November 6th, 2010 — Politics (general)
Even the most loyal Labour scribe (also known as Paul Geater) admits that there is an 11% cut in the nominal income for Suffolk County Council, and in a time or rising prices this is a far larger real cut. Suffolk County Council have a plan that they think will save the most services by drastically squeezing efficiencies and using the private sector.
You would think that this would put the Labour group in a quandry. After all if Unison get their way, and the plans are shelved this will mean that the cuts will have to be deeper than they are currently planned to cover for the administrative roles that Unison wants to save. That’s basic arithmetic. In Bridge and other Labour held wards the council services are far more used than they are in richer wards. So supporting Unison will mean hurting Labour constituents in return for rewarding Labour donors.
But Unison members are vastly over represented in both Labour Party membership and in Labour party funds.
So who do Sandy Martin and Dame Bryony represent, their donors or their voters?
Unison is the Countryside Alliance of the Labour Party, they may have money and activists – but you don’t really want to show them to the public. By all means let them help – but treat them like the junior partner that they are and don’t let them dictate policy as they have been doing locally. Unison need Labour in a way that Labour simply does not need Unison.
By not realising this Sandy Martin has proved that although he may be a good local representative he’s just not ready for the big time. Not ready in the slightest.
October 31st, 2010 — Politics (general)
- How not to get the protest votes. Image via Wikipedia
A couple of interesting posts surfaced today. One is from political betting which shows that a small majority of Labour voters support the housing benefit cuts and another is from Peter Black which points out that the cap on housing benefits was actually in the election manifesto. For Labour. (Guido Fawkes points out that Conservative Central office missed a trick on this, and it’s hard to disagree).
The opposition smacks of a party that has a lot of middle aged public sector middle managers and senior professionals who’ve flocked to property investing in the last decade. Let’s be honest, these will be the ones who really feel the pain of housing benefit cuts as they find that they have no choice but to cut the rents.
Of course you can sustain a political party’s membership on that narrow sociological base, but you can’t win a general election. So bringing us to the hiving off of services.
There is a lot to worry about from a left wing point of view, but the idea that it is bad because Unison say so will not really cut it with the electorate. Sooner or later the Tories, even the Suffolk Conservative group, will manage to work out that it’s possible to win votes by saying that Labour cares more about Unison members than it does about the people who receive or pay for the services. There’s no credible Labour plan and if they were to get in the whole place would collapse.
To be really brutal about it, Unison will have to take whatever crumbs Labour gives it. Where else can they go? Labour should be opposing selectively, while accepting the need for deep cost cuts. The fact that Labour have subcontracted their thinking about the direction of Suffolk County council to a group that in reality depends entirely on them for any influence at all is pathetic and shows that Sandy Martin really is not up for the job of Labour Group leader.
If you’re going to be pushed around by Unison, how are you going to stand up to people who don’t need you – like the government?
