Gordon Brown's budget

Gordon Brown gave his ninth budget on Wednesday. Of course he made remarks in regards to fifty consecutive quarters of GDP growth (a lot of which were under the last Conservative government) and Britain's generally healthy economic state at present. The budget appears to be well received by the electorate and the media, even though Howard and the Tories labelled it a 'spend now, pay later' budget.


Of course Brown and New Labour should be commended for maintaining a strong economy. Nonetheless there are some points that I don't concur with.

Firstly, government is simply too big. The government released the Budget speech on a PDF file and this file states that the government plan to spend over £500 billion in the financial year 2005/06. This equates with a figure of 40-50% of GDP. I've stated before on this blog that government should spend approximately 10% of GDP.

Secondly, there is still too much red-tape surrounding small businesses. Small business equates with 40% of the economy, so it's not a sector that can be ignored. If New Labour want British people to be more enterprising and entrepenuerial, then having excessive amounts of regulations on small business would only defeat such a vision. People who own small businesses simply desire to trade and make a profit.