BUDGET BETTER GO WELL.

 

TAX AND SPEND

I think the fevered talk of plots to dislodge the Prime Minister is exaggerated. Whoever is PM on Brexit Day better stand by for massive criticism either for paying the Europeans too much or keeping us too close to the EU. Better to leave Mrs May to take the flack is surely the wise course for aspiring leaders. Reports that some Tory MPs want to go into opposition to refresh the party are ridiculous.

All that said the government is in a fragile state and is relying on Philip Hammond to deliver a good budget next week. I’ve got a lot of time for Phil The Till. When you look around the Cabinet table and see charlatans like Johnson and Gove, there is something reassuring about the grey man with his spreadsheets. He knows Brexit is a dangerous threat to the economy. He knows we are spending billions servicing our debts. Yet he is bated for exuding gloom when he should be apeing Johnson’s unfounded cheerfulness.

On Wednesday the Chancellor ought to loosen the purse strings to help with housing, the NHS, and elderly care. He needs to address our woeful productivity and skills record. But he should be bold enough to put up some taxes to pay for it and go back on a manifesto promise to raise the 40p income tax threshold to £50,000. The elderly should have to pay some National Insurance to begin the task of tackling intergenerational unfairness.

Unlike many commentators I don’t think a General Election is at all likely so now is the time in the political cycle to take a risk with incurring the wrath of those opposed to any tax rises.

But Phil Hammond faces strong opposition in his own party. Former Minister Nick Boles wants the Chancellor to scrap his deficit reduction target. He believes it is fine for the annual deficit to remain at 2.6% indefinitely. This in the face of an Institute for Fiscal Studies warning the deficit could be on course to be £20bn higher than expected by 2021/22.

GORDON BROWN.

The former Prime Minister has been in the North this week to boost sales of his memoirs. I had a lot of time for the granite integrity of this Scottish son of the manse. His one great achievement in No 10 was in October 2008 when he showed global leadership in the middle of the economic crisis.

His great flaw was his undermining of Tony Blair in his desire to be Prime Minister. Why did he want the job so badly? When he got it, he didn’t know what to do with it. Was he a continuity man for New Labour or something else?

He claims his differences with Blair were over policy and he had nothing to do with the personal attacks. The fact is Brown could have reigned in his spin doctors Damian McBride and Charlie Whelan who were constantly briefing against the Prime Minister.

Blair should have sacked Brown after the 2001 General Election, but it’s not just weak Prime Ministers who find it hard to dismiss troublesome Cabinet colleagues.

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“EDUCATION DEPARTMENT NEEDS A KICKING”.

 

 

EDUCATION MINISTRY HINDRANCE TO SKILLS TRAINING.

As the skills and productivity crisis deepens, the Department for Education has come under savage attack from the mayors of Greater Manchester and the Liverpool City region.

Andy Burnham and Steve Rotheram are getting into their stride in speaking for the North on a range of issues as was evidenced at a packed Downtown meeting this week. There wasn’t a single reference to strained relations between the core cities of Liverpool and Manchester, just a demonstration of the easy relationship that the two politicians share. This is important for the northern voice. Oh, that it was replicated in Yorkshire where rival councils are knocking nine bells out of each other over devolution models. Or in Lancashire, Cheshire and Cumbria where to describe progress on devolution as glacial would be to insult those magnificent features of the natural world.

After their election in May both men had very different starts. Burnham acquired a large staff at his Oxford Street headquarters in Manchester, although he said he envied Rotheram’s ability to shape his own team. That was a reference to the “Mary Celeste” situation faced by the Liverpool City Region mayor when he took office. Rotheram inherited no staff and a difficult relationship with Liverpool city mayor Joe Anderson.

Both men were just back from visits to Paris and New York and have realised that they need to impress the world, not just the government, that the North is a great place to invest in.

Raising skill levels is one of their main aims and you’d think the Department for Education would be an ally. Not so apparently. Rotheram said it was the least responsive department in Whitehall and needed a good kicking. The mayors wanted to control skills spending locally and show young people that there are routes to success other than through university by boosting vocational training. Burnham had been to his kid’s Year 9 options meeting where the ICT teacher had no takers while the pupils queued for humanities subjects.

Now in office the mayors want to tone down the politics to appeal to business. They feel firms in the two sub regions would feel more comfortable dealing with them than the highly politically charged Westminster village. They are working with other elected mayors including West Midlands Tory Mayor Andy Street.

Transport is another area where the mayors have given a voice to the North. With Downtown providing the launch pad they had launched a salvo of criticism over the government’s broken promises in the summer. They claimed it had born fruit to some extent with Liverpool City Region getting two “touch points” with HS2 and the Chancellor announcing a £400m cash boost for northern transport at the party conference. All well and good but still small potatoes compared with transport spending in London.

While stressing that their door was open to business, the mayors fired a shot across the bows of house builders saying the emphasis on developers needs had to change to provide the affordable housing that is in short supply. Andy Burnham made a striking remark that may meet with a mixed reception in his outer boroughs. He said they needed to shrink their retail offer and increase the space for housing.

Finally, on Brexit, the mayors had recently met with Brexit Minister David Davis. Burnham had told him that Greater Manchester exported 58% of its exports to the EU compared with the national average of 44%. No deal would be a very bad deal for him. Rotheram, also a Remainer, nevertheless said the port of Liverpool stood ready to welcome global opportunities post Brexit.

It is too early to say whether these politicians will actually deliver their visions, but people can begin to see how City Region mayors might make a difference in the absence of what we really need, which is powerful regional government.

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SINGLE MARKET CHALLENGE TO CORBYN

 

NO ENEMIES TO THE LEFT.

Jeremy Corbyn does not take easily to adulation. This weekend he would probably prefer to be tending his allotment than hearing “Oh! Jeremy Corbyn”, ringing out from the Brighton conference centre.

But Labour’s surprisingly good performance (they failed to win for the third time by the way) in June’s General Election has confirmed Corbyn in the leadership for years to come if he wants to stay. Except for Alison McGovern’s Labour Campaign for the Single Market, most moderate Labour MPs have become political zombies. They remain because of an admirable sense of loyalty, hoping the tide will turn. I fear they will be disappointed.

In Brighton at the weekend we will see the hard left not only buttress the current leadership in power but take steps to make the left revolution permanent. Corbynistas are set to take control of the Conference Arrangements Committee and National Constitutional Committee. Most people have never heard of these bodies but the former used to be used by New Labour to keep embarrassing subjects like unilateral nuclear disarmament off the agenda. The latter body came into existence after the expulsion of Militant in 1986, but would be unlikely to expel similar people today. “No enemies to the Left” is likely to be the guiding principle.

But Corbyn’s people are looking beyond the day when Jeremy returns to his marrows. The percentage of Labour MPs needed to nominate a leadership candidate is being reduced so that in future left wingers will not need misguided moderates like Frank Field and Margaret Beckett to put them on the ballot paper.

Don’t expect a huge row on the conference floor about all this. The outside chance that the Tories might implode under Brexit strains and Labour come to power in yet another General Election will probably ensure good behaviour.

 

BREXIT REVOLT?

If there is to be trouble for Corbyn, it is likely to come from the Wirral South MP Alison McGovern and her attempt to get the party to commit to staying in the Single Market for ever. The Shadow Brexit Secretary Kier Starmer won a surprising partial victory in getting the Eurosceptic people around Corbyn to commit Labour to the Single Market during the Brexit transition period. McGovern wants to go further with all the implications that has for continued freedom of movement. McGovern belongs to the Blairite Progress faction in the party which has recently suffered a huge financial blow from the total withdrawal of funding by Lord Sainsbury.

LIB DEMS STICK TO THEIR GUNS.

While Labour try to walk the tightrope between Remain and Leave supporters, Tory Cabinet infighting was patched up just ahead of the Prime Minister’s Florence speech. But that was after Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson repeated the lie over a £350m Brexit windfall for the NHS. Let’s remember we do not send £350m to the EU each week. After the rebate and European aid is considered the figure is £161m.

Meanwhile I was in Bournemouth with the Lib Dems. They were celebrating the EU with flags and yellow starred berets. They also reaffirmed their commitment to letting the people vote on the Brexit deal.

It would have been easy for the new leader Vince Cable to have taken the party’s poor election showing as an excuse to abandon this policy which shows no sign at the moment of being popular.

However, talking to representatives, I detected a hope that public opinion will undergo a massive change when the consequences of the botched Brexit talks become apparent. Let us hope that change of view is lead by the North, the area that was sadly deceived by the Boris bombast and which has most to lose from leaving.

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FINAL SURGE TO MAY ?

 

THE LAST LAP.

The Prime Minister didn’t expect it to turn out this way when she called her snap election in April. The campaign was meant to deliver her a majority of 100+ so that she could go and sock it to those arrogant Europeans.

In fact, there has been very little discussion about what sort of deal we might get from the EU negotiations. We can’t get past the slogans of hard and soft Brexit. That’s deliberate as Mrs May wants to go off for two years negotiating with little challenge from a parliament with a thumping Tory majority. Her speech in the North East on Thursday, specifically on Brexit, clarified little.

Unfortunately for her other issues have intruded into the campaign. Tragically terrorism and security came to the fore after the Manchester outrage, but also the future funding of social care. She came a cropper on this issue and there seems to be a lot of support for a general sharing of the cost of care above £72,000.

Then there’s Jeremy Corbyn who has campaigned well with policies that are individually popular. Also, bullying questions from Jeremy Paxman and daily vilification in the Tory press have provoked a closing of the polls.

All that said I think wider truths will bring a Conservative majority of around 50 next Thursday. Labour cannot be serious in asking the British people to elect as Prime Minister a man with an ambiguous attitude to IRA terrorism. Also, nobody believes Jeremy Corbyn would ever launch our nuclear weapons. He has very honourable feelings about the issue, but the whole concept of deterrence would be undermined with Corbyn in No 10. Personally disorganised, he does not have a credible team of Shadow Ministers around him to form a government.

Perhaps reluctantly the British people will elect Theresa May hoping that she can display the strong and stable qualities that she has not projected during this campaign

THE NORTHERN BATTLEFIELD.

So, which seats should we be watching out for in Downtown areas of the North? The gloomiest of Labour insiders think any seat with less than a 10,000 majority is potentially vulnerable to the Tories. Those would include Huddersfield (welcome back to the Premier League by the way), Leeds North East, Lancashire West and Ellesmere Port and Neston. In relation to the latter I have picked up strange rumours that Justin Madders with a six thousand majority could be in more trouble than Chris Matheson in neighbouring Chester on ninety-three.

If we come on to constituencies with a Labour majority of less than 5000 they include the popular Deputy Speaker of the Commons, Lyndsay Hoyle, in Chorley, Bolton North East which is being heavily targeted, Wakefield and Wirral South where Alison McGovern is putting up a determined fight.

Right in the front line is Chester which I have already mentioned. The city is on the up, symbolised by the recent opening of the brilliant Storyhouse theatre complex. The seat went against the trend of the Cameron victory in 2015. Could it possibly stay Labour this time? Nearby another constituency that went against the trend was Wirral West. The 417 Labour majority should be overwhelmed by the able and popular Tory candidate, Tony Caldeira.

Other seats held on slim majorities by Labour include Lancaster and Fleetwood. The incumbent, Cat Smith, is a big Corbyn supporter which certainly can’t be said of John Woodcock in Barrow. His leader’s views on nuclear weapons are toxic in the submarine building town which went Tory in 1983 when Michael Foot was in charge of Labour.

I had hoped the Lib Dems would do well with their promise of a second EU referendum. It appears they have been squeezed as people polarise between Labour and the Conservatives. This means the Lib Dems are unlikely to reclaim Burnley or Cheadle. Indeed, they look likely to lose Southport where they only have a 3% majority over the Conservatives and have been damaged by the decision of the long serving MP John Pugh to retire.

FINAL THOUGHT.

Might this happen on Thursday night?

BONG

It’s ten o’clock and the BBC predicts the Conservatives have won the General Election with a comfortable majority.

BONG.

Jeremy Corbyn vows to fight on for socialism.

BONG

Tony Blair and Nick Clegg announce the launch of a new centre party for Britain.

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