Anything Goes!

It is often said that the housing market can only be kick started when the first time buyers return to bolster the housing ladder. Too true. As ever in the UK, we seem unable to take the middle road as evidenced by the latest first time buyer figures. Year on year, the number of mortgage advances to first time buyers has increased by an eye watering 41%. Ouch. This is the sort of territory which culminated in the 2008 crash. To put the state of our recovery in to some kind of perspective, Spain has just announced record borrowing of 943 billion euros in June. Talk of recoveries is, if anything, stupid rather than premature. The way in which the first time buyer levels have been artificially stimulated beggars belief. There is only one ending for this story and we seen it so many times over the years. No more boom and bust? That'll be the day. As the Spanish and many of their Euro cousins teeter on the brink, the Euro and our relationship with it remains more fragile than the Dead Sea Scrolls. The announcement that Twitter is to pursue a stock market flotation is therefore rather odd. They have just witnessed the disastrous Facebook flotation which has taken a year just to reach parity. They occupy the same sector so should expect a similar outcome. Should one of the Eurozone countries go cap in hand to Brussels (Germany), the effect on world markets will be huge. It isn't so much if this event happens as when. Greece, Spain, Italy, Portugal et al all remain in a perilous position. The problem with putting a flag in the sand as Mark Carney has is that you tend to look a bit stupid if you subsequently move it. His 7.0% unemployment target for raising interest rates could be a real problem. If he is too proud to raise the rates before this magic figure is achieved, it may well be too late. All the emerging statistics are screaming out for a rate rise. He's going to miss the boat at this rate. One major achievement of recent weeks is the decision not to seek military intervention in Syria. Had Cameron waited for the UN reports, the outcome would have been rather different so his ineptitude on this occasion saved the UK a small fortune. The domino effect Stateside suggests a shift in US foreign policy. Maybe the penny is starting to drop? You never know. As the economies of both China and India revise down their respective growth forecasts, it seems as though an outbreak of normality is making its way through the rest of the world economy. Let's hope the UK wakes up sooner rather than later and takes note. Pardoxically, the numbers of immigrants to the UK is rising at a similar rate to the number of landslides on our coasts. This suggests that there are now more people living in an increasingly smaller space. I don't know if this augurs well for the future but logic would say not. As they will all need feeding and the amount of land diminishes, we are said to become even more dependent on our imports than currently - and that is frightening. In management circles, the mantra says, "If you can't measure it, you can't manage it". The truth is we don't know how many immigrants are coming to the UK. Ergo, how can we deal with the problem if we don't know the size of it? Whoever finds themselves in no.10 come 2015 will have a heck of a job on their hands. Meanwhile, the great God money which dictates modern life continues to attract people to the National Lottery and its promise of riches (misery). This week, the lottery fund turned down funding to remember the millions who gave up their lives for the liberty which we enjoy today. A grant of £92,000 was turned down to create a memorial to remember those who perished in the Great War. It is by remembering those men that we remind ourselves of the futility of conflicts such as the one in Syria. We can't afford not to learn this lesson. On a final note, hurray for the internet. The decision to commence privatisation of the Post Office will mean an ugly end to great institution. Strikes a plenty will follow and the new service will be a shadow of the current one. If I had to post items like this one, you may not get them at all. But perhaps that wouldn't be too bad a thing either! On a serious note, I wonder what else the government can flog to make a fast buck? Suggestions please because as the Cole Porter musical says, "Anything goes"!