Who wants to work with who after the General Election? It’s a question that pundits like to chew over, partly because few politicians can afford to rule anything out with the polls suggesting quite such a jumbly outcome in May. But today two parties effectively ruled out a coalition with one another, even though they’re ideologically close. Grant Shapps was first, telling his press conference this morning that ‘I can rule out… we are not going to do pacts and deals with Ukip’.
This afternoon, Ukip has released this statement:
‘UKIP are not promising pacts with anyone. For us politics is about getting something done, not about stitching up deals to get jobs for the boys. We think about you – not us.
‘For that reason we will drive for a confidence and supply agreement to ensure the big issues that matter to the public are on the table and that voters have a powerful voice. It looks increasingly likely that we will have a hung parliament after May, so now is the time for voters to back the party that really represents them and will make sure that their concerns are addressed and not brushed under the carpet for another 5 years by a cosy cartel of establishment parties.’
This is interesting, not least because ruling out pacts with people makes it more likely that there will be two General Elections between now and 2020, but also because it suggests that one prominent member in the party has got his way over Nigel Farage. Farage refused to rule out a coalition with the Tories when grilled on the matter on Sky earlier this month, while Douglas Carswell did so immediately when on Newsnight last week. Both men insist there are no tensions between them, but there are clearly differences of opinion on party policy and its trajectory.
Confidence-and-supply does limit the ambition of a government as it cannot work on really big reforms as the coalition has done unless the parties who might support it are on board. But for Ukip and for the Tories, it’s a much safer option politically. For the Tories, coalition with Ukip would mean that the ‘bastards’ who David Cameron hopes will have as little influence in his party could go into league with Carswell, Reckless and any other Ukippers elected as MPs. it would reunite the Right, perhaps, but only by appearing to drag the Tory party further away from the centre, which Cameron wouldn’t want even if many of his colleagues do. And Ukip doesn’t want to have a Lib Dem moment just yet where all its anti-Establishment credentials are dashed by being in government. Just offering support on major votes such as the Budget would be a better way of wreaking havoc in Parliament.
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