Vote Tory, Vote Recession
Tonight’s BBC leaders’ debate, at Birmingham Univeristy, was the last chance for any of the potential candidates running for the post of prime minister to impress and convince the public, that their party’s policies on the topic of the economy, was the only solution to dealing with the UK’s huge structural deficit.
So you would have expected Gordon Brown to perform extremely well, seeming as the economy was his strongest card to play. Yet, following his dreadful comment made yesterday, calling a member of the public, ‘bigoted’, his beginning statement was poorly received. Trying to be open and honest about it, the BBC’s instant reaction from a watching audience did not buy into it, leaving Brown at a huge disadvantage before the debate had even started.
But one could instantly see, the passion behind Brown’s reasoning of trying to persuade the public not vote for David Cameron’s Conservatives. He constantly, throughout the debate, talked about the prospect of a double-dipped recession, which could potentially occur if the Tories were voted into power. The Conservative’s proposed cuts, which would happen later this year, would greatly threaten the economy, by taking £6 billion out of the economy to pay for the deficit.
April saw the growth of the economy rising to 0.2%, from 0.1%, equivalent to £600 million of investment. With the Conservatives planning to take ten times this amount out of the economy this year, there is clear validity in Labour’s argument, and one which should definitely not be shrugged off lightly.
This, however, is exactly what Cameron did. Refusing to engage with Brown, Cameron passed off these extremely strong claims as being desperate; claims which will most certainly come back to haunt the Conservatives if they win a majority government in this election. Following sixty economists, earlier this year, publishing in the Financial Times explanations of what the huge damage cutting the deficit this year would do, it appears that out of the three main parties, the Conservatives have the worst economic policy. As the economy is arguable the most important part of this general election, they are clearly a party which you should not vote for, purely on the basis of economics; they have put this issue firmly on an impractical right-wing ideology, to which should be tackled pragmatically instead.
Nick Clegg, instead of Brown, was, almost flatteringly Cameron’s main target tonight, focusing almost all of his fire on the Liberal Democrat leader. In an event to which the Liberal Democrats will hold the balance of power in a hung parliament result, this party is no doubt posing a huge threat to the Conservatives.
These two leaders clashed heavily on the topic of immigration, but Cameron, who had done very well in the previous two debates on this topic, failed to score highly this time round. Because of his direct attack on Liberal Democrat policy, it was obvious the public did not take to this approach, which unfortunately for those viewers, this
topic exploded for the first time between the leaders. There was proper debate and proper distinctive barriers created between all three parties, distinguishing themselves from one another and finding holes in each others policies. The argument, however, stopped the real question being answered, with the leaders preferring to criticise each other instead.
Interestingly, when Clegg talked about working together, with other politicians and economists on solving the economic problem, this was very well-received by the public. This outcome makes the prospects of having a hung parliament seemingly appealing to the voter, who would want to see some form of cooperation between all the parties in dealing with the deficit. David Cameron’s scaremongering during the week, aiming to claim the majority power for himself, is not a tactic that is therefore working. A hung parliament, despite Tory attempts to the panic the public, could be a good thing for our country.
Overall, it was the polls that showed Cameron as a winner, but again only by a tiny margin. With Clegg coming in at a very strong second, this will no doubt frighten the Tories, who fear the prospect of change in the electoral system if the Liberal Democrats hold the balance of power. With an increasingly larger representation of the public choosing to vote Liberal Democrat, this will not be reflective in parliament with the current first past the post voting system Britain has. This country no longer has a two party system. The Conservatives will be massively against a change in the voting system, because in order to make the House of Commons more representative of society’s viewpoints, it will greatly shrink the Tory seat majority. This is clearly a party who seem to be hungrier for power, rather than to be serving in their country’s best interest.
