A poll shows voters think shielding services is more important than reducing the deficit. The findings are a blow to the Conservative's "age of austerity" message.
A PoliticsHome poll has found that British voters think that shielding services is more important than reducing the budget deficit. The findings will be seen as a further blow to the Conservative party’s economic message about the “age of austerity“.
Politics Home interviewed 1,082 voters over the weekend who were “asked to say whether their greater worry about the next government was that it would cut public spending too deeply, or that it would fail to reduce the budget deficit quickly enough.” The website found:
“Forty per cent of people were more concerned that state services would be cut back too deeply. Meanwhile, only twenty five per cent said that their greater fear was that the deficit would not be tackled with sufficient speed.”
Floating voters were particularly sceptical about prioritising paying back the deficit quickly. According to Politics Home:
“Only sixteen per cent were more worried that debt reduction would be too slow. Meanwhile, more than double – thirty six per cent – are more concerned about the effect of a spending squeeze on public services.”
The finding corroborates polling by Ipsos-MORI last year which found that the public disagree by 48 per cent to 21 per cent that too much is spent on public services. Ipsos-MORI’s CEO Ben Page told Left Foot Forward last year:
“The public are not convinced that there will need to be massive cuts in front line services in order to balance the books. In fact, 50 per cent deny that the debt situation needs addressing in that way.”
Other surveys covered by Left Foot Forward show that, when pushed on bringing down the deficit, the public is split on tax rises versus spending cuts while another poll showed that 60 per cent favour tax increases to help close the budget deficit.
Rachel Reeves, Labour’s PPC for Leeds West and a leading left-wing economist, told Left Foot Forward:
“People want more than an age of austerity. We are one of the richest countries in the world with fantastic people and businesses. The age of austerity that Cameron and Osborne prescribe once again seeks to talk Britain down. It’s not surprising that voters are turned off.”
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27 Responses to “Public turned off “age of austerity””
Liz McShane
Duncan – this is worth a read:
http://www.compassonline.org.uk/news/item.asp?n=5911
alanj
For a serious discussion about the deficit – beyond the crassness of what we’re getting from Labour acolytes (including, unfortunately, on this blog) – I recommend Willem Buiter’s piece in today’s FT. He’s ex-MPC, now Citi chief economist, and has been among the most accurate and credible commentators throughout the financial crisis. His article’s about why sterling sinks when the prospect of outright Conservative victory becomes less likely. For example:
‘Unfortunately, thanks to a decade of fiscal mismanagement, the British government has little credibility. Public finances during the last boom are the obvious guide to expectations about the likely future fiscal behaviour of a Labour government. The cynical manipulation of Gordon Brown’s “golden rule” (over the economic cycle borrowing only to invest) and the decision to jettison it and the sustainable investment rule (net debt not to exceed 40 per cent of GDP) as soon as they threatened to become binding constraints will cause the markets to act like St Thomas towards promises of future fiscal tightening: seeing is believing.’
If anybody who knows anything about fiscal policy over the past 8 years or the bond markets disagrees with that, I’d be interested to know why.
Contrary to what Polly Toynbee, not a noted economic commentator, says, the choice is not whether we have nice cuts or nasty cuts. It’s between nasty cuts (and/or tax rises) and even nastier cuts forced on us by our increasingly powerful creditors. I almost hope that Labour is brazenly lying to the electorate (as it has so often) in pretending its post-election fiscal policy would be materially different from the Tories’, as at least that means they are potentially competent rather than fundamentally deluded.
Liz McShane
Alan J – How do you view David Blanchflower – also an ex MPC member who is a strong & vocal advocate against cutting public expenditure?
You just have to scratch the surface of the Tory veneer to see that their policies – fiscal or otherwise or radically different to Labour’s – with the major difference being towards the public sector.
alanj
Liz – I think what Blanchflower emphasizes too little (and what Buiter and no doubt Mervyn King, whenever he pretty much openly castigates the government about its fiscal policy, have more of an eye on) is what is possible, given that we are perilously reliant on lenders to finance our deficits. Maybe it’s right that we don’t need significant spending cuts in 2010/11 because cuts would tip us into recession and so the market will continue to finance the deficit – I think everybody (including, as I understand it, the Tory leadership) are fine with that. But what we most certainly do need is a credible plan to cut the deficit. Labour haven’t provided that, they’ve just provided a commitment to cut the deficit and a timetable. They either don’t have a credible plan (which seems to be what the markets think, and I wouldn’t blame them) or they do but they’re hiding it, and lying about the scale of cuts/ tax rises they’re planning just to be able to distinguish themselves from the Tories before the election.
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