Why do you think the Conservatives’ support has remained relatively high, despite spending cuts and continuing high unemployment?
I think the Tories are ahead for a variety of reasons that include the voters’ willingness to blame the Lib Dems more than the Conservatives for unpopular coalition policies which they opposed when not in power, student tuition fees, for example. Contrary to the frequent complaints of frustrated right-wing Tory MPs and activists, their own party dominates the coalition and David Cameron talks with an optimistic ‘I’m in charge’ tone, one which voters respond to until they turn against a government. This hasn’t happened – yet.
On the crucial political and economic judgements which will decide the coalition’s eventual fate, voters seem more persuaded by the narrative it has promoted since day one: that a return to sound banking and fiscal prudence is the priority which will create the best conditions for growth, and that Labour’s alternative, one which seeks a less austere balance between growth and fiscal retrenchment, is wrong. It helps that Ed Miliband hasn’t made much of a personal impact and Ed Balls is widely mistrusted as the brains behind Gordon Brown who got us into this mess.
It may be unfair, but life is very unfair at present. In reality the coalition has solved one problem, market confidence, at the expense of creating another, flat-lining growth, which is starting to undermine, yes, market confidence.
Do you think that the Conservatives’ support will stay steady as government austerity continues?
That depends on a lot of factors, including many far beyond the coalition’s control. George Osborne is already blaming the protracted Eurozone crisis (on which his policy and Labour’s have been both similar and broadly correct for several years) for the problems of the UK economy. It’s true, up to a point, but not what he said in opposition.
Has Britain bought into Cameron’s ‘Big Society’?
No. It might have been more acceptable and boosted the voluntary sector in positive ways if the boom had continued. When it didn’t the Big Society was used to justify cuts or the transfer of social functions to voluntary agencies – just at a time when vital state support for such activities was being cut back. That’s what the Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB) told me when I asked it in the PM’s own Witney constituency just up the road from Oxford. So the big idea, which was always a bit airy-fairy, got tainted by reality on the ground.
Do you think that the Lib Dems have made the government’s policies more centrist?
In a few areas, yes, and the Lib Dems have also prevented the Tory Right exercising more influence than it might have hoped for – not to mention having 20 more jobs in government. Europe is the obvious example, tax policy too. If you were Cameron would you prefer to depend for power on the herbivorous Lib Dems or the carnivorous Euro-sceptics ? Precisely.
Do you think that we will see a coalition government at the next election?
The two parties will probably – probably – fight as rivals with the Lib Dems not ruling out a coalition deal with Labour and the Tories not cutting local deals to help Lib Dems save their seats. That’s what EU parties do in states where PR voting systems create coalition politics as a matter of design. For some reason which has always escaped me it’s thought to be more democratic. Watching Danish coalition politics via the TV series, Borgen, has not changed my mind – far from it.
Michael White is Assistant Editor of The Guardian, having written for them for over 30 years, and was Political Editor from 1990-2006
