Let’s hear it for Downing Street and Treasury spin-doctors. This hard-working, deeply-committed bunch will deserve a bonus if they succeed in putting positive spin on next Wednesday’s Budget. Failing that, George Osborne should treat them to a midnight feast in the dorm with lashings of ginger beer.
They have already made an impressive start on behalf of the hapless public schoolboy. “Tax and pension joy for millions”, trumpeted one right-wing tabloid after a particularly fantastical briefing. The slender premise was the Chancellor’s nods and winks suggesting he will scrap the 1p hike in fuel duty now due to come into effect, and a rehash of Iain Duncan Smith’s proposal to introduce a flat-rate state pension for all starting at £140 a week, probably in 2014. Osborne is expected to endorse the latter in his statement – a classic case of promising jam tomorrow. So far, so much spin.
But it will be a tougher job selling Osborne’s overall strategy almost a year after the formation of the coalition which has so far heightened the risk of a double-dip recession, withered growth, boosted inflation and seen unemployment head towards the three million mark last witnessed under Margaret Thatcher.
Expect some headline-grabbers, such as a tax hike on super-strength lagers, which have broad appeal at little cost, plus the traditional Tory “war” on red tape and waste – tell me a single Conservative administration, and quite a few Labour ones, which hasn’t promised the same with little real outcome. Expect also curbs on the rights of employees to take their bosses to industrial tribunals, and a relaxation of planning rules which will amount to yet another broken Liberal Democrat election promise.
Don’t expect any reversal on VAT, any further curbs on bankers’ bonuses, or any real crackdown on tax avoidance. The independent consultancy Tax Research UK found that last year half a million companies were dissolved without paying an estimated £16 billion in unpaid taxes. Not a peep from the Treasury. This is truly a Tory-led coalition.
Budget Day will also be a testing time for Labour’s newish team. Ed Miliband and Ed Balls this week gave a taster of what to expect when unveiling their alternative Budget. It is clear that they will focus on measures to reverse the fall in living standards for the average family struggling with escalating travel costs and the blitz on many child and child care benefits, and to set out a clear strategy for growth.
That is fair enough, as far as it goes, as long as they don’t ignore the rapidly-lengthening dole queue caused by savage cuts in the public sector. That should be resisted at every opportunity, even at the risk of undermining the “I can’t believe it’s really Labour” message of moderation that the leadership has assiduously fostered. For those in work, job security remains the major worry, particularly when combined with the raids on pensions which the Con-Dems have imposed on the public sector and encouraged in the private.
To be fair, Miliband and Balls have included job creation measures in their wish-list, notably £1.2 billion to fund the building of 25,000 affordable homes and boost a badly-hit construction industry by up to 200,000 jobs, and a proposed £600 million youth fund to get 90,000 youngsters into work. But they need to push such measures higher up the agenda. They will find that Talking Eds are no substitute for action.
