Is this all the Lib Dems have got?
Dear Nick Clegg,
It never fails to amaze me how lightly the Lib Dems get away with their lack of respectable policies. People say that the Conservatives need to focus more on policy, yet the Lib Dems have been so quiet that no-one ever seems sure what their purpose is as a party. Your pledges on cutting taxes are the first attempt in a long while to get some press coverage but no-one really gave a toss apart from the Independent this morning, and the policies themselves further emphasise how bereft of ideas the Lib Dems are.
Let’s quickly run through your list of proposals. You want to cut Whitehall spending? Well done for catching up with the Conservatives on that issue. You’re going to cut the basic rate of income tax to 16p by hiking up ‘green taxes’? Everyone has now seen through green taxes as they are a complete sham used by the government to raise revenue as opposed to saving the environment. I know it, you know it. You’re going to scrap the entire Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR)? Oh great, because everyone really wants another renaming of government departments and shifting of responsibilities at a cost of millions to the taxpayer. You want to move parts of the Civil Service to cheaper locations outside London? They’ve been doing that for years, which is why departments such as the DVLA ended up in Swansea. On that point, I’ve spoken to lots of civil servants about the possibility of moving parts of the Civil Service and they said it’s a bad idea in general because departments must be represented in and around Westminster by their most senior people because Westminster is where all the important decisions are made by government – so actually your idea could be seriously counterproductive.
Poor Cleggy. No-one really cares what you say as we all know that you won’t get close to being in government. Even when Labour are in complete freefall you find it almost impossible to even break 20% in the polls. If this ‘back of a beermat’ calculation is the best you’ve got, the Lib Dems will continue to drift towards irrelevance.
Yours sincerely,
A.Tory
Witanagemot Blogs
Lots of interesting stuff here! I’d better stick to one or two points.
The LibDems have been widely preceived as a legitimate outlet for protest voting, by those who wouldn’t vote for either of the two traditional main parties. Thus they ended up with a larger vote share than they really warranted.
As far as moving Gov’t depts is concerned — yes, this has been done quite a lot, but as you write in your letter, policy-making depts with their own Ministers cannot realistically be moved away from quick access to the Palace of Westminster.
Even with electronic aids such as email and video-conferencing, it is still vital to be able to ferry papers to the House, and for key personnel to be available in person at short notice, e.g. in the Box.
Just about all those areas of gov’t that could be moved away from London already went a long time ago, such as accounts/payroll and similar. Liverpool and South Wales are just two areas where they have gone, helping the unemployment situations in those places in the process.
I mention all this as an ex-Civil Servant who saw some of this happening during my time in the Service, in the hope it will be of use to know.
“The LibDems have been widely preceived as a legitimate outlet for protest voting”
The Iraq war being a prime example.
However, now all the Lib Dems realise that the key objective is getting rid of Labour, not boosting the Lib Dem vote – which is why Cameron and his team have been ‘lovebombing’ the Lib Dems to extremely good effect.
Have to disagree.
Go to Lib Dem home and it seems clear that rather than target Labour and Independant seats at elections they are keen to carry on their strategy of targeting Tory Southern seats.
I would expect that this is based on the idea of them gaining the Labour fallout votes, and using their second place status to push for third.
It seems like a bad strategy. They won’t pick up nearly enough votes as London and Henley have shown. Disaffected Nu Labour are going home to Dave. No one wants Brown and few are going to be casual enough to risk voting for Lib Dems if it means Brown might stays in power. Worse.. In coalition power..
Its no longer a ’sin’ to vote Tory so a lot of the Middle Class / lower middle class votes that they have relied on will just not come to them.
Attacking Labour, who really do look like folding completely at the next one, would surely produce a better chance of them actually gaining seats.They will retain much of their South West heartland anyway, but could really do a number in the North.
Glasgow East would never bring in a Tory. But a lib Dem standing on a ‘Labour and Tory have always let you down.. we will never let that happen because..blah blah….’ may well reap some rewards.
Ok maybe not in Glasgow, but if Clegg looks at all the Labour safe seats between Crewe and Glasgow there must be some pretty tempting targets.
Sorry, I meant the Lib Dem voters will want to push out Labour – the main party and campaign organisers have a very different agenda.
The party can keep fighting valiantly in the South East but both they and Labour are facing some heavy losses
I would expect that this is based on the idea of them gaining the Labour fallout votes, and using their second place status to push for third.
I meant Push For First.
[but was probably more accurate the first time]
The Limps don’t need to worry too much about having real policies, what they have to do is plan for a hung parliament as that is their best hope of getting any sort of real power.
I would stress that Lib Dem policies are always independently audited. To take lessons from the Tories on policies that don’t add up with be silly in the extreme.
I suspect your real fear is that the Lib Dems plan cuts they day after Dave announced the Tories may have to put taxes up.
This must be a real worry to lots of Tories.
Nich Starling -Norfolk Blogger ..
Just seen your chaps on newsnight pretty much arguing the two strategy approaches.
one, like me recons forget the Tory seats and take over the Labour seats.. the old low hanging fruit.
The other, to chase the Tories in those nice marginals.
For strategy 2 the WE ARE THE TAX CUTTERS is going to play quite well. But the strategy is flawed.
Osborne can say “cut inheritance tax and tax breaks for nursery care” at any time and the voters are lost.
Brown is a tainted brand. He’s changing the golden treasury rules even now, despite the fact they’ve been cheating on them for 4-5 years. That’s desperation. Real real desperation. He can ONLY borrow more. That could easily put up interest rates and once home repossessions kick in then he’s into the end game.
Attacking Labour is just going to pay better dividends. brown can’t offer anything. He gave 2.7 billion away to try and win Crewe and they still didn’t vote for him.He could not counter Tax Cuts. He’s broke.
In a strategy meeting, despite the natural inclination to fight the Tories, the #Northern Option would make a stronger case.
But lib/dems and reality have trouble sharing the same room.
To be honest Nich, I’m not worried at all. I’d much rather that Cameron was honest about the economy and public finances (which, by any independent measure, are in a shockingly bad condition). He continues to say that he cannot promise anything because he doesn’t know what state public finances will be in by 2010 and I support him 100%.
Clegg pretends to be relevant and is clearly trying to fill the tax-cut void, but Cameron is thankfully living on planet earth whereas Clegg is still not entirely focussed on the reality of politics.
Clegg wants (needs!) headlines, but Cameron will almost certainly be faced with having to actually deal with whatever situation befalls the nation in 2010.
Clegg will never be in that position, so has the easy option of making cheap claims. However, as they are completely out of character with his party’s history (at least since the merger with the SDP) he and his claims are not credible.
Maybe Cleggy realises that the party is stuck in the past and is going to drag them into the 21st century (or at least try to)?