FT.com / Comment / Opinion - A hung parliament would be a tragedy for Britain.
Ken Clarke has written in the FT:
I find the idea that the British produce an inconclusive result particularly worrying, because I don’t think the bond markets will wait for the discussions and the horse-trading. Sterling will wobble. If the British do not vote in a government with a working majority, and the markets conclude we cannot tackle the debt and deficit, then the International Monetary Fund will have to do it for us. That will be the view outside.
Let's unpack that, shall we? That paragraph then becomes:
Vote Tory or we'll send our banking friends round to beat you up.
And this from the man who also wrote in the same article:
A hung parliament, a minority government, held together by backroom deals with the Scottish and Welsh nationalists, the Lib Dems and Ulstermen would be a tragedy. The uncertainty would kill the recovery. It would do nothing to improve the reputation of our parliamentary system. It would leave us in the same hole of financial incompetence and institutional loathing that we are in today, with seedy deals between political fixers digging us deeper in by the day.
Unpacked this says:
I hate democracy, the right of people to decide, the Union and all who come from outside England, parliament, accountability and the right of a government to rule.
I think we should leave it all to the markets and we'll do just what they want.
And this from a man who served as Chancellor in one of the sleaziest, most incompetent governmentss we've seen - Major's from 92 to 97.
Don't get me wrong - I'm not exonerating New Labour from massive contempt for parliament either - but from Clarke this is beyond the pale. And a typical act of a market besotted thug.
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I agree – it’s dodgy scaremongering of the worst sort. Clarke conveniently doesn’t mention that most of his Chancellorship from 1993-97 took place under a minority goverment. And I didn’t see him complaining too much then.
I’d actually argue that a hung parliament provides GREATER legitimacy than a majority government – if a coalition emerges, then for the first time in decades in the UK we’d have a government backed by more than 50% of the voters. Rather than 35% as in the case of the 2005-10 administration.
Clarke says business would prefer the most stable and predictable result of the election – but of course democracy is inherently unpredictable (because the opposition might get into power). So the logic of that is that business feels we’d be better off with a dictatorship like China or Saudi Arabia. Absolutely sick thinking from Clarke and his friends in big business.
Very amusing to see the Tories flailing about in the low 30s in terms of percentage support though. I hope it turns out like that – or lower – on polling day.
“I hate democracy, the right of people to decide, the Union and all who come from outside England…”
I think anyone who values democracy is deeply uncomfortable with the current system.
The idea that a party who comes third in the popular vote could have the largest number of MPs is clearly wrong and undemocractic.
So is the idea that MPs from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland can vote on matters which only affect England, whereas MPs in England have no say over matters in Scotland, Wales or NI.
A hung parliament would mean small parties getting a disproportionate influence. It just so happens the small parties are all in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. The realit will be horse-trading: move this part of the civil service to this constituancy or else we won’t support you; move the call centre from Hull to Merthyr or we won’t support you. Give us an extra £10m or we’ll back the others. That is not democractic.
If Wales, Scotland and NI have devolution then clearly England should have it as well. Democracy means equality. It means people have the same say, over the same matters, regardless of wealth or location. And the current system fails woefully in that regard and the horse-trading of forming a coalition would magnify that inequality still further.
Having said all of that, I’m not sure the bond markets will really care. A hung parliament looks very possible at the moment and the markets look quite calm about the possibility of it. It’s hardly that unusual when you look around Europe.
The Major government was certainly sleazy and incompetent (though scarcely more so than the present government) but Clarke had a record as Chancellor that Brown/Darling would die for.
Who was a more succesful Chancellor than Clarke (since the war?)
Well actually most would have said Brown until 2007
Ten years of constant growth…
So my answer is it’s much too soon to say
You’re joking right – Brown is probably the worst Chancellor this country has ever had. It was obvious even in the boom years that it was built of a mountain of debt.
@Peter
The power of retropsect, eh?
“Clarke conveniently doesn’t mention that most of his Chancellorship from 1993-97 took place under a minority goverment.”
Eh?
The tory majority in 92 was 21.
@Tim Worstall
And then they lost umpteen by elections
You have a short memory Tim
Howard says “most of Clarke’s Chacellorship” took place in minority.
The majority was down to one by 1996 and the Tories were a minority in 1997, leading up to the GE. But that’s still not the majority of his time as Chancellor.
@Tim Worstall
Pedant
Er – hang on a minute Tim – 10 Tory MPs had the whip withdrawn from them in 1993 after refusing to support the Maastricht treaty. So effectively they were independents, thus making the Major government a minority government from 1993 to 1997. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maastricht_Rebels for full details