Osborne’s duty

Vince Cable has a point. The government does, alas, lack a ‘compelling vision for the economy’ but the Liberal Democrats see this as an opportunity, not a defect. They regard George Osborne’s agenda as a blank slate on to which they can write all sorts of policies: a mansion tax, capital gains tax, even a state bank which would bring to corporate Britain the sub-prime loans that triggered the financial meltdown in America. With the budget looming, open negotiations have begun. It has been a festival of bad ideas, which have prospered in the absence of a Tory agenda.

The risk of the Cameron project was not that voters would be appalled that the Prime Minister went to Eton or that his Chancellor is the heir to a baronetcy. The risk was always that the party’s leadership would be so paranoid about their backgrounds that they would not defend wealth creation, or speak up for those who aspire to own a house big enough for the Lib Dems to tax.