Liberal Democrats MPs really will say anything to get elected.
Liberal Democrats MPs really will say anything to get elected
With the General Election looming, many Liberal Democrat MPs are understandably trying to distance themselves from the toxic coalition in the hope that it may help them hold on to their parliamentary seat next May.
In fact, it looks like some may be willing to say anything to disassociate themselves from Cameron and Osborne, including flatly contradicting things they’ve said in the very recent past.
Cue David Laws, Liberal Democrat MP for Yeovil and former deputy to chancellor George Osborne.
According to David Laws, speaking today, the chancellor’s spending plans are a ‘political suicide note’. As Laws put it:
“This will be seen to be a very extreme and very right-wing suicide note because all those people who care about the education service, about the police, about the armed forces … will see that the plans they have put forward are hugely damaging and dangerous.”
We couldn’t agree more.
Yet this flatly contradicts words which came out of the mouth of the very same David Laws a mere two years ago.
In a 2012 interview with the Telegraph, Laws boldly outflanked the Tories on the right by arguing that the share of the economy accounted for by the public sector ought to be cut back to 35 per cent.
Public sector spending has hovered at around 40 per cent for decades, but jumped to 49 per cent in 2010-11 on the back of a rise in welfare outgoings triggered by the global financial crisis.
But for Laws, speaking in 2012, this was unacceptable; he wanted further swingeing cuts more drastic even than those planned by George Osborne. As Laws mused:
“The implication of the state spending 40 per cent of national income is that there is likely to be too much resource misallocation and too much waste and inefficiency.”
So why the sudden change of heart?
We would certainly never dream of suggesting that Liberal Democrats MPs will say anything to get elected.
James Bloodworth is the editor of Left Foot Forward. Follow him on Twitter
42 Responses to “2012: MORE CUTS. 2014: FEWER CUTS. Will the real David Laws please stand up?”
robertcp
Incidentally, I am curious to know who you will be voting for in 2015.
Leon Wolfeson
Almost certainly “Arnold J. Rimmer”
robertcp
That post makes even less sense than usual. Incidentally, I will not be responding to your posts unless you confirm that you will be voting in 2015. People who do not vote are a waste of space!
swat
You’ve just written of 40% of the population! many of them ‘working class’! But I think I tend to agree with you. You may not have two pennies to rub together, but at least you’ve got a vote, if you bother to register individually that is in the first place. If you can’t be bothered to vote, even if its for Mickey Mouse, then don’t whinge is my motto! And if you’re Party doesn’t win, then don’t whinge, is also my other motto.
Tom
At the Autumn statement, George Osborne proved that his Government has been unable to go faster than Labour’s 2010 plans. I don’t see how that makes them fools.
Their further big criticism is that the Conservatives have been unable to meet their targets because they simply do not understand the root causes of the social security bill. By proposing some mildly social democratic policies, Government expenditure could be reduced much quicker as people move into more secure, better paid work, and have to pay lower housing costs.
So where’s the foolishness?