Just a few hours before today’s prime minister’s questions, the Resolution Foundation’s Squeezed Britain report for 2013 warned that earnings for low-to-middle-income families will not reach pre-recession levels until 2023. When families are working harder for less, the pantomime of PMQs has the unfortunate habit of making politics looks small when the challenges we face are so big.
Who won?
David Cameron was backed into a corner by Ed Miliband on living standards and he will surely come to regret his bolshie claim that at the end of this parliament the British people will be a ‘lot better off [under the coalition] than they were under Labour.’
It’s not just Resolution Foundation who are showing up the coalition’s failings – as Ed said, its own Office for Budget Responsibility is saying that people will be worse off as prices rise faster than wages. In 1980 Ronald Reagan’s campaign slogan was ‘Are You Better Off Than You Were Four Years Ago?’ Having taken Disraeli’s One Nation mantra from the Tories at last year’s conference, why not go one step further and steal Reagan’s slogan as our own at the next election?
As much as the public dislike childish exchanges that we all, let’s be honest, find amusing, the bigger problem is when they think we’re all the same. Today’s PMQs showed once more the gulf in values between our party and a coalition that is putting an ideological attachment to austerity economics above the needs of our country’s hard-working families.
But Ed could have drilled that home more strongly by calling Cameron out on his claims on personal income tax. It gives the impression they share our values when they do not – as the IPPR has shown, raising the personal allowance is a very inefficient way of helping low-to-middle-income families, and nowhere near enough to counter the combined effects of the coalition failing austerity economics and benefit cuts.
Best backbencher
Liberal Democrat MP Stephen Williams’ question on tax avoidance on developing countries. Rich and poor countries alike cannot provide universal public services for all when they miss out on tax revenue because UK and multinational companies aren’t paying their fair share. While it’s welcome that this is on Cameron’s agenda for the G8, it’s scandalous that his chancellor’s own budget last year will create a tax loophole for UK companies that could deprive developing countries of up to £4bn (and our own Exchequer of £1bn). Another example of the wrong priorities and wrong values of this government.
Best joke
‘The prime minister is rightly shocked by the revelations that many food products contain 100 per cent horse. Does he share my concern that if tested, many of his answers might contain 100 per cent bull?’ Mark Ferguson may disagree over on LabourList but Anas Sarwar’s line was perfectly delivered, and, to his credit, Cameron took it well.
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David Taylor is the founder and former chair of the Labour Campaign for International Development. He tweets @DavidTaylor85