As the FT notes today:
Mr Osborne believes the public will be with him on Tuesday. But in spite of opinion polls showing that a majority accept the need for cuts in general, nothing has fully prepared people for what is about to land on their heads.
I did my only small piece of research on this today. OK, not wholly scientific, I agree, as it was undertaken from the barber’s chair here in deep Tory Norfolk but what I found quite surprised me and was confirmed as commonplace by the barber himself — a man I’ve got to know over a few years. People are really frightened about what might happen on Tuesday. They think they’re going to suffer. They think the less well off are going to be hit hard (the survey population is biased in their favour, I might add). And they’re really angry about it.
The ConDem ‘Plan for Pain’ is deliberately designed to make ordinary people suffer whilst the best off benefit. And they realise that now. Even here in Tory heartland.
This would be interesting except for the fact it is going to be so nasty.
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The ConDem ‘Plan for Pain’ is deliberately designed to make ordinary people suffer whilst the best off benefit. And they realise that now.”
This comment is just emotive silliness and does you little credit. You clearly know little about politics if you honestly believe that politicians are deliberately going to embark on a policy where the vast majority of people in the UK (in this case your “ordinary people”) are going to suffer so that a small minority can benefit.
There is simply no way that the government will do anything that will guarantee that they will be out of power at the next election (if they actually last that long as I suspect the level of civil protest will see them out within a year). Do you honestly believe that the British public are so stupid not to see if they are being stitched up to accomodatee a few Tory rich mates?
@Justin
The funniest comment I’ve ever seen on this blog – congratulations. The entire POINT of Tory policy is to implement policies where the vast majority of people suffer so that a small minority can benefit. That’s almost a definition of the Conservative party, since Thatcher at least.
How do they get away with it? Largely because they control most of the media…
So how come 13 million people voted for them in 1992?
@Peter
See above – “largely because they control(led) most of the media.” Remember The Sun – “Why I’m backing Kinnock – by Stalin” etc? Nice, unbiased coverage. 👿
@Peter – because they absorbed whatever poison Murdoch, Desmond, Rothermere and Black fed them? I can remember poor pensioners in Basildon who believed they would be paying extra income tax if Labour were elected.
Discussing cuts at the barbers? Almost certainly there would have been some hair raising answers. Having got that one out of the way a lot of the fear will arise from so many people now having high levels of personal debt and/or being over mortgaged. With many of the population having been encouraged to go to the margins on household budgets any down turn will hit a lot harder than in the past.
@Howard
Howard, while as a Labour Party member I agree with your sentiment whole-heartedly, I have to disagree with you. Most Tories do actually believe that their policies will benefit the country as a whole. All you have to do to see this is read anything written by Iain Duncan Smith, especially when writing for his Centre for Social Justice. This demonstrates exactly what most Tories think will help the vulnerable.
And while I respectfully disagree with alot of it, and will happily argue the case, the majority of Tories do really want to do the best for everyone. I’ll wait for the budget to see just how bad it is…
@Howard
It is a myth that the press have any meaningful say in the outcome of general elections. Numerous studies support this. They might reinforce public opinion but they almost certainly don’t shift it.
And the killer is that the paper whose voters showed the most swing from Lab to Con in 1992 was….the Daily Mirror.
@Peter, no matter what studies may show, Labour lost in Basildon – a marginal seat – in 92 and pensioners were interviewed saying they would pay more income tax under Labour. That was the Sun’s message.
Tory politicking has always been “we will make everybody richer”, whilst,in the past, the left has always been “we’ll make evrything fairer”. Which works best on the front page?
Which is truest? Shame on New Labour, though inroads were made at some levels.
The reason so many people vote Tory, who are not already in the ‘wealth preservation society’,is because they truly believe in trickle down.
There has neverbeen a bigger lie.
For the sake of completeness I would be interested to know what is “ordinary people” who the “best off” are?
Without properly defining these groups, this blog and contributors like Howard no better than the nasty, Tory owned media who seem to have this wonderful ability to totally mislead the British people.
@Ewan
I wish I had that degree of confidence in the Tories’ instincts. Some of them genuinely do want to do the best for people, and are misguided rather than malicious – I’d agree. But I’d argue that many are just presenting a cover story to disguise their real intentions.
@Peter
If the press doesn’t swing elections why on earth would politicians like Tony Blair and Dave Cameron spend so much time assiduously courting it? The media mostly determines the narrative. For example the election campaign mostly failed to produce a serious debate about economic policy, taxation or public spending – the whole thing was reduced to the ludicrous “jobs tax” shouting match.
[…] commentator on this blog has asked if I really think the Tories are […]
@Howard
I completely endorse your comments
I’m afraid the malicious are present in Tory ranks
And the abuse of data and information by them is staggering.
I think the lesson of the last election is that the written press has no influence at all. In fact, it’s not even clear that the candidates debate had any effect either. People didn’t much like Gordon Brown and it is very difficult to win 4 elections in a row.
We are probably all political nerds who would like to think of elections as a choice between competing visions of the future. I think in general, they are not: they are judgments on the past.
I think the simple truth is that we need Tory governments to rein in public spending when the economy is doing well and Labour governments to loosen the purse strings when the ecnomy needs a boost. Instead, we get it the wrong way around.
As for the malicious in the Tory ranks. The majority of people vote according to their narrow self-interest. The rich have more capacity to harm the poor than vice versa, but its all a sorry picture.
mad foetus
There is little to argue with your last post. That narrow view you have described differentiates us from even the most basic ‘french cafe postulators’. The thinking on the continent is far much more philosophical. Whether or not a political outcome puts us (as in UK – so by inclusion the Crown Dependencies) in a different economoic position; there is a lack of understanding, and indeed, desire to involve oneself in an area of life that affects everything we do as ‘people’.
i edited to heavily. i hope you understand what i meant.
too
for goodness’ sake
you don’t need to publish that. I’m a stickler for typos, but knowing how fast one has to do it, and the output you produce, all typos should be expected!!!!!
In the last election there was one ideology and three political parties. So we are, in effect, a one party state with three (or more) sub-divisions. As Marx and Engels pointed out those have power and wealth will always promote the system that provides it – hence the media will allow squabbles about how neo-liberal capitalism works but will not give a hint about alternatives or if the whole shooting match has outlived it’s purpose.