Manchester speech of PM took a 'steady-as she-goes' path of aspiration, blinkered to the woes of Poundland Britain
David Cameron delivered a good Tony Blair speech in Manchester on Wednesday, upbeat and aspirational, the difficult bits of life mostly glossed over or ignored. What it lacked was Blair's willingness to take on his own party in order to address some urgent problem needing fixing.
That and any emotional connection with the millions of food bank and Poundland Britons (increasingly middle-class, the Daily Mail tells us) who are having a seriously hard time.
So it was a good enough, steady-as-she-goes speech for Middle Britain, the kind the recession has repeatedly forced the prime minister to make since the bankers' recession of 2010 and the blaming of it all on Labour and the Greeks.
Greeks? Yes, Cameron again trotted out the canard that the British economy was heading over a Greek cliff in mid-2010 and was saved only by Osbornian austerity.
It wasn't true then and isn't true now. In large measure austerity has been self-defeating, forcing up the borrowing that ministers have deplored and, as Osborne had to concede in his more substantial speech on Monday, meaning a squeeze that will have to continue to 2020 at the least.
That is one of the big holes in the Downing Sreet narrative, which the PM set out to the party not-so-faithful in Manchester.
Another is the inability to acknowledge that it was badly regulated markets, labour markets, financial markets, energy markets of the kind "set free" by the conference's patron saint, Margaret Thatcher, which have failed the country so clearly since 2008.
Bankers, their pay and bonus schemes, their dishonest activities and reckless judgment? He did not mention them or their failings once, though he did give welfare scroungers a fresh whacking in the passage following his unexpected praise of social workers, the speech's only surprise. We don't want activists thinking too hard about social work, do we?
The omission was the equivalent of Ed Miliband's much-noted failure to mention Mid-Staffs NHS hospital trust in his Brighton keynote speech eight days ago.
It is safe to say the recession has caused a lot more ill-health than Mid-Staffs (and the story of patients having to quench their thirst with vase water is not true, Dave), but we understand why leaders' inspirational addresses require simplification, omission and amnesia. All story telling requires a good edit.
All the same, the Cameron who hugged hoodies and huskies from 2006 to 2008 has come a long way. No mention of the environment, not much about Europe or the threatened repeal of human rights laws, another painful topic, though there was a generous appeal for Scotland to stay in the union. No mention of low wage, insecure jobs, of rough justice from Atos-style fitness-to-work tests.
No attempt either to explain that Theresa May's one-third reduction in net immigration is probably down to student exclusions and the visa squeeze on high-end IT specialists which so annoys big business.
That might have unsettled Cameron's audience with complexity – and given Nigel Farage a soundbite.
No mention, come to think of it, of Ukip; and only one about the Lib Dems (when Vince Cable's OTT conference attack on the Tories would have justified a fire storm). That implies that Dave is sensibly keeping his coalition options open. No mention of the c-word either.
Instead, most of the jokes and the jibes were directed at Labour, especially that figure of hatred and fun, Ed Balls.
Vladimir Putin's spin machine got a kicking too for that "ignored little island" jibe at the G20 summit. Fair enough. They were good jokes, nicely delivered. But the imperative to blame Labour for our economic problems is less effective with every painful year that passes.
The PM declared that Britain had to become less London-centric, with less of the archetypal capital and home counties complexion. True, but the British hinterland will not feel better loved after this speech.
Miliband's put Labour in a better place when he attacked dysfunctional markets and the need to create more responsive and responsible models of capitalism.
For all his praise of small start-ups (his wife's included), Cameron still sounds like the corporate suit he once briefly was. We all want to push out children to get on in life, he said. At the back of the hall we smiled, remembering the call from Buck House which landed Dave his first job at party HQ.
Unfair, of course. Life is unfair and Tory grandees pretending that all you need to do is work hard and play by the rules is uplifting for many – but insufficiently so for those trapped by forces beyond their control. "Land of opportunity" will not cheer the Neets or the jobless 50-somethings.
My hunch at the end of the conference season is that all three main party leaders did make good-enough speeches: that Clegg differentiated his party from the Tories; that the Miliband speech was the best and funniest; that Cameron's middle-of-the-road, safe, sub-Blairite, speech could work best with those listeners who actually turn out and vote. Provided, that is, they are still in work and feel just a bit better off on 7 May 2015.
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