3 Comments

• Liberal Eye 24th Jul '09 - 2:22pm

  It all depends on how large you believe the inefficiency of govt is.

  That over half think that efficiency savings alone can rebalance the books while an overwhelming majority believe efficiency savings need not damage services are pretty remarkable statistics.

  Given that a large proportion of the public works for govt and all of us have extensive contact with it this is a view that deserves to be taken very seriously indeed.

  Irrespective of just how much mileage there is in efficiency savings a democratic party that aims to win power needs to align itself and its manifesto with what voters believe and you will find few clearer signals than this one.

  Of course the track record of politicians on efficiency savings is dreadful – which is precisely why it has now become such fertile territory.

  For what it’s worth I believe that while the efficiency savings will not be enough to avert the need for cuts entirely they will go a very long way. The only tiny difficulty is how to achieve the necessary savings.

  Getting Clegg and other senior LibDems talking and worrying about it would be a good start.

• Bill le Breton 25th Jul '09 - 9:30am

  The above news from the pollsters and Liberal Eye’s preliminary analysis explains why A Fresh Start is the most vacuous suicide note in history with its testosterone laden rallying cries of :

  “cuts will be necessary to deliver any priorities”

  “any new spending will be paid for by a specific cut made elsewhere”

  “This means we will not increase public spending overall”

  and

  “We will only include policies in our programme for government once we are certain the necessary resources are available.”

  Our leadership is drunk on a cocktail of self flagellation (the hair shirted economics of the balanced budget) and political marketing. Both intoxicating ingredients are as much a product of the Westminster micro-climate as the abuse of allowances.

  It was this macho economics which had the leadership advocating tax cuts at Bournemouth while those in the world outside Westminster were experiencing the first blasts of an economic blizzard. The leadership appears to have climbed back onto the Keynesian bandwagon but with little conviction or credibility which is why A Fresh Start schizophrenically advocates (frequently in the same paragraph) large scale public works, cuts in public borrowing, safeguarding employment and being uncertain about ‘what Britain can afford’.

  The slump continues. Borrowing is not a problem. Borrowing and other means of creating money by Governments is still necessary at this time to counter the destruction of money that occurs when other sectors save more than they borrow and when the velocity of money falls. Demand remains the problem. Expansionary monetary and fiscal policy remains the answer.

  But we are assured it is alright because these ‘hard choices made by Liberal Democrats will be firmly guided by our values’ – using market speak these are defined, confined and trivialised as: Fairer, Greener, Safer, Stronger.

  But are your values summed up by these sanitised slogans? Even their marketing value has been so diminished as to be almost worthless outside of the political economy of Westminster.

  On balance, I would rather be free than live in a fairer world. The campaign for fairness is too often a cloak that hides policies which will inhibit rather than free individuals and their communities. Efforts to increase fairness reduce rather than increase opportunity. This may be counter intuitive to the Westminster elite but on the bus, train, school run and shop corner this apparent paradox is understood and appreciated. The counter intuitive is most often the rational explanation.
  Likewise, I’d rather be described as farsighted than ‘green’. We are not the Green Party. Even the most polluting multinational now claims to be green. Consumers see right through their claims so, surely, in today’s climate of cynicism and distrust, the more we claim to be green the more people will mistrust us. That word is now part of Doublespeak and citizens know it.

  In a further paradox, a tougher and more challenging world values freedom in the act more than a safer world. We see a love of and a respect for Liberty expressed with extreme bravery in the toughest, most challenging and dangerous circumstances in Iran whilst here basic freedoms are removed without a whimper.

  As Jonathan Calder points out elsewhere, in pursuit of a safer world Governments interfere at the micro level with family life but cannot prevent appalling cases of brutality to children; they impose more and more restrictive laws but cannot bring truly violent and organised criminals to justice, and they remove hard won liberties only to increase the potential for acts of terror.

  Finally, I don’t want Britain to be stronger. It is as simple as this: We cannot be a force for peace and reconciliation with guns in our hands. More lives are saved, more freedom won, more good done in the world by the ‘neutrals’. There is a peace dividend to be won. Make peace not war.

  Therefore the touchstones by which I would assay policies, decisions and campaigns would be Liberal, Farsighted, Challenging, Peace loving. But, rather than declaim them on a non-interactive website, I would express them in campaigns in the streets, the malls, the meeting places, the councils, the parliaments and in the multiple media by which people can be engaged in political activity in our communities.

  Apologies if this posting breaks with accepted courtesy. I really value the site, its discursive qualities and contributer’s informative and stimulating posts. So I had a lot to encapsulate

  Bill le B – [email protected]

• Lonely Wonderer 26th Jul '09 - 6:48pm

  Don’t apologise Bill. Interesting thoughts.