Today on #CampaignCheck a look inside the Liberal Democrat manifesto. How would they manage to finance one of the biggest fiscal giveaways in modern history without borrowing a single penny? Short answer: a fair bit of financial jiggery-pokery libdems.org.uk/plan
Let's start with this. The LibDems have gratifyingly published their workings and this is the main table. In the left column is a lot of extra spending (14bn for universal childcare! 10bn on schools! 7.7bn on the NHS!). On the right is how they intend to pay for that spending...
Here's same table in chart form. Top bar is revenues. Bottom bar is spending. Somehow the LibDems manage to fund ALL their extra spending through revenues. But here's the thing, only a little over half of that revenue is what you'd traditionally call revenues (dark blue bit)...
That dark blue bit is tax revenue. 1p on income tax, some big changes to CGT, increase in corp tax, even duties from legalised cannabis. But that only gets you so far: about £37bn of the £64bn they say they're raising in total. Where does the rest come from...? Two part answer:
1: the "remain bonus". It's a wee bit, well, odd to see this put in the revenue column alongside actual tax increases, because it's based on an economic forecast, and therefore is hardly assured. Still, it's not half as odd as the second thing in there - that green bit...
2. That green bit is the 2019 spending round. Why's it in the REVENUES bar when it's spending? Because the LibDems effectively want to CANCEL the Tory spending round and replace it with their own plans. THAT'S how they get their balanced budget.
That's fine & all but upshot is that a lot of the spending in that bottom bar is actually re-announced versions of what the Tories have announced - and begun to implement. Eg 20k more police, more NHS funding. LibDems will go further. But not quite as far as they'd have you think
One in every five pounds the LibDems are today promising to spend is, in fact, OLD MONEY. Already promised. Some of it already spent. In effect they're just reannouncing it. This is 🤨, esp since LDs want to position themselves as the party of fiscal responsibility #CampaignCheck
I was a bit unfair last night abt the LibDem spending plans. They insist dept spending will NOT be lower than existing Tory plans in ANY dept. Only area they'll spend less is on Brexit prep. 1 in 5 pounds of what they're promising is nonetheless "recycled" from spending round
Final thing on LibDem manifesto. They're not really planning to hypothecate their taxes (eg NHS spending to be paid for specifically out of the penny on income tax). Those are ILLUSTRATIVE numbers. After all, hypothecation is almost always a bonkers idea and I think they get that
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The Chinese owners of British Steel say they are now considering shutting their blast furnaces and end steelmaking at Scunthorpe in early June - only a few months away.
It would mean an end of virgin steelmaking in the country that invented it during the industrial revolution
British Steel say the main question now is timing: whether the operations will close in June, in September or later.
It says tariffs are one of the reasons the blast furnaces are "no longer financially sustainable".
Press release 👇
The news means @jreynoldsMP faces two interlocking crises in the coming months: 1. The imposition of US tariffs on an ever growing segment of British exports 2. The end of virgin steelmaking (the UK would be the first G7 country to face this watershed moment).
This is big stuff
Donald Trump just announced 25% tariffs on anyone importing oil from Venezuela.
This is odd.
Because the country importing the most crude from Venezuela is... the US.
Capital Economics chart of Ven oil exports by Capital Economics via @rbrtrmstrng
But it raises a bigger point
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Why does the US import so much oil from Venezuela?
Mainly for the same reason it imports so much oil from Canada.
And no it's not just because they're close.
It's because most US refineries are set up to refine the kind of oil they have in Venezuela and Canada.
To understand this it helps to recall that crude oil is actually a broad term. There are LOTS of different varieties of crude - a function of the geology of where the oil formed and the organic ingredients that went into it millions of years ago.
It's called "crude" for a reason
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Here's a thread about ALUMINIUM.
Why this commonplace metal is actually pretty extraordinary.
How the process of making it is a modern miracle...
... which also teaches you some profound lessons about the trade war being waged by Donald Trump. And why it might be doomed.
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Aluminium is totally amazing.
It's strong but also very light, as metals go.
Essentially rust proof, highly electrically conductive. It is one of the foundations of modern civilisation.
No aluminium: no planes, no electricity grids.
A very different world.
Yet, commonplace as it is today, up until the 19th century no one had even set eyes on aluminium. Unlike most other major metals we didn't work out how to refine it until surprisingly recently.
The upshot is it used to be VERY precious. More than gold!
🚨TARIFFS🚨
Here's a story that tells you lots about the reality of tariffs both for those paying them & those hoping to benefit from them.
A story of ships, storms, bad luck and bad policy.
It begins a week and a bit ago, with a man frantically refreshing his web browser...
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That man is Liam Bates.
He runs the UK unit of a steel company called Marcegaglia. They make stainless steel - one of the most important varieties of this important alloy. The method of making it was invented in Sheffield. And this company traces its DNA back to that invention.
Watching the process is TOTALLY amazing.
They tip a massive amount of scrap: old car parts, sinks etc, into a kind of cauldron and then lower big glowing electrodes into it.
Then flip the switch.
⚡️Cue a massive thunder sound as a controlled lightning storm erupts inside it.
🧵Three years ago, when Russia invaded Ukraine, EU, UK and other nations vowed to wage economic war, via the toughest sanctions in history.
So... how's that going?
We've spent months documenting what ACTUALLY happened. Here's a thread of threads on the REAL story on sanctions...
1. Flows of dual use items, including radar parts, drone components and other parts used by Russia to kill Ukrainians, carried on from the UK and Europe to Russia, via the backdoor (eg the Caucasus & Central Asia)
2. Of all the goods sent by the UK to Russian neighbours, few were as significant as luxury cars.
Having sanctioned Russia (the idea being to starve Putin's cronies of luxuries) Britain (and Europe more widely) began sending those sanctioned cars in via the backdoor instead
If the main thing the US really wants out of a deal with Ukraine is "50% of its rare earth minerals" then I'm surprised this can't be wrapped up pretty quickly.
Why? Because Ukraine doesn't HAVE many rare earth resources.
Really. As far as anyone knows it's got barely any...
Yes, Ukraine has lots of coal and iron and manganese.
It also has some potential sizeable reserves of stuff like titanium, graphite and lithium. Not to mention some promising shale gas.
But of the 109 deposits identified by KSE only 3 are rare earth elements
Now in one respect I'm making a pedantic point: a lot of people say "rare earth elements" when they actually mean "critical minerals".
The two aren't the same thing.
Rare earth elements are a v specific bit of the periodic table: actually they're NOT all that rare.
More on them👇