Poster wars, battle of the growth and borrowing figures

By Peter Hoskin
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Unsurprisingly, Labour aren’t letting the absence of a triple-dip hold them back. They’ve released an online poster highlighting the sad truth that this is the slowest economic recovery in 100 years.

But CCHQ aren’t holding back either. They’ve done their own insta-version of the Labour poster, using that ol’ favourite from the Institute for Fiscal Studies: that Ed Miliband’s Labour (had they followed Alastair Darling’s budgetary plans) would have borrowed £200 billion more over the course of this Parliament. We’ve pasted the poster below.

A bit of web-based rough and tumble? Certainly. But it’s indicative of current weaknesses for each party: the Tories, growth; and Labour, the public finances. Ed Miliband’s party may have thought that their howlongwillittakegeorgeosbornetobalancethebooksatthisrate.com website, in response to Tuesday’s borrowing figures, was very clever. But it just prompted another question: how long would it take Ed Balls?

Anyway, here’s the poster:

Miliband risks being written off as irresolute

By Andrew Gimson
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The Labour Party finds itself in the disconcerting position of being on only 35 per cent, or a mere six percentage points ahead of the Tories, in the latest poll published in the Observer. Questions are raised once more about Ed Miliband's leadership. Hurtful comments are made even by pundits of a left-wing disposition. Rafael Behr, political correspondent of the New Statesman, suggests there are "two possible reasons" why no one seems to know what Miliband would do if he became Prime Minister: "either he is keeping it a secret, or he has no idea himself".

It seems to me quite possible that Miliband has a masterplan which he is not yet ready to unveil. In politics as in infantry warfare, there is much to be said for not shooting until you can see the whites of their eyes. Miliband may in the fulness of time stand exposed as a master strategist who lulls his opponents into defenceless proximity before slaughtering them.

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Thank you, Gordon Brown

By Paul Goodman
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A last word on the controversies over Margaret Thatcher's state-funeral-in-all-but-name.  I believe that it was right to honour her in this way, others will think it was wrong, but there should at least be agreement on one point.  The arrangements were drawn up under, and to some extent by, New Labour - under Tony Blair and, especially, Gordon Brown.

I've been critical of Brown for not attending the Commons for the Thatcher tributes - he's the only former Prime Minister entitled to be there, and he should have cancelled his other commitments to do so.  But it's evident that he had a good look at the funeral plans during his time in office, especially in the early months before he funked calling an early election in the autumn of 2007.  The historian in him will have thoroughly grasped Lady Thatcher's significance.

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35 and minus 23: two numbers that are on Labour’s collective mind today

By Peter Hoskin
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And the number of the day is 35. That, according to Dan Hodges and Rachel Sylvester (£), is that percentage of the vote that some members of Team Miliband are shooting for at the next election. Apparently, this “35 per cent strategy” involves securing the 29 per cent of voters who supported Labour at the last election, with a further 6 percentage points carved off the Lib Dems – and they think it should be enough for victory.

It all sounds pretty plausible, and not just because Hodges and Sylvester are a well-sourced pair. As the New Statesman’s George Eaton has pointed out, 35 per cent was enough to deliver victory to Labour in 2005 – and that was with the Lib Dems on 22 per cent, and without a split vote on the right. Looking at the current electoral landscape, it’s little wonder if some Labour advisers believe they can win it without dominating it.

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What's going on in Gordon Brown's mind?

By Paul Goodman
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Only one former Prime Minister is currently a member of the Commons, and he wasn't there yesterday to pay tribute to Margaret Thatcher - or to criticise, in the well-chosen terms that Ed Miliband deployed, the Thatcher years.

It may be that Gordon Brown had some good reason not to attend.  But it can fairly be added that even if this is so, he's not exactly a regular speaker in the chamber.  He has mostly raised constituency cases, as he properly should, in his few interventions - though there was that extraordinary intervention on phone hacking.

I don't believe that a former Prime Minister is required to have a high voting record.  None the less, the absence of interventions from Brown on the big issues of the day is becoming more and more striking.  The "feartie from Fife", as Alex Salmond described him, has never been a great one for taking criticism on the chin.  Could it be that he simply can't bear to face the Commons?

Wilson closed more coal mines than Thatcher

By Harry Phibbs
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That faction on the Left that has been busy over the past 48 hours denouncing Margaret Thatcher has been so blinded by prejudice that facts have been disregarded. In the Daily Telegraph this monring Allister Heath points out that manufacturing output rose during her time in office. Does anyone really believe that manufacturing would have done better without the trade union reforms and with British Leyland and the British Steel Corporation remaining under state ownership?

Then there is the charge that it was Margaret Thatcher who "destroyed" the coal mines and the mining communities. How many times have the BBC broadcast that claim without refutation? Yet the facts show that far more coal mines closed under the Labour Prime Ministers Harold Wilson and James Callaghan.

These are the figures for the sharply declining number of coal mines open each year under those Labour Governments.

1964           545
1965   ..      504
1966   ..      442
1967   ..      406
1968   ..      330
1969   ..      304
 
1974   ..      250
1975   ..      241
1976  ..      239
1977   ..      231
1978  ..      223
1979  ..      219  

These are the figures for the Thatcher years:

1979  ..      219
1980   ..      213
1981  ..      200
1982   ..      191
1983   ..      170
1984  ..      169
1985  ..      133
1986   ..      110
1987   ..      94
1988   ..      86
1989   ..      73
1990   ..      65 

The Lord Palmerston blog says:

It was the ever-erudite @allanholloway who brought to my attention a few weeks back that more coal mines closed under Harold Wilson’s governments than under Margaret Thatcher’s, and I owe him an apology for not having credited him sooner, given the number of retweets I got for passing that on earlier.  Based on these figures from the government about 290 mines closed under Wilson in all his time in office, and about 160 under Thatcher.  Because the figures are based on year end totals of pits operating, it’s not possible to be precise, but the relative scale of those numbers is clear.  So why isn’t Wilson execrated by the Left for his part in the decline of coal mining?

That is a fair question. Do the Left seriously claim that Harold Wilson was accepting economic realities while Margaret Thatcher was motivated by sheer spite?

Will Galloway turn up today, and try to speak? If so, will the Speaker call him?

By Paul Goodman
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9.15 Update: Evident now that there's a big Labour Boycott coming today.  There will be lots of green space on the opposition benches.  Blair got a standing ovation from Conservative MPs when he left Parliament.  Thatcher will get a boycott now that she has died.  Many will wonder whether, in key respects, that's the right way round.  P.S: Galloway isn't going.

"Who's he?" "Never here!"

That's how George Galloway was greeted recently by MPs when the Speaker called him during Prime Minister's Questions.  I wondered, when Galloway won the Bradford West by-election, whether he would deign to turn up to the Commons and do some work - given the hype that his victory provoked, and the expectations he clearly aroused.  "His new constituents may not approve if the march of the Bradford Spring ends up back at the Big Brother studio," as I put it at the time.

That was before the "sex game" business - and Galloway is, as his reaction to Baroness Thatcher's death reminded us, unwilling to moderate his act (and probably incapable of doing so).  He's in Westminster scarcely more often than he was, and his new constituents may not like it any more than his old ones did.

This afternoon presents a cracking opportunity for Galloway to turn up and urinate on the carpet, and I will surprised if he doesn't try to do so.  Will Bercow call him?  Ed Miliband will be relieved if does, because the more Galloway waves his willy around in the Commons, the more likely it is that his antics will distract attention from any Labour MPs who assail Thatcher's memory.

Hatred from the extreme Left is a perverse tribute to Margaret Thatcher

By Harry Phibbs
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When I was compiling the rolling blog of tributes to Lady Thatcher yesterday I chose not to include any of the unpleasant comments (usually made via Twitter or the BBC) from those on the Left welcoming her death. For all decent people such a welcome was repulsive. Yet for some the  passing away of a law abiding, frail, 87-year-old grandmother was a spur most callous way they could manage with aggressive, publicity seeking, celebrations.

George Galloway, who never met a dictator he didn't like, is the leader of the Respect Party but surpassed himself with his disrespect.

There were also hostile comments from Gerry Adams of Sinn Fein, from Scargillite remnants in the National Union of Mineworkers and Argentinian veterans from the invasion of the Falklands.

Some yobs gathered in Brixton to "celebrate" her death - then smashed the windows of a Barnado's shop. In Bristol anti-Thatcher nostalgia involving setting fire to bins and injuring seven police officers.

Had she not succeeded in her mission to defeat Socialism and revive our nation these attacks would have been much more muted. There is an Arab proverb that you should : "Judge a man by the reputation of his enemies." That was also a good way to judge this particular woman. Had should always sought consensus she would not have been effective.

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Labour split on welfare reform

By Harry Phibbs
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Writing in the Daily Telegraph this morning the Labour MP for Rochdale, Simon Danczuk wrote:

"The Labour Party is a moral crusade or it is nothing,” said Harold Wilson. It’s time this sense of crusading zeal was applied to helping people off benefits – not pushing them into poverty – and back into work. Seeing people that are capable of working languish for years on benefits is not something the Left should be proud of. It’s something we should be fighting. Otherwise why call ourselves the Labour Party?

He went on:

We should all experience the feeling of satisfaction after a hard day’s work, the pride at getting a promotion, the sense of achievement from making a difference in the workplace. But for those trapped in welfare dependency these experiences will never happen. This is a criminal loss of human potential and something everyone interested in progressive politics should rail against.

Although he did not vote for Ed Miliband to be Party leader Mr Danczuk is not one of the "usual suspects", but a Party loyalist who seldom rebels. 

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As Osborne's accent dives downmarket, Chuka Umunna moves upmarket. He slams "trash and C-list wannabes" on "exclusive" website

By Paul Goodman
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Oi, mate! Over in the blue corner, there's George Osborne with his newly-acquired glottal stop.

I say! Over in the red corner, there's Chuka Umunna, looking for classier company.

The Labour front-bencher turns out, according to the Sun, to be "a user of he Small World site, dubbed MySpace for Millionaires". The Daily Mail, never one to miss a telling detail, reports that "the invitation-only website, which was founded by Swedish investment banker Erik Wachtmeister, currently features an article about ‘mile-high hook-ups’ on private jets. It has also been described as a hunting ground for ‘sugar daddies’."

‘Is it just me or is there a serious lack of cool places to go in central London at the weekends.
‘Most of the West End haunts seem to be full of trash and C-list wannabes, while other places that should know better opt for the cheesy vibe', Umanna wrote, adding that he had found only one venue with a “cool international crowd”.  I've said it before, and say it again: you get a better class of person in the Labour Party.