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Some commentators on last night’s Chancellors Debate have suggested that it lacked a bit of spark and drama – including, it must be said, my colleague Tony Dolphin (see 2 posts below).
No gaffes, no bombshells, no personal attacks – so no interest.
I beg to differ – here were serious issues being discussed in a serious way by serious politicians. Even the much criticised George Osborne seemed to rise to the occasion and to – by and large – engage constructively and effectively with his counterparts, Vince Cable – everyone’s idea of how a grown up politician should act– and Alistair Darling – whose reputation seems to be growing by the day. Without getting too dewy-eyed – or indeed po-faced – about it, this was just the sort of political debate that the country needs at this time.
There was point-scoring of course, but there were also plenty of points of agreement and a strong sense that the argument was constructive – and, yes, interesting. (All three seemed like decent, nice, sensible human beings as well – and when was the last time anybody said that about a group of politicians!) We the viewers were treated as adults up to the task of listening for an uninterrupted hour to informed debate about the country’s future. This is a high cry from the ridiculous pantomime of parliamentary exchanges, the inanity of so many studio discussions and the complete emptiness of Piers Morgan style ‘lifestyle’ interviews.
Can we dare to hope that the spin doctors, the strategists and tacticians, the rebuttal units and ad agencies – and yes the party leaders - will reflect on last night’s low key, but fascinating debate and think: Hey! How about having a serious, constructive, instructive campaign?
Tim Finch
Mission accomplished – no gaffes. That was probably the initial reaction of Alistair Darling, Vince Cable and George Osborne to their live debate on Channel 4’s Ask the Chancellors programme. There will be no clips from this event being endlessly replayed on You Tube in coming days and weeks.
Unfortunately, the prospective Chancellors' safety-first approach also robbed the event of its drama. It was more like watching three academics debate economic issues than three senior politicians bidding for votes less than six weeks before a general election. Where were the fireworks? Where was the passion? It was all very civil and, therefore, somewhat flat.
Before the debate, Vince Cable was expected to emerge the winner and he did, though only by a narrow margin. He scored points for honesty - on several occasions he was the only one of the three men prepared to tell the audience just how bad things are. He was not attacked by the other two, though he was happy to round on both Alistair Darling and George Osborne. And he got the biggest rounds of applause, when calling bankers ‘pin-striped Scargills’ and accusing the Tories of wanting to get their ‘snouts back into the trough’.
Alistair Darling was, well, Alistair Darling. He said his main quality for the job was ‘tenacity’ and he did a dogged job of keeping the debate on the future, so avoiding having to explain why everything went wrong while Labour were in charge. But he was vulnerable to criticism about the lack of detail in his plans.
George Osborne came into the debate with a new pledge announced earlier in the day – to halt Labour’s planned rise in national insurance contributions in April 2011, a plan he will finance through government efficiency savings. While this has some electoral appeal, economists have already questioned how it can be squared with the Conservatives’ previous view that reducing the deficit was the number one economic priority and how it fits with previous Conservative descriptions of efficiency savings as fictitious. Alistair Darling and Vince Cable made these points, but neither landing a knock-out blow on Osborne.
So now it is on to the leaders’ debates. Will David Cameron make important policy announcements on the days of the debates, so he has something to focus on, as George Osborne did? Will Gordon Brown and David Cameron give Nick Clegg as easy a ride as Vince Cable enjoyed? If they do, the Liberal Democrats will emerge as winners from the debates and, assuming their target is a hung parliament, possibly in the election too.
Tony Dolphin
Some commentators on last night’s Chancellors Debate have suggested that it lacked a bit of spark and drama – including, it must be said, my colleague Tony Dolphin (see 2 posts below).
