It was never going to be a good spell in UK politics but with overlay of continuing dismal winter weather it ended feeling particularly gloomy . None of Britain's diminished political leaders can be proud despite some smirks flitting across faces. Miliband's anyway. Cameron has forgotten what they feel like and Clegg remains too ashen to lighten further.
The gloom started ten days ago when fearless David Cameron walked out of talks between the three party leaders' ( a term which we always use loosely) talks on Leveson inspired press controls saying that no way would he support the proposed (already repressive) measures being backed by statute. From that moment on everyone knew he would give way. He almost always does. He must have been inspired in his childhood by the grand old Duke of York.
What followed over the weekend was the most astonishing scene of Cameron withdrawing from centre stage and allowing the final compromise negotiations to be conducted by Ed Miliband, in his impressive House of Commons office, with the pasty faced new best friend for the day Nick Clegg at his side and beyond him, almost off the table , the Tory lightweight Oliver Letwin who had been given the task of attending by the sleeping or sleepwalking Prime Minister. It was a masterpiece of positioning by Miliband, naivity by Clegg and a disaster for Cameron.
Taking Cameron first. Having made his line in the sand statement on Thursday night in the full knowledge that it would probably lead to defeat in the Commons on Monday, he should have stuck to his position. It would have enabled him now and in the future to say that it was he and the Conservative Party who resolutely opposed statutory press regulation while the two parties of the left, (Old) Labour and the LibDems promoted it. It would have cost a defeat right now but built a platform for the future. As it is all that he can say now that he didn't actively support it,-whatever it eventually turns out to -but when the crunch came he stood aside, let it happen and actually signed up to the deal brokered between the parties of the left and the self interested ( are we allowed to say that now?) pressure group Hackedoff. The mark of a man of conviction and determination? No.
Allowing Miliband to chair/lead the meeting was crass and showed almost unbelievable political naivity and lack of understanding. It was the hallk of a man relatively new to the Commons (one and a half terms so far) and not hardened in the battles and cut and thrust of the place. It allowed Miliband to look almost Prime Ministerial and certainly in control of the process while he, Cameron, if awake, looked on from the sidelines.Where were his advisors or even the office boy? What has happened to the Conservative machine?
We will skip quickly over Nick and the LibDems. Their role, again orchestrated by Miliband, was to appear as fickle chancers in coalition with one lot one day and daytripping with another the next. How the LibDems can claim to be liberal when they repeatedly back centralist and illiberal policies has always been a source of amazement but that's what they do and seem to find no contradiction in it.
Miliband is extremely well advised on tactics and his party machine is way better than Cameron's so that was another good weekend for him. He has no problem with illiberal moves on the press. Labour have never much liked them anyway and have always wanted to see the jackals better "controlled" and unable to speak too freely, particularly if they revealed embarrassing shortcomings or inconsistencies in party people or policies.
So much for the individuals. Now for all the politicians there that night and in the shadows behind them collectively.
As a group, politicians like spoiled celebrities, love to bask in adulatory media coverage but find some investigative journalism embarrassing . They have never liked some of their social or professional activities receiving critical or questioning public airings. All that embarrrasing stuff about expenses, carryings on in the ( £5 million+ subsidised) Palace of Westminster places of refreshment or even the occasional office table. Really not stuff the electorate should know.
On this occasion the left slipstreamed behind public concerns about press misbehaviour including possible phone hacking and unjustly publishing unfounded conjecture about some of the people involved in murder and other cases. There are laws to deal with this anyway as Cameron should have realised before laying down and then stepping on the Leveson bananskin The Labour and LibDem behaviour was totally cynical opportunism at its worst . The final act of thrashing out a deal between a Miliband, Clegg and , part time, Letwin on one side of the table and a bunch of luvvies representing one pressure group on the other was extraordinary. All the political parties should be ashamed of themselves,-but are not.
With all that out of the way for the moment, up stepped George Osborne with his latest budget. These are never merry occasions and last year , when he managed to allow several sensible and well intentioned moves be portrayed as horrifically unreasonable, was a particular disaster. This year, at least presentationally, wasn't as bad. The messages were downbeat and gloomy but not described as starkly as they should be to jolt public awareness that there simply isn't any money in the tin and that the ongoing rises in the total national debt make Labour's solutions of just borrow, borrow, borrow even less credible than they would be anyway. The real problem though is that ,other than good housekeeping, there is no overall political philosophy or vision behind it. Nor is there real understanding of what it takes to wield a real axe at Whitehall and its local satellites. The Tory leadership, especially in the form of Cameron and Osborne are totally without those insights. They are OK with the figures but see them in a two rather than three dimensional fashion . As result they are left unable to navigate an inspirational or even reasonably explained course out of the current backwater where Messrs Brown , Balls and Miliband Minor left the nation in 2010.
As yet the Conservatives have not come up with a proposition as to why they should win in May 2015 other than that Miliband, Balls and the unions would be infinitely worse. A good point, but probably not good enough over enough of the country to avoid swapping sides of the Commons aisle after just five years.
That was it then, but the week did have a couple of run-ons. There is the financial crisis in Cyprus where the EU hammered the Cypriots into an admittedly deserved corner primarily to save the Euro rather than the diminutive country. Meanwhile at home, Cameron resolutely declared a war on new immigrants receiving immediate benefits , priority on housing and the like once they manage to touch the UK Border signs with as much as a finger. That means nothing much is likely to happen, at least this side of the 2015 election and Labour and the EU will probably veto it anyway. Business as usual then, statements all over the place, nothing happening, no balls other than Balls. It's not been a good ten days,- and the winter has continued too.
Easter eggs around the corner? Don't bet on it.
