Budget comment: Typhoon Cameron trumps placid Darling
Alistair Darling’s measured calm versus an unusually animated David Cameron: this was a Budget confrontation of polar opposites.
Despite all the tensions, there’s a reason Gordon Brown picked Alistair Darling to be his chancellor: he’s a safe pair of hands.
The usual tactic emanating from No 11 over the last three years has been a form of war of attrition, the kind of boredom which can make an international economic crisis sound a little tedious.
We’ve grown used to it, indeed come to expect it. It is surely impossible to watch Darling’s speech to the Labour party conference last year without expiring at the monotony of it all.
An implacably dull politician is the perfect foil to the suggestion that Labour’s monstrous public spending deficit was the semi-crazed response of the same old tax-and-spend lefties.
For the 2010 Budget the delivery was the same. The unruffled monotone and barely flickering expressions were familiar. But this time there was something different. Darling, for all his inbuilt dryness, was actually being interesting.
He couldn’t help himself. There is a general election in the offing, after all, and it’s impossible to lay down such extreme battlelines with the air of a bored caretaker. The words may have been delivered placidly, but behind them was the kind of steely determination which Tory advisers briefly sought to associate with Iain Duncan Smith.
Darling insisted that the “right calls were made”. He warned that “there is nothing pre-ordained about continued recovery” and even hinted that the “force for good” which governments can be might turn out otherwise if the Tories gain power. His timing as he revealed the coming tax information exchange agreement with Belize, where Tory donor Michael Ashcroft has most of his business interests, was impeccable. It was an utterly partisan speech, the political wolf lurking in a thoroughly boring sheep’s clothing.
There are a large number of sweeteners, but few of them – with the exception of the stamp duty threshold increase – are likely to make an impact. On the other hand there are no shocking revelations to report, only the hidden Easter Eggs awaiting the “crowdsourcing” Conservatives. George Osborne has already unearthed the frozen personal allowance on income tax, which he claims is a real-terms tax hike for millions. Let’s wait and see whether that one gains any legs.
David Cameron’s response to the Budget was an extraordinarily impassioned performance from a man whose minders are clearly encouraging him to get worked up whenever possible. Soundbites flew from his mouth with alarming frequency as he whistled through his notes.
I was surprised that a quip about the Cabinet looking at their Blackberrys was actually scripted, which just goes to show what an excellent performer the leader of the opposition is becoming.
There is a lengthy list of quotable lines. “The taxis for hire are on their way out of the chamber” got a huge laugh. A comparison of the prime minister to the captain of the Titanic saying “let me command the lifeboats” was neat. And then we had an overwhelmingly sarcastic finish: “Find me the small business owner who would wake up to a Labour victory and say ‘thank god we’ve got five more years of this prime minister’s red tape and taxes.” Try and read that out without sneering – you’ll find it hard.
How will the public respond to these two very different approaches? One is measured, calm, flagrantly announcing new funding to help Britain’s universities cope with the impact of monstrous cuts. The other is passionate, lambasting, appalled, without really coming up with any serious alternatives.
There are reasons why both could move ahead in the polls, but I’m backing Cameron to make some progress. News bulletins showing him tearing into Darling, before cutting to the chancellor gently scratching his nose, are more likely to reap results for the Tories.
Not that anything is guaranteed, of course; whichever approach seems to be working best now will probably the one which will help win the general election.
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