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Decisions, decisions...
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I've just submitted the following to a thread on the Telegraph's Speaker's Corner , which asks us whether we think John Redwood's tax-cutting proposals will persuade folk to vote Conservative:
"Just as the Wilson/Callaghan era needed a Margaret Thatcher to restore common sense and sanity, so the Blair/Brown era needs an equivalent.
(Brown the Roundhead's wearing of not-made-in-Blair-Land clothes should fool no one, since it was he who used pensioners and taxpayers' money to bankroll one botched, half-baked, misguided project after another. He deserves a lengthy period in the political wilderness to reflect on the enormity of what he and his Laughing Cavalier predecessor inflicted on Britain, leaving an angry resentful population, cynical about politicians of all colours).
The present tax -cutting proposals are welcome, and will help re-connect with traditional Conservative voters who are not all in their dotage. But piecemeal tax cuts are not enough: the Tories should aim to become the June 1st party, that being a target for Tax Freedom day, presently postponed till July 23rd, thanks to the ex-Chancellor and his predecessors. The aim should be small, lean, financially-astute, ruthlessly-cost-cutting Government in which not every other person in the country is on the Government payroll.
There is one other nettle that Cameron needs to grasp if he is to restore confidence in his stewardship. He has to address the legacy of Blair's typically messianic pledge to have 50% of our youngsters in higher education. Yes, I know it's a separate issue, but it's the source of much that is sick in our society.
That pledge looked superficially attractive when first announced, at least to the gullible, but as we now know it was a poisoned chalice, only being possible by youngsters being forced to buy £20,000 of chips on tick to be able to play in Nu-Labour 's employment casino . That's the one with the slogan: "Get something better than a McDo job - at an eye-watering entry fee - and even then you'll have to be lucky."
See what you have created, Mr. Blair, Mr. Brown - a generation of youngsters for whom adult life on the 18th birthday requires immediate decisions that could make or break their entire careers, indeed lives ? How many of us would opt for university, if it meant starting one's working life with £20,000 of graduate debt ? But what are the alternatives ? A job at the minimum wage, with few if any career prospects ?
Welcome to Blair/Brown's Brave Nu-World of opportunity, provided you have a degree from an "old" university, and your Dad has contacts to get you into that vital first job, so you can then start repaying that mountain of debt.
Is it any wonder that so many youngsters, especially on the estates, shrink from adult life and its responsibilities ?
Thanks to that pledge, we have also seen the inevitable proliferation of third-rate universities, devaluation of degrees, and with it, the perception that non-graduate employment means failure, such that we now have to rely on Polish plumbers and other immigrant workers to fill the gap. They prosper, as well they should, while our disaffected youth congregates on the estates, taunting those who still have property to protect.
Don't hug a hoody, Mr. Cameron. Give him a decently paid job, with prospects, that is within his capability, backed up with day-release training. Don't let employers skimp on that - use a carrot-and-stick approach.
Scrap the Blair madness that requires youngsters attend their first job interview clutching £20,000-worth of largely useless paper. Then maybe you will start looking like a credible Prime Minister-in-waiting, with John Redwood as your red-in-tooth-and-claw Chancellor."
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