Chris, Councils do not set or keep business rates. They only collect them.

The business rates are 'uniform', they are the same all over the country. They are based on the rateable value x 43.3p.

It doesnt matter if it is Carlisle, Liverpool or Exeter. It is the same formula. The wastefulness or not of the Council is irrelevant.

By the way, this is what the Audit Commission said about Carlisle City Council:

"Carlisle City Council manages its finances and provides value for money ."

Kind of blows apart your claim, doesnt it?

That's two for two.

Another casualty of the councils ridiculusly high business rates no doubt!! How are companys supposed to thrive when they are getting stung by one of the most wastefull councils in the country!

Until councils either charge people to cross public property, in to the large out of town supermarkets more than they charge for town centre parking, or make ALL town centre parking free thwn all of our town and city centres will continue to decline and unlimately disapear.

In the run up to Christmas The Lanes certainly did not have 100% occupancy.

another council employee, if there isnt a commitment to spend, you dont need it!

Paul, 'carry forwards' are only permissable if there is a real reason. You can't just roll money to the next year just because you haven't spent it - there has to be a commitment to spend.

Tony you've hit the nail on the head, the confidence has been lost but that's because people are worried they will loose their jobs. If Cameron appeared on tv tomorrow and said "it's all going to be fine, there will be no more job cuts, we've sorted out our finaces" I'm sure things would change drastically as the confidence is the starting point in a brighter future for all. I wouldn't want to be the one who has to make those decisions as to how to improve the national finances. As usual however, unfortunately under the tauries the less well off appear to be the biggest loosers. I mean the kids EMA has been cut, the conexions programmes cut, higher uni fees, the 20% spending cut for policing meaning the loss of 16,000 police jobs and thats just the tip of the ice berg. Even ken Clarke had to admit that austerity and deficit reduction are at the forefront of their priorities. This goes back to your point, confidence, when theres a fear of job loses people spend less and then business' in the private sector will continue to close. And like I say, I fear worse is to come unfortunately

Council Employee: councils do it all the time, it's called 'carry forwards'. It is discouraged to spend for the sake of it or lose it.
All budgets are profiled on a month by month basis, any variances are pretty obvious.

It was at one time like this, but many many years ago, at least a decade or more.

Sam, one of the big problems is servicing the debt which keeps on increasing (remember, every years deficit adds to the total debt). The more money you divert to paying off debt interest is money you can spend on tax cuts or public spending.

I think the coalitions plan is to get spending under control and allow the economic growth to increase quicker then spending. Over time this will decrease the percentage spent on public services.

The problem the coalition has, is that as many of our customers around the world are in a similar predicament there is a lack of confidence and a lack of growth.

You cannot spend your way out of debt, and evidence of spending ourselves out of recession is murky at best. The coalition havent really got the courage to make genuine cuts, what we see are cuts in planned increases.

For a great and interesting and easy to understand discussion of the issues, i recommend the Youtube video about Keynes Vs Hayek.

It is presented as a rap, but seriously you are unlikely to come out of your first year of an economics degree with a better understanding than after five minutes of this.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GTQnarzmTOc&feature=related

and then this one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NoTXYOIQBCQ

The Government need to rethink their attitude to Keynes. His theory is being applied in the USA in part and although there is hardship, there are signs that their economy is beginning to grow again at a higher rate than here and the rate of unemployment is declining. While austerity is needed it needs to be applied less drastically or deferred a while. What is happening now clearly isn't stimulating the economy. Taxes need to be cut and HMRC need to be serious about collecting the reported billions still owed, stashed away offshore or set aside as a result of cushy deals done in swanky restaurants with HMRC's chief inspector. What troubles me is that the government has no plan B to their failing plan A. All this quantitative easing (another 50 billion slipped to the banks last week) seems to have made little difference to lending or economic stimulus; it seems a desperate measure to merely stop growth figures from going below 0% and therefore the embarrassment of having to extol the virtues of an economic policy that leads to stagnation and contraction and not the (slow) recovery smooth-talking Georgie-boy says he would be delivering by now.