A poll conduced at the end of February by Ipsos-MORI for The Economist shows that the economy continues to be the public's most pressing concern. This is potentially a double-edged sword for Labour. The public still blame Labour, rather than the banks for the deficit. Moving beyond that will be easier said than done.
A poll conduced at the end of February by Ipsos-MORI for The Economist shows that the economy continues to be the public’s most pressing concern.
This is potentially a double-edged sword for Labour.
With the increasingly influential presence of Lynton Crosby in the Tory camp, not to mention the loss of the Eastleigh by-election, David Cameron will come under increasing pressure from Tory backbenchers to shift policy further to the Right.
Nothing new here of course.
An excellent (separate) piece for the Economist today notes that in the run up to the 2005 election, an emboldened Tory Right sought to “shift…emphasis [in the party] away from public services towards immigration, crime and, of course, Europe…”.
They largely succeeded, resulting in a calamitous electoral defeat for Tory leader Michael Howard in a winnable election.
Backbench ideologues rarely learn lessons from history, so expect Cameron to face similar demands as worried MPs sense weakness on the back of humiliations like that in Eastleigh.
Labour can, indeed, take a degree of solace from the prospect of the Tories scrabbling around to prevent their core vote indulging Nigel Farage’s protest party.
No more than a degree of solace, though.
While Ed Miliband has been wise to turn his attention to economic concerns of late in the form of (largely symbolic) policy proposals on the mansion tax and the 10p tax rate, Labour is still suffering badly when voters are asked about the economy, as a poll for YouGov this week showed.
Q a) Which party would handle Britain’s economy best?
Q b) Who would you trust more to run the economy?
| a) Which party? | b) Which team? | ||||||
| Con | Lab | Other/ Don’t know | Cameron/ Osborne | Miliband/ Balls | Not sure | ||
| % | % | % | % | % | % | ||
| Apr 2012 | 28 | 27 | 45 | 36 | 28 | 35 | |
| Jul 2012 | 27 | 26 | 47 | 34 | 31 | 35 | |
| Oct 2012 | 26 | 28 | 46 | n/a | n/a | n/a | |
| Dec 2012 | 28 | 27 | 45 | 37 | 26 | 37 | |
| Feb 2013 | 27 | 29 | 44 | 35 | 29 | 37 |
As Peter Kelner phrased it:
“Almost three years after Gordon Brown left Downing Street, more people still blame Labour rather than the Conservatives for the state of the economy and the public spending cuts that Osborne has imposed. Secondly, when asked who they trust more to run the economy, more people still prefer Cameron and Osborne to Miliband and Balls.”
While Labour is right to focus on the economy – it is voters’ main concern and Osborne is the government’s biggest liability – doing so is a double-edged sword. It is potentially Labour’s strongest area of attack, but it also risks a damaging boomerang effect.
Moving beyond the fact that the public appear to still blame Labour, rather than the banks, for the deficit will be easier said than done.
In the public mind, the party is still stuck in the Gordon Brown era, and the failure to win the argument in 2009/10 that it was the banks rather than the government which was to blame for the crisis still hangs around the party’s neck like an albatros.
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142 Responses to “Labour is still struggling to leave the Brown era behind”
Newsbot9
They inherited a recovering economy and immediately killed off growth. Your revisionism is sadly typical of the Tories. Things like the bedroom tax are a core part of the Tory strategy, trying to claim support for them while dodging around trying to avoid major parts of their cuts is parsing hairs.
And you keep on ignoring when Labour was in power post-war. And the massive bleed of support thanks to New Labour, to levels far lower than post-war. Of course you want, desperately, to continue to have neoliberalism rather than a sensible economic policy, for the people rather than your rich old men.
Newsbot9
Actually, crime is far lower today than in the mid 90’s. And right, no surprise you’re for mass homelessness rather than see the poor housed.
Newsbot9
Crime fell during the Labour era. Repeatedly. But you can’t talk about that. It’s rising again now. But you won’t talk about that either. This is one of the few things Labour did entirely right, actually.
And you keep on talking about the economy, when your Tories have crashed it.
Newsbot9
Of course you want to pick their principles for them. All the parties are, of course, coalitions anyway because of FPTP. You just don’t want the coalitions to be explicit, and you don’t want parties to have to represent their supporters properly.
And yes, Labour needs to move back to the 5+ million voters they left. Business and industry does not vote, except in the City of London,
Mick
Maybe today. But under Labour, things like violent crime went up. Labour may have tried to patch their own damage towards the end but it was done: http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/2884595/Crime-up-44-under-Labour.html
And things like this were compounded by ASBOs, ABCs and idiots like Chief Justice Woolf telling judges not to jail burglars. And when you consider Labour refused to build a single new prison,they were still more foolish to invent more crimes: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1245189/Labour-dreaming-33-new-crimes-month-unprecedented-legislative-diarrhoea.html
And there’s nothing wrong wanting to see the poor housed. But that’s gt nothing to do with berks like Prescott saying more lefty-friendly things like people should be rotated in their rented housing. Yup, this was him: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-20949602