I’ve just caught up with Ed Miliband on Marr this morning (transcript here) and his aim seemed to be burying Ed Balls’ complaint about cuts being too fast and too deep. In its place, he
called for more growth. Here’s my take on his interview:
1) He doesn’t complain about cuts. “The basic message is this: we’ve got to cut the deficit, but the best and most important way of doing that is to grow our
economy… A year ago there was a contested argument whether the government strategy should work. It’s not working.” You don’t hear him talk about Ed Balls’ “too
hard, too fast” cuts, just a reference to ‘the government’s strategy’. Balls tells porkies, of course, and I think Miliband is a bit more honest. So he can’t quite
bring himself to blame cuts, given that state spending in the first year of the coalition was the highest in British history. When Marr asked him if he’s spend more, he replied: tax less.
2) Clever dividing line with Cameron over moralizing. “I have a difference with the Prime Minister though, and this is the difference. He wants to sort of say the problem with
Britain is the British people. I think the promise of Britain lies in the British people. The problem is the tragedy of Britain is that’s not being fulfilled.” He is highlighting
Cameron’s habit of giving speeches where he appears to be wagging his finger at the country, talking about the need for people to change behaviour and be more ‘responsible’. The Tories are deeply
interested in behavioural science, nudge theory etc. But this can often come out as one big moral lecture. The ‘broken society’ agenda is also open to malicious misinterpretation. Miliband has
picked up on this.
3) Please trust big government again! “I sense a real feeling of fear in this country – fear that nothing is being done, that the government is if you like just standing aside,
as I’m afraid governments have done in history in response to this crisis. Don’t stand aside. Put our young people back to work. That’s what would make the difference.” This is the
dividing line, a weaker version of Gordon Brown’s the “do-nothing Conservatives” vs “Real Help from Labour” and nods to Labour strategists’ wider anxieties about
the appetite for big government (which Rawnsley put well this morning).
4) Labour is not for the ‘strivers’. “Now why do we say temporarily cut VAT? The reason we say that is, as every family knows, when you’ve got a credit card bill,
you’ve got to make savings; but unless you’ve got an income coming in, unless you’re in work, you’re not going to have the money to pay off that bill.” So Labour is committed to cutting
taxes on consumption, claiming it cares about those who are unemployed. This gives the Tories a clear chance to cut income tax for the low-paid and proudly proclaim “we are the new
workers’ party”. It’s a great tactic: Labour is worried about the people it kept on welfare dependency. The Tories should care, deeply, about the strivers: those who work. They
should cut taxes, so that work pays more. Marr later challenges him about anger amongst the low-paid against those who are fiddling benefits. Miliband acknowledges people in his constituency angry
about it, but doesn’t offer much in the way of anger himself.
5) Not much difference with Osborne on cuts. “If I was the Prime Minister, we would be having to make cuts. We would meet the plan of halving the deficit over four
years.” Osborne is halving it over three years, and the way growth is evaporating it may be three-and-a-half. It’s worth constantly reminding ourselves that the two parties are
fiscally closer than either likes to admit. Osborne is raising national debt by 51pc over a parliament: Labour’s published plan, which Ed Miliband endorsed again, would be 59 per cent.
6) Rules out early election. He tried to wriggle out of the fees question by saying “The manifesto’s three and a half years away”. He’s probably right, but he
should give the impression of being impatient for power. The truth, of course, is that even May 2015 is too soon for his party, but Miliband should do a better job of disguising the fact. Ladbrokes
offers 5/1 odds of a general election next year, which I’d say is about right. Miliband talks as if there’s a 100/1 chance of that happening.
One final thing. There was a dangerous throwaway line where he says, “We’ve got to change the way our economy works. We didn’t do enough to change the ethic of our economy. We’ve got a short-term fast buck economy.” This is a slander on the millions of British businesses who think and act for the long term – unlike those taxing them. Miliband is thinking (I suspect) about the investment banks, but he can’t say “British economy” when he is referring to a division of the City. It could well be that Team Miliband has a blind spot for business. If so, this presents opportunities for the Tories.
All told, the most interesting point from his 25 minutes is that Miliband is reclaiming his party’s economic narrative from Balls. The shadow chancellor complains about cuts, Ed Miliband complains about growth. Balls speaks tomorrow: let’s see if he modifies his message.
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