Paper Tigers

May 1, 2010 — simonashall

Not particularly unexpectedly, the papers continue to turn on Gordon Brown as Labour heads for utter wipeout at the election. The Times, which has backed Labour for the past three elections, returns to the Conservatives along with the Sunday Express but interestingly the Grauniad and its sister The Observer is backing the Liberal Democrats, presumably in order to force a hung parliament and keep DC away from Downing Street.

It will also push Labour voters tactically into the hands of the Lib Dems in a reverse of 1997.

What previous Conservative voters thinking about chancing one on Nick Clegg have to consider is this: do they really want to be voting along with Guardian and Observer readers who’ve been happily voting for Labour since 1979? I’ll be the first to admit that the Conservative Party isn’t perfect and I’ve posted before on how I think that is but really, take the thoughts of the Times – which hasn’t supported the Conservatives in 18 years – on board and think about what Britain needs right now.

A hung parliament and Nick Clegg’s promise of change, which means different things depending on where you live, or David Cameron’s visionary and responsible blueprint for Britain that is backed up by a depth of experience within a party with a track record of sorting out Labour’s mess.

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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.

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Halving the deficit

December 15, 2009 — admin

moneyOne of the key things in the the Pre-Budget Report was the headline to “halve Britain’s deficit” during the next four years, bringing this down from 12% of GDP where it currently stands (up from 2% in 2007) to 6.5%. In other words we are going to reduce the £180bn-a-year borrowing levels to something more “manageable”.

But this is not the same as reducing the deficit ie paying back what we owe – it simply indicates that the government, over the next four years, wants to reduce borrowing to £90bn a year, adjusting for inflation. During that time, of course, they could have borrowed the best part of £600bn more.

It doesn’t pay off the amount borrowed – it doesn’t even pay off the interest – it is simply a commitment to reduce the future levels at which we borrow. Strangely, this distinction doesn’t seem to have made it past Tom Clark in The Grauniad, as the paper happily swallows the government lines that Labour is to “halve the deficit”.

The total figure for what Britain owes is not easy to find but one must assume it is heading towards £1trillion. In addition, the nation has promised £2trillion in public pensions that it doesn’t have.

What the government is actually doing is spending £100 on a credit card every month. It used to spend £20, but the recession meant it needed to borrow more. It has not paid any of the money back and is intermittently paying back bits of interest. The bank is watching closely to see if the credit limit should be reduced. So the government is now looking to reduce its spending to £50 within four years. It is not saying that half the total amount on the card will be repaid.

That isn’t the impression left by James Lansdale on the “full story of the pre-Budget report” on the BBC, or even by the Daily Telegraph, who also seem happy to take the government’s suggested wording.

What the government is seeking to do is halve year-on-year borrowing, nothing else. It might help if journalists read the report itself rather than the Treasury’s press release, or even understood a little bit about how the economy works.

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Two reasons for Labour shame

September 29, 2009 — simonashall

Two things came out of the Labour conference that real made me angry. I can put up with Labour ministers banging on about how Gordon Brown saved the world and how the Tories are planning to throw pensioners into the sea etc etc but the sight of ex-terrorists being allowed to return to the scene of one of their most infamous atrocities on an official ticket, to be able to mingle with Cabinet ministers and turn up to parties sponsored by the Grauniad really makes me doubt the character of the people responsible. We all know who I’m talking about; his name doesn’t get mentioned on this blog.

What the IRA did to the Grand last time they visited

What the IRA did to the Grand last time they visited

I don’t need to go into the details of the Brighton bomb, which happened 25 years ago next month. Suffice it to say that I refuse to believe that it never occurred to the Labour Party what an inappropriate situation this was. It’s just the small, petty, spiteful and vindictive actions of a party that has lost its self-respect. No doubt next year they’ll be heading down to Eastbourne to hold the Labour conference outside the former home of Ian Gow. I don’t agree with Norman Tebbit about much but I certainly understand why he is not happy. Strangely, the BBC reports this only in its Northern Ireland coverage rather than the main conference section.

The second thing that made me mad was Gordon Brown‘s proposal for 16 and 17-year old single mothers to be housed together in shared accommodation rather than single flats. I can imagine the utter furore if a Conservative government had come forward with similar proposals. This is the politics of victimhood – of Labour saying to people “You’ll never amount to much but if you stick with us, we’ll protect you from the Conservatives who want to cut you loose in society.” Wrong.

The way to tackle teenage pregnancy is break the cycle of poverty and lack of opportunity that teaches young girls the only way to get on in life is to have babies because with those come houses and income through benefits. Young people need teachers who can instill self-worth in them, social workers who have the power to tackle parents who don’t give a damn and clear and distinct paths of opportunity to make their lives better before they bring babies into the world to share them.

It would also help if teachers didn’t hand out contraceptives to girls barely old enough to write their own names and if our culture wasn’t so wholly dominated by images of sex and peer pressure to engage in it. There are other enjoyable pursuits in life for young people – but if sex is all they know, it’s inevitable that it will become a preoccupation. It is up to government to enable the alternatives. It makes me mad that Labour has no intention to do this while telling everyone it cares about young mothers. It is not interested in single mothers – only their votes – and bunging them all together in block accommodation is a ghastly piece of ignorant and exploitative legislation that has no place whatsoever in Parliament.

I hope DC refers to this in Manchester. The Conservatives should be able to do a lot better.

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