One of Sparrow’s rules of political journalism is that is often an inverse correlation between the newsworthiness of a speech and its quality. Today’s speech from Ed Miliband is a good example. The main announcement in it, the tax break for firms that pay the living wage, or the “make work pay” contracts as Miliband calls them, came at the weekend and, in story terms, it’s a bit thin.
The comments about payday lenders may make the news, but one journalist at the event said on Twitter than Miliband did produce a story until he revealed in the Q&A that he had recently spoken to his brother.1 Yet it’s a very good speech because it tackles the Conservative charge that he is anti-market head-on and makes the case for market intervention in language that is clear and engaging (and relatively free of the usual bombast and hyperbole).
Here are the main points.
Miliband mocked David Cameron for thinking the cost of living was not related to the state of the economy.
Now, David Cameron said recently that I wanted to talk about the cost of living because I didn t want to talk about economic policy.
So we have a Prime Minister who thinks we can detach our national economic success from the success of Britain s families and businesses.
He doesn’t seem to realise that there is no such thing as a successful economy which doesn’t carry Britain s families with it.
And he obviously doesn’t get that the old link between growth and living standards is just broken.
He said living standards, and whether they are rising, is the most important test of economic policy.
The first and last test of economic policy is whether living standards for ordinary families are rising.
He said government had to “permanently restore the link between growth and living standards for all of Britain s working people”.
He accused the Conservatives of being ideologically committed to the economic model that led to people being on low wages.
Listen to their silence on our plans for a living wage.
Nothing to say.
On the falling value of the minimum wage.
Nothing to say.
On zero-hours contracts.
Nothing to say.
On the exploitation of low-skill migrant labour which undercuts wages.
Nothing to say.
They re silent because of what they believe in.
In his speech to the Conservative Party Conference, George Osborne described my argument that they believed in a race to the bottom as something straight out of Karl Marx and Das Kapital.
No.
He s wrong.
It is about what is happening in this capital city.
Right here.
And towns and cities across the country.
Right now.
Now, they think that this low wage economy is the best we can do.
Because they believe doing anything about it means intervening in markets in ways that we shouldn t.
He said that David Cameron’s willingness to defend energy companies meant that consumers were facing a “Big Seven” (Cameron and the “Big Six” energy firms). Labour was giving MPs a chance to vote on its plan for an energy bill freeze in an opposition day debate tomorrow, he said.
Miliband defended market intervention. All markets had rules, he said, and all governments, including the coalition, intervened in markets. The difference between Labour and the Tories was not about whether to intervene, but how to intervene, he said.
A dynamic market economy, with profitable private sector companies is essential for creating the wealth we need.
But markets always have rules.
The question is: what do those rules allow?
And what do they encourage? …
All governments set rules for what they want to see.
This government does intervene in markets but in the wrong way.
They make it easier to fire people.
Water down rights for agency workers.
Turn a blind eye to the failure to pay the minimum wage.
Pushing companies to compete on low wages, low skills and worse terms and conditions.
They introduce tax cuts for the richest.
Defend bonuses for the bankers.
Stand up for a powerful few.
Supporting their belief that wealth will trickle down from those at the top to everybody else.
Don t believe it when they say they are stepping away, they are stepping in all the time, stepping in to stand up for the wrong people.
He described the rise of payday lenders like Wonga as “one of the worst symbols” of the cost of living crisis.
Last night the boss of Wonga said he was speaking for the silent majority , who are happy with their service.
But the truth is he wants us to stay silent about a company where in one year alone their bad debts reached 120 million.
An industry in which seven out of ten customers said they regretted taking out a loan.
With half saying they couldn t pay it back.
Payday lenders don t speak for the silent majority.
They are responsible for a quiet crisis of thousands of families trapped in unpayable debt.
The Wonga economy is one of the worst symbols of this cost of living crisis.
He said that Labour would introduce “make work pay” contracts giving 12-month tax breaks to firms paying the living wage as soon as it was elected.
He accused Cameron of being more rightwing than former Conservative prime ministers Stanley Baldwin and John Major.
This power station was built in the 1920s after a Conservative government intervened to fix a broken energy market.
That government, of Stanley Baldwin, knew that if government didn t fix broken markets, nobody else was going to.
Stanley Baldwin knew it.
John Major seems to understand it.
But David Cameron doesn t.
His response to Labour s energy price freeze shows how out of the mainstream he is.
He took issue with the whole idea of government intervention in a broken market.
He said there was no need for Labour to reopen its inquiry into the alleged vote-rigging in Falkirk. He had responded to the allegations “swiftly”, he said in the Q&A. Mr Miliband said he believed Mr Darling meant “that we should look at any new evidence” and that had happened.
He said that the local party was already in special measures and that he was bringing in fundamental changes to relations with the unions. “I am absolutely determined that we do not have a repeat of Falkirk anywhere,” he added.
Ed Miliband delivering his cost of living speech Photograph: /BBC News
References
- ^ one journalist at the event said on Twitter than Miliband did produce a story until he revealed in the Q&A that he had recently spoken to his brother. (twitter.com)
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