Bids for the 2015/16 spending review will land on George Osborne’s desk today from Secretaries of State across Whitehall. Some, like Iain Duncan Smith and Patrick McLoughlin, are signed up to the idea that their departments need further cuts. McLoughlin, as a former chief whip, prefers to avoid conflict, while Duncan Smith has made it known for some time that he’d like a bit of conflict with the Lib Dems over his budget, with a number of cuts sitting ready on his desk if only Nick Clegg and colleagues backed down on their refusal to touch Work and Pensions spending again. As yesterday’s Telegraph interview showed, IDS is also frustrated with David Cameron’s similarly recalcitrant attitude towards pensioner benefits, highlighting the absurd situation of tough cuts in welfare for those of working age when the winter fuel payment continues to go to those who spend it on things the state probably doesn’t need to give them help with, like expensive claret. That ‘read my lips’ pledge won’t be abandoned this side of 2015 unless Cameron fancies a taste of what voting to raise tuition fees felt like for the Lib Dems.
But there are other rules, perhaps not made in as much haste as the pensioner benefit pledge, which other ministers are now trying to bend. The Sun reports this morning that Philip Hammond, one of the most vociferous members of the National Union of Ministers, wants to raid money from other ring-fenced areas in Whitehall. Newsnight reported last week that Education officials were already bracing themselves for their ring-fence getting rather smaller. It’s a sign of how desperate ministers are to protect what they see as precious parts of their budget that they are prepared to burrow under the fences for spending pots that were previously considered unquestionable.
The Lib Dems and MPs such as Liam Fox (not often in agreement) have made their opposition clear in the past to the idea of protecting certain budgets above others. The Cabinet must do what it can with the present situation on protected spending pots. But perhaps as the parties start to think as much about red lines for any coalition negotiations as they do about current battles, ring-fences will, like pensioner perks, be another apparently sensible pledge that they won’t want to repeat now they know the reality of government.
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