With the next UK general election now only months away, this round of political party conferences is all about building towards polling day. That means each party is beginning to mark out its territory, and to lay out the policies that voters will be asked to choose between.
With the economic crisis refusing to abate, and a series of deep cuts to public sector funding likely to be followed by more in the next parliament - certainly if the current government survives the election - the economy is going to be a major factor for consideration.
On the matter of economics, political parties seem to adhere to a set of rules that ensure that things don't change too much. But the main parties all have their own visions, even if there are some common themes. Each of those visions reveals to us a little bit about the differences between the parties.
Amongst the most telling are the policies of the right-wing conservatives, who will have the novelty of being represented by two parties at the next general election. The Conservative Party and UKIP represent the same fundamental political positions, though in UKIP's case it has been taken to some extremes.
Savage cuts to public services appear to be on the Conservative Party agenda for the next parliament, with the wealthiest looking likely to be the main benefactors (Ball, 2014). UKIP's offer looks astoundingly similar, if anything even more weighted towards the upper middle class and upwards - to be paid for, they say, by leaving Europe, and so ending Britain's contributions to things like the Regional Development Fund and support for Agriculture and Fisheries, and by cutting foreign aid (BBC, 26/9/2014).
Both conservative parties are also offering to copy the Liberal Democrats and their stated commitment to take the poorest out of income tax. Along with that, go commitments to give tax cuts to those earning up to £50-£55,000 a year, along with making fairly tenuous promises to 'protect the NHS' (Wright, 2014).
The question is, with all of the tax cuts, how exactly is the NHS going to be protected? Unless by more cuts to other public services or more privatisation? It has been suggested that the cuts will only really benefit the wealthier. Those concerns will become a reality if keeping public healthcare afloat means even more cuts to basic services that the poorest depend on.
With those kinds of attitudes towards the role of government, and to the running of public services, along with the belief of both conservative groups in dismantling Europe's Human Rights framework, the way ahead does not look rosy for the poorest should one of the conservative parties get their way.
Labour Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls has focussed his economic pitch on standing out from the other main parties. Rather than raising many of the lowest paid out of tax, Labour want to increase the minimum wage. They want to combine that with a freeze on energy prices (BBC, 22/9/2014).
The issue comes with Labour's unwillingness to commit to whether or not they will continue with the Conservative Party's cuts to public spending (Peston, 2014). This has happened before. Throughout the last four years Labour haven't ruled out continuing the cuts, and Ed Balls' conference speech has done nothing to offer reassurance on the matter.
The Labour Party's determination to set itself apart from the opposition is so far obvious only in words. On the surface, the difference between conservative and Labour positions appears as if it will be a contest over who can better administer the status quo, and subtle shifts in tax taken either from the wealthy, or from the poor.
Meanwhile, the Liberal Democrats have also set their stall out in an effort to distance themselves from the others. They want to give a tax cut to 29 million, increasing the pre-tax allowance to £11,000, a policy that has been copied across the board. However the Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg has stressed that this will be paid for by focussing tax increases on the richest, as part of an effort to 'rebalance' tax increases and cuts (Lansdale, 2014) - highlighting the need to find new ways to rebalance state finances without more cuts.
Their pitch is that the Lib Dems would borrow less than Labour and cut less than the right-wing parties. They are trying to set out their own position, and get back to the basics of liberal policy. But that comes with an attachment to the free market that ultimately chains them, and has led them to sacrifice other policies, like the abolition of tuition fees, that were more important to voters (Wheeler, 2014). It also prevents them from being a complete alternative to the Conservatives, UKIP and Labour.
Their pitch is that the Lib Dems would borrow less than Labour and cut less than the right-wing parties. They are trying to set out their own position, and get back to the basics of liberal policy. But that comes with an attachment to the free market that ultimately chains them, and has led them to sacrifice other policies, like the abolition of tuition fees, that were more important to voters (Wheeler, 2014). It also prevents them from being a complete alternative to the Conservatives, UKIP and Labour.
A group that has not been afraid to criticise the market orthodoxies are the Green Party. The Greens present voters with a progressive alternative that sets them very much apart from the other parties.
They want levies on wealth and large rises in the minimum wage, along with the introduction of a basic income - also known as a citizen's income - and to renationalise the railways (Mason, 2014). Further, they aim to do this within a new framework, a new political settlement, to be drawn up with the participation of the whole country.
The Greens represent a quietly growing progressive movement, with organised political parties across Europe, who are beginning to find support for a renewal of trust and engagement in politics, one coupled to a new approach to economics.
Yet that quiet movement is struggling to make the catchy headlines needed to get public attention away from stunts and controversy, like the Conservative Party tearing itself in two over the European Union, and splitting apart into new factions like UKIP.
Those controversies will ultimately prove the making or breaking of this next UK general election. With so much populist and hyped-up focus on extreme factions, and the main parties squabbling over who to trust on certain issues, it will be hard to see the real information through the cloud of noise.
And that is a problem, because to make the right decisions, when election time comes around, all of the best information is needed. The noise and popularity contests will mean people having to remain vigilant to find it, and see through the propaganda to what each party is really trying to achieve.
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References:
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+ James Ball's 'Cameron’s tax cuts benefit middle and higher earners, not the poorest'; in The Guardian; 2 October 2014.
+ BBC's 'UKIP conference: Income tax cuts plan unveiled'; 26 September 2014.
+ Ben Wright's 'Cameron frames election choice with tax cuts pledge'; on the BBC; 1 October 2014.
+ BBC's 'David Cameron pledges tax cuts 'for 30m people''; 1 October 2014.
+ Nick Robinson's 'Cameron: Talk of 'better times' rather than austerity'; on the BBC; 1 October 2014.
+ BBC's 'Ed Balls sets out priorities for 'first Labour Budget''; 22 September 2014.
+ Robert Peston's 'Can Balls be just austere enough?'; on the BBC; 22 September 2014.
+ James Lansdale's 'Lib Dems seek centre 'gap' as Tories and Labour shift'; on the BBC; 5 October 2014.
+ Brian Wheeler's 'Lib Dems should have died in a ditch over tuition fees - Farron'; on the BBC; 6 October 2014.
+ BBC's 'Nick Clegg pledges 'tax cut for 29 million people' in 2016'; 7 October 2014.
+ Chris Mason's 'Can the Greens' economic ideas grab the attention of voters?'; on the BBC; 5 September 2014.
+ BBC's 'Green Party calls for £10 hourly minimum wage by 2020'; 5 September 2014.
+ BBC's 'Green Party says membership up to 26,000 across Britain'; 6 October 2014.
+ BBC's 'Green Party seeks 'radical' new political settlement'; 19 September 2014.
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