RBS Bonus

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-16783571

I saw Ed Miliband at the weekend say that the Government should stop the bonus. Er.........Ed, in case you didn't know, Gordon Brown signed his contract. His contract entitles him to the bonus. You can't just ignore employee's contracts - it's the law!!!!

I assume, then, that if Ed Miliband thinks the Government can just ignore the contract that his predecessor signed, then it will be OK for the Government to change all the public sector workers' contracts and change their pensions?

Taxpayer Statement

A group of Conservative MP’s, backed by the Daily Express, have come up with a brilliant idea. They suggest that every year the Government should send us a Taxpayer Statement, showing how much tax they’ve taken off us and what they’ve done with it.

A sample 2010/11 tax statement would look like this:

Your salary	£15000	£26000	£50000
	£	£	£
Benefits and pensions	948	2135	5130
NHS	493	1109	2666
Education	371	835	2006
Public protection	287	646	1551
Government	100	226	543
Transport	94	211	507
Industry and economy	64	145	348
Housing	56	126	303
Recreation sport and culture	57	127	306
Waste and environment	47	107	256
Overseas aid	27	60	144
Debt interest	181	407	978
Total	2724	6134	14739
Your share of Government borrowing this year	2221	2221	2221

The above table only includes direct taxes on your salary. It does not include National Insurance Contributions by your employer.

The above table only includes direct taxes on your salary. It does not include indirect taxes. On average every person over the age of 18 paid £2737 in indirect taxes in 2009-10. The main indirect taxes are:

·        Air Passenger Duty

·        Beer and Cider duties

·        Betting gaming and lottery duties

·        Capital gains tax

·        Climate change levy

·        Council tax

·        Hydrocarbons oils duty

·        Insurance premium tax

·        Made wines duty

·        Spirits duty

·        Stamp duty

·        Tobacco duty

·        VAT

·        Vehicle excise duty

·        Wine of fresh grapes duty

UK Growth

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-16715080

Government numbers show grwith was negative in Q4 of 2011. Not sure how accurate the Government numbers are though as our clients are reporting reasonable growth.

How to outsmart the competition

http://www.peninsula-uk.com/blog/blogentries/55/The-Big-Idea-–-Outsmarting-The-Competition.html

This sounds a fascinating read

Interesting book - Do More Great Work

http://www.peninsula-uk.com/bottomlineexpress/511/Do-More-Great-Work-written-by-Michael-Bungay-Stanier.html

Why 2012 might be a great time to sell your business

http://www.bcmscorporate.com/why-now-excellent-time-sell-your-business

UK Debt

Current wisdom is that the UK is suffocating under a mountain of debt. Some interesting statistics emerged at the weekend.

The UK's debt burden is amongst the highest in the world as the following table shows (all figures are a % of GDP):

• Japan 512%
• UK 507%
• Spain 363%
• Portugal 356%
• Germany 314%
• USA 278%

However, the above figures are slightly misleading as the following show (again all figures are a % of GDP):

• Government UK 81% Japan 226%
• Corporate debt UK 109% Japan 99%
• Consumer UK 98% Japan 79%
• Financial sector UK 219% Japan 108%

It is the UK's financial sector that has vast debts and that is what is holding the economy back.

Once again, one has to ask what the FSA and the Bank of England were doing in the years up to 2008 to allow our financial institutions to run up such enormous debts. Interestingly Mervyn King, the Governor of the Bank of England, has refused to undertake an investigation into the Bank of England's handling of the financial crisis.