Myopic Milibland's misplaced attack.

[matgb]

So, Boy George did his first budget yesterday, and it was nasty. But I somehow suspect the nastiness was inevitable, and it was a lot less nasty than it would've been if it'd been a Tory-only administration. Labour have decided to spend their political capital attacking the Lib Dem junior partners for the nasty, instead of the senior party, and there's no sign whatsoever from them of what they'd do instead.

I agree, completely, with Sunny on this one, their attacks are misplaced. One of the leadership candidates, currently rated as "second least awful" on my scale, has even set up a tool to email the LD leadership. Because apparently ameliorating the Tories and getting clear committments to help the lowest paid through increased tax credits and personal alloances, while increasing taxes on the wealthy through increased CGT is something we should be ashamed of. So, he wants to recruit former Lib Dems, and wants us to email the leadership. Using his tool, here's what I send:

Dear Mr Clegg and Mr Hughes,

I'm sending this using a tool on Ed Miliband's campaign site, but basically am doing so to offer full support, he wants to recruit former Lib Dem activists who don't like we're in Govt with the Tories.

I don't like it, but it was inevitable. The Budget has a lot of stuff I really dislike in it. But it has a lot of stuff I like, and I'd like to see what Labour would've done differently.

Getting the Tories to accept an increasein CGT and the allowance was brilliant. Having to accept a, hopefully short term, increase in VAT in order to prevent further cuts was probably inevitable.

Labour are out of ideas, and all they want to do is attack us, instead of the Tories who're the senior coalition partner.

Pretty much proves we made the right choice.

Do I like the VAT increase? No. Do I like the cuts in some benefits? No. Do I like that spending cuts were inevitable and would have to happen this year or next regardless of who was in power? No. Do I like that they've ring-fenced the NHS budget so waste there isn't being hit, meaning spending elsewhere will have to fall further? No.

Have Labour said what they would've done instead? No. If the LDs weren't in coalition, would the Tories have even considered raising the personal allowance, increasing tax credits to the lowest incomes, pegging pensions back to earnings, increasing Capital Gains Tax? No.

I've voted Labour in the past. At the next election, odds are very good I'll have a second preference to allocate as well. Dear Labourites, it would be nice to have a choice as to where I'll put my second choice, currently, you're not giving me one. Wake up, FFS.

Comments

[missedith01]

Of course Labour are attacking the Lib Dems. They are the opposition and the Lib Dems are in government. The Lib Dems are an easier mark, because, as HH quite rightly pointed out yesterday, the Tories might bleat about inevitability but they want to do this stuff anyway. One would hope that many Lib Dems are at least feeling the pain of being in office and having to make unpopular decisions.

The fact is, a lot of the budget is nasty and not inevitable. For example, it is nasty and not inevitable to reduce the period of backdating of tax credits from one month to three months. It's especially nasty given the administrative chaos that the Tax Credit Office seems to revel in most of the time. Real people will lose out on money they should have had. It is nasty and not inevitable to punish Jobseeker's Allowance claimants with a 10% reduction in their benefits if they haven't found work after a year. It's especially nasty given that it's very difficult for many people to find a job at the moment, and that JSA is a breadline benefit in the first place. It is nasty and not inevitable to change benefit uprating from the RPI to the CPI. They know that this will mean a drop in the real value of benefits over time as research has shown that the things which the poorest people buy rise in price faster than the CPI. And don't get me started on VAT ... some hope of economic growth recovering if this is the solution.

And Labour have said what they'd do instead. They would make cuts next year when the benefits of growth would make the cuts less savage. Of course they can't say exactly what would be cut and how, no more than the Tories would before they got elected and had had a chance to look at the books.

Besides, when the local Lib Dems here stop sending me leaflets attacking the Labour party for not forming a coalition and being a little over jubilant beating Labout into third place (it's mentioned three times in the latest missive) I'll get interested in Labour negativity. Dunno when they're going to work out the election is over and they won. :-)

[matgb]

The fact is, a lot of the budget is nasty and not inevitable.

True, no argument there. Thing is, it's palpably obvious it would've been a lot worse without LD influence. Tactically and strategically, I think Labour are playing this wrong.

They should be showing an alternative, and making the LDs feel there was a different option, highlighting that working with Labour would be possible, that the Tories weren't the only option.

Carping on about 'betrayal' and similar all the time is palpably wrongfooted; there's a real feeling in LD circles that it was Labour who betrayed us, which is why Clegg and others will repeatedly talk about the 13 years thing; when they came in, we were very hopeful, and LD MPs were on Cabinet committees and similar. But apart from a very early surge, nothing.

Clegg said before the election when appealing to former Labour voters "it's not you betraying Labour, it's they who betrayed you", and he was right.

they can't say exactly what would be cut and how, no more than the Tories would before they got elected and had had a chance to look at the books.

Sorry, that doesn't wash. Tories couldn't look at the books because they weren't in office and couldn't look at them. But LAbour's only just left office, has had full access to the books for 13 years, and, um, Osborne's published them anyway as part of open government process.

Labour could offer alternatives. If they were good enough, they could actually break the coalition.

As it is, they're strengthening LD resolve to stick with it, as they're not giving any other choice.

If AV comes in at the next GE, they'll need to appeal to 2nd preferences to get anywhere. In many seats, they'll need to appeal to LD supporting swing voters anyway.

I Really think this is a tactical error. Sure, the Govt should be attacked, opposed, etc. But concentrating pretty much all their fire on the junio partner and alienating them completely, which is what they're currently doing, is daft.

when the local Lib Dems here stop sending me leaflets attacking the Labour party for not forming a coalition and being a little over jubilant beating Labout into third place

The first part is inevitable, it's called rebuttal, Labour keep saying that the LDs are betrayers, but it was Labour who refused a deal. Can't have it both ways.

Latter makes tactical sense, LDs can only win in a seat if people believe they can win, emphasising second place on pretty much every leaflet is standard practice. If Labour hadn't broken their electoral reform pledge of 1997, it'd be different, but...

You are, at least, being constructive, and I do appreciate that, and I completely agree on many points about the bloody awful negative points within the budget. But there are good points, and the bad points were lessened, and that's due to LD influence.

That's what I signed up for after all, it's how coalition politics works.

[missedith01]

I certainly agree that the LDs will have had a softening effect ... how much we won't know until the detail of the departmental cuts come in - that's when we'll really know the character of the govt, I think.

I have difficulty with this criticism of Lab not going for a coalition. I truly don't think it was because they weren't prepared to negotiate on policy. Brown realised the game was up, and it would be politically impossible to cling on in a coalition of the minor parties. They had to refuse to deal if a coalition involving the biggest party was a possibility. Perhaps the LDs would have prefered a LibDem/Lab coalition; personally I think Clegg preferred the idea of working with Cameron (and I can understand that - Brown beong notoriously difficult to work with ...)

The issue of 13 years ago we've talked about before - I hold my hands up and have nothing to say. But Labour being skullduggerous after 1997 doesn't excuse a single Lib Dem vote for Tory nastiness now. The Lib Dems will need to take a view about what is necessary yet painfull, which they must of course support, and what is Tory vileness being introduced under a coalition fig-leaf. The former makes them look statesmanlike, and I think the freeze on CB comes under this heading - no-one wants it but it's probably the least-worse option. The latter I think will come home to roost - the changes to TC backdating and reduction in JSA I would class here. There isn't anything that can be done, as I understand it ... support for the emergency budget is a requirement of the coalition, but people on the left (in both the labour and liberal traditions) have long memories.

With regard to Lab and the books - sure they know where we are now but they don't know where we'll be in 12-18 months time, that was what I meant.

[matgb]

Agree about the cuts. Danny's more leftish within the party, whereas David was very dry, but David is one of the smartest people I've ever met, will miss him in that job, we'll have to see.

I think Clegg did prefer working with Cameron, definitely over Brown, and I know I personally favoured it anyway (not a secret that one), but the Parliamentary party, especially Vince, definitely preferred a Labour deal if at all possible; I think that would've been even more electorally suicidal than the Tory deal, but...

When I spoke to Vince at the special conference, his disappointment with Labour not negotiating at all was palpable, he really wanted to see if a deal was possible, and really wanted to try and make it work, but the Labour negotiators pretty much said "this is the manifesto, take it or leave it", whereas the Tories gave ground. Lots of ground.

The idea that we could get a better deal on policy from the Conservative party scares me, even without the qualms about legitimacy and similar.

The big problem is of course British governance traditions. We know there've been lot of behind closed doors negotiations. What we don't know is how much vileness was stopped by that already. I suspect quite a lot, but won't know until the memoirs are published.

But yes, being in opposition does make it harder to make decent policy. What really bothers me is they hadn't got anything prepared already, despite saying in the last Budget they'd make massive cuts (nearly as big as the Tories are making, just timed slightly slower).

What were those cuts going to be? I know why they didn't announce them, and I know they want to make hay attacking everything now, but the open government consensus politics fan hates it; all ideas should be on the table, not just those from the governing party.

Ah well, plus ca change.