George Osborne is choreographing his autumn statement week to make things as difficult as possible for Labour. At present senior ministers are travelling the country handing out nice things to voters as they unveil details of the 2014 National Infrastructure Plan. Yesterday’s roads bonanza has been replaced by a garden city, better flood defences and a tidal project in Swansea today.
You can almost hear the Chancellor singing ‘roll out the barrel’ as he and colleagues indulge in American-style pork-barrel politics by handing out many of these goodies to seats they want to hold or win (read Seb’s piece yesterday). But though Labour can accuse Osborne of a cynical focus on marginal seats, they also know that this show of apparent generosity from the Coalition government is rather awkward as this is the sort of thing that Labour governments like doing. The Tories are almost trying to address the risk of some voters thinking that now the recovery is underway, it is safe to vote in a Labour government that will give them things.
But then it seems that just as Labour is getting used to complaining about pork barrels and pointing out recycled announcements where money has really already been spent, it will have to switch into a new defensive mode. Because Wednesday appears to be shaping up to be a day where the Chancellor is downbeat about the economy in a pitch to voters to let the Tories finish the job. And this is even harder for Labour as they need to be able to give the impression that Ed Miliband and Ed Balls would finish the job just as well. Currently voters disagree and the big poll lead that the Tories enjoy over Labour on economic trust is the reason David Cameron is happy now to not talk about immigration and talk endlessly about money instead.
It has been a long while since either Ed Miliband or Ed Balls had a good Autumn Statement or Budget response, and with just one more of each before the General Election, the stakes are getting higher.
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