So much has happened since the general election that it is hard to press events into a meaningful pattern. The first coalition since the second world war, the deepest cuts since the 1970s, our military’s budget slashed, and the extraordinary (if predictable) crisis in the eurozone. The coalition has begun with remarkable energy and purpose. But where is the government going right? And where wrong? The end of the year is a good time to take stock.
The coalition’s success so far has lain in its ability to marry Conservative economic liberalism with Lib Dem democratic radicalism. Its agenda, the coalition agreement, was inspired as much by the vision of Tory localists, such as Douglas Carswell and Daniel Hannan, as by the Lib Dems’ Orange Book. This explains why, to the bafflement of the BBC, the government has so far enjoyed popular support.
But writing four-page political accords is easier than altering the nature of the British state. The real question is how the coalition has measured up against its own stated goals.
In most areas, the ledger is positive. The deficit is being brought under control. George Osborne, whom we interview on page 26, could have expected to be the most hated man in Britain by now. Instead, he finds that Nick Clegg has claimed that honour. Clegg owed his brief flowering in popularity during the election to rather pious rhetoric about ending the culture of false promises. He will take no pleasure in commentators using words such as ‘courage’, ‘maturity’ and ‘leadership’ to describe his behaviour over tuition fees: what they mean is that he has broken his word.
He is not alone, however, in doing that. Outside Heathrow airport, there is still a tattered Tory poster denouncing Gordon Brown for letting out 80,000 prisoners early. Conservatives should feel a pang of shame when they drive past it: after promising to ‘increase prison capacity’, they have decided to shut down up to ten prisons. Both coalition partners have betrayed their promises.
Encouragingly, the coalition has started to disempower the political class. Parents will be allowed to choose where their children go to school, providing Michael Gove is given the support he needs. Communities will be free to decide what kind of policing they want, if the reforms are seen through. Eric Pickles is trampling on quango after quango, although new ones creep up. And Iain Duncan Smith’s agenda will shift millions from the squalor of dependency into productive lives, albeit over a timeframe of ten years.
When it comes to constitutional reform, the record is less impressive. Several inspiring commitments have been watered down, shelved or bungled. For example, the Conservatives promised to cut the number of MPs by 10 per cent. The Lib Dems made the even more attractive pledge of a 20 per cent cut. The compromise between these two figures? A 5 per cent reduction with no commensurate cut in the ministerial payroll.
Both parties promised a recall mechanism, whereby unpopular MPs might face a by-election. But instead of allowing recall to be triggered by local demand, the coalition has placed the process in the hands of a House of Commons committee, which effectively gives a small group of MPs power to remove any of their colleagues from parliament. It is a disheartening fudge. The plan to select MPs with open primaries, which was in the coalition agreement, would have strengthened the legislature vis-à-vis the executive, but the commitment appears to have been quietly dropped.
Referendums are a splendid device. But why are we having a referendum on the alternative vote, which neither of the two coalition parties included in its manifesto, while being denied a referendum on the European Union, which all three parties recently promised? It is in their obsequious approach to Brussels that David Cameron and, in particular, William Hague have been most disappointing. Since the general election, they have shown an even greater hunger for European integration than the previous government, approving a new EU diplomatic corps, agreeing to Brussels supervision of the City of London, extending EU control in the field of criminal justice and accepting a higher EU budget. They opted in to the Irish bailout on the same terms as euro members — though it is now clear that that bailout was designed to rescue the euro, not Ireland.
The coalition’s Euro-enthusiasm contradicts the devolution which it preaches domestically. While scrapping quangos at home, it is strengthening the biggest quango of all, namely the European Commission. While decentralising power in Britain, it is centralising power in Brussels. While cutting spending, it is increasing its contributions to the EU budget.
Happily, there is a way for the coalition and the country to alter course. The Lib Dems fought the last election promising that any new EU treaty would be put to a referendum. When he dropped his commitment to a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty, David Cameron made the same pledge. Now, Angela Merkel has offered an opportunity to make good on that commitment: she needs a new treaty to be implemented in all member states within three years. Instead of looking for a way to wriggle out of their promises, the two coalition parties should hold the referendum they pledged and let the people decide.
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