It is commonplace to think that there is nothing that will prevent a Conservative election win in 202o now. I disagree. There are, as Macmillan may have said, 'events, dear boy, events' that can blow any government off course. Here are some that might do just that.
- The NHS failing
- People dying waiting for treatment
- Social care failing
- People dying for lack of care
- People forced onto the streets by the benefit cap
- And children, especially
- Councils going bankrupt
- And basic essential services being cut as a result
- Power cuts
- People dying because there is insufficient capacity to meet demand
- An increase in interest rates
- Giving rise to mortgage defaults
- Rapidly rising class sizes
- Failure to meet the needs of a growing number of children
- Rapidly rising government debt
- Spending rising and revenue falling: the end of the Tory dream of a balanced budget
- The next economic downturn
- All the signs are there
- Tax cuts for the well off or large companies
- Defying the public mood
- No change to migration
- A failure to deliver what people thought was the promise of Brexit
- Rising unemployment as companies leave the country
- No one voted Brexit to see their job disappear
- Failure to deliver a negotiated Brexit in two years
- The failure that's almost inevitable
- No sign that anyone of significance wants to do a trade deal with the U.K.
- And most especially a protectionist USA
But of course, the availability of an alternative would help.
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I can’t help but believe that the right-wing press will spin it as somehow being the EU’s fault and people will believe it. The Sun says it’s true therefore it must be.
I agree with Leigh – finding others to blame is now the standard MO of our society and enables certain parties to get away with murder. And the public fall for it again and again.
The worrying thing is, who will be the patsy next time?
I think that UKIP will be the net beneficiaries however – not Labour or the Lib-Dems.
I agree entirely. Political feeling is very volatile almost everywhere and tipping points proceed rapidly.
My Tory friends tell me that their party is in fear of losing their blue collar vote to UKIP and that the Boris faction is gaining strength.
Brexit really is tearing them apart, despite the media cover up, and the purging of civil servants and ‘experts’ continues: academic criticism rarely makes the media. Our press is surely the most right wing in Europe?
My high street has increasing numbers of beggars, the homeless, and food banks: but for local charities the situation would be worse. My local authority is not replacing children’s play equipment in the parks. People are angry.
I’ m getting on a bit and I can’t remember a time when feelings are so high.
I see in the news that personal debt levels are now at 2008 and it’s Fat Cat jamboree time this week. Volatile- oh yes.
Great blog, brings hope. Thanks
Thanks
Depressing, isn’t it?
Shame that your tory friends are not concerned about what their policies are doing to the country, as listed above.
I’m more and more worried that it is increasingly likely that it will not be a case of a certain Conservative victory in 2020 – more case of ‘all bets off’. That’s because that scenario is of the economic catastrophe that’s looming out of the Brexit shambles. the most recent alarm signals include the resignation of ambassador Ivan Roger amid the ‘New McCarthyism’ of Brexit Britain, and the deeply worrying piece today by the FT’s Brussels Bureau Chief Alex Barker. Alex Barker’s piece well delineates the Article 50 cauldron the UK is now tipping into with the loss of its most capable civil servant in the field. Background noises include the quite deplorable, fatuous and disingenuous footering aboot by politicians the likes of IDS.
The UK is indeed, to quote Martin Wolfe this week, now ‘in the year of living dangerously.
Indeed
And what infuriates me is that those mainly responsible for this situation won’t take any responsibility for it, but , as others above state, will try and blame everybody else for it.
You can talk all you like about the failure of the left in the UK, in various forms, to oppose this, and in the form of New Labour, to actually go along with (to some extent) the disastrous neoliberal ideology, but where we are now is fundamentally the responsibility of the right. They have created rising inequality and austerity through their policies in government, and then cynically used this anger to get the Brexit vote; and as we all know, this will just make things even worse.
I’ve no wish to repeat Bevan’s infamous quote about Tories and vermin, but really, I’m beginning to see where he was coming from. People who bang on about ‘taking responsibility for your own mistakes’ but then never do it themselves, or who lie time after time about the EU, or attack long serving civil servants when those civil servants are simply doing the job they were paid to do… vile, utterly vile.
I have nothing but contempt for them.
I find fcca’s comment above about the Tory party somewhat amusing. Maybe if the Tory party had shown some moral and intellectual integrity in tackling the effects of the banking crisis instead of using it as an excuse to impose austerity, and had backed our EU membership rather than worry about losing votes to UKIP, they wouldn’t be in the state they are now. Are we supposed to have any sympathy for them? Isn’t it about time the party finally split? The anti EU faction should join their fellow swivel eyed loons in Ukip, while the pro EU lot should join the Lib Dems and make every effort possible to oppose us leaving the EU.
I will not say events have no effect – an event is an effect, in and of itself – but effective political action requires effective actors, and a functional political system.
The effective actors are all on one side of the house, and they’re not acting in your interests, nor mine.
That – the lack of effective opposition – is a missing piece in a functional system; but the lack of diverse and reliable media coverage is another. It leaves the way open to ‘scapegoating’ and political violence; and, as we can see already, it gives a free rein to stupid and destructive extremists.
The question is: how bad does an event, or events, have to be, before there is any prospect of improvement in the situation?
Is the government, and English politics, so dysfuntional that we’re collectively incapable of responding to events in any way that doesn’t worsen the effects?
Right now, we’re sliding rapidly downhill and each event merely adds momentum. I joke about it with analogies about “The wheels fell off some time ago but the carcass of the wagon’s still careering down the ravine, Brexiteers cheering and whooping in the back and Mrs May gripping the reins firmly and ‘driving’ with her eyed screwed shut”; but that is an analogy where the ‘brakes’ are a bang at the bottom of the precipice – and it predicts the nature of the *effective* event that you’re expecting rather better than your optimism about our polity and our resilience.
So the question is – what happens when there is no alternative?
That is the real crisis we’re facing
I feel a blog coming…
I look forward to reading it.
Some of it will be right. Some of it will be wrong; but, at least, sufficiently well thought out as to be remediable and workable as policy, with a little thought to mitigation.
Most policies are, even bad ones, and our Civil Service are masters at making them work, or appear to; but they can’t and won’t if the cabinet considers their advice ‘disloyal’ and excludes them.
It never used to be this bad, in this particular way: we have fallen so far that even Osborne’s cynical tribalism seems like wisdom. At least there was some benefit, for someone, however repellent; and he was and is a man of despicable flaws but he is neither aimless nor pointless, and definitely not stupid.
And that’s the point: we are becoming inured to politics and propaganda that we cannot even call “not even wrong” – it’s wilfully stupid and often malign – and this is, I think the ‘Underton Window’ of the polity.
Not a lurch rightwards, but downwards.
‘English’ politics? In a looming post-brexit Britain that recalls Prof Henessey’s fear expressed during Scotland’s independence referendum campaign, ‘I fear David Cameron will mean we lose Scotland and the EU. (slight paraphrasing]. Seems we’re getting there – all apiece of the catastrophe I commented on above?
I don’t know if there are any Scots reading this blog, but whatever the substantial technical problems there might be in Scotland becoming independent (the currency, most obviously), doesn’t independence now begin to look more and more attractive?
Maybe there’s no more desire for independence now than in 2014, but as the consequences of the UK leaving the EU become more and more serious and obvious, surely that’s going to change?
Let’s face it, Nicola Sturgeon is a far more capable politician than Theresa May, and I suspect she’s going to be handed the opportunity to call a 2nd Indyref sometime in the next few years.
And to me at least, there’d be the satisfaction of seeing the dismay Scottish independence would cause to all the ‘make Britain great again’ fools.
I think your argument logical
As a Scot who has lived in England for over 20 years the prospect of living in “Little England” makes the idea of returning to Scotland more attractive, even if the Scottish economy may not be as good as it might have been since the oil price fall. Scots have generally been more open to links with Europe than the English and there is less prejudice against immigrants – possibly because the numbers in Scotland have been less proportionately than in England
That old Scots French alliance, eh?
And why not?
I note Mrs Maybe has ditched the traditional new year interview with the BBC in favour of the Murdoch channel
sickoftaxdodgers there’s curious paradox in which the Scottish independence movement is entrapped in. Despite the lamentable UK-wide situation and prospects, the pro-independence voted has hardly moved since the independence referendum. I share its proponents contention that the entire Westminster party model is broken and unfit for (any) purpose. Moreover, the present SNP Scottish Government includes several highly competent politicians. Reassuringly, it’s not a one-horse trick in the form of Nicola Sturgeon (albeit she is a superb media player & communicator). It, thus far, displays a coherence and probity so lacking at Westminster. There is then a big however. A majority of those who voted in the referendum were not convinced of the indy economic case sufficiently to overcome their basic economic fears over mortgages, pensions and (maybe surprisingly) public sector jobs. IMO that remains so. I do not see that the SNP have sufficiently redeveloped their economic arguments. I respect their aim to convince the voters of their economic management competence – but that has entailed what is for me their unconvincing stance as an anti-austerity party. All the while, time is running out on room for the SNP’s diffident positing around this matter. Further, and deeper, austerity cuts are about to ‘hit the street’. Will the SNP continue to succeed in persuading voters that ‘it’s Westminster’s cuts’… and if they do, might not many Scottish voters question what is the point of supporting the SNP if they can’t stop the cuts? (Again IMO that’s part of the Labour collapse story.) Of course, for the likes of the wonderfully recalcitrant SNP veteran Jim Sillars this is all a distraction and device to push the SNP away from the ‘real’ issue of Scottish independence.
Edward, thanks for that. As you say, at present the pro-independence vote in Scotland hasn’t increased much, but the Scots may be pushed towards if (as looks very likely) this government makes a disastrous mess of Brexit.
I would have thought that the further cuts on the way would push the Scots more towards independence, not make them inclined to blame the SNP.
I have a feeling they are less easily fooled by the right’s lies about the ‘need’ for austerity than the English/Welsh.
At one time it was possible to organise a general strike event, but even a million protesting against Blair’s war had no effect!
What pivot can we unite around to galvanise mass action? Go to it Richard.
To answer Carol, my Tory friends are of the opinion that austerity has shown that local authorities were wasting so much money, and still are. Like Cameron, they have no idea, and think that back office jobs are still available to chop. Not the Tories fault!
None of them use buses, homeless shelters, public libraries, public toilets, State schools, or care about curtailed rubbish collection, and they call for privatisation of public parks – no doubt for private gain. If it doesn’t affect them, then it does not exist – that’s a Tory.
The reference by Paul fcca to his Tory friends speaks volumes to me. I have followed this blog avidly since the Labour leadership election brought it (and Richard’s books) to my attention. I am absolutely persuaded by Richard’s economic and political analysis but find myself almost isolated in the social bubble that I inhabit. I have friends and acquaintances who are good people at heart and would help anyone close to them in immediate need, but believe that austerity is a good thing, that “their” tax money shouldn’t be spent on wasters and lazy council workers, that the private sector is always more efficient than the public sector, trade unions are against the public interest, government regulation is bad for the economy, etc., etc., etc. Never mind all the Brexit slogans!
Politicians, the famously “independent” British press and the “unbiased” BBC have been telling them this for the past 30 years and their minds are set solid. The problem is that they’ve done well in this environment; house owners with values massively inflated, any still paying mortgages on the lowest interest rates ever, those retired on very comfortable pensions (but still they’re cross about council workers “gold plated pensions”), new car every few years with personalised number plate. Austerity doesn’t touch them, but makes them feel smug that they “earned everything they have by hard work”. Their children had good educations and are doing well, no zero hours contracts for them.
Try explaining that government finances shouldn’t be run like a household, money is created by banks and can be created for the government by the BoE, we need a government to regulate to avoid businesses doing harm, etc., etc., and their eyes glaze over and they think you’re mad. Trying to get them to read something about it is a waste of time. Try telling them that there are people living in very different circumstances who are having a hard time and they’ll say that there’ll always be some poor people and everyone they know is fine.
This isn’t the top 1%. I don’t know what the statistics are but I’m sure that in the current environment it’s a sufficient proportion to keep a Conservative government going for many years yet, whatever events come to pass, short of Armageddon.
And I know people in my office at work (HMRC) who voted Leave, who, whilst they’re very good at their jobs, still believe the anti EU rubbish that’s been put about. At the same time though, I see and hear of loads of experienced people who’ve finally had enough and are leaving in their droves, or will leave when the HMRC office closure program makes their journeys to work impossible.
If, as I suspect, Brexit turns into an economic disaster for the UK, which will exacerbate the disastrous austerity policies of the Tories, your smug, complacent acquaintances will end up suffering too, just as the Leave voters in my office will when the combined effects on the civil service of endless cutbacks and the extra workload caused by Brexit chaos, hit home.
After all, if interest rates rise and house prices plunge from a Brexit induced recession…..Let’s see how smug your acquaintances are then.
I concur A. Pessimist.
I spent New Year in London, where the people I mingled with talked about tax efficient trusts and how to avoid the tax man and investing abroad but then prattle on about the state of infrastructure!
Some of them were even London based civil servants who would not have a word said against austerity. Even the ex head of children’s services I was talking to believed that the country should be ran like her last department and that all government expenditure was ‘our money’.
Such retired well-heeled people have all the time in the world to read and learn about the other narratives we know of but do not.
There is a epidemic of ignorance in this country – especially amongst the supposedly well educated and very comfortable middle class I’m afraid.
But also is this phenomenon tied to those who have (through no real effort by themselves) been fortunate enough to see the value of their property(ies) go up because of the market? Such a passively earned means of acquiring wealth seems to have dumbed people down and also inured them to the struggles of others. I find that when people acquire money, it changes them. They sort of detach themselves from society.
That’s the only way I can explain this grab all, anti-tax/pro-austerity stupidity that I see – from the Guardian reading middle class grand mother who has all her cash stored in tax reducing trusts to the middle class 40 year old who puts her partners free lance earnings into the bank without paying any tax on the income but worries about BREXIT and the state of the infrastructure.
The overall revelation is that of rank hypocrisy.
A.P. – I absolutely recognise what you say. I live in a village on the Surrey/Hampshire borders with a mixed community in terms of income though pretty monoglot in terms of ethnicity and culture. The village shop sells mountains of Telegraphs, Mails, Expresses and Suns – with me I sometimes feel as the only Guardian buyer! Im pretty well off but my peer group of friends from the last 30 odd years of living in the area would have most of the prejudices you describe, though to be fair many with business backgrounds would not be pro-Brexit.
Though Ive worked in the business world most of my life, years spent as a management consultant with a wide cross section of clients in all sectors means that Im well aware that there are good and bad in every sector and that the public (and third) sector is much tougher to operate in than most businesses. From working in international development with NGOs over the last 1-15 years, Im very well aware of the issues around poverty and the impact of neo-liberal economics
However, even with a pretty good base of real experience and examples,trying to have a rational discussion with the kind of people you describe is usually futile. When gently tested on their knowledge of basic data around say the EU or benefits or migrants, it is invariably apparent that they know very little apart from what they get from the Telegraph/Mail/Express/Sun (roughly correlating with social class?!!)
Its going to take some careful thought and a lot of hard work to create and then disseminate new narratives that challenge and undermine the negative narratives that have been absorbed by people. Perhaps using the ideas of people like Lakoff. Its not yet clear to me where that might be happening. They’d get my immediate support
I think that practically all this list could be either blamed on others or explained by the right wing media as necessary eg must give tax cuts to the wealth creators.
But this list and others would bring them down if they are accompanied with sleaze.
So add some election expenses scandal, a large helping of Panama papers fall out plus the ever present cloud of political lobbying finally getting some exposure. Then we’d see some fireworks.
Particularly as seems likely the smell mainly hangs around the Tory party.