Not really, Blair’s admin just followed the same path of a free unregulated capitalist economy. For example, the lack of affordable housing is a legacy of Thatcher which Blair did nothing to address. He could have initiated a council housing building programme (he certainly had the mandate to do so). And the economic boom was false as it was all based on unaffordable credit, which started under Thatcher and continued under Labour. I think the fact that successive governments blame the previous admin for the economic state of the country throughout their (as the Tories do now) parliamentary term, reinforces my view that they are powerless to make the sweeping changes required. Where is the promised banking regulation? Why are big companies still avoiding paying UK taxes? The fact is that the Blue or Red parties can only scratch the surface as the real power will always lie in the hands of the banks and Big Business in a free unregulated global economy.

I wasn’t really being political with my original post, just could not help noticing that the subject matter of the news stories could all be traced back to the eighties.