The most important fact in British politics

If you want to know why the Tories are an average 17% ahead in ConservativeHome's Poll of Polls we suggest it is, quite simply, the reduction in peoples' earnings.  Rising incomes protected Tony Blair from his failures on crime, immigration and the public services but they are no longer protecting Gordon Brown.

Research by the Centre for Economics and Business Research for ASDA - quoted in The Telegraph - shows that the average family is £400 worse off this year.  Increased incomes have been wiped out by rising taxes and rising prices.  A big hat-tip to Tory candidate for Dover, Charlie Elphicke.  His research for the Centre for Policy Studies has been way ahead of the curve on this issue.

It's been nearly a year since Gordon Brown became Prime Minister and CCHQ has produced a devastating dossier on his failings.  Chapters attack him for basic failures, incompetence, dithering, opportunism, hypocrisy and "Brownies".  Section 2.4 of the dossier even takes up Guido's theme of 'Jonah Brown'.

You can upload a PDF of the report to read for yourself but here are two highlights of an incredibly thorough piece of work that will feed journalists for months to come:

1. The events that have produced the decline and decline of Mr Brown

Click to enlarge.


2. Images from Brown's year

Clockwise from top left: Asleep at the UN, With orange make-up all over his face, Tangled in a net, Receiving the Olympic torch in Downing Street, Launching his leadership bid obscured by an autocue.

Comments

[Adam McNestrie]

The greatest threat to the Labour government at the moment is that the Conservatives will realise the potential potency of the politics of value. For more than a decade Labour have made a certain tax-and-spend paradigm the cornerstone of their appeal. They argued that the keys means of achieving public service improvement was higher spending, that spending more constituted a sort of achievement, and that any tax cuts were disguised spending cuts. This was a politics of scale and bigness: more is good, less is bad, quality and efficiency don’t come into it.

This was remarkably successful coming out of a period of Thatcherite decay, when New Labour was fresh and untainted and the economy growing robustly enough to obscure the zero-sum game of taxation and personal consumption. Those conditions have now been dissipated and the British public is ripe for a different type of politics – one which emphasises value. The Conservatives can destroy the government if they start to advocate a more-for-less politics and to argue that value should be the key measure of political success, not raw magnitude. This politics is a loaded shotgun which the Conservatives have to hand with which they can put the government out of its misery.

To read more link to my blog, just who the hell are we?, at:
http://adammcnestrie.wordpress.com/http://adammcnestrie.wordpress.com/

[David Belchamber]

Well put, Adam:

"The Conservatives can destroy the government if they start to advocate a more-for-less politics...".

The only questions are: have the conservatives the will to do this and have they the people competent and experienced enough to implement this policy?

[Felicity Mountjoy]

I don't like David Cameron or CCHQ poking fun at Gordon Brown in this way. Leave that to the tabloids.

[Steve Garner]

The Tory lead in the polls goes back much further than this year's drop in disposable incomes, and if you don't mind me saying so your analysis is ludicrously simplistic. Other than the Brown bounce the lead has been consistent and growing since 2006.

Virtually everybody I speak to is sick of NuLab and has been for years. It only took a credible Tory leader to establish a true alternative in people's eyes. The public knows Labour has failed on crime, immigration, tax, health, education etc etc and knows that Labour is systematically dishonest about its record. The problems in the economy in the last year are just the icing on the cake.

If I were DC I'd frankly be insulted to read on ConHome that the sole reason for the poll lead is a reduction in incomes in the last year. You're just plain wrong.

[Steve Garner]

Actually, it's not just DC who should be insulted by your analysis. Literally thousands of people who have worked to turn our party into an attractive alternative government should be insulted as well. This poll lead is not just about Labour's failures. I'm angry with you about this.

[Editor]

I'm sorry you're angry Steve!

Let me try and explain further:

(1) I specifically highlighted the 17 (S-E-V-E-N-T-E-E-N) % lead. I'm sure we'd be ahead because of the other factors but the scale of the lead is rooted in Labour's economic failure.

(2) I mention other factors and they are potent but they were, as written, cloaked by good economic years. Now they are no longer cloaked.

Has David Cameron been a good leader? Of course he has.

:-)

[coterie]

Of course Blair's biggest failure was Iraq. But the Tories were in no position to capitalise because of IDS unquestioning stance. It was clearly the biggest issue in 2005 election. By then of course too late for the Tories.

So its not all about in

[Guido Fawkes]

Dear Andy,

Am loving the report. Some of it seems hauntingly familiar in style and approach. Usually expect a bottle of decent Margaux from hacks in these situations.

Think a case would be in order this time.

Regards,

Guido

[Alan S]

The Editor might have worded it better but he is right that it still is the economy which determines most elections.

Steve should stop being a drama queen.

[Tony Makara]

Its just a pity that it took so long to attack Labour over the economy. At times it felt like the Conservative party itself believed all the bluff about Brown being a master economist. It was so obvious that Labour relied on credit to run their smoke and mirrors show and as soon as the credit ran out the economy stopped running too.

[Iain B]

Step down Brown, for the good of Britain, f u love her so much, u will put Briain before yourself

[john]

Meanwhile Peter Oborne, in the Mail, paints Brown as Honest Joe.
I assume he was sober when he wrote:
"Slowly, Gordon Brown is beginning to restore trust in British life."
He also says:
"Jacqi Smith has gained in stature" and "The Foriegn Office is functioning more like a great department of state under the leadership of David Milliband".
Apparently, according to Oborne, many of the media commentators who denounce the Prime Minister used to be fevent supporters of the Blair regime.
I seem to remember when Oborne regularly denounced Gordon, but that was when he was a Tory and not trying to please Paul Dacre.

[David_McD]

In peacetime, at least, most those who can be bothered to vote do so on the basis of their perception of their individual short term economic interests.

Furthermore, there is no gratitude in politics for what has been done. Voters look to what they believe will be better for themselves and their immediate families. This short termism leads, periodically, to feasting on the seed corn, as has been the case recently, and to boom and bust. This phenomenon is THE major fault line in democracy. I think we will just have to accept it though, since the alternatives of democracy are worse.

Hence the Labour victory in 1945 and the Labour defeat in 1951. Also the New Labour success from 1997 until recently, as the government floated the economy on a bubble of debt. This bubble has now burst and that will be the reason for the Tory victory in 2010.

David Cameron’s impending victory will be, almost entirely, the result of being in the right place at the right time. Being “nice” has no resonance outside the few who make up the metrosexual chattering classes and with teenagers who have not yet assumed financial responsibility for themselves. A commitment to efficiency (or delivery of “value”) has little resonance either, outside the ranks of that small minority who have ever run a business.

Alas for the frailty of human nature!

[Dave B]

The timeline graphic, I think the 'run on Northern Rock' label is in the wrong place.

[ChrisD]

"Its just a pity that it took so long to attack Labour over the economy. At times it felt like the Conservative party itself believed all the bluff about Brown being a master economist. It was so obvious that Labour relied on credit to run their smoke and mirrors show and as soon as the credit ran out the economy stopped running too."

Tony, I could not agree less with your comment.

We have been attacking this government's record on the economy for years, because as you rightly point out it has been built on smoke and mirrors.
But, as with every other issue that we trailed the government on in the polls, it was our toxic brand which stopped us from being listened too, never mind being taken seriously.
Some short memories here, David Cameron has successfully led the detox programme which built the strong foundations for this now mouthwatering lead in the polls. His colleague George Osborne, a very political astute strategist knew right at the start that even with Blair still in power, the man that had to be attacked and undermined was one Gordon Brown. George Osborne was right, and was also extremely successful in the task he set himself.
We all know that oppositions don't win, governments lose. But the government will lose the next GE because of the economy and a very poor political strategy led by a very weak PM lacking in either courage or a functioning political antennae.
But that is not enough for the Conservatives to win with 3/4 party politics throughout the UK. It will be strong and decisive leadership, empathy with the public and good common sense policies that will decide whether the swing is big enough to take us from where we are now to a working majority.
Mike Smithson of PB.com noted early on that phenomon now called "Smithson's rule", the more that David Cameron is in the news the bigger the poll lead.
The economy can be factored into some of the dire Labour poll ratings now in the 20's, but it is not why we are now hitting the mid 40's. We are electable again because of the long term hard work put into the party by everyone from David Cameron and his Shadow cabinet right down to every hard working activist out there.

[David Sergeant]

"I don't like David Cameron or CCHQ poking fun at Gordon Brown in this way. Leave that to the tabloids."

Posted by: Felicity Mountjoy | June 21, 2008 at 09:48

"Its just a pity that it took so long to attack Labour over the economy. At times it felt like the Conservative party itself believed all the bluff about Brown being a master economist."

Posted by: Tony Makara | June 21, 2008 at 10:36

When Tories want to leave others to get their hands dirty in attacking Labour, and the Tory leadership is scared to take on Labour spin, you can see why we have a Labour government.

The trouble is that unless we are prepared to start fighting there will be more Labour governments whatever peoples' economic cercumstances.

[RichardJ]

"I don't like David Cameron or CCHQ poking fun at Gordon Brown in this way. Leave that to the tabloids."

Don't be so po-faced, it's good crowd-pleasing fun! Frankly the man deserves it.

[Pooter]

Three factors common to the dying days of every Labour administration since the Second World War are economic incompetence, high taxation and government meddling into the conduct our private affairs. The cri de cœur that resounds at such times is “Please, get off our backs and out of our lives.” I hear it clearly now.

[Malcolm Dunn]

CCHQ is undoubtedly more effective at attacking the Labour administration now than it has been for years. Yes Labour have failed and most of their leading lights are fairly useless people but their voters have largely turned to us rather than the Lib Dems for which the leadership and CCHQ should be heartily congratulated.
However I am far from sure that over the economy George Osborne and his team have provided us with the ammunition to prove that we will be more effective managing the nations finances.

[Tony Makara]

Malcolm Dunn, George Osborne and his team need to get into attack mode and be on the news at every opportunity to attack Labour's economic incompetence. Remember how Labour chased up every news opportunity in 97 under the guidance of Mandelson. I worry that the large lead the party now has might lead to comfort-zone opposition. The hunger must be there, and there everyday, fight as if the party is behind in the polls rather than ahead. The style must be pressing and unrelenting, all out economic attack.

[David Cooper]

Malcolm, Tony: absolutely correct and all the more reason why simply repeating the formula "we will share the proceeds of growth" is not going to be good enough. Even if the economy is going to be in too poor a condition for immediate large scale tax cuts across the board, there is a clear call for a definite plan to make people at least £400 better off (to echo the theme of the thread) in our first year in office, ideally by shrinking the size of the state but perhaps also by a specific pledge to cut fuel duty.

As for the weapon of ridicule - OK, not to everyone's taste, but one of Labour's strong points from 1992-7 was the ability to kick a man while he was down and show no remorse about it. The time for us to be magnanimous is once DC is in Number 10 - in the meantime, everything about Labour is fair game.