford to live, a classic case of oppression of the working population by the 'evil' capitalists. However, only 16% of zero contract workers in research done by the CPID 'felt they did not have an opportunity to work enough hours', which is pretty low and also highly subjective on 'enough'. But even if it were the case that people on zero contract hours were struggling to get by as the norm they would not be getting by at all if they did not have any jobs. Then again we could always have these people on benefits, perhaps that's what the lefties want? They're not interested in jobs for people only to have voters stuck in a situation where they have little freedom and rely on the state letting them live. We already know that the lefties in the Guardian just want to control people's lives, this may just be another way about it.

 The lefties just don't want people choosing to improve their lives by earning money.

Vote in the new poll on the sidebar.

Erewash Jobs Fair

I rarely pop over the border from Nottinghamshire to Derbyshire for a blog article, but today I will make the exception because the great Jessica Lee MP is yet again organising a Jobs Fair in Erewash.

Jessica Lee is continually promoting jobs in Erewash.

Businesses and constituents are invited from across the area to come together at West Park Leisure Centre between 1pm and 7pm on 12th September 2013 to get advice and find new opportunities at the Job's Fair. Last year over 1000 people turned up and with a 2nd bite of the cherry Jessica is hoping for an even bigger turnout. Jessica is really getting behind the idea of helping her constituents to aspire to a better life.

Last year's jobs fair was so successful a bigger venue is needed. 

Jessica is really hot on the ball with increasing employment across Erewash giving massive support to apprenticeships in the area. Jessica has gone back to see how apprentices given opportunities at the last Jobs Fair were getting on. She said that the apprentices "recognised that it wasn't just a wage packet and training they were getting from taking up an apprenticeship; but confidence and self esteem, which I am sure you will agree, are qualities key to getting the best from and for yourself." This is very good to see because having a job is the best way to improve people's lives and gets the economy rolling to create others.  

Apprentices are very important to getting the economy going and improving people's lives.

If you want to know more information about the Jobs Fair click here. The Jobs Fair also has a promotional Twitter, @ErewashJobsFair, and Facebook account.