vivweb01blog

  This particularly thorny question is the subject of much discussion at present. It has also resulted in many sleepless nights for many of our pensioners and for single occupiers of all ages, who now fully expect to lose some or all of their entitlements on October 30 th . There is little doubt that Starmer and Reeves are planning to use the ‘Tory Black Hole’, as they call it, to justify both swingeing benefit cuts and tax rises in the Autumn Statement.   The size of this new ‘celestial’ phenomenon is reputed to be £22Bn, although it should be noted that the calculations supporting it have never been fully verified. To put the amount properly in context, the calculation was based on an audit performed by the treasury in July, comparing the Spring Budget Forecast of £1226 Bn for total public spending with a post-election updated estimate by Labour. If this is correct, the difference would represent only a 1.8% underestimate of spend (i.e. well within 'experimental' error f

  Those of us who were suspicious of Labour’s motives before the election will not have been surprised at Rachel Reeve’s first salvo in Labour’s ‘war on pensioners’ in August. The only thing that was a little unexpected was the belligerence of her delivery…and the readiness with which she was prepared to ‘let the cat out of the bag’ this early in her tenure. The pronounced ‘gasp’ from all sides of the Commons when she announced the move suggested that even her own colleagues were a tad surprised. Subsequent analysis has shown very little evidence of contrition on her part, although Starmer's 'happy band' of new MPs are getting it in the neck via their mailboxes. It was a virtual certainty that benefits would come under attack following the Tories election defeat. Labour, having successfully hemmed themselves in by their manifesto promise of no increases in NI, VAT or income tax rates, have already agreed several inflation-busting increases in public sector pay. With man

This blog will be updated regularly in the run up to the Autumn Statement at the end of October.  I'm planning to ask a series of key questions on 'X' (Twitter in old money), then attempt to answer them myself  in this blog,  in more detail than X will allow.  Why ? It's important that we all keep this Government's 'feet to the fire' to reduce the risk of losing any more of our precious and hard-won benefits.....  See also my recent blogs for more details on this topic: https://vivweb01.blogspot.com/2024/07/labours-war-against-pensioners-where.html https://vivweb01.blogspot.com/2024/09/update-on-pensioner-benefit-changes.html Here's the first offering for the pot: 1)   DWP have identified 880,000 pensioners who they 'believe are entitled to Pension Credit'.  Why don’t they do the decent thing and simply award these folks the benefit, without forcing them to fill out a 230-question form ? Comments: The answer is almost certainly money....and to an

  Amidst all the current government-inspired gloom we’re currently experiencing, a ray of hope shone out in the retail sector in late September with the news that the last of the Issa brothers had quit his executive role at ASDA. Before we roll out the bunting, however, we should remember that the ‘terrible twins’ as they became known after their takeover in 2021, both retain significant involvement and influence in the business as non-executive directors, and one of them remains a part-owner. This is because the EG group, in which they both still have a major financial interest, continues to own ASDA. Zuber Issa sold his stake in ASDA in June ’24 but remains a non-exec. director of EG. Mohsin Issa stepped down as CEO of ASDA in September, and is now sole CEO of EG group. Stuart Rose has now assumed his responsibilities as ASDA’s CEO. As I predicted in a previous blog , from a financial point of view, the Issas’ intervention in ASDA’s fortunes has been little short of disastrous, w

I first published the text of this post on my website. As  a consumer interested in installing solar panels in UK,  I wanted to see what detailed advice was available on how to go about it, but didn't really find anything suitable. I decided to share my experience, as far as it went, in the hope that it would make life a bit easier for anyone else in the same boat.   There is plenty of advice out there on the web, but it seems to be mostly from installers, who will naturally want to extol the benefits of their product, and won't necessarily want to highlight the pitfalls. I've tried to do just that by taking the reader through what is likely to happen if you embark on a quest for solar panels yourself.  I hope it's useful in helping you answer the question in the title...... --------------------------------   Solar Panels: Are They Right For Me ? Despite the relatively slow uptake of domestic micro-generation technology over the past decade, m any of us are now looking