Many people are saying on the doorstep that they used to vote for Labour and that they don’t know who to vote for now.
In 1992 the Conservatives were elected when, in reality, they needed to be kicked out and allowed to understand the responsibility of power.
In 2005 the Labour Party, if you ever supported them, reached that same point. They should not have won.
It’s a shame that the electorate realises this so soon after the last election that that party will win.
If Cameron continues this abandonment of Conservativism then, when we are in power again, he will make the same mistakes as Major and we will be consigned to history. If Cameron continues this abandonment of Conservativism and loses then we will be consigned to history!
Posted In: Political, Blog, News and Politics, David Cameron, Tory, Socialist, General, Conservative
April 8th, 2006 at 5:42 pm
Cameron is on the same post-modern band wagon the other two parties are on. He talks passionately, but about things that just arent top of the list in the majority public conscience.
If he cant talk core values, and cant capture the public imagination, he’s just another hot air balloon. One that this country, especially at this time, just does not need.
Its a tragedy that we may end up with him because people are defecting from Labour, and some people will vote conservative come hell or high water.
Is that the best we can do?
April 8th, 2006 at 8:05 pm
You’re right. I want voters to vote Conservative because they’re excited about the difference we’ll make. Not just because Labour’s not doing anything exciting themselves…
April 8th, 2006 at 9:41 pm
“make the same mistakes as Major and we will be consigned to history”
Confused. What mistakes did Major make in terms of alignment?
He got more votes and a greater percentage share than either Maggie or Blair ever managed. That his majority was tiny was due to a stupid quirk of the electoral system. That his back benchers decided to rip the party to shreds wasn’t exactly his fault.
Back to basics was a mistake, and inheriting 15 years of party of governance not easy, but overall Major himself was OK.
Oh, I remember, ERM. Yes, well, I’ll give you that one, stupid system. You can’t buck markets if they want to go the other way. Especially if George Soros doesn’t like you.
The problem in the British polity is that the two-party hegemony can’t adapt easily. Cameron is moving the party in the right direction electorally, but the party doesn’t like it. In a sane system, you’d have an open broad church and probably two parties, one of which would also include a number of LibDems.
And I’d be int he same party as Diane Abbot, and nowhere near Tony Blair.
April 9th, 2006 at 7:08 pm
People voted Labour in the last election because they can see the results of Labour in power. Whether you like it or not stability and low unemployment matter more to most people than whether the EU allow straight bananas.
Remember the money wasted on high unemployment in the 1980s.
Also compare the number of hospitals built under labour compared to the lack of investment of previous years, have any of you been into a school recently and seen the new IT areas.
The minimum wage brought thousands out of poverty while people such as yourselves lied that it would cause unemployment.
Fortunately for Labour and Britain people looked around them at the last election and voted on what they saw around them and not the prejudices of right wing Thatcherite apologists.
April 9th, 2006 at 8:18 pm
Excellent — thank you Edward. You’ve given me plenty to dismantle!
The stability and low unemployment was despite Brown except for his one master-stroke — an independent Bank of England. For all his flaws, Clarke started the economy on its track to here and the success we have seen since could have only been improved upon under Hague’s stewardship.
It is quite, quite beyond me how anyone can genuinely believe the government is spending our money wisely. More money in schools and more money into hospitals has brought improvements but as Blair said in the 1997 manifesto Major had been spending more money and yet more money without reform doesn’t work.
There is no reason to assume that jobs were not lost. That said, there can be no excuse for wages that are below that provided (in total including free dentistry, free rent, free school meals etc.) by unemployment benefit.
Of course none of what you mentioned was done since 2001. In fact the Conservatives had accepted by 2001 that the minimum wage was humane and should be retained.
All the indicators point to a better Britain with changes made by Hague after 2001. Nothing Labour’s done in the last five years has been as ground-breaking or successful as their first few actions.
April 9th, 2006 at 9:30 pm
Minium Wage is about protecting higher skilled unionised workers from the low skilled offering to work cheaper.
While the minium remains relatively low the effect its barely noticeable because anyone getting less would be working in the black economy anyway.
The black economy is worth over £53 billion a year, and has increased with the introduction of the minium wage.
April 10th, 2006 at 3:05 pm
“In 1992 the Conservatives were elected when, in reality, they needed to be kicked out and allowed to understand the responsibility of power.
Quite right. Any party that stays in power too long becomes corrupt.
Matt, from your point of view Major probably wasn’t too bad - the ERM and Back to Basics did more damage to the Tories reputation than to the country. Major expanded government, invented the ludicrous Department of Culture, increased taxes and pursued weak foreign policy. The Tories got all the bad parts of being in power too long (lack of trust, gave Labour a chance to reform etc..) without advancing a conservative agenda. Five years of Kinnock and Britain would have been ready for a second wave of Thatcherism.
Edward, you seem to be measuring inputs rather than outputs. More hospitals and computers in schools are no use if there are no imporvements in longevity or educational standards. Labour have acheived low unemployment by expanding the government rapidly. Now they have stopped unemployemnet is picking up. The impact of the minimum wage is only visible if you look at the drop-off in jobs created by small enterprise.
The minimum wage is essentially a minimum productivity rule. Employers lose the incentive to train up people (that can only exist with staggered pay rises) and instead hire workers who are productive immediately. It is no wonder private sector investment is plunging as a proportion of the economy.
April 10th, 2006 at 3:11 pm
mark and Dave — thank you.
You’ve both done a better job of defending the opposition to a minimum wage than I could manage.
April 10th, 2006 at 3:40 pm
Well, after what Cameron has been rattling on about recently, I’m off to join the loonie, nutcase, closet racist party… (that’s UKIP I think?).
April 13th, 2006 at 11:13 pm
Dave; you assert that the wage is low, and that anyone working for lower would be in the black economy.
Sorry, not the case. When it came in, I was working in retail, for a national chain. I got a pay rise because of it. Since then, of course, I’ve gone and got myself a degree, so have a low end graduate salary, but the company I work for now used to pay people £2 an hour for some jobs, and £20 flat rate per day for others. Distinctly not black economy.
The only valid argument against is an attack on a market, but a fair market needs to enforce minimum standards through regulation, else we’d have unsafe products, etc as well. My conversion to a belief in the market only goes so far…
I am worried it’s not going too high, but also think it’s utterly ludicrous that someone on minimum gets taxed, think the thresholds, indeed thewhole system, needs readjusting.
April 14th, 2006 at 1:29 am
Well ok fair enough, although I didn’t mean every single low paid job was in the black economy. I was making a generalisation.
Its good that it helped you, and as I said I’ve no problem with it if it remains low, but I think there is a danger that a strong leftist government could raise it too much too fast.
Another problem with minium wage is that is bad for small business, I’ve heard in America huge companies like wal-mart like rises in minium wage because they are more able to cope with it than their small business rivals.
I don’t think we wanna live in an economy totally dominated by big business without any small alternatives.
April 14th, 2006 at 9:59 am
The taxation system can only be explained by one thing — a hegemony of big-business lobbyists.
- Tax on non-oil fuels should be lower, it isn’t.
- Tax on those on below-subsistence wages should be nil, it isn’t.
- Tax on the value of the house you live in is unjust, but there’s no serious party proposing a sensible replacement.
- Tax raised for social-amendment reasons is not spent on social improvement solutions.
A flat tax is the answer. Tax everyone at the same rate and the rich cannot avoid it by living abroad, the poor don’t pay more tax as a result of the like of VAT and Council Tax and the rich don’t avoid inheritance tax by owning a country estate.
There are several reasons a flat tax won’t be accepted or implemented:
- It doesn’t give enough control to the government
- It doesn’t provide enough information
- It is too transparent
- Some people don’t think about it and assume it is a tax cut for those on 40% tax
- It, rightly, keeps its nose out of people’s business which doesn’t suit a socialist government
If it wasn’t for the complete mess that the government’s tax collecting departments are in, the government would have unbelievable information about people just from this collection.
Tax avoidance should be impossible — the information they have should be enough to know what you’re really earning etc.
April 14th, 2006 at 5:00 pm
erm, how is it not a tax cut for those on 40% tax if you make a flat tax of say 22% ?
April 14th, 2006 at 6:33 pm
Because at the moment the vast majority of 40% tax payer will pay most of their tax at the lower rates and very little of their disposable income will be spent on VAT-able items.
A poorer person will spend the majority of their disposable income on VAT-able items and a large amount of the rest of their income will be spent on Council tax. Other taxes like inheritance tax and the BBC licence fee only affect the effective incomes of those in the lower wage packets.
It is middle-England who pays the most tax as a proportion of income and middle- and lower-England who would benefit most from a flat tax.
On feature that this absolutely relies upon, though, is setting the tax-free threshold at a reasonable level (something above £11,000pa).