Clegg still digging

Cameron and Osborne resort to U-turns and personal attacks when they know they face a real possibility of election defeat,but they can`t hold a candle to Clegg in his efforts to stave off electoral humiliation. Not content in digging a hole for himself with his attempts to defend the honour of politicians in the wake of criticism from Paxman, he now has the temerity to front the coalition`s attack on Johnson for his "greed is good" speech, Cameron`s patsy to the last. He attacks Johnson for suggesting "we should give up on a whole swath of fellow citizens", without seeming to realise that is exactly what he and his coalition colleagues did by giving their support to Gove`s examination changes, which in the long term will lead to a two-tier system of education! It`s hard to believe the Deputy Prime Minister has not heard of the inferior education provided in the old secondary moderns, hardly centres of  a "culture of opportunity and aspiration",which he pretends to favour, but this is the same man who, after three years of being in  government, declared it was time to "hardwire fairness" into policies! He continues to talk as if the inequality this government has increased and encouraged has nothing to do with him; supporting the living wage is all very well but has he instigated any policy to make it compulsory? "Greed", he says, "brought a banking collapse and misery and hardship", yet for three and a half years he`s joined in with the Tory propaganda blaming the Labour government`s spending and borrowing for causing the problems. That hole gets deeper by the day! 

Tory U-turns a warning to Labour

Carney might say that a likely 17% rise in house prices in two years does not mean there is "an immediate risk to financial stability", but it certainly suggests yet another gamble by the Chancellor has failed to reap rewards.  His Funding for Lending scheme, giving access to banks to very cheap money yet again, was originally intended to benefit small and medium sized businesses until it was hi-jacked by the greedy buy-to-rent brigade, and lasted so long unchecked because it resulted in low mortgage rates and house price rises, with the  accompanying pre-election feel-good factor. The truth is the Tories have been banking on no interference from the Bank of England, and the continuation of low interest rates, until the Tories are "swept back into power in 2015", on the back of the homeowners` vote. Labour must be very wary, especially with an Autumn Statement due next week, because the Tories are clearly prepared to adopt any populist policy, such as caps on Pay Day Lenders, accept U-turns, as with the FLS, resort to any measures, no matter how low, such as the personal attacks on Miliband, and even accept the idea of a freeze on energy prices, albeit in a different guise. Expect, too, yet more emphasis on "efficiency", not only to keep the financial sector on board, but because in Tory-speak, this means job losses, and lower unemployment figures would trigger the Bank of England to raise interest rates.

     Labour have only a few days to commit themselves to some obvious and electorally popular policies, because they are almost certainly pencilled in for Osborne to announce next week, and a start could be made with an immediate rise in both the minimum wage and tax-free allowance, acceptance of the EU`s version of the Tobin tax, a cap on all private rents, with a commission on the rental system to follow. Miliband must ensure he gets his "retaliation in first", making it absolutely clear to the voters whose side he is on, people not City. Obfuscation and prevarication must be avoided, as clearly the Tory election campaign is well under way.

  

More on Boris and greed

Supporters of Boris Johnson, in their attempts to clean up the mess made by his recent speech, are now saying that what he meant by the "greed is good" nonsense is that it`s perfectly okay for people to better themselves. Does this mean we can expect to see the mayor of London giving his support to the outsourced University of London staff in their struggle for pensions and proper sick pay, as they seek to improve their conditions? Of course not! No matter how much spin Johnson`s cronies put on it, everyone is well aware of what he meant: that it`s okay for the likes of him and his mates in the City to grab, profiteer, run scams to cheat fellow citizens,take bonuses like annual lottery-wins, fix interest rates,to enjoy the security, transport and health benefits provided in this country but pay as little tax to fund them as possible, but when it comes to hard-working people, who often have to work all hours for pay less than the minimum wage,suddenly it`s different.

Johnson is so lacking in sympathy, he cannot see the irony of saying that he does not want a return to a time of "heartlessness", when "figuratively riffling banknotes under the noses of the homeless" was commonplace. Isn`t the membership qualification test for his beloved Bullingdon Club these days exactly that, only literally?

       The speech appears to be the start of his bid for Tory leadership, hoping presumably Cameron`s hold on the party will weaken further after the expected Ukip gains in next year`s Euro elections, and stealing Gove`s thunder with his call for a return of grammar schools, the inevitable long-term result of the recent examination reforms. Ingenuous to the last, Johnson hails the super-rich, the "1% of earners who contribute 30% of income tax", many of them his friends in the City,yet fails to mention not only their obscene wealth for "socially useless" work, and their tax avoidance and evasion, which now costs £95bn a year to the British economy, but also their refusal to pay decent wages to the majority of their workforce. He doesn`t even understand why they are "so despicable in the eyes of all decent British people". They are not the hard-working "Stakhanovites" as he describes them, but greedy capitalists, and his version of laissez-faire, where they will "do more to help poorer people" is simply preposterous. No doubt by spouting forth such rubbish, his popularity in the Tory party will soar, but hopefully it will reveal to the people formerly impressed with him the true nature of the man. Liverpudlians must certainly never forget the remarks he made soon after the Hillsborough disaster, whilst his description of the £250,000 paid to him for his weekly column in the Telegraph as "chickenfeed" should have ensured he never win any election again, especially in a city where economic apartheid seems the order of the day.

 

Boris`s bid for power

Boris Johnson has managed to escape with his career intact after making so many unacceptable and offensive speeches, one can only hope that this time, he has gone too far, even for right-wing, but extremely election-conscious, Tories. If "the spirit of envy" and "greed" are characteristics to be admired and fostered, presumably Johnson would lend his wholehearted support to strikes in London by nurses and carers, social workers and cleaners, in their attempts to break the stranglehold on them imposed by the "economic apartheid" which he appears to care so little about in the capital. He apparently does not want a return to a time of "heartlessness", when "figuratively riffling banknotes under the noses of the homeless" was commonplace, yet isn`t the membership qualification test for his beloved Bullingdon Club exactly that, only literally?

       The speech appears to be the start of his bid for Tory leadership, hoping presumably Cameron`s hold on the party will weaken further after the expected Ukip gains in next year`s Euro elections, and stealing Gove`s thunder with his call for a return of grammar schools, the inevitable long-term result of the recent examination reforms. Ingenuous to the last, Johnson hails the super-rich, the "1% of earners who contribute 30% of income tax", many of them his friends in the City,yet fails to mention not only their obscene wealth for "socially useless" work, and their tax avoidance and evasion, which now costs £95bn a year to the British economy, but also their refusal to pay decent wages to the majority of their workforce. Those are the reasons why they are "so despicable in the eyes of all decent British people", Boris. They are not hard-working "Stakhanovites", but greedy capitalists, and this version of laissez-faire, where they will "do more to help poorer people" is simply preposterous.

Osborne`s U-turn

Osborne`s U-turn, with his "legal cap on the overall cost of payday loans", should act as a warning to the Labour party.The Tories, as duplicitous as ever, have two different messages in their preparations for the 2015 election, one for the financial and corporate sector, one for the rest of us. For the City, as Cameron`s "gold throne" speech at the Lord Mayor`s banquet explained, the aim is a "leaner and more efficient state" with less interference in the market, and evidence can be seen with the Chancellor`s efforts to prove the EU`s cap on bonuses illegal. This is the Chancellor  who is so in cahoots with the City he has allowed the regulators to appoint a head of their own choice for the inquiry investigating why the regulators saw nothing wrong with the Co-op Bank`s affairs!

     For the rest of us, after years of punishing austerity policies, we are expected to believe the Tories care, and "represent the low-paid"! Osborne can harp on about making sure "hardworking people get a fair deal from the financial system" as much as he likes, but the truth is that the Tories are running scared, knowing that Miliband has "struck a chord" with the electorate by promising to freeze energy prices.More Tory U-turns will undoubtedly follow, and we can expect pledges on the minimum wage and changes to personal allowance levels for income tax, probably as early as the Autumn Statement next month; so determined are they to maintain power, ideology will remain "all over the place", and principles will be ignored.They cannot even afford for unemployment to fall too much just before the election, as an interest rate hike,which would be triggered, would be electorally disastrous. Miliband must use this to his advantage, and ensure he gets his "retaliation in first", making it absolutely clear to the voters whose side he is on, City or people. Obfuscation and prevarication must be avoided, as clearly the Tory election campaign is well under way.

Politicians qualifications, like those of Rev Flowers!

The revelation that Paul Flowers, the disgraced and former chairman of the Co-op Bank, knew "next to nothing about banking" , and was £44bn wide of the mark when asked about the assets of his bank, came as a shock; his lack of knowledge and experience in the sector should have excluded him even as a candidate for the job. However, it does suggest  there may be a need to check on the suitability of many of those holding key positions in our society, starting with the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The heir apparent to the Osborne baronetcy left the Bullingdon Club with a degree in modern history,and worked as a researcher and speechwriter with the Tory party before becoming an MP in 2001.He was Michael Howard`s third choice as Shadow Chancellor in 2005, and ran Cameron`s leadership campaign.Where are his accountancy skills and expertise in micro amd macro-economics? If he had any, perhaps he would not have praised the Co-op for its attempts to spend £750m which it clearly did not have, on buying Lloyd`s branches,or,as Andrew Rawnsley tells us, tried to "persuade other finance ministers to waive capital requirements" in order to promote the purchase. 

    This is the man who is so in cahoots with the City he has allowed "the regulators to appoint a head of their own choice" for the inquiry set up to investigate why the regulators saw nothing wrong with the Co-op Bank`s affairs! Osborne also ignored the parliamentary commission`s advice on bankers` bonuses by skedaddling off to Brussels to claim the EU`s bonus cap was illegal! Banking on interest rates not rising significantly until after the 2015 election is clearly his "essential gamble", but this shows exactly how the Chancellor`s pursuit of political power takes priority over the needs of our society, just like the bankers` pursuit of profit and bonus has precedence over the requirements of their customers and the taxpayers.

  There is definitely a case for "ethical leadership by independent people",as suggested by the Centre for Public Scrutiny,but until the priorities of our party politicians change, it seems a distant and unlikely prospect.Harping on about transparency is all very well, but without, for instance, insisting on publication of the personal tax details of all politicians and those holding public office, is what can be described as "all talk and no trousers"; our politicians appear well qualified for that at least!

Idle f----r or nightmare?

Another week in British politics, another question of major political significance emerges. Which is worse, for the person ostensibly designated as your number two to be an "idle f----r", or someone your office describes as a "nightmare" to work with? Either way, the answer is unlikely to do anything to increase election turnout in 2015, which, if it  reaches 60%, will be verging on the miraculous. All we need now is for Miliband to do something so electorally disastrous, akin to Kinnoch`s "We`re alright" rants in 1992, like appearing on a radio programme pretending not to be high-brow!