The Tories turn their fire on ‘lamentable’ Johnson

Come back, you insufferable relatives, all is forgiven: the political class has devoted an afternoon to trading insults about who said what about VAT and when. However, there have been some intriguing exchanges amid the New Politics’ latest outing.

First, Labour seems to be fighting the two coalition partners as a single entity in Oldham East. Cameron, Clegg and Simon Hughes have received equal measures of opprobrium this afternoon and all have been lumped together. This was always a danger, but, as Fraser noted, Clegg and Cameron invited the manoeuvre by uniting their parties’ central operations in the cause of government. If Cameron and Clegg don’t differentiate in the general, Labour won’t in the particular.

Second, the Tories are after Alan Johnson. Justine Greening has eviscerated the Shadow Chancellor for his economic illiteracy on the Today programme this morning. She writes:

‘He committed Labour (apparently by accident) to a brand new, job-destroying £13 billion increase in National Insurance to replace the VAT rise. He admitted that he didn’t know which year Labour would eliminate the structural deficit, initially telling the BBC it would be 2015-16 before later saying he “probably” meant 2016-17. He was confused over when Labour’s own cuts would start, saying that 2011 “has to be about jobs and growth” not cuts, when in fact Labour’s own plans are for the biggest cuts to happen in 2011. He hasn’t even read the Budget Red Book on which his economic plan is supposedly based, telling Evan Davis “you’ve probably read more of it than I have.”’

This pugilistic approach contrasts with the campaign against Ed ‘Bandwagon’ Miliband. As Iain Martin observes, the latter is straight from Blair On Tactics, designed to convince that Miliband is a desperate populist – desperate because he is loathed. It is an attritional, long-term strategy that should mature in 2015. The attack on Johnson is merely the latest of many head-hunting expeditions. And the former tactic supports the latter: if the Tories decapitate Johnson, then Miliband will become more desperate and seek ever more rickety bandwagons.