Bank cuts interest rates
Thursday 5th February 2009, 12:00PM GMT.
The Bank of England today cut interest rates from 1.5pc to 1pc – a new record low.
For the full story see today’s Shropshire Star
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i think these rate cuts are beginning to work, dramatic savings in mortgage bills means more money to spend, house prices went up 2% last month. not yet green shoots but spring is coming!
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Pensioner/savers shouldn’t worry, Clown and Darling have just stolen the Tories promise to increase the over 65s Income Tax allowance to compensate for the lost of interest on their savings accounts. If I was the Tories in the Commons, I wouldn’t mention any new initiatives – they will only be stolen by Clown and co who seem bereft of any new ideas, least of all to get us out of this current disaster.
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oh stuart ye of little faith, from small acorns i smell a revival in the offing. your diddy david cameron is only good at one thing, selling his country short, talking down the pound, he may get his comeuppance at the ballot box!
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Really hope this works the whole of the UK is heading for shutdown! all major constuction projects are on hold lots of people ar being put on 90 day notices in the arcitect and M&E Consultancies.
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And there was me thinking that Prestfelde produced financial geniuses. Come on devon, the cause of the low value of the £ against the dollar and the Euro is directly related to low inflation, low inflation has a direct connotation to low interest rates and taken all around, it is a vicious spiral that all the talk in the world is not going to alter. We don’t want “talk” from any politician, least of all Clown, it is action that is needed.
The value of the £ has a direct bearing on lack of global confidence in the British economy and vice versa and when Masters Clown and Darling say that they are saving the world, one can understand why the International markets think that we are a load of rubbish.
Labourites cannot have it both ways, on the one hand they say that Cameron is doing nothing, on the other hand, they pinch all the Tory initiatives and say that Cameron is talking the £ down, now what is it to be?.
Brown has messed up good and proper and does not have one word to say about the catastrophic exchange rates which, whilst good for foreign buyers are an absolute disaster for our own importers.
True to past form, we now have a Labourite government coming out with its past modus operandi’, blood curdling economic problems and very pronounced labour/work problems.
Heard that little ditty on TV, “There may be trouble ahead”. How apt and timely – it might as well be the signature tune of Labour’s demise.
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when the snow finally goes, i predict green shoots appearing, the government needs to get some money into the construction industry, building starter homes and new towns.. there has never been a better time to buy a new house with prices stabilising. there are excellent deals to be had. likewise with cars but let us buy british made cars, bmw mini,toyota,nissan, honda etc and if you have just won a jackpot how about a morgan, not sure if ford or vauxhall make cars in this country, if they do i apologise. recovery from recession is in our hands, let us go for it
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Stuart,
So are you suggesting that because the opposition have finally made a small suggestion that will actually relieve the pressure a little on at least some of those hard-pressed in the current difficulties, the incumbent government should refuse to implement it because it was suggested by someone else?
Wouldn’t that be cutting off one’s nose to spite one’s face?
Lower interest rates are the right thing to do in the current circumstances.They allow businesses to function with lower debt levels and overheads, and ease the pressure on those with mortgages.
On the down-side, those who rely upon interest payments for income do suffer, and it’s right that the government have sought to help with that.
Whilst circumstances are hard for many at present, there will be positive outcomes in the longer term. We will hopefully see a return to more sensible lending, and put the final nails in the coffin of the ‘greed is good’ philosophy which was so encouraged in the 1980s and 90s, and which has done so much harm in the time since.
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Broon & the McMafia should head north and vanish.
They are only interested in their own salvation!
10 plus years of Bliar and co. and it’s not so Great Britain.
No political party can save us from the vast taxes, borrowing and waste.
Just go Gordon
You are seriously bad for our health!
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Devon is losing the plot. The interest rate cut has virtually no effect on what people are really paying every month – many are on fixed rates. Those on trackers have hit a barrier as the banks have special clauses to prevent rates dropping too low. There are very few new tracker deals available and fixed rates are much higher than the BoE base rate.
And house prices have risen? Great statistic! How many completions were there in that period? One must look at the trend over at least a quarter, not one isolated month.
And just wait for inflation to start increasing when the effects of the £’s devaluation kicks in – all our imports are in $ or Euros!
Green shoots? Don’t make me laugh! This is hardcore.
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Devon Salopian – 80% of the country are on fixed rate mortgages please explain how the lowering of interest rates helps these 80%???
Also when interest rates go down you also get less interest on savings in banks…
Not good at all in my view.
Surely it would be fairer to cut VAT to 5% instead of lowering interest rates
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Savers outnumber borrowers by 7 to 1! We are not pensioners but do have savings which we were hoping were going to grow to help us in our old age. Now it all seems rather pointless! As already mentioned most only a small percentage of people have been helped by the interest rate drops, those on trackers, the rest feel even more frustrated that they are paying such a high rate. People will start taking their money out of the banks and investing elsewhere. Then there will be no money to lend people wanting mortgages!
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oh sorry to be so provocative and to drag us all away from bad weather stories.
where do i begin, i agree those on fixed mortgage rates will not yet feel the benefit of low interest rates, examples have been quoted of a man paying £900 per month 6 months ago now paying £275 p/month,
house prices are on the rise, those relying on savings will need to invest in something else, for example gold coins and old dinky toys, i kid you not both are good investments.
harold, house completions will take some time to take off, we are only at the point of arresting the downward spiral.
finally stuart i am not a labourite. i am trying to show the lack of any creditable opposition over the past 12 years. weekly knockabout does no mask a lack of policies. if only the tories would return to one nation politics, looking after the less well off in our society, i for one might return to their fold. over the last 12 years only one party has done anything for those less well off.
i do not surely have to remind you of all the good things blair and brown have done which to be fair is balanced by them taking us into two wars not worth fighting, selling off our gold reserves and i will accuse them of spending too much of our money. but surely our nhs is in much better shape than it was in 1997, the minimum wage has helped and pensioners have really been taken care of, most of the homeless have been taken off the streets. and 3.000,000 new jobs have been created over 12 years, just as well with this global collapse in confidence. talking of confidence yes the £ has fallen, but will rise again when things will seem to be working. snow drops are here, more green shoots will surely follow.
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Devon really has lost it.Unfortunatly beacuse of his political views he is very short sighted and can’t see what a hole we are in !!..
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A little snippett devon, Iv’e just come from the 6.0pm news and do you know what, all that talk from Clown saying that the world is copying what he and Darling is doing – well, take it from Nicolas Sarkozy of France, nothing is further from the truth, in fact, what this country is doing is a load of little round objects, or rowlocks. He (Sarkozy) was so critical of the UKs policies that when Clown heard, he started crying and Sarkozy had to apologise and tell him he did not mean it. In fact he had the French Ambassador go around to No 10 to give Clown a handkerchief to wipe away the tears, pat his head, give him a Mars Bar and tell him if he needed any help, Sarkozy was only to willing to give it. The latest is, Clown collapsed in a crumpled heap on the floor, screaming obscenities at Sarkozy and the copper on duty at the door had to call for reinforcements in order to put him in a straightjacket for an hour until he had calmed down. This is the man handling our current disaster – where will it all end I ask myself.
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Bank of England rates mean nothing now because the bank dont use it anymore.
When you have loan rates at 7.9% and a credit score thats bullitproof, still wont get you one, it all up to the banks to start the economy again.
More credit thats given the more people will spend on cars, electronic goods and holidays, etc.
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Peter
Things can only improve in the future, we can start by removing the NU Labour disaster.
Bring on the revolution!
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Peter,
No, I have no objection to the Labourites stealing the Tory policies seeing that they have none of their own but what I do object to is them acting like the economic saviours of the world, when, what little they do, has been thought up by greater brains and expertise than they possess and they don’t acknowledge it but lie through their teeth, saying the Tories sit on their hands doing nothing.
It started with the Inheritance tax scam and has gone on since until now, what the Tories come out with today, becomes Labour party/Government policy tomorrow. Let’s see what they come out with for small businesses after the Tories have said that they would help them. Let’s see what they will come out with for pensioners Income Tax after the Tories said that they would reduce it for over 65s.
As for low interest rates, yes with a son and daughter in their own houses and with big mortgages, great, they have benefited but not as much as they could have done if Banks etc had passed on the full decreases to them – they patently have not. Low interest rates however have downsides, the same with all economic issues there are swings and roundabouts and, whilst manufacturing industry may gain from low interest on loans (if they can get them), the benefits of that is lost when it comes to buying raw materials from foreign suppliers and selling the finished goods to overseas markets or even our own for that matter.
Clown and Darling have been unnaturally silent on the subject of the devaluation of Sterling, they are plainly at a loss to know what to do but I suppose they could always fall back on the excuse that George Osbourne “talked it down” weeks and weeks ago – a little thin now that one don’t you think. Their policies have almost driven Sterling on the rocks and the next step, if low interest rates fail is to print more of it, in other words, do something that has never been done in our history, albeit Healey (another Labourite) came close. What an admission of abject failure.
As for pensioners, they have been forgotten albeit Devon say’s that they have never had it so good, my monthly interest on my savings account with Barkclays which I use to supplement my derisory State Pension has gone down from £50 per month in September to the magnificent amount of £2.15 paid to me on the 1st February. And other pensioners are the same – that is, those who are means tested and have no freebie benefits given to them by this grotesque cabal which calls itself a Government.
As for Master Clown, he says he has saved the world, I am busy counting the countries which have openly come out and rejected everything that he has come out with, let’s start with Spain, Holland, Germany, France, he must be getting tongue tied now coming out with all the parrot like utterances that make him the biggest laugh and dunce in the western world.
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it wont work, labour has failed, the economy wont pick up until we get a new government
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Drewp,
Perhaps you have forgotten, or are too young to remember, the despair of the 1980s for many ordinary working people. And you’ve obviously failed to understand that the values of greed and ‘no such thing as society’ engendered back then have put us where we are now…
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“Drewp,
Perhaps you have forgotten, or are too young to remember, the despair of the 1980s”. (that’s Peter – not me).
Let me tell you, just in case Peter is correct in his assumptions of your age.
The 1980s were the age of Thatcher, who took over this country on the verge of it’s entire collapse after years of old Labour. A country beset by strikes, political extremism, social disorder and on the verge of economic collapse. It was after the likes of James Callaghan, surely the biggest disaster to hit this country in all the annals of Labour misrule. It was after the likes of Scargill and his ilk who hobnobbed with Gadhafi, an international terrorist who supplied the IRA with arms and explosives and who funded the Scargill empire with funds to bring down the Government of this country and bring about a “Socialist Revolution”. It was a country where, due to Labours love affair with the Unions, they ran this country like their own private fiefdom, firms and businesses were bankrupted by strikes and worker unrest, even the media had to print what the unions dictated or they were subject to strikes and unrest and a number closed down.
Thatcher took over this country on the brink of collapse. The only workers who despaired were the car workers, the miners, the print workers and similar who held this country to ransom. They despaired because their time was up, the beer and sandwiches cosying up to the Labour Government were at an end and they did not like it.
In fact to quote “Dads Army”, “they did not like it up em”. Thank god, Thatcher well and truly put it “up em”, had she not done, we would now be living in something approaching North Korea and that, presumably is what Peter wants.
But who knows, the way things are going with this clown Brown, that’s where we may end up anyway.
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Stuart,
As far as I can see there have been very few suggestions from the Tories that we should intervene to do anything to help with the current crisis – instead, Osborne seems to think that if we leave it to the market it will sort itself out. We’ve all seen where the ‘market knows best’ philosophy has taken us.
We have seen a number of initiatives from the goverment that will help to protect ordinary people – a shortened period before mortgage interest payments are picked up by the state in the event of unemployment, and an increase in the level to which they are paid, reductions in interest rates,(and I believe more pressure will be put upon the banks to pass these on), effective part-privatisation of some of the failing banks, plans to support jobs with public infrastructure projects, possible help for the beleaguered car industry, the possibility of government-backed loans for small businesses etc…
By comparison the inaction of the Shadow Chancellor looks quite pitiful. Time for your lot to drop ‘Eton George’ – he’s clearly not up to the job – perhaps that’s why they brought in Ken Clarke?
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Just one little example to bring the rest into disrepute Peter, FACT, the Tories were saying two months ago that small businesses should be given Government help. Well, where is it, only now have Labour picked up on it and by the looks of things it will have to wait until the budget, in the meantime they are going bust by the hundred – daily.
As for “Eton George”, well now, are you saying that a Secondary Modern, Grammar or any other of the Labour variations are the only institutions of learning to fit one for Government. Should we read something into the fact that the 4 Labour peers at present being investigated in the House of Lords are “political appointees” on a “life” basis as opposed to the Hereditary titles that were formerly the rock on which the House of Lords was based prior to “the wallet and bank account” of Labour taking over their motivation.
As for bailing out the banks, absolutely great, initially £37 billion given to them and more since. Not one condition attached to the “gift” and how do they repay the favour, why, they are about to give themselves massive bonuses that helped cause the initial problems and they have refused to make business loans at all, eg, one small example, Anthony ….. ….., the Chef with a pile of restuarants wanted a loan of £200,000 for short term running costs, the bank refused, result, 6 restuarants closed, 60 staff made redundant and the Chef goes into “Administration”. Just ask him what he thinks of the Labour policies with regard to the disaster that they allowed to happen.
Clown has that worried, ashen, drawn faced appearance again Peter – so does Darling for that matter, have you seen a crinkle of a smile cross Clown’s face lately – well, say for the past three months anyway. I just wonder if he will announce a General election fairly soon, he should do if he is as good as you say.
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Stuart,
Your memory really must be failing you. You’ve forgotten about Neil Hamilton, Archer, Aitken, et al.
You also appear to have forgotten that the architects of the ‘greed is good’ philosophy that has dominated our large companies and especially financial institutions over the last 20 years or more were the Tories.
If you had suggested to them back in their heyday that they should consider regulating the banks or cutting back on bonuses for their fat cat friends they’d have accused you of holding back enterprise and entrepreneurs.
The falseness and hypocrisy of Cameron and Osborne, with their backgrounds, belatedly joining the party and scolding their friends the rich simply in order to try and pick up a few votes, is palpable.
Don’t forget the 40%+ tax cuts for the wealthiest back in the 80s – they may wag their fingers at the bankers in public, but in the gentlemen’s clubs in London reassurances will be being given that the status quo will be preserved…
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Stuart,
Scargill was an offensive little man – but in the Miners’ strike of the 80s he claimed that Thatcher was out to destroy the industry, and she did – she had no interest in ‘sorting it out’, and denied subsidies to our miners whilst buying subsidised coal from Poland.
The British motor industry had some fine engineers and some of the best builders of cars in the business – what it was chronically short of was investment.
Thatcher didn’t ‘sort out a few militants’, she launched a wholesale attack on the working class of this country, and rolled back numerous hard-won rights – even banning the fundamental human right of trade union membership for some workers.
The so-called ‘winter of discontent’ was provoked by a marked disparity of pay increases between the public and private sectors. The attempt by the then Labour government to restrict pay increases was ultimately undermined not by the unions but by large employers who wanted to pay their workers more. In the end, the only ones held to the policy were public sector employees, and driven not by militancy, but by the sheer injustice of their falling living standards, they took action. Your suggestion that we were becoming like North Korea is almost McCarthy-esque in its ‘Reds under the bed paranoia’.
And if Thatcher was the saviour of our industries, let me ask this: Who owns the jobs of British car workers now? Who owns our former National utilities? And who sold them all off to the highest bidder?
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Peter, I haven’t forgotten anything, you were making the usual “left wing” point about a good private education being unacceptable in your type of politician. I was making the point about the lack of a good private education in politics did not stop them being bent – your “working class politicians” are just as bent – if not moreso than the Eton lot etc. As for the bent Tories, I don’t dispute it but again FACT, when it comes to Labour, never have so few, bribed, corrupted and gained so much that they put the Tories in the shade.
As for the rest of your ramble, it is a significant attribute of the extreme left that they are able to turn truth on it’s head, exaggerate molehills into mountains, substitute fact for fiction and twist and distort issues to suit their own ends.
Given three or four pages of this paper I could show the truth of every single matter that you mention. I will close with but one example, you said:-
“And if Thatcher was the saviour of our industries, let me ask this: Who owns the jobs of British car workers now?”.
Well, seeing that your mob have been in power for the past 12 years and the car firms have not long been taken over by foreign owners (ie Jaguar/Landrover taken over by the Indian firm TATA about twelve months ago), I suggest that you ask Gordon Brown that question.
That one example sums up the rest of the comment you make Peter. I call a halt now. Labour are done for and unfortunately when the Tories take over they are going to get the blame for this mess because it is going to take a lifetime to sort out – that is according to that other clown Ed Balls. Him, a financial advisor to Clown – oh! my god, that why we are where we are. I wouldn’t trust him with a piggy bank, his eyes are enough to frighten me let alone his brain.
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