Call me old-fashioned, but was George Osborne, Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, having a laugh yesterday?
OK, no party has so far come up with anything radical in respect of the public debt. Freezing public pay rates was hardly demanding of the grey matter and miserable prioritising of the rich over the poor (see Polly Toynbee‘s sums in yesterday’s Guardian) didn’t come as a great surprise. Still no grasping the nettle of the banking/financial system per se.
What is in place today (other than fear – and a restriction by banks on lending the money they were given by the taxpayer for … er … lending…) that would prevent a second meltdown? Answers on a postcard…
But two things struck me from yesterday:
1. Objections to the new Tory alliances in Europe were dismissed by the party as ‘politically motivated allegations made by the Labour party’. I see. Avoid the complaint by slandering the complainant and casting aspersions about his integrity. Isn’t this the way the Old Tories (Thatcher’s ‘vegetables’, according to Spitting Image) used to operate: consider anyone who differs from you as an idiot? The response to the CDU’s downgrading of relations with the Tories was equally dismissive and equally suggestive of the old ways: we are so self-evidently right that we can afford to dismiss as simply stupid anyone who disagrees with us. Anyway, it saves us having to engage with the argument.
2. Why did no one laugh when Osborne announced that ‘we are all in it together’? I know this is the new Cameron mantra – and I wish I could believe it. But Osborne and Cameron aren’t ‘in it’ in the same way thousands of the people I serve in South London are ‘in it’. They are rich kids with inheritances to spare them worrying about their future – whatever happens to the economy in the future. If any party’s policies fail, it won’t lead any of them to claim Incapacity Benefit or any other type of social safety net.
I know the Old Etonians (who, along with their chum, Boris, will soon run the country) are doing their best, but … why did no one laugh?
Nick Baines's Blog 
October 7, 2009 at 8:20 am
Nick, where I work many *public servants* earn slightly over that 18K and in this area are on not on the breadline but don’t have any wiggle room, they certainly don’t have enough to take time to smell the hyacinths,(let alone buy them). I will know that we are in it together when Osborne’s wife sits and cries because her child needs new shoes NOW and she cannot afford them till the end of the month, or Mrs Cameron is doing the rounds of the charity shops for extra jumpers, and sees freecycle as an important resource to help her manage, not something one ought to do so people can see your green credentials.
October 7, 2009 at 8:33 am
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October 7, 2009 at 9:00 am
I think there’s a lot longer than a week before the election – aeons in politics before that then so no idea who’ll be running the country, unless you’re Mystic Meg.
October 7, 2009 at 9:23 am
Is it me or are most BBC news items on politics cast on the assumption that Cameron’s the next PM?
October 7, 2009 at 9:24 am
I had to laugh this morning as the Today programme played the High School Musical song “We’re all in this together” and dubbed George Osborne over the top of that. As the mother of an eight-year-old girl, I’m afraid that’s exactly what passed through my head as I heard Osborne speak. (And then, annoyingly refused to leave for the rest of the day) SO, the Tories are adopting Obama’s strategy of using children’s programme songs as slogans? Well, I guess Bob the Builder worked for Obama and if you’ve nothing more interesting to say then why not?
But seriously, Obama DID have more interesting things to say…. I’m waiting, Mr Cameron.
October 7, 2009 at 11:01 am
Hi Nick,
Three posts castigating Tory policies and you still haven’t furnished any evidence for your ‘racist’ and ‘pseudo-facist’ claim. Would you have been as active in posting criticism during the other party cnoferences had you not been travelling or is this an indication of your overall political sympathies? You can surely be straight about your political voting intentions and allegiances especially if you’re going to pontificate about party politics like this? (Just to come clean. I was a Labour voter until the last election when I voted Conservative largely for tactical local reasons. Am now a floating voter, but will probably vote Conservative to help retain our excellent hard-working, sleaze-free constituency MP.)
You contrast Tory proposals on public spending with their attitude to bank bonuses. But you don’t note the bigger picture of public and private debt in Britain for which we are all responsible.
Furthermore, I don’t see the government proposing bonus freezes in the City. The fact is, that governments can control public spending but they can do very little about spending in the private sector (where would it stop?). However, as shareholders the government can put pressure on some of the banks to restrict, or streamline bonuses. Are they using this power and influence? I think some of these questions would be best pointed at the Government rather than the opposition.
As for the Etonian stuff – what is all that about? Class warfare? Student politics? Envy? Surely it’s below you that kind of ad hominem?
October 7, 2009 at 12:30 pm
It’s not a class war it’s a triumph of reason over wrong. There are plenty of examples of people from that sort of background who have risen above it to be independent of mind and free of spirit, we are all aware of that and no-one should condemn anyone simply for where they’ve come from, but (and it’s a big but) how can it be right that it is still true that if you go to two particular public schools you have something like an 80% better chance of being an MP? That’s the issue of inherited wealth and power and the class system which is still very much in existence and that is what you see when you look at the Tory front bench, you cannot deny it and it is very relevant as it would also appear to be the structure of the Tory party. Face that and set about dismantling it because inherited power does not come on merit. Quite apart from the fact that their motivations have been shown time and again to be avaricious, they don’t have anything like the depth of intelligence of Gordon Brown for instance or the ability to run the country. You might think it will be funny when it all goes tits up as usual for Boris Johnson et al but the consequences of them getting their mitts on the country will be absolutely disastrous – for all us. If people must have Boris why not vote him in as Head of State for a while? When you take a look at the Tories he’s pretty much all they’ve really got popularity-wise, they know it and he knows it, that’s why he’s not going for a second term as mayor, he’s at least got his sights on David Cameron’s job. How about going further than that Boris? He backed Obama while he was running remember. Could be a perfect transition object while we get the country weaned off the Windsor family, get taxpayers’ money extracted from their finances, and those of their sisters and their cousins and their aunts, give Cornwall and Lancaster and the Crown estates and the palaces and the Art Collection, all of which we own and for instance only see 2% of the Art Collection currently, properly to the people and let them be free. Even the old horse in the stable yearns to run free, let Liz out now and Boris can be a fun alternative for a while. I mean he is the eighth great grandson of George II and in his case that’s proven by DNA apparently.
The squeals of “Class war! Class prejudice! Inverted snobbery!” are rather pathetic. Talking about class prejudice against people is just a red herring to distract us from facing and confronting the class power structure and tackling dismantling it. No we shouldn’t care re the former where people come from, of course not and we don’t, but where it is inextricably linked to the latter we have to stop sticking our heads in the sand.
October 7, 2009 at 1:36 pm
How right you are Nick, did you see the Jeremy Paxman/Boris Johnson interview? I missed it but hear it was really good, some points had to be edited out as it got quite heated during the interview. (mainly over wealth)
October 7, 2009 at 2:50 pm
>(see Polly Toynbee’s sums in yesterday’s Guardian)
Ouch. I don’t read Polly these days for the reason that the numbers are wrong as often as they are right, and that she changes her position with the wind for rhetorical reasons.
Example: in the column you link, we have the Evil Tories cutting benefit, reassessing capability to work etc etc:
“Second, the 2.6 million people on incapacity benefit would face tough medical tests and benefit cuts of £25 a week. The Sun loved this “shirk attack” on “loafers”.
Leave aside the callousness of cutting off sick and depressed people’s weekly benefits by £25 to make savings.”
while three days ago (THREE!) the benefit reassessment was already being done by our current government, with no mention whatsoever of how “callous” it is:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/oct/02/cameron-cuts-tory-policy
“His pledge to “reassess 2.6 million people on incapacity benefit to see if they are fit for work” is meaningless since Labour is already doing exactly that”
For the record, I think that the reductions in cost of Parliament are way too timid (a 10% cut in the cost of Parliament is only about 2 years’ worth of rises, and only a fifth of the doubling since 1997), that perhaps the pay freeze should start at 21k not 18k but should be more than 1 year, and that he should be *far* more aggressive with GPs, who had a 50% income boost in 2004-6 when the Govt messed up contract negotiations (the cut there should be perhaps 25-30%).
October 7, 2009 at 4:56 pm
Hi Andrew,
First things first. I would have blogged on the other parties had I not been travelling. But can you show me where in those three posts I endorse Labour? Just read what I actually say. Questioning the Tories should not be taken as support for any other party. I take each election as it comes – and long for a party that will raise taxes and ‘let justice roll’.
Secondly, I wasn’t addressing the question of private debt. Had I been, I would have questioned the compulsion of the banks to turn their staff into sales people and the sheer quantity of offers of ‘credit’ (read this as ‘debt’) that poured through my and my children’s letter boxes in the last decade or more.
Thirdly, I wasn’t aware (if you read what I wrote rather than what you want me to have written) that I was defending the present government. But I think it is perfectly reasonable to question the party that wants to take on government and positions itself in a way that is at least questionable. Or do you think I should only question the party in power now?
Fourthly, don’t be silly. ‘Class warfare? Student politics? Envy?’ You really should know better. But I did grow up in the north at a time when the Tories shattered my city (with help from Derek Hatton and co) and left wounds in my family that still weep. These guys have not the first idea about life outside the privileged circles in which they moved and I don’t trust them or their worldview. Their policies will be examined on their merits. But do you trust them when they talk about poverty or spongers or the realities of impoverished life? My point is that they have no subjective experience or notion of how a good deal of the population lives.
So, no, it isn’t below me to make the point. But it should be below you to identify my comments with ‘class warfare, student politics and envy’.
(Glad to see you haven’t gone soft in your silence!)
October 7, 2009 at 4:57 pm
Good points – well put, Matt. Knocking Incapacity Benefit won’t raise much at all. other more radical measures might.
October 7, 2009 at 5:17 pm
Andrew, I forgot to reply to the ‘racist’ stuff. I have just spent several weeks reading newspapers and listening to people in Europe whose views on the Tories’ new consorts are not moderate. Speak with the pastor in East Berlin whose greatest problem with young people is the attractions of neo-Nazism … and all with links across Europe including with the people I am referring to. Do I really need to spell it out?
October 7, 2009 at 7:19 pm
The trouble is Nick that you are just about the only Bishop who has unguarded moments like this in public, so of course you’ll get hacks like me who enjoy your blog. And as you’ve probably realised I just can’t shut up.
I’m sceptical about the fact that you’ll give Tory policies a chance on their merit, given what you’ve said about your history, and your attitude to those you dismiss with reductionist terms like ‘rich kids’ and ‘Etonians‘. And yes, you haven’t convinced me that this isn’t just another form of class politics. You’ve already written these people off as unable to understand how the rest of the population lives because of their backgrounds, so they don’t seem to have a chance as far as you’re concerned (and let’s face it, the perception of alienation between public and politicians cuts across party politics and class divisions). It’s simply a distraction from real issues of policy.
Iain Duncan Smith is someone who springs to mind having done an impressive amount of work since he unceremoniously lost the leadership in undergirding the so-called ‘compassionate conservativism’ which Cameron inherited. I’m sure you’re aware of the Centre for Social Justice.
And you say you want taxes raised? Well you’ll get your wish whoever is in government and it’ll all be to pay off public debt rather than to benefit anyone with genuine needs. You may be able to pay more tax, many struggling families like mine are feeling really, really squeezed.
Should you only question the party in power and not the opposition? Not at all, but I see far more pointed and passionate criticism of the Tories than of Labour on your blog. You’re not being open about your voting intentions but I think I can safely guess you won’t be voting conservative.
Finally, I don’t think you can divorce private and public debt in the way that you suggest. It’s all a continuum. We’re all guilty of losing track of real value, not just the banks, the direct marketeers, or even our shabby excuse for a government.
October 7, 2009 at 8:32 pm
Nick,
I am less than impressed with the content and policies proposed by either the Labour or Tory Party.
Your commentary arouses hackles, perhaps because the element of fairness and truth shines through and hurts.
Your comment regarding the worries and concerns of those you serve demonstrate a listening Bishop – in touch with the issues effecting those you care for. I just cannot find any love or compassion in any pronouncements from any mainstream politician these days.
Political Alliances by the Tories with right wing groups in Europe, will not change anything, but will contribute to the growth of extremism both in Europe and the UK.
October 7, 2009 at 8:53 pm
George Osborne is mistaken, we are not all in this together. I will never be punished by a Tory government ever again.
I lived under Tory austerity for many many years, and watched our manufacturing and agricultural background slide away.
I support many Tory principles and small government but the very principles that are laid down as a safety net for less fortunate members of society should not be sacrificed
Many people are detecting a very arrogant streak running through this conference.
They have to be very careful you know.
There are many more people on the minimum wage in the countryside who are struggling along. Now it is very wrong to assume that hard working families who need a top up are parasites! If George thinks that deducting £25 pounds form families who need it achieves applause he must think again. He must address the black economy first and foremost.
I have huge doubts about this conference and the PR spun. They may just be talking themselves out of a result.
October 7, 2009 at 10:10 pm
If as a journalist I was to use the terms racist and pseudo-facist I’d have to support this with evidence (and even then I’d probably be told to moderate the language). This is where the blogosphere (much more like pub-talk sometimes) can be inferior to traditional media.
October 8, 2009 at 7:48 am
Andrew, my moments are not ‘unguarded’. I know what I am saying and why I am saying it. And, as I have said before, I think there must be a place for some honest learning and conversation. Politicians, bishops and anyone else is made to think that they cannot show any ‘weakness’ in their public position – when we all know that we all need to keep learning by conversing. So, this blog is – I hope – an example of how to open up conversations that enable me to listen and learn and, maybe, change my mind. We need to end the tyranny that ‘public figures’ fear saying anything or showing a change of mind because it will damage their reputation or career prospects.
Your scepticism about my voting intentions is your problem, not mine. When I last looked, we still had a secret ballot in this country. But, to be clear, I will not be sure where on the ballot paper my cross will be placed until I have heard the arguments, weighed up the options (both locally and nationally) and come to a conclusion on the day I vote. Good on you if you can tell where I am heading … when I myself don’t yet know.
Andrew, read what I have said about the Labour Government. It might not be as extensive as the Tories, but read it.
I haven’t divorced public from private debt. I simply asked where the pressure for driving private debt had come from. The connection between the two would take a book or more.
October 8, 2009 at 7:55 am
Andrew, as an ‘inferior’ blogger, I would simply point you to the many self-proclaimed and self-expressed policies and values of the parties and personalities concerned. If I get time, I will do a search and provide you with the relevant pointers.
Incidentally, the CDU in Germany probably waited to see the outcome of the German elections before downgrading relations with the Tories. Having strengthened their electoral position, they acted swiftly. You haven’t addressed why they did so.
One of the problems of British journalism is the myopia caused by linguistic incompetence. If you were to read the newspapers and websites of other countries, you would get a very different ‘take’ on what goes on here. See my comments on Helmut Schmidt and the need for young politicians to know at least two foreign languages, if they are to properly be able to understand their own culture.
October 8, 2009 at 11:35 am
My local MP is a Conservative, a national ‘name’ who has served in previous Tory cabinets. We are on first name terms.
In the last 3 General Elections he has come to the local (church) parish hustings meetings that I have chaired, and participated actively in a number of other local initiatives. He stood head and shoulders above the other candidates, and has been resoundingly elected 3 times.
Although a listening politician, his party attachment mean that some of his political views are not really quite mine. There may have been 3 days during that time that he has not had my unwavering loyalty; but as a concerned and faithful and elected MP, and mine own, he has had some 12 years worth of support and respect from me.
This does not stop me asking him awkward questions on occasions in private; whilst supporting him in public.
As those who are setting the public policies of the Conservatives for the next election, it would seem entirely appropriate for +Nick, or indeed any of our other bishops, to be asking some questions about Cameron & Osborne’s policies out loud. And not just their’s…
October 8, 2009 at 2:26 pm
Alastair, this is my experience also. A local Tory MP (and friend) phoned me this morning to say that the local newspaper has been trying to set up a row between him and me and to get him to diss me. He has issued a very measured statement in which he supports me but thinks my views on this are misguided. We had a good conversation, as always. I would defend him against all-comers and he could even tempt me to vote for him (except that I don’t live in his constituency) – but politics is not about personalities, but about policies.
October 9, 2009 at 10:29 am
Blair/Brown? I voted them in and I shall be voting them out! I say this not out of premature and/or foolish triumphalism, but rather because I want to be clear that my starting point is neither tribal nor habitual.
I think that all the “Tory toff” nonsense is a distraction. Just as Obama raised unbelievable sums from Hollywood and Wall Street, there is no lack of personal wealth or cupidity amongst the Labour party or its supporters. Please let’s be more grown up about things than this.
I have worked as a Child Protection lawyer for many years and know and visit the very poorest and most deprived homes in the country. In this work you cannot fail to see that the greatest poverty is that of spirit, aspiration and hope. Much of this arises from the fact that once you are in the benefit culture, it is very hard to escape. One has to be aware of the political question that if a politician can make you benefit dependent, it becomes very easy for him/her to keep you in client dependency with other people’s money.
Frank Field was charged by Tony Blair to ” Think the unthinkable” and when he did was rewarded with exile into the political wilderness. Iain Duncan Smith has taken up the baton, and has done a first rate job in trying to puzzle out how to carry Christian compassion ( both are Christians) into this most complex area. The project is not about doing down the poor, but lifting them up.
Shawn Bailey is another inspirational figure challenging the roots of failure amongst inner City, often Black, youngsters.
It is a legitimate question to ask to what extend the State’s intervention has made the life of the poor worse. Our “sink estates” are no advertisement for the success of “progressive” policies.
By all means let us debate the mechanisms of how to achieve a society built upon personal responsibility, self respect support and encouragement, but to do so please leave aside the nastier side of debate that convinces nobody who is not already fully in agreement.
Do not forget that amongst the Duncan Smith proposal is one to allow new entrants back into the workforce to receive their income AND their benefit, to get away from the current practice of removing the fruits of their labour at a “tax rate” of 96p in the £.
This may be right, it may be wrong, but it is hardly “grinding the faces of the poor.
October 9, 2009 at 11:06 am
After writing my earlier post, I began thinking back over my own journey from liberalism to progressive Conservatism, and wondering if I could offer one starting point for others to understand where people like me are coming from.
There is an American writer on Education named Thomas Sowell – a high quality brain at Stamford University, much of whose work is worth reading as he is that mythical animal ” The Black Conservative Academic”. Usually such thinkers cannot get posts on a US campus.
If you read just one article of his, I commend one at
http://www.tsowell.com/speducation.html – it may be easier to google ” Thomas Sowell Dunbar High School.
As an educational Academic, Sowell examines in this short paper what worked for poor black young people and how it was inadvertently destroyed by good intentions. Dunbar High School was a poor Washington School that was virtually the “Eton” of the black South.
I should be very interested Nick in what you make of it and if it helps explain those of us exploring other ways forward who are motivated by the Gospel message to “feed my sheep” with better than welfare handouts.
October 9, 2009 at 2:49 pm
“Is it me or are most BBC news items on politics cast on the assumption that Cameron’s the next PM?”
It may be you and the BBC. Can you offer a more realistic assumption?
October 9, 2009 at 3:34 pm
It will be interesting to see if Iain Duncan-Smith gets the same treatment as Frank Field did.
October 9, 2009 at 7:48 pm
[…] response to what I heard from the Tory Party Conference has evoked strong responses from those who think I […]
October 10, 2009 at 11:12 am
Would you care to explain precisely what you mean when you say that Thatcher trashed your city in the 1980s?
The way I recall it is that the Conservatives rescued Liverpool from itself. Personally I would have let Liverpool accept the consequences of voting in Hatton and company.
October 11, 2009 at 4:39 am
As a Sovereign nation we could try coining our own money and issuing that into our economy Free of charge.
Had we printed over the past 70 yrs Exactly the same amount as we had Borrowed ( if we can print the Gilts, then why not the Money ) Our National debt would be ZERO.
No Govt Borrowing, no national debt hence no need for Income tax to pay ot off ( stung again folks )
But of course, those whom we borrow our money ( worthless bits of unbacked paper ) from would not be very keen on this.
May 17, 2010 at 9:45 pm
[…] the Tories claimed, before the elction campaign proper, “we’re in it together”, I responded somewhat scornfully. It didn’t exactly go down well in all quarters… But, given the […]