You don’t con, Vince

April 1, 2010 — simonashall

It's Yoda from Star Wars - no, not really, it's Vince Cable

Just a few words about Vince Cable. I watched the Chancellor’s debate the other evening and I’m not going to claim that George Osborne wiped the floor because he didn’t.

But given that he was being ganged up on by both Alistair Darling and Vince Cable, I think he came across well enough for me not to be persuaded of the case for him being replaced by Ken Clarke. The party is lucky in Phillip Hammond and Clarke to have two minds with plenty of economic experience to back George Osborne up and Osborne himself is made of far sterner stuff than I believe is immediately apparent.

Darling, on the other hand was an utter bore. His budget speech was more interesting and yes, although he did land a hit on the Conservatives over the NI part-reduction, subsequent events may  be more significant in this regard. He wasn’t nearly commanding enough for the man holding all the aces.

Vince Cable won the debate and that’s easy enough to understand. He was able to stand in the middle and come across as the voice of reason, hopping (albeir deftly) onto the “plague on both your houses” feeling that currently pervades. But did anyone notice a policy in there? At least Darling and Osborne were discussing whether or not an extra 0.5% on NI was a good thing to do – Vince was only bashing the other two. The debate may be politics; but politics isn’t necessarily the debate.

Frankly, anyone could have done what Vince did. And I think underneath it Vince doesn’t have any more in the way of policy than anyone else. Which is less forgiveable because the Lib Dems aren’t constrained by having to say things that will ever come to pass.

Standing in the middle with nothing to lose isn’t difficult (and will no doubt be repeated by Nick Clegg in the leader debates). But sooner or later, the waiverers that the Lib Dems are hoping to attract will catch on.

Posted in Economy, elections, politics. Tags: , , , , , , . No Comments »

Direction of Travel

February 20, 2010 — admin

Come on David, it's not rocket science!

Last night was Woking Constituency Conservative Association’s annual general meeting at which Humfrey Malins gave his farewell speech and Jonathan Lord the first of what we hope will be many. During his speech, Jonathan talked about many interesting things, including references to helping the poorest in society that I think it does well for the grass roots to hear.

One of the subjects he touched on was this idea that the Conservative Party has no policies. I firmly believe that this is a message that Labour spinners, aided by the BBC, Grauniad and others are determined to repeat over and over for our consumption – that DC is a salesman with nothing to sell except the art of selling itself. A Blair mark two. Jonathan argued, quite rightly, that there are many examples of Conservative policy out there and that in-depth policy details are not the norm before a general election; Margaret Thatcher didn’t have them in 1979, nor Tony Blair in 1997. What the country understood about these two Leaders of the Opposition, Jonathan said, was their direction of travel.

Cllr Mike Smith asked Jonathan what it was that bound these policies together, the central message to activists and candidates to sell on the doorstep. He, along with others including myself, don’t yet get the sense of an overarching theme to Conservative policy that defines a direction of travel.

It’s desperately needed if DC is to win a convincing rather than narrow victory. And it’s not rocket science. The concept that binds our policies together is three-fold; self-empowerment, opportunity and the fulfillment of aspiration. The credibility gap that the Conservative Party has is linking its support for the wealthy and Middle England, the encouragement of entrepreneurship and businesses and the rolling back of inheritance tax with its desire to help the poorest in society achieve a better life.

Our problem is that we only ever talk about one of these at a time. The first allows our opponents to claim we are the party of the few, not the many. The second provokes a reaction among grass roots that the party is abandoning its core voters. But these two flanks of the spectrum are inextricably linked and go hand-in-hand.

We want to allow people who have been succesful the opportunity to enjoy the fruits of their success. We want the prospect of that enjoyment to be an aspiration that creates excellence in its pursuit. We believe that leaving an estate to the next generation is a self-empowerment that begets striving for success. And we will fight for the right of the well-off to enjoy their lives – as long as they pay a fair share to those less fortunate. The successful business creates employment, tax revenue and generates investment in this country – it is also key to our recovery from this dreadful recession.

Similarly, while I am not entirely comfortable with DC’s phrase Broken Britain, there are parts of Britain that don’t work. In some areas, people have poor life chances and little hope of being anything other than a criminal or lifelong welfare recipient. We have to show these people when they are young that we believe in them. We have to demonstrate through community policing, social services and educational opportunities that with hard work and self-belief, anything is possible. And we have to be serious about it, knowing that it is in society’s interests that we address this problem.

In between these extremes, there are countless other examples of people who want the government to help them achieve their aspirations through the tax system, employment regulations, adult education, public sector reforms and so on.  I’m not big on small government - the government should be there to help the people who elect it. I’m big on enabling government - a government that leaves people alone when they are doing well and picks them up when they need help.

But we need to hear more from DC and the party about the link between the two things above. We are not the party of the few,  nor are we the party of the many; we must be the party of everyone.

I believe that with the economy being how it is, voters will forgive a lack of specific, concrete promises. But they will not forgive a listlessness, a lack of direction. Now it is for DC to elucidate the various Conservative policies that are out there in these strategic terms – it is not only voters who need to hear it but his own party too.

Posted in Conservatives, Social Justice, politics. Tags: , , , , , , . No Comments »

Brown’s Got Talent

February 14, 2010 — admin

It’s not much a secret that Piers Morgan is a big supporter of Labour and his whole transition from hack to celebrity has centred around his political connections and the New Labour project that has failed Britain so woefully during the past 13 years.

What he served up on ITV tonight was something more akin to what you’d expect from the BBC - a sycophantic and unduly flattering portrayal of the weakest PM this country has had since Anthony Eden. As far as I’m aware, no other PM in modern times has had the luxury of a similar “interview”, which was little more than a party conference piece, stage-managed as it was with his silly smile and prompted audience laughter. Surely nothing the PM says is really that funny?

ITV’s dull reaction to Conservative protests has been to offer DC a spot on Piers’s show as well. No thanks. With any luck, the public will see through this carefully choreographed piece of propaganda and remember that Gordon Brown is the architect of Britain’s worst recession in 70 years, the man whose own staff and colleagues believe is incapable of leadership and should be removed and who is now using his last days in government to make it harder for an incoming government to deal with problems.

That is the reality. What Piers Morgan served up was a masterclass in re-presentation and an insipid manipulation of public opinion. No big surprise there.

Posted in Labour, news. Tags: , , . No Comments »

We’re going to the chapel

January 17, 2010 — admin

Back in the spring of 2007, I watched Francis Maude give one of the most unimpressive performances on Question Time that I’ve ever seen. The background for this was the announcement that the Conservative Party intended to commit to the idea of rewarding married couples through the taxation system. His answers were defensive and and a little condescending and I held my head in my hands as the Conservative Party once again went back to basics.

Even back then, I knew that just as the original back to basics had started the decline of John Major’s government, so the new version – despite its different presentation – could seriously damage a future Conservative challenge; people don’t want to be told how to live. And now the issue is back in the news - not because it’s new but because given everything that has happened since St David’s Day 2007, Labour feels that the Conservatives are vulnerable on this issue – and they are dead right.

I’m not against marriage – heck, I’m getting married in June. I’m not even going to argue with the fact that marriage is a preferable institution from which to create a stable family unit. I’m not arguing that kids from married families statiscally don’t do better at school and stay out of trouble. Marriage is the most important building block of our society and we disregard it at our peril.

But marriage is not a magic wand – it is a means to an end. Marriages create stability, continuity and an environment of care, which is why it is so good at nurture and creating stable and balanced households. But it doesn’t have a monopoly on love, stability and care. There are plenty of co-habitees, single parents and same-sex relationships that provide exactly the same environment. Equally, there are plenty of marriages that provide very little in the way of any of these positive things.

My problem with the Conservative policy of rewarding marriage in the tax system is that it alienates people who don’t fall into this category, many through no fault of their own. The break-up of any marriage is always a tragic and deeply traumatic event, particularly when there are children involved. But it happens – sometimes people who fell in love with all good faith simply fall out of love, or fall more in love with someone else. It’s one of the most difficult things about being human – but being human is all that it is.

I feel very uncomfortable about levvying a financial penalty against those involved in such a sad chapter of their lives – even though to them it would no doubt pale into insignficance compared to everything else. To me, it smacks of kicking people while they are down, of turning our backs on them when they need support most and of keeping a whole lot of other people, many of whom will be relatively vulnerable, off a list of “the favoured” because they – for whatever reason – cannot or don’t wish to embrace a formal marriage arrangement.

I understand what the Conservative Party is trying to do here – but it’s all wrong. It allows our opponents to paint us as an exclusive party – as if we didn’t have enough trouble with that already. I seriously don’t want the Tory Party to be the party of the rich – I want it to be the party that leaves the rich alone, looks after the poor and increases mobility from poor to rich. But it’s difficult to get that inclusive idea across when you illustrate it with policies like this one.

And the party only has itself to blame. By trying, in the spring of 2007, to impose its grass roots’ preferred way of living, we have been overtaken by circumstances to a point where we are left with a policy that DC would probably reverse in an instant if he could – he’s already tried and then had to go back on himself - but can’t. Despite the recession, despite the sensitive issue that taxation policy has now become, he cannot go back on the marriage promise for fear of losing grass roots votes and another Lisbon-like U-turn. On one side his better judgement, on the other ConservativeHome and the Daily Mail. Rather him than me.

It’s what happens when you announce things three years ahead of an election. Okay, there’s nothing wrong with supporting marriage but I’ll bet that if DC could choose something now that he’d announced in 2007, it wouldn’t be this.

The Conservative Party must support people, not institutions if we wish to remain on the centre ground.

Posted in Community, Conservatives, David Cameron. Tags: , , , , , , , , . No Comments »

Not so easy now

January 11, 2010 — admin

Reality bites - Nick Clegg has ditched some of his key promises

Writing in the Grauniad this morning, a smug Michael White claimed that DC’s appearance on the Andrew Marr Show had clarified nothing and that he had not been able to give firm promises on any of his draft manifesto commitments. Well, I can’t deny that DC is avoiding any more cast-iron guarantees but neither can Mr White deny that the reason he is doing so is because of the total and utter ruin to which the government his newspaper supports has brought the economy.

Furthermore, we know that the government is being deliberately obstructive of Conservative attempts to gain access to Treasury information – both to hide the extent of their failure and deny the opposition any advantage they may derive once in government. DC knows that things are bad but he isn’t sure how bad and until he knows he’s not making any promises. Is Mr White saying this isn’t sensible?

The Liberal Democrats have been busy making quite a bit of hay over that situation in the past. But now it turns out that they too have seen the absurdity of promising free elderly care and scrapping tuition fees when the money most obviously isn’t there to fund it. It’s not the first time they’ve decided they want to scrap some of their policies (Mansion Tax, anyone?) but at least Nick Clegg is shelving these because he can’t afford it, rather than because they are rubbish.

As ever with the Lib Dems though, they don’t have to be properly costed because they aren’t ever going to be enacted. But there comes a time when promising the earth just looks silly - even when you don’t necessarily know the details of the costs involved. Such a point has been reached and Nick Clegg is using the opportunity to launch his own austerity regime.

Which just leaves Labour. The Chancellor has promised cuts, the PM used the word once but thinks he got away with it and one half of the Labour party wants class war and investment and the other half wants the middle class vote and a pair of sharp scissors. It is clear that the government is in total disarray not about the economic policy needed – because both spending cuts and tax rises are coming without a doubt – but how to present this to voters.

The Conservatives went for honesty at their conference last year and it went down well at first but started to wobble once the government comms department got hold of it. The Lib Dems tried honesty, the party didn’t fancy it and so they went back to investment but now Nick Clegg has obviously put his foot down for the sake of credibility – as far as it goes, good on him.

But Labour – Labour is a complete and utter shambles with PM, Alistair Darling and Milipede pulling one way and Balls/Cooper the other. Most of the cabinet seem to have given up, obviously completely bemused with the whole situation and the shattering lack of leadership.

They didn’t go into politics for this. Hopefully, they’ll be put out of their misery before too long.

Posted in Economy, elections, politics. Tags: , , , , , , , , . No Comments »

Gone to Iceland

January 5, 2010 — admin

Has the Icesave money been flushed down the waterfall?

Iceland is apparently a startling beautiful place. And up until quite recently, it was an attractive place to deposit money if you were a local authority. Indeed, the treasury included it on a list of, ahem, approved destinations for local authorities to save, such was the benefit of the interest rates on offer at places like Landsbanki.

Unsurprisingly, many local authorities did so – although not Woking – and when the whole thing went under in 2008, the price of local authorities’ silence on the Treasury’s advice was the government not blaming the councils themselves for incompetence. Many councils, in fact, sussed that there was something wrong in Iceland many months ahead of time but couldn’t get their money – tied in for periods of a year or more – out in time.

As well as councils, around 300,000 depositors in the UK, Netherlands and Germany had Icesave accounts that were guaranteed by the government – it is compensation for this bailout that is being questioned by Icelandic president Olafur Ragnar Grimsson. His government led by prime minister Johanna Sigurdardottir wants to do the right thing by paying back the British and Dutch governments nearly £3.1bn but he has decided the Icelandic people should have a say in a referendum instead.

They are likely to vote against because they believe that the country shouldn’t pay back the money to foreigners that its incompetent and dubiously run banks – the foreign debt of the biggest three was more than five times Iceland’s GDP – took from them in full understanding of their precarious position. The reducing value of the Icelandic currency was also to blame – somewhat more the fault of the people of Iceland than the people of Britain.

What this issue has to do with the people of Iceland is unclear. This is nothing less than nationalism being the last resort of a bankrupt nation and a president keen to gain some political capital out of his government’s stupid actions. Iceland has never been a centre of world finance and was scarcely able to sustain such highly leveraged financial devices – at least the City of London has that excuse.

If Iceland refuses to pay back what it owes to the people who lost out in Icesave, it will actually lose out further in the long term. It is difficult to see how it could ever enter the EU and investment in that country would be very, very hesitant in the future. Icelandic banks would remain a byword for loss and injustice along with the likes of BCCI and Barings.

Let us hope that the President and his people drop the patriotic ardour and start to understand the unfortunate consequences of neighbourly disputes.

Posted in Economy, Europe. Tags: , , , , . No Comments »

Don’t Mansion It

November 30, 2009 — admin
The nation's favourite bean-counter - pity his idealogy isn't as good as his maths

The nation's favourite bean-counter - pity his idealogy isn't as good as his maths

I wouldn’t like to buy a mansion from the Liberal Democrats because they only seem to price them in increments of £1million. Back in conference season, just after Nick Clegg promised “savage cuts” to assauge the thirst of the Orange Book brigade, the nation’s favourite economist Vince Cable stepped forward with a plan to surcharge people with homes worth more than £1million 0.5% of the value above the £1m threshold.

Unfortunately, the Liberals forgot that, somehow, they hold seats in places likes Winchester, Lewes, Oxford West and Abingdon, Richmond and Kingston. Many of the MPs in those areas, almost all of whom face a serious Conservative challenge at the next election, came forward to say that they didn’t like the policy much. Today, Nick Clegg made appearances on a number of popular news outlets announcing a re-think. Otherwise known as an admission that the policy was a silly idea.

Instead, they are going to charge people with homes worth more than £2million a whole 1% in tax above the £2m threshold. I can’t think of many people in Woking with houses worth that much, although I know there are a very few. This copious nonsense of a policy will affect just 70,000 households in the UK and raise just £1.7billion a year. Not only is this a paltry sum compared with the £175bn the government will borrow over the next two years but Mr Clegg is not even proposing to use this money to pay off the debt.

Instead it is part of a muddled package to increase the income tax allowance to £10,000 taking four million people out of income tax - but also giving £700 to every taxpayer, including the super-earners, each year. To counteract this, he wants to reduce the tax relief on pensions for higher earners. Fine. If you want higher taxes for the rich, you can try – but you’ll always end up paying more to get the money from them than you’ll recover in tax, which is why the 50% tax band is nothing more than classist posturing. The best way to raise the tax take is to solve our economic problems, get business booming and increase people’s incomes. When they earn more money, they pay more tax.

So not for the first time, the Lib Dems have a credibility gap on tax. I understand they want the rich to pay proportionally more tax. Yes, so do I. But the way to do that is not to single out the rich, or even “super-rich” for special treatment because wealth has its own way of avoiding penalty. You have to engage the economy, make everyone richer and give the rich a reason to stay in the country - a favourable business and earning environment – to contribute a fair share. I don’t think that 50% is too high a figure – but doing it as Labour have done will not produce anything.

Nor this shambles of a Lib Dem policy on mansions. Nick Clegg says that the changearound is not a U-turn and that the policy does “exactly what it says on the tin“. To me, the tin appears to be saying that the Lib Dems have very little idea how to get the government’s revenues flowing again.

Posted in Economy, Tax, lib dems. Tags: , , , , , , , , , . No Comments »

UKIP’s major point

November 28, 2009 — admin

An interesting story in The Times today about the relationship between UKIP and the Conservative Party, which threatens to become even more bitter than that between the Tories and the parties of the left.

The story says that UKIP offered to not fight the general election if the Conservatives gave a written guarantee (as opposed to a cast-iron one) that a referendum would definitely be held after the election and that its MPs would be given a free vote in a Commons ratification. He got no answer, although both the BBC and The Times say that Lord Strathclyde acknowlegdes the meeting have taken place.

In case anyone didn’t know, UKIP elected a new leader last week, Lord Pearson of Rannoch, to take over from Nigel Farage. This is obviously his attempt to make some headlines and announce his presence on the scene and that’s all fine. I’m glad that six months ago, the Conservatives had the foresight to see that Lisbon might be ratified ahead of an election and that this delicate siutation required careful planning, not more rash promises. In addition, a pact with UKIP endorses an openly Eurosceptic view, which may have caused further conflict within the party. We were right to reject their silly politicking.

What is interesting to me is the idea that, this one policy demand satisfied, UKIP was prepared to stand down from elections. In addition, Lord Pearson continued:

“And then when we had the referendum – which we believed we would win – we would then be out of the European Union and then at that point UKIP, well it would have been up to UKIP, but it would probably have disbanded because its major point would no longer be in existence.”

I thought this was a major party with policies on a range of issues. It appears, in fact to be a single-issue pressure group that stands for election and paradoxically ends up taking votes from the one mainstream political party that can deliver its single issue objective. It’s an incredibly short-sighted organisation.

If, as I hope it will, Britain ends its membership of the European Union within the next 10 years, there is a great deal that will have to be planned for to ensure that we remain competitive and politically engaged inside and outside the EU. For 35 years, our politics has operated on various fringes of Europe and to place ourselves outside that will require plenty of adjustments. Adjustments for the better, perhaps, but adjustments nevertheless.

But as soon as the exit from the EU is achieved, that appears to be UKIP’s tipping point to disband according to its new leader. Never mind the implications of the exit, never mind the work that follows it – we’ve got we wanted and now we’re off. This group doesn’t know the first thing about running a country – it’s only interested in tunnel vision politics and single issues. Successful politics understands that issues tend to happen simultaneously and everything, as Lenin once said, is connected to everything else.

So if you aren’t that keen on Europe and are thinking about voting for them in Woking or anywhere for that matter, try asking this of your UKIP candidate when they come knocking – what happens during life after the EU? Then ask yourself whether you really want people bought into a party with no concept of strategy to be your MP or local councillor.

Posted in Conservatives, Europe, politics. Tags: , , , , , , , , . No Comments »

Shoulder to shoulder no more

October 29, 2009 — admin
It's all gone a bit wrong for Brown

It's all gone a bit wrong for Brown

Following America is what Labour has done best throughout its tenure – in Iraq, Kosovo, Iraq again, Afghanistan and finally Iraq yet again. On each occasion we’ve gone in with America and been the last ally to exit ahead of them. What a shame that the recession has not been a similar story.

We learn to today that the recession, which famously “started in America” is no longer there. Last week, we learned the British economy, which was “better placed to weather the financial storm” than ever before, it still in it. This was totally unexpected by the government, who had used its new-found comradeship with the Daily Telegraph to place an article that anticipated recovery. Er, that was a mistake.

Guido has a great account of what actually has been going on here.

The fact is that once again Gordon seems to have an entirely different view of the world from everyone else. Either his civil servants are so incompetent that they were unable to see the “shock” figures coming, or his Treasury officials are too scared to tell him the bad news.

Either way, the PM is still denying that there are tough times ahead when most of the rest of the country – who don’t have the benefit of access to dodgy Treasury estimates – have figured out that the party is over. I’m not altogether convinced with Conservative performance on the economy over the past 18 months – it’s been patchy to say the least.

But the reason it’s been patchy is becuase there are any number of traps for an opposition without access to proper information to fall into. By and large, DC has avoided falling into those and Gordon looks determined to hurl himself into them instead.

The idea that the Conservatives want to prolong a recession by ordering unecessary spending cuts is ridiculous. Either the cuts don’t need to be made – in which case why would you contrive to reduce the size of your economy? – or despite recovery, which just means growth, the cuts still need to be made because we are spending more than our income.

That’s the point. Gordon spent 10 years at the Treasury, so we can be sure he understands income and expenditure – but it’s an interesting example of how quickly economics goes out the window when political considerations start to dominate instead.

Posted in Economy, Labour, Other blogs. Tags: , , , , , , . No Comments »

Come off it, Nick

September 23, 2009 — simonashall

Nick Clegg delivered a speech today that by most accounts rounded off a pretty disastrous Lib Dem conference in a moderately efficient way without setting any real fires in the hearts of activists.

Nick Clegg, would-be PM

Nick Clegg, would-be PM

But yet again, he seemed intent on playing to his weaknesses. Instead of displaying the resonant pragmatism that a party with little chance of government can afford to have, Clegg seemed intent on talking about what would happen if he became Prime Minister. It only served to highlight the fact that he isn’t going to be Prime Minister.

A hung Parliament is still an outside possibility next May. The LDs’ best strategy is to win as many seats as they can (at least offsetting any Tory losses with Labour gains) and look to hold the balance of power after the election. By refusing to countenance sharing power or state his price as a coalition partner, Clegg has lost touch of reality at the end of a conference where members really needed him to grab hold of it again.

The Lib Dems are about 150-1 to win the next election. There is a possibility that they could go from 20% to 45% in the polls in seven months. There is also a possibility that I could end up campaigning for Rosie Sharpley in Woking next May. But it’s a pretty slim one (she wouldn’t let me, anyway) and if I started talking about it at length, people might assume that I’d let go of the handlebars and fallen off the bike. Similarly with Nick Clegg when he talks about being PM.

What the Lib Dems have is a unique credibility among voters. Because no-one really pays them much attention, no-one really understands what they stand for but they seem nice enough on telly so they get the benefit of the doubt. I’ve known right-wing Conservatives and left-wing Labourites vote Lib Dem as a protest – clearly they didn’t have a clue what they were voting for. But that credibility has been damaged this week – not least because the star player Vince Cable has received criticism in the media first the first time ever.

Nick Clegg needs to rebuild that credibility over the autumn – claiming he can be the next PM and that his party are “real contenders” to win the next general election isn’t the best of starts.

Update 24/9: I think I probably wrote this post a day too earlier because the thoughts in it hadn’t really solidified in my mind. I considered re-writing, but Denzil Coulson has written a comment below that I think is a very fair “other side of the coin” argument.

The problem the Lib Dems have is actually a credibility gap. As the third party, they have a high degree of credibility among both Labour and Tory voters – hence why either will vote for them as a protest and why at local government level they control large metropolitan councils and shire districts that by any measurement ought to be Conservative.

But as a party of government, they have no credibility at all. And when Nick Clegg tries to move them in that direction, it all seems a bit ridiculous and that in turn affects their credibility as the third party. Denzil is quite right and Clegg is quite right to not be happy as the third party and to push for opposition and government. But the issue is how to close that credibility gap without damaging their current position and weakening, rather than strengthening themselves.

Hence Clegg urging voters who support the Lib Dems to vote for them even if they don’t believe government is realistic – the more the polls show the Lib Dems at 20% the fewer supporters will leap across the gap; the fewer supporters leaping across the gap, the more that figure stagnates at 20%.

Lib Dems should be assured that I will give an equally critical analysis of Gordon Brown and Labour starting tomorrow – and yes, to DC and my party too. I want to vote for DC next year but in doing so I want to know that it is the right, not just the tribal, thing to do.

Posted in lib dems, politics. Tags: , , , . 1 Comment »
«
»