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The view from Birmingham: Tory doctors, Lib Dem machines, Labour hopes

06/04/2015, 12:51:20 PM

by Jonathan Todd

I voted for Gerry Steinberg in the City of Durham in 2001, Keith Hill in Streatham in 2005, and stood in Westmorland and Lonsdale in 2010. I’ll vote on 7 May for Gisela Stuart to retain the Birmingham Edgbaston seat that she’s held since 1997. Then David Hill, a veteran of Labour communications, reacted to this Labour gain by repeatedly saying “fucking unbelievable” at the Labour celebration party at the Royal Festival Hall.

Dr Luke Evans, Stuart’s Tory opponent, is pictured with a stethoscope on his literature. The word Conservative is an afterthought. It bemoans the record of NHS Wales that is Labour controlled, while being silent on Stuart. No attempt to critique her record or change how we should think of her is made.

A “re-elect Gisela Stuart” poster looks out from our kitchen window. Our next door neighbour has one up too. Labour appears to be winning this street. But the constituency has not been blanketed as Tim Farron posters covered Westmorland and Lonsdale during 2010. These declared, “the local choice v the London banker”, which summed up the Liberal Democrat framing of the election as a contest between Farron and Gareth McKeever, a former banker and the Tory candidate.

In contrast to the Liberal Democrats in Westmorland and Lonsdale in 2010, communications from both the Conservatives and Labour in Edgbaston have made minimal attempts to frame the election. And as Evans downplays his Conservative status, Stuart also stands somewhat removed from her party, as her letter heading describes her as, “your independent thinking Labour candidate”.

Reflecting on his comprehensive defeat to Farron, McKeever has written, “the main reason we lost was the sheer size and scope of the local Lib Dem machine and extremely popular local MP”. Edgbaston has no such machine. To the extent that any Lib Dem activists are local, they have relocated to Birmingham Yardley and Solihull, where John Hemming and Lorely Burt seek to hold the only Lib Dem seats in the West Midlands.

Solihull recently hosted Nick Clegg watching a hedgehog walk in circles, a Lib Dem attempt to hold back what the local paper describes as “Boris mania” following a constituency visit by London’s Mayor. It is not just in the south west of England that the Conservatives are seeking to make gains at the expense of their coalition partners. That’s also their aim to the south east of Birmingham.

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The French ambassador’s Sturgeon statement looks like a non-denial denial

04/04/2015, 10:33:09 AM

by Atul Hatwal

Diplomats weigh their public statements carefully. Words are parsed for intent, implication and likely inference. Which is why the French ambassador’s response to the Telegraph’s Sturgeon scoop is so interesting.

“While the ambassador and the first minister, some time ago, have discussed the political situation, Ms Sturgeon did not touch on her personal political preferences with regards the future prime minister,”

At face value, this seems like a denial. But the words have been very carefully chosen. The key phrase is “did not touch on her personal [emphasis added] political preferences.”

Why use the words “her personal”?

Why draw a clear, albeit implicit, distinction between Nicola Sturgeon’s views as a person and her views as the leader and representative of the SNP?

Surely it would have been simpler for the ambassador’s spokesman to say that there was no discussion on preferences for PM or the outcome of the election. That would have been a categorical and water-tight denial.

The words “her personal” are utterly extraneous, unless they are there for a specific reason.

The statement makes it clear that the “political situation” (in other words the election) was discussed and it would have been extraordinary if the ambassador had not asked Nicola Sturgeon for her views on the result and the SNP’s preferences. She simply would not have been doing her job, and so far noone has suggested that the French ambassador, Sylvie Bermann, is incompetent.

Following the meeting, it is entirely plausible that a Foreign Office official, drafting a short contemporaneous account intended for internal consumption, would assume Nicola Sturgeon was speaking in her capacity as leader of the SNP – the FCO memo seen by the Telegraph states, “She’d rather see David Cameron remain as PM (and didn’t see Ed Miliband as PM material.)” – after all, why else would she be meeting the French ambassador?

Just as it’s plausible that a French diplomat looking for a way out of a sticky situation could willfully interpret the memo differently, and take the meaning of the wording, “She’d rather see” to refer to Nicola Sturgeon’s personal views. This would then allow an ambassadorial denial of the story without calling the British Foreign Office liars.

Such semantics might seem esoteric, but this is the stock in trade of senior diplomats. And right now, the French ambassador’s statement looks like a non-denial denial.

Atul Hatwal is editor of Uncut

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Labour’s response to the Tories’ business letter has been an epic act of political self-harm

01/04/2015, 08:22:37 PM

by Atul Hatwal

When the history of the 2015 general election is written, the Tories’ business letter in the Telegraph will be seen as a pivotal moment. Pivotal because of what it presaged for the potency of a key Tory line of attack in the campaign and Labour’s inability to mount a convincing response.

For the Tories, the letter is not just a one-off story but part of a longer, sustained offensive that will build over the coming days and weeks. More business leaders will have been lined up to intervene to kick the story on, reheat it if it cools and bulldoze the central Tory message on Labour and the economy, into the public consciousness.

How do I know? Because I have a memory which stretches back to the 2010 campaign, something that Ed Miliband’s strategists evidently lack.

In 2010, the single most damaging intervention in the campaign was the letter from business leaders opposing Labour’s National Insurance tax rise. The manner in which more and more business signatories were rolled out by the Tories dominated days of coverage and shattered Labour’s fragile reputation for economic competence.

To paraphrase Tony Blair, the public might not cherish these business leaders as national treasures but they do believe that Britain’s CEOs know more about creating jobs and wealth than politicians.

In the end there were over 500 signatories of the 2010 letter running businesses that employed over 1m people, with all sectors and ethnicities represented.

Tuesday’s letter in the Telegraph is just the start.

Damaging as the Tory offensive is though, perhaps the worst aspect of the exchange between the parties has been Labour’s response.

On Twitter, Labour activists, candidates and Labour supporting journalists engaged in an epic, collective act of political self-harm as the story broke.

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Revealed: Osborne’s next Budget

01/04/2015, 08:47:09 AM

by Jonathan Todd

Of course, we strain every Labour sinew to have the next Budget delivered by Ed Balls. Even if the worst happens and the next government is Conservative led, it may be that George Osborne finds himself serving away from the Treasury.

But Osborne’s 2010 “emergency” Budget framed this parliament. Amid a leadership election, Labour struggled to respond. He’ll spy a way to repeat this trick. On different terms, however.

The 2010 vintage made spending this parliament’s key axis. Labour had spent too much. Osborne would curb it. You can’t trust Labour on spending but you can trust Osborne.

This spending card showed its age in 2014’s Autumn Statement. Again playing it big, Osborne crash landed in the 1930s. He predictably backed out of this rickets afflicted cul-de-sac in the Budget. Neither the Autumn Statement’s spending profile for the next parliament nor that which followed his Budget readjustment are truly credible.

It’s a charade engineered to push Labour into positions that allow him to bemoan Labour’s supposedly reckless profligacy. If Osborne does deliver another Budget, he would be expected to reveal the brutal details that he has lead us to expect.

Will he close the police? Or the army? Or is local government an outdated sticking plaster?

Much as Labour sees Osborne as an ideologue – and he probably does have somewhat more deeply held convictions than David Cameron, a particularly light wearer of his beliefs – he is sensible enough to know that the cuts that he has set himself up for in unprotected departments risk policy chaos and political ruin. To the extent that he has ever had a Long Term Economic Plan (LTEP), it has only existed as rhetoric of spending responsibility. The policy substance has regularly shifted, not least away from the 1930s between the Autumn Statement and the Budget.

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It is time to put some humanity back in the Treasury

31/03/2015, 03:20:44 PM

by Rajesh Agrawal

It is wrong for commentators to lazily blame Labour for the economic downturn and credit the Tories with the recovery.

The truth is, the recession wasn’t caused by Labour. It was the result of a serious collapse in the global banking system.

After five years of Conservative spin you might be forgiven for forgetting that Labour’s economic record in power was actually one of remarkable stability and sustained growth for the ten years before the banking crash. It was also a time when the vast majority of ordinary people felt the benefits of economic prosperity.

Far from irresponsible spending, Labour biggest deficit before the crash was 3.3% of GDP. Osborne’s currently stands at 4.6%.

In fact, Labour successful and responsible economic management was arguably the single biggest reason the Conservatives found it so difficult to win back power in 2001, 2005 and a majority in 2010.

By comparison, Osborne’s economic record is hardly a shining success story he claims.

The current recovery is the slowest economic recovery in over a hundred years. It is also an unbalanced recovery with huge areas of the UK and millions of ordinary people yet to feel the benefits, while the gap between rich and poor gets ever wider.

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The Tories want to park the bus. But the wheels are falling off

30/03/2015, 09:00:30 AM

by Jonathan Todd

This was the week that the supposed Long Term Economic Plan (LTEP) gave way to short term miscalculation. The question is whether it will have a resonance deep enough to reach beyond the narrow cadre of the politically obsessed and long enough to be felt on 7 May.

It was a good week for Labour. And there are precious few weeks left before the election. The Tory plan was to stuff them full of LTEP. Park a bus of LTEP on the playing field of the election and close off all Labour routes to goal. Lynton Crosby as José Mourinho. But the wheels have looked like they are falling off the Tory bus.

“You had one job,” Crosby must ruefully lament. Instead of LTEP, Cameron needlessly diminished himself by triggering speculation about the Tory leadership and increased agitation among the runners and riders to focus on positioning in this race. It’s akin to John Terry tossing aside mid-match the armband that denotes the Chelsea captain.

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Horse-trading in Halifax

25/03/2015, 09:55:41 PM

by Rob Marchant

Union money: “the cleanest in politics”, as some Labourites describe it, misty-eyed. To be fair, sometimes it is. There are decent unions who donate money because they actually want a Labour government. On the other hand, the cliché is that business donations always come with strings attached.

Let’s decide which of the two the following is.

Exhibit A: the Halifax selection, where Len McCluskey’s friend Karie Murphy was working hard, with the backing of the considerable weight of Britain’s largest union, to be its MP. The Sunday Times (£) wrote a couple of weeks ago that her place on the shortlist was being horse-traded for a previously-pledged donation of £1.5m to Labour’s election fund. Surely not?

After her failure to be shortlisted by the party’s Special Selections Panel, there were two possible outcomes: that Unite’s donation would then be delivered, and that it would not be delivered. Naturally, the outcome couldn’t possibly related to the Halifax selection. We’re talking about the cleanest money in politics, after all.

Oddly, the Telegraph reported last week that “a senior Unite figure said the union could withhold any further funding for final two months of the campaign and demand Miss Murphy is allowed to run for another seat this election.”

It is also important to note that Labour is perfectly entitled – and always has been – to select shortlists close to an election. The party has never pretended that this first stage is democratic – it can’t afford to be, when you only have weeks to establish a candidate and try to win – it is only afterwards that the local party gets to choose from the shortlisted candidates.

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David Cameron has made a massive mistake but Labour’s picked the wrong line of attack

24/03/2015, 08:50:59 AM

by Atul Hatwal

If the Conservatives win the next election, David Cameron has turned himself into a bystander in his next government.

By pre-announcing his resignation he’s dissolved his future authority with backbenchers, who will be more interested in winning the favour of the next leader, and shifted the media lens onto his potential successors. The question of when he will resign – because he surely won’t last a full term – will dog him each day and ultimately he will struggle for relevance. He’s condemned himself to a living political death.

In the wake of such an extraordinary unforced error, Labour’s chosen line of attack is that Cameron is taking the electorate for granted by assuming he will win the next election. It fits with Labour’s broader critique of him and in that sense is logical, but it’s also wrong.

Two of David Cameron’s greatest political assets are his double digit lead over Ed Miliband as the public’s preference for PM and the extent to which he personally outpolls his party.

David Cameron’s telegraphed resignation is the very antithesis of leadership; it’s the epitome of weakness and raises the likelihood that any one of a gaggle of unappealing Tories could be prime minister in the next Parliament. Suddenly, there might be some hope for Labour.

Instead of talking about arrogance, Labour should be recasting the leadership choice at this election as one between Ed Miliband and the dangerous unknown.

There are two aspects to this.

First, the message should be hammered home that David Cameron is about to quit on the British people in the next Parliament.

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Revealed: George Osborne’s secret £6.5bn tax raid on pensioners

20/03/2015, 11:17:26 AM

by Samuel Dale

Buried deep in this year’s dull Budget was a secret £6.5bn tax raid on pensioners and savers under the guise of radical reforms.

George Osborne’s most significant policy announcement was the proposal to allow pensioners already drawing an annuity to sell their policy in exchange for a lump sum.

It is the second stage in major pensions reform announced in last year’s Budget to allow all over-55s to access their pension pots.

The first stage of pension freedoms is relatively simple. The pension system saw savers build up a retirement pot of cash with generous tax relief on contributions. In exchange they had to buy a secure income or annuity (or face a punitive 55% tax if they withdrew their cash from the pension wrapper).

Annuities work as a reverse insurance product so you pay over a big chuck of cash to the insurer and in return they pay you money every month until you die. Insurers pool the risk so those who die earlier fund the payments for those who live longer than expected lives.

As people live longer insurers are paying a lower amount each month over a longer period, making pensioners buying them poorer. Successive Governments have taken steps to ease the requirement to buy an annuity by allowing wealthier investors to drawdown their own money.

But Osborne’s announcement last year, coming into force on 6 April, is the big bang. It means anyone can withdraw their pension pot at marginal income tax rates (although everyone receives an initial tax-free lump sum of 25%).

The Treasury estimates the behavioural changes will see individuals wanting the money today despite the tax penalties. It will lead to many savers paying income tax on withdrawals they have never paid before.

So how much does it cost?

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Budget 2015: The quiet moments matter

19/03/2015, 02:27:16 PM

by Jonathan Todd

Budgets are supposed to be big moments. The kind that determine general elections. But maybe they are decided by millions upon millions of quieter moments. When payslips are inspected, profits turned, and housing wealth accumulated.

In these quieter moments judgments are made on the economy’s performance. In turn, these bear upon general election votes. It is a eighteen months since Uncut spotted a gradual rise in the proportion of the electorate reporting the economy as doing well and a steady decline in Labour’s poll lead. We ran a regression to assess the relationship between these data series and postulated that the Tories would overtake Labour when a quarter of the electorate came to the view that the economy is doing well.

In May last year, when YouGov’s tracker on economic sentiment first started to bump up against a quarter of the electorate being of this belief, we noted that Tory poll leads had started to emerge. These leads were faltering and slow to confirm themselves. Like the upward trajectory in the proportion of the electorate positive about the economy.

24 per cent of the electorate thought the economy was doing well last May and Labour held an average of a 3 point poll lead, as the table below illustrates. Occasional Tory leads then existed but the average favoured Labour. The Tories weren’t consistently ahead but nor was economic sentiment resoundingly over a quarter. At 30 per cent, economic sentiment now comfortably clears the quarter threshold, and Labour’s poll lead is less impressive than last May.

If we simply compare the data in May 2014 and March 2015, they seem to confirm the original Uncut hypothesis: the more the economy improves, the narrower Labour’s lead. The pattern of these series between these two months, however, rewards inspection.

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