Against the backdrop of the loss of the triple-A rating much coveted by Conservative Ministers - and trivialised by others - Cable is right again. Wednesday's remarkable New Statesman article makes plain the case for a new economic strategy, and the need for as elegant as possible a reversal of Osbornomics that was itself eclipsed by Cable in the economic debates of 2010.
Gareth Epps is the co-chair of the Social Liberal Forum
I am not an economist, but I do recognise common sense when I see it.
Around ten years ago, a then relatively obscure MP submitted a motion to the Liberal Democrats’ conference about personal debt. To the uninitiated, it seemed an esoteric and obscure issue.
But it wasn’t.
Indeed, it was the start of a period in which Vincent Cable’s analysis of the economic situation was unsurpassed.
Against the backdrop of the loss of the triple-A rating much coveted by Conservative Ministers – and trivialised by others – Cable is right again. Wednesday’s remarkable New Statesman article makes plain the case for a new economic strategy, and the need for as elegant as possible a reversal of Osbornomics that was itself eclipsed by Cable in the economic debates of 2010.
At the same time, and free from the shackles of cabinet collective responsibility, the Social Liberal Forum (SLF) has been describing the need for an economic Plan C which also argues for fuller investment, a wider reform of the economic system than the sticking plaster of greater spending alone, but an understanding that dogma should not preclude increasing borrowing if growth is at stake.
This evening, Vince Cable will make a keynote speech at our Spring [Liberal Democrat] Conference fringe; a conference that, curiously, does not include a frontline keynote economic platform speech.
As at Eastleigh, Lib Dem campaigners understand the axiomatic value of winning the economic argument. Hence SLF has also tabled an emergency Conference resolution calling for the following immediate steps – not a strategy, but urgent initiatives – to be taken:
. Get the builders building
. Get the banks lending to business
. Prevent a slash and burn approach to public spending
. Bring in the mansion tax.
While the third point relates specifically to the need to avoid further regressive cuts in the year 2015-16, the rest are not new. Indeed, they are consistent with the economic position taken by Liberal Democrats since the onset of the financial crisis.
It would be quite astonishing if a serious Keynesian political party were not to place them centre stage.
27 Responses to “Vince Cable’s New Statesman article makes plain the need for a new economic strategy”
Mick
Newsbot didn’t answer a single point. And as Newsbot’s an unashamed anarchist mutualist, we could also expect a 50% tax on earnings under a Newsie admiistration.
Plus his founder Proudhon’s idea for ‘vouchers’ instead of money in your wages. So to him, no wonder even Kenneth Clarke’s historic 17% VAT on fuel would have been OK.
Newsbot9
Except that the vouchers are your idea. Keep lying about YOUR plans for earned income – after all, your unearned income needs a tax cut in your world. That is, it needs to see you paid even more corporate welfare. You sponge.
Mick
Again, don’t take my word for it. Even that nutter Marx thought Proudhon’s tatty coupons were a non-starter.
http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/1970s/1971/no-801-may-1971/labour-time-vouchers
__________________________
“Maybe its time i dropped anarchism, cos apparently its a far more coercive and intolerant ideology than i thought.”
http://flag.blackened.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=75813
Newsbot9
“Coupons”. Ah yes, a completely different thing to your currency replacement, which you’re demanding for the poor. Local currencies have a history in the UK, and there are time-trade websites today. People swap time as well as participating in the money economy. But keep up your bigotry.
Marx cribbed from Proudhon and added stateism…he’s a hack.
And well done, you’ve found one of your shill posts.
Mick
People have been ‘time trading’ for time immemorial, so it’s hardly an original idea for Newsbot and his friends to clamber on board. And yes, there have been local currencies.
Currencies… not half-cocked ideas about tickets recycled into pretend money!
And coupons for druggies and alkies add to the tested practice of issuing luncheon vouchers and stamps as benefits for employees.