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?”
AlanGiles
I am afraid I have absolutely no confidence in Miliband’s Labour: he is a weak man who has to look over his shoulder constantly because he is in fear of the Blairite PLP, who must be emboldened by the recent election of Murphy in Scotland and the probable adoption of the remortgage queen Jowell as candidate for London Mayor. I suspect that IF there is a Labour government it will merely be New Labour Mark 2. I also suspect Miliband will be the prisoner of Balls, just as Blair was to Brown
Tom
Maybe so, but there’s no other viable PM apart from David Cameron. The only alternative is to have a Labour government, and be actively involved in strengthening the non-Blairite wing.
Leon Wolfeson
That you don’t understand the concept of write-in votes is not *my* problem.
And I see, thanks for your contempt for much of the left, since many of us don’t vote because there’s nobody to vote for. My using a write-in vote is because I’m stubborn.
Your contempt for the left will be returned in full, in future
Leon Wolfeson
Completely disagree.
We should encourage voting reform to PR, which would naturally lead to much higher voting turnouts because people would have a party to vote for which represented them.
But hey, no, you prefer contempt for the left.
Leon Wolfeson
Ah, don’t “whine” (i.e. take any action, politically) if a party who doesn’t represent you gets in, no matter if any people don’t have a party to vote for because no UK-wide party is standing up for the left..