Dave’s Cuts are Really Gordon’s Cuts

David Cameron’s speech on reducing public spending, curbing the deficit and tackling the national debt was important stuff. Not least because, at some length, he pointed out the poisonous position the incoming government faces to make it clear that, far from being Tory cuts, when the axe comes, as fall it must, the underlying responsibility for these spending cuts belongs to Labour not the Camerlegg Ministry. 

In one sense this is cheeky: it’s Dave’s ball now and his to play with and decide the rules too. And it was a stretch to say that spending reductions aren’t driven by at least an element of “theory or ideology”. They are. Which is why Labour spent years pursuing its “Investment vs Cuts” strategy only for that to morph into a muddled “We Will Have to Cut Spending But Remember At Least, Unlike the Nasty Tories We Don’t Really Want to Do It and Won’t Gain Some Pseudo-Sexual Thrill from Doing So.