My what a lot of news we've been having - or at least a lot of comment so I might as well add my two penn'orth. The CUTS: I'm in no way qualified to discuss macro economics but even a financial dunce like myself knows that if you make more people redundant they are not going to spend as much money to stimulate the economy. New governments like new owners of a business always make claims of improving efficiency by eliminating waste. This can only go so far as for the twenty odd years I've been voting all these efficiencies would surely make us some streamlined freak. What it always really means is job losses as it does at work where for example you have six people on a shift and the new owner reduces that down to five. A few years down the line and another takeover later and the new boss realises that you operate with four people when someone is on holiday so why not all the time. Now when someone is off somebody will have to work over from another shift. They will throw in some guff about switching lights off but the real saving is in the wages they no longer have to pay. If you're making more people redundant you seriously can't expect the private sector to pick these unemployed up and those they do will be on lower wages and rather than cutting the Welfare budget more claims will come in. Saying that you should earn more in work than on benefits is all very well but you can't do it by just stopping benefits and leaving the vulnerable in poverty. We've just started claiming the Working Tax credit, which was all rather vague to me and I realised that this is a complete nonsense and an admission that employers can't be paying high enough salaries that the government has to effectively top your earnings up. Surely raising the minimum wage so that people can earn more in work would be more sensible. Earn more, spend more, increase tax revenue and improve profits for the businesses that you are spending your extra cash on (the same ones that will probably complain that an increase in the minimum wage will ruin them).
   Wayne Rooney: A shift in the air may be in the offing. This is by no means the first or last case of mercenary footballers and for those who castigate his greed a number of people also say they too would follow the money or simply gloat at Manchester United being the victim and not the perpetrator. I think there is a slightly subtle change in the latter case where one example cited was Dimitar Berbatov who left Spurs for more money / medals. That subtlety is that Berbatov didn't publicly claim that he wanted to leave before any offers for him came in - whether he was tapped up or not is another matter but again that is usually par for the course. In this instance the major unsettling figure appears to be his agent whose sole purpose is to keep his clients moving from club to club so that he can get his cut of the fees. Claims that United haven't signed any big players is a little disingenuous as at first that is true but then not many other Premiership teams have signed big world class stars - most of them play in Spain or Italy still and for all Man City's spending they have spent a lot of money on decent or good players but no Messi or Kaka. The timing with the cuts in the background could have been better but it may help signal the end of the silly money flying around the top end of the game. This may be wishful thinking but not every club has a rich sugar daddy and they are not going to last for long if the money does dry up. With Alison set to leave work and concentrate on part time nearer home while spending more time with Bethany means we had to look at economising and the first thing to go was Sky Sports. In the current climate we won't be the only ones, as well as a number foregoing the season ticket or getting a cheap knock off version of the shirt as opposed to the official merchandise. When this happens more and more some clubs will struggle and be unable to sustain the current wage structure. Tax laws in Spain for example means that players can take home more pay on the same salary and there may be an initial outflow of talent, but this financial situation is global and will possibly have a knock on effect. Or it may just be wishful thinking only the impression seems to be that the fans are not happy and something's going to happen soon - perhaps FA intervention with wage caps of some sort to nip any dissension in the bud and prevent clubs going insolvent.
   Final point: Just read that Ari Up, front woman of the Slits has died aged 48 and it feels like another era of legends is about to start losing its battle with mortality. Scarily she was only 10 years older than me despite the Slits debuting when I was 5.