The Economy

Debate between Lord Clarke of Nottingham and Tom Brake

Thursday 4th June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Kenneth Clarke (Rushcliffe) (Con)]

I congratulate the right hon. Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband) on his forceful and good speech, and on his resilience in coming here and facing the House with such dignity and distinction. I, too, pay tribute to the way in which he fought for his principles and his cause in the election. Indeed, it causes me slight annoyance that in the leadership election that has broken out in the Labour party, some of the people who a month ago were his greatest admirers, his most loyal colleagues and those closest to his cause are now busily detaching themselves and attempting to scapegoat him for the problems that the Labour movement experienced.

In my opinion, for what it is worth, the right hon. Gentleman fought a very good election campaign. It was much better than anybody expected, because of the expectations that the tabloid press had raised. I thought he put the message across very well. I thought the message was wrong, and that was the judgment of the majority of constituents in my constituency and my part of the world. It is not the case that his performance had anything to do with the result. Apart from the great events in Scotland—[Hon. Members: “Hear, hear!”] Apart from the remarkable, almost bizarre, events in Scotland—the SNP is equalled only by Syriza in Greece on economic policy—and the very welcome events in the south-west, which were also very unkind because I lost many good colleagues in government as a result, the underlying basis of the majority that we won, to most people’s surprise, was the judgment of sensible people on economic competence and our record on the economy.

I do not think the election campaign made very much difference to the result one way or the other. My part of the country, the east midlands, is thick with marginal seats. We won all of them and added gains by taking back Derby North. In the end, people saw what we had inherited economically and what we had done over the previous five years. They recognised our economic competence and accepted the message that the job had to be completed. When listening to the Labour party’s message, however it was presented, they simply decided that they could not take the risk of changing the Government. When the problem arose that the SNP would apparently be able to hold a Labour Government to ransom in what was bound, because of the tsunami in Scotland, to be a hung Parliament if Labour won, that made a little bit of difference, but the result was mainly down to economic competence.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

Does the right hon. and learned Gentleman feel that in individual constituencies, particularly Liberal Democrat-Conservative marginals, the fact that his party was often outspending my party by a factor of perhaps five to one made any difference to the election result?

[Mr Clarke]

I look forward to a little party political debate with the right hon. Gentleman again. As I have said, what decided the election was the coalition Government’s extraordinary record. It was a particular tribute to my right hon. Friend the Chancellor, closely assisted, as he said, by Danny Alexander, the former Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey, who was an excellent Chief Secretary, in getting the affairs of the nation back in order and steering us to some of the most successful economic results in the western developed world, which is what we have now.

What concerns us now, in this Parliament, is what judgment the public and history will make of this Government when they look back in five years’ time, or whenever. That will crucially depend on whether we finish the job and deliver the modern, more balanced, competitive economy that will give our children and grandchildren greater security and a better quality of life. That is the task we have set ourselves, and it is not going to be easy.

At the moment we are all enjoying the hubris of victory, as far as my party is concerned, or the relief of being back here just opposing, as far as the Opposition parties are concerned. On the surface the task looks easy, because at the moment our economy is growing more strongly than almost any other in the western world, employment is soaring because of our flexible labour market, which we should keep that way, our inflation is low, and real pay is at last beginning to rise as the benefits of recovery get through to every level of society. However, it would be a false assumption to think that it is plain sailing from now on, that everything will continue in that way and that the risks have vanished domestically and abroad, so we can take easy measures to reward those who voted for us. The world is not like that.

I take encouragement from what I took to be the Chancellor’s message. He has announced a July Budget, because he wants to take the opportunity while the economy is growing to take some of the tough and difficult decisions that the Government still have to take. I certainly encourage him to do so. In my part of the world—Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire, the east midlands—the people who voted for us knew that there were still tough and difficult decisions to take. They were not seduced by the speeches of those whose only examples of what they intended to do were ways of spending money or rather short-term popular things. The sooner we get on with tackling the underlying problems—including, as my right hon. Friend the Chancellor has reassuringly just confirmed, the debt and the deficit—the better we will be able to get on with all the other things that need to be done, which will enable our economy steadily to get back on to a stronger and more secure footing.