It is clear that Keir’s mission to restore trust in public life has only made preliminary progress. Nonetheless, something very like a political genius is emerging from the chrysalis of his first months in office.
It is well known that the older people get, the more conservative they become. Keir’s strategy of releasing prisoners, giving asylum seekers the vote, and encouraging illegal immigration is now matched on the other side of the register by helping on their way the hobbling, wobbling, trembling, Tory-voting, benefit-scrounging, NHS-devouring pensioner population.
The Government have artfully concealed this “punishment beating of pensioners” (Edward Leigh) as a fiscally-driven measure to “fix the foundations”, “end the Tory chaos”, “restore stability to public finances”.
That argument is contestable. Several speakers pointed out that cancelling the payment may save £1.5 billion but it will tip a million pensioners into poverty – and when they take up Pension Credit it will cost £3 billion to save that £1.5.
However, there is an obvious counter.
They won’t be claiming Pension Credit if they’re dead!
None of the Government MPs or ministers had the wit to make this point. When they do, it will to shift the polls. A healthy majority of the UK electorate secretly hate the old, – the canceling of their winter fuel allowance is the most likely policy to deliver another landslide with extra rubble come 2029.
The Tories don’t see it, either.
Shadow Pensions Mel Stride opened his Opposition Day debate with some soaring, Trades Hall rhetoric invoking the semi-mythical Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee. Their scrutiny had not been invited and no impact assessment published to reveal the wickedness of what opposition parties affect to think of as an abhorrent and dishonest proposal to means test the benefit.
Labour’s Mike Amesbury spoiled Mel’s moment by asking which Tory minister when in government had called for this very means testing. There was a pause while Mel looked around for the answer. He decided not to claim the credit. He continued with train drivers, trade union paymasters and “We are the party of triple-lock plus!” He meant it as a good thing.
The Tory’s Ancient of Days, Edward Leigh, while recognising that Labour had guaranteed they wouldn’t do what they had now done, observed that increasing the state pension every year was the route to national bankruptcy.
The Conservative known as Dr Johnson demonstrated how bankrupt the party already when she told the House, “The first job of government is to keep people safe”. The allure of fascism is latent in the political mentality of all parties.
Ed Miliband arrived on the front bench towards the end of the debate, lured in perhaps by reference to his Great British Energy company “bringing down the price of electricity”. Ed is close personal friend of the prime minister and a key part of the elimination strategy.
It defies the laws of physics let alone economics, that more wind will reduce bills. A massive increase in renewable energy will see whole retirement communities turn into a deep-frozen necropolis. The only way poverty-stricken pensioners will keep warm is by huddling together in the local crematorium.
It’s taking Labour election strategy to a whole new level.
PS: Candidates for metaphor-mixing awards are “balancing the books on the backs of pensioners” (Kirsty Blackman); “a sticking plaster solution of kicking the can down the road” (Andy Mcnae) and “we should not listen to their crocodile tears” (Paul Waugh, getting one of the loudest cheers of the day).
