As I have posted elsewhere - it's the deficit stoopid!
Which seems not to get much/any exposure. It's quite simply the excess of expenditure over income.
We've all been there some months; say £3k coming in and £3.5k going out The plastic eases the squeeze temporarily, albeit at some cost. But you can't keep doing it.
UK plc is spending as we speak £3k every second more than its income, even with all the (so called) "austerity" and "cuts".
It's not about the debt (which is of course increasing) it's about the defecit. Whoever is lucky (sic) enough to get the keys to No 10 in May, will find a cocktail cabinet full of poisoned chalices.
It will all end in tears - Wilkins Micawber understood the principle well:
Slightly elementary analysis there...debt can still fall at a certain deficit threshold, and it's not all going to end in tears really, is it? And of course it's all about the debt, the debate realistically is a focus on how much we want to pay back in the future for the good times now. £3k a second is irrelevant if you're not qualifying it against the wider economy - which isn't too far off £2 trillion, if not already there; there are plenty of other countries that have set much tougher austerity examples.
If the NHS can afford to be ring fenced, then why not the defence budget? Indeed any other budget that is deemed politically difficult to cut?...indeed the total savings required outside of the welfare budget will be c.£12 billion under the Tory (harshest) proposals. Hardly outside the realms of the possible, given the size of the overall budget.