David Laws’ decision to hand Liam Byrne’s infamous ‘there’s no money’ note to ITV is intriguing. It suggests that the Liberal Democrat leadership intend to escalate their attacks on Labour.
Laws must know the power of this image. For when he first mentioned it at an early Osborne/Laws press conference, Andy Coulson pushed hard for an image of the actual note to be released. Coulson calculated that the note would have made nearly all the front pages and established the image of Labour profligacy in the public’s mind.
But Laws, slightly taken aback by the level of interest in the note, refused to hand it over. At the time, friends of Laws said that he felt that putting the actual note itself out there would have been a bit below the belt. The fact that three years later, Laws has decided to go public with it suggests that the Liberal Democrats are prepared to step up their attacks on Labour.
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