Money, students and manifestos

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It’s only a few weeks since the UK General Election and already Labour seem to be rowing back on their promise to write off student debt, with claims in the last few days that it was more of an 'ambition' than a firm policy, even if it didn’t exactly sound that way during the election campaign. 

Here in Wales, Plaid Cymru, the party which helped Labour introduce tuition fees in the first place during the One Wales period, is now criticising Labour for increasing fees to match the latest change in England, claiming that the proposal goes against the Labour Party’s manifesto.  They presumably assume that we’ve all forgotten that when most of the Plaid AMs voted to introduce fees in the first place they were also going against their own manifesto commitment.  (And it’s worth noting that the politician taking the decision to increase fees is actually a member of the Lib Dems, another party with a somewhat, shall we say ‘chequered’, history on the question of fees.)  The whole issue of student fees seems to be one which unites governing parties in supporting them whilst opposition parties unite in opposing them, and that’s true whichever party forms either the government or the opposition.

The underlying question has two strong ideological elements to it.  The first is whether services supplied by the government should be collectively funded or paid for by those who actually use them, and the second is to do with the question of the availability of money for the government to pay for things.

Regular readers will know that I’m a committed supporter of the idea that services should be funded collectively rather than paid for individually, and I entirely accept that that is a position which flows from my own ideological standpoint.  In the case of university education, I accept that those benefitting from it often end up better off financially than those who don’t, but a properly progressive taxation system would ensure that those with the highest earnings also make the highest contributions to paying for services.  (And, as an aside, people who end their education at ‘A’ level tend to do better financially than those with GCSEs, and those with GCSEs do better than those without.  Why single out one particular type of education for payment at point of use?)

But let’s turn to the second ideological factor – the availability or otherwise of money.  Governments, of whatever colour, tell us that ‘we can’t afford’ to provide university education without charging for it.  But like all the other things that they tell us we can’t afford, it comes down to policy choices.  How much the government raises in taxes, how much it borrows, and how much it spends are all political choices.  When the government needs a few billions for some project or other – such as buying the support of the DUP or starting another war somewhere – it can always find it, because the UK Government controls the money supply.

However, the Welsh Government does not control its money supply.  It has long been a theme of this blog that governments are not like households, and they really don’t have to balance their budgets in the same way, but more accurately, that is only true for governments which can control the supply of money – like the UK Government.  The Welsh Government’s budget, on the other hand, really is more like that of a household, and a household whose purse strings are controlled elsewhere and which can be arbitrarily loosened or tightened.  Whilst I might have had more sympathy for Labour’s response if they had been more honest and spelled out more clearly that any promise relating to fees in Wales was wholly dependent on the election of a Labour Government for the UK as a whole (and therefore on voters in England), their basic point that they can only find the money to do something different in Wales if London gives it to them or they cut elsewhere is a valid excuse in itself.

The backtracking by UK Labour is a far more serious issue.  The interesting point is that in his interview McDonnell actually acknowledged that half the nominal amount of student debt will never be paid back in any event.  And figures elsewhere suggest that 70% of students will never repay the whole of their debt.  In essence, the whole edifice of student loans and debts is based on little more than an accounting sleight of hand. 

The UK Government pretends that it is not paying student fees because the students are paying them.  But the students do so by borrowing the money from the Student Loans Company which is wholly owned by the UK Government.  And where does their money come from?  From the Government, of course.  So, instead of using borrowing, taxation or the magic money tree to pay fees, the government raises the same money from the same sources to fund loans through the SLC, and for accounting purposes assumes that it’s going to get around half of it back over a lengthy period.  The other half – the bit that will never be repaid – will, in effect, have already been paid by the government – exactly what the government says it ‘can’t afford’ to do as a reason for introducing tuition fees in the first place.

Before the election, it appeared that Labour were offering hope to young people that they could enjoy a university education in exchange for paying a fair share of tax if they earned more when they took up employment.  It even looked as though they understood that governments are not like households.  After the election, it appears that they’re reverting to type and falling in with the Tories’ attitude towards finances after all.

What's the vision?

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One of the consistent themes on this blog is about whether political parties should be leading or merely following public opinion.  The former involves having and setting out a clear vision about the sort of future they want to see and trying to persuade or lead people to follow; the latter is more of a beauty contest, with parties saying much the same thing and arguing about which has the best team to deliver on the popular policies.  The second scenario does not necessarily mean that all policies are identical; there’s still some scope to appeal to different demographics and groups, but in essence, much of the core will look essentially similar, and election campaigns will concentrate on ability to deliver.

In some ways, this election looks like something of an exception.  Jeremy Corbyn seems to be trying to articulate a different set of values and priorities in a way which Labour has not really attempted for decades.  Indeed, that is precisely his biggest sin in the eyes of many of his party’s MPs, who are much more comfortable with the beauty contest style of politics.  The Tories, on the other hand, seem increasingly prepared to say anything which they think might be popular, and to concentrate all their efforts on trying to prove that an automaton is better qualified to implement them than a thoughtful man who actually wants to consider the facts first.

Here in Wales, this dichotomy between the two approaches is a particular problem for Plaid.  The party that I joined in 1971 was, unquestionably, a party which had a vision for a different future for Wales and set out to convince people about that future.  The Plaid contesting next month’s general election seems to be much more in the second camp.  The idea that Plaid might actually be better at defending Wales than the Labour Party has the advantage of probable truth, but ‘we’re more anti-Tory than Labour’ isn’t much of a vision for the future, and seems to me to be playing to an interpretation of Welsh politics which is increasingly divergent from contemporary reality.

At the core of the party’s appeal for this election is the idea that Plaid is the only party that will put the interests of Wales ahead of its own interests, yet that doesn’t always seem to be supported by the detail.  According to this report from BBC Wales’ political editor, Plaid has now accepted that Brexit is inevitable, and a Plaid insider told him that ‘they felt there were no votes to be gained by re-fighting last year's battle’.  As an assessment of the probability of garnering votes on this particular issue at this particular time, I’d agree with that conclusion.  It’s the same problem being faced by the Lib Dems in trying to appeal to voters on the issue – their promise of a second referendum seems to be making little impact. 

The question for me, though, is not about whether it would win votes but about where the best interests of Wales lie.  If someone really believes that the best interests of Wales lie in membership of the European Union, shouldn’t they be making the case for that outcome when given the opportunity, even if less than half the population agree with them?  That does not preclude attempting to influence the nature of any Brexit deal in the interim, nor seeking to maximise any opportunities which may exist, but it does require having and presenting a clear vision about what sort of Wales they want to see, and how they see Wales’ place in the world.

And that brings us to the question of independence.  For sure, the word is given more prominence than has been the case for some years now, with a clear statement right on the first page that “It remains our ambition for Wales to become an independent nation”; but the detail of what independence actually means in a post-Brexit world is conspicuous by its absence.  For decades, the word has been synonymous with ‘full membership of the EU’; but for a party accepting Brexit it must now mean something else.  And if I, as a long-term independentista, don’t know what that is and am unsure about supporting it, what chance of convincing the rest of Wales?  But then, there are even fewer votes to be gained by promoting independence than in opposing Brexit - which brings us right back to the question of what politics should be about.

How will you pay for it?

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When it comes to political manifestos, I struggle to work out which is the silliest – asking that question, or trying to answer it.  But that doesn’t stop them.  Having ‘fully-costed’ manifestos is, it seems, de rigueur, even if it’s economic nonsense, and yesterday’s Labour manifesto was a case in point.  I can’t remember when or how it became necessary for parties to explain in detail both the cost and the method of financing of their policy proposals, but I suspect it’s a consequence of the Thatcher years when a political ideology contrary to the interests of the many was promulgated by the simple expedient of pretending that government spending is like household spending, and must always balance out.

It’s a simple enough comparison to make, and it’s counter-intuitive to argue that it’s nonsense, which is why it has taken hold to the extent that it has.  The press and broadcast media promote the ideology by default – whether because they are biased towards it, see it as in their own best interest, are innumerate, or are just plain lazy is an open question.  It doesn’t really matter why – the effect is that parties have become so afraid of challenging the established wisdom that they seek to comply even if at least some of those involved realise how silly it is.

So, yesterday was Labour’s turn to answer the silly question and explain how they will pay for one of the boldest manifestos put forward for many a year, so they duly gave an appropriately silly answer.  Oh the numbers certainly add up, it’s just that they’re based on so many unstated assumptions as to be completely meaningless.  The government, with all its statisticians and experts, has only just been able to tell us what the rate of inflation was last month, and nobody knows what the actual rate of economic growth is until after the event either.  And that’s without throwing in uncertainty over exchange rates, Brexit, and unexpected events which are, by their nature, unforeseeable.  Yet producing a ‘fully-costed’ manifesto requires all of these things to be known for the next five years in advance.  It’s impossible; figures which can only be, at best, rough estimates based on a whole range of assumptions are being bandied around as though they are gospel truth.

Since being elected in 2010, and again in 2015, the Tories have borrowed hundreds of billions of pounds more than they said they would.  This is equivalent to hundreds of billions of pounds’ worth of uncosted expenditure compared to their manifesto promise, yet few of the media so keen to pin down Labour and other opposition parties seem to bat an eyelid over that.  Politicians can get away with uncosted expenditure as long as either a) they don’t predict it in advance, or b) they’re Tories, apparently.  But having said that, I should make it clear that it’s the hypocrisy and double standards to which I object, not the borrowing itself.

Borrowing, despite all the rhetoric, actually makes sense at a time when people are queuing up to lend money to the government at what are, effectively, negative real interest rates.  They don’t call it lending to the government, of course – they call it investing in NSI products, or buying government bonds.  But whatever they call it they are in fact lending money to the government, and are currently willing to go on doing so.  Labour’s talk of increasing borrowing not only makes economic sense, it’s a welcome change from the ideological straitjacket.  My main criticism would be that they’ve tried to put a firm figure on it, rather than simply stating that they will borrow whenever it makes sense to do so.

There’s an interesting analysis here of borrowing over the years by Labour and Conservative governments respectively.  It clearly shows that the rhetoric generally being used is at variance with the truth: overall, Tory governments borrow more and Labour governments are actually better at repaying debt.  One possible (and counter-intuitive interpretation) of this is that, actually, the Tories really are better at economics than Labour, and that, despite what they say, they have a willingness to borrow as and when appropriate – we just need to judge them on what they do, rather than on what they say they will do.  It isn’t the only possible interpretation however, and it would be a far too simplistic one.  A more detailed analysis of the difference in circumstances facing governments of the two parties would be too lengthy for this post.  It’s enough for the time being to indicate that knee-jerk criticism of Labour for planning to borrow owes more to spin than to good economics.

Avoiding broken promises

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In this story last week about the Chancellor’s little local difficulty over the increase in National Insurance, the Tory MP for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire came up with a real humdinger of a suggestion; or at least it would be if he followed it through to its logical conclusion.  In essence, as he sees it, the problem isn’t that the Chancellor broke a promise, it’s that the Tories were silly enough to make the promise in the first place.  Matters such as taxation policy are best left vague, so that the government can respond to changes in circumstances.

That needs to be followed through, though.  Clearly, without knowing what any putative government is going to do on taxes, it’s difficult to make any spending pledges either.  And it isn’t only financial circumstances that might change, so perhaps all policies should be left unstated in case the government feels it needs to do something different.  It’s an approach which would lead to very short manifestos.  One sentence would be quite enough:

“We will do whatever we think needs to be done at any point in time.”

I’d like to think that it’s an approach which would never catch on, but it actually strikes me as a refreshingly honest statement of the current government’s approach.  I’ll bet that the PM won’t be overjoyed at seeing the cat let out of the bag.

Identifying what's actually broken

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Yesterday’s news was full of accusations that the Chancellor broke an election promise by raising the level of National Insurance payments for self-employed people.  I think, though, that people are aiming at the wrong target.

In the Conservative Party, policy is made by the leader; the leader is ultimately responsible for the content of the manifesto; and the leader is responsible for keeping any promises.  So the ‘promise’ which Hammond broke yesterday wasn’t one made by him, nor by his boss, the Prime Minister.  It’s a promise made by a man who is no longer involved in politics and is in no position to either keep or break any promises he made.

Cameron may well have been elected on a manifesto containing the said promise, but we no longer have a Cameron government.  We’ve had a change of government, and under the UK system, it’s a fundamental principle that no government can be bound by its predecessor.  Neither can any Tory leader be bound by anything his or her predecessor may have said.  New leader = new government = new policies; any expectation to the contrary flies in the face of the whole history of the Conservative Party and the UK constitution.

Now some might object that all the Tory MPs were elected on the basis of that same manifesto and they should all be bound by it.  Actually, no they weren’t.  Under the UK constitution, people don’t vote for a party and they don’t vote for a set of policies.  They vote for one person in one constituency, and once elected, that person has the constitutional right to vote for or against any issue, solely as he or she pleases.

What’s my point?  This whole issue shows that something is indeed broken, but it isn’t a throwaway pre-election promise.  What’s broken is a constitution and electoral system which allows a change of personnel to become a change of government and a wholesale change of policy and direction with no elector input at all.  I’m not even sure that ‘broken’ is the right word for this – it was unfit for purpose in the first place.  Either way, in fairness to ‘Spreadsheet Phil’, he isn’t the one who broke it.  And I’m absolutely certain that hounding him for it isn’t the way to fix it either.  But then, who of those attacking him really wants to fix the underlying problem?

What next for Cameron?

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After resigning his parliamentary seat yesterday, Cameron said that his continued presence would be a ‘distraction’ from the work of his successor, and appeared to make it clear that he did not want to be in a position of putting an alternative point of view to that of the government.  However, he also said that ‘he wants to continue in public service and campaign on the domestic and international causes that he championed in Downing Street’.  I wonder how he squares that particular circle.

There was another piece of analysis yesterday by the BBC’s Political Editor, looking at how completely May has junked the people and policies of the Cameron era.  We’ve had a complete overturning of the economic policy which Cameron, Osborne, (and, I’m sure, even May) previously told us were essential.  International policy (towards China in particular) looks likely to see significant change.  This week, policy on selective education was reversed.  It seems that the so-called ‘northern powerhouse’ so beloved of the ex-Chancellor is rather less close to the hearts of the new team as well – and all this in just two months.  Who knows what else will change as she really gets stuck in?

The comment ("it IS a new government", one senior Tory told me, "not everyone has understood that yet") reported in the second story seemed quite accurate to me.  We have a new government, working to a new and different set of priorities.  Whilst the changes are not necessarily in the same direction, the difference between a May administration and a Cameron one looks like being as great – perhaps even greater – than the difference that there would have been between a Cameron administration and a Miliband administration had the 2015 election gone the other way.  And all achieved without the bother and hassle of an election.

But back to Cameron: given the extent of the emerging differences, how can he continue to campaign for the same things without ending up in opposition to May’s government?

The safety of the frying pan

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The UK’s new Prime Minister has been referred to many times in recent days as someone who ‘campaigned for Remain’.  This seems to me to be an extremely loose use of the word ‘campaigned’.  As I recall, she said little or nothing during the campaign, save to broadly agree with the anti-immigration line of the Leavers; and there was speculation about which side she’d support right up until the formal start of the campaign.  I’ve wondered throughout whether the tag of ‘reluctant remainer’ should not have been ‘secret leaver’; someone who chose, perhaps simply out of loyalty, to state her support for the official position of the then government and prime minister without really believing it.

Whether that’s true, or whether it’s simply the zeal of the convert, the placing of prominent anti-EU figures in key positions of influence over foreign relations looks to me to be a clear indication of her determination to press ahead with Brexit, regardless of what emerges during negotiations.

It also looks as though the government’s economic policy will change significantly; the ideological commitment to ‘austerity’ is quietly being sidelined, and the rhetoric looks likely to change.

Calls for a new election because none of us voted for the new PM are the natural but misplaced reaction of opposition parties – after all, outside of the Witney constituency, no-one voted for Cameron either.  The UK does not operate a presidential system of government (although personally, I’m attracted by the idea of separate elections for the legislature and the executive); we elect a parliament from which a PM is then chosen, and there’s nothing to stop any party of government changing its leader (and therefore the PM) at any time. 

There is though a much better argument for holding a new election; if the ‘new’ government jettisons much of the manifesto on which all the MPs of the outgoing government were elected, then that is a change compared to what we voted for.  And economic policy was central to the Tories’ manifesto just a year ago.  I’m not sure how good an idea a new election is though; I wouldn’t care to predict the likely outcome.  Jumping from the pan into the fire might not turn out to be the brightest idea.

Election fever?

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The Assembly election is now upon us, and I can’t say that any party has said or done anything which has made it stand out from the rest.  The whole election campaign reminds me in some ways of some of the pointless wars of the past where the armies throw everything into the battle, and fight each other to a standstill more or less where they started.  All the indicators are still that, come Friday, the main difference will be the presence of a number of members from a party which really neither wants the institution to exist, nor to play any constructive part in it.

I doubt that many people have actually read any, let alone all, of the parties’ manifestos, but I’ve at least scanned them - more to get an impression of what the parties are saying than to look at the detail.  History shows that there’s little point in looking at the detail; all four of the parties currently represented in the Assembly have a record of saying one thing and doing another, and it would be folly for anyone to place too much trust in the detail of their manifestos as a result, especially if coalition is on the cards.

So – what’s the general impression?  Well, there’s an awful lot of motherhood and apple pie, much of it common to multiple manifestos.  It’s also noticeable that a lot of the verbs used in all the manifestos are ‘soft’ or ‘weak’ verbs, such as work with, support, continue to, improve, promote, press for, explore, aim for, oppose, move away from, encourage, investigate, pursue, discourage…  It’s not that there’s anything wrong with doing all of those things; it’s just that the effect is to make the promises and pledges a great deal less specific and measurable than they could be.  And even where there are more specific commitments, the ‘how’ is often noticeable mostly for its absence.

Insofar as there is any distinction in feel between them, it’s Labour’s manifesto which stands out from the crowd – but not necessarily in a good way.  Whilst the rest are generally clear that current management is poor and needs replacing, Labour seem to have failed to get that message at all, and their manifesto reads as, shall we say, more than a little complacent as a result.  But given the difficulty the other parties have had of shaking the core Labour vote, and the near certainty that Labour will be far and away the dominant party come Friday, perhaps complacency is all they need.  That tells us more about the voters than the parties, though.

For what it’s worth, I concur with the general view of the rest that Labour’s management has been poor, and that Wales needs a change.  But that’s the easy bit – the idea that a change of management will, of itself, produce the desired improvement is one which I find strange.  Yet that ‘managerial’ approach is at the heart of what most of them have been saying for the past few weeks.  I can understand why they all believe that “We can manage things better than Labour” (and I’d probably agree with them); what’s less clear is why they believe that better management is enough to motivate voters.  It’s an even harder message to sell when the punters can read the polls and conclude that there does not seem to be, at present, a credible alternative to a continuing Labour-led administration.

Digging an efficient hole

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I’ve referred to the question of “efficiency savings” in the past.  It’s invariably a political euphemism for “budget cuts”, because it’s a top-down exercise telling people what they must save rather than a bottom-up exercise based on real identified savings.  I’ve also previously referred to a report by the Auditor General, which highlighted concerns that 'efficiency savings' have all too often resulted in cuts to services rather than any real improvement in efficiency, and to a report which identified that one of the outsourcing companies more honestly explained how efficiency savings wouldn’t affect profits, because they’d just cut the services.

It’s not that I don’t believe that large organisations can always find ways of running themselves more efficiently – I’m convinced that they can.  (Whether that’s always a good thing or not is another question – getting the cheapest supplies from elsewhere may look like ‘efficiency’ but may not be the best thing for the local economy.)  It’s more that I don’t believe that simply imposing cuts to budgets and telling managers to do more with less will achieve that aim without affecting services in any way.  To pretend that it will is to be blind to the way things will actually happen as a consequence of demanding such savings.

It was disappointing this week to see Plaid joining the “efficiency savings” bandwagon.  For sure, assuming efficiency savings of £300 million makes the figures add up; but it doesn’t make them actually happen.  One person’s £300 million of unidentified savings is another person’s £300 million of budget cuts.  I can’t really blame Plaid’s opponents for jumping on the figure in the way that they have (although it’s totally disingenuous from parties who’ve done exactly the same on a regular basis); and I find Plaid’s defence of the figure no more convincing than the arguments put forward by other parties in the past.  In a manifesto which contains many good things (and I’ll probably come back to manifestos when I’ve had time to read and digest them), it’s an unfortunate hole to have dug.

Are they decentralists or not?

Tweet When the EnglandandWales Green Party manifesto was published, I saw it as something of a step forward in that party’s thinking about Wales.  The reference to a referendum on Welsh independence and the right of the people of Wales to choose that status if we wish was something I hadn’t heard as clearly from them before.

It didn’t tell us where they actually stand on the issue, though.  Are they for or against?  It has long surprised me that any party claiming to want more decentralised decision-making and a more localised economy wouldn’t automatically support any proposal for greater local autonomy.  The position taken by the Scottish Greens in the recent referendum was much more robust.  They not only supported the holding of a referendum, they actively worked to encourage people to vote yes.

But shortly after the EnglandandWales manifesto came the Welsh manifesto, which was a much weaker document as far as this issue goes.  No mention of independence or of any referendum, merely the wishy-washy sentence “We believe that the starting position should be that all powers are devolved from Westminster to the Welsh Government except for those that are best retained at a UK level”.

What on earth does that actually mean, other than that “we’re in favour of devolving everything except those things that we’re against devolving”?  Devoid of any explanation of the basis for deciding what things are “best retained at a UK level”, it tells us absolutely nothing about what they actually believe.  It can mean anything to anyone – and it’s a statement which it’s impossible for anyone to disagree with.  Supporters of independence and supporters of the abolition of the Assembly could both say the same thing.

It looks, from the outside, as though the Green Party in Wales is almost afraid of being too Welsh, or of supporting autonomy for Wales.  But I really don’t understand why.  And I think that they’re missing a trick as a result.

When is a promise not a promise?

Tweet After reading Vaughan Roderick’s post the other day, it wold be tempting to respond “when it’s made by a Liberal Democrat”.  However, that would be a little unfair; that party is not unique in promising one thing and then delivering the opposite.

Yesterday, the party committed itself to scrapping the toll to cross the Severn Bridges if the party found itself part of a government again after the UK elections next year.  Or did it?  How much of a commitment was it in reality?

In the first place, it’s not in their manifesto yet, only in one of those curious documents called a ‘pre-manifesto’; a mechanism usually used by parties to publicise policies which they’re thinking about including in their manifestos (or for those of a more cynical bent, policies to which they’d like to attract attention but without making any real commitment).  So, is there a guarantee that what’s in their ‘pre-manifesto’ will also be in the final document?  Apparently not.

And secondly, if they do find themselves in government again next year, it can only be in coalition with either the Labour Party or the Conservative Party.  Are the contents of the Lib Dem manifesto then guaranteed to form part of the coalition agreement?  Well, no – they just become a basis for negotiation.  Unless, that is, the party is saying in advance that this is a ‘red line’ issue and that they will not agree to any coalition programme which does not commit to abolishing the tolls.  Are they saying that?  Apparently not.

So, whilst the headlines stated “Lib Dems commit to scrapping tolls”, the actual story is that the party is thinking about maybe including the scrapping of tolls on a shopping list of items which might, and probably won’t, get included in a programme for coalition government.  There’s something of a gap between the headlines and the reality.

When is a manifesto not a manifesto?

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Last week’s issue of the Carmarthen Journal did its best to tackle the thorny issue of how to treat all candidates fairly when so many of them are standing as ‘Independents’.  It’s easy to get a statement from each of the other political parties; they all admit to being a group standing on a common platform.  It’s not so easy when dealing with people who claim to be ‘independent’.  The paper couldn’t really give equal space to 70 or more candidates.

However, the Independent Group’s co-ordinator has come to the rescue by providing a statement on behalf of all the members of the group.  In it, she sets out a number of commitments which the group is making to the electors; sounds a bit like a manifesto of sorts, albeit a very short one.

In the same issue of the paper, the current council leader also sets out her group’s ‘vision’ for the council, but is quoted as saying that the group “cannot produce a manifesto as they are independents, but the group had discussed their priorities”.  Hence the question in the headline.

Does a list of promises and collective views on the future, even a very short list, really only become a manifesto when it is written down and published in a document with ‘manifesto’ written in large letters on the front cover?  I think not.  But then I also don’t believe that a group of politicians seeking election on a joint platform and forming a group once elected to promote that platform only becomes a party when it registers as such.

What's the big idea #4

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Surprisingly, given the influence of David Melding on their policy in Wales, I found the Tory manifesto to have a certain lack of focus; I had expected more clarity.  It’s not that the individual policies proposed aren’t clear or specific – the advantage of having the shortest manifesto is that it is, of necessity, more succinct.  I just couldn’t see where it was going.

Certainly there is a theme of saying that Labour and Plaid have managed things badly.  And certainly, just like the other three parties, there are a large number of proposals which could happily sit in any of the four manifestos.  And rhetoric about ‘ambition’ abounds here, as elsewhere.

Torn between not wanting to say anything that the boss in London wouldn’t like, and not wanting to say anything that puts them too far outside the Cardiff Bay consensus, the result reads to me like an attempt to make ‘not a lot’ sound like a lot more than it is. 

It would be very aesthetically pleasing for me to end this little tour of the four manifestos by saying that the theme of ‘we can manage Wales better’ is as clear cut in this manifesto as it was in the others, and maybe that’s what they really mean; but somehow, they seemed to stop short of actually saying it.  Perhaps they don’t really believe it themselves.

I suppose that creates a distance, of sorts, between them and the other parties, but it’s not exactly a very positive one.

What's the big idea #2

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From much of what Labour has had to say during this election campaign, one could be forgiven for thinking that their biggest idea is that they are ‘not-the-Tories’.  Perhaps that’s an unfair understatement – they are really claiming to be more ‘not-the-Tories’ than anyone else.  It may well help them to win the election, so I can’t really blame them for using that line.

Their manifesto however is a little more positive than that, if one gets away from the simplistic sloganising of Peter Hain.

The theme is all about delivery.  It chimes with the speech which Carwyn Jones made at Labour’s Conference – we’ve spent enough time writing strategies, now it’s time to implement some of them.  There’s a lot to be said for being that honest about their intentions, and not encouraging us to expect a lot of originality in government, just a government that will get on with things.

It does though mean that their key positive message is much the same as that of the Lib Dems – it amounts to a claim that Labour can manage Wales better than the others.  But is it any more credible?

Mirror, mirror, on the wall...

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…who’s the most devolutionary of them all? 

In a comment on a recent post, ‘Adam’ took me to task for not recognising that there were things in Plaid’s manifesto which the other parties could not say.  Specifically, he mentioned “devolution of police and criminal justice, the coastguard, broadcasting, natural resources, teachers pay and conditions, various stuff regarding rail and of course it speaks independence”.  I hadn’t seen the other manifestos at that point, but I have now, so it’s possible to examine the question more closely. 

Firstly, on the question of Independence, the manifesto does indeed mention it, but it does so, as Adrian Masters astutely pointed out, only to immediately sideline it, saying that Wales will be better served during the next period by concentrating on further devolution in certain areas, and reform of Barnett.

Now for the rest of the list – and some other things which ‘Adam’ didn’t mention.  The question was not whether other parties were uniquely saying that they would devolve certain matters, but whether it was only conceivable that one party could say that they would do so, consistent with the rest of what they have to say.

On police and criminal justice, the Lib Dems specifically say that they will press for such devolution and the Tories promise a White Paper on a legal jurisdiction for Wales.  Carwyn Jones has also talked in the past about a separate legal jurisdiction for Wales, although it doesn’t appear in Labour’s manifesto, and the party now appears to be against it.  Only Plaid specifically mention devolution of family courts, but it’s such a logical result of a Welsh jurisdiction that I can’t believe it would be a huge issue of principle.

On the Coastguard, only Plaid specifically mention it as a matter for devolution.  Possibly unique, but I can’t see any obvious reason why the others couldn’t propose it; there’s nothing obviously inconsistent with the rest of what they say.  And with the Ambulance and Fire Services already devolved, it would be a natural follow-on from policing, as the fourth emergency service.

On broadcasting, Labour say that they want to oblige broadcasters operating in Wales to “keep the National Assembly informed of their activities”.  Not quite the same as devolving control, but a step in the same direction.  The Tories want S4C to be the subject of some sort of ‘joint mechanism’ with Westminster.  Again, not exactly devolution of broadcasting, but a step towards that.

On teachers’ pay and conditions, Plaid is the only party calling for devolution.  But UK Governments have in the past supported ‘regional’ bargaining in some areas; I don’t find it completely inconceivable that they could support devolution in the right circumstances.

On rail services, the Tories want to explore the possibility of devolving Network Rail to Wales, and Labour say “that Network Rail should have a greater degree of accountability to the Assembly Government”.

Of the points raised by ‘Adam’, it is only when we start to talk about control of natural resources that I can really see that the claim that Plaid is unique in calling for further devolution might be made to stand up.  The commitment, though, is pretty vague. 

The manifesto says only “that Wales should have control over its own natural resources – wind, water, sun and tidal – and we will press for the devolution of responsibility for these areas as well as all energy generation projects”.  Indeed, looking at all references to the question of natural resources in the manifesto, it is a phrase which always seems to be closely linked with the question of energy.  And Plaid is not unique in calling for further devolution in the area of energy policy.  The Tories want devolution of power on projects up to 100MW; the Lib Dems want power over ‘larger energy projects’; and Labour seek to devolve control of renewable (an odd limitation) consents up to 100MW.

Plaid also propose devolving the Forestry Commission and the Environment Agency.  Whilst Labour and Lib Dems don’t specifically propose devolving the Forestry Commission and the Environment Agency, both do talk about bringing them together in one body, which implies to me that they have to have been devolved first.

On the question of taxation powers, it is the Lib Dems and Tories who are specifically proposing limited taxation powers.  Labour explicitly rule out taxation powers, and Plaid link it to reform of Barnett, a rather more conditional form of support.

Plaid also propose devolving Job Search Services, the Food Standards Agency, and Research Funding.  None of these look like being huge issues of principle to any of the other parties to me, although they are unique to Plaid’s manifesto.

Only one party also includes a more open-ended pledge to look at other matters which might be devolved – and that’s the Lib Dems.

So, to answer my opening question – who’s the most devolutionary?  On balance, the answer would have to be Plaid.  But, having sidelined the bigger question at the outset, it’s not quite the strong USP as which ‘Adam’ was trying to present it.  Devolution of further powers is something which all parties are proposing (although the Labour Party is significantly less forthright on the matter than the rest).  It’s not really therefore as strong a distinguishing feature as some might suggest.

The fact that calling for devolution of a range of specific responsibilities is something which all parties can convincingly do shows how far Wales has travelled, and how successful Plaid has been at shifting the centre of debate in a particular direction.  But, even taking all the proposals together, Wales would still not have a Scottish-style parliament.  That should be the next major step, but it's a goal for which none of the parties is promising to argue during the next Assembly term.  And as long as the argument is not put, it will not be won.

Bland and blander

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With all four main parties now having published their manifestos, people can compare and contrast.  Well, compare, anyway; contrasting is a lot more difficult with so much overlap between the four parties on just about everything.  Much of the content could simply be swapped from one manifesto to any one of the others.

In his column in the Western Mail on Saturday, Matt Withers came to a similar conclusion.  I entirely agree with his comment that “essentially these four documents are all about make (sic) a case for being the most competent managers.”  We are not really being asked to decide between alternative routes forward for Wales; just between four leaders who want to take us to pretty much the same place, but all claiming that they can drive better than the others.

I don’t doubt that all four parties would try to argue that the statement is not true, and each would say that they (and they alone) have got some really big and original ideas in their manifestos – but that’s more about rhetoric and spin than about substance.

I also agree with his comment on the language in which the manifestos are couched.  Far too many of what look like promises are actually preceded by words such as seek, try, work towards, consider, examine, investigate, review, strive, develop, encourage…  None of these can be taken as firm promises, but discounting every ‘promise’ which starts with such weasel words would leave some very thin documents.

I cannot, though, agree with his conclusion that “the days of ideological warfare are over”.  The fact that the four main parties have chosen to converge in the same ideological territory doesn’t mean that there is no alternative which can be put.  It just means that we shouldn’t expect to see that alternative actually being put by the leaders of any of these parties.

Spotting the difference

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Putting a title on a manifesto can be harder than writing the content sometimes.  The titles of the two that I’ve seen so far (For a Better Wales, and Wales Can Do Better) remind me of the competitions that they used to run on the back of cereal packets – combine the words ‘Wales’ and ‘Better’ into a phrase of 6 words or less to describe why you would choose X.  We could then disqualify any party which failed to meet the set criteria.

Perhaps when I’ve seen them all I’ll be better placed to identify the differences of substance rather than of rhetoric, but to date there is a large degree of overlap.  For me, a genuine USP isn’t just about saying something that no-one else is saying; it’s about saying something that no-one else could say, because it’s based on a different set of values or aims.

Alternatively, maybe we should just use the approach to differentiation which Betsan and Vaughan seem to be pioneering – count the spelling, grammar, and typographical errors in the manifestos and associated press releases and rank the parties accordingly.  The question is, though – what do we vote for, the highest score, or the lowest?

Labour haven't won the argument

Tweet There were no surprises in the announcement this week of the scrapping of the Tuition Fees Grant; but then, no-one really expected any. I understand why the Government has taken the decision, but that isn't at all the same as agreeing with the decision.

There is no doubt, as Adam Price has persuasively argued, that the policy was not only a distinctive measure, but was also achieving one of the Assembly Government's stated objectives of encouraging more Welsh-domiciled students to study in Wales. In some ways, it was a blunt instrument; but even blunt instruments can work well on occasions. There's always an argument for replacing a blunt instrument with a sharper one - as long as it does a better job. This one doesn't.

Adam goes further, and argues that we should make a clear commitment to reversing the policy in the next Assembly manifesto. That's something which the membership will decide when we debate that manifesto, of course.

The more important lesson for me - and I know for many others - is that it isn't just what's in the manifesto that matters. As Adam indicates, it's equally important to define what manifesto commitments are non-negotiable when it comes to coalition negotiations. Experience is not always the most comfortable way of learning a hard lesson.

The whole issue of student finance is, of course, a great deal more complicated than the simplistic question of fees, and the Assembly Government's package to start to address student debt is one aspect which should be welcomed. The question of principle, however, remains whether students should be in debt at the end of their studies in the first place.

For me, increasing the level of expertise and skills possessed by our young people when they complete their education is an investment in the future of all of us. Given a truly progressive tax system, those who use their expertise and skills to earn more than others will pay more in taxes in return, and that helps to fund the next generation's education.

Wales' biggest problem, in economic terms, is that our GVA per head is lower than the UK average. Part of the answer to that, surely, has to be encouraging our brightest young people to make their homes and careers in Wales, rather than to look elsewhere – and encouraging them to study in Wales helps to achieve that aim.

The introduction of top-up fees in England was always going to create difficulties in Wales unless the Assembly Government had a full range of powers on taxation and spending. And increases in the cap level in England were always going to make the situation worse. Policies being pursued in England inevitably constrain the range of options which could have been followed in Wales, and it would be naïve to pretend otherwise.

But, even having said all that, I still don't believe that the Assembly Government needed to simply follow the English lead, which is what the Labour Party wanted to do from the outset. The lack of imagination shown by the Labour Party in Wales on this issue is disappointing, to say the least. They may have got their way at this stage; but they haven't won the argument.

Promises, promises, and com-promises

Tweet The conflict between what parties promise in their manifestoes and what they can actually deliver in coalition government is an issue which has, not unsurprisingly, been much exercising me of late. Although it's Plaid which has come under the spotlight in the past few weeks, it's an issue which could very easily have faced other parties as well had the 2007 coalition talks ended differently. It ought to be affecting the Labour Party as well, but I suppose that their manifesto was so bland and unambitious that they didn't really have that many promises to fail on.

Parties drafting their manifestoes try to present themselves as different and distinctive when they choose which policies to highlight as key promises. The difficulty in doing that is especially acute at Assembly level, given the comparatively narrow range of powers available.

When we put our manifesto before the people of Wales in 2007, we certainly believed and intended that, given a majority of seats in the Assembly, we had a programme which we could and would fully implement over a four year term. I'm reasonably certain that the other parties felt the same way about their programmes.

In reality, of course, we didn't win a majority of seats – and nor did any other party. And in the absence of that majority, it is unrealistic to expect full implementation of our programme, particularly in coalition with a party which was fundamentally opposed to key elements of it. Indeed, one could even go further and argue that the people of Wales didn't want the full implementation of our programme - if they had wanted that, in sufficient numbers, they would have given us the mandate we needed for that.

If we expect – as I certainly do – that coalition will be the norm in Wales, then where does that leave party manifestoes? Perhaps all parties should put some sort of 'health warning' on them, making it clear that they are programmes for a majority government, but that no such programme can ever be implemented in full by a coalition involving two or more parties.

In a coalition context, manifestoes are more like 'shopping lists' which each party takes to the negotiating table when a programme for government is being hammered out. And the largest parties in any coalition are always going to get more of their manifesto included in the programme than the smaller ones – doesn't that simply reflect the relative levels of electoral support?

So some promises made at election time will inevitably turn into compromises during the process of negotiating a programme for government. That's hard for a lot of us to accept given the history of UK politics, however normal it may be in most of the rest of Europe. We're going to have to get used to it – and perhaps we all have a responsibility to do a better job of explaining to the electorate why and how some promises will become compromises.