Skip to main content

Bournemouth absence

Although I had hoped to get down to the Liberal Democrat conference in Bournemouth this year, simple pressure of work has now made that impossible. I must admit to great disappointment. The last conference before the General Election was always likely to show a few fireworks, and indeed the conference has attracted more headlines than any other over the past three years.

Some of these headlines show a significant change of course in terms of economic policy. Scepticism about the size of government expenditure has given way to concern and now it is clear that reducing government expenditure will need to be the most urgent priority of the next government. So far it has been the Liberal Democrats that have made the running, and although the Conservatives are now belatedly recognising that cuts will be required they continue to fail to provide even the slightest detail as to what they think should guide their decisions in this area. This political cowardice means that we are expected to chose a government without having the first clue as to what the Conservatives might do should they get into office.

The new property tax that Vince Cable proposes: the brilliantly spun "Mansion Tax", at least underlines that the Liberal Democrats are serious about balancing the books. Indeed there has been a plethora of new policy detail emerging from the conference. Neither has there been any of the tension between delegates and leadership that we saw, for example at Blackpool a few years ago. The party looks pretty united and increasingly well organised. The opinion polls offer some comfort, as the party has clearly recovered from the lows of two years ago.

There is every chance that, despite a potential Conservative resurgence, the power of Liberal Democrat incumbency and the growing weakness of Labour will allow the Lib Dems not only to limit any losses to the Conservatives, but also to make substantial progress against Labour. Under certain scenarios, there is even the very real chance to make progress beyond the current level of MPs, and the party of two years ago, traumatised by the internal problems that it then faced would be very happy to see the current position. The Conservative upsurge poses a challenge, but it does not pose an existential threat.

Of course the media's dismissal of the Liberal Democrats: Jeremy Paxman's arrogant assertion that "there can be no distinction between a Lib Dem policy and an aspiration since you are not going to win anyway" remains the primary challenge. When voters think the Lib Dems are able to win, they have a dramatically higher rate of success, so such a dismissal is incredibly damaging. The fact is that the party is back on track, and indeed at local level is making some dramatic progress.

For me it really is a case of "wish you were here".

Comments

Newmania said…
I am glad to see your comments . Your assertion that the Liberals are ahead of the game on cuts is away with the fairies is it not . For the last ten years when it would have made a difference the Lib Dems have been to the left of New Labour arguing for more Government expenditure( Pensions tuition fees penny on tax et al) and if the Conservative Party are scared of the word ‘cut’ it is because they are so associated with the policies .
As I understand it the Liberal approach to debt is much the same as Labour`s “Lord, make me chaste – but not yet!”.
There has been an enormous amount of personal abuse handed out to the Conservative Party by the way , I suspect to disguise the fact that the Liberals are serruptitiously trying to rebrand as Tory-lite . Clegg was not up to spinning gold from corn on this occasion.

Looks well organised and serious but as we have two of them why have another ? The Guardian has been scathing, which surprised me .

All in all ho hum...next
Newmania said…
http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/fourth-estate/2009/09/labour-lib-parties-party


http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/sep/21/lab-lib-dem-ideas-coalition


Friends of yours
Max Atkinson said…
I wonder what you thought of Clegg's speech. For what it's worth, you can see my verdict here: http://bit.ly/1I5GOr

Popular posts from this blog

Concert and Blues

Tallinn is full tonight... Big concerts on at the Song field The Weeknd and Bonnie Tyler (!). The place is buzzing and some sixty thousand concert goers have booked every bed for thirty miles around Tallinn. It should be a busy high summer, but it isn´t. Tourism is down sharply overall. Only 70 cruise ships calling this season, versus over 300 before Ukraine. Since no one goes to St Pete, demand has fallen, and of course people think that Estonia is not safe. We are tired. The economy is still under big pressure, and the fall of tourism is a significant part of that. The credit rating for Estonia has been downgraded as the government struggles with spending. The summer has been a little gloomy, and soon the long and slow autumn will drift into the dark of the year. Yesterday I met with more refugees: the usual horrible stories, the usual tears. I try to make myself immune, but I can´t. These people are wounded in spirit, carrying their grief in a terrible cradling. I try to project hop

Media misdirection

In the small print of the UK budget we find that the Chancellor of the Exchequer (the British Finance Minister) has allocated a further 15 billion Pounds to the funding for the UK track and trace system. This means that the cost of the UK´s track and trace system is now 37 billion Pounds.  That is approximately €43 billion or US$51 billion, which is to say that it is amount of money greater than the national GDP of over 110 countries, or if you prefer, it is roughly the same number as the combined GDP of the 34 smallest economies of the planet.  As at December 2020, 70% of the contracts for the track and trace system were awarded by the Conservative government without a competitive tender being made . The program is overseen by Dido Harding , who is not only a Conservative Life Peer, but the wife of a Conservative MP, John Penrose, and a contemporary of David Cameron and Boris Johnson at Oxford. Many of these untendered contracts have been given to companies that seem to have no notewo