What George Osborne didn’t tell you about the Tories’ radical economic agenda

10 October 2009

James Forsyth reviews the week in politics

It was as if the banks were taunting the Conservatives when they arrived into Manchester Piccadilly on Sunday: the cash machines at the station had run out of money. The queues were snaking around the escalators, and Tory activists could do little. This, of course, is excellent preparation for government in the age of austerity. What to do when money is in such short supply? It’s a question that the Conservatives are developing a convincing answer to — but very little of their thinking was revealed in Manchester this week.

This was the iceberg conference: only a small part of Tory policy was allowed to peek above the surface. The emphasis was on the icy water of austerity: telling the country to work longer, public sector workers that they will get no pay rise and those earning more than £50,000 that they will no longer receive means-tested tax credits. But the question that dominated debate in the conference bars — how the Tories are going to cut back the £175 billion deficit — remained conspicuously unanswered.

There are good reasons why Mr Osborne and his team did not reveal their whole hand in his speech. Partly it was because the Tories fear that every commitment they make to cut spending or raise taxes hands Labour an issue with which it can try and revive itself. Being straight with the electorate has its limits; there is little political advantage to be had in saying that nearly all capital spending projects are likely to be delayed or that the strong probability is that the only new roads to be built are going to be toll roads. Alongside these measures, the first Budget will almost certainly increase VAT to 20 per cent — again, hardly a vote winner.

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