Public spending – any light amidst the heat?
The RSA has a double interest in the debate about public spending. In its lectures and Journal and other platforms for ideas, the Society aims to frame issues in ways which shed light, rather than heat, and also encourage us to understand the role we, as citizens, play in creating and solving policy problems. Also, our research programme is exploring various aspects of public service reform, with a particular emphasis on how public services can build social capacity. The question is whether the current row over public spending will be one that enhances public understanding.
Today sees the start of Labour’s autumn offensive. A speech later by Peter Mandelson and by Gordon Brown tomorrow to the TUC will be opportunities for the Government to lay out its core script. Also, today sees a political cabinet, at which the agenda is focussed on Party matters and the civil servants leave the room. I attended a few of these, and even spoke at one. Generally, they are deeply tedious affairs. Unlike the policy issues on the agenda of an ordinary meeting, at political cabinet everyone thinks they have something useful to say about political strategy and the state of the party. This means every single person speaks, many of them sticking to well worn scripts. There are those ministers who always start their contribution with something folksy about their own constituency, those who cannot speak without reminding colleagues of their voluminous knowledge of Labour history, those who offer deep analysis and new conceptual frameworks without actually saying anything useful (this would have been my flaw had I been a cabinet member). They are the kind of meetings where people late in the order of speaking say ‘most of my points have been made already’ and then go on to make them all again.
I assume that Brown’s message to his colleagues will be that Labour can use the row over public spending to do to the Conservatives in the autumn of 2009 what the Tories did to Labour on tax in the autumn of 1991. The phrase may not be used but the tone will be ‘Tory public spending bombshell’. With this tactic having been used before, in 2001 and 2005, with the public hostile to Labour and more open to the Tories, and with opinion polls suggesting the public wants to see spending reductions, this is a much harder attack to mount. At political cabinet the thing really to listen out for is the coded subtext beneath all the waffle. Today I suspect it will be this ’We are all behind you Gordon in trying to put the heat on the Conservatives. But if it doesn’t succeed the writing will be on the wall’.
Having said which, there will be some nervousness in Conservative ranks. Whether by accident or design the Opposition are in the position that whatever Labour says on spending constraint it has to seem tougher. Labour’s task is to recast the divide from being ‘Labour denial versus Tory realism’, which was how Osborne and Cameron successfully branded the divide in the summer, to ‘Labour toughness versus Tory recklessness’. But in arguing that this is not the time for making major cuts in public services, Labour has the backing not just of the TUC but many respected economic commentators, including last week Anatole Kalestsky in the Times and Martin Wolf in the FT.
If Labour does manage to start winning this argument the Conservatives may face some hard questions (not a bad thing if they are to be the next Government). If they back away from their tough line they will look weak, but if they stick to it, the pressure will be on to specify their cuts, especially as many Conservative front benchers seem actually to be promising more investment in their own areas.
Although there is bound to be lots of political posturing, this is at least a debate that matters and where Government policy can make a real difference. The hope (but not the expectation) must be that our politicians are forced to go beyond the point scoring to engage with the bigger question of what kind of welfare state we will need in the future, and what does this mean for us as citizens.
Labour Party woes: only connect
On Friday the Observer asked me for 100 words on Labour’s problems. They only used the last forty, but this is what I sent:
‘ It’s easy to say what Labour needs to compete in the next election; signs of economic recovery, a compelling policy programme, credible dividing lines with the Conservatives. The political pendulum has swung several times over the last 2 years and the Conservatives still have some frayed edges. From where he is now any improvement could create momentum, but Gordon Brown’s biggest problem as a politician is how hard he finds it to relate to the public at large. Unless he can find a way to connect, it won’t matter what Labour’s message is it simply won’t get through.’
Behind all the talk of conspiracies and betrayal, Labour faces a simple dilemma. Gordon Brown is in some ways a very good leader and in other ways he is not. Arguably his greatest flaw is that the public find it very hard to relate to him; which for a politician is fairly fatal. To say that anyone who expresses this view is obsessed with personalities is a bit like criticising a modelling agency for being obsessed with looks.
Over ninety percent of human communication is non verbal. If this emotional communication is going wrong it gets in the way of the other 10%; the words themselves. For some reason our Prime Minister finds it very hard to get over this non verbal barrier. A friend once said something like this:
‘When I listen to Gordon Brown it reminds me of watching the weather forecast. It all sounds very clear and I think I am paying attention, but if at the end someone was to ask me if it was going to be sunny tomorrow in North Wales I wouldn’t have a clue.‘
This isn’t just about winning votes. Political leaders need to be able to appeal to our better nature, but to do that they must be able to form an emotional bond. I have argued before that the biggest challenge facing the political class as a whole is to get us, the people, to own the dilemmas facing the country; to stop making impossible demands (‘Swedish welfare on American taxes’ as pollster Ben Page says) and to recognise that we are all responsible for making a better future possible. This is as much an emotional appeal as a rational argument.
The Labour Party faces a very tough choice. In some ways its apparent willingness to stick with Gordon Brown despite his failings is commendable (the Conservatives have traditionally been more ruthless with their leaders) but for MPs and activists to ask for an urgent answer as to how the Prime Minister intends to overcome his demonstrable inability to connect is entirely reasonable.
Party like it’s 1991?
I found myself on Newsnight yesterday debating election promises with Danny Finkelstein from The Times. I say ‘debating’, but we were so in agreement that among the abusive text messages I received on the way home was one reading ‘why don’t you and that bloody Tory get married?’ This is an outrageous suggestion: Danny already has a wife.
The Conservatives’ problems over tax raise the question of whether 2009 is most like 1991, before the ruling Party scored a stunning victory, or 1996, just before the Opposition won a landslide. Try these three key indicators:
State of the country
Just like in 1991, the economy, public and family finances of 2009 are in a mess. In 1996 we were three years out of recession. People may not feel this is a time to take risks. In 1996 there was a powerful feeling that people wanted a fundamental change of direction in society. In 2009 people are angry with the Government but it isn’t clear they are rejecting Labour values in the visceral way they recoiled against Conservativism in 1996.
Verdict: 2009 more like 1991
Standing of the leaders
David Cameron hasn’t hit the heights of popularity attained by Tony Blair in opposition but he isn’t that far short, with a current rating from MORI of plus 22%. He is certainly considerably more credible with the voters than was Neil Kinnock. Gordon Brown has not plumbed the depths of John Major in 1996 (although Major was generally ahead of his Party in the polls) but he is a long way behind Major in 1991.
Verdict: 2009 more like 1996
Mindset of the parties
This isn’t easy to call. Although the Labour Party is hollowed out in many parts of the country, just as the Conservatives were in 1996, sitting MPs tell me they can still get people out canvassing and leafleting. More importantly, the vast majority of Labour politicians and members remain hungry to win again. This is in stark contrast to senior Tories in 1996, most of whom had given up on the next election and were much more interested in fighting about Europe than taking on Blair.
On the other hand, the tax row over the last few days suggests there is still a significant group of Conservatives who put ideological rigour above political pragmatism. To suggest that the Conservatives commit themselves to major tax cuts for the most well off during a deep recession and on the verge of a crisis in public expenditure is surely barking. But it is also the firmly held position of a cluster of commentators around The Telegraph, The Spectator and the lively Conservative blogosphere. In having still to keep one eye on his Party faithful, while trying to woo a not quite convinced electorate, Osborne and Cameron share more in common with the dilemmas of Kinnock and Smith than the untrammelled authority of Blair and Brown.
Verdict: On balance, 2009 is more like 1991.
Two things drop out of this analysis: First, that 2010 will probably be somewhere between 1991 and 1996, which may be why most people I speak to predict the Conservatives will be the largest party but not, perhaps, with an overall majority; second, the reliance of the Conservatives on the leadership dimension. If Cameron were to lose credibility and Brown to gain it, the Conservatives would lose the one dimension with clear parallels to the New Labour landslide David Cameron wants so much to emulate.
RSA Animate
RSA Mobile
RSA Comment- RSA Projects Blogs
- Twitter @RSAMatthew
RSA Bookshop
The RSA Bookshop, in partnership with Blackwell's the UK's leading academic bookseller, offers Fellows and friends an opportunity to purchase books and to explore our speakers’ ideas in greater detail. Visit the RSA Bookshop.