Looking back over the last decade, were many mistakes made by our politicians?

twitter.com/AndrewCornwall5/status/1197011331917983744?s=09

I feel it would be quicker and easier to ask which decisions were not mistakes.

I agree with previous posts. The referendum was a big political mistake. Other mistakes the two party culture and the lack of willingness to work together in a cross party way, particularly for implementing reforms in social care. Arbitrary public funding cuts post 2010. Too much tinkering with the education system. Failure to reform police force - why do we have 49 different constabularies instead on one national police force. Tinkering with NHS rather than a real reform to get the best out of the service.

I agree winterwhite. I think that short-termism is an overarching problem and to some extent it arises because of the FPTP voting system.

In spite of them not having got the support of the majority of electors, Tory and Labour Parties have alternated almost on the basis of "buggins turn" by gaining a disproportionate number of seats.

When they have an outright majority they can rule in a way which was once described as "elective dictatorship". Because they know their time is limited they plunge headlong into ill-thought-out schemes, mainly undoing whatever the last lot did, whilst continuing to blame them for everything which goes wrong.

If we had a proportional voting system, as most grown up democracies have, there would be far more coalition governments, shifting after an election a bit to the right or left, rather than hurtling to extremes. Having to co-operate and compromise with other parties should result in more carefully considered shifts in policy.

There are many immediate priorities for our politicians. Stopping brexit is the most important because only then will we be able to address all the pressing issues - the climate emergency, investing for our future, properly funding our public services and creating a fairer society, but I would also put electoral reform very high up on that list.

Thanks for starting this thread, Martha. I agree with whoever said that involvement in the Iraq war was a major long-term mistake, tho more than your decade ago.

At home, the introduction of the academies system which has reduced accountability and not improved educational standards.

More generally short term thinking and quick fixes, instead of planned investment and improvement. (Did the 'ageing population' come as the unexpected factor that ministers seem to imply? Of course not.). Failure to implement the Dilnot report.

Ministers constantly changing departments - rushing to make their mark with 'innovations' that aren't funded long-term so don't work. The NHS and the justice system have been victims of this as well as education.

Tolerance of low standards of probity in public life.

None of this contradicts the fact that even a cursory perusal of the financial media shows that there was real worry about the situation in the wider community and that despite these warnings, no-one, neither politicians nor BofE, did anything about it.

Politicians may not have the same control of the BofE that they had but they do have fiscal and taxation tools in their hands that could and should have been used.

Under our current Governor of the BofE, Canada managed to avoid most of the problems of the crash. That is why he got the job.

I suggest that you look at the global financial crisis from a slightly different angle, MOnica.

When the Governor of the Bank Of England is happy that all is well, who are politicians to gainsay him? Wasn't the financial sector held to be driving our economy and full of responsible and far seeing, highly paid senior executives who absolutely knew the job and could be utterly trusted with the economy? Because that is what we were fed, from Thatcher onwards...

The BoE's report in April 2007 wasn't warning of impending doom:

This is the first sentence of the report from April 2007: "The UK financial system remains highly resilient." Five months later came the run on Northern Rock. To be scrupulously fair, the same report noted the early rumbles in the US sub-prime mortgage market and pointed to the potential dangers of excess leverage and lax credit standards.

But it also said the operating environment for UK banks and global financial firms had been stable and predicted that "conditions are likely to remain favourable". The reports, then, were full of "on one hand, on the other hand" lines. Some parts read well today, but the overall tone was definitely not a declaration that banks should look to their core tier one capital ratios while they still had the chance.

There's more

www.theguardian.com/business/nils-pratley-on-finance/2013/jun/29/mervyn-king-bank-of-england

As for the 'need' for austerity. Well, you know what I think of that... The same as the IMF

www.globaldashboard.org/2017/01/26/austerity-economics-just-smashed-imf/

Today the IMF will launch a new report, “Macro-Structural Policies and Income Inequality in Low-Income Developing Countries”, the latest in series that mark the intellectual journey the IMF research department has been travelling in recent years. Packed with detailed quantitative analysis it demonstrates that much of what elites have been advancing as unquestioned economics is demonstrably harmful both to economic growth and to public wellbeing.

The banking crisis, Iraq, election of Corbyn as Labour leader, the referendum, unfortunately the list is endless.

It was what happened in the decade before the last decade when worst mistake was made.

Warnings about the over issuing of credit, whether in the form of mortgages and loans or 'financial products' were in the financial papers from the early 2000s. Gordon Brown was Chancellor at the time and he and Tony Blair (and Mandleson) were completely comfortable with credit expanding out of control, 125% mortgages, interest free mortgages, the salaries of Directors going out through the roof.

The warnings were all there but the New Labour government chose to ignore them, they were too pally with those making and landing the money. Yes, other countries, well, the USA, was doing the same, but that didn't mean we had to.

But, yes, there would have been a financial hiccup in 2008, but if the then government had done something before then about the spiralling level of personal and corporate debt, it would not have hit us anything as like as badly as it did and the period of austerity would not have been as long or as deep.

The mistakes made since 2010, were, fristly, the slippy sloppy way the referendum was set up, Cameron took his eye off the ball, if he ever had his eye on it in the first place.

It is usual in most countries that when major constitutional changes are planned there must be 60% or two thirds vote in favour of the change. But Cameron just assumed he would win so didn't bother with particulars like that and is entirely responsible for everything that has followed. With the vote so close, the chaos that has followed is inevitable.
- and I cannot see what difference this election will make. A second referendum will have to be on the same terms as last time and whichever way a second referendum goes, the result will be as close as last time and the infighting will continue.

The second mistake since 2010 was made by those Labour party members who nominated Jeremy Corbyn for Prime Minister even thought they had no intention of voting for him, thought he would never get elected, but thought it would make the party look more democratic if they had a left winger on the list of candidates. Well, they will not do that again.

I think, MarthaBeck that if the government were to fake leaving the EU, big declarations, ceremonies etc. but not really do it, few of the Leavers would actually notice that we hadn't 'left'. and they would be perfectly happy.

Because they don't expect anything much to happen that's different from now and they are not in the least bit interested in the intricacies and minutiae of trade deals and what happens in the following years. They just want to be able to say that we've Left..

I would make a simple request to all the parties in this election, that they please tell the factual truth as to how long it will realistically take to fully implement a fully functional Brexit. Few voters realise it is likely to take up to 2025 & beyond according to the FT and Economists because of having to create new trade agreements outside the EU and adhere to international treaties.

Urmston Gran. Lynn loved going to Urmston Bath after a hard day on the Wards. In the winter she went dancing at the Baths where she met her future husband. Once watched with her him playing football, I think was at a ground called Chasson Road or similar. Good memories.

When Cameron called the referendum he should have made it perfectly clear that:

it was advisory only
it needed a considerable majority, not 52%

His promise that "we will implement the result" was nonsensical since the referendum was advisory.

I think Cameron calling for a referendum was a mistake, but I also think he had little option by the time it happened.

The Tories have been increasingly anti-Europe for decades.

Yes, I live in Urmston MarthaBeck hiding in plain sight amongst 41,000 others!

I worked at the same hospital as your sister for more than 30 years until retirement!

I agree with varian; Brexit is the keystone in all this....

To get our priorities right we must stop brexit - only then can we do all the good things we need to do.

Brexit should NOT be our priority in this election it could take years to implement. Improving the lives of all, getting us out of the horrible damages austerity created.
I want us to get rid of Food banks, homelessness, child poverty, improve lives of older people, more resources for our NHS & Care services than give away political bribery, repairing the damage austerity has created. Brexit could take another 5 to 15 yrs to implement, instead of Gov and Ministers concentrating on improving our domestic needs and creating more jobs and our economy . Let’s get our priorities right,

I don't remember lots of people calling for a referendum. I can remember people moaning about foreigners for many years but they didn't seem to equate that with us being in the EU until the Mail/Sun etc started stoking the fire. I think the biggest mistake over the past few years has been due to Labour being a weak opposition; even parties in power prefer to have a worthy adversary because they know it's better for the country.

Nobody wanted a referendum.The old order was crumbling and took a punt.

But the country wanted a Referendum. It wasn't plucked out of thin air.

There have always been eurosceptics and Farage honed in and the rest was history.

I remember Milliband being booed on QT for saying he didn't want a Referendum

...did he have a choice....er yes. The damage he and his entitled posh boys have done is immeasurable.

Did David Cameron have a choice re: Referendum?

People have been babbling on about leaving the Eu for decades

Milliband was slaughtered for not agreeing to one

Farage was nipping around

And Jo Swinson actually called for one a decade ago!

Cameron....aka I was born to lead....the arrogance of the man.

The problem with politicians of all types is they think they are better than the previous ones, they only think short term and never learn from history. The same mistakes are made over and over again.
The worst in recent years was getting involved with the Arabs, the Gulf wars, Libya and Afghanistan have been a total failure. Yes, Saddam and Ghadafe were despots, but removing them caused far more deaths than leaving them alone ever would have.