T is for Team....or lack thereof

A continuing series of spelling out Conservative plans part 7.



This is Peter Brookes cartoon from today's Times. It comes after the launch of the £400,000 2 week bill board campaign across the country, which Labour cannot match and polling which shows that Dave is the only recognised faced of the Conservative party. This is of concern to senior Tories just a little late in the day to realise it.

U is for U Turn

A continuing series of spelling out Conservative plans Part 6.

They say that a week is a long time in politics. But an hour and forty two minutes!

Yeah that is how long it took the Dave to spell out that "could not guarantee a Conservative government would be able to offer a tax break to married couples".




Until he, well, he had to correct himself. So less that just two days into spelling out just what the Conservative policies are going to be and they have to get out the Tippex*. Oops.



* Other correction fluids are available, probably on a Conservative HQ desk right now.

U is for Uncosted

A continuing series of spelling out Conservative plans Part 4.

I've just taken a quick look through the Conservative Party's manifesto chapter on health (you can access it here). Now on a cursory glance although expense and savings are mentioned many times there is no actual figures for much of this. Indeed apart from a line of in the introduction that says:

"By the time you've finished reading this sentence we'll have racked up £33,000 more in [national] debt"

There are only three figures of actual costs either current or future of what is involved.

First up we have we have that poor mental health costs the economy £77 billion each year. Before they go on to say that rules preventing welfare-to-work providers and employers purchasing services from Mental Health Trusts.

There is of course the one-off payment upon retirement of £8,000 for their 'free personal care for the elderly' as I blogged earlier during their conference this is but a poor imitation of what the Lib Dems have been proposing for a number of years now, and delivered in Scotland.

The only other monetary amount to be mentioned is a £10 million a year commitment beyond 2011 to support hospices in their vital work with children.

In the past the Tories have often thrust the argument out at the Liberal Democrat manifesto pledges that they were uncosted and meant nothing. That of course is no longer the case Lib Dem manifestos are fully audited and costed. For all their talk of expense and savings the Tories have not indicated one costing of what will be saved or what will be committed in what is Chapter one of their manifesto.

Lib Dem MP Norman Lamb had this to say about the announcement this morning.

"All today’s announcement confirms is that the Tories can’t be trusted with the NHS and have every intention of playing fantasy politics all the way up to the election.

"The NHS is facing enormous shortfalls in funding over the next few years yet the Tories continue to promise extra health spending without any details of where the money will come from.

"The time has come for David Cameron to be honest with the British public. If the Tories want to pledge extra spending on health in some areas then they must admit that without extra funds it will lead to cuts in frontline services elsewhere. And if they plan to remove all central targets how do they intend to prevent a return to the waiting lists of old?

"The sad truth is that David Cameron knows his health policies don’t add up. How else do you explain the sudden U-turn today on their flagship single room’s policy?"

Alistair Darling meanwhile has pointed out:

"The Tories have made over £45bn of promises, but can barely explain how they can pay for a quarter of this. This leaves them with a credibility gap of £34bn.

"These are not long forgotten promises from another time. All have been confirmed in the last two years. Most have been repeated in the last few months.

"You can't fight an election on a nod and a wink; sometimes claiming you are committed to these promises, and when challenged claiming you are not."

Maybe he has a point.

V is for VAT

A continuing series of spelling out Conservative plans Part 3.

At the end of last year I noticed that Iain Dale had said that VAT would rise to 20% in his predictions for 2010. Speaking yesterday David Cameron said:

"Britain needs responsible economic policies that deal with our debts, so we have stability to create jobs and keep mortgage rates and taxes lower."

However, in today's Sunday Torygraph the last Conservative Chancellor Kenneth Clarke said:

"It is something that every Conservative tries to avoid but I didn't avoid it when I was getting us out of recession before [in the 1990s]. Coming out of a recession when you have such a severe deficit you can't rule out putting up taxes.

"If you can't get it down quickly enough, in order to maintain the confidence of the markets and to create conditions for growth and employment, then you may have to look at tax increases."

When asked specifically about the fact that many commentators have sad that the Tories will but up VAT to 20% even temporarily he went on to say:

"When you're the most indebted country in the western world, and people are talking about looking at the credit rating of the country, and we're not sure that foreigners are going to buy gilt-edged bonds to finance our debt, then you cannot start promising you are not ever going to start increasing taxation.

"We will try to avoid it, we'll minimise it if we have to by having proper control of public spending, which we haven't had in this country in the last 12 years."

So the Tories look set to carry on the Labour policy of increasing regressive taxes. The tax policy that has led to the poorest paying a considerable higher proportion of their income in tax than the richest. VAT affects everyone at the same rate on the same items, there is no threshold to help the poorest escape it. National Insurance which has been Labour's toy in recent years does have a threshold, yet even those who are on the 'minimum rage' are above that threshold. Surely that cannot be right.

The Liberal Democrats are promising to sort out the tax system in this country in a fair way. We promise to raise the tax allowance to £10,000, it currently stands at £6,475. Somebody currently on a 37 hour week at the full minimum wage (currently only required for those over 22) would be earning £11159.20. So 42% of their so called working wage is taxable for both Income Tax and National Insurance, plus anything they purchase which has VAT is now taxed at 17.5%. The Lib Dems while not completely removing the poorest from the first two taxes will at least reduce that amount to 10.4%.

Yes as Kenneth Clarke did point out we are the most indebted country in the Western World and we do need to find a way to get ourselves out of that, but we need to be fair in who we affect by those decisions. We need fairer taxes, taxed that are based on the ability to pay. The concentration on VAT must be at the end of any changes to help pay our way out of recession. Yet it seems to be something that the Conservatives are contemplating very soon.

W is for War

A continuing series of spelling out Conservative plans Part 2

"In that spirit of unity, of a greater purpose than the simple pursuit of politics, I have an announcement to make.

"We have said that from day one of a future Conservative Government, a national security council, with the key ministers and defence chiefs, will sit as a war cabinet.

"And I can announce today that if we win this year's election, I will invite leaders of the main opposition parties to attend the war cabinet on a regular basis so they can offer their advice and insights.

"When a nation is at war, it needs to pull together.

"I am determined that with a Conservative government, it will."

Well there you have it folks the full extent of co-operation that David Cameron is prepared to announce in today's Woodstock speech. And it tucked down there at the very end the bit about working with others. It comes shortly often the comment, "And over the past four years, we have always tried to work with other parties rather than looking for political dividing lines where none exist."

Woah! Take me back there a minute.

We have tried to work with others...not dividing lines...we'll set up a cross party war cabinet.

Ok surely by having a war cabinet you are admitting dividing lines with someone else. Do they really exist? Surely if you are taking one approach domestically and another internationally you are all messed up. If you are trying to ignore some dividing lines yet not seeking to understand others, either across Europe, with fundamentalist Muslims, or whomever, what is it you are trying to achieve?

How about a national peace cabinet? To look for solutions. Or is that too far out there for the Tories. Or a cross party Economic cabinet to get us out of this recession? But then that would admit that the long believed Tory strong hand of economic responsibility is something you could not uphold.



The war on 'terrorism', as I suspect this is the war that Dave is spelling out today, is actually gaining us more enemies from our reactions to it. Indeed the enemy is no longer over there is some place outside our imagining but the actions of Blair and the Tory opposition have disaffected some of our own citizens.

We do need solutions but the might of the forces seems to be the default position. What was the lesson that 9/11 tried to teach us. The targets hit were our economic prosperity in the World Trade Centre and our military might in the Pentagon. The speculation of what the fourth plane's target was is that the Capitol or White House may have been the other, so that is the fact that our politics ignore and don't engage with certain groups.

So what have we done about it in the past 7 years to look at these issues?

I think we all know the answer to that. Little for the economies, at least little that doesn't benefit us in the West. Tried to impose our own democracy on them. Have we engaged across the political divides with those we don't agree with? Not much. What we have done is gone in militarily, imposed regime change in two countries, holding a threat over others.

How anyone can end a speech that sets out plans for a war cabinet with the words, "So let's face this new year with confidence, optimism and hope," is beyond me? We are so optimistic that we will be at war for some considerable time that we will be going to a war footing.

UPDATE: Thanks to Darryl Goodliffe for pointing out the true result of having 'have opened up our party and have more women candidates and candidates from ethnic minorities ready to bring their expertise to help change this country' really means at grassroots level. Just where that war is going to be fought and who it is going to fought against.

P is for 'Progressive'?

Speaking as in Woodstock today David Cameron has launched the Tories election campaign. He said:

"The next general election is no more than 153 days away and I don't think it can come soon enough.

"Let's make this the year for change - the year when the positive defeats the negative.

"We can't go on in these difficult times with a weak Prime Minister and a divided government."

He also said that he would from today and every day until the General Election he would spell out what that means. That is a good idea I'll be waiting each day to see just what Dave D.A.V.E. Dave spells out and reporting back.

Well to be fair he did give us three of those letters today, n, h and s. He said the following:

We are progressive Conservatives.

"Our goal is to create a fairer, safer, greener country where opportunity is more equal.

"It's because we are progressives that we will protect the NHS.

"In its bricks and mortars, care and compassion, it is the embodiment of fairness in our society.

"We recognise its special place in our society so we will not cut the NHS, we will improve it for everyone."

So he is using the P word too progressive. But there are no cuts for the NHS, but hang on, bricks and mortar come top of his list ahead of care and compassion. Isn't Dave meant to be the caring, compassionate Conservative. The main concern that many of us have is that as part of his plans for the NHS certain aspects of it will be sold off. Putting brick and mortar ahead of care and compassion may not speak of the total fairness to society that Dave aludes to later.

Other P's that were used today include public sector pay. He announced he would freeze it for a year. All of it. Even those on the lowest grades. This in the name of fairness?

Those on the lowest grades suffer because the consumer price index is where the bulk of their spending is not the retail price index. The former is still increasing while the former may show deflation. To freeze pay for the lowest paid public servants as the Conservatives want to do is being positive to defeat the negative, indeed it will add to more negative for those people. There will be little 'aspiration' from the lowest paid public servants to be 'supported'.

The Lib Dems on the other hand have promised to freeze pay at the upper ends of the pay scales only and help out those at the lower end by lifted the Tax Allowance to £10,000.

However, Chapter one of the manifesto is promised on Monday, so obviously Sunday is a day of rest in this statement (precised by Woodstock above):

"We are starting our campaign to win the general election today and we will be spelling out exactly what that will mean every day from now until polling day."

See Also: Kasch Wilder isn't impressed saying it lacks radical change we need. Tory Blogger Byrne Tofferings even said in his predictions yesterday "Cameron to back-track on certain planks of Tory policy. I would expect Cameron to be very middle-of-the-road in his first term. I do not expect any major changes."