While Labour’s budget responsibility lock should wrongfoot the Tories as they struggle to say where the money is coming from for their NHS promises (Labour’s big promise: no extra borrowing, 13 April), it is hardly offering us much real possibility of change in the years ahead. And change is what we need most; austerity is not working. This agenda is wrong and I am sorry Ed Miliband will not challenge this Tory rhetoric. For a start, we do not live in a “time of scarcity”. Look at the record car sales announced recently, soaring house prices, pensioners pouring their savings into fancy holidays, second homes and buy-to-let properties.
We’ve never had it so good, “we” being the top half of our society and all property owners, especially pensioners like my wife and me. So who is Ed Miliband trying to appeal to? The comfortable majority? Or rather, why is he trying to appease them? I want to hear more about how Labour will help the rest of our societyand there are plenty of possibilities: simple matters such as a requiring all companies to pay their full-time employees a living wage, closing tax-dodging loopholes, revamping and adding a few higher bands to council tax rates, would all bring in more revenue.
And when will anyone start trying to do something about soaring property prices, which see most of the younger families in London paying monster mortgages or equally monstrous rents, while property developers build more and more outrageous, blocks of empty expensive flats? We need a new, radical government, not another lot of fiscally retentive lackeys.
David Reed
London
• The fairly obvious difference of interests between capital and labour (owners/bosses versus workers) has increasingly been ignored by the Labour party. The Labour party, which is advocating continued austerity, albeit austerity lite, and is not uncomfortable with people becoming very rich, is putting the blame for the crash and the economic pressure for a recovery from the crash, on labour. The greed, avarice and shady practices of capital that got us into this economic mess are being ignored, with labour being made to pay for the faults of capital. I don’t feel that the Labour party represents me, my class (such as it is) or the interests of the UK any more. Rather, it has sided with globalised capital and the only differences I can see between it and the Tory party is more a matter of accountancy than politics.
Colin Clarke
Cleckheaton, West Yorkshire
• I welcome Rafael Behr’s informative essay on Ed Miliband (Long read, 15 April). However, it should be read in conjunction with George Monbiot’s incisive critique of Labour’s manifesto (Opinion, 15 April). But neither Behr nor Monbiot pay attention to a glaring lacuna, namely that Labour, by allying itself so closely with the approach of the Tories and the Lib Dems to Scotland, has failed to harness and benefit from the radical energy released by the progressive transformation of Scottish politics in the independence referendum and since which Monbiot highlights when speaking of the “passionate re-engagement” of Scotland. On the contrary, Miliband and Labour have done their best to vilify and discredit the SNP and to dissociate themselves from any alignment, a policy that the SNP has rightly exposed, resulting in the anticipated humbling of Labour in Scotland.
I recognise that independence is a consummation the SNP devoutly wishes and campaigns for, but this should not dissuade a party that under Miliband’s leadership professes to espouse a radical transformation of Britain from a close alliance with the one party in British politics today that can lay claim to a vigorous democratic legitimacy. I argue this particularly since a genuine radical vision ought to be that our small island, whose populations are so intricately intermixed, should adopt some form of federative structure. Even if part of the country has opted for independence, this is a prospect that may be years ahead but, if it is not, should be faced with equanimity.
Benedict Birnberg
London
• Labour’s 86-page election manifesto says at the very start: “Every policy in this manifesto is paid for. Not one commitment requires additional borrowing.”
Ed Miliband asserts in his foreword: “An economy built on strong and secure foundations, where we balance the books.” But when it comes to national security, the manifesto swerves off message. It pledges, “Labour remains committed to a minimum, credible, independent nuclear capability, delivered through a continuous at-sea deterrent,” as your round-up of policies recorded (Miliband’s programme under the microscope, 14 April)
But, despite the upfront commitments to explain how expenditures will be paid for, Labour has no word of how it is going to find the £100bn for Trident replacement. It goes on to assert: “We will actively work to increase momentum on global multilateral disarmament efforts and negotiations, and look at further reductions in global stockpiles and the numbers of weapons.” So it will first spend taxpayers’ money to build Trident’s replacement, then spend even more taxpayers’ money to dismantle it.
This madness is shared by the Conservatives. In a parliamentary debate on 20 January on the Trident nuclear weapons system, defence secretary Michael Fallon told MPs: “We also share the vision of a world that is without nuclear weapons, achieved through multilateral disarmament.” This is complete cognitive dissonance: believing two diametrically opposite things at the same time. Doesn’t the British electorate deserve better than this from the political parties from whom the next PM will certainly come?
Dr David Lowry (former director European Proliferation Information Centre)
Stoneleigh, Surrey
• For the sake of historical accuracy, there are a few corrections needed to Rafael Behr’s account. First, a regular canard: unions do not have “bosses”; they have (more or less) democratically elected leaders. It was not unions that voted for Ed Miliband, but affiliated union members, a significant distinction. Note also that an MP’s vote was worth 468 individual members’ votes and 762 union members’ votes. Had it been a universal one member, one vote, Ed’s majority would have been significantly greater. That David should gain a majority of individual members’ votes was not surprising in view of his almost universal media support. Despite which, throughout the rounds Ed gained more proportionately than David as other candidates dropped out.
Frank Jackson
Harlow Labour party
• Ed Miliband has stated: “If you elect me as your prime minister in just over three weeks’ time…”. But not all British citizens are able to vote for their PM. Labour continues to exclude Northern Ireland from its constituency organisation or to stand for elections in Northern Ireland. Non doms can vote Labour, but ordinary people in Northern Ireland cannot. The media’s silence and even acquiescence in this matter is shocking. Ukip, the Greens and the Conservatives are fielding candidates here. They are unlikely to win any seats, but they recognise their responsibility to put their manifestos before all citizens of the UK. Why does Labour feel it is exempt?
Paul Kelly
Loughinisland, County Down
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