Speaking to the Lib Dems’ one-day policy conference in London today, Nick Clegg has highlighted the party’s policies to address the UK recession, and attacked the Labour/Tory “cosy consensus” for ignoring the needs of ordinary people and communities:
Our problems are systemic. Take a look at the problems in Britain today, from the economic crisis to the lack of social mobility, from disengagement with politics to our failure to get the best out of the European Union. The blame lies squarely at the feet of Labour and the Conservatives.
The Conservative adulation of the City of London, replicated by the Labour party: supplicants each in turn to the Square Mile’s masters of finance. That’s what’s made our economy so vulnerable to the global financial crisis. Both parties’ dependence on special interests, their centralising, micro-managing ways, that ignore the needs of ordinary people and local communities. That’s what’s sucked the life out of our politics.
The two old parties have been running Britain, turn and turn about, making the same mistakes, for longer than most people can remember. A cosy cabal, not wanting to change too much.
His speech concluded:
I’ve talked today about some of my priorities for taking Britain out of this recession. Big, permanent, fair tax cuts to put money in people’s pockets. Parental leave, affordable, accessible childcare and quality schools – helping every child achieve their potential, and helping every family make ends meet. Massive investment in green energy and infrastructure to create jobs and protect our precious planet.
But there is more we need to do – and across the board, Liberal Democrats are leading the way. We’re leading the way on how to get the banks lending again, and how to regulate them better in the future. We’re leading the way on housing: stopping repossessions, and using the property crash to help build up our depleted stock of social homes for people who need them. We’re leading the way on fuel poverty, promoting a massive investment in insulation and energy efficiency to lower bills and protect the environment too. And we’re leading the way on training and education for young people and adults alike – support for apprentices, better funding for colleges and vocational courses, and extending student support to people studying part time.
This is the route out of recession. But the other parties will not deliver it. Liberal Democrats – and Liberal Democrats alone – can truly change Britain for the better. Together, I know we can make it happen.
Here’s links to a couple of media reports Nick’s speech attracted in anticipation: the BBC – Clegg voices school leaver fears; and the Express – Clegg warns over ‘downturn victims’.
Update: And here’s a blogger’s report – Stephen Glenn.
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7 Comments
I was trying to look up our commitment to a ‘Massive investment in green energy and infrastructure to create jobs and protect our precious planet.’ the other day but could find very little detail. Perhaps I didn’t look hard enough but we don’t seem to go very far at all in our policy: Investing in insulation, ‘green technologies’ and a bit in railways.
This is supposed to be creating jobs but it doesn’t really say how. We have no firm commitment on green skills such as environmental engineering and nothing relating to manufacturing. Even our commitment to invest in ‘green technologies’ is a bit wooly and doesn’t really have a figure attached to it or any specific outcomes.
I know it’s potentially early days but if we could make firm commitments in these areas before the next election we could really take the fight to Labour in their heartlands and have a much more coherent environmental AND employment policy.
The Tories policy is concentrating solely on the supply of energy and efficiency savings there. We have the opportunity to create a unique narrative and we are currently squandering it with wooly language.
If I have missed something I’m happy to be corrected.
I take it you’ve been here and looked at the linked pdf?
And remember that’s not a replacement for but an addition to the Zero Carbon Britain paper we passed a little while back.
“I was trying to look up our commitment to a ‘Massive investment in green energy and infrastructure to create jobs and protect our precious planet.’ the other day but could find very little detail.”
This isn’t the first time Clegg has mentioned investment in “green energy”, but the actual policy documents don’t contain any commitment to government spending on the development of renewable energy, as far as I can see. It seems it’s all meant to be funded by “feed-in tariffs” – i.e. by using a legal mechanism to raise the prices paid for energy by consumers.
If he really is proposing “Massive investment in green energy” by the state, then of course he needs to explain how it would be paid for.
“The two old parties have been running Britain, turn and turn about, making the same mistakes, for longer than most people can remember. A cosy cabal, not wanting to change too much”
Oh dear oh dear. I’m afraid those people that think the Tories and the same as Labour, also think we’re the same as them both! Three parties all the same.
This kind of “they’re all the same” language doesn’t build any support for us, it just adds to the general apathy and disillusion with politics.
Andrew Turvey at 2.23 pm, your evidence for that is??
I’m afraid this starts off with a grand claim, but ends up in a whimper.
There’s this big claim about the Liberal Democrats being different from the others, but then just a list of policies which don’t sound remarkably different from what the other parties are putting forward. He sounds just like another politician engaging in politico-speak, rather than someone with real passion and really different from what’s on offer elsewhere.
“Better education, helping people make ends meet, protecting the environment”, yeah, yeah, yeah – but Nick, they ALL say that. If you’re claiming to be fundamentally different you have to sound different, and you DON’T.
“Supplicants each in turn to the Square Mile’s masters of finance” sounded fierce and radical, but it would have worked better had you, Nick, shown any signs of anger about this sort of thing BEFORE the current economic downturn. Instead, the impression our party gave was that it was reasonably happy with the way things were, and some of them, associated with a publication called the “Orange Book” (remember it, Nick?), gave every impression that they adulated the Square Mile Master of Finance and their ways of doing things, and they felt the main thing wrong with the Liberal Democrats was that the party hadn’t fully aligned itself with free-market “City boys know best” thinking in the way Labour and the Conservatives had.
Andrew and Matthew are right. Whatever you think about the Orange Book etc, we HAVE to talk like normal people do!
“The two old parties …. ” That’s a crib from all the speeches made at the time of the Alliance and the new Liberal Democrat party, when it formed twenty years ago. We did have a brand new party then, so it made some sort of sense. It doesn’t any more!
“Cosy cabal” – just ask yourself, who uses words like that, apart from an old-style politician with not enough imagination?
“Liberal Democrats alone – can truly change Britain for the better.” Now come off it, everybody can see that Britain is changing for the worse. So don’t make starry-eyed overclaims.
What is Brown saying? “We will do everything we can so that families can feel secure…”. Straightforward, down-to-earth, not bombastic. Irrespective of the actual merits of what Brown is doing, this is a far better pitched message to the public.