I have long argued that tax justice is the most pro-business economic policy going. Now it is core Labour policy. But that's not all that's pro-business about Labour. As the Times Red Box email put it this morning:
Labour have not learnt the lessons of the past, the Tories insist. But perhaps they have not learnt the lessons of the present.
By the time the Conservatives have finished saying "f*** business" and pursuing an ideological Brexit which many firms warn will be somewhere between inconvenient and utterly destructive, they might wake up to find that Labour has won the argument.
A decade after the crash, for which those responsible paid little price, voters might be happy to let Labour do the business.
That's The Times saying that.
The Tories are in trouble.
Thanks for reading this post.
You can share this post on social media of your choice by clicking these icons:
There are links to this blog's glossary in the above post that explain technical terms used in it. Follow them for more explanations.
You can subscribe to this blog's daily email here.
And if you would like to support this blog you can, here:
Buy me a coffee!
I hope that you right, I really do.
Personally I’m hoping that the Tory conference will be a disaster.
But even if it is a disaster the media will tell us otherwise. It’s not a lever playing field.
May can slither on for four more years unless enough Tories do the decent thing and put her down. This only leads to Lord Snooty and his pals vying to hire Mack-the-Knife. Gove is well-placed as he is married to Lady MacBeth. They could eke out their small majority with bribes to the Dupers on suppressing ‘word burning stove corruption’ and changes of the guard. We are not a people’s democracy as I understand the term, more a copy of the Persian-Greek participative management assembly system with the criticisms taken out and real power left with the empire elite. If you haven’t noticed, politics takes no account of what real public opinion might be and always reverts us to dubious opinion polls and soggy, media-controlled ‘slogan oratory’. Labour haven’t made much of a fist of the people’s vote or the radical system changes we need, including wider inclusion of material on how the debate is framed in the language of austerity and macro-economic lies. Our democracy still takes no account of the informed discourse advocated 2500 years back. Bill Mitchell comes at this through ‘framing’. Not arguing at Richard here – just feel we overstate the rationality of the system all the time. The Tories are haplessly incompetent and I honestly can’t explain them without concepts of evil – but our constitution offers no real means of getting rid of them without their internal consent. I see different possible outcomes.
The Times must have a hidden agenda to be making such heretical comments,
I cannot believe for a second that they will turn against their Masters, what’s going on here? Trying to destabilise May so Johnson or Gove may challenge? Anything is possible with that lot.
The most pro business party is the one which dedicates its efforts to creating and maintaining a social infrastructure in which productive businesses can flourish.
The Conservative party doesn’t seem to include that as part of its raison d’etre any longer. I think Margaret Thatcher believed that was what her party of the day was delivering but she was completely misled by those with a different and exploitative agenda.
I’ve said before, and I know Its contentious, but she was not bright in my estimation.
There must be bright Conservatives, but there don’t seem to be many in the present crop, and certainly not in the Hof C. Clever, maybe……. but intelligent…..? I’d feel more reassured about the future if I thought there were fewer of these not very bright Conservatives lurking on the opposition benches biding their time awaiting their turn to get their snouts in the trough of the public estate.
@Any Crowe
“I’ve said before, and I know Its contentious, but she was not bright in my estimation.”
I think you are right. Thatcher wasn’t bright but just lucky. She happened to be in the right place at the right time when people had grown (perhaps only for a short time) tired of the post-war social settlement. She then had an enormous double dose of luck in the formation of the SDP and the Falklands war (lucky for her but terrible for many others).
Perhaps someone else judged “not bright” is about to be the beneficiary of the slowly turning wheel of political fortune?
Thatcher’s luck was deeper than that. Look at all the North Sea oil coming in during that time which covered up the really parlous balance of payments issue if I recall correctly. Oil money subsidised many a stupid policy until it started to decline.
I always felt that Thatcher was used by the party’s ex – City crew ministers as a poster girl to change our economy in favour of high finance and debt. Most sober accounts of Thatcher’s time note that debt played a bigger part in the economy from and after the Tories ‘liberated’ markets.
The changes she brought in actually shackled the economy to debt – never mind liberating it. Something we are still addicted to.
I recall that the CBI hated Thatcher at one time too because she hiked up interest rates so high that the short term overdrafts that business needed at the time between business cycles and orders (cash flow) became so expensive that many firms closed (I recall the Tories telling people that these businesses were just not managed efficiently and therefore deserved to go under).
Again, it all smacks of design to me. A so called ruling class who can’t be bothered to manage traditional industry and like making money out of money that has already been made is a dangerous think to have in power
@PSR
Regarding Thatcher being lucky.
I had forgotten about the North Sea oil revenue. I had a look at the figures a while ago and the amounts involved were astonishing.
Also, further to the Falklands, it is reasonably clear that foreign policy blunders by her administration allowed the invasion to happen – for which she was rewarded!
Neil says:
“Perhaps someone else judged “not bright” is about to be the beneficiary of the slowly turning wheel of political fortune?”
There are so many candidates lining up for that honour that I confess I don’t know whether you might have someone particular in mind.
Seriously, I don’t.
@Andy
Well l’m left-leaning and optimistic, does that help?
It is true that my original description didn’t narrow the field very much.
I occasionally like to play the conservative politician sorting game – are they stupid, evil, or both? !