Fear and Loathing in Westminster

Xinjiang Riots: A People Submerged

2011-01-04T00:37:00.043Z

The trucks rumble by. Astride them Chinese soldiers peer out below. As though their far-eastern features, and differing physiques did not distinguish them enough, their fatigues and itchily shoulder-mounted machine guns put them in stark contrast with those they pass. Stocky middle-aged men, dressed in garb more reminiscent of the Ottoman empire than Imperial China, some adorned with traditional dorha astride their heads, some blue of eye, with light dusky coloured hair, regard them as they parade through the centre of this large road, so contrary to the ancient rustic architecture of this place. Like a perverse victory lap, they continue. The eyes are not friendly however, these people are not here to welcome these soldiers. Apprehension, barely disguised disdain, muted anger, fear. The soldiers gaze down, the people cautiously stare up. This unsteady, uneasy situation brought about, along with the presence of these largely ill-educated, poor foreign soldiers, by the recent riots here. Cars burned, windows shattered, frustrations unleashed. Retribution sought; power established. Neither side doubts who controls this old market town, famed for it's position at the heart of the ancient silk road. It's splendour no longer quite so vibrant, muted as with it's people, by years of neglect and mistreatment.

The people here, muslims largely, are the Uighers. Culturally distinct from these soldiers and those they represent. Separated by religion, culture, and the vast Gobi desert. Chinese rule here has never been particularly popular, uprisings and rebellions a frequent feature of the tempestuous and often violent relationship between these two uncomfortable bedfellows. The Chinese see this place, now called Xinjiang, as the distant wild west of their indisputable domain, a land in need of civilising and modernising, rife with opportunity, inhabited by a people backwards, and somewhat inferior. For the Uighers, the Chinese represent an unwelcome intrusion. The Uighers are historically insular, an independent people, content with self-rule in this distant domain of theirs. Understandable, being as far removed in the interior of Central Asia as they are. Though their position straddling the Silk Road historically brought them contact with the world outside their remote fortress, buffeted by large mountain ranges and inhospitable desert on all sides, the external influences remained contained by and large. Even previous Chinese dominion here was greatly limited by this modern standard; a distant province that the Chinese were satisfied to station a governor within, receive their tribute, but little more, this level of involvement and influence a mere fantasy.

This is no longer the case, as is clear from this scene I witness. Bustling markets full of exotic goods as well as the benign, an animal market seemingly from another century (below left). While scenes like this may caste one back to adolescent thoughts of great game adventure, it soon becomes clear that Han Chinese shops and businesses are coming to dominate the trade here in Kashgar, as well as Xinjiang province as a whole. Encouraged by the Chinese government's 'Go West' developmental push, millions of Chinese, usually poor, but also young officials and technocrats viewing it as a temporary posting before greater prestige in the east beckons, have been lured, unwelcome and often unsuspecting of the sentiment against them that can lead to unpleasant violent reprisals, to this remote corner of the kingdom. Here, with generous tax benefits, monetary and entrepreneurial incentives, and support from official quarters. This is the Chinese way of civilising. The Uighers, once the absolute majority in this now derelict castle of theirs, now represent the tedium, the annoyance of an unwanted squatter. Ungrateful and hostile, sometimes outwardly so, regrettably so indeed, they have not embraced as the Chinese assume they should, what the Chinese assume they must. They have not embraced the Chinese way, one they believe will lead this large country towards a powerful, assertive and self-determined future. The Chinese will say, with a small measure of mitigated justification, that they have brought with them opportunity, emancipation, and equality. For these Uighers, watching the trucks roll by, nervously eying the large manned cannons mounted on back, it's a notion overly difficult to reconcile to.

As has been stated already, Chinese claim here is tenuous, though not entirely historically unfounded. As with their equally defiant neighbours to the south, in Tibet, the Uighers of Xinjiang have before experienced periods of Chinese control, though of a far more limited variety, operating more as a satellite, tributary state to their powerful, technologically advanced neighbours to the east. Culturally they share little with the Chinese; in religion and tradition, next to nothing. The Uighers are a muslim people, closer in many ways to the regional muslims of central Asia, they are now almost entirely cut off from by strict Chinese controls on the western borders. Discontent arises not primarily from the notion of being ruled externally, though this cannot be discounted. For the Uighers have like most of the peoples of this tough and difficult region been governed by outsiders, from fellow muslim tribes of central Asia, the Russians by proxy (albeit briefly), as well as Imperial China. In addition to this, internal upheavals and civil wars between competing claims to power here have meant that permanent rule here has rarely been a reality for whomever attempts it.

But this reign, this outside rule, feels different. For the Chinese are plainly here to stay, and in increasing numbers. Geographical isolation and a not immediately obvious appeal in terrain and environment has meant in the past that even under new rulers, settlers from the outside were an exception rather than a rule. With millions of Han Chinese now pouring in, at the behest and with the support of the government, this has changed. Changed to the point where Uighers now number less than their far eastern counterparts, and this looks set to continue in the future (the chart here shows the 2000 census of the province, and this has continued pace since).

What particularly galls the Uigher people, is what they feel to be an obvious favouring of the incoming Han. Local government officials are often Han Chinese, and in the few instances they are not, the men they choose are invariably chosen for their amenability to Chinese rule at the expense of their fellow Uighers. Furthermore there is a sense that no amount of hard work will pull the majority of people here out of this situation. A young woman, clearly bright, nearly fluent in English (a rarity in this part of China), laments her lost opportunity to attend a university in Singapore. Prevented not by intellect or diligence, in receipt of a letter of acceptance, she had been denied her dreams to escape what is fast coming to feel like a tar pit for many Uighers by the punitive 'fee' local communist officials had demanded her family pay in order to process her student visa and permit her to leave in order to pursue her studies as thousands of aspirational, intelligent young Chinese do every year. As for many young Uigher, she now faces an uncertain future. Unable to venture abroad in the hopes of improving her lot, and that of her family, her community, she must now find a way through a system seemingly content to promote minority rights in theory alone. We cannot say this policy of minority neglect runs all the way to the top of the Chinese political system, but in a country as vast, as diverse as this, undoubtedly local politicians and bureaucrats hold with their positions a great deal of power and discretion, power they have come to be detested for in many parts of the country where nepotism, greed and corruption have come to impede their duty to the people they govern (such as in the aftermath of the deadly 2008 Sichuan earthquake, when corrupt and negligent officials bore much of the anger and blame from grieving relatives, and fed up people, who were used to their complacent rule). This problem is not limited to just minority areas, not just to Uighers or Tibetans, for all of China, especially in rural and remote areas, is attempting to wrestle with this problem. But it is undeniable that here, this problem seems all the more acute, all the more destructive of it's victim.

And so what now? It is clear that both the Chinese government and the Uigher people have a great problem that after 61 years of Communist party rule they seem no closer to resolution. Unlike the Tibetans, the Uighers have no popular cause to which they can attach some hope, derive some aspiration for change. They have no figurehead as amenable and highly renowned as the Dalai Lama to promote their plight. Additionally, in a world as fractured as it has become, being a muslim group seems to further cement their position as the forgotten and ignored minority within China. In the context of the wider 'War on Terror', which many might read as a war between the fundamentalists of Christianity and Islam, the Chinese can, and have, claimed many of their restrictive and punitive policies in this region to be their own war upon Islamic extremists. Except to this point, ties between Uigher rebels and wider Islamic religious combatant groups in general (such as those operating in bordering Pakistan, and in Afghanistan and much of central Asia, the Middle East and parts of Africa) have been limited at most. However as with the Russians in their Caucuses territories, it provides a convenient smokescreen to continue actions that would otherwise be harder to justify. The Uighers are yet another group to suffer under the unfortunate label of the 'War on Terror', but the terror here is largely their own. They fear assimilation to the point of losing their own distinct history and identity, they fear even more aggression and violence that is brought upon them whenever they voice their concerns and frustrations. For in a country such as China, very little can be said when the government declares martial law in this wild west province, when thousands of men are rounded up with no charge and kept hidden, when the government cuts all phone and internet connections with not just the wider world, but with the rest of China too. These people are isolated, they are largely ignored, and increasingly they wear the face of the resigned, acceptant that this may be their lot.

The children above should offer these people hope, hope towards a future of increased self-determination and opportunity. They do not yet possess the distrust of the outsider that seemingly makes the Uigher people an unwelcoming bunch. They smile as they pose for the camera, the young girl in green rallies her playmates as they adopt stances you could imagine young children anywhere adopting. They are curious, they are naive to the wider world around them. Sadly, from other conversations here in this place, with those not many years older, this will probably not last forever. They too, will probably join their fathers in grimly watching the parading forces, they may well shriek with their mothers yet again for the release of their menfolk. But above all, they will come to accept a life devoid of fundamental hope, of a respect born of self-identity and determination, they will come to the resignation we have spoken of earlier, interspersed with frantic but futile outpourings of rage as were witnessed here but days before my arrival.
We can but hope that this will not be their destiny, for when a man is deprived of his history, of his culture, his legacy, he is infinitely poorer for it. And while the Uighers may not capture the imagination of the world as the legend of the mysterious Tibetan plateau did and does, it should be just as pressing to us all that another ancient people are being squeezed to the sides within a rapidly expanding, increasingly assertive and powerful country such as China, doing little, if nothing to prevent it.

Cynics may proclaim this sentimental. Indeed, to an extent it might be. But history has given us enough examples of peoples stripped of their lands and identities, who have been ever poorer for it, and have come to suffer the indignity of being without home, links to the past, and very often fractured and dysfunctional communities and societies beset with problems as a result. The Native Americans within the United States, languishing upon their isolated and defunct reservations, similarly with the Aboriginals of Australia, both succumbing to the slow death of drink, drugs, and a lack of hope for the future, and that of their children. The native peoples of Latin America, similarly oppressed and abused for centuries, repressed at the behest of European conquistadors. The 2,000 or so residents of Diego Garcia in the Chagos Archipelago, forcibly moved and left impoverished and homeless on Mauritius nearly 1,000 miles away in a detestable collusion between the governments of Britain and the United States in 1965 to provide the United States with an airbase in the Indian Ocean, the black Africans under the yoke of Apartheid South Africa, the Palestinians still under the rule of a belligerent Israel uncaring of world opinion.

The Uighers are yet another in a long line of this tradition. Submerged beneath the expansionist urges of the powerful, subject to colonisation and then suffering what amounts quintessentially to no less than an ethnic cleansing, subtle and less overt than some in history, but the result is not too far removed. And so they watch, the tanks continue to roll by, they nervously pass checkpoints around their neighbourhoods, their homes. They attempt to live their lives, to raise their kids. They are but another minority in this long, sad tradition.

Fees Fail: Rebuttal

2010-12-09T14:45:00.004Z

The fees debate has become one of the most important student movements in the UK for years, and has inspired people across cultures, generations, and class to co-operate in solidarity against the government's massively unfair proposals.

There is no doubt in my mind that demonstrating is the right thing to do, and that the media's portrayal of the participators as violent middle-class yobs is a hideous misrepresentation and cynical betrayal, especially considering that the destructive image of someone kicking a window in was used on the front cover of nine national newspapers. I am becoming increasingly convinced that the students are the only ones who can help change this country's unenviable situation, and that anger at the fees hike is symptomatic of a larger malaise around the western world at the ridiculous inequalities and injustices consistently perpetrated by the rich against the rest of us, which were brought to the collective attention with the economic crisis.

However, though I wish I could be at the protests today like Joni Mitchell wished to be at Woodstock, I am in two minds as to what to feel about practical solutions to the problem. Demonstrating is important, but if there are no alternatives then it seems a bit redundant. And the quasi-Marxian rhetoric some have been proposing as a solution to the problem of funding seems achingly naïve. Though idealism is wonderful in theory, I am continually reminded that it cannot fit into the system of neoliberal economics which governs most of the world today. A Robin Hood tax, development economics, and getting rid of Trident are all potential solutions being whispered about in schools and universities around the country, yet each of them is fundamentally unworkable. I therefore continue to grudgingly stick by my statement in the first post on this issue a few weeks ago that 'cuts had to be made' for the reasons I will now explain. If anyone has heard about a different (workable) solution, please let me know though.

The essential problem stopping us from doing anything but cut to ameliorate the economic deficit is greed. It is a simple concept, but is the crux of why a Robin Hood tax or development economics would not work. As I have stated previously, the world is run by people who have a lot to lose should capitalism be reigned in, therefore it is in their interests to maintain its strength (though ironically it was their greed which caused the economic downturn). What then is stopping a private company or a high earning CEO from fleeing abroad (or at least moving their money abroad) to a place like the United Arab Emirates or Hong Kong if a Robin Hood tax is created? The answer is precisely nothing. Capital flight has already been happening, and is likely to get worse if taxes were raised. This could then adversely effect the economy through loss of jobs and, ironically, decimated tax revenues. This is a risk which understandably no country wants to take.

Leading on from this, the success or failure of domestic economics is highly subject to global trends, and totally dependent on global markets to operate; just look at how the seeds of the global financial crisis were first sown in the USA. The fate of planned, self-sustaining economies is widely known with the examples of Russia, North Korea, and even Cuba showing that it is tremdously difficult to maintain a population at a reasonable level of subsistence with no external trade. As a result, to switch the UK economy to some form of heavily regulated capitalism would be to drastically reduce its global competitivity and GDP, which would then affect every aspect of life, from health, to education, to entertainment. This is because it would not be able to compete with global economic norms where things like protectionism and high import taxes are only reserved for the resource rich on whom the rest of the world relies for fuel. For the UK to attempt this would therefore be economic suicide.

In response to this argument, I would argue for something along the lines of the Scandinavian model, but economic systems aren't structures which can be fit just anywhere; you have to take into account all kinds of variables including natural resource wealth, land mass, ethnic homogeneity, geopolitics, history, geography, and population size. As well as this, people who want to propel a system's values have to be created before the system is put in place to insure against even one person destroying it, as happened with Stalin's Bolshevik coup.

In considering the reasons Germany, Austria and Finland can leave their metro systems with no barriers, but France, the UK, and America must have them, it is interesting to note that the former three countries are known to be very wealthy and certainly more egalitarian than the latter three, so there is a (perhaps superficial) argument for correlation between the nature of a system and the nature of its people; apparently more likely to be trusting and honest in egalitarianism, but who run the risk of becoming opportunistic and even deceitful in neoliberalism. This exemplifies the fact that even if a switch in the UK to a Scandinavian-esque model were possible, it could very easily be corrupted without extreme ideological brainwashing, which is a philosophically murky issue.

The Trident proposal is interesting though as it is the most feasible of the three main solutions to the problem of university funding. Nevertheless, it again falls to consideration of global issues which is making me hesitant to endorse the scrapping of Trident to free up billions of pounds. Nuclear arms have become a bargaining tool in international affairs, where they either act as a deterrent (or threat) to prevent potential attacks, and can be used as a route to further/alternative steps in the international bargaining process. Heightening nuclear threat is more likely to get results (see South Korea's reluctance to attack the North), and if the UK didn't have a nuclear deterrent, the sad truth is that it would leave it at severe risk by allowing countries who do have nuclear weapons a massive advantage on the global playing field. This is another risk the UK understandably doesn't want to take. It would require universal agreement to disarm nuclear weapons before Trident's end could even be considered. Until then it is not rational to disarm, regardless of the price.

I agree with the previous post on this issue that poorer students who went to (or want to go to) the best unis are, on average, going to be hit harder than anyone else with the fee increases, and that this is unacceptable. It's hard to predict whether the fees will put poorer students off applying to the best universities though, because loans will still be given out. It could then still be that many students will have the opportunistic capitalist "we'll cross that bridge when we come to it" attitude to university fee repayment. After all, it's still better to have a degree than to not. Also, because the UK economy is now almost wholly geared towards the service sector (a legacy of the 80s), university qualifications have become non-negotiable for many types of work whilst jobs in vocations and trades have disappeared or been outsourced. There is a bias in the UK towards university education, but the hierarchy of universities and subjects that exists here also destroys the value of some degrees.

Following on from this, I stick by my argument that burdening students from the few universities who offer prospects of good earnings with the total debt incurred by the government on fees is a grossly unfair ask. After all it is politicians' fault that university education has come into such demand, not students who were barely even born when coal mines were closed and polytechnics turned into universities. What is essentially happening is that the rise in fees is an indirect insurance policy for the government to be sure they will recoup their debts from students whose investment doesn't pay off i.e. those who don't earn £21 000 a year, or only reach this threshold years after graduation. Saddling the most 'successful' graduates (those who earn above £21 000 a year, which is hardly what anyone would consider 'successful') is therefore verging on taxing the poor to help the poorer. Taxing the rich makes more sense, especially those that went to uni for free, but we must remember that wealth is relative, and that the average income of a 'rich' person in the UK is probably something like £50 - 60 000 a year (perhaps even more depending on outgoings etc.); nothing near the ridiculous £21 000 the government is saying. Furthermore it is hard to justify a responsibility on the already rich to help pay for people going to university now. Of course morally it seems right, but there is no real other incentive for anyone to do this besides altruism, which as I have stated, is not a reliable or realistic condition for an economy to operate on.

What needs to happen is that the education system and the economy itself needs to be overhauled to ensure that the maximum potential of citizens is utilised - the economy must work for the people; the people mustn't work for the economy. I badly want things to change, but if the change is not universal then we risk damaging things even more. Positive change requires cooperation from each one of us, but until then, we are sadly fighting a losing battle. I nevertheless wish luck to the thousands of protestors out today and deeply regret that I can't be there with them.

LM

Response: Fees Fail

2010-11-28T11:04:00.010Z

The piece below is an interesting article, there are some fair points made, particularly at the beginning when discussing the potential damage done to the cause by the violence committed. And I am inclined to agree again with the point that in some perverse manner, seen through the lens of frustration and anger, that seeing an act of action, violent though some elements sadly proved to be, was somewhat refreshing. All too often we allow our frustration at decisions we deem unfair to swallow us without uttering a word of discontent, aside the odd mumble over our toast at the breakfast table.

However, I think too many overreaching claims are made here. For one, it is by no means consensus thought that cuts were an absolute necessity, as it is put; "everyone knew that cuts had to be made in order to pull us out." This is not to say that it's not desirable to eventually strive towards a deficit free and sustainable economy, but historic lessons have shown that this is by no means the most absolutely sober, sensible course to chart.

A look to the 1930's in particular provides the most obvious example of this, whereby an attempt globally (by which, I mean the America's and Europe primarily) to combat a severe depression was met, at least initially, with cuts and 'austerity measures', as we have now taken to calling them (a loathsome term, in my personal opinion). As we saw then, by reducing even further in a time of economic recession the input and role of a potential stimulant influence, that of sensible public spending, you are merely shrinking further an already shrunken pond. Surely a better way to get back on course would be to put money in to areas which are liable to provoke economic growth, jobs at one level or another, and encourage small as well as larger businesses to start operating normally again. In other words, to get currency and wealth flowing through the economy once again. In addition to this, I might add, with new measures designed to mitigate greatly the potential for damage we have seen rampant capitalism can wreck when left unattended, or even be encouraged to behave with this level of disdain for the very societies from which it draws its immense, often bordering upon vulgar, profits.

Also, from parts of the piece addressing the issues of 'better' and 'lesser' universities, poorer students facing less chance to attend, and the idea that this may again increase the value of a university education. I feel too many, possibly most, of those commenting on this issue in the public domain are) from the relatively comfortable position of those who have secured a very good degree from a 'better' university, on lower fees, and seem rather intent, whether by design or negligence of thought, upon pulling the ladder up behind them.

Social mobility is at one of its lowest ebbs in this country since the 1950's, opportunities for the poor being limited by the lack of access to decent schooling in many situations. The dismantling of the grammar school system (for the faults of the system as some see it, to do with fairness and the implementation of a two tier system of intelligence at such a young age) has merely served to breath vigourous new life in to public schools (by which I mean fee paying schools). Public schools were once dying on the line, the refuge of the very rich and those of a mind to recapture something of the essence of an older, possibly imperial era. But for those with aspiration and a humble origin, a decent grammar school did much the same job, and for lower and middle class families they didn't provide the same financial stumbling block to good education. To now further increase the divide between rich and poor through the extension of this opportunity imbalance to higher education, based upon the wealth of your parents, seems to be yet another depressingly regressive move.

It is intelligent, aspirational kids from poorer, or lower middle class income families who are going to bear the severest brunt of these measures. Think to the example here of the young man or woman, intelligent, but not from a family of any wealth, able to attend one of the eminent universities in the country by virtue only of intellect and hard work. Having been able to do so after being not overly impeded by fees that would have forced them to seriously consider the burden that they would be placing not just upon themselves, but their family too. I know that the proposals are not that these fees be paid upfront. But if an 18 year old has spent their entire life in a family on an income of less than £30,000, possibly even less than £20,000 a year, and they're faced with the option of sinking £50,000 into debt to attend the university of their choosing, and by right of intellect and hard work one they should have access to, it is undoubtedly going to be a severe caveat upon their ability to make such a choice.

Do we really wish to live in a society whereby up and down the line of the education system, such inequalities of opportunity, based heavily upon wealth, are not just accepted, but in effect being cemented and reinforced by government policy?

In addition, I'm not sure I understand the idea that 'richer' graduates will be paying for everyone else, as has been suggested. As I understand it, there will not be extra fees levied after you have finished above and beyond what you have agreed to pay at the start. Surely one cannot disagree that those who can afford (by virtue of leaving university to a £30/40/50k+ a year starting salary) to pay back in order to finance the system from which they have derived so much benefit, ought to do so? Equally, to remove any kind of salary based scale of repayment in such a system will surely just further enhance the impediment to those fearful of leaving after 3 years under £40/50k of debt (this is a rough calculation based upon the idea that if you do a 3/4 year degree, at £9,000 a year, plus another £5/6,000 per year in maintenance loans, that you are looking at a minimum of £42,000, and potentially as much as £60,000 for a degree from one of the best universities).

I agree at the heart of this that our education system needs addressing, it is a flabby system, one that does not always give a very good service or education to those passing through it. And in this sense, we do indeed need to look seriously at it for reform. But to merely look at the very top of said system, and furthermore to just look at it in a very simple economic manner (how can we cut it's funding etc.), will I believe in the end be very detrimental to not just the poor, or lower middle classes (I speak in economic terms of class here), but society as a whole. Within this country we have moved lock stock towards an information/service based economy, one that requires educated and trained people, primarily for immaterial labour. This is not to say that providing more option and scope for manual or non-academic skill sets is not a worthy idea too, indeed it would be, but to do so as an alternative to providing access to a higher education to all based upon intelligence and hard work, is to regress yet further the notion that in a fair society, you should not be impeded overly by your circumstance of birth. So yes, while I agree that those with degrees in a system of fewer university graduates would initially benefit, I contest that in the longer term, they would lose out from being the elite in an economy that could begin to lag behind other economies, both those established, and those rising (Brazil, India, China, and potentially others in the longer term still) who realise the power of bestowing upon your people the skills needed for an economy to compete in a global system. We are by no means an independent economy, we are very reliant upon our skills sets being desired and utilised not just internally, but internationally as well, if we shrink this pool of people, we do ourselves no favours in the long term.

WM

Fees Fail

2010-11-19T10:44:00.014Z

As students and young people stormed the Tory HQ in Millbank Tower it was both depressing and brilliant. It was depressing because it greatly diminished the serious political sway of such a worthy cause, but was also brilliant to finally see people in the UK hit back at a system that has screwed, and intends to continue to screw, us all.

Issues surrounding the proposed rise in university tuition fees are surprisingly complex, and though I revelled in the smashed windows and fire, I essentially didn't agree with the cheap scapegoating of the Tories for the proposed rise in university tuition fees, although I believe the government must ultimately be held responsible for their decisions. Nevertheless, in this case the Tories inherited a country with a deep deficit, and everyone knew that cuts had to be made in order to pull us out. Regardless of the morality of the free market, or how we got into this mess, in cold reality there is little we can do but cut until we break even. Outrage at rises in university fees is a little immature then, since the government cannot afford to subsidise universities, and must now pass part of the bill onto students instead. There have been many other cuts proposed too, but none of those have seen the ire that accompanied the announcement of cuts to universities. That isn't to say that the government is thinking this through properly; the most ridiculous contradiction in government policy is that they also want to cut immigration, and instead of cracking down on illegal immigration, are looking at lowering the amount of non-EU students entering the country, who heavily subsidise university for home students with the outrageously inflated fees they pay.

My main issue with Lord Browne's recommendations for cuts to university funding, and thus higher fees, subsidised by government loans to students, is that the minimum salary at which graduates will begin to repay their debt is only £21 000, and the write off date will be raised from 25 to 30 years, with interest remaining the same as the rate at which the government borrows. Furthermore, the best universities will be encouraged to raise their fees (although the higher the fee, the higher the levy to the government gets i.e. if the fee is £7000 the levy would be £400 but if the fee was £12 000 the levy would be £4500, although the limit is currently set at £9000). This is designed to discourage universities from charging too highly, and to make the government money back on their initial expenditure.

However, the idea that 'richer' graduates will ultimately offset the cost of their own and, by virtue of the higher fees for better universities, the government's remaining debt is very unfair. Going to university is supposed to increase your job (and therefore earning) prospects. However in the UK only 18 of 143 universities have been reported to have prospects of a graduate starting salary of over £21 000 (see table below from the Sunday Times University Guide 2010). The remaining 42 universities in the list of 60 have graduate earnings below that, and the other 83 universities who did not appear in the list either do not offer prospects of a starting salary of over £18 755, or were simply unaccounted for in the research. Either way, this is a disturbing prospect for graduates in the top 18 universities, who may end up helping to pay, at least in part, the government debt for the hundreds of thousands of students at the lesser 125 universities - a massively disproportionate number. On top of this, factor in the issues of the 'West Lothian Question', where the UK taxpayer subsidises much of the Scottish and Welsh welfare state, including Scotland's free (to Scottish and EU nationals), and Wales' minimal university fees, and you have yet more unfairness. Furthermore the cost of living, mortgages, travel, and largely mediocre salaries even in London, and especially in the public sector, would most likely wipe out the 'high' earnings of graduates able to pay anything at all. Obviously the figures only relate to starting salaries, and most people will certainly begin to earn more as their careers progress, but this still unfairly attacks new graduates who have enough to pay for besides an arbitrarily inflated university debt. The prospects of graduates recovering from debts quicker would be lower under the new rules, and perhaps even adversely effect the economy through either lack of spending, or credit debt accumulation.

I am also aware that heightened fees will act as a deterrent on poorer students to consider applying for university, but a potential effect of the rise in fees is that degrees may again become valuable because the amount of people doing them could drop. This would then mean that people with degrees could actually earn a lot more in future than they do now. Certainly the increased amount of people with degrees has devalued their worth, despite the fact that Labour thought that increasing the price with top-up fees would increase their value again. If less people did degrees though, the government would have to widen access to vocational courses, especially in trades.

The government has a large mess to clean up with education, let alone the economy, and they would be wise to consider how unfair their new proposals are, especially considering how poorly most new graduates get paid in relation to how much they spend on their degrees.

LM

Rise of China: The Looming Dragon?

2010-11-12T04:17:00.069Z

We've all certainly heard plenty in recent years about the "Rise of China"; a term encompassing both menace, and a certain ominous ring, potentially leading one to envisage some great demon swelling from the depths, intent upon wreaking havoc and mayhem upon the established international order. So much so that the Chinese themselves have attempted as recently as 2003 to rephrase this rapid ascent as China's 'peaceful rise' (though it must be noted, such conciliatory terminology is no longer being used so freely). The fact is that in this part of the world, certainly amongst the laymen, and alas even amongst those supposedly more informed, assumptions made sometimes bordering on the hysterical, often upon ignorance and persisting Cold War-era stereotypes are bandied about with a great deal of vigour, with such a level of certainty that one must surely question it. However, this is not to say that such trepidation is entirely unfounded. There are reasons for both hope and fear in the rise of this enormous new powerhouse, the vigarous dragon with a population of 1.3 billion, nearly 20% of the entire global population, and newly crowned as the second largest economy after the US, having overtaken Japan earlier this year, and with the largest (though by no means best equipped, nor modern) military on the planet.

Allow us first to suggest that indeed, for these reasons, some of the arguments held against the potential for a peaceful or static Chinese rise are indeed understandable, to one extent or another at least. For a start, though not possessing the ideological fervour or vigor of previous periods of communist rule in the country (such as the largely disastrous periods of the 'Great Leap Forward' and the 'Cultural Revolution', for the two most obvious), this regime certainly has many facets which make it rather unsavoury to those of us schooled (however naively at times, however hypocritically even) in the notion of liberalism, individual freedom, of the import placed upon rights and the necessity of the observance of the sacrosanct nature of said rights. Despite our often disputable, and contradictory commitment to these ideas, nonetheless, the domestic record of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is one worthy of suspicion and hesitancy. From the introduction of the 'One-Child Policy' in 1978, to the lack of protection provided to the poor Chinese migrant workers largely from the vast interior in the east coast factories, reminiscent in condition to Dickensian-era sweat shops, to the often brutal repression of the minority groups; the most obvious examples of this being in Tibet and Xinjiang with the muslim Uighers, where demonstrations (often peaceful, it must be noted, though sadly not without outbreaks of violence and rioting) have been afforded no quarter, no discussion of the whys and whereforalls of the situations that led to these outbursts of discontent and anger. Instead repression, hostility, violence, and the extension of already inflammatory social policies designed to dilute and eventually submerge these ancient and culturally very different peoples underneath the mass of the Han Chinese majority. But this is a matter for another time, here simply for the purposes of illuminating why it is understandable as to why there persists such a grave doubt as to the intentions of the Chinese as they continue to grow and expand in power and influence on the international stage.

Now allow us to assess the reasons why the looming prospect of an increasingly assured and confident China does indeed pose questions to the rest of us globally. Firstly, the Chinese government, and even more so the vast bulk of the population, carries within it a real burning desire to recapture what they deem to be their natural place at the high table of international affairs, so long deprived them by aggressive, expansionist and bullying foreign powers (think the British, Russians, and to a lesser extent the other European colonial powers, and then the Japanese, the culprit to whom the Chinese people undoubtedly feel most ferociously). These powers have all at one point or another in the previous three centuries meddled with the internal politics of this ancient nation, seizing territory, and integrity, in equal measure (something we will address in a more modern context later on here). In light of this, and in combination with a forceful nationalism amongst many ordinary Chinese, and a new economic forcefulness, and the subsequent potential this affords for future military expansion, one can understand a fear of the Middle Kingdom's ascent.

In fact, there is already growing evidence of an intent, of sorts, already. Regionally especially, China has been expanding it's so-called soft power (diplomatic, economic ties, political influence) exponentially since the 1990's particularly. While before China was very much the shelter under which pariah states sought security, though not necessarily legitimacy (North Korea, Myanmar, Laos, Khmer Rouge-era Cambodia); China has now managed to extend this involvement gradually throughout the region. China is attempting to position itself as a counterbalance to the great power of the Pacific. Providing the alternative to over reliance upon the United States, who as we all know, does not have the most glowing of histories in this region. Using trade and economic incentive primarily, the Chinese have managed to secure a position of greater import. This position has a historical significance too. With China being the self-proclaimed Middle Kingdom (the two chinese characters that make up the name literally mean 'middle/central' and 'kingdom': 中国), they have long viewed themselves as being akin to the elder brother in their dealings with smaller neighbours. Where this possesses a challenge to contemporary international relations theory is that they do not have a great history of conquest or overt aggression, at least not comparable to other great powers of the ancient and imperial worlds. Preferring to use economic might, as well as cultural and technological superiority to maintain a position as regional hegemon, attempting to implement smaller neighbours as loose tributaries rather than as colonial subjects.

This can be seen for the moment in its dealings with not just regional neighbours, but further afield as well. China is at the moment cementing it's economic and political ties with many African nations, and attempting to do the same as far afield as Latin America (the latter especially showing it's new boldness, daring to move into what the US has historically viewed as it's 'backyard'). In doing so, and in doing so in a very different manner to that of the Western world (focusing on cold business deals: resources in exchange for money, technology/infrastucture, and expertise), without the emphasis placed upon the structure of the countries involved, or an expectancy that neoliberal ideals be adopted wholesale that is ever present in Western involvement (think here of the IMF, the World Bank, or loans/aid tied heavily to economic and political conditions and terms), in pursuing this strategy, in countries such as the Sudan, Zimbabwe, even Nigerian and Ghana; China is already providing a real challenge to the established order, though not of the doomsday Cold War-era zero-sum scenario hawkish analysts on either side eagerly seem to anticipate. It's cash for minerals and infrastructure deals compare favourably with the conditions-heavy equivalents offered by the West, especially for those states viewed in less than glowing terms internationally.

We must however acknowledge here a fear in many circles of the recent growth in the size and technological modernity of the Chinese military. While China has to this point been content to rely largely upon trade, diplomacy, with the occasional half-hearted baring of the teeth thrown in more for face-saving that any real commitment to draw blood, as we move forward, there appear to be signs of a newly emboldened China, increasingly able, and ever more willing to invest in a modern, forward thinking military, and to begin using the threat of its usage to force the hand of it's rivals in the region. This movement toward a military in keeping with it's new status as a global economic force is being noted with a great deal of apprehension both regionally and globally as a whole, for China has anything but an easy relationship with a great many of it's neighbours. These disputes are largely centered on territorial matters for the time being. China to date has ongoing disputes with Russia, Japan, India, Taiwan (and therefore the United States, who are its principle backer). Then an increasing hostility with it's South East Asian neighbours Vietnam, Malaysia, the Philippines and Brunei over competing claims placed upon resource-rich tracts of the South China Sea; a contentious issue which has as recently as July 2010 brought the US and China to somewhat of an impasse when the Chinese suggested that US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton had organised an ambush at the ASEAN meeting in Singapore, encouraging the countries affected (some 12 in total) to organise a forceful protest to Chinese claims in the region. As well as having indulged in some old-school saber-rattling in response to recent proposed joint naval manoeuvres and war games between the South Koreans and the Americans, as well as proposals for similar engagements between Malaysia and Singapore, as well as Cambodia in a more limited capacity.
However, this challenge is tempered by the fact that despite it's desire to reassert itself, China has not yet displayed in any concerted way a desire to overturn the international system. China has signed itself up to the notion of international trade as a means to prosperity and development in the past few decades (though admittedly at times on its own terms, such as it's continued artificial devaluation of the Chinese Renminbi against the US Dollar, designed to help maintain the large trade imbalance between the two superpowers), and has prospered greatly from it as a result. It fits well with the character of the Chinese; a historically industrious, economically resourceful people (a view they themselves seem to embrace). Having awoken to the idea that even the fervour of Mao-era communism couldn't permanently suppress the entrepreneurial instincts of the Chinese people, the Chinese (led initially by the 'Four Modernisations' reforms of Deng Xiaoping, begun in 1978) have now embarked to embrace and further this national trait internationally as well. As such, it would seem counter productive to enter in to costly and potentially economically damaging conflicts with the very nations it still relies upon for trade and advanced technology. As we have seen already, China is heavily dependent on trade with the USA, and has ever strenghtening economic ties with other regional economic powerhouses such as Japan and South Korea. This factor cannot be understated, as we have seen recently with the clashes last month between the Japanese navy and Chinese commercial ships, potential conflicts and flash points are still a real risk. However as in this instance, both sides strong trade ties with one another make an escalation in hostilities a relatively undesirable prospect.

This is not to say that future conflicts are not an ominous possibility. For China has many historical animosities that linger to one extent or another, and impact to this day it's interaction with neighbours and major international actors alike, such as those with Russia with whom it persists in a dispute over territory taken by the latter (both during the 19th Century, and later after the Soviet Union's invasion of Japanese occupied Chinese territory at the close of WW2) that the Chinese have consistently said they want returned. As well as the Japanese for their actions and atrocities during the war and occupation of the 1930's and 40's which are still either officially denied, or at the very least not explicitly acknowledged. In addition a tense atmosphere with their historical enemy to the south, in the form of the Vietnamese, continues despite their apparent ideological parity. The unease the South Koreans feel toward them despite record trade between the two, largely due to China's continued connection to and support of (albeit greatly scaled back from before) the bankrupt and despotic regime of the Kim dynasty to their north, and memories of previous Chinese (as well as Japanese and Russian) conquests. Then take into account it's large, and in parts contested, border with India, that other gargantuan rising power. This in addition to their ever competitive attitudes towards one another economically in key new markets, as well as vying for regional influence and soft power. Take into consideration also China's cooperation with Pakistan (as well as military and economic ties to Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, forming what some have termed the 'ring of pearls' around an increasingly nervous India), India's ever bitter foe, with the twofold aim of stymying the potential damage of extremist Islam seeping through it's border in Xinjiang as well as what seems a direct challenge to India's regional influence. With this current situation, surrounded by either hostile or uneasy neighbours, we can see that while the Chinese have indeed been pursuing a more active foreign policy, they are by no means yet fully established, nor secure enough in the role they with to caste themselves to begin propagating a more belligerent and militarily aggressive foreign policy.

This is furthered when we consider the base consideration of pure military capacity, and it is painfully obvious that while China is in possession of a large armed forces (some 2.28 million regulars, to the US' 1.58 million), it still remains for now a generation behind the most advanced militaries technologically speaking, certainly that of the United States, which still outspends it by nearly 7 times per annum. Which means that despite the US being stretched by involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq, it poses a real pause for thought to any Chinese dreams of expansionist or aggressive acts, which would likely be confronted with the might of a military that has consistently received large scale funding and significant periods of active usage since the entry of the USA into the Second World War. But also one that is still being lavished annually with a figure some seven times larger than it's own expenditure. It becomes clear then that while regional powers may feel severe unease at an emboldened and expectant China, so long as the US maintains it's regional presence the Chinese are unlikely to launch into full-scale warfare or hostilities unless a situation truly grave enough should arise.

Of course, while all this may seem sensible for the time being, and hint at China rising as a status quo power, only a fool would deny the worn cliché that things in world politics change rapidly. And with Obama's administration taking what may seem a surprisingly hawkish attitude towards Sino-US relations, and other regional powers taking steps to counterbalance Chinese influence, there is no guarantee that this seemingly increasingly uneasy relationship between China and it's neighbours will continue to be maintained by trade and economic ties alone. We simply must hope that the lessons of the past with the rise and fall of great powers are heeded in the event that the rise of China continues unhindered as so many assume. Though to mitigate, this is by no means an absolute certainty, owing to China's potential power keg of internal frictions already simmering below the surface (a matter for future coverage here), and the potentially immense difficulties it will face in the course of it's necessary further evolution of it's economy as development levels continue to increase.

Newly emboldened and forceful statements of intent are becoming increasingly common from the Chinese civilian population, including the intellectual elites. Such a statement as this made by Professor Shen Dingli, a leading Chinese academic at Fudan University, Shanghai, in his article 'US-S.Korean maritime war games needlessly provocative', further offers a foreboding potential for future escalation, at least as seen by the Chinese; "China may not have the military strength to forcibly prevent such exercises now, but it may do so in response to such provocative actions in the future.”

If this suggests anything, it is that moving forward one of the main challenges the Chinese government is confronted with is the attempt to balance effectively its attempt to further legitimise and cement its position internationally, from that of international pariah to responsible senior stakeholder; with the at times intense calls internally for shows of power, force and belligerence amongst the populace of over 1.3 billion people, still seething and embittered with anger and resentments at previous national humiliations.

The following are a couple of interesting and relevant videos on this topic too, primarily centered upon the more hawkish elements of what we have previously discussed here, but providing an interesting overview of the various disputes and issues of contention occuring currently, and potentially going forward:

101 East - Asia's Arms Race

Empire - The New Arms Race

Fixing the System

2010-10-28T12:31:00.008+01:00

Debt. We've all got it apparently, even those who saved during the boom years. Now we've got to step up to our responsibility as citizens and help pay it back.

But what is the debt? Where did it come from? Most people accept that the rules of free-market capitalism are sacrosanct and unfallible. But this is where they're wrong. Though David Cameron's buzzword of the year has been that the system is 'broken', the solution to this mess is not necessarily to be found within the confined rules of free-market capitalism. After all, why fight fire with fire? Why patch-up a broken structure with pieces of itself? It doesn't make sense, and is dangerously susceptible to failure. For me, the reason this illogical solution is being used is simply to do with greed and power; more specifically the preservation of money and power in the 'right' hands. It's not really a surprise then that the people with the most money (and therefore the most interests to protect in a financial crisis) have found their places either literally, or coercively (as éminences grises) in governments. One famous example is that the U.S. Treasury Secretary is Henry Paulson, who is also incidentally the ex-Chairman and CEO of Goldman Sachs; one of the men responsible for drawing up the bail-out plan which involved the obscene idea of the taxpayer paying for the gross mistakes and greed of the banks.

Most people are rightly outraged at the unjust solutions, now mostly put into effect, created to deal with the financial crisis. I therefore began to wonder why governments themselves have always, to a greater or lesser extent, been in debt. This lies with the ancient concept of loans and interest, entrenched in Lombardy in the middle-ages. But it's not loans or interest themselves which are the problem here; it's the subsequent way in which the mechanics of the economy work. What loans have always done, from the middle-ages until today, and in spite of the deterrent of interest, is encourage people to foster short-term goals and live beyond their means. And once living beyond one's means becomes entrenched in a society, or becomes a societal norm, it becomes the assumed natural way of things. What this then means is that the general level of prices will rise to match the level of spending - inflation.

However, what the inflation is based on when an economy is driven by loans (to a greater extent as in the UK in 2008, but to a lesser extent throughout history) is precisely nothing. It is virtual money; money that exists only through common agreement and trust. Loan spenders have no tangible source for this money; it belongs to the banks, and it needs to be paid back, with interest. In fact it is not money at all; it is credit - I.O.Us to banks. But it's not just greedy people with not enough money who take out loans; governments do too. And the reason governments have to get involved in such risky operations as loans, interest, and debt, is because the spending rate of loan culture has become the assumed way of things by suppliers, therefore governments with only a finite amount of tax income also need to pay market rates for services, especially for the public sector or military equipment.

This cycle of loans and inflation followed by debt and recession (boom and bust, perhaps?) is propelled by many interlinked actors - governments, the media, private industries, banks etc. and it would take cooperation between all of them to come to a fair agreement on eradicating the country's debt. However, in assuming that hitting the taxpayer with cuts to the public sector will get us out of this mess, governments are pandering to businesses rather than consumers; and clearly there are more consumers in any country than businesses - the rights of the few are trumping the rights of the many again. In fact, in using such definitions, governments are tacitly propogating more neoliberal dogma because to be defined as a consumer can in some cases replace our fundamental rights as citizens; think about the Middle Eastern regimes wherein non-collection of tax absolves governments of responsibility to citizens, or the idea of 'UK plc'.

The ideal solution would be for global cooperation to write off all debt, but that will sadly never happen. Furthermore, the conjecture that constitutes lowering interest rates also won't help much since a) this again relies on too much cooperation in the globalised economy and b) as recently confirmed by Mervyn King, the crisis is no longer of liquidity, it is now a crisis of solvency. This basically means that the problem isn't one of cash-flow any longer, it's a problem of not having enough cash in the first place. The only way out is to work together globally, without ideology, without greed, and without the kind of political arrogance and power games displayed at the Copenhagen Convention.

This is not a political or economic issue anymore; it is humanitarian.

LM

The following videos act as interesting compliments to this piece. The first is Marcy Kaptur's speech to US Congress, pleading for the bank bail-out bill to be rejected back in 2008. It was eventually passed. The second is Professor Michael Sandel's argument for morality in markets, especially in relation to the commoditisation of priceless human values.

Governance as a Commodity

2010-10-25T13:19:00.005+01:00

In the oil rich states of the Middle East it may come as a surprise to know that precisely none are regarded as functioning democracies; rather they are considered to be authoritarian or at the very least, a hybrid between authoritarianism and democracy.

We in the west are more used to the idea that wealth on the level of much of the Middle East is a condition for democracy, and that authoritarianism is mostly the preserve of economically and ethnically torn countries. However, the fallacy of this assumption is that the oil rich Middle East (which includes the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, Iraq, Bahrain, Oman, Syria, and Yemen) is clearly incredibly wealthy, but has very few democratic tendencies.

I don’t mean to present a normative, Orientalist view that democracy is the best system of government available; that would be naïve and ignorant. However, I do wish to question why it is possible for oil rich Middle Eastern regimes to strongly curtail citizens’ democratic rights. In terms of the content of ‘democratic rights’, I would like to avoid subjectivity by assuming that most people’s basic conception of such rights and freedoms entails many of the same ideas; ideas which stem from innately occurring traits in human nature (rather than being socially constructed) such as perhaps those which are listed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Yet the disrespect of these rights and freedoms is commonplace in many oil rich Middle Eastern countries. These include things like the right to vote, the right to oppose the government, and the right to demonstrate. In the Middle East, many of these rights (and the freedoms which extend from them) barely exist. There is little or no civil society, and if the press is not completely restricted as in Saudi Arabia, it exercises self-censorship, as in Kuwait, which is among the most liberal in the Middle East for the press.

Women and migrants have drawn the shortest straw in the Middle East, with myriad cases of discrimination and repression against them. In the United Arab Emirates, rape laws are grotesquely in favour of the perpetrators, and employment laws barely protect the rights of employees; often resulting in the confiscation of passports, or being forced into agreeing to a lesser rate of pay than originally forecast. Saudi Arabia censor the media and internet, with the recent BlackBerry debacle bringing this issue to international attention. They also enforce the use of male guardians (usually a husband or father) on women, who must approve even the most apparently arbitrary of things such as leaving their house, marriage/divorce, or education. Rape laws in Saudi Arabia are also uncodified, and often lead to the punishment of the victim alongside/in place of the perpetrator. It is safe to say that, although far from perfect, none of the given examples would be tolerated to the same extent in a democratic country.

It is unnecessary to go on listing all the perceived human rights breaches in the Middle East, but the given examples are just a taster of how individuals may be treated in the region. Many people blame Islamic law and traditions for such attitudes, while others look to norms in old Middle Eastern tribal culture. Both these explanations though, whilst having some purchase, are still too simple and even reactionary to explain why such breaches happen. Instead, the most prominent variable which links most Middle Eastern countries together is oil wealth. In the Middle East most governments do not tax their citizens, instead generating their income from rent earned from oil and the infrastructure surrounding it. Therefore the link between taxation and accountability emerges as the main justification and cause for lack of democracy in the region, and subsequently the abuse of freedoms and rights which would undoubtedly be in place were there a democratic structure to utilise.

It is this idea that the payment of tax also buys a right to a democratic freedom such as voting, or demonstrating against something you don’t agree with, which poses a problem. Taxation is undoubtedly a necessary measure taken by governments to raise the capital needed to effectively rule and provide for its citizens. However, it is unclear where the payment of taxes and the practice of democracy are connected. I would argue that the payment of taxes is an important pre-requisite for the establishment and maintenance of democracy, but I take issue with the Middle East’s philosophy that non-payment of taxes absolves the government of any duty to their citizens. This, I believe, is a fundamental mistake on behalf of many Middle Eastern regimes, which assume that governance is a job rather than a service. This confusion therefore arguably treats the function of government as something more akin to a private company than a public service. Certainly money is needed to govern properly, but it should not be the sole incentive for governing, as it is made out to be in the Middle East.

When seen like this, the relationship between citizen and government becomes completely distorted, where the people are expected to pay the government in return for its service, rather than the government serving the people, in return for tax funding (to use the term ‘pay’ is wrong in this instance because tax is not ‘payment’ in the market sense of the word). This attitude therefore implies that if people subsidise the government through tax, they will receive their democratic rights, but if they don’t donate this ‘stipend’, their democratic rights will be withheld. In this sense democratic rights (including the simple right to choose who governs you, or to withdraw your support from them) are commoditised. They are not seen as a right, they are seen as a privilege.

Most citizens in the Middle East didn’t ask not to be taxed (at least not natives; many western people move there for tax reasons); rulers simply assumed people would rather not pay tax than have democratic freedoms. The assumption that humans value money over democratic freedom is dangerous, and the fact that this is accepted as a legitimate way to govern is a worrying thought. When people enter a social contract with a governing elite which involves handing over their democratic freedoms in exchange for no taxation, it also begins to connote that democracy has a monetary value, and that it is a financial nuisance. To see the ‘price’ of democracy as a burden compromises so much of what humans value, and whilst little or no tax is undeniably desirable in the short-term, its potential effects are incredibly dangerous in the long-term. Instead of seeing democracy as something worthwhile, people have begun to see it as a useless commodity which costs them money, and so hand over their stake in society in favour of a boosted net income. Democracy though is not a commodity, nor should it be seen as such. Its value is equal to the value of our freedom, and though it is not perfect, it is the best method we have of ensuring that our freedom and rights are adequately preserved in the modern world.

The idea that not receiving tax payments exempts governments/rulers from their duties to citizens is ridiculous even by neo-liberal standards. This is exemplified by the fact that a government can neither adequately nor efficiently protect even the most constricted spheres of rights without the mandate of the majority of its citizens. It isn’t a government’s job to tell citizens what rights it will protect and how it will do so; it is the government’s job to do this based on what mandate citizens give them through a free and fair election. This confusion again comes from the Middle East’s idea that governing is a for-profit job, not a service. The irony is that in the traditional free market there would at least exist choice between products and services you may wish to buy. With the Middle Eastern regimes there is no choice over who governs or how they do it.

Though of course there exist laws designed to protect people in the Middle East, there is little in place to stop or deter a government from breaching these laws, especially internationally agreed ones. In the United Arab Emirates for example, the government haven’t signed most international human or labour rights treaties, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families, and the Convention against Torture. Evidently much of the Middle East is a precarious place for people to live, where law is as malleable as rulers’ whims, and where there is no platform to change or dispute this. And this is all a result of money, and how it can change people’s perception of even the most fundamental and important concepts such as rights and freedoms.

In the most cynical interpretation of democracy, taxation could at the very least be seen as an insurance policy against the breach of rights and freedoms by the government rather than an unnecessary financial burden. Though we in the west grumble about relatively high taxes, most of the time we are getting an invaluable return on them including things like a police service, military, healthcare, legal aid, and community facilities. The effectiveness or value of these is not always perfect, and many western countries are still corrupt, but at least there exist the means to attempt to alter this in western society.

I point the finger at the Middle East only because it is an obvious example of the malignant influence of money on politics. Similar examples of rights being bought off can be found in the USA, where low taxes are venerated (and to an extent accepted) in favour of a full public healthcare system, or the glut of ‘career politicians’ in most western countries. The main issue is that the buying and selling of rights and freedoms, whether you agree with it or not, has a dangerous effect on how we view our governing system, and cedes too much individual sovereignty to politicians.

In even the harshest social contract developed by Thomas Hobbes, reason dictates that the all-powerful leviathan ruler’s best interests are to rule citizens fairly, if only for its own self-preservation. It seems however that Middle Eastern regimes have ignored even the chimes of reason in their governing decisions.

LM

Calais: The Forgotten Land

2010-10-17T21:57:00.021+01:00

A cold November night, icy cold, the wind intermittent yet penetratingly cold. It's dark here, with just a distant street light illuminating the grey warehouses and depressed looking apartment buildings within eye sight, each feeling somehow representative of this part of France; industrial, cold, lacking in obvious charm and appeal. A group of young men sit huddled around a makeshift campsite under a bridge. They've built a low fire, despite fears of detection, the warmth it provides against the bite of a cold European winter's night deemed important enough to warrant the inevitably increased risk of detection. They've managed to construct this makeshift camp (one of many scattered variously about town since the old Calais 'Jungle' was shut down) out of plastic sheets and wooden poles, donated by the few who actively involve themselves here; involve themselves with these men, and the hundreds of others who for now call these quiet and sparse streets on the outskirts of Calais home. For now, you see, they must call this place, the somewhat ramshackle assembly of sheets and sleeping bags, home. Or at least until they escape over the sea, to the land of promise and hope, as they see it.

No, I do not deliberately pander here to easy cliché, though it may seem so, for here this is the prevailing dream. These men did not endeavour to cross thousands of miles of desert, sea and other such treacherous terrain, often illicitly, usually with great hardship and danger, to arrive at the outskirts of Calais. To sample it's rustic dilapidation, and sense of casual neglect, to walk amongst it's many understated and largely drab streets. For this place, despite being the gateway between two countries, feels as though it has ceased to be of more import than somewhere for the English to load up on alcohol and cigarettes; unfair, even harsh though this may seem, and probably is. But it is hard to imagine the charms it may possess being either obvious, or extended to these men.

They are not welcome here, this they know all too well. Between the frequent bouts of harassment dolled out by a police force both fatigued and nonplussed by the situation, and a local populace ill amused by the presence within their midst of these aliens, these men without papers endure few niceties; few acts of hospitality. Viewed largely as unwelcome guests, arriving without invite, long having overstayed welcome, and now seen as pests to be dealt with, often in manners both demeaning and ultimately without purpose. As the police here well know, for the time being there is very little that can be done with these men. An unpleasant compromise has been struck with the local community in order to provide even the merest semblance of accord. In order to fulfil their end, these men, the police, must surrender a commitment to acts of balance and prudence we ordinarily hope to associate with them and their ilk, and commit acts almost vulgar in their arbitrariness. Acts they know themselves serve merely to paper over what are now cavernous cracks in a system not capable, flexible enough, or even really willing to address the matter of these men, these migrants.

A man approaches the camp, the men gathered tense up for should he be someone unwelcoming to their presence here, it is likely the next visit they receive will be from the police. As he passes under the distant streetlight it becomes obvious that he is one of them. Dishevelled in appearance, his clothes, though not quite rags, are clearly not of his choosing, donated no doubt from one of the few we have spoken of, those who attempt to provide these men with basics, such as clothing, sleeping bags, food even. He approaches the camp. He is clearly tired, walking with a slouched and withdrawn gait. They begin a conversation, as you might imagine, the language not French nor English. He explains to them, we learn later, that he had just been let go from a police station far across town, stripped of his already meagre possessions, and left to walk the 5 miles back to where he had earlier lain his head. They converse a while longer, the niceties and intricacies lost to us. After bidding each other well, he continues his long walk back. This is normal here for these men.

They know on some basic level that the indignity they face daily; be it upon entering a shop and being swiftly and unceremoniously asked to leave, or the acknowledgement of the receipt of a leering look, a hostile glance as they make their way about town, is but a part of life, for now. Indeed, they do express an exasperated, yet ultimately muted anger with this treatment. But above all they know all too well, they possess not the ability nor the power to hope to rectify it. For now, they must simply persist, persist in searching for their way to continue onward.

For these are men caught between the cracks; illegal in this place, knowing however that often they cannot return home, having left for reasons most could quite easily empathise with: war, famine, torture, political instability, poverty; sadly familiar themes for most here. They dream, often naively, and usually because of myth and here-say propagated earlier on in their migration by those employed in the field of trafficking the desperate. These traffickers know full well they can make an extra few pounds off the back of these men's aspirations for a life of relative comfort and civility in the UK, beyond even the continent at large. Because for them, a chance to work, to learn, be educated, or to simply live a life devoid of fear and instability amounts to the greatest of attainments.

To belatedly cut to the heart of this matter, many of us may hold disagreements as to the situation regarding immigration, both legal and illegal, to the UK and Europe as a whole. While we may disagree as to the extent to which our fortune obliges us to have a responsibility to shelter or embrace those potentially in need of it, and indeed there may be those amongst us who may resent their presence; of their wanting a part of what we have; even see them as potential threats for a multitude of reasons; some reasonable, many not. We can all but surely agree that the situation these men face, living in the shadows, between the cracks of society and often without the protection of basic laws, is one no civilised person could honestly abide by. It speaks ill of us as a community of Europeans, supposedly bound by the highest of commitments to rights, freedoms, and the expression of the individual that we are content to leave a situation so patently distasteful to simply fester and rot as we are. We face at the moment a period of uncertainty continent-wide, while we can but hope the worst of this self-inflicted economic crisis has receded, we know we will be dealing with its aftermath for a fair while longer. In this climate, sympathy or clear thought regarding a situation as complex as that in Calais, and other port towns in northern France, runs at an all time low.

Yet we must consider now that this issue, difficult though it is, and certainly divisive and problematic, must be discussed; brought to the forefront of thought continent-wide. It brings a measure of shame to us all, regardless of which political persuasion we attach ourselves to, that we allow something of this nature to continue undiscussed, let alone attended to. For at the moment, it is understandable why the peoples of Calais, or the police force there, feel so aggrieved, for they are indeed the recipients of a great problem, or even of many great problems globally. Problems propagated not by them; not on their doorstep. Yet it is with them it rests; rests whilst awaiting the opportune moment to flee across the channel; by scrambling aboard unattended lorries, or clung with futility to the underside of a train. Calais represents on our doorstep a manifestation of so many ignored ills, so many intolerances tolerated; the acceptance of people living as we had apparently committed to challenging as unacceptable long ago, people living between the cracks of society, as though they were rodents, harassed and harried, unwelcome and openly resented. Though it may seem so, I do not cast upon the entirety of Calais, it's populous and it's police, this tarnished brush. But nonetheless, the problem persists, and while this tainted microcosm is allowed to, many will be living this existence. The existence of those without dignity and respect. All the while taunted, with unfortunate irony, by being in a part of the world so ready to pronounce to the rest, its liberal and tolerant successes.

Government Fails A-levels

2010-08-20T10:30:00.014+01:00

The A-level results are out, with GCSEs to follow next week, and the debate is already raging over whether the courses are becoming increasingly easy. Patronising to young people though this is, the most pertinent discussion going on right now is related to how candidates with excellent academic records nevertheless end up without university places. This comes with the news that places are in such demand that apparently the amount of courses available in clearing this year dropped by 13 500, from 32 000 last year to 18 500 this year.

The problem of too few university places has been getting worse over the past few years, but simultaneously the pass rate for A-levels also goes up each year. Intuitively you would assume that this would mean that more people go to university, but this isn't the case. In fact, compared to 2004, where according to UCAS there were a total of 486 028 university applications and 377 544 acceptances, 2010 shows that there were a massive 639 860 applications and 481 854 acceptances. The ratio of applicants to acceptances has stayed static at 1.3, but it remains that in 2004 22% of applicants lost out on places compared to 24% in 2010.

David Willetts, Minister for Universities and Science has encouraged A-level students to "maximise opportunity" by applying for lower calibre universities as an insurance offer, or taking a gap year and doing charity work to bolster their CVs. Gone are the days where you can become a cabinet minister's private researcher upon graduation, then within five years be head of a think-tank, as Willetts did. In fact, the problem of graduate unemployment is probably more endemic than lack of university places, and if this continues, students who had to fight for a university place will then have to fight even harder for a job.

Some have pointed to population change as the main reason for the lack of university places, which seems suspiciously simplistic. Nevertheless, according to the Office for National Statistics the UK did see a hike in births around 1991, to 699 217, and 689 656 in 1992. It must be noted though that this year's university applicants were mostly born in the academic year September 1991 to August 1992, so the total births given for each year cannot all be included in this period. Also, bearing in mind that the problem of university places has been in motion for a few years, the astonishing increase in applications this year could be indicative of not only the large proportion of people born in 1991/2 applying, but also a backlog of applicants who were unsuccessful last year, and perhaps even the year before, who would have been born in the academic years 1990/1 and 1989/90 respectively. In fact, 1990 saw the largest birth increase in the UK since 1972, with 706 140 babies born. This is evidence which shows that the strain on the university system is probably partially being caused by a birth-rate increase in the UK 18 or 19 years ago, which is a massive can of worms itself.

But what of non-EU applications? Are universities accepting a relatively higher proportion of foreign students compared to UK students simply because they pay far higher fees? With particular universities this may well be the case (the LSE for example), and the Guardian has said that the increase in enrolments from non-EU students from 1998 to 2008 was 96% . This of course was greeted with praise, with people saying that UK universities were competing on the level of international counterparts, making a lot of money, and were encouraging "diversity". But it seems that no one stopped to think that perhaps some UK students were being unfairly outsourced, not because they were worse academically, but because they were entitled to lower fees. This has led to criticisms of universities as propogators of the class system, who indirectly allow education to be available only to the rich. But according to the UCAS statistics the rate of UK admissions has fluctuated between 88.2% and 88.9% over the past six years. What's more the non-EU acceptance rate has fallen from 7.4% to 6.8% over the same period, so it seems that foreign students are not yet a cause for concern, at least not in a general sense.

The problem with judging from these statistics though, is that there is no qualitative analysis. If we consider the students who got the top grades at A-level who didn't get into their university of choice, such figures become redundant. Generally speaking, there is not a dangerously large problem with the UK's university system, with the uncomfortable (but not obscene) 20% of applicants not getting a place. However, the real problem is that we cannot judge the success of a system such as higher education by box ticking. Just because over 80% of people do get a place, it doesn't mean that that place is right for them, or that they even wanted it. Of course on clearing you could probably get in for Film and Television at Greenwich, but would you really want to, especially if you had initially applied to places like Bristol, Durham, and UCL? Therein lies the problem; there are too many good candidates and not enough good places.

The blame for this lies with New Labour, who were obsessed with box-ticking and reaching rigid quotas, and who encouraged all manner of poorly performing polytechnics to become fully fledged universities offering honours degrees. At the same time, many students who arguably would have done better on a vocational course, were bribed by EMA to remain in education for their A-levels, pushing the saturation of applications up. Degrees have since been devalued, with many graduates needing not only a degree, but also a variety of unpaid 'work experience' placements or internships on their CVs to prove they can do what employers up till the early 90s trusted a degree would teach.

Many argue that there are not as many good candidates as there seem to be, it is just that the A-level courses are easier than before. This ignores that the vast majority of students who get top grades at A-level and are lucky enough to get a place at a prestigious university usually end up with 2:1 degrees or higher, which would imply that those people got the high A-level grades because they were smart and hard working, not because the courses were easy. Furthermore, many people who take a mixture of non-traditional subjects such as psychology, law, business studies, or media studies are more likely to get three or four As than someone who has done arguably harder subjects such as history, english, politics, or geography. Many universities won't accept applications from students with more than one non-traditional subject, but again, the fact that so many students get As and apply to 'good' universities, but then perhaps don't do as well as expected, is explained by their subject choices.

The new government desperately needs to fix the UK's education system, which is failing its students. Top universities should be encouraged to increase their expenditure to allow more people to study without class sizes or student-staff ratios being affected, whilst lower level universities should focus more on vocational courses rather than teaching subjects like law, politics, and english which have few employment prospects, and simply increase the quantity of competition for jobs (though not the quality, evidently). All A-levels should be subject to the same standards; non-traditional subjects should be as rigourous as their traditional counterparts, and satisfaction with courses should be the parameter of the education system's success rather than faceless percentages, which David Willett's seems to be covertly promoting.

LM

Ireland: A Lesson to Dubai

2010-08-11T11:32:00.009+01:00

The arrogance and profligacy of the global economy is something quite remarkable. Thanks to the devastating effects of the banks' policies of short-term economic benefits, tax-payers around the western world are now being hit hard by austerity measures. In the UK, these have even had an unexpectedly adverse effect on consumer confidence, though that this is a surprise is merely indicative of the catatonic bubble in which the overpaid financial world resides.

However, whilst some financial bubbles are straining, or in Greece's case, burst, others are still trundling along, ignoring the possibility of the chaos which can arise once the omnipotent markets begin to doubt the liquidity of any given product or service. Dubai in the United Arab Emirates is a case in point. The oil-rich middle-eastern metropolis has been living in a property bubble for over five years, and risks a crash on the level of its western counterparts if the government and Sheiks don't reign in the overzealous real-estate developers. The problem in the region is not one that is new though, it has been seen before in Europe, especially in the Republic of Ireland.

For most of the early to mid noughties, Ireland enjoyed a massive property boom, with housing estates and holiday homes appearing everywhere, from town suburbs to the remote countryside. No-one questioned the grossly inflated prices, or the disturbingly deregulated Planning Policy, and slowly what were once quiet, green hills became infested with large bungalows, turning the Irish landscape into a rainy imitation of the Costa del Sol. Yet by late 2008 signs of a crash were appearing in line with the global recession, and today, Ireland's budget deficit is over 14% of its GDP. It doesn't help that the housing boom saw over 20% of Ireland's population employed in the construction industry, or that many of the developers not only went bust, but took many pre-existing businesses with them, especially in the hotels sector (Ireland's lax planning rules meant that developers were able to build hotels in towns which could only generate business for the use of one). To put it bluntly, Ireland is in big trouble, and still has thousands of empty, and even unfinished houses scattered all over.

What Dubai needs to learn from Ireland is that unsustainable property development could have severe effects on its economy. Of course Dubai has oil wealth, and many of its construction employees are poorly paid immigrants, but the sheer amount of empty properties (estimates of the property surplus vary, but some say there are up to 70 000 empty homes, especially in suburban areas such as Sharjah or Al-Gusais) creates a self-perpetuating climate of economic suspicion for potential investors. Why, for example, are these homes empty? And more prosaically, why should developers invest in somewhere which has little likelihood of yielding any profits, especially if prospective developements are in the small and already saturated luxury sector?

Dubai doesn't tax its residents or investors, so on first glance it stands to lose little if investors pull out. However, what this will do is lessen the chances of other investors coming to Dubai in future, which may eventually stagnate the entire economy, which itself is dangerously reliant on private investment rather than government stimulus to stay bouyant. This is what happened to Ireland, which didn't have a large enough government revenue to build so many properties itself (approximately 750 000 houses have been built in Ireland since 2000, with the most expensive plot of land being sold in Dublin for €36m, equivalent to €96m per acre on that particular site), and so allowed private investors to carry the weight. This apparent prosperity drove demand for Ireland to live beyond its means, and ridiculous 100% mortgage offers became common. The eventual results of this though, were that the whole system crashed, and now Ireland is facing very tough austerity cuts, low bond prices, and even lower investment. It is a vicious cycle of bust and bust.

If Dubai continues along its deregulated property development path, which, like Ireland, seemingly has no demand, it too could face a crash which would put pressure largely on the Sheikhs to use their private oil-wealth to keep the economy afloat. To avoid this, Dubai (and the United Arab Emirates as a whole) may need to consider relaxing its job market, which is elitist in relation to foreigners, and practices protectionism on most other mid-level jobs. This would open up Dubai more, which would then help to fill the empty homes, and consequently go towards removing any possibility of dwindling private investment in the region. Furthermore, in certain areas foreign nationals are not even allowed the right to own freehold property, although this may be set to change in future, at least in certain areas of the city.

It would be unwise to allow the development of Dubai to proceed any further, but though more and more commentators are issuing warnings, it is hard to tell if Dubai is listening, or even cares.

LM

South Eastern Neglect

2010-08-02T10:26:00.016+01:00

The UK electoral constituency of Camberwell and Peckham in London is characterised by "high unemployment and many social and economic problems" according to the Guardian's constituency profile of it. I have also called it home for most of my life.

What is interesting about this constituency is that it serves as a warning to the coalition government as to what can happen if small businesses are forced into liquidation by outsourcing, underfunding, and take-overs. The new government's emergency budget promised a drop in Corporation Tax to 20%, which should help alleviate pressures on small businesses, as well as exempting them from up to £5000 of employer National Insurance payments for the first ten employees hired, which could mean that they could save up to £50 000. However, the scheme will not be offered to companies starting up in London or the south-east, rather it will be targeted in areas which apparently need it the most.

But with a population of roughly 105 000 and total unemployment at 6%, Camberwell and Peckham (as well as similarly deprived London constituencies such as Tottenham or Poplar and Limehouse) is arguably in need of as much help as it can get. Its infrastructure has been stagnating for years, and the only new businesses which invest in the area offer nothing new or exciting to the residents. There is no cinema, but there are betting shops; there is no tube station, but there are numerous Pentecostal African churches. The only book shop in the area closed down over five years ago, only to become a nameless bric-a-brac shop; and though there is a Morrison's and a Co-Op/Somerfield (the sign reads Somerfield but the company was taken over by Co-Op last year), they are too small to really cater to all the residents' needs, meaning a bus journey to either Marks and Spencer's or Sainsbury's, both of which are about 15-20 minutes away, dependent on traffic, is often necessary.

These laments would give the impression that Camberwell is a very deprived area, and for the most part it is, but a short walk around reveals another side to it which the newspapers miss out. Of course there are large council estates, tower blocks, and dangerous alleyways, but there are also leafy avenues and large Georgian houses. The same can be said of Peckham. The constituency is not all deprivation and poverty, yet the infrastructure of Camberwell says otherwise, which has continually been left out of government and EU sponsored investment plans, whilst the nearby areas of the Elephant & Castle, East Dulwich, and even Peckham have all had make-overs to improve their image and infrastructure.

On this evidence it would seem that both the government and Southwark Council have done little to help Camberwell, but recently an opportunity to change this has arisen. Another Pentecostal African church, the Redeemed Christian Church of God, has this year privately bought a 2000 capacity, grade II listed ex-bingo hall in Camberwell, which, should their planning permission for change of use be approved by the council, will further compromise the possibility of the area's regeneration. Without the bingo hall, many unemployed and elderly residents no longer have anywhere to go for socialising and entertainment, and the prospects of a new, universally appealing hub arriving in Camberwell soon are very unlikely considering its continuing economic decline and saturation of ramshackle African churches.

The decision of whether or not to allow the church to move in rests in the hands of the council, but will undoubtedly have major effects on Camberwell's future whatever the decision. Nevertheless, the government's unwillingness to help businesses in London and the south-east is a factor working against the residents of Camberwell. If the government's plans for helping small businesses are limited by geographical area, they severely risk allowing many more areas of the south to fall into the hands of aggressive monopolies, such as the Redeemed Christian Church of God, and leaving infrastructures which should cater to the majority of their populaces crippled and stagnant. Not only do many new businesses not have the resources to set themselves up in areas stricken with poverty, but they also have little incentive to do so based on the already poor infrastructure of such areas. This is why a strong private business, or a government stimulus is the only way for areas such as Camberwell and Peckham to grow and become places where people are proud to live. Sadly there is little incentive for private businesses to invest in such areas either, so the burden of responsibility falls to the government. However, their new geographically specific plans designed to help business grow merely isolate from help areas of the south which are equally as needy as deprived areas in the rest of the UK.

The spiral of deprivation and social problems that plague places like Camberwell and Peckham seems doomed to continue, this time at the explicit behest of the government.

LM

UK Businesses: Cable's Mission

2010-07-19T23:31:00.012+01:00

Vince Cable, the Business Secretary is finally flexing his economic muscles in a move to make it more difficult for foreign companies to take over UK businesses. This comes after outrage over the buy-out of Cadbury in the spring by the US leviathan Kraft, and further fears of similar things happening to other UK businesses in the near future.

Kraft initially promised to save Cadbury's Somerdale factory from closure before they bought them, then announced after the acquisition that the factory would be closed by 2011, which risks over 500 jobs. Let us also not forget that Thames Water is owned by the German company RWE, and that three UK-run energy companies were bought up by the French company EDF. Not only do such instances put jobs in jeopardy, but if we let UK business continually sell out to foreign monopolies, we stand to lose more productive and bureaucratic power, and will end up living in more of an economic bubble than before. This is one of the many lessons to be learned from Ireland's example, whose economy was largely based on investment in inflated real-estate prices until the housing market imploded, and they were left with little else to boost their economy.

Cable's plans will be accused of flirting with protectionism, which is an absolute no-no in a globalised economy, but the flip-side of this is that the UK has been punching above its economic weight for too long, and now that the deficit is sky rocketing again, it needs to ensure that it owns enough human, natural and industrial resources to sustain its outgoings. The service economy that the UK has indulged in since the 80s has proved that though it can make billions of pounds, the transitory nature of the financial industry does not produce tangible goods that people will always buy, whether there's a recession or not. Thus when a recession hits, service economies living beyond their means, like the UK, get hit very hard, and without severe cuts and high unemployment, will find it very difficult to recover.

If the UK then allows more of its companies to be bought out, which as we saw with Kraft could easily entail more outsourcing of work and therefore higher UK unemployment, its economy will become more reliant on the borrowed money and external economic fluctuations which have already gotten it into this mess in the first place. Germany, on the other hand, is the perfect example of a country which has the best means and solutions for its debt. It has a massive industrial sector, and has been actively harnessing this to generate government revenue to handle its deficit. Of course competition with cheap Chinese and Indian produce will have an effect on the German recovery if they rely on industry, but its rise in import levies on goods from non-European Union countries by 23% should go some way to protecting German produce.

But because Germany is an industrial power it can afford to do this, unlike the UK, which relies heavily on imports, which include the controversial importing of New Zealand lamb over and above lamb reared in the UK. This is only one of many examples, but it serves to illustrate the reliant state of the UK economy in comparison to Germany, which is very dangerous when attempting to deal with a deficit. I mention this because recently it seems that the German economy has been recovering at an impressive rate; so much so that they believe that by 2013 they can comfortably meet EU regulations that deficits must be no larger than 3% of GDP. And this is all thanks, not only to Angela Merkel's austerity measures (which the White House fears could push Germany into a double-dip recession, much like the UK) but also to a cocktail of good business news amounting to a healthy economic stimulus, which is needed to avoid the dreaded double-dip. Just one example of this is that German car manufacturers are struggling to keep up with demand, mostly from the US and China this summer. Together, BMW and Mercedes have had to hire thousands of new workers to keep the production lines running.

This success story is a far cry from the UK at the moment, but it's not as if the UK doesn't have the resources to act in the same manner, it's just that over time it has seen fit to either close down or outsource most of its major manufacturing powers. This has left it with a service economy trading intangible goods, subject to the whims of confidence, whereas cars, steel, ships, planes and coal at least wouldn't face dangers as arbitrary, as Germany has shown. Therefore the least the UK can do is implement Vince Cable's recommendations which seek to reform the current system for corporate takeovers.

This would include increasing the merger fees which companies have to pay to the Office of Fair Trading in return for them examining any competition issues resulting from the proposed deal. If the fees are significantly higher than the current maximum of £90,000, predators may be put off from tabling more speculative offers. Allowing the City more time to scrutinise a proposed takeover before the deadline by which shareholders have to decide whether to accept or reject the offer would also help decisions be more well-considered. Rather than appearing protectionist, these measures are designed to ensure that takeovers are motivated more by the longer term interests of the company being acquired, as well as its employees, rather than hedge funds looking to make a quick profit.

These seem fair, and are the least the government can do to aid with the UK's recovery. Since German-style measures are sadly impossible for the UK's status as a former industrial superpower, smart moves to focus economic growth in the UK are what is needed to continue the deficit reduction. Reconciling this with Tory free-market sympathy may be difficult though, as well as having to calm the inevitable fears of the markets.

LM

Ill-Thought-Out Health Reforms

2010-07-08T09:53:00.020+01:00

Health Secretary Andrew Lansley has proposed radical changes to the NHS in a new white paper. All 152 primary care trusts and 10 strategic health authorities are to be replaced by GP commissioning consortia and, for the first time, all NHS contracts will fall under EU competition law. The consortia will seek to find the best and cheapest services in the healthcare market for their patients. This shake-up of the health system is intended to reduce government “bureaucracy” and give GPs more power to decide on the care their parents will receive, as well as increasing the role of the free market in healthcare provision - all very in-keeping with the note struck by Cameron’s pre-election “Big Society” ranting.

However, it is not at all self-evident that creating hundreds of GP consortia will cut NHS “bureaucracy”. Why would staffing these cost less than staffing primary care trusts? Conversely, if there were less consortia they couldn’t claim to be local bodies, and thus the reform wouldn’t fulfil its objective of locally-run healthcare, as Poly Toynbee points out. Rather than saving money, the reforms will mean greater public spending in the short-run; in the British Medical Journal, Professor Walshe estimates that the transitional costs of the NHS reorganisation will be £2-3bn.

Toynbee also highlights the possibility of the free market sabotaging relationships between GPs and local hospitals, as competition law will prohibit the former from favouring the latter if it entails rejecting a cheaper offer from elsewhere. Moreover, imposing a neat divide between GPs purchasing healthcare services and hospitals providing them - to create a market scenario - is a mistake when most patients need a complex network of services, or services that are provided by GPs, nurses and consultants but not hospitals. More worryingly, a free market in healthcare could lead to overprovision of the most profitable services and underprovision of specialist services for which there is little demand - a concern voiced by health service union Unison.

Of course the Government is going to have its ideologically-shaped arguments for reducing the state’s grip on healthcare provision. Yet at a time of financial austerity, practicalities should override ideological concerns. This view is a popular one, with even those on the Right complaining that we simply cannot afford to make changes to the NHS. By preaching deficit reduction while proposing costly and disruptive reforms, the Government is sending out mixed messages regarding where its priorities lie.

AT

The Alternative Vote: A Suitable Alternative to FPTP?

2010-07-03T13:22:00.024+01:00

On 5th May 2011, the British electorate will be asked to cast their vote in a referendum on electoral reform. To AV or not to AV - that is the question. This article by the Electoral Reform Society provides a useful summary of the arguments for and against the alternative vote. One important argument for AV listed is that under the system, all MPs would have the support of a majority of their constituents, as opposed to merely a plurality. Indeed, Labour leadership candidate David Miliband recently said, “I think that it’s important that we move to a system where every Member of Parliament has at least 50 per cent of the vote of their constituents.“ Whilst Miliband won 52 per cent of the vote in his South Shields constituency in the May election and therefore is just about safe in making such a statement, 434 MPs received less than 50 per cent of the vote in their constituencies. This immense number includes Ed Balls, Jon Cruddas, Danny Alexander and David Davies, and incredibly, over 70 per cent of the Parliamentary Labour Party. A move to AV could be more democratic and, arguably, also strengthen the constituency-MP link, but it's easy to see why so many MPs are shaken by the prospect.

Another pro-AV point is that it goes further in excluding extremist parties from representation, as the latter are unlikely to gain many second-preference votes. The possibility of second- and third-preferences has additional benefits: it eliminates the need for tactical voting (no more agonising over whether to pick your no-hope first-choice candidate or your safer second-choice), and it can entail a reduction in negative campaigning (you’re not going to slate a candidate whose second preferences you want).

Despite the potential advantages of AV over FPTP, there is one major argument against the electoral system: it doesn't necessarily offer better proportionality, in terms of votes to seats. The majority of the Lib Dems have backed AV because they believe it will improve their representation in Parliament - and who can blame them? Having received 23 per cent of the national vote in May but less than ten per cent of the seats in the House of Commons, they have been most adversely affected by the current voting system. Had the most recent election been conducted under AV, the Lib Dems would have a higher seat share of 79. However, the system can produce results even less proportional than FPTP; the Jenkins Report of 1998 estimated that Labour's disproportionate majority of 179 in 1997 could have risen to 245 under AV, with the Tories' number of seats falling to a lowly 96.

Greater proportionality is so important because it transforms voter power. The number of "wasted" votes falls with increased proportionality, and the resulting Parliament better represents voter preferences. In fact, the voter empowerment generated by proportional representation could dramatically reduce apathy. Yes, the coalition governments likely to result from PR are not hugely popular in this country, but neither is the feeling that our votes often count for nothing - a feeling that is probably a major factor contributing to falling turnout. Without improving proportionality, I don't believe that the arguments in favour of AV are strong enough to justify its implementation. If only the Lib Dems had managed to secure a referendum including an option for the single transferable vote, the proportional system favoured by them. Yet as things stand, the Lib Dems are in for a real battle against the Tories' negative campaigning, as they try to win public support for an electoral system that is by no means their first-choice candidate.

AT

The Price of Power

2010-06-28T14:34:00.014+01:00

If you’ve been following the news lately, you will have noticed that Vince Cable has, strangely, become the spokesman for the coalition government on all matters regarding the Budget. For example, he has publicly dismissed his party’s pre-election poster on the dangers of a VAT rise as “point-scoring”. However, other Lib Dems are decidedly less flippant about trading in their values of fairness for ministerial positions, with four Lib Dem MPs in particular seeking to amend the Finance Bill. So far dissent within the power-sharing party has been limited, but this could all change very soon, especially if its MPs feel moved to join forces with Labour in its protestations against the VAT hike.

Whilst opinion polls indicate that the Budget has bolstered public support for the Conservatives, it has dealt a real blow to the Lib Dems’ support base. An ICM survey reported in the latest issue of the Sunday Telegraph showed Lib Dem support to be at 16 per cent - an 18-month low. This places the party in a paradoxical position; if the Lib Dems were to oppose the Budget, it would most likely result in the dissolution of Parliament and the calling of a new election, in which they would lose seats and the Tories would gain. Yet backing the VAT rise and other hard-to-stomach features of the Financial Bill could cause an even greater bloodletting of support. The party has descended from the dizzying heights of Cleggmania and kingmaking, and it's going to be un uphill struggle for it to regain a positive image while remaining in bed with the Tories.

AT

The Budget: A Damning Assessment

2010-06-22T20:55:00.016+01:00

George Osborne claimed that his budget was unavoidable, fair and progressive. Yet surely the rise in VAT alone nullifies this claim? The increase to 20% is a massively regrettable move - not least because it will harm the economic recovery by reducing consumption. A recent report for the Centre for Retail Research found that the new rate would cost each household on average £425 a year, and that the fall in consumer spending could result in the loss of 47 000 jobs. The rise in VAT, coupled with the drastic spending and benefit cuts, could potentially hamper economic growth to the extent that we are plunged back into recession. The chancellor has argued that his concessions on corporation tax will serve as adequate fiscal stimulus, but research undertaken by the IMF has found this measure to be relatively ineffective. Conversely, government investment yields a high return, so really the government should be spending its way out of the recession before wielding the axe. The mounting pressure in the eurozone to produce austerity budgets is somewhat misguided when unemployment is still too high.

The problems with raising VAT do not stop at strangling economic recovery. For those who consider social justice a high political priority, VAT is, in the words of Simon Hughes, "the most regressive tax". The Fabian Society's Tim Horton has stated that the poorest 10% pay one in every seven pounds in VAT, while the richest 10% only pay one in every £25. Families who rely on child and housing benefits to supplement their income will especially feel the pinch of the indirect tax hike. Adding the fact that many of these families will also be squeezed by the public sector pay freeze, you'd be hard-pressed to find any truth in the chancellor's refrain of "we're all in this together". The poorest will experience the harshest treatment in this budget. I accept the increase in income tax-free allowance will cushion the financial blow for those on lower incomes, but the unemployed still slip through the safety net into greater poverty.

Osborne argued that he had no choice but to raise VAT, as he could not increase income tax beyond the 50p rate. Yet there were other routes he could have taken. He could have put the welfare of the people first by forsaking debt reduction for a year or so, until economic recovery has been secured. He did not have to scrap Labour's tax hike on cider - a sin tax preferable to an all-encompassing indirect tax such as VAT. Corporation tax could have been left untouched, and the bank levy could have been more significant. Thus the chancellor's claim that his hands were tied must be viewed as a ploy to absolve himself of responsibility for the hardships his austerity measures will create. Governing is always informed by ideological positions and the priorities that derive from these, even when times are tough and money is tight. The Tories have simply made their position on "fairness" abundantly clear.

AT

Emergency Budget: Facts and Comments

2010-06-22T15:28:00.024+01:00

This morning on Whitehall, PCS union members were out to protest the proposed Tory tax-hikes and public spending cuts; on Parliament Square there was a lorry with a massive electronic counter showing how much more the UK's debt was getting each second; and Lord Paddy Ashdown pushed in front of me in the queue at Maplin electronics.

Today was of course the day when the Con-Dem coalition's emergency budget was released to the public, and the contents and subsequent reaction to them has been confusing and unsurprising, respectively.

The centrepiece of the budget was George Osborne's rise in VAT from 17.5% to 20%, which will raise £13bn over the next parliamentary term. However, in an attempt to help shed the Tories' nasty 80s reputation, he also pledged to protect the poorest from the controversial and "regressive" hike in VAT through a £1000 increase in the personal income tax allowance which will take effect from next April, bringing the allowance to £7475. This will reportedly take 880 000 people out of tax altogether. I wonder what happened to the pre-coalition Lib Dem promise to raise the personal income tax allowance to £10 000 though? In relation to VAT, items such as food and children's clothes will happily remain exempt from the rise, though most other things will not. The argument that this is not a regressive tax (regressive in the sense that everyone, rich and poor, pays the same amount) is that poor people buy less and rich people buy more, so the rich will get hit harder. This doesn't seem convincing though, and smacks of the introduction of indirect infringements on buyers' liberty, and could make the poor even less well-off by decreasing their incentive to buy anything.

As per the magic Pareto ratio of 80-20, Osborne stated that 77% of total consolidation is to be achieved through spending reductions and 23% through tax increases, which is unsurprising for a predominantly Tory government. I would be worried though that this arrangement will hit the lower middle-classes the hardest (think nurses, administrators etc.) This is because they have enough income to live reasonably comfortably, but not enough to make up for the vacuum which will be created by the services they rely on which will be cut in the coming years (housing, enrichment/extracurricular activities for children etc.)

The freeze in public sector pay will affect anyone earning over £21 000 but it will be ensured that those at the top of organisations are paid no more than 20 times the salaries of those at the bottom, which is a welcome reform. However, £21 000 a year in any city in England is a pittance to live on, and I suspect that this codified lack of mobility will have an adverse effect on certain sections of the country, specifically the housing market for first-time-buyers. Again. As usual.

Osborne also addressed the problem of a double-dip recession, which possibly explains the strange drop in corporation tax from 28% to 24% over the next four years, which should encourage businesses to produce, invest and grow. Small companies' tax will also fall to 20%, whilst new firms outside the south-east are to be let off employer national insurance contributions, which may amount to up to £5000 for each of the first 10 employees recruited. These measures will hopefully stimulate econimic growth in the UK, even if it's slow, which should help to avoid the dreaded double-dip. The government are banking on the fact that this will work to alleviate unemployment because as the public sector is being squeezed, the private sector should theoretically pick up the slack. However, the fact that on average in 2009 the private sector paid £74 less per week than the public sector does not bode well for the future. In short, if the private sector isn't confident, it could parasetically use up the money being thrown at it, but not invest/borrow/hire in return (much like the banks have done), and thus the UK could still easily fall back into recession.

The Robin Hood-esque moves came in the guise of a reduction in child tax credit payments to families earning more than £40 000, which will take effect next year, whilst the government have pledged to work with local authorities to freeze council tax for one year from April next year. That'll be the day. More realistically, capital gains tax, which is currently at 18%, will increase for higher earners from midnight tonight to 28%. That sort of reminds me of Cinderella for some reason. Low and middle-income savers will however continue to pay 18%. People were expecting harsher measures on this though - more like 40% or 50% - so some will feel cheated by the relatively gentle measures adopted here. People will also be perplexed at the threshold for child tax credit payments since it penalises double income families who arguably work just as hard for their money as anyone else, and again ignores the ridiculous cost of living in the UK (which will only increase with the rise in VAT) which will certainly affect families on £40 000 a year who have a mortgage and bills to pay too. In this sense the poorest (who on paper don't look 'poor') will be hit hardest by the new measures. On the BBC news, three women from Deptford were interviewed about these measures, and they argued that it would be the lazy and unemployed who would benefit most, whilst those who have menial, low paying jobs would end up worse off than before.

The inevitable and much welcomed bank levy is also to be introduced in January next year, which will apply to the balance sheets of UK banks and building societies, and to the UK operations of banks from abroad. This is expected to raise over £2bn of annual revenues, though relative to the damage done, amount spent to bail them out, and bonuses paid, this is simply not a tough enough move on the opportunistic enterprise of banking. Whatever happened to the 10% banking levy? Though I understand our banks need to remain internationally competitive, I have a feeling this decision could come back to haunt us somehow.

Finally, of interest to the many, there will be no increase in duties on drinks, cigarettes or fuel. Personally I thought that these would be taxed to hell, what with all the health risks and stuff, but obviously the UK's fuel (by that I mean fags and booze, not just coal/gas/oil) is far too important. In fact, if the Tories had raised duties on these things, there would probably be a lot more outrage about this budget than there has been so far.

The all-important reaction of the markets to the budget has been negligible. I guess they wanted the deficit dealt with quicker - ignoring the double-dip risk - so that they could safely regain confidence in things again (and therefore make money). The pound rose against the Euro as the markets closed, and the price of most gilts rose, although neither were by a particularly significant amount. The markets are cynical, so I suppose the real effects of the budget will need to be felt before there is a major market reaction. This is a start though.

This budget is a mixed bag of decent and not so decent policies. Like the markets, I'm not sure what to think about it. The main focus seems to be on the balance between cutting the deficit whilst simulataneously stimulating growth, protecting the poor, and maintaining the UK's international competitiveness, but the question is, is this a realistic and realisable goal? It seems the Tories have been torn between their 80s heyday and the influence of the Lib Dems, which has certainly had some effect on the outcome. Perhaps the Tories really are the right party for the tough job, or perhaps they're veiling the real cuts and effects under liberal rhetoric?

As Bob Marley said, time will tell.

LM

Emergency Budget: Preview

2010-06-20T11:04:00.005+01:00

So it's nearly here. The Emergency Budget. 'Emergency' in the sense that if the UK doesn't make moves to cut its deficit, the wrath of the vengeful market Gods will be wreaked upon us.

George Osborne's five-year-plan, partly based on findings by the Reform think-tank, apparently identifies £85bn worth of cuts and tax-rises for this parliamentary term, with benefits getting hit hard; raising the collective ire of many Guardian journalists. Even Alistair Darling, perhaps the Guardian's new darling, has written a damning critique of the Government's budget plans.

However, when I glanced over a brief synopsis of the proposals, I wasn't as shocked as I thought I'd be. When they say cutting 'benefits', it seems that a lot of these could be more in relation to middle-class child tax credits/child benefits etc. than in relation to the lower classes. I'm not sure of the details of this, which will become clear tomorrow, but at the moment the prospects for the lower classes look no worse than they are now, although the reduction in council budgets will undoubtedly have a negative effect on them. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if there are a bundle of 'hidden' taxes and cuts designed to indirectly hit the poor, with the obvious middle-class hits being placatory nods to the liberal media.

It also seems that the Lib Dem influence has been co-opted somehow because Osborne is also expected, along with cuts and tax-rises, to propose a parallel growth strategy for the public sector based on safeguarding infrastructure projects, education reform and tax incentives for businesses. Vague as these may sound, I hope they materialise to avoid the disturbing prospect of a 'death spiral' recession from too many cuts to an already weak economy.

All shall be revealed tomorrow, until then, sit tight.

LM

What Should Labour Stand For?

2010-06-11T20:19:00.009+01:00

Whoever wins in the Labour leadership race will have to reverse the trend of ideological decay and come up with a credible and inspiring vision for the party. Here are just a few of the issues the candidates should bear in mind when crafting their competing visions:

1. Public debt was the issue of the general election. How big should the state be and how far should the goal of wealth redistribution be taken? If the next potential Labour leader believes in maintaining a high level of public spending, he/she must raise taxes to make this sustainable, and carefully target tax increases.

2. Education needs an overhaul. Our current examination arsenal of SATs, GCSEs, A-levels, etc. and standard of teaching have proved ineffective at providing the kind of high-quality education enjoyed by pupils in other OECD countries. Higher education also deserves a rethink; if funding is a problem, what incremental rise of tuition fees will not price poorer teens out of attending university? Should certain courses and areas of funding be cut to avoid fee hikes, such as "Mickey Mouse degrees"?

3. The environment drives much debate but little action. The claim that our oil supply will run out in a few decades is not verified, but massive green investment is necessary sooner rather than later. Dependence on the Middle East for this precious nectar is certainly not desirable, and climate change waits for no man.

4. Civil rights were the prime casualty of the Blair years, with the development of a "surveillance society", questionable additional powers for policemen and tough anti-terror legislation. How authoritarian or liberal should Labour be in aiming to tackle crime and dangers to national security? And what should be done about the fit-to-burst prison system?

At a speech delivered to party members at the West Yorkshire Playhouse yesterday, Ed Miliband proclaimed: "It's time to turn the page on Blair and Brown." So please, potential party leaders, give us a preview of the next chapter.

AT

Breaking Laws

2010-05-31T13:18:00.011+01:00

Yeah yeah, everyone knows, the first casualty of the coalition government has been David Laws, former Chief Secretary to the Treasury, current psychological mess.

Laws was targeted by the Telegraph in an expenses-related scandal which said he had claimed over £40,000 on his expenses in the form of second home costs, in the period 2004 to late 2009, during which time he had also been renting rooms at properties owned by his apparent "secret lover" and "long-term partner", James Lundie even though since 2006, parliamentary rules have banned MPs from “leasing accommodation from...a partner". Suffice to say Laws duly resigned from his Cabinet position after the maelstrom of media abuse.

Tellingly though, Laws was the Vice President, then Managing Director of JP Morgan during the mid to late 80s/early 90s, then Head of US Dollar and Sterling Treasuries at Barclays which would imply that he probably didn't need the tax payer's money, and claimed for other more nefarious reasons. This is mainly why the media seems to have pushed Laws to resignation, and admittedly, it was a stupid and greedy thing to do. Now we all know why George Osborne tried to poach Laws for the Conservatives before the election.

Nevertheless, that a Tory-leaning newspaper was the architect of the first Lib Dem fall from grace is suspicious. Moreover, that David Cameron has appointed the former Secretary of State for Scotland Danny Alexander (himself now subject to accusations of financial fiddlings again by the Telegraph) to replace Laws instead of the far better qualified Vince Cable is completely ridiculous.

As a result I'm becoming more and more cynical of the whole coalition affair the longer this kind of nonsense goes on. It almost looks like a Tory conspiracy to oust or neutralise Lib Dem influence on their policies. Seriously. Consider the placatory yet inutile Cabinet positions doled out to the Lib Dems: out of twenty-two positions only five were designated for the Lib Dems; Deputy Prime Minister (obviously), Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, Secretary of State for Scotland, and Chief Secretary to the Treasury.

The aforementioned Chief Secretary to the Treasury is the second most influential ministerial position in HM Treasury, and therefore one of the two most important positions for the Lib Dems to occupy in the coalition, yet it has been given to someone inexperienced (Alexander) over someone who could do a far better job of checking George Osborne's ham-fisted cuts (Cable). The other Cabinet positions, though of course important, nevertheless remain platitudinous nods to the Lib Dems in comparison to the positions occupied by Tory MPs, even though their parliamentary majority is laughably small.

The Guardian reported that "Some Liberal Democrats said...they feared Laws was irreplaceable, and that his absence would weaken the Liberal Democrats' contribution to the coalition, and ultimately the party leader, Nick Clegg's bargaining power with Cameron." I am inclined to agree with this, Laws being a smart and experienced intermediary between the Tories and Lib Dems. I would also add the curious fact that like his predecessor, Danny Alexander was an early advocate of Osborne's apocalyptic £6bn worth of cuts in one year, which was opposed by Cable. Alexander said of his new role "As part of the team that negotiated the coalition agreement, I am absolutely committed to taking the necessary steps to address the deficit rapidly." Rapidly? Oh God.

Is it a coincidence that he got the job over Vince Cable? I think not.

LM

Free Schools: Free of Bad Consequences?

2010-05-22T18:10:00.017+01:00

The Lib-Con coalition plans to bring in "free schools", which will in many ways imitate the Swedish free-market education system. Education vouchers were introduced in Sweden in the early '90s, so now anyone in the country can establish a for-profit school. The idea of free schools is to increase parental choice and thus competition in the education system, which is supposed to drive up standards in both new schools and existing ones. In addition, the schools are directly accountable to parents rather than to municipalities, in the hope that schools consequently become more responsive to the needs of their "customers".

Are the Conservatives wise to adopt this model in the UK, and the Lib Dems to concede to its adoption? The policy is questionable, given that it draws its inspiration from an education system that has hardly been a great success. Per Thulberg, director general of the Swedish National Agency for Education, said the new free schools "had not led to better results". The pupils attending the schools were from "better backgrounds" than those who attended the institutions the free schools had replaced. Segregation in education has undoubtedly increased as a result of the schools, even though the Tories envisage the British free schools to offer better-quality education to children from relatively deprived backgrounds.

There's the very real worry that free schools will crop up in middle-class areas and service middle-class kids, that some schools still tied to LEAs will be left to rot, and that greater inequality in education will develop, thereby furthering socioeconomic inequality. Free-market reform in education is certainly not free from serious repercussions for the youth of today.

AT

Why the World Should Default Debt

2010-05-19T10:45:00.014+01:00

Since the announcement of the UK's enormous deficit, there's been one buzzword that I have constantly heard: markets.

Markets have been referenced at every twist and turn of the election race and coalition talks. Apparantly the markets would react badly to a 'weak' hung-parliament, and it was made clear that the markets wouldn't like it if the government began to cut the deficit after waiting a year to stimulate economic growth.

I know little about economics, but with a bit of common sense, lots of news reading, and recently the help of this brilliant article, I can finally define the markets for anyone who was unsure. 'The markets' is essentially the term we use to describe the interactions between buyers, sellers and middlemen, notably in terms of these actors' confidence in the transactions they're engaging in. If these actors are not confident that, for example money they've lent to the UK government will be payed back, this is considered a risk, and they will therefore demand higher interest to ensure the loan's hasty repayal. They will also judge this risk based on the perceived competence of the politicians to deliver the repayment. The markets therefore didn't want the UK government to wait one year before beginning repayment of their debt since this holds a higher risk than paying it back now. I've been through the awful repurcussions of beginning cuts without first stimulating economic growth in a previous post, but this isn't the markets' concern - all they want is their money back as soon as possible.

The question I would ask then, is why governments allow the profit-driven will of the markets to dictate domestic policy to them? In our society there is an intricate tangle between economics and politics; capitalism and democracy. Our government needs money to provide services (the NHS, state schools, care homes, benefits, MP's salaries etc.) which is funded largely by the taxpayer. However, if government spending becomes higher than its revenue, a deficit begins to appear. And due to the complexities of the economic system, if the government simply printed money to pay for the deficit, they'd cause inflation which would devalue the money of citizens who had saved or invested. Therefore the only solution when a government is in debt is to borrow money (which occurs through the sale of gilts to private investors) and use taxes to repay the loan, plus interest. That way the burden falls more evenly across the economy and doesn't disproportionately penalise particular sections of society, such as savers. Therefore the answer to the question 'why do governments allow the profit-driven will of the markets to dictate domestic policy to them', is that they have no other choice if there's a deficit!

Or do they?

Capitalism is a fine balance, and though I'm no Marxist, the man was right when he said capitalism holds within it the seeds of its own destruction. In fact we're seeing evidence of this right now in Thailand. People have never liked suffering massive gaps in wealth, and according to political philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre, western elites know this, and have found that the most effective way for the rich to get richer is by making the poor richer, because then the poor have the money to spend on all the goods and services which made the rich richer in the first place. Indeed, the credit crunch initially happened as a result of banks allowing mortgages to be issued to people who could never realistically pay them back. And this practice was endemic - remember the prevelance of 0% interest for 6 months credit cards? It is a fact that the vast majority of people in the west bought their lifestyles on credit, sanctioned by the banks. Then one day, someone realised that this was completely unsustainable, and confidence in the economy crashed; much like when a poker-player begins to sweat, or smirks slightly. This calamity then increased the pressure on government spending, what with bailing out the banks, and drew attention to the government's unwieldy deficit; making the market's confidence in its ability to repay the loans very shaky in the process.

So the solution? Default debt across the world. There is no 'real' money involved so no one is really losing out. The values ascribed to the 'deficit', 'risk' and gilts which have emerged are all based on trust, confidence and belief. If I buy £100 worth of shares and something happens which means that it has been decided they are now worth £10 000, I can recoup that amount because it is commonly agreed that this is the real value of the shares. Similarly though, if suddenly everyone agreed that no debt existed in the world, debt would magically vanish.

The economy and the markets are the biggest example of the emperor's new clothes I have ever experienced (and I've heard Coldplay), and with the expected repurcussions of Cameron and Osborne's cuts hitting the poor, the elderly, the unemployed and the young the most - not to mention the ongoing effects of government debt in the developing world - I don't think the priorities of the markets should be taken into account anymore.

LM

The Next Left

2010-05-17T18:58:00.022+01:00

New Labour is officially old news. Which of the Miliband siblings should carry the torch for Next Labour? Here is my brief guide to help you decide which brother to back in the Labour leadership contest.

The Ed Camp:

1. More of Daddy's boy than David (their father is the late Marxist Ralph Miliband), he is further to the Left and big on environmental issues. He serves as a compromise between his brother - known for being a Blairite - and the more old-school Labourite Ed Balls, who is expected to stand. David's association with Blair is likely to work against him, with trade union barons favouring his younger brother as a result.

2. He was named one of the Telegraph's expenses saints; he claimed only £6 300 a year in rent for a modestly-sized house in his Doncaster North constituency. David is 118 places higher than Ed in the expenses league table because of an apparent fetish for pot plants.

3. He is the superior media performer - a definite plus in the age of YouTube and TV debates. By contrast, David is a bit socially awkward. His enemies say he looks and acts unnatural - other-worldly, even. Case in point: at university he used to compose essays in the college bar, holding a Mars bar and a pint of orange juice.

The David camp:

1. Ed may bring the personality to the political double act, but David definitely brings the brains. Both studied PPE at Oxford, with David distinguishing himself by achieving a first-class degree. He also has a masters in political science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Alastair Campbell even dubbed him "Brains".

2. Just as some are put off by his Blairite status, others favour his political outlook to that of his Brownite baby brother. Having spent five years at think-tank IPPR, he is a Labour moderniser who would never take the party backwards. Conversely, Ed argues that Labour lost the election because it wasn't Labour enough, getting dangerously close to employing the kind of logic that alienated half of the party in the 1980s.

3. He has far more experience than his brother. Within days of Blair being elected Labour leader in 1994, David was asked to become Blair's head of policy. He has also served as Secretary of State for DEFRA and as Foreign Secretary.

AT

Q & A with Professor David Blanchflower

2010-05-14T14:26:00.017+01:00

That Professor David Blanchflower even responded to our email requesting a Q & A is amazing. Whilst being an academic based at Dartmouth College, New Hampshire, Professor Blanchflower is also a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research, a Research Fellow at the Universities of Munich and Bonn, a part-time lecturer at the University of Sterling, an economics columnist at the New Statesman, and was an independent member of the Bank of England's interest-rate setting Monetary Policy Committee from 2006 to 2009.

Professor Blanchflower is probably best known for his prediction of the credit-crunch, and is now outspoken in his opposition to David Cameron and George ('Slasher') Osborne's policy of immediate cuts to the economy without prior economic stimulus. He argues that this course of action could lead the UK economy into a 'death spiral', despite the fact that the Governer of the Bank of England, Mervyn King, has agreed with George Osborne's proposals to make £6bn in cuts in the 2010/11 period. On the Channel 4 news this week Blanchflower said "Anybody who is going to start cutting in that position is basically going to push us into that death spiral. That's what we've avoided until this date...We need to be stimulating growth, not withdrawing multiple billions out of the system." The end result of making cuts to an already fragile economy could lead not to another recession, but to a depression; a far worse prospect by anyone's standards. Professor Blanchflower duly signed a letter to the Financial Times, along with 67 other leading economists from around the world, which was also supported by the IMF and OECD, advising against a faster deficit reduction for the reasons cited above.

Worrying though this is, such information is obviously not what voters wanted to hear, and ever obliging, politicians - namely the Tories, who were the only ones proposing such dangerous economic measures - didn't mention anything about a 'death spiral' or a depression during the run up to the general election.

Bearing all this in mind, here is the very short Q & A on topics related to the UK's imminent Budget that Professor Blanchflower kindly took the time in his incredibly busy schedule to answer for us:

Which social groups are likely to be hit the hardest by spending cuts?

The low paid and the unemployed, but mostly the young. Firms have stopped hiring and that impacts the young most and public sector hiring freezes will hit them hardest.

Should the UK be investing more in its own industry, and even protectionism if necessary, to bolster its economy?

Protection is a bad idea but we should be helping firms to invest and providing them with necessary capital.

Is ringfencing any policy areas - as the coalition government has done with the NHS and international development - a wise move?

This seems unecessarily constricting - so education and social welfare get doubly hit.

Even from Professor Blanchflower's brief analysis of the economic policies being put into effect by the Tories in the coming months, the consequences aren't looking good for the country. We can only hope that the markets think otherwise and continue to have faith in the UK economy, which should help keep us afloat in the painful times of deep public spending cuts. And of course the fact that Vince Cable is in the Cabinet, somewhere.

LM & AT

Full List of Surviving Lib Dem Policies

2010-05-12T20:57:00.006+01:00

Below is a full list of the Liberal Democrat policies which we can expect to be implemented under the Lib-Con alliance. Unfortunately there is little by way of taxation which will leave George Osborne with the power to begin cuts now, without stimulating economic growth - a dangerous move if I ever heard one. It seems the Tories' immigration policy trumps the Lib Dems' too, which as long as the 'cap' isn't arbitrary, should be a positive move for the UK.

Without wishing to comment further, the overwhelming feeling I get is that the Lib Dems have been short-changed, especially in relation to the cabinet positions they have taken up. The irony that the party who trashed the 'Labservatives' are now being referred to as the 'Libservatives' is just too much to bare. The Lib Dems maintain that this is a good deal, but I'm really not so sure.

Introduce a Pupil Premium to give all children a fair start.

A substantial increase in the personal allowance from April 2011 with a longer term policy objective of further increasing the personal allowance to £10,000, making further real terms steps each year towards this objective
Reform of the banking system, ensuring a flow of lending to businesses and a Banking Levy. An independent commission on separating retail and investment banking.
Capital Gains Tax reform

Fixed-term parliaments and a referendum on electoral reform for the House of Commons.
A power of recall, allowing voters to force a by-election where an MP was found to have engaged in serious wrongdoing.
A wholly or mainly elected House of Lords on the basis of proportional representation.
Giving Parliament control of its own agenda so that all bills are properly debated.
Enacting the Calman Commission proposals and a referendum on further Welsh devolution.
A statutory register of lobbyists.
A limit on political donations and reform of party funding in order to remove big money from politics.
Radical devolution of power and greater financial autonomy to local government and community groups.

Establish a smart electricity grid and the roll-out of smart meters.
Establish feed-in tariff systems in electricity
A huge increase in energy from waste through anaerobic digestion.
The creation of a green investment bank.
The provision of home energy improvement paid for by the savings from lower energy bills.
Retention of energy performance certificates when HIPs are scrapped.
Measures to encourage marine energy.
The establishment of an emissions performance standard that will prevent coal-fired power stations being built unless they are equipped with sufficient CCS to meet the emissions performance standard.
Establish a high-speed rail network.
Cancel the third runway at Heathrow and refuse additional runways at Gatwick and Stansted.
Replace the Air Passenger Duty with a ‘per plane’ duty.
The provision of a floor price for carbon, as well as efforts to persuade the EU to move towards full auctioning of ETS permits.
Make the import or possession of illegal timber a criminal offence.
Promote green spaces and wildlife corridors in order to halt the loss of habitats and restore biodiversity.
Reduce central government carbon emissions by 10 per cent within 12 months.
Increase the target for energy from renewable sources.

Restoration of the earnings link for the basic state pension from April 2011 with a “triple guarantee” that pensions are raised by the higher of earnings, prices or 2.5%.
Phase out the default retirement age and end the rules requiring compulsory annuitisation at 75.
Implement the Parliamentary and Health Ombudsman’s recommendation to make fair and transparent payments to Equitable Life policyholders.

Scrap the ID card scheme, the National Identity register, the next generation of biometric passports and the ContactPoint Database.
Outlaw the finger-printing of children at school without parental permission.
Extend the scope of the Freedom of Information Act to provide greater transparency.
Adopt the Scottish approach to stopping retention of innocent people’s DNA on the DNA database.
Defend trial by jury.
Restore rights to non-violent protest.
A review of libel laws to protect freedom of speech.
Safeguards against the misuse of anti-terrorism legislation.
Further regulation of CCTV.
Ending of storage of internet and email records without good reason.
A new mechanism to prevent the proliferation of unnecessary new criminal offences.
End the detention of children for immigration purposes.

Dawn of a New Era...

2010-05-12T10:41:00.005+01:00

Almost a week and a hideous media frenzy after the general election, the UK finally has a solid government headed by Conservative leader David Cameron.

If you're a regular reader of this blog, you'll probably have noticed by now that it's far from impartial, though we do try. Accordingly Cameron's premiership was greeted with middle-fingers raised at the TV and despairing four-letter words. The true maxim of the election turned out to be 'vote Clegg get Cameron', which made the FPTP voting system look worse than it already does. And by the looks of it PR won't be introduced to the House of Commons any time soon. I'm not sure what the terms of the alliance are, but I suppose they'll become clear over the next few days.

Provisionally I will choose to fear for people's job security with George Osborne as Chancellor; making whimsical cuts in a country that is already dangerously fragile. Then again, in the knowledge that their buddies are back in business, the markets will probably maintain confidence in the UK from now on, regardless of how close to meltdown things get.

The consolation prize for bruised liberals is of course the Tories' historic alliance with the Lib Dems, and Nick Clegg's spot as Deputy Prime Minister. Whether he will just be a scapegoat/marionette as and when it suits Cameron remains to be seen. Vince Cable is in line for some sort of cabinet position which is heartening, and David Laws and Chris Huhne are in similar situations at the moment for Education and Energy Secretaries, respectively.

It will certainly be interesting seeing how this pact pans out, since the policy gulf between the two parties is massive. It will also be interesting seeing how the backbenchers take it, not least the far right and the far left. The era of the Libservatives has begun - sit back and watch, and try not to be made redundant.

LM

Future for the Left?

2010-05-11T09:55:00.004+01:00

By definition, the right wing press' attack on Labour and the Lib Dems in the past few days has indicated that both political parties are still considered 'leftist' - which seems to mean they are in opposition to many of the ideas and policies the Tories stand for.

But if papers like The Sun, the Daily Mail, and The Telegraph are going to continually stick the boot in over the alliance talks, which have been severely shaken up by Gordon Brown's public letter of resignation, they should also recognise that although the Tories won roughly 10 million votes (36%), Labour and the Lib Dems together won about 14 million votes (altogether 52%). Other parties including Scottish, Irish, and Welsh nationalists, along with the Greens in Brighton made up the other 12% of the vote.

To me, and by the logic of the aforementioned papers, this looks like 4 million, or 16% more people voted for parties in the UK based on their centre-left-leaning policies. If this is so, a Lib-Lab alliance should therefore surely be allowed to govern if they come to an agreement. After all, the election was about voting for the party who will introduce the best policies for this country.

The similarities between Labour and Lib Dem policies, especially in relation to immigration, electoral reform and the economy, are far more than between either party and the Tories. That over 50% of the electorate voted for these surely renders cries from Tories and their journalist pals that they won the majority of the vote null and void.

On another note, I'm very unhappy with how 'the markets' can hold the outcome of the alliance talks to ransom; which could potentially damage the UK economy if a 'strong' government doesn't take power soon to deal with the deficit. This obviously puts unnecessary pressure on the alliance talks, and creates an innate (and unfounded) bias towards the Conservatives. National stability should be paramount and not at the mercy of the markets, which themselves contributed to the credit crunch/deficit situation in the first place. But then again that's the free market for you.

In sum I think that the majority has spoken - in overwhelming favour of the left. Whether New Labour are truly leftist is doubtful, but their 'heart on the left, wallet on the right' philosophy still leaves them further left than the Tories could ever be.

LM

Deal or No Deal?

2010-05-10T19:49:00.013+01:00

So much has transpired since the 6th of May. The non-decisive general election has left us in a bit of a constitutional pickle, with the Tories 7% ahead of Labour in terms of the vote share, but short of enough seats to command a majority in the House of Commons. The predicted hung parliament has indeed become our political reality. Although Labour lost, its hold over most of London and certain other seats the Tories hoped to gain has meant that the latter party didn't win a mandate to govern. Significant Conservative figures are vocalising their disappointment at the result, blaming the shambolic Tory campaign for their failure, as well as Cameron for agreeing to the televised debates. Ashcroft in particular is furious that he didn't get value for his money! As for the Lib Dems, the polls bounce didn't translate into tangible results; they somehow managed to lose a few seats (oh Lembit, how you won't be missed!) and to only increase their vote share by a meagre percentage point. The public flirted with the notion of a three-party system, only to have a change of heart when it came to committing on the ballot paper.

Clegg is now in an unenviable position. He would probably taint his centre-left party by entering into an unholy alliance with, or giving confidence assurances to, a Tory government, which will have to make unpopular spending cuts in the near future. An additional problem is the ideological gulf that exists between the Lib Dems and the Conservatives. The two parties completely clash on Europe, immigration and the timetable for spending cuts. Conversely, Clegg can reach agreement on a Lib-Lab coalition, thereby forming a progressive government. Yet this outcome would ignore the fact that the electorate awarded the Tories with a plurality of the vote. Moreover, now that Gordon Brown has announced his plans to resign, it would mean a second unelected PM for this country - most likely in the form of Miliband. And smaller parties would need to enter this coalition to give it a seat majority. It's questionable whether the Lib Dems want to be shackled to a party that people believe has outstayed its welcome in national government. Both parties are trying to entice Clegg with a referendum on electoral reform, but this alone is not offering a great deal, especially as the alternative vote does not necessarily produce a "fairer" result anyway.

It's the party that won less than 10% of the seats that will determine who governs us, rather than the popular vote - how remarkably undemocratic. Will the government that emerges from the series of behind-closed-doors talks credibly be able to make the tough decisions that are needed in the coming months? Which party combination will be the most conducive to political and economic stability? What about the implications for our democracy and the national interest? These are the questions Kingmaker Clegg must seek to answer when he and his party decide between a) a deal with the Right which many Lib Dems and their supporters will find unpalatable and b) an alliance of the election losers. The choice urgently needs to be made, to take the country out of post-election limbo. Maybe flip a coin, Clegg?

AT

Fear and Loathing in the Final Hours

2010-05-05T17:00:00.011+01:00

True to the name of this very blog, both fear and loathing - or at least reasonable dislike - are emotional drives which have featured prominently in the general election campaign. Especially in the last few days, Labour and the Conservatives have employed scare tactics to warn voters off voting for the Lib Dems. Fear of a hung parliament is squeezing the latter's popularity; Shadow Schools Secretary Michael Gove equated voting for the third party to "succumbing to a sort of blind date politics".

If it's not fear of the uncertainty that a hung parliament would bring, it's the loathing of the "old politics" that is influencing the electorate. As I have commented before on this blog, 13 years of the same government has made change the issue of this campaign. Initially the Tories thought they would be known as the bearers of change, but then the first TV debate graced our screens and ten million viewers were razzle-dazzled by Nick Clegg.

Clearly, conflicting forces are at work. The electorate may want a government that isn't led by the much-maligned Brown or disingenuous Cameron, but they don't necessarily want a chaotic hung parliament situation to unfold on 7 May, which would essentially see the Labservatives rule for another five years anyway. Plus our electoral system is so ill-equipped to deal with the current distribution of party support that even those planning to vote tactically are confused about what move they should make.

Combined, Clegg's success in the first ever British leaders' debates, the failure of Cameron to sell the New Conservatives to the public, and Labour's waning spirit have really shaken up this election. Less Clegg airtime and a bit more fight from Labour could have seen them win a fourth term in office. One Guardian poll in particular shows that people still think Brown is the most capable leader, the best in a crisis and best at understanding world problems. It's his prickly personality that's the deal breaker - a character flaw that's certainly been under the magnifying glass due to the TV debates. Conversely, a different Tory strategy which didn't involve Cameron pandering shamelessly to the "plebs" probably would have yielded different poll results, even taking into account the Clegg factor - but of course, the debates haven't done them any favours, either.

Polling day will be cloaked in uncertainty. With so many undecideds at this late stage of the game, no one is quite sure what election results will materialise. Will those riding the Lib Dem surge in popularity arrive at the polling station and suddenly revert back to being a Labour or Tory supporter? Will Labour supporters, about to cast their ballot, find that they cannot bring themselves to vote for the governing party in its current tired - if not exhausted - state? Will all the young people who've hastily registered in recent weeks swing the vote one way or another? For us first-time voters, it's great to see big question marks looming over this election. It's roughly 16 hours until I'll be casting my vote, and the fact that at this time the result doesn't seem pre-determined makes this an election to get excited about.

AT

So Close Yet So Far

2010-05-05T00:15:00.005+01:00

It's been a gruelling few months of work and scrutiny for politicians, and a frustrating few months for the electorate who just want to know the truth (whatever that is) but we're finally there; we're almost at the end of the campaign trail.

The biggest difference in this election has undoubtedly been the leaders' debates which not only brought the leaders' accountability to a new level, but also propelled the Liberal Democrats into a newfound position of authority and respect; widening the traditional two-party system in the process.

With the Gillian Duffy 'bigot' incident, and the lobbying scandal, the final nails in Labour's coffin have been hammered in. Gordon Brown has remained a disaster magnet throughout the past few months and it is highly unlikely Labour will gain any seats this time round. Swing Labour seats will probably go to the Lib Dems which could increase their share of the vote substantially, but the Conservatives will likely pick up a lot of votes no doubt with the help of decreased turnout or slightly increased votes for marginal parties. After all, a vote for the Lib Dems and their ilk is apparantly a vote for Labour due to the intricacies of the first-past-the-post electoral system.

Ideology is irrelevant in light of the deficit, but it has perversely played a greater role in this year's election; with parties strongly aligning themselves along different cleavages in relation to how they will deal with it. This has brought out the age-old class divide again, which seems a bit regressive. Immigration, as I predicted, has also become a livewire issue which I hope won't translate into any seats for the BNP either at local or national level.

It's all very exciting, but the people and the politicians are no doubt in for a very tough term in office as the vague statements issued in the past few months unfold into real policies with real implications. It may seem fine right now, what with promises for NHS protection and better education, but "change" must also mean "cuts", and that is something no party, regardless of positive rhetoric, can avoid when in government.

LM

Change, Change, Change

2010-05-02T11:22:00.014+01:00

After two or three terms of the same government, the opposition's most prominent slogan is invariably something along the lines of "time for change". It was the mantra of the Obama campaign, and it rings true for both the Tories and the Lib Dems this side of the Atlantic. Usually, there is some indication of what that change might look like; Obama offered universal healthcare and improved US international relations, and way back in '97 Blair promised that a Labour government's priority would be "education, education, education". In this election campaign, change in the form of the Big Society has at best been met with a lukewarm response, while the prospect of changing two-party politics, and thus broadening voter choice, has received rave reviews. Yet most importantly, a vote for change is more often than not a negative one - a vote NOT for the incumbents rather than a vote for what the opposition has to offer. New Labour's 1997 take on "time for change", "things can only get better", is an expression of this weariness, and the recent Tory "we can't go on like this" posters convey a similar message.

In retrospect, how have things changed over the past 13 years? Prospect magazine has produced infographics to illustrate the transformation of Britain that has taken place under the current Labour government. From the information, I gathered that we have less crime overall but more crimes relating to possession of a weapon or rape (i.e. the bad kinds). The country has experienced a fall in the teen pregnancy rate. We eat more, smoke less. There are tons more doctors and nurses. The number of lap dancing clubs has multiplied, while libraries and public pools are being closed down. Tesco has done an excellent job of monopolising the high street. Funding per school pupil has risen and there's been a massive increase in the number of teaching assistants, and exam results have improved, but these spending commitments haven't translated into much of a fall in the number of failing schools. A greater proportion of youths are in higher education than ever before. We have more war casualties. Due to changes in taxes and benefits, the poorest 10% are substantially better off, and the richest 10% considerably worse off. Wages are higher. Property prices are much, much higher.

Certainly, there are a few glaring negatives to list, but only amid plenty of positives. The Big State of Labour has made significant improvements to the lives of many, albeit it at a massive cost to the public purse. The Big Society might have more to live up to than Cameron thinks.

AT

Voters Like to Back a Winner?!

2010-05-01T11:42:00.005+01:00

I recently read, in a New Statesman article no less, that 'voters like to back a winner'. I've been dully aware of this tragic fact for years, but it has never been put so succinctly as to make an impression on my consciousness. But now the full horror of liberal democracy has smacked me upside the head.

Unfortunately then, human nature has undermined one of the main tenets of procedural democracy - free and fair elections. It seems that the will to smugly say "I voted for them" when a particular party wins is stronger than voting for the party you believe is best for you and the country.

Another important element of procedural democracy, free press, is far from non-existant in the UK, but the fact that media mogul Rupert Murdoch owns two of the most popular newspapers (in fact The Sun is sadly the most popular in the UK) undermines the otherwise high standard of procedural democracy we enjoy.

Murdoch, like the electorate, also likes to 'back a winner', and his papers (which also include The Times/Sunday Times) are therefore firmly backing David Cameron. The press are commonly acknowledged as the vehicle by which the electorate can make informed decisions on who to vote for, but in practice the monopolisation of the media hinders this. As a result, when Murdoch chooses a winner to back, much of the electorate are most likely to go with his choice too. Because they like to back a winner.

This also explains why the politicians won't fully breach the issues of cuts and taxation because to do so would be to style oneself as a 'loser', because no one wants cuts or taxation, obviously, even when they're necessary; the fault of gullible people and greedy banks.

It almost makes you want to adopt J.S. Mill's weighted votes for the educated. But then again they're the ones voting for the individualistic policies anyway. We're doomed.

LM

They've Had It

2010-04-29T23:41:00.016+01:00

Each time Gordon Brown shook his head during last night's debate was a sign of his utter dismay regarding how things have unravelled for Labour. The economy is his strong issue; he did his best to associate the Conservative party of today with its past failures during times of economic strife in the '30s, '80s and '90s, and ripped into Cameron for his party's non-progressive inheritance tax plan. Unfortunately for Brown, he just couldn't combat the fact that the public is aching for change (and Duffy-gate didn't help much either). Early polls suggested that Cameron won the debate, even though he definitely lost on the issue of fairness. His tough stance on "waste" must have resonated well with the viewing public. The Tory leader didn't offer any new detail on further cuts - none of the leaders wanted to touch on this issue - but people trust his party more than Brown's or Clegg's to rein in public spending.

Maybe the public is justified in doubting Gordon Brown's economic credentials. As Cameron pointed out in the debate, the PM betrayed the Labour constituency when he abolished the 10p tax rate and by neglecting pensioners. Yes, the link between state pensions and earnings was broken by a Conservative government (Thatcher in 1980), but Labour has had 13 years to restore it. Cameron also argued that Britain needs "to start making things again" - a statement with which Clegg agreed. Again, it was Thatcher who paved the way for our over-reliance on financial services at the expense of the manufacturing industry, and yet the Labour government has done nothing to relinquish the British economy from the firm grip of the City. Having said all this, Brown should have come in second place instead of third, as Clegg is no whizz kid when it comes to the economy, and he got annihilated on the Lib Dems' immigration policy once again. It no longer seems to matter what the PM says or how hard he strains to smile when he says it - he's fighting a losing battle.

The Labour party itself appears to share this sentiment, as their entire election campaign has reeked of defeatism. There has been little mention of their past achievements: peace and some self-government in Northern Ireland, the introduction of a minimum wage, greatly reduced waiting times for treatment on the NHS, House of Lords reform, falling child poverty. Maybe it's hard for Brown to extol these virtues of Labour government when they're attributable to Blair's administration rather than his own, but I still can't help feeling that he's let the side down by not pushing the positives.

Alastair Campbell was overheard telling a security guard, "We've had it." Sadly, I couldn't agree more.

AT

Party Budget Proposals are Irrational in the Long-Term

2010-04-28T10:44:00.007+01:00

The party leaders, including golden boy Nick Clegg, have all been criticised recently in relation to their patchy economic policies. According to the BBC and the Guardian, each party has avoided stating the full extent of cuts necessary to deal with the UK's astonishing deficit.

It seems that all the parties have identified large cuts, but have cancelled them out with other promises that will cost the same or more than the cuts they have found. Counterintuitive this may be, but it is down to good old rationality to explain why the parties are being so economical with the truth.

Here's a hypothetical example: let's take a worst case scenario; let's say a terrorist blows up a bus and kills dozens of people.

If the government decides to curb individual liberties to better monitor, arrest and prosecute terrorists, many people would be outraged at the private infringement and curbs on freedom that would have to occur to implement this. However if the government didn’t implement any policies to try and combat terrorism and instead allowed personal freedom to win out, another incident could potentially occur wherein more innocent citizens die, which would certainly lead to outrage and anger at the government for not taking measures to avoid such an outcome.

In each outcome there are differing levels of negative consequences which are either short-term and long-term. But the common theme is that the government always ends up accountable for the negative consequences. And this is true of any similar decision to be made by governments, including the deficit.

It is intuitive that to begin paying for the deficit there is going to have to be raised taxes and cuts in public spending. But because the parties are at the moment focusing on vying for people's vote, being unclear about where and how much they will cut is in their interests. This is because to admit for example that the NHS needs to be severely cut would be to lose many potential voters.

The truth of the matter though, as with the hypothetical terrorism example above, is that something has to be done about the deficit. This is because the worst case scenario of ignoring the deficit is more damaging to more people than the best case scenario. Obviously. However, in the instance of the deficit, as well as the terrorism example, to achieve the best case scenario involves painful choices which could damage people's wellbeing in the short-term. And in the run up to the general election, the best way to get votes seems to be to avoid the notion of any painful choices altogether.

This is exemplified with all three parties' contradictory budget proposals. The Tories want to cut the deficit quicker than Labour or the Lib Dems but are also promising increased NHS spending, more prisons, a lightening of the inheritance tax and a scrapping of the National Insurance increase. This leaves a gaping hole in their finances and also sees potential jobs eliminated through 'efficiency savings'.

The Lib Dems have said that they will find £17bn by, among other things, implementing tougher capital gains, and extending air travel taxation to freight. However, because they want to spend £17bn on raising personal allowances there is no net contribution to the deficit. Their levy on bank profits will only raise £3bn, and though apparently more cash will be raised through tougher laws on tax evasion etc., the Lib Dems are again spending more than they make, leaving a large black hole in their finances.

Labour's deficit plans initially seem the most honest. They have proposed a four year plan for a cut of £80bn, mostly subsidised by spending cuts and higher taxes. However, they have also promised to protect aid, the NHS and schools for two years, which means they would have to in the meantime find alternative cuts elsewhere which not many people have been made aware of. As a result there is again a black hole in Labour's finances which has yet to be filled.

Taxing the rich and saving the NHS are key issues for the majority of the population, and this is why they play such ambiguous roles in the party budget proposals. If they admit to large NHS cuts, or tax breaks for the rich, it is political suicide, and the parties know this. However, in the name of short-term gain the parties are pandering to the majority by promising things they will logically not be able to deliver. The next government is going to have a tough time.

Watch the third leaders' debate tomorrow evening to see all three leaders attempt to defend their flawed and populist budget proposals.

LM

Something Lacking

2010-04-26T13:42:00.017+01:00

The election campaigns of the three main parties have been sharply focused on the party leaders - largely due to the live televised debates and the dispute over who would become PM in a hung parliament scenario. This has been at the expense of other aspects that usually make up a campaign. There's been little mention of the politicians who are likely to be cabinet ministers, should their party win, nor has there been much buzz about the new prospective parliamentary candidates (PPCs). Also distinctly lacking from the campaign trail are women.

The obsession with Clegg has obscured the fact that the vast majority of people couldn't name more than three or four Lib Dem MPs if their lives depended on it. Who else from the party would feature in a coalition government is an issue that should be given more attention. Similarly, although Gordon Brown isn't the most inspiring leader figure, he's supported by a political team who have considerable experience of governing and who many may find preferable to the Lib Dem or Tory equivalents.

It's a terrible shame that the media has failed to give airtime or column inches to the new PPCs (see one of Insight PA's guides). Around 140 MPs have announced they are retiring, which means that the make-up of parliament will dramatically change after 6th May. This is a hugely positive and exciting development that has been largely overlooked. More ethnic-minority candidates have been selected, as well as more women; roughly 60% of Labour's new PPCs are female. All three main parties are guilty of under-selling their new talent - a grave mistake, considering that new faces will shake up the demographics of parliament and make it more relevant and relatable to the modern-day British public.

Where have these new women been during the campaign?! Whenever a camera lens was in his vicinity, Blair never missed an opportunity to brandish his babes. Sadly, it's only the party leaders' wives who've made much of an appearance in recent weeks, as this Guardian article points out. One of my previous blogs was critical of the way politicians have tried to appeal to women voters in this campaign, offering up family-friendly policies with little regard for what woman-without-child might want from her government. Having no female politicians featuring significantly in the election campaign is symptomatic of how male-dominated our politics remains today.

I think it needs to be pointed out both to the press and to the public that this is not a presidential election. On 6th May we'll be voting for our respective constitutency parliamentary candidates in order to elect a new parliament, from which a government can be formed. If only the campaigns could reflect this and broaden their narrow focus, instead of giving centre stage to the three leading roles and keeping everyone else behind the scenes.

AT

Class War? We're Beyond That...Aren't We?

2010-04-25T10:37:00.011+01:00

About half an hour's car journey from London's dizzying urban sprawl lie hundreds of pockets of affluent, 'traditional' English towns and villages. Think village greens, roses around doors, and very large houses surrounded by walls.

As I sped through this beautiful yet alien world on a sunny spring day, I noticed the largest evidence of political activism I have seen since I started following the general election campaign in mid-March. This may be due to where I live being particularly electorally apathetic/predictable, or the dense population of London (including the many blocks of flats) making it logistically hard to put up posters in windows etc., whilst also meaning that the sheer amount of posters here appear diluted since there are even more places without them. But whatever the reason, the amount of political placards and signs in people's windows and front lawns in places like South West Surrey, Chichester and Horsham was still astonishing.

Most houses had large placards in front of them, whilst even at seemingly random sections of road there were strategically placed double size placards (for both sides of the road to see, I guess). Unsurprisingly however, these were all for the Tories. By the end of the day I almost wanted to vote Tory myself, such was the intensity of the propaganda. This made me realise quite how wide the class divide still is in the UK. This is further evident when you look at the 2005 election map which more or less shows all major cities to be red (Labour), and all the countryside to be blue (Tory), with small smatterings of yellow (Lib Dem) throughout. Even more telling is if you zoom in on London, where you will find famously poor areas such as Camberwell & Peckham, Dagenham, and Walthamstow to be red, and famously rich areas such as Kensington, Putney, and Cities of London & Westminster to be blue. Anomolies exist though, mostly with the Lib Dems, who hold well-off Richmond, Twickenham and Sutton & Cheam.

However, in London, like the rest of the UK, it is helpful to note that there are no completely 'rich' areas and no completely 'poor' areas. For many reasons, the UK is a mixed bag and some places, for example Hampstead which is incredibly well-off, but is still a Labour constituency, don't necessarily conform to rigid class types. In this sense I wonder if the Lib Dems are the best party to cross class boundaries; indeed they seem to have already begun to do so; winning both old Labour and old Tory constituencies at the 2005 elections. Even in the aforementioned Tory stronghold of South West Surrey there is only a roughly 5000 majority over the Lib Dems.

Though on my journey I only saw a grand total of one 'Vote Liberal Democrats' sign, which sat at a skewed angle in a dusty window, perhaps now really is their time to shine by fostering fairness and forgetting class divides in UK politics?

LM

The Unshakeable Clegg Factor

2010-04-23T13:50:00.007+01:00

Last night's debate on Sky News saw the three party leaders battle it out on international affairs for the first half, and general issues for the second. The event was regarded as crucial in either solidifying or crushing Clegg's surge in popularity. Polls taken on the night suggested that both Clegg and Cameron were the winners of the debate, with the former holding his own and the latter vastly improving upon his first performance. There has been little mention of Brown in the press coverage of the debate; it's worrying that the prime minister is third wheeling at present.

As predicted, this time round Clegg was in the firing line. He slightly unravelled when pressed on his nuclear disarmament plans; Brown pointed out that despite the expense, the UK can't make a move toward disarmament unless other countries agree to do the same. At one point, he even accused the Lib Dem leader of being weak for not proposing adequate security plans. Cameron actually found he could agree with the PM on the nuclear issue - a touching moment!

And the Churchillian-come-Nazi leader (note names awarded to the Lib Dem leader by sensationalist media) stumbled again on the subject of immigration. His party's policy of granting amnesty to illegal immigrants was met with opposition from Brown and Cameron, with the PM complaining that it would encourage illegal immigration and that these people should be deported, and the opposition leader putting forward the case for a cap on numbers.

Although last night Nick Clegg didn't trip up too much on Europe and generally held his nerve, he had to contend with a much more confident Cameron and a less friendly Brown this time round. Yet his popularity hasn't greatly waned. Regardless of whether you look at the polls reporting Cameron was the winner or the ones claiming Clegg clinched victory, it's true to say that the Lib Dems have become a viable third party in the eyes of the British electorate. Their leader hasn't suffered from "second-album syndrome" and has reinforced the notion that he is a serious contender in the race for the premiership by his performance in the second debate.

Interestingly, what Nick Clegg actually says in the debates has been considered of little importance by analysts, who instead have commented on his body language, gesturing and eye contact with the cameras. Many thought Cameron would be the new Blair in this election, but Clegg has well and truly stolen this role from him and emerged victorious in the style stakes.

If we have learned anything from the televised presidential debates in the States, the smallest things can have a significant impact: Nixon's ill appearance, George Bush Senior glancing at his watch, McCain refusing to look at Obama. The image of Cameron and Brown bickering is similarly powerful. These men represent the "old politics", while Clegg professes to be the man capable of delivering "new politics". David Cameron can use the word "change" as much as he likes, but actions speak louder than words.

AT

Even Tories Deserve Fairness

2010-04-21T20:18:00.005+01:00

There have been many arguments over the past ten years, some more convincing than others, that social divides are dead, and that now is the era of the catch-all, middle-ground parties. But from the looks of this general election, social divides are well and truly alive and kicking, both within parties and throughout the electorate.

In terms of the electorate, these can be seen in the way people relate and react to political parties. In the case of the battle between the left (Labour/Lib Dems) and the right (the Conservatives), Labour/Lib Dem voters create a clear binary opposition between left and right, which is also normatively loaded; with Labour/Lib Dems being characterised as the good guys who'll care for the poor and needy, and the Conservatives being portrayed as the nasty, greedy rich-kids. There is no in between. This opposition is made more obvious when browsing through photos of vandalised Conservative posters. During this election campaign the Conservatives have been repeatedly attacked on countless levels, with both paint and photoshop. Here are some related to the class war:

Then we have personal attacks on David Cameron:

There are ones which make sweeping claims about Tory policy (I would trust the Tories over the Anarchists any day to be honest):

There are also reminders of Thatcher's devastating effect on Britain:

This one is just an expression of immature anger:

This one taps in to popular culture and suffice to say is much funnier than the original:

And this is my personal favourite. Why did it also have to be one of the most innapropriate?

Witty though some of these may be (there are literally hundreds more too), they also unfortunately show Labour/Lib Dem supporters to look like small-minded, sanctimonious zealots. The cause may be 'good', but the way it's been handled gives the Tories the moral high ground. Further adding to this is the 'National Not Voting Conservative Day' on Facebook which, when I last checked, had 12 794 confirmed participants (compared to the 6482 I noted down this morning). There is no such group for a 'National Not Voting Labour Day'.

Today all this bile culminated in a student throwing an egg at David Cameron in Cornwall (watch the BBC video on the link - the presentor is embarrassing). Of course in the name of publicity Cameron joked about the incident, but I can't help feeling that my left-leaning views are consistently being let down by this kind of destructive behaviour administered by lefty rebels. The Facebook group called 'David Cameron Getting Egged' already has 621 fans, and I suspect this will grow considerably over the coming hours. The left is about reason, compassion and justice, not reactionary, judgemental nastiness - lefties should leave that kind of thing for the right to take up if they get into government.

Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg took the words out of a great number of people's mouths when he said that the Conservatives "...have very little policy rigour because George Osborne and David Cameron are all about short-term tactical advantage. The overriding sense you get from them is one of entitlement to government rather than why they want to govern..." I would agree with this, but it is still no reason for anyone to hurl silly abuse at them. If you do, you're just as bad as the politicians themselves.

LM

Prelude to the Potential Downfall of Clegg

2010-04-19T10:37:00.028+01:00

The Lib Dems must be relishing in their post-debate glory. The polls have recorded results they could only have dreamed of achieving previously, and their leader has gone from Unknown to Winston Churchill in the popularity stakes. Whilst the Labour leadership is happy about this unexpected turn of events, as it has decimated the Tory lead, it's brave smiles all round in the Tory camp; George Osborne described wholly unconvincingly "another great week for the Tories" on Sunday's The Politics Show. In response to the Lib Dem bounce in the polls, Cameron has repeatedly - ad nauseam - said, "We'll be doubling up on the positive" or, "A vote for the Lib Dems is a vote for Gordon Brown." The Tories have been tireless in their efforts to warn the public that a hung parliament situation with Brown remaining as leader is a possibility if they don't achieve a decisive win.

However, the Tories might not have much to worry about after the next TV debate. Nick Clegg will have to face the mammoth challenge of tackling mass Euroscepticism. The British public is, at best, ambivalent about the country's integration into the EU. The Lib Dems have argued for such integration and still entertain the idea of the UK adopting the euro in the not-too-distant future - though not until the economy has fully recovered, and only after being given the green light by a referendum. Cameron, who was clearly a bag of nerves during the first debate, may well come into his own in Thursday's debate and put Clegg on the defensive.

To win the foreign affairs debate, the Lib Dem leader will have to emphasise his party's position on the Iraq War - a definite crowd pleaser. Both Labour and the Tories will struggle on this issue. "If we had known before that there weren't actually any weapons of mass destruction..." (or something to that effect) was hardly a satisfying response from David Miliband on yesterday's Daily Politics election debate, and it certainly won't do for the leaders' debate. Yet at least Brown can demonstrate that he's experienced in the realm of foreign affairs, whereas Clegg is a bit of a novice. And singeing cacti with a lighter in Germany is hardly exemplary behaviour when it comes to international relations (i.e. Clegg's infamous story of destroying cacti while on a German exchange trip with his school).

Another factor that could lead to Clegg's downfall is low voter registration. The Lib Dems are most popular among young people, with one poll giving them a huge lead of 44 points among those aged 18-34. Yet figures issued last month by the Electoral Commission suggested that more than half of eligible votes under the age of 25 weren't on the electoral roll. Many younger people have been registering over the last fortnight or so, but it's optimistic to assume that they will all cast their vote on 6 May. At the 2005 election, only 37% of young people voted.

Boris Johnson has made public his own perceptions of the Lib Dem bounce in an article in the Telegraph, suggesting that Clegg's popularity will soon drop anyway. According to Boris, "Next week they will be gone with the wind. Clegg is the beneficiary of cunning Labour spin, bigging up the third party in order to take the shine off the Tories." He goes on argue that once the electorate has recognised that a vote for the Lib Dems is essentially a vote for Brown, it will throw its support behind the Tories. It will indeed be interesting to see if British voters can break away from the norm of tactical voting in this election, or if they will revert to the mentality bred and nurtured by our FPTP electoral system and resulting two-party system.

I disagree with Boris that the Clegg hype is of Labour design; it's the media that has whipped up this frenzy, with vast exaggerations of the qualities the Lib Dem leader showed he possessed by performing relatively well in one debate. Thursday evening will test the man behind the hype and reveal that he is not a Churchill - Winston or car insurance. At best, he might be a British Obama, "but perhaps this is just another way of saying that he is the new Tim Henman" (see Guardian article on Clegg as Obama). Nick Clegg will have to really impress in the foreign affairs debate to prove - to both his new fans and his sceptics - that he's not just a one-hit wonder.

AT

Q & A with Dr Anthony Seldon

2010-04-16T21:55:00.006+01:00

Dr Anthony Seldon, whilst also being the Master of historic independent school Wellington College, has also found the time to be Tony Blair's biographer, a regular commentator on issues related to politics and education, and a prolific author on political history. Dr Seldon's latest book is entitled 'Trust: How We Lost it and How We Get it Back' and focuses on how institutions including the government, banks and the health service have systematically destroyed people's innate ability to trust. However, instead of leaving us with a cynical Blakeian nightmare, he then boldly sets out some ways in which these institutions and people could go about regaining trust within national life.

Despite being bedridden with illness, and under pressure from presumbaly far more influential and important media groups than this blog, Dr Seldon still took the time to briefly answer some questions we sent him about the state of politics today and the general election.

In light of co-writing 'Britain under Thatcher' and co-editing 'The Thatcher Effect', do you think Thatcherism is alive and kicking in today's Conservative party?

In light, 20%.

You give valid examples of how the government often acts in a distrusting manner, but how trusting of people can a government rationally be, particularly when taking the terrorist threat into account?

The only way to end terrorism is to build trust with terrorists.

Which current cabinet minister do you consider to be the most trustworthy? And which shadow minister?

Hilary Benn. David Willetts.

Has Blair's decade of spin helped to destroy our trust in government?

A significant factor - Alistair Campbell and Peter Mandelson.

Which do you trust more: big government or Cameron's "Big Society"?

To be seen!

Seeing as you think journalism should have the same ethical standards as medicine, what do you think about the 'Murdochracy' and the 24 hour news culture? Is it damaging the way politics is perceived or is it making it more accountable and transparent?

Both. Ultimately, we have the media we deserve.

Bankers breached public trust to a disturbing extent before the financial crisis. How would you propose, if at all, that the free market be injected with trust?

The more open a system the greater the trust.

From Machiavelli to Bush, have politicians ever been trustworthy?

Some trustworthy figures e.g. Carter were not effective. To be trustworthy, one needs to be effective, communicate well and fully, and be honest in public and in private. No one achieves 100% and no one achieves 0%. Hitler was trustworthy to his own demented cause, and to Eva Braun. The Mafia are trustworthy to their own family (some of the time).

LM & AT

Vote with the Back of your Hand

2010-04-16T12:50:00.013+01:00

You may be following YouGov polls, Populus polls, ICM polls, or even the so-called "poll of polls". Watching numbers slightly fluctuate on a seemingly random basis is hardly an enjoyable way to engage in the speculation surrounding 6 May. Yet there is another way you can get your pre-election kicks.

Personally, I'm loving the Slapometer The originial version of this "game" (although it should really be taken more seriously and given the respect it deserves) was created so that web users could virtually inflict the pain on Nick Griffin they wished they could in real life. For all those appalled by the rise of neo-fascism in this country, it made for a very comforting experience. In a similar vein, the disaffected public now get the opportunity to take out their frustrations on the political party leaders.

The total number of slaps received by each leader speaks volumes about where they stand in terms of voter contempt. Many people were slapping along to the live debate last night, registering their disapproval at what was being said. Every time Real Cameron opened his mouth, his cyber doppelgänger's percentage of slaps in relation to the other two leaders rose dramatically - particularly when it was to let out some disingenuous, sycophantic drivel. Cyber Brown was doomed to a similar fate (expectations were clearly not lowered enough). Throughout the debate, both Real and Cyber Clegg remained relatively unscathed. How accurate the Slapometer is as a gauge of public opinion regarding the party leaders is questionable; I wouldn't be surprised if party activists are incessantly slapping the opposition, and sometimes its hard to slap just one character without accidently ricocheting onto another, setting in motion a virtual Mexican wave of abuse.

Aside from being a decent barometer of how people feel about Brown, Cameron and Clegg, the Slapometer is a therapeutic tool. It's soothing for the politically antipathetic soul. I've given Cameron 2893 slaps so far and boy, does it feel good!

AT

Thoughts on the First TV Leaders' Debate

2010-04-15T23:16:00.010+01:00

This general election has been the most exhaustively covered in UK history, so it's no wonder that my Facebook newsfeed is covered in statements and discussions about this evening's leaders' debate. It seems strange that democracy, the traditional method of giving the masses a voice, has been replaced by the internet which has proved to be a far more effective means of doing so. Now the politicians just have to listen.

Accordingly, the most intriguing thing about the leaders' debate was the live reaction tracker, which allowed viewers to respond in real time via the internet to what they liked or disliked about what each leader said (worth a mention is also this site, which is a less official but funnier way to respond to the leaders, link courtesy of Annalise). The public's response to the debate could then be gauged to ultimately see if there was an overall winner decided by the most important factor of all - public opinion. Suffice to say according to the ITV poll, more or less throughout the entire debate the Lib Dems held the lead, with Labour closely behind, followed by the Conservatives trailing in the dust. The next opinion poll results will certainly be an interesting read.

I won't labouriously write a summary of what was said - you can already find these in depth at the Guardian and the Times, which should give a reasonably balanced view of what took place. However, I will say that Nick Clegg is surprisingly an excellent rhetorician, and cleaned up on issues related to law and order. Instead of complaining that Labour weren't punishing criminals enough as David Cameron did, he spoke about how prisons are being turned into "colleges of crime", and how instead the country should be rehabilitating petty offenders. Finally, a politician who understands that constructive measures are the only way to solve society's problems rather than implementing more slapdash, money wasting deterrents.

Gordon Brown disappointingly brought out the ubiquitous false figures that immigration is falling, which is beginning to annoy me. Why would he do this when he knows how salient and potentially explosive an issue immigration is? Cameron proposed a quota which cut immigration right down, but I am again inclined to agree with Nick Clegg that immigration should be managed on the basis of which parts of the country needs immigrant workers the most. After all, immigration is necessary, but it must be managed fairly and sensibly.

Brown must have picked up on Clegg's popularity though as on a few occassions, mostly with specific issues related to immigration and the reputation of politicians, he went about partially agreeing with Clegg (an actual quote "I agree with Nick.... I think Nick also agrees with me....") possibly to butter him up for a coaltion, and possibly to isolate Cameron. Or maybe it was a bit of both?

I think the general consensus that Clegg came across the best is because he was being honest instead of slinging mud. His party is, give or take a few people, squeaky clean in terms of all the scandals hitting politicians recently, and his mature response to the immense problems being faced by the UK is impressive and reassuring. However it's also true that it's easy to stand in the middle of two warring factions and preach peace. The proof is in the parliamentary pudding, and Clegg has yet had the chance to substantively follow through on his policies. If The Sun's YouGov opinion poll is correct though, Clegg could get this chance sooner rather than later, with the figures showing the Lib Dems to have won the debate by a mile with a 51% majority compared to the Tories' 29% and Labour's 19% (the product of months of anti-Labour propoganda I'd imagine).

But this is not the end for the leaders. There are still two more debates to come, so though the Lib Dems may be riding high at the moment, they need to sustain this for it to make any difference in the elections.

LM

Thrilla in Westminsta?

2010-04-15T11:17:00.009+01:00

In 1975 in the Philippines; Manila to be exact, one of the most intense verbal grudge matches ever was taking place between boxers Mohammed Ali and Joe Frazier. The bile was extreme, the arrogance unfettered, and when the fight commenced, history was made.

Unfortunately Gordon Brown won't be aiming powerful left-hooks at David Cameron's face tonight, but the lead up to the first party leaders' debate has been as equally hate fuelled as Manila in 1975. Anyone would be forgiven for forgetting that this is politics. Indeed, the questionable smear campaign on Gordon Brown, plus the obviously bitter resentment between the two main party leaders has made for a maddening/entertaining run up to the elections. The anti-climax you will feel when you finally slip your ballot into the box will be unprecedented. Trust me.

Some things to look out for:

Brown reminding us all of the letter printed in the Telegraph signed by 50 economists worldwide, supporting Labour's lead on the economic crisis and condemning the Tories' plans to ditch further National Insurance cuts.

Cameron asking us if we really want another five years of this bumbling old fool.

Brown reiterating that both the Tories' and the Lib Dems' economic plans are fairy-tale nonsense.

Cameron claiming that Labour's economic plans will leave the majority worse off with unfair tax increases.

Nick Clegg being able to comfortably take the middle ground, trashing anything either man says and saying that the Lib Dems have all the solutions.

Cameron using the word 'change' a lot.

All men using plactory non-commital language on issues of employment, immigration and education.

All men prefixing answers with the reliable get-out clause "Well the question, I think, is actually about..."

The problem with TV debates is that in a climate of ridiculously hyperactive media coverage, they are an unfair way of essentially swaying the election outcome. We may be taken back to Nixon sweating in the the 1960 US Presidential debate, which apparently scuppered his chances of winning the elections. Like a Machiavellian nightmare, TV debates operate on the premise that people only ever judge by appearances. So tonight, if one man does one thing wrong - interrupts, raises his voice, sweats, trembles, stumbles over a word - you can bet the media will be all over it tomorrow morning like a pack of ravenous hyenas. David Cameron has already criticised the rules of the debates, saying they could make them "slow and sluggish", and though he is right, Labour have attacked him (naturally) for questioning the rules his own party had agreed upon. It's true that the ridiculous 76 point rules are incredibly constricting - apparently banning booing or cheering - but in the name of impartiality all this has to be done. The Telegraph makes some good points about the difference between British and US politics, and how TV debates could be unfair here, but also that they may give us the opportunity to really see the men behind the PR masks.

All that's left to say is...FIGHT!

LM

The Liberal Democrats: Out-Lefting Labour?

2010-04-14T14:15:00.016+01:00

The Liberal Democrats' general election manifesto, revealed today, is a remarkably "leftist" document - at least by today's mainstream political standards. The emphasis on creating a fairer tax system makes the manifesto more redistributive than Labour's, which in turn is more redistributive than previous New Labour manifestos. The party's plan to raise the tax free personal allowance to £10 000, combined with the fact that it is to be funded partially by a mansion tax, exemplifies this point. Plus they must be pretty keen on this policy to swallow the £16.8bn it's going to cost. The Lib Dem manifesto is also disdainful of higher earners, pleasing to the CND, generous in terms of education pledges, and soft on prison sentences. It's a document that Labour would most likely be proud to call its own.

The character of the Lib Dems' manifesto reflects a good compromise between the social democratic and liberal wings of the party: left on tax and social policy, strong on civil liberties. Kudos to them for reaching a decent intra-party consensus, but is forging an inter-party consensus between the Lib Dems and the Conservatives in a coalition government feasible, given the ideological disparity that evidently exists between the two parties?

AT

Voter Apathy Gets Constructive

2010-04-13T16:53:00.019+01:00

Voter apathy is a-risin', with the UK having seen a 61% turnout in 2005 and a paltry 59% turnout in 2001, compared to about 78% back in 1992, and an astonishing 83% in 1950.

There are various technical explanations for this, but to me the reason seems clear: people see politics for what it is - motivated by lies, greed, and power. Most people then cynically believe that 'whoever you vote for, the government always get in'. What's more, with the UK's majoritarian voting system, people see that their vote barely counts anyway and just give up hope altogether. Encapsulating this attitude, I encountered a guy a few weeks ago when I tried my hand at election canvassing, who leant out of his window (which was emanating a suspiciously heady odour), and upon hearing that I was from a political party, said "I'm voting for myself bruv".

But voter apathy doesn't always mean that people are completely politically disengaged. I have come to be aware of at least two movements set up for the upcoming general election which seek to use democracy for a perceived positive change.

The first I will discuss is the Give Your Vote movement. This is essentially a method for disillusioned voters to vote by proxy on behalf of someone in a developing country - either Afghanistan, Bangladesh or Ghana.

The site reasons that "The UK makes decisions about climate change, migration, poverty and war that directly affect millions around the world. There is no democratic means for those outside the UK to have a say in how these decisions are made" which seems fair enough. On closer inspection though there are a number of criticisms that could be levelled at the movement. Firstly, if 20 000 Lib Dem voters can't oust the Conservatives in North Wiltshire, how can a few thousand proxy votes scattered around the country even make a scratch on the election results? This alone shows the promise that "you can bend the rules to inspire a new way of thinking" to be a naïve, idealistic dream, and more charity than solidarity. Furthermore, it seems strangely ironic that an Afghan person could possibly vote Labour with this system; showing support for the party who agreed to go to war in their country. That this campaign has become one of the most read topics on the BNP's forums speaks for itself, but that was pretty predictable. I like the idea of Give Your Vote, but it's far from realistic, and the energy could be spent organising aid rather than giving people a vote so useless that UK citizens don't even want it.

The second movement is called 'It's All Their Fault' and is a rail against the 'baby boomer' generation who are apparently the reason the world is in such a mess right now. Founder Neil Boorman is semi-famous for publically burning all his branded possessions a few years ago in a stand against consumerism. Below is the video of their manifesto, which outlines their stance and the action that can be taken.

Boorman has a point - the baby boomer generation went to uni for free, picked up dole payments during holidays, and yet are systematically denying this to younger generations whilst also destroying the economy and the environment. However, to make this movement work it is necessary to vote only for people under 45 or over 65. This poses two problems - the first is that the baby boomer mentality is probably far less transitory than being within a 20 year period; surely people born before and after it also acquired some of the attitude? Secondly voting only for people outside of the baby boomer age range is quite limiting in terms of who it allows you to vote for. What if the only candidate outside of the baby boom age range represented UKIP or the BNP? Also the same problem with the Give Your Vote campaign would occur with this one - even if 20 000 people join up, the majoritarian voting system along with their scattered geographical positions would leave little, if any mark on parliament.

These movements are brave and painfully idealistic, and their sentiment should be valued. However, realistically voter apathy should be channeled into beating the system from within, rather than trying to create one's own outside of it.

LM

Marry for Love, Not for Three Quid a Week!

2010-04-11T14:47:00.011+01:00

The idea of a marriage tax break was floated by the Tories at the beginning of the year. At the time, David Cameron commented in an interview that a Conservative government would send out a signal that "if you take responsibility you will be rewarded, if you don't you won't". From this line, it's easy to see why there is so much opposition to the proposal. Linking marriage and responsibility implies that single mothers and women who've divorced to escape domestic violence are irresponsible for not holding the institution of marriage in higher regard than other concerns. And how are widows supposed to feel about the tax break? Ed Balls was right to remark that the policy amounted to "social engineering".

The last week's barrage of critcisms on the proposed tax allowance for married couples reflect what was said by Labour and the Lib Dems back in January. Brown slated the tax allowance for essentially "taking money away from children." Clegg employed a bit of Cable-esque wit and said, “Miriam and I got married for love, not for three quid a week." Vince Cable himself ridiculed the worth of the policy (the full £150 a year for couples in which the chief earner's income falls between £7 300 and £42 500): "It is an absolutely derisory sum, the price of a cappuccino." It's also likely to be a few cappuccinos more than the next government will be able to afford, given the state of the government's finances. Surely after calling for austerity, it would be wise to fund only the policies and programmes that are deemed necessary and will make a substantial difference, not something as frivolous as a tiny tax break? A YouGov poll on the subject suggests that the public is dubious about the policy, with 9% warning that they would vote for other parties in response.

On his Telegraph blog, journalist Ed West defended the policy on the basis of the rationality of incentives: offer a financial incentive for someone to do something, and he/she will be more likely to do it. Yet does the economics apply so simply and directly to the decision to get married or to stay married, which involves taking into account huge and often overbearing non-financial concerns? And would such a paltry incentive do the trick? Ed West concluded with his objection to the left-wing/liberal opposition of the marriage tax break: "At the heart of this is not a concern for justice, poverty or genuine liberalism, but some ongoing psychological rebellion by the post-Bloomsbury middle-class Left against 'Victorian' morality. And, my God, it’s boring." But it is a genuinely liberal endeavour to fight against monolithic belief systems, such as the "marriage-is-always-preferable" school of thought. Liberals strive for a pluralistic society, free - beyond a certain point - from the state telling citizens through any form of coercion how they should lead their personal lives.

When it comes to the family, it appears as though Victorian morality = Thatcherite morality = "new" Tory morality. The sums of this policy do seem a little off to me.

AT

Tories Support Private Sector Shocker

2010-04-11T11:40:00.005+01:00

The Conservatives who previously appeared to be a reactionary party with all the right rhetoric, are finally beginning to reveal their true substance after the general election was announced.

The latest problem in their policy relates to their promise of stringent cuts on public sector pay. According to David Cameron, the Tories would establish a fair pay review to ensure that no senior manager in the public sector can earn more than 20 times more than the lowest paid person in their organisation. Cameron sees this as a progressive move, showing Labour up to be "reactionary" and past-it. However, though this 'pay multiple' idea was inspired by private companies who wanted to introduce fairer and more equal pay into their organisations (the famously philanthropic John Lewis are one business who use this), Cameron has not mentioned anything about implementing the same system back into private industry. It seems almost comically hypocritical that so many business leaders would show their support for the Tories by signing a sanctimonious letter calling for a freeze in National Insurance tax, saying it "will protect jobs and support the recovery", but are not even being considered for having a pay multiple introduced in their companies which would also "protect jobs and support the recovery".

Essentially Cameron is hitting the public and leaving the private even though in many private industries the disparity in pay between highest and lowest is at least 20 times or more. To avoid this, many companies subcontract work for the lowest paid jobs, which increases 'competition', but is in actual fact just a cost cutting method, and way of avoiding their books looking astonishingly unequal.

If Cameron truly wants to be progressive he should be focusing on public and private pay gaps. By promoting a cut on only public sector pay, he is reinforcing the old stereotype of Tories as the party of the rich.

LM

National Citizen Service

2010-04-09T11:23:00.008+01:00

This week's press has been dominated not only by NI contributions nonsense and attempts to make sense of the Tory budget maths, but also by Conservative plans to bring in National Citizen Service, which would serve as a modern-day, voluntary equivalent of the retired National Service. All 16-year-olds would be offered the chance to join a two-month summer course which, in essence, would be an amalgamation of community service and physical/teamwork activities. The long-run objective of the supposedly character-building scheme is to cut crime and anti-social behaviour. The idea of National Citizen Service has been well-received by the public; a YouGov poll recorded 77% in favour, compared with only 14% who think it's a bad idea.

David Cameron has lauded the National Citzen Service scheme as the way to solve the “national scandal of all this wasted promise”: the government's failure to adequately integrate youths into mainstream society. When making the case for his proposal, the emotive language he spews smacks of his sappy "hug a hoody" speech. As if narrating for a film like Kidulthood, he proclaims, "Show me a young kid acting up in class and I'll show you someone who feels deep down they'll never make anything of their life. Show me a gang taking drugs and I'll show you a group of young people who have nothing to look forward to." It always seems misplaced when this Old Etonian claims he knows how to cure the ills of underprivileged kids. Moreover, I doubt that gang members and vandals will be the ones who readily take up the scheme. In my view, it's more likely to be a middle-class thing, something the parents push their teens into doing because it will look good on their university applications.

I don't actually have a problem with the scheme itself. Today's young cohort is more disaffected than ever before and for all the benefits they derive from the internet, they lose out in terms of more constructive outdoor and social activities. Yet presenting National Citizen Service as a gift specifically for troublesome teens is silly. If this is the kind of change you want to effect, tackle child poverty and restructure primary education to better promote child development. If you really want to shape the lives of young people, you have to get to them earlier.

AT

We Don't Need No Education...or Jobs Apparently

2010-04-09T10:20:00.007+01:00

The media has gone into a hitherto unseen level of overdrive this week since Gordon Brown officially announced the general election on Tuesday. This particular blog will not be able to keep up with the unbelievable volume of news and analysis presented daily by the paid journalists with our national papers, but we will continue to bring a coherent voice to the cacophany of opinion. If you've been a regular reader, you will have noticed for example that it was here, before many of the national papers, where the Tories' national insurance plans were first deconstructed and shown for what they are. But I digress.

As a student, I've found David Cameron's approach to issues which will directly affect me quite disappointing. Firstly, he has admitted that university tuition fees might have to rise. Now, this is a bad thing on two counts, the first is because higher fees reduce the incentive for poorer students to go to university, and the second is because the government, which is massively in debt, would then be criticised for paying out millions of pounds of loans to poorer students. This scenario therefore means that the majority of people going to university would be the among the richest. So much for the Tories criticising Brown for increasing the gap between rich and poor on their smear campaign posters.

When questioned about accusations that his economic plans could cost up to 40 000 public sector jobs within a few years, Cameron did not dispute the figures, and responded that they referred to jobs 'cut' by vacancies not being filled rather than people getting made redundant. This may make people already employed breath a sigh of relief, but for students and recent graduates this is bad news. With the recession and massive amount of people leaving university every year, losing 40 000 potential jobs is a recipe for unemployment disaster. Already people who have worked hard for three years, sometimes at top institutions, are taking temp jobs or are left unemployed, so what would the effects be if 40 000 jobs were simply made unavailable in the public sector?

This may seem speculative, but with the research into the Tories' numbers and a damning report from the Institute of Fiscal Studies, my reactionary predictions may not be so outrageous after all.

LM

No Tory Glory

2010-04-07T09:15:00.011+01:00

When the 1997 election date was announced, Labour's lead in the polls ranged between 20 and 25 points. Why the Conservatives are not in a similar position today is simply baffling. The incumbent government has two unpopular wars and a recession under its belt - not to mention a prime minister who couldn't fall further in public approval ratings if he tried. Cameron should be walking this.

Yet a 10% poll lead only points towards a marginal victory - if not a large margin of error. Jonathan Freedland's article in the Guardian suggests why the Tories aren't in the position New Labour were in 13 years ago. Aside from George Osborne's dodgy maths specifically and Tory confusion more generally, Freedland attributes voter nervousness about the Tories to the party's failure to evolve its '80s form. "They see an appealing shop window, but inside is a party whose cash register still rings with the millions of an exiled billionaire who is ready to sit in our second chamber." And maybe a poster in the window advertising 'Grayling's Bed and Breakfast - No Queers Please'.

Trying to make the best of a bad situation, Fraser Nelson of The Spectator has written an article in praise of the Conservative poll lead. In contrast to Freedland's article, Nelson seems to suggest current Tory popularity is down to the fact that the party hasn't fundamentally changed. "If the Tories say 'we're shiny and modern!' no one cares. When they cut taxes, people listen." Just like the days of old, you'll get lower taxes and lower-quality public services with the Conservatives, and higher taxes and better public services with Labour. What Nelson argues is that people will vote in a self-interested way (quite an obvious point), but what he fails to point out is that the National Insurance tax cut is reminiscent of a traditional Tory party offering.

And in harking back, the Conservative party is reneging on current commitments. When trying to reduce the public debt, one has three options: raise taxes, cut spending on public services, or do both. Having pledged to protect public services, Cameron's "modern" Tories can only fulfil their promise to cut debt substantially by raising taxes. Freezing IT projects - when really UK government desperately needs to enter the 21st century - and selling property is not enough. If the Conservatives are serious about the deficit, why fight the NI rise so ferociously? The party has done much to raise voters' suspicions about its true nature, this tax matter being the latest in a series of incidents. If they had said and done nothing for the past few months, they'd probably be polling better. As things stand, it's highly likely they'll still clinch victory but, in the words of Jonathan Freedland once again, "it will be a victory tainted by failure."

AT

Polls, Parties, Politics

2010-04-06T00:53:00.011+01:00

Recent polling figures demonstrate either a high margin of error, or an undecided electorate. An ICM poll carried out last week gave the Conservative party a lead that would produce a Commons majority, and suggested a relatively small gap between Labour and the Lib Dems; the more recent one saw this lead trimmed to four points, which could mean Labour would still win a seat majority. To add to the confusion, the latest YouGov poll put the Tories at 41% and Labour at 31%. Opinium Research reports the same size of margin, only at 39% and 29% respectively.

With such great uncertainty surrounding the 2010 general election, everyone is looking to the polls to shed light on voter preferences. Yet should we be scrutinising them to such an extent, or relying on their predictive capacity? The latest ICM survey included a question concerning the fickleness of voters, to which 29% of Labour and 29% of Conservative supporters responded that they might swtich away from their first-choice party. Worryingly for the Lib Dems, just over half of their supporters responded that they would stick with their current party choice until 6 May.

The voter volatility evident in recent polling figures signifies a real lack of party loyalty and with so little choice in British politics (will someone reform the electoral system so we can have multi-partyism please?!), swing voters keep switching sides. It's a sad state of affairs when one is forced to choose between the lesser of evils rather than making a truly positive vote, but that's the state that many of us are in.

AT

Homophobia is Gay

2010-04-03T22:40:00.011+01:00

It seems that recently the Conservatives have revealed a side of themselves they would rather not show in light of their continual failure on issues of gay rights.

The latest controversy surrounds the Conservative Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling, who is reported to have been caught on a secret recording during a meeting with think tank the Centre for Policy Studies, defending B & B owners' right to turn away homosexual couples at their discretion. This argument seemed to rest on the fact that B & Bs are largely run in people's homes, and since home owners have the right to turn away people at their discretion, so should B & B owners. The example of a Christian B & B owner was given, with Grayling stating that it is up to them whether or not to allow homosexuals into their establishment.

As the Guardian reported, the Labour party attacked Grayling's comments, saying that they ran contrary to the Equality Act (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2007, which state that no one should be refused goods or services on the grounds of their sexuality.

Interestingly, on the ever useful public whip website, 29 Conservatives are listed to have differed from the majority vote of the rest of their party on the Equality Act (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2007.

The majority vote of the Conservatives was 83 votes against the motion, and the aforementioned 29 were for the motion.

Cynically, 21 of the Conservatives who voted for the motion were front benchers who had an image to maintain, including David Cameron, George Osborne, and ironically Chris Grayling. Most of the 83 who voted against the motion were backbenchers, but a few were frontbenchers at the time such as Eric Pickles. Other prominent Tory figures such as Kenneth Clarke and Ian Duncan Smith are also reported to have voted against the motion.

In statistical terms, 74% of the 112 Conservatives who voted on the issue voted against it. That is quite a significant majority, and makes you wonder why the Tory whips didn't police the party more stringently, especially since most of the Shadow Cabinet voted for the motion. That the Shadow Cabinet and frontbenchers differed greatly from the reams of backbenchers in their vote gives more weight to my article about judging a party by their backbenchers, not their media-pruned frontbenchers. In this light, the Conservatives' newfound image and credibility could easily be construed as a hollow sham.

Further embarrassing failures on gay rights which have been conveniently forgotten by many newspapers are David Cameron's cringeworthy Gay Times interview, posted below for your enjoyment, and the related issue of Tory MEPs' refusal to vote against a homophobic motion being proposed for implementation in Lithuania.

The gay vote is not one to be underestimated, and the Tories' succession of mistakes and failures on gay issues could mean that the confidence the gay community has previously shown in them could easily be lost.

LM

Poster Wars

2010-04-02T21:02:00.029+01:00

Today Jedward - sorry, I mean the Miliband brothers - smiled awkwardly and unleashed upon Basildon a van displaying the latest Labour campaign poster. Designed for a nationwide competition (Labour can't afford a decent ad. agency), the poster portrays David Cameron as Gene Hunt in Ashes to Ashes. The Labour attempt at a personal attack on the Tory leader has pretty much backfired, as many people view the Gene Hunt comparison as flattering, including Cameron himself. After all, the portrayal is completely antithetical to Cameron's image as Posh Boy from Eton, so it may well do him a favour. Additionally, many are not averse to the idea of a return to the '80s. Yes, it was a time of civil unrest and great unemployment, but it was also a time of prosperity (albeit not for everyone) and large-scale modernisation relative to the preceding decade. The poster has already been spoofed online a multitude of times, with edited versions defending the Tories' Thatcherite past or slating Labour's record in the 1970s. An article on the Tory Bear website declares that the poster is "a spectacular own goal", associating Cameron with a popular figure and a popular era. What a gaff for Labour.

The latest Tory posters are only marginally better, brutally attacking Gordon Brown and his party's track record with taglines such as "I increased the gap between rich and poor - vote for me" and "I doubled the national debt - vote for me". Of course, these too have been savaged/modified/corrected (depending on your political views) by members of the online community. The age of the poster campaign is seemingly dead; as soon as one is released, mere minutes pass before it is spoofed. Vandalised billboards and spoof websites achieve more publicity than the original posters, rendering the latter self-defeating.

Meanwhile, the Lib Dems have embraced cyberspace by launching their "Labservative" campaign online as well as on billboards. Labservative.com mocks the enduring two-party dominance of British politics, with its purple colour scheme and faux party name inferring that Labour and Conservative essentially offer the same thing to voters. Hence, a vote for the Labservative party is a vote "for more of the same". On the election manifesto page Gorvid Camerown, a rather frightening hybrid of Brown and Cameron, spews nonsense while standing in a room adorned with framed portraits of Thatcher and Blair respectively. I think a Nivid Cleggeron might've been more appropriate... Anyway, the overall concept is clever, and certainly well executed. Unfortunately, the Lib Dems' campaign is just as negative as the other ones. Every slogan is tinged with bitterness over the fact that Liberals have been politically third-wheeling it for decades now.

Is negative campaigning what the public really wants? In an interview on Sky News this morning, Dr Ruth Fox from the Hansard Society responded that there is research evidence to the contrary. People may react well to policy criticisms, but not to cheap and nasty personal attacks. The three main parties are wading in a sea of negativity by using posters to make the electorate associate their feelings of disillusionment with a particular party or leader. The former have only succeeded in shoring up contempt for British politics in general.

Vote for Liblabservatives: for more of the same silly party-political games.

AT

Businesses Contribute to National Insurance Row

2010-04-02T11:04:00.009+01:00

A letter was published last week in the Telegraph from a group of twenty three powerful business leaders arguing that Alistair Darling's 1% National Insurance increase would be bad for the recovering economy. Naturally the Conservatives are now using this letter - which incidentally contains signatures from known Tory donors - against Labour's main policy claim that they are the only party who can bring about financial recovery, and this could be yet another nail in Labour's rather large coffin.

One particular argument from the letter stands out to me as very misguided though. It states that "In the last two years, businesses across the country have cut their costs without undermining the service they provide to their customers. It is time for the Government to do the same." Essentially they want the Government to become more efficient "by removing the blizzard of irrelevant objectives, restrictive working practices, arcane procurement rules and Whitehall interference." This would be done by making efficiency cuts to the Government. However, the ultimate aim of these cuts seems to be to allow the public sector to become as productive as the private sector, which has apparently increased by 20% compared to the public sector's fall of 3%. This idea rests on a dangerous confusion between public and private though. The public sector's function, in its form as tax funded bodies, is not productivity or profit; rather to serve the interests of the government and/or its citizens. In relation to publically owned corporations, public services must conform more to market norms, but their function is still to provide a service rather than make profit.

The argument that the business leaders are making in the letter they sent to the Telegraph is for 'competition'. However, the ultimate ends of competition is in a monopoly of the market (see Starbucks, McDonalds, Tesco etc.) where smaller businesses are squeezed out because they are 'uncompetitive'. What in reality you may end up with is two extremes - the services for the rich, and the services for the poor; meaning that freedom through market choice is eradicated. In many instances this isn't totally the case; indeed there are multiple grey areas, but the possibility of this happening with public services is a more frightening prospect than it happening with food shops.

Showing that he wants to introduce competition into the governance of public services in an interview with the Guardian, Conservative Shadow Chancellor George Osborne said "What we have asked is whether it is necessary that these public services are entirely delivered as a monopoly through large, monolithic bureaucracies and whether you couldn't get a diversity of providers. [This is] particularly so in areas of the public service which have proved not very effective at reaching the most hard-to-reach people in our society." The governmental monopoly is perhaps not the most efficient thing in the world, especially when there's a massive deficit, but surely the only guarantee that public interest will remain the primary goal of public services is by having it controlled by the Government?

Osborne's plan to scrap the 1% National Insurance tax on people earning under £45 000 a year was criticised by Alistair Darling, who predicted it would lose him about £5.6bn in funds. Osborne proposed that this gap would be filled by the aforementioned 'efficiency cuts' in the government and public services, and interestingly has been taking the opportunity to valiantly defend the "aspirational hard-working majority" from Labour's tax hike. However, I find it difficult to believe Mr Osborne when on the one hand he agrees with the business leaders that the public sector should increase economic productivity, and on the other he is trying to defend the majority, many of whom work in businesses which are being squeezed by increased productivity competition and the resulting market monopolisation.

Osborne has said that he wouldn't make more than £6.5bn of cuts in this financial year - £6bn of that coming from efficiency cuts, and £500m from cuts to both child trust funds and tax credits for the better-off. Those cuts are £1.4bn more than Labour predicited the National Insurance tax would earn the government. So if there is so much waste, why haven't Labour cleaned it up already, and why are they proposing a tax hike to make up costs which could be met through efficiency cuts, as the Tories have pointed out?

My own guess is that 'efficiency cuts' would almost certainly cost jobs too, and so Labour have shied away from it. In fact upon doing some research, I found that the BBC's political editor Nick Robinson has said the same thing albeit in relation to the NHS rather than the government itself, both of which are public services. The brilliant thing about using 'efficiency cuts' against Labour, is that the Tories have an adequately nebulous term to placate disillusioned voters, but can also remain vague and non-committal about their own cuts.

During an interview with Radio 4, upon being reminded that his own party had not fully explained how they would "fill the hole" in the nation's finances, David Cameron lamely argued that the hole in Labour's plans was even bigger because the government had said less about what it would cut. I personally don't see that as a convincing reason to vote Conservative over Labour.

The ultimate choice of every government is how to balance economic prosperity with social justice, the problem is that at the moment the two main parties aren't being very transparent about the whole thing.

LM

Blair: The Sequel

2010-04-01T12:40:00.005+01:00

The former prime minister re-entered the fray of British politics on Tuesday when he delivered a speech in Trimdon, his former constituency. Tony Blair's efforts on the campaign trail may just be the missing piece in the puzzle for Labour; he is more centrist than the Brownites and therefore can assist in convincing "Middle England" that Labour is the party most deserving of their vote.

Yet could Blair's intermittent public presence in the weeks leading up to 6 May become a hindrance as opposed to a help? His oozing charisma and relaxed manner may serve to show swing voters that part of the Labour package they voted for in 1997 and onwards is distinctly lacking today - the well crafted wrapping is gone and all that is left is the Brown box. Conversely, the Tory package - albeit it relatively empty - is nicely wrapped and could lure to it those who don't really know what they want. The former Labour party leader now has to convince Middle England that Cameron is not the "heir to Blair", that what they have previously opted for is no longer on the table in a Labour or Tory form.

Another pressing worry is that the sudden appearance of Blair will remind the electorate of the troubles of New Labour, especially Iraq. The former minister Peter Kilfoyle voiced this concern: "He evokes very strong antagonism, frankly, particularly because of the Iraq war, but not only that - I think he epitomises all that people see as wrong about New Labour."

I appreciate these concerns but Blair articulates the anti-Tory message better than other prominent Labour figures can (i.e. Gordon Brown), and thus I believe him to be more an asset than a hindrance to the campaign. In the speech he gave at Trimdon, he contrasted the strong convictions and detailed policies of New Labour in 1997 with "the question mark over the Tories" in 2010. Blair also pointed out how they had made all the wrong moves, going right on Europe and left on law and order. In my view most importantly, he commented on the internal contradictions of the Conservatives regarding health policy; they seemingly seek to maintain the status quo, while also wanting to introduce free market principles to public services.

Tony Blair's message to Middle England was summed up by a single line: "Everywhere you look, where you want certainty, you get confusion." For those swing voters who supported New Labour, is it really time for a change to the Tories, or time for a change of heart on this one?

AT

Brown's Immigration Response

2010-03-31T10:09:00.005+01:00

Just after I wrote my piece on immigration a few days ago, Gordon Brown made a speech which attempted to address some of the issues which I raised. I doubt he read this site, but it was good to have an almost immediate political response to compare to my own suggestions.

Unfortunately though, it seems that he is pandering to the non-committal again. He used the standard economic argument which I criticised in my piece, then went on to say that "investing in the skills of our own workforce" is important, but in the next breath said that an immigration quota would be a bad thing since it would "deny businesses the skills they need". This contradiction is crucial, especially because Labour won't release details of the amount of people they intend to allow into the UK. Without this data we have no real conception as to how many people will be entering the UK, and how many workers will be outsourced as a result by cheaper foreign labour. It also seems a bit rich that people are worried about the UK's economic performance when it's already in dire need of attention. Immigration won't change that. In fact, many immigrants are leaving as a result of the deficit!

Brown was also economical with the truth in terms of his immigration statistics which, as I pointed out in my piece, were shown by Channel 4 journalist Cathy Newman to be a very sly stats fiddle. As it stands, Brown mixed up figures from different sets of statistics - including figures from different sources, and even different timespans! In fact as of June last year, immigration had risen by about 18 000, and that's ignoring the rest of the year. Read Cathy Newman's piece for the full story.

Aside from the wrong data, it is simply misleading to fiddle statistics as Brown did, and this further adds to the mistrust of politicians we have today. However, the worst thing about his speech wasn't necessarily the fiddled figures or the vague statements, but his use of the issue as polemic. As usual with immigration, politicians talk about the evils of what others (the BNP) say, but keep quiet about what they themselves will do. This leads to trying to gain votes by negatively identifying other parties, rather than trying to gain votes on one's own policy. If this is the only way a party can identify its stance on an issue, what substantive promise of action do we have?

LM

Ask The Chancellors

2010-03-29T12:31:00.012+01:00

Big surprise - the live televised debate between the three would-be Chancellors was somewhat uninspiring. Instead of giving a very detailed account of the hour-long special on Channel 4, which would entail incessant use of the words "cuts" and "banks" and would thoroughly depress anyone reading this, I have offered my highlights - the word "highlights" being a bit of a stretch - of the discussion that unfolded yesterday evening between Alistair Darling, George Osborne and Vince Cable (henceforth to be known as A.D., G.O. and V.C. respectively).

On the opening speeches:
G.O. expressed disapproval at the fact that next year the Government will be spending more on servicing its debt than on educating British children. He grumbled about the future rise in national insurance as well. V.C. proposed the need for a reformed economy that doesn't rely on a few "prima donnas", and for a new tax system. A.D. gave his now-familiar economic recovery and job creation spiel, to justify his year-long delay in cutting public spending.

On their personal qualities:
V.C. claimed he was good at anticipating problems, A.D. said he had "tenacity" and G.O. offered that his principle value was "responsibility".

Come clean about public spending cuts!
A.D. referred to his public sector pay freeze and admitted that the next year will be tough. G.O. said he would cut benefits like the child trust funds, deal with quangos and implement a public sector pay freeze. V.C. suggested a public sector pay freeze as well, getting rid of the Trident nuclear deterrent, reducing bureaucracy, scrapping the ID cards scheme and the national identity database, and cutting child trust funds. G.O. criticised the Government for not cutting sooner, to which A.D. responded that it made no sense for the Tories to push for cutting the public deficit while seeking to block a N.I. tax rise, which would cost £30bn over a 5-year period. V.C. chimed in that the Government's £11bn of efficiency savings are fictional. A.D. protested this accusation, saying that he has identified £5bn-worth of specific programmes to be cut, alongside the public sector pay freeze and pensions reduction.

On protecting the health service from cuts:
G.O. commented on his party's commitment to a real increase in NHS spending for every year they are in power. A.D. reminded the audience of Labour's doubling of health expenditure during its time in office. In contrast, V.C. argued that ring-fencing policy areas isn't a smart move, for it entails deeper cuts elsewhere, such as in defence, policing and local government. G.O.'s reply to this was that an ageing population and new medicines will require investment in healthcare.

On a possible death tax:
G.O. voiced his opposition to a 10% death tax which would pay for elderly care. V.C., on the other hand, would consider such a tax. A.D. said it's no longer an option being supported. G.O. pointed out that A.D. criticised him for not supporting a policy that Labour now isn't supporting!

On saving the middle classes from higher taxes:
G.O. claimed that seven out of ten people would be better off under the Tories. A.D. said that most of his tax rises are on higher earners. V.C. argued the case for fairness, with top earners paying a bit more and everyone else paying a bit less.

Will increasing the tax burden on higher earners cause them to move to Switzerland?
The short answer: no. G.O. remarked that higher taxes on the few couldn't be avoided. V.C. wouldn't tolerate "pin-striped Scargills" holding the country to ransom.

Is it Government's job to make society more equal?
All agreed (unless any of them believe in a "nightwatchman" state, of course they were going to say yes!). A.D. and G.O. bickered over the Tory plan to axe child tax credits for middle-income families. V.C. remarked that he thought G.O.'s "top tax priority" was reducing inheritance tax.

What's a recent graduate to do?
G.O. promised a jobs programme that would provide apprenticeships and training for youths unemployed for over six months. A.D. was optimistic about jobs, as the UK economy (apparently) still has its strengths, and there will be new jobs created by the growth of green industries. V.C. said that ensuring banks led to small firms would improve the employement situation. While G.O. dismissed the danger posed by a reduction in public spending, saying that one can't rely on the public sector for jobs, A.D. stressed the importance of public sector investment, especially the role of government in helping businesses.

So who came out on top? It's generally agreed that Vince Cable gave the best performance; he's more charismatic than the other two and he avoided being cornered on any issue. Conversely, Osborne seemed insincere and got himself into trouble with his misguided national insurance policy. Aside from his death-tax blunder, Alistair Darling was fine. As I said before, the event wasn't all that entertaining - it was all policy and no Punch and Judy! I hope the leaders debates pack a bigger punch, and yet with all the pre-agreed rules, I unfortunately doubt that will be the case.

AT

Immigration: The Silent Issue?

2010-03-28T10:49:00.019+01:00

Both Gordon Brown and David Cameron have breached the hitherto silent topic of immigration recently, making similar statements about nebulous points based systems, and admitting that the current rate (apparently a net amount of about 200 000 people a year, shown in the graph below from the Office of National Statistics, dated 2008 since the full figures from 2009 are not yet available) is too much and needs to be curbed. The livewire issue of immigration has been dwarfed this year by the deficit, but let's not forget that it was one of the main differentiating Tory policies under Michael Howard's leadership in the 2005 general election, and will play an important part in this year's general election too.

The government has failed dramatically on immigration. There have been around 1.5 million immigrants from Eastern Europe alone over the past six years, and though many of them spread out around the UK or only do seasonal work, there is a sizeable amount who stay put, mostly in the South East of England - where the most jobs are. The fact that the government predicted that there would be around only 5000 - 13 000 people from Eastern Europe per year entering the UK was grossly mistaken, and they have subsequently admitted this. What's more, Cathy Newman of the Channel 4 news team has revealed that Gordon Brown fiddled his immigration figures to show that net immigration to the UK had fallen, but in fact it has risen.

There is one main reason I can see first-hand which points to a real failure on the part of the government to deal with immigration, and that is that the infrastructure of the South East is straining beneath the weight of the sheer amount of people living here. Buses are fuller, jobs are more oversubscribed, the affordable housing market is saturated. Now the Government are looking to build on the greenbelt again to fuel the housing demand, and are springing up horrible, utility blocks in every residential area to cater to the visible rise in population. Indeed, in answer to the question 'why is greenbelt land under threat?' the Energy Saving Secrets website answers "In a word: space. As the UK population continues to rise, the demand for land and housing increases too." So it's not just a racist's delusion. Furthermore, countless reports on the news of people travelling over land and sea to make it not to France, Spain or Germany, but to the UK (see for example the people living in squalor in Calais at the moment) add more fuel to the issue. It's not that these things are making people angry, but they are certainly visible representations of the UK's lax immigration policy.

There was a brilliant moment on the episode of Question Time where British National Party leader Nick Griffin appeared, and after he had been destroyed by the audience and panel; with Jack Straw playing the sanctimonious goody, a black man angrily told him that there is an immigration problem and that it needs to be dealt with. Of course Griffin jumped at this and Straw was left in a stuttering mess. But the point is that immigration is not an issue of colour, religion or ethnicity in the UK - we're beyond that nonsense - it's an issue of sheer amount of people no matter who they are.

The general argument for immigration is that it helps bolster the economy which creates more wealth for the country. Immigration is also not a problem since many of the immigrants will actually go home, or if not, help boost the UK's ageing population and low fertility rates. Though I find the latter argument fair, there are two problems with the economic argument, one of which relates to unskilled labour, and the other to skilled labour.

The recession occured regardless of this economic argument, and therefore my suspicions about the cynicism of immigration policy related to unskilled labour have been partially confirmed. Businesses are allowed to have the most say on the issue and in doing so they kill two birds with one stone. On the one hand they can be seen to be encouraging diversity and acceptance, and on the other they can benefit from the immigrants' inevitable cheap labour.

Whilst I agree that skilled immigrants should be brought in to improve the UK's services, I also think that in some cases this can turn into another slapdash method of covering up the UK's own social problems. If it is cheaper to pay a wage to someone from abroad than train a UK citizen, this lack of investment only propels the cycle of unemployment and hopelessness which plagues certain parts of the country.

An example of this can actually be found in football (yes, footballers are 'skilled'). Compared to many other countries, UK football teams produce relatively little 'home-grown' talent, and instead opt for importing the best foreign players. Although this is good for the game, it has an adverse affect on aspiring young UK footballers, many of whom are from deprived areas. This issue was outlined in full in a Times article, showing that as well as the negative influence of the UK's poor social conditions, compared to other European countries, its football clubs and Government also invest far less in raw talent, and instead tacitly agree that buying foreign players is cheaper (in the sense that a £10m price-tag is cheaper than building and continually running a youth academy), safer and easier for the game. So what of those young players? They're in the same situation as the unemployed, untrained labour force - outsourced because it's cheaper to import foreign workers. Incidentally, the Tories' new immigration policy has been criticised for potentially preventing football clubs from signing foreign players! Surely that could actually be a good thing for UK football, even though the billion pound earning clubs may lose a bit of money?

The reasons for a curb on immigration stated above are not exhaustive, rather they are some thoughts as to why immigration is such a salient issue in the UK. The critical focus for the current immigration policy's problems has been on, rather than a liberal conspiracy or a hatred of foreigners, how businesses and the Government cut spending corners in importing labour. Indeed, paying a largely paltry wage is cheaper than setting up the facilities for training, then paying a subsequent wage to a worker, whether it's a footballer or an administrator.

Whilst it is totally understandable that many people are outraged at the prospect of curbing immigration for varying reasons - the economic benefit, the cultural benefit, humanitarian duty, fairness - the rather reactionary form this can take has perversely politicised the issue more than it should be. In shifting their focus of the prime definition of society from a class-based approach to a more ethnicity-based approach, pro-immigration activists (including human rights activists in some cases) have also paved the way for political action based on the ethnic societal cleavage, and that's exactly where the BNP step in.

The BNP are clearly a deplorable party, but nevertheless one which is gaining an increasingly more ambitious and serious role in elections. Their main policy issue focuses on the same ethnic societal cleavage that has been overemphasised by pro-immigration activists and the egg-shell stepping Government. They want, simply, all immigrants out. And people actually vote for this party! Unreasonable as it may sound, the incapacity of the Government to make a fair and objective decision on the immigration issue, instead letting big business justify its poor decisions, has allowed for a reactionary movement to edge its way into prominance; preying on people's anger and fears over immigration. This is not the way immigration should be dealt with, and all the BNP are doing is scaremongering with sensationalist, unfalsifiable claims which destroys any capacity for reasoned debate on the issue.

Immigration is a sensitive thing, whether you're for or against it, and parties are finally realising this, including the Lib Dems. It needs to be dealt with in a nuanced manner, without ascribing rigid definitions to ethnic groups or seeing immigrants as quotas to fill. It is necessary to be very careful but firm with who is and isn't let in, and on what basis this is. Businesses shouldn't be allowed to have a say, and in cases where immigration means cheap labour, should be forced to invest in training a workforce who already lives in the UK. There are further sensitive citizenship issues which I won't touch, but hope that the professionals can adequately and maturely deal with.

LM

Selling the Candidates 2010

2010-03-27T11:24:00.021Z

One of my favourite political books is Selling of the President 1968, which follows Nixon on his journey to becoming a television president. Through a carefully crafted TV campaign, advertising executives sold Nixon to the public. This book wonderfully illustrates how the commercialism of the '50s and '60s began to permeate political life, and the transformation that was taking place due to the growth of TV ownership. The mid-twentieth century ushered in a new era of politics not for the camera-shy, an era that would see style over substance came to the fore and political PR become a mainstream profession.

Richard Nixon was painfully aware of how important "image" had become, having experienced an election defeat to John F. Kennedy because of it. In the 1960 presidential election race, the first televised presidential debates took place. In the opening debate, Kennedy came across as handsome, athletic and confident; Nixon looked pale and tired (he hadn't yet recovered from a hospital stay). Americans who watched the debate thought Kennedy had won it, whereas radio listeners believed that Nixon had emerged victorious. The debate attracted 80 million viewers and thus proved influential on polling day. In the US today, TV advertising is an extremely important vehicle for publicising a presidential candidate; in 2008 Obama's campaign flooded the airwaves with paid TV ads., including a 30-minute infomercial broadcast across three US networks, costing around $6m (the most expensive single piece of political advertising in the country's history).

In the UK we have strict regulations concerning election campaigns, to prevent the most well-funded candidate essentially buying the election through the purchase of airtime. The televised debates to come will doubtless be influential in the close race between the two main parties. Yet for the most part, candidates vying for the premiership are marketed to the average Joe through poster campaigns. In particular, advertising giants the Saatchi brothers have attemped to sell the Conservative party to the British public on and off for the last three decades now, with their "Labour Isn't Working" campaign for Margaret Thatcher initiating the relationship.

The Tories' most recent billboard campaign, featuring the now infamous airbrushed face of Cameron, was branded "rubbish - silly" by Lord Bell, who was managing director of Saatchi and Saatchi during the Thatcher era. He also said that the Tories have made a PR faux-pas by "trying to be liked"! The billboards were vandalised both on the streets and online (see previous post); this fiasco compelled the Tories to re-hire M&C Saatchi to work their marketing magic. Rather surprisingly, their former company recently worked for the Labour party, producing the "Not Flash, Just Gordon" poster.

You cannot accuse Gordon Brown's Labour party of employing overly-slick advertising tactics. The message effectively conveyed by the above poster is that Brown is all about substance. Giving the cold shoulder to the cameras, his election campaigning has primarily consisted of direct discussions with the public. The Guardian's creative director may have commented that Labour's current election publicity has "all the boldness of a muesli advert", but maybe that's OK. It only serves to widen the gulf between Cameron and Brown and their respective parties on the style-substance spectrum. While Labour are putting policy on posters, the Tories are gearing up to reveal their most aggressive smear campaign against Gordon Brown, with six new posters of the prime minister pleading for votes and admitting his policy failures. Ironically, it is one of Tony Blair's former spin doctors, Lord Mandelson, who underlines the fundamental problem with Cameron: "He is too much PR, and not enough PM."

AT

Don't Ignore the Backbenchers

2010-03-27T10:36:00.014Z

The judgement of both main political parties has largely been focused on the leaders and their ministerial henchmen up till now. The media machine uses the aesthetics of this small group of people to make judgements on the whole party, but in politics this is completely wrong. This is because to ignore the majority of a party, you are also ignoring the majority of views of the parts of the country those politicians represent.

Instead we should also be looking to the reams of backbenchers in each party to fully judge that particular party's ideological persuasion, and to make a prediction as to how the media-friendly policies being proposed by the leaders will be actualised.

At the bankbench level, it is interesting to see how the centrist stance of the leaders and their minisiters becomes more diluted into a clearly defined left or right leaning view.

Paul Flynn, Labour MP for Newport West (and the man who invented the genius nickname 'Doris Karloff' for Anne Widdecombe), is a good example of an outspoken backbencher who represents another side to the Labour party we're familiar with today. Showing that not all Labour MPs are scum, Flynn has been vindicated for the fact that he has been "going on about the lobbyists for many years", as he said in a brief email exchange with me recently. Indeed, Flynn was actually interviewed by the now infamous Dispatches lobbying programme, but his contribution wasn't aired since the MPs ended up giving the game away themselves. The fact that Flynn has been aware of this problem for longer than most, and that he has constantly tried to draw attention to it, shows a propensity to justice that is often absent amongst the well-know politicians.

Interestingly, Flynn takes the distinction between New and Old Labour very seriously, and clearly falls onto the side of Old Labour i.e. socialist Labour. This lobbying scandal, he says, is New Labour sleaze; nothing to do with Old Labour. In his latest book, 'The Unusual Suspect' he describes his idea of New Socialism, which is "Classic Socialism minus the greed, sleaze and failed concepts." He has also attacked MPs who accept hospitality from foreign countries in exchange for essentially lobbying parliament on their behalf. This was apparently done by one of the MPs on the Commons Standards and Privileges Committee; the very body that is supposed to police such behaviour. Continuing the institutional corruption, a Lord on the Prime Minister's Advisory Committee for Business Appointments (Acoba) was also implicated in the lobbying scandal. Flynn incidentally voted against his being appointed to Acoba last year.

Thus we can see that the Labour backbench still has social welfare-oriented MPs, which may outrage the libertarians among us. Indeed, Flynn voted strongly for the hunting and smoking bans, and moderately against introducing student top-up fees, but he also voted very strongly against the Iraq war according to the data at theyworkforyou.com. This is surely good news for any disillusioned Labour voters, although quite how socialism will deal with the globalised free-market economy and the UK's deficit is unclear.

So if certain Labour backbenchers are still essentially socialist, then are Conservative backbenchers still free-market libertarians?

Philip Davies, MP for Shipley is certainly a good starting point for analysing the unseen Tory ranks who could be in Government come May. Davies has been a controversial figure for a few years now, being accused of racist and sexist remarks on a number of occassions. In one instance he was jokingly portrayed by the media as lobbying for blacking up when he sent a letter to Trevor Phillips, chairman of the Equality and Human Rights Commission asking why it was racist to black up. Furthermore, in 2007 Davies voted strongly against the 'Equality Act (Sexual Orientation) Regulations' Bill, which was designed to allow the Secretary of State to make regulations defining discrimination and harassment on grounds of sexual orientation, create criminal offences, and provide for exceptions.

The most abominable thing he has done though (along with other Tory backbench MPs Christopher Chope, Andrew Robathan and Simon Burns), was to help kill the 'Debt Relief (Developing Countries) Bill' earlier this month, which was supposed to protect developing countries from vulture funds, where investors buy up defaulted debt, then sue the country for immediate repayment. This has already happened in Liberia, which lost around £20m in London courts to two vulture funds last year.

Obviously neither Paul Flynn nor Philip Davies are indicative of their respective parties' backbenches, but I think it's important to look at the reasonably extreme cases they both present and seriously consider - forgetting Gordon Brown and David Cameron - which side we want in a majority for the next term of government, especially with the economy in such dire need of careful restructuring and the social effects this will inevitably have. The parties are made up of far more than the people criticised in the media daily, and a nuanced perspective should be adopted to really judge what's best for this country.

Biased? Me?

LM

Clothier: Easier to Fool Former Ministers than Football Hooligans!

2010-03-26T11:11:00.011Z

I urge you to read the article in Prospect on the cash-for-lobbying sting; written by the producer and director of the Dispatches episode responsible for uncovering the immoral dealings of certain former ministers, Philip Clothier, the story in full is hilarious and at the same time, profoundly troubling. For one, I read the stuff about the guilty parties taking the bait in the first place in a state of incredulity. Amazingly, the fall-out from the expenses scandal hasn't seemed to have proved influential on the behaviour of MPs. Lack of integrity aside, how could Byers and co. have been so stupid? Clothier comments: "I once made an undercover film about Chelsea football hooligans and it was far more difficult to fool them than it was to open up the heart of Westminster." He also points out the missed clues that would have suggested a ruse, such as the fact that the name of the fake lobbying company was the reversal of a Marxist historian's name (though only old-school Labour politicians are likely to know who Perry Anderson is) and the failure of the company to divulge any of its supposedly impressive US clients.

Labour is not the only party that should be tarnished by this scandal, as even Michael Howard was interested in meeting with Anderson Perry, and questioned what the restrictions would be if he became a Lord. It's such a shame that "time" got in the way of including the Tories in Politicians For Hire; I think the British public deserves to be made aware of Sir John Butterfill's remark about cycling with Mr Cameron: "We were always meeting in the changing rooms when we were showering because we were hot and sticky when we got in." Unfortunately a shower can't get you out of this sticky situation, John!

After reading the article, what stuck with me (apologies for the awful pun) is Philip Clothier's revelation regarding the state of British politics in general: many politicians have lost their fervour for politics. If even notable MPs have fallen out of love with politics, what hope is there for a relatively disillusioned, apathetic electorate?

AT

Shakedown 1979

2010-03-26T11:06:00.008Z

It has widely been acknowledged by politicians and journalists alike that the political climate of 2010 is worryingly similar to that of 1979. Unfortunately there is no Joy Division, The Clash or Gang of Four to help us through.

Although there are of course differences in scale in 2010, especially with the lessened amount of Union strikes, the heightened influence of the media is actually helping to make this look as devastating as it was in 1979.

The Unite strike against British Airways have made Gordon Brown look like an incompetant marionette. Though it wasn't necessarily his fault, the fact that it looks like he didn't want to impose sanctions on a Union that funded the Labour party makes the situation look very bad for him. Furthermore, the looming four-day national rail strikes in April are set to cripple the economically fragile and more densely populated UK, which will again be blamed on Labour and blown up by the media as on a par with the strikes of '79.

Then there's the Dispatches scandal which hit Labour ranks, rightly showing some of Brown's more prominent MPs to be lying, greedy scumbags who care little for their constituents. Though Tory MP John Butterfill was also implicated, the programme largely focused on Labour (a conscious ideological decision on the part of the producer perhaps?), though according to an article in Prospect magazine by the producer/director of the programme (see Annalise's post on the article), Butterfill was keen to show how chummy he was with both David Cameron and George Osborne. Lucky they edited that out otherwise people may have gotten more suspicious as to how endemic, accepted and widespread MP lobbying is. Let's also not forget the expenses scandal either...

Oh talking of forgetting things, it seems that everyone has also forgetten this hideous cock up in the shadow of the Budget fallout:

The economy is still in a mess and desperately needs to be sorted out. Though Alistair Darling's Budget was an initial success, the aftershocks have begun to hit home, with accusations of it covering up deeper cuts than first suspected - especially in relation to the nebulous 'efficiency cuts' promised. Darling admitting that cuts would have to be "tougher and deeper" than those seen by Margaret Thatcher seems scary, and is at odds with his promise of training and work for anyone under the age of 24 who has been out of work for 6 months or more. The problem is not isolated just on Labour though, as the Tories have also had a £7bn hole in public finance proposals identified. However, Darling's vague promises of public spending have been severely criticised, and though the Tories have done no better, it looks as if a very tough few years is upon the UK. And there will be no patriotic victory in the Falklands to raise support for whoever has the unenviable task of steering the UK through this period.

The deficit is much higher than when Thatcher came to power, though unemployment is lower than it was during her reign. But is the only way to recovery really through job cuts? With the rise in population and people going to university (as well as doing practical apprenticeships) cuts anywhere are going to hit hard, especially in areas in the north which already had their infrastructure decimated during the '80s. Another dimension to this is the bitter irony that immigration has always been supported and encouraged based on how it boosts the economy, cynical though that is. But since the recession happened regardless, and the surplus of people especially concentrated in the south east of England remains, who knows what tensions and problems may arise from this time of economic strife. It's all doom and gloom here.

LM

Cameron & Osborne's Budget Hit List

2010-03-25T16:47:00.003Z

Immediately after yesterday's Budget, Conservative leader David Cameron delivered a venomous response which seemed rather heavy on rhetoric and light on substance. He stated that the Government should be ashamed of its management of the economy, adding that it had only brought "debt, waste and tax" in return for overseeing a ballooning deficit which will lead to Britain borrowing £167bn this year. He then compared the Labour of 2010 to the Labour of 1979 when he said "Like every Labour government before them, they have run out of money and have left it to the next Conservative government to clean up the mess." He dug the boot in over the Dispatches lobbying scandal, conveninetly forgetting that one of his own MPs, John Butterfill was also caught out on the programme.

The main critique was that Alistair Darling had stolen policies from the Conservatives, as Cameron spat "He came in as Chancellor copying our inheritance tax cut, he leaves as Chancellor copying our stamp duty cut." He also pointed out that if Labour get elected, they will be borrowing £734bn over the next six years, giving the UK a national debt of £1.3 trillion, as well as the fact that over the next year there will be more spent on debt than education. Those are some big numbers, David.

Besides the polar extremes of the political parties' responses, the general consensus in the media is that Darling's Budget was a smart and tight affair, with good populist cuts (banker's tax and freeze on Stamp Duty) and no real excess flab to worry the markets or give the Tories anything to really get a grip on. Yes, the deficit is big, but it can and will be cut, Darling seemed to be saying.

The main difference between Labour and the Conservative stance on dealing with the deficit seems to be more a matter of when to begin the necessary cuts, rather than what the cuts should be. On the one hand Labour are proposing that economic growth should be stimulated before beginning to make cuts, whilst on the other the Tories feel that it is necessary to begin cutting as soon as possible to deal with the deficit quicker. Objectively there is a problem with both methods though. If Labour wait to clear the deficit, the bond markets may look unfavourably on the UK and this could even push it into recession again. However, if the Tories make cuts immediately in order to be favourable to the markets, the further deflation of demand this would create could in fact lead to a worsening of the deficit.

Besides this, the main substantive criticism of Labour's Budget at the moment is to do with inflation.

Indeed, last September Labour froze personal tax allowances, which refers to the amount of income you can receive each year without having to pay tax on it (at the moment it's £6475). This freeze was implemented because inflation was negative and Labour were presumably attempting to avoid the controversial 'deflatory spiral' that could occur if wages were allowed to rise along with the lowering of prices. However, though inflation is no longer negative, this freeze hasn't yet been revoked, and if inflation (at about 3.7% on the Retail Price Index at the moment) defies Darling's predictions and continues to rise over the course of the year, millions of people could end up paying higher taxes. This is because taxes like income tax will rise along with inflation, but the amount of income allowed without tax will stay the same, leaving the tax payer out of pocket.

Tory Shadow Chancellor George Osborne said "What that means, in effect, is a tax rise for millions of working people and, if you're someone on the basic rate, that's around £50 extra tax a year; if you're a couple, around £100 extra tax a year. And of course that's not including the national insurance tax on people's incomes which is coming down the track."

With his reasonable propositions, Darling was probably trying to avoid the negative press that last year's Budget received, and he largely did. But you can always rely on The Sun to make good news into sensationalist pap, who said of Darling that he "just screwed more people than JT, Ashley, Mark Owen and Tiger Woods". They also pointed out the conflict between the rising interest and frozen personal tax allowance, stating that although wages would rise, the lack of a personal tax allowance in line with interest would mean people would pay more income tax, which is a "stealth" tax.

So far the Tories haven't released their crowdsourced Budget criticism from www.yourbudgetresponse.co.uk but there are hundreds of pages of writing and graphs to trawl through before any anomalies are found so it could be a while before we see a full appraisal of Labour's Budget from them. It'll be interesting to see what they pull up though, because the aforementioned inflation/personal tax allowance criticism is purely speculative, and relies on the fact that inflation will rise, not fall as predicted.

It seems that for now Darling's Budget has more or less been a success. Whether it wins his party a majority remains to be seen, but looks very unlikely.

LM

Vince Cable's Budget Hit List

2010-03-25T11:16:00.021Z

Lib Dem Shadow Chancellor Vince Cable was not best pleased with Alistair Darling's Budget. In his video response, Cable made disparaging remarks about the lack of honestly regarding inevitable public spending cuts, and the absence of measures that would deal with the "fundamentals of fairness" in the tax system. He highlighted the need for the public and external creditors to know specifically how borrowing will be reduced - a need that "hopeful targets" have failed to meet.

The Lib Dems have criticised the Government for not specifying half of the efficiency savings proposed yesterday, and have contrasted Labour's detail deficit with the Lib Dems' willingness to produce and publicise specified cuts amounting to a £15bn saving. Additionally, Vince Cable described the efficiency programme as "totally vacuous" and posed the question: "If it's inefficiency, why has it been tolerated all these years?" The Shadow Chancellor suggested that the only cut Darling announced was the reduction of housing benefits for people living in large houses, which he condemned as a policy tough on poor families residing in London.

On the issue of taxation, Cable argued that Labour is not doing enough to create a fairer, more progressive system. Conversely, the Lib Dems would increase the threshold to £10 000, thereby removing £3.6m people from the income tax system completely. They would fund this change through taxes on the wealthy, including a tax on mansions worth over £2m and moves to tackle tax loopholes. With the Government's decision to freeze the tax threshold, more people will unfortunately cross over the threshold at the bottom end. His party is also against the significant hike in the price of cider (10% above inflation), which will hit those on lower incomes.

As much as I always enjoy Vince Cable's bravado, I question the cohesiveness of his Budget critique. These are tough times for the Government; pressuring it to declare solid spending cuts (as opposed to efficiency gains) to attend to the deficit on the one hand, and to implement tax cuts on the other is somewhat unfair. Even if a tax system more favourable to poor and ordinary folk could be made feasible by increasing the tax burden of the rich, is it politically viable to lean on the latter to this extent? I imagine it is extremely easy to ask the Government to fix everything at once when you are perpetually in opposition. If a hung parliament comes to fruition, maybe the Lib Dems will become more accustomed to the difference between ideological aims and what is politically possible.

AT

Can't Buy Me Love?

2010-03-24T20:23:00.001Z

The big issue underlying today's Budget is that whoever wins the next election will oversee state retrenchment. Yet despite both Labour and the Tories agreeing that relative austerity is necessary, the investment versus cuts debate that has traditionally characterised the dichotomy between political left and right is still thriving within debates over the budget. One article in particular from the Guardian well represents the leftist opinion on what the Budget should aim to achieve; Brendan Barber's article praises the government's willingness to borrow and spend, which has helped Britain out of the recession, and argues that the economic priority should be reducing unemployment and promoting economic growth. Policies are working better than expected, so they should be intensified rather than cut. Conversely, Eamonn Butler's article in the Telegraph makes more of the sizeable deficit and calls for deep cuts as the only way forward (higher taxes to reduce the deficit would make Britan even less competitive). As a Director of the Adam Smith Institute, it is unsuprisingly that he believes the private sector will cure us of our economic woes.

So how will the political left and right view the 2010 Budget? Leftists will be pleased to hear that for the next two years, no one under the age of 24 will be out of work for more than six months before being offered training or work. They will also be happy that the stamp duty allowance is to double for first-time buyers, which will be funded by higher stamp duty on properties worth over £1m. The wealthy will further bear the brunt of taxation when the 50% tax bracket is introduced next month for those earning over £150 000. Those that earn over £100 000 will pay more because some allowances will be dropped. Also announced today: the higher child tax credits for infants and higher winter fuel payments for the over-80s for a year, a £2bn green infrastructure fund and moves to allow everyone to open a bank account. Oh, and no rise in VAT!

The traditional Tory voters will not be so chuffed. Labour's tax plans will raise £19bn towards reduced borrowing (including a hike in sin taxes and an increase in fuel duty), but the Government has decided to put off tough cuts until 2011. Worse for the political right, the inheritance tax threshold will be frozen for the next four years.

A distinct lack of daring cuts, higher taxes on the wealthy and no £600 000 inheritance tax theshold as previously promised make Labour's Budget rather unpalatable for many. Yet what it offers may be enough to win back some of the swing voters who previously withdrew their support from Labour during the recession. Polls show that overall, the public cares more about economic recovery than cuts. Darling was therefore right to focus on economic growth as opposed to the deficit - at least from a pragmatic point of view. Additionally, the Chancellor has succeeded in producing an economic plan that truly highlights the distinction between Labour and Conservative mindsets. Swimming against the tide of public opinion, Cameron has hit out at Labour for delaying cuts. He stated that his party is ready for the tough spending decisions that need to be made, but he has yet to put his money where his mouth is.

AT