The prime minister is gearing up for his trip to America later this week but at home his government is facing several pressing concerns. The Afghan atrocity is sure to dominate today’s news but David Cameron will be looking ahead to the budget next week. The Quad of Cameron, Nick Clegg, George Osborne and Danny Alexander are due to meet today for its last big session ahead of the budget. The two declared Tories, and the two quasi-Tories, are set to discuss the proposals over the 50 pence tax rate, Vince Cable’s mansion tax and Clegg’s backing for the populist sounding Tycoon Tax. The latter appears to have been gently snubbed by the Treasury but Osborne has been making tentative noises in support of scrapping the 50 pence tax rate and replacing it with Cable’s mansion tax, much to merriment of the battered Lib Dems.
And the Lib Dems need some cheer. They’ve spent a sunny weekend in Gateshead continuing their nervous breakdown. Few organisations can hold a debate for three days on whether or not to actually stage a debate, to then hold the debate, have a vote and then proceed to have a debate about what they have debated. But that is why the Lib Dems have been doing with their weekend. The once-saintly Shirley Williams, regarded as a deity in her party, has fallen to earth with a bump. Her sterling rhetoric cannot disguise the fact that she has put the Liberal Democrats ahead of our doctors and nurses in the NHS. The politics of this bill are poisonous and this, along with their duplicity over tuition fees, will further tighten the noose. Labour, led by the increasingly impressive Andy Burnham, have scented blood and will hold an Opposition Day debate on Tuesday demanding the government drop the health and social care bill. After their defeats last week, Labour is not expecting success but hopes to continue to destabilise an increasingly turbulent coalition.
On the committee corridor, the transport committee has a well-timed session scrutinising the performance of Network Rail and the Office of Rail Regulation. With talk of more fare rises and spending cuts in the air, angry commuters will want to see that Justine Greening, the new transport secretary with the aura of all-knowing prefect, is addressing their concerns. Added to the woe, a new Centre for Economics and Business Research study released today shows that disposable incomes are set to fall for the third year in a row. That will make unwelcome reading in the Treasury, the Bank of England and the country as a whole.
On Thursday the Commons begins with Business, Innovation and Skills questions. Doubtless the BIS secretary, Vince Cable, will face cross-examination on his blistering leaked letter that criticised the lack of overall strategy inherent within the government, and in particular the lack of effort to promote economic growth. Given his grandstanding at the Lib Dem conference, a cynic could say that Cable is secretly delighted that his letter was ‘leaked’. His Conservative colleagues may extract revenge and point out that he is partly responsible for the government’s economic strategy.
Returning to the budget, Ed Miliband and Ed Balls will conduct a pre-budget press conference at midday today. Both are expected to push hard for tax credits to be protected and, aided by last week’s Institute for Fiscal Studies research which highlighted that the working poor will be worse off under coalition proposals, expect much talk of the ‘squeezed middle’. In it together we are surely not. The avowed concentration on the economy this week, on the back of Miliband’s call last week for a government-backed ‘Made in Britain’ mark to insert patriotism into British economic policy, brings hope that the Labour party have finally discovered the pivotal issue for the next election. It is, after all, the economy, stupid.
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David Talbot is a political consultant, tweets @_davetalbot and writes the weekly The Week Ahead column on Progress
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Photo: UK Parliament
I think it is absolutly key we keep up the pressure on the Libdems, it’s clear if you read back over some of the commentary from the more career minded of their activists and councillors in Gateshead; they have been rattled again by the strength of feeling among their own remaining ranks over this.
It might be a sensible idea to see some big policy ideas come out from the Labour frontbench clearly aimed at wavering Libdems, I would suggest stuff around tuition fees, civil liberties, and sustainable development where clear Libdem manifesto commitments have been not only abandoned but gleefully trodden into the dirt by the coalition.