I had a good friend who worked as a baggage handler at Heathrow. He and his astute wife wanted to be sure of some money in retirement, so some decades back they took what little money they had and invested in a one-bedroomed flat and paid the mortgage with the rent.
There was very little left over once the rent was paid, but after 25 years they owned the place. They had done it. Assured their future.
Recently my friend died and that meant his widow is now unexpectedly the landlord. That makes her, in Starmer’s nasty world, not ‘’working people’’ and therefore, as he made clear today, she will be on the end of a tax hammering in next week’s Budget.
Not enough to lose the man you love, she must face up to an uncertain future financially just as she’s at her weakest point. Starmer is such an appalling piece work.
In a wholly unwise interview with his lefty chums at Sky News, Starmer made clear that if you are either a landlord, own shares or paid through dividends then he does not consider you ‘’ working people’’ and you’ll cop it on October 30.
The reality is that all the small-time landlords I know went into the game because they could not be sure that their pensions would be protected under Socialist Prime Ministers. Nor could they be sure, with steep inflation, that the pensions would be worth anything in any event.
Both pretty wise thoughts.
Others who had savings didn’t think much of the slow returns of bricks and mortar and looked at shares. Often betting against the market believing they knew better. I was one of those mugs. Lost a fortune over the years.
I would be considered both a working person and not a working person at the same time by Starmer and his collection of half-witted, semi-communist acolytes.
Everybody, and I mean everybody, who has made something of themselves has worked bloody hard, either put money away or borrowed some to take a risk. That way they have ended up with the very assets which Starmer so hates and loves at the same time. They will have already paid tax on the money they employed. Why must they pay again. Simply to keep welfare benefits at record highs?
The reality is that the United Kingdom became great because we are a nation of shopkeepers. Not because we are a nation of train drivers.
I agree with the former Tory Chancellor Lord Lamont who said the expression ‘’working people’’ is being deployed as part of Labour’s class war.
He said; ‘’ I must say I dislike this phrase working people not just because of its ambiguity but I think it’s designed to imply working class which I think is an out-of- date idea and is appealing to old fashioned Labour mythology.’’ Good point.
Another aspect of their class war attack is Labour’s new employment law which hands enormous power to the union which will damage many small and medium sized companies and lead to hundreds of man hours being lost in negotiations and stoppages.
All this ‘’working people’’ crap is designed to take away the money from the middle classes and give it to the idle and undeserving. This nation has become relentlessly poorer over the last twenty years as you can be better rewarded for being lazy than being ambitious.
In the years Starmer may be great news for the skint and the dim, but for anybody who wants to make something of themselves or their families he will be a disaster.
The brightest person I know is planning to move to America next year. Every conversation I have with somebody who wants to make a difference is pondering on how to leave our shores.
Soon all we’ll be left is migrants from Africa and the Middle East. Let’s hope they and Starmer don’t turn our nation into where they came from.