Shrinking Britain

Cometh the hour, cometh the man. George Osborne

is going to be one of the most hated public

figures of our time. But he can take it

This afternoon George Osborne, the British Chancellor of the Exchequer, gave the most important speech of his life - and maybe ours.

Is this a full frontal ideological assault on the welfare state that has served us since the end of the Second World War? Or is it simply a radical response to desperate economic times?

Put the transits for his speech on the UK chart and what do you get? Very simple astrology…and an explanation, for Britain at least, of what the Cardinal Climax means for the nation.

Saturn, the planet of constriction, austerity and boundaries is crossing the ascendant and moving into the first house for a nice two year sojourn.

What does that mean?

Shrinking Britain. Smaller army, navy, airforce. Smaller government, smaller welfare state, smaller pensions, smaller paychecks. A big reality check.

We're all going on a diet, so tighten your belt. This is "bringing sanity to public spending", according to George Osborne.

So that'll be £13 billion in welfare cuts.
Almost 500,000 public sector jobs cut.
Etcetera

In a person's chart, Saturn across the ascendant often shows physical maturing; for example, transitions from childhood to adolescence, adolescence to adulthood, youth to middle age and so on. Oh no, do we have to grow up again? Yup and this is the beginning of a new 29-year phase for all of us.

This transit happens once every 29 years, and with the UK ascendant at 7° Libra, it's appropriate that we are talking about balancing the books today.

The last few of Saturn's transits across the nation's ascendant and through the first house have formed either an opposition or a conjunction with the planet of more, Jupiter. This time it's an opposition.

Riots in Brixton, April 1981.

Last time Saturn crossed the ascendant? 1981. For those of you too young or too depressed to remember, that was the year that Geoffrey Howe's slasher budget plunged the country even deeper into the economic doldrums. With Jupiter in conjunction, it seemed as if there really was "no alternative" to the Thatcher government's monetarist ideas.

That was also the year of the Brixton riots and the so-called Night of Anarchy in the summer, when inner cities across the country went up in flames. It took a royal wedding to make everyone forget Britain was in a bad way and then a quick war in the South Atlantic the following year while Saturn was still in the first house to keep Thatcher in power. Of course, Pluto (violence) was also in Libra in those years.

Like lambs to the slaughter.

The Conservatives were also in charge the previous time Saturn was in this position back in 1952. And the royal events? Just the coronation of our own dear queen and the funeral of her father.

Why was the coronation of a young woman Saturnian? Tell me, just how long has she been on the throne. Long equals Saturn. If I were in the business of prediction I'd say we're bound to have a big royal show in 2011/12. (Isn't it time whatsisname got married?)

But I digress, we're talking economics here. When Saturn moved out of the first house in 1954 rationing came to an end, so that was nice. So the opposition, being more balanced, looks  more pleasant than the conjunction.

But right now, this is far more than an ordinary Saturn-Ascendant moment. Why? Because it ties in exactly with the great Cardinal Climax of this summer.

Cuts, cuts, cuts.

Back at the end of  September I wrote a post rounding up the events of the summer vis a vis the old Climax. (The central image of that posting was a mystic portal; bizarrely, I have been unable to get rid of a huge empty space at the beginning of the piece, so you actually have a mystic portal above the text. Be warned, but it was quite prescient.)  Anyway, in it I point out that June 22 was astrologically a significant date, locking the Sun in with the Cardinal Climax, and it so happens that was the date George Osborne announced this spending review. That suggests to me that this speech is going to effect long-lasting and radical change. The review and its results will show us one important way the big CC will effect us right here in Blighty. In other parts of the world, it'll have a different message.

Today, we're between a New Moon in Libra and a Full Moon in Aries - both Cardinal signs, of course. The big CC is reignited just after the speech when the Moon crosses 1° Aries on its way to full.  For more on this moon in general take a look at real astrologers.

Furthermore, Venus, the planet of money, is going backwards in the sign associated with debt in the second house of income. We've certainly been living beyond our means, so this spending review (always what's implied by a retrograde planet) is timely.

During Osborne's speech, Mercury, planet of speechmaking, was in the very last degree of diplomatic Libra. This evening, Mercury will move into let's-talk-home-truths Scorpio. Up until today, the rhetoric has all been about being balanced and fair (how Libran is that). Tonight, the mask will come off.

Mercury conjuncts the Midheaven in the chart for the speech and cruel Pluto is rising.

The planet ruling cuts, Mars, is currently at its strongest in its own sign of Scorpio in the powerful tenth house of government.

I don't have a birth time for Osborne, but his chart is striking. He has a huge stellium in the bankers' sign, Taurus - Venus, Mercury, Moon and Saturn. His Sun is at 1° Gemini, directly opposite a fanatical conjunction of Neptune and Jupiter in Sagittarius, and conjunct Saturn from Taurus. He's not sensitive, so the hate he's going to engender will wash right off him. He's hard. He's also got an almost exact trine between the action planet Mars in the sign of society, Aquarius, and Uranus, the planet of revolution, in Libra, the sign of wheeler-dealers and balance. He'll do whatever it takes to take action.

George Osborne owes his personal fortune
(at least a little) to this rather lovely
wallpaper, produced by
Osborne and Little, the family firm.

In answer to my own question, this is the right man to make a no-holds barred attack on the welfare state. Watch him dismantle it over the next five years. The cuts could go deeper and harder if he can just elbow those wet Liberals out of the way. He's got the tenacity to carry on and on - but he is up against Capricorn Nick Clegg who has the same quality.

If the coalition can hold it together for five years, they should be able to hang on to power, again. Labour is just too devoid of ideas right now. Oh by the way, when was the last time the Liberals got into bed with one of the big parties? 1981, but back then it was with a bunch of Labour renegades who called themselves the SDP. They eventually became subsumed in the Liberal Party. Wouldn't it be funny if the same thing happened to the Conservatives? Unlikely I know.

And what about us? The Moon represents the people in a mundane chart. During the speech we're in sensitive Pisces getting a hell of a shock from Uranus (think cattle-prod) and right afterwards we're moving into a harsh square with Pluto (Mr Nasty) from Capricorn (government). And in between, of course, we cross the Cardinal Climax point.

Undoubtedly, Britain is about to undergo surgery so radical that the country will never look the same again. Watch for the real impact of these cuts when Uranus and Jupiter return to the Cardinal point after the beginning of next year.

I wonder if it's time the Specials' Ghost Town was re-released. It was a big hit back in 1981.