Member News
By Sam Macrory - 25th June 2010
Lib Dems take the heat over cuts
The human victims of this week's "unavoidable" budget are yet to feel the squeeze of its austerity, but the political casualties are already choking from the strain.
And no, it's not George Osborne, who as chancellor of the exchequer is the most identifiable author of a budget already dismissed as "regressive" by the economic gurus of the Institute for Fiscal Affairs.
Instead his coalition partners the Liberal Democrats are bearing the wounds of the backlash to Osborne's ferocious round of cutting and freezing, and while the post-Budget headlines weren't universally generous, Osborne will be delighted that he has managed to avoid much of the flak.
This is the political of age of "we're all in this together", but the Lib Dems are looking alarmingly vulnerable. Judging by Labour's line of attack, dangerous isolation is exactly where the opposition want the junior coalition partner to be. They should be careful what they wish for.
As James Forsyth writes in this week's Spectator, the chancellor's budget masterplan was to draw up a set of polices – backed by Lib Dem support - which pave the way for the election of a Conservative majority in 2015. By boosting private sector support and clawing back state dependency, the necessity to vote Labour at the next election, Forsyth argues, will vanish.
But is the Liberal Democrat crime of reversing their pre-election economics and backing Conservative policies - for faster cuts and most specifically the need to raise VAT to 20 per cent – which is being portrayed as far worse than the Tories' impatient unleashing of what could be seen as an ideologically-driven reining in of the public sector.
High profile Lib Dem attacks during the election on the "Tory VAT 'bombshell" hardly help the party's case, while Nick Clegg struggled his way through a particularly brutal John Humphries interview on the Today programme earlier this week.
Responding to the Budget on Tuesday, deputy Labour leader Harriet Harman, after a brief bit of 'same old Tories' rhetoric, went straight for the Lib Dems.
Harman derided a "Tory budget" which "includes things that the Liberal Democrats have always fought against….surely they cannot vote for this?"
Harman went on to describe Clegg and Alexander as Tory "fig-leaves" and accused the Liberal Democrats of having "sacrificed everything they ever stood for to ride in ministerial cars and to ride on the coat tails of the Tory government."
Labour backbenchers followed her lead. Mary Creagh called the Lib Dems "wolves in sheep's clothing", while Barry Gardiner went for the rather more politically-charged "Quisling apologists".
The attacks continued outside the chamber. Writing in his local paper, Ben Bradshaw howled in anguish for those voters "utterly betrayed" by the Lib Dems. Liam Byrne, the former Treasury chief secretary, declared that "No one will ever believe what the Lib Dems say ever again."
The tactics are obvious, and clearly hurting, with backbench Lib Dems such as Bob Russell and Tim Farron speaking publicly about their discomfort over the VAT rise, but if Labour aims to split the coalition so soon after its formation then it will surely be disappointed. The disgruntled of the Lib Dem backbenches recognise that compromises must be made if Liberal Democrats are to enjoy power for the first time in 70 years.
Deputy leader Simon Hughes has already backtracked from an apparent criticism of the possible cuts to pensioner benefits, and while rumblings of disquiet go on, the coalition won't fall in the next few years, even it fails to make the full five of its planned existence.
Labour must refine its approach.
The Lib Dems may be whipping-boys, as a source close to Nick Clegg has admitted, but the opposition's anger should be focused on the coalition, and not just its junior partner.
Shouting betrayal at the Liberal Democrats won't be enough to derail George Osborne's budget, and in two or three years time, Labour may find it's too late to stop the Conservatives march towards a majority, especially if the coalition experiment has knocked the Liberal Democrats out of the contest.
Sam Macrory is political editor of The House Magazine.
Have your say...
Please enter your comments below.