From Canary Wharf to Bournemouth

And it's nothing to do with the Labour Party Conference. I was training some wonderful people from KPMG at the weekend and tomorrow I have the privilege of teaching 14-year-olds at Avonbourne School on the south coast. I hope I can park.

Another man on a journey from the City to the playground is Vince Cable, a man who wants to be Chancellor of the Exchequer. His speech last week scored top marks for intellectual incoherence in my fantasy politicians-against-the-wall league. Two sentences stood out.

"There is a gulf between socialists and liberals. Gordon Brown has a deeply
ingrained belief in the capacity of the State to achieve both massive and subtle
social transformation; and in the capacity of armies of civil servants to
improve lives and change behaviour."

Sounds like liberalism to me. But the speech which surrounded this claim
would have inspired Labour Conferences of the twentieth century. We had:

"greed and reckless gambling by overpaid executives"
"the poor are hounded for small over payments of benefit and the super rich can pay no tax"
"lax, indulgent bank regulation"
"the reality of modern Britain in which amoral and anti-social behaviour by the super-rich is given free rein"
"our country is turned into the world’s super casino for speculative investors"
"accountants, "consultants, and contractors are laughing all the way to the bank."
"another expensive gift to the wealthy is non-domicile resident status"

Cable blamed Gordon Brown for failing to regulate against people taking out high levels of personal debt and, bizarrely, for failing to prevent that property speculation which leaves houses empty. He reiterated his commitment not to cut overall taxation.

Can Liberal Democrats and Socialists possibly have more in common? Cable himself has the answer:

"In one respect, however, we share the same philosophical ground: a commitment
to social justice. And here we have a paradox. No British prime minister
since Lloyd George has preached about social justice with such fervour. But, Mrs
Thatcher’s legacy of income inequality has been respectfully left alone. Wealth
inequality has actually widened considerably since the Tories left office, on
the back of inflation in land, housing and financial assets. The voters have
noticed. Our poll shows that two-thirds of voters believe the earnings gap
between rich and poor has widened in the last decade; three-quarters that the
wealth and property gap has widened."

So let's summarise. Vince Cable has a deeply ingrained belief in the capacity of the State (his policies) to achieve both massive and subtle social transformation (reversing a thirty-year trend in the distribution of wealth); and in the capacity of armies of civil servants (whom he is not intending to sack) to improve lives and change behaviour. I'm glad we got that clear. He thinks the problem faced by the poor is that other British people, with land, a house or shares have got richer in the last decade. If you're an old-fashioned leftie planning to share my queue into Bournemouth tomorrow morning - sorry, you're a week late.