The biographer, headmaster and all-round political player Anthony Seldon has written a letter to savour for tomorrow's edition of the New Statesman, in which he calls on Ed Balls to stand down as shadow chancellor. Here are some excerpts:
“After 20 unbroken years at the heart of politic... quitting
in the next few months until, say, 2017 would undoubtedly benefit your leader,
your party, your wife and even yourself. Let me explain.
Ed Miliband would be a much stronger leader without you... Forgive
me, but you stop Ed breathing fresh air. With you close to him, his breath will
always be stale and smell of a toxic brand. Without a prolonged period out of
the public eye, neither you nor the party will ever rid yourselves of the
opportunistic, negative and bullying image of the Gordon era...
Without you, Labour could present itself as a clean party,
free of the factionalism and brutalism that so tarnished it when Brown was boss
and you were his consigliere...
The greatest beneficiary would be you... If Labour loses in
2015, you will be blamed and your career will be damaged beyond repair. If it
wins, you would return to the front bench in 2017 a redeemed and respected
figure. You might even one day become leader, your long-held ambition.”
If
you believe that David Cameron’s likeliest route back to No.10 in 2015 is
another coalition with the Lib Dems, then then the past fortnight may have been
rather perturbing.
Reason
being, there are increasing signs of unity between Labour and the Lib Dems. Of
course, the two parties appear to be split—between a 10p tax rate and raising
the personal allowance—on the best way of lightening the tax burden on
low-income workers. But, apart from that, they have basically coalesced in
their response to Oliver Letwin’s Royal Charter for press regulation and in
their demands for a mansion tax.
And
Labour are even trying to smoke out Lib Dem support for their mansion tax
proposal with an Opposition Day debate in the Commons, or perhaps even—as the
Spectator’s Isabel Hardman reports—an
amendment to the Financial Bill after the Budget. This crude politicking has
left Vince Cable, for one, cooing
and flirting. He won’t be the only Lib Dem who feels some attraction
towards Labour at the moment.
In The Times (£) I make a case for some sort of mansion tax (my preferred model is higher council tax banding) but I end the piece by noting that however justified new property taxes might be they do not add up to an economic policy fit for today's challenges. I admit that 1% of me would quite like to see Ed Miliband in power after the next election - if only to rebalance the reputation of Britain's two big parties:
"There has been a Tory hand on the surgeon’s knife during each of our country’s last economic contractions. It was Margaret Thatcher who was chief nurse when Britain was ailing at the end of the 1970s. John Major dispensed the medicine in the 1990s, when the cross-party consensus in favour of ERM membership had come to grief. And it has been another Tory, David Cameron, who has had to preside over the worst of all three episodes — today’s debt-fuelled crisis.
The result is that politics has become unbalanced. The Tory brand has become associated with pain while Labour has loftily cruised above it all. The IFS, like every independent forecaster, suggests that the age of austerity will last at least a decade. I’d take some partisan delight at Ed Miliband presiding over its second half. He hasn’t begun to be honest about the pain that, mansion tax or no mansion tax, still has to be borne."
Rachel
Reeves has an article explaining Labour’s 10p tax policy in today’s Sun. “So
what?” you might think, “isn’t this what shadow ministers do?”
But
there’s still something striking about this article in itself. Consider where it
appears: the Sun, a newspaper that might have cause to be unfriendly towards
Labour after the phone hacking scandal. And consider the fact that Ed Miliband also
wrote a piece for them in January. This was the first time he’d done so for
around two years. The pieces, as another Labour leader once put it, are in
flux.
LabourList’s
Mark Ferguson—one of the smartest Labour writers in the Westminster typing
pool—noted the significance of Ed Miliband’s Sun article at the
time. It could be, he suggested, part of an effort to turn “Red Ed” into “Everyman
Ed”: a tribune of the people reaching out the people in the sorts of
publications the people actually read. Rachel Reeve’s article today can be seen
as a continuation of that process.
This
is all part of what the Fabians’ Marcus Roberts has identified, in a recent
blog-post, as “Labour’s new ‘Blue Collar’ politics”. I’d encourage you to
read the entire post, but these passages are particularly pertinent for
Conservatives, whether you agree with them or no’:
“Politically,
it offers a response, just in the pre-Budget nick of time, to the growing
threat of ‘blue collar Toryism’ or ‘Little Guy Conservatism’ espoused by
serious long term thinkers on the Right like Tim Montgomerie, Robert Halfon and
Jesse Norman. But their prospectus for a
Tory Party that cares more for middle earners then the 1% has of course an
obvious weakness; whatever good they proscribe, Labour can likely do it better.
By amending and adapting smart Tory thinking on the squeezed middle, Miliband
broadens his One Nation brand.
But
the differentiation with the Tories still matters of course and this is where
Labour policy is particularly ingenious. Payment for the 10p cut through the
mansions tax substantiates voters pre-existing belief that Labour not the
Tories is the party that best answers the vital pollsters question: ‘who cares
about people like you’. And at last Labour activists have a policy that they
can explain on the doorstep without needing to reach for some think tank’s
definition of ‘predistribution’.”
It
will be worth keeping tabs on whether Labour continue to try to outflank the
Tory leadership on this ground. Indeed, one of the items in ConservativeHome’s
recent “Little
Guy Conservatism” series was Harriet Baldwin’s struggle for English
votes for English laws – part of a broader theme of “Englishness” that
Labour’s policy chief Jon Cruddas is also keen
to explore. Don’t be surprised to see an article by him in the Sun, any day
now.
Ed Miliband's pilfering of Robert Halfon's 10p tax rate restoration proposal, balanced out by his borrowing of Vince Cable's plan of a mansion tax on homes worth more than £2 million, is almost completely meaningless. The Labour leader is not committing to the measure if he wins a majority in 2015. (See Andrew Neil wring this out of Ed Balls above.) Since neither Ed knows what the Government's future spending plans are, and therefore haven't yet committed Labour either to keeping them or chucking them, it could hardly be otherwise.
All Miliband is saying that were he Prime Minister now, he would fund the 10p cut by the mansion tax hike. Which he might or might or not do. Most likely, voters would get the hike, but not the cut. However, it is a supreme waste of time following that train of ifs any further.
Which is a reminder that Miliband's announcement (cleverly concealed; no leak - which is a bit of a start) is not about economics, but politics. Which is where the story gets more interesting - a little bit, anyway. The Labour leader has three main aims, which are roughly as follows.
To get ahead of Osborne. Announcing a measure that you think your opponent might support or has backed is a classic manoevre. As Chancellor, Alistair Darling pulled much the same stunt on Osborne over inheritance tax. Miliband has sought to get ahead of what Osborne might have announced in the coming budget. Osborne, a fellow member of what he calls "the guild" of professional politicians, will admire Miliband's chutzpah.
To lure Vince Cable and the Liberal Democrat left. Cable needed no invitation to welcome a proposal which is, after all, his own. “The mansion tax is not just about fairness, it is also about giving the right
signals to the economy,” he has said. “I’m glad Mr Miliband has adopted
it. I haven’t been able to persuade my Conservative colleagues. I never give
up hope.
To wrong-foot Downing Street. Number 10 doesn't usually respond to Miliband's speeches, but is attacking him for approving the scrapping of the 10p rate in government and then demanding its restoration in opposition. Halfon is fighting back, arguing that his plan is to fund a 10p band from the revenues gained from the top rate cut, not from a mansion tax.
To set the Coalition at odds. Many Conservatives want the 10p rate plan and very few want more property taxes. The Liberal Democrats want the mansion tax and are opposed to a 10p rate - they want to keep raising thresholds. This is, in its own way, a piece of triangulation from Miliband.
Policy Exchange says that "under this proposal, net incomes for
low paid working families would only increase by 67p a week if they are
on in-work benefits. This is because of complex interactions between the
tax and benefit system".
Over at Coffee House, Ryan Bourne shares my concern about complicating the tax system, says that raising thresholds is better targetting, and points out that if, as Labour say, the policy would benefit lower earners only, this implies dragging more people into the 40p band. Miliband's plan may or may not happen after 2015, and it may confuse the Coalition in the meantime, but one thing is certain: he has just raised Halfon's profile even further.
At least, that's the only sense to be made of Labour's selection of John O'Farrell - "The Joke Candidate" - to fight the Eastleigh by-election.
Miliband had a strategic choice in the Hampshire seat:
To try not to take votes from the LibDems, run a campaign so low-profile as to be almost invisible - and boost Nick Clegg's chances of winning the seat, thus turning up the heat under David Cameron.
To try to take votes from the LibDems, pick a high-profile candidate who may well do so - and harm Clegg's chances of winning the seat, thus turning down the heat under Cameron and giving him a bit of a breather.
You don't have to be a brain surgeon to conclude that, by making choice b), the Labour leader has made the wrong decision. I thus agree with hired Miliband contract killer Dan Hodges.
It would be a big mistake to write the Labour leader off as completely clueless, but there are times when I almost yield to the temptation...
If Ed Miliband commits to David Cameron's In-Out referendum, he could lose it if he becomes Prime Minister - and might well then have to quit. (A Prime Minister Miliband recommending a Yes vote, with an Out-leaning Conservative Party urging No, is a very different animal from a Prime Minister Cameron recommending a Yes vote, with an In-supporting Labour Party urging Yes.)
If Miliband does not commit to Cameron's In-Out referendum, he will be (as I've said before) "painted by Cameron, Farage, some on the left and others as the elitist
from Hampstead who is frightened of giving the people their say. There
is a danger for him that this perception will leak from the EU
compartment, so to speak, and colour voters' view of him more widely".
The Sun reported this morning that:
"Ed Balls risked plunging Labour into civil war over Europe yesterday by
declaring the party would be “stupid” to rule out an EU referendum.
The Shadow Chancellor insisted it was vital they did not let themselves “be
caricatured as an anti-referendum party”.
Balls also said:
“If we allow ourselves either to be the ‘status quo party’ on Europe, or the
‘anti-referendum party’, then we’ve got a problem. We would be pretty stupid to allow ourselves to get into either of those
positions...“We’ve absolutely not ruled out a referendum.”
This is a less dramatic intervention that it might sound, because Labour's official position is not to rule out a referendum in the event of, say, a major reconfiguration of the EU into a) a Franco-German and b) everyone else.
But it is Balls's carefully-calibrated way of reminding voters of his Euro-sceptic credentials (in Labour terms, anyway), appealing to Labour MPs who think Miliband should match Cameron's referendum offer...and turning the temperature up under Miliband, his former leadership rival.
Ed Miliband expresses irritation at being given the label "Red Ed." The Labour leader can reasonably point out that he is not a Communist - he does not want to abolish capitalism or overthrow Parliamentary democracy.
However, while he is not on the far left himself, he does show signs of being exceptionally indulgent to those who are.
There is an abundance of evidence of Commmunist genocide, in its various manifestations over the past century. Considering this evidence, most reasonable people would conclude that Communism was not merely a mistake, but evil.
Mr Miliband is not part of the faction that condones the mass murder that Communisim brought about. Nor does he deny it took place. Instead Mr Miliband disregards it.
Last year we had Mr Miliband paying tribute to the historian Eric Hobsbawm as a "lovely man." Mr Miliband pitched up, along with Jon Snow, to Mr Hobsbawm's memorial service with The Internationale ringing in his ears.
"There is a fundamental decision to be made and only the British people
can make it. Europe has for too long been an elite project. The
pro-Europeans have been content to win the argument in the corridors of
power. That is why, since 1975, the argument has been lost by default.
But the Labour party was formed to combat the power of elites, not to
yield to it."
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