Cameron’s own ticking time bomb

Posted on November 29, 2008 by bobpiper

I have written here on numerous occasions about the way in which politicians, Labour, Lib Dem and Tories, seem to spend their time appealing to a very small section of the population. The centre swing voters.
Blair was very successful at doing this. He knew the ‘tribal’ working class Labour voters, like their Tory upper middle class equivalents, were not his real target vote. Although there would be exceptions in both groups, within their constituencies they were not significant enough under our present voting system to swing an election.
The target were those upper working class, aspiring middle class voters, who exist in significant numbers, and because they were considered more politically aware, may switch their vote based on their perceived self-interest, or a feeling of what was politically or morally right.
David Cameron, to his credit way in front of many of his Party colleagues, also knew that this was a strategy he needed to use. All his appeal on the ‘green’ agenda, and on ‘fairness’, ‘compassionate Conservatism’ and ‘equality and diversity’ were not aimed at Lord Tufton-Bufton in the Tory Shires. Tufton-Bufton’s vote was already in the bag. No, Cameron’s strategy targeted those Blair had won over in 1997. The teachers, college lecturers, doctors and nurses, local government professionals. Drag them away from the Lib Dem sandal wearers and the Blairite New Labour ‘project’, and a Tory majority starts to look like a genuine prospect. And it has started to work. The opinion polls have been showing it for a couple of years (ignoring the Brown ‘bounce’ over the Summer of last year). As I say, it is not to every Tory’s taste… but they don’t matter. Blair had demonstrated with the Clause 4 moment, you can take some liberties with your core vote.
But last Monday, David Cameron for all his talk of ‘bombshell’s’ on the economy, dropped a ticking time bomb under his own strategy, which in all the heat of the economic debate went almost unnoticed. Speaking to the Greater Manchester Chamber of Commerce, Cameron pledged a future Tory Government to end the final salary pension schemes of millions of people in the public sector. The very teachers, academics, civil servants and health workers he has spent three years buttering up to.
It is a very bold move. It will play well with the ‘tribal’ tories who perceive an injustice in the way the state feather bed’s public sector workers. It will even play well with the shop assistants, factory workers, and warehouse workers (but most of them are the instinctive Labour voters who have benefited from the minimum wage – opposed by the Tories). And it will have an appeal to the accountants, IT workers and other private sector aspirants. But for the six million voters in the public sector, it is the kiss of death, and Labour and the Lib Dems will milk it for all its worth.
So, the question is really, have the Tories deserted their Blairite strategy to win over middle England? Or are they hoping to shift tack and rely on an appeal to a different section of the aspirant working class? Whatever the strategy, it is bold… and very, very risky.

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8 Responses to Cameron’s own ticking time bomb

  1. godzilla says:
    November 29, 2008 at 8:58 am

    No it isnt. Middle Britain has had enough of gold plated indexed linked pensions for civil servants and public sector workers, the cost of which is spiralling out of control, whilst the poor old person with a private pension has seen it cut to ribbons by this Govts economic mismanagement. Cameron will certainly end it for MP’s too. I think hes on the right side of the argument and that it will be a very popular policy.

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  2. Bob says:
    November 29, 2008 at 9:24 am

    People tend to vote on self-interest. Ending someone else’s pension provision, believe me, will not be high on their radar. But for the six million losers…. they have got a personal motivation to vote against the Tories.

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  3. Clive says:
    November 29, 2008 at 12:07 pm

    The public sector pension issue is going to haunt whoever forms the next government. The differential between public and private sectors is now so great, and the public sector bill growing so large that maintenance of the status quo will become more and more difficult. I don’t know what impact Dave’s idea will have on his party’s popularity, if only because no one (Dave and Gideon included) has any idea what the detail of this “policy” will be.
    But, there are a lot of people out there who have seen their employers final salary schemes wound up; who have seen their personal pensions eroded by Brown’s taxation changes; who are facing the prospect of working life out to keep life in. And it is creating a “them and us” mentality even in somewhere as staunchly socialist as Barnsley.

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  4. Bob says:
    November 29, 2008 at 1:31 pm

    My point on this Clive is about whether it will affect voting intentions. I can’t see a welder from Barnsley determining his voting intentions inside the polling booth on whether or not someone who works for the local DSS office has a final salary pension scheme or not. That is not to say he or she may not resent it…. but decide their voting intention? I can’t see it.
    But if the welder is married to a teacher, not to mention the DSS clerk and their family, it may be the overriding issue for them if someone threatens to change the terms of the superannuation scheme they have already been paying in to for 15 years.
    And I know it has happened in the private sector…. but those who administer private sector pension schemes don’t stand for election.

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  5. Clive says:
    November 29, 2008 at 3:53 pm

    I can certainly see your point Bob, though being brutally honest, most of the people working in the public sector would vote Labour regardless of the candidates and their policies. So a Tory policy which emasculated public sector pensions wouldn’t have any real effect here. Other than to perpetuate the local hatred of Tories.
    But I wonder if it would have any real impact on voting intentions one way or another. Though if the Tories were to link scaling back public sector pension schemes to a cut in council tax then I reckon blinkered self interest might kick in.

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  6. Rob Atkins says:
    November 29, 2008 at 4:32 pm

    It may be risky Bob, but I agree with Clive that the public sector pension issue is going to haunt whoever forms the next government. Brown severely damaged the private pension industry as Chancellor, creating a “two tier” system that is patently going to be difficult to sustain. The fact that MPs and civil servants, who make the law, are feather-bedded while most members of the public are not, adds to the perceived inequalities and the sense of people protectuing their own interests. perhaps Cameron has made a mistake by mentioning it before the next general election : I’m sure Mandelson’s advice to Brown would be to say nothing on this (and on other unpalatable realities) until after the election and then just do it. What do you think ?

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  7. Bob says:
    November 29, 2008 at 5:39 pm

    Rob, being a cynic by nature, I suspect that if Brown was considering it he would not be as daft (honest?) as Cameron to promise people he would reduce their pension entitlement. Your mention of the civil service response makes me think that they would do a hell of a lot to scupper an Government trying to attack their superannuation scheme.
    Clive, my whole point was that Cameron has gone out of his way to seduce the public sector vote away from Labour and the Lib Dems – turning up at doctors and nurses protest meetings, for instance. Believe it or not, it is upward of six million votes. It might not matter in Barnsley, mate, but it plays pretty damn big in Swindon and Southampton.

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  8. godzilla says:
    November 29, 2008 at 6:17 pm

    Its going to be difficult… but it has to be done.. for the sake of our children and our children’s children. Its a monetary time bomb that has to be defused. As for the politics of it, yes in certain quarters it will be very unpopular, but with Private sector final salary schemes being closed at an alarming rate and a lot being dumped on the pension protection fund, the status quo is unsustainable.
    Difficult times ahead but the bullet has to be bitten. Typically Brown dodged it.

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