Thought for the Day

Good Morning Scotland
BBC Radio Scotland
Tuesday, June 22nd, 2010

We hate to wait. We try to figure out what’s coming down the road. We guess. We make stuff up. There’s a lot of that going on with the budget about to be read out today. Speculation is rife. Opponents are already lining up with things they think they know or believe they’ve figured out.

We’ve been prepared for it, even here in Scotland. The chancellor has told us that this is the ‘unavoidable budget’ – the one where we will pay the price for what’s gone on in the past in order to make what is to come workable and liveable. People in the here and now, however, are the ones who will need to do their part and pay the price.

But you and I know this won’t be the end of the story. We’ll wonder why we’ve been targeted by certain taxes or have to pay the price of cutbacks in our sector. “What makes us special”, we’ll ask. Not everybody will have been won over by this time tomorrow.

A coalition government producing a budget must take enormous risks. These are two very different animals welded together – a Tiger-Lion, if you like, or a Beaver-Duck. We're not privy to all the late night telephone calls between convinced Liberals or convinced Conservatives warning that the pure principles of their Party are being put at risk.

Whether or not you believe we’re living in the sort of age which requires an “emergency budget”, we are all familiar – or will be – with those moments when emergency measures are required in our relationships – when bottoms fall out of things, when the rock rolls down the hill and, all of a sudden, the love we take for granted between ourselves and our spouses, or the religious faith which we ‘ascribe to’ but have never absolutely needed become extremely valuable. Our priorities will change in an instant and our creativity “kick in” when the bad news is known, but we’re pointed back to things we had neglected.

Things we didn’t value at the time.


Audio available for a limited time HERE.
TFTD begins at 1:23.13 - about halfway along the audio bar.