The week in politics: When the twigs snap
It’s been another week of ‘new politics’, a phrase which here means ‘ministers breaking conventional rules with dizzying audacity’.
First came the forestry U-turn, which became more and more certain as the week progressed before finally happening on Thursday.
This was always going to be a tough gig for environment secretary Caroline Spelman. She managed it quite well, apologising with startling contrition for having made a mistake. That’s not supposed to happen! It certainly disarmed Labour, whose response was judged to have been somewhat wrong-footed as a result.
Then came the start of the AV referendum campaign at the end of the week. The prospect of the first and second most important figures in the government taking sides was one we had known about for a long time. But that didn’t stop it being utterly dizzying and disconcerting when it actually happened. What impact will the vote have on the coalition? We’re sensing it’s going to have more of an impact than many will have anticipated.
The start of the electoral reform campaign was far from guaranteed at the beginning of the week, as the legislation implementing the referendum – the parliamentary voting system and constituencies bill – faced last-ditch resistance from Labour peers. We spent all Wednesday following the thoroughly entertaining ping-pong process. First the Lords comprehensively rejected MPs’ attempt to overturn their inclusion of a provision requiring a turnout. Then, shortly before midnight, their resistance collapsed. It was time to go off on their half-term break, after all.
The government’s agenda was firmly fixed on the ‘big society’. Cameron was on the defensive at the start of the week, in yet another relaunch of his controversial “passion”. The funny thing is, he’s making progress. During the general election the idea was a washout, as no-one understood it. That has definitely changed, thanks to persistence and the automatic audience granted to any prime ministerial utterings.
But there are problems, nonetheless. In the context of spending cuts, as Labour are repeatedly emphasising, the ‘big society’ is having the ground cut from underneath it. And its practical application is fraught with difficulties, as the prime minister found when he was confronted with one tricky questioner yesterday.
All of the above seemed to serve as a distraction from some of the big news stories reflecting these troubling times. The NHS is in a mess; inflation reached four per cent, double the Bank of England’s target; and the bank bonuses issue continued to hang over the City and, by extension, the entire country.
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