It would of course deliver environmental benefits as industrial “farming” is to a large extent propped up by the taxpayer, given the huge costs it entails, which agribusiness generally can’t pay for.

You’re very right, donpaskini, to further say that the money spent on ill thought out welfare to work schemes is actually far more than the dole. It seems to appeal to people’s vindictive instincts against those who have the temerity to be out of work, rather than any desire to get people into sustainable jobs. But we find ourselves spending a fortune on little or nothing.

You actually could make a bonfire of right-wing government spending inspired by the tabloids rather than any kind of sensible policy-making. I am not one of the Chris Dillow fan club, but he is right to say that a smaller state can often be more progressive, not less. But this is all to be fleshed out some other time- as I usually work on the early shift this is exceptionally late at night for me & I’m not feeling it right now!

Let us continue talking along these lines.

Agreed. Every word.

Agreed, this is something that libertarians and the Left can unite on.

“What improvements to schools and hospitals? I concede Labour has SPENT a lot of money on education and the NHS, but what actual tangible results has it had?”

It has had many effects.

Bringing the hospitals and school buildings up to modern standards instead of leaving them run down and leaking and depressing to use and difficult to maintain.

More doctors, nurses, teachers and all better paid.

More ancilliary staff including classroom assistants.

More and better nursery provision for more children.

Specific improvements in waiting lists and waiting times in hospitals.

Improved survival rates for some cancers

Better equipped schools.

Improved exam results.

More youngsters in university education and tertiary education.

probably more that I can’t think of at the moment.

In short, a better society (remember, that of which “there is no such thing…”?).

Now repeat after me “What have the Romans ever done for us….”

“So, in the context of a discussion about class war, if the left wants to wage one, where do the cuts come? If Martin Wolf is right, protecting front line services and avoiding cuts in housing, transports etc. can only be done by cutting wages in the public sector. How nuanced can a class war message be? Could the left accept that need for wage cuts in the public sector and still fight the class war? How can the class war be adapted to suit the current circumstance of inevitable fiscal tightening?”

Firstly, I don’t think the left should aim to wage class war. It should seek to make people aware that the Right is waging (and is planning to intensify) a class war, and to stick up for the working and middle class people who the Right is planning to attack.

In terms of how to reduce the deficit, I’d suggest taking the “easy” cuts – pull out of Afghanistan, cancel Trident, scrap ID cards and other vanity projects. Some wage cuts in the public sector, targeted at higher earners more than those earning the average or below.

And I think that “corporate welfare” is an area which could do with greater examination, as so much public money these days is in fact given to the private sector.

For example, thanks exclusively to public money which is meant to help unemployed people get jobs, Emma Harrison of A4e lives in a mansion and is “worth” £35 million. In a time of austerity, can we afford this kind of largesse? Can we afford to pay buy-to-let landlords tens of thousands to house homeless families?

have a read of this

especially this bit:

The second challenge is over the balance within the cuts. The government has decided to protect aid, health and “frontline” schools. Given the rise in debt interest and social security spending, this guarantees deep cuts in defence, transport, housing and higher education, as the Institute for Fiscal Studies points out. Yet this is irrational. It implies that spending on health and schools, at the margin, was much more valuable than in other areas, before the crisis. A better approach would be cuts across the board, but focused on the wage bill and poorly-targeted benefits.

there is probably scope to choose a higher level of taxes and a lower level of cuts (when they come) but I don’t think cuts can be escaped.

So, in the context of a discussion about class war, if the left wants to wage one, where do the cuts come? If Martin Wolf is right, protecting front line services and avoiding cuts in housing, transports etc. can only be done by cutting wages in the public sector. How nuanced can a class war message be? Could the left accept that need for wage cuts in the public sector and still fight the class war? How can the class war be adapted to suit the current circumstance of inevitable fiscal tightening?

Speaking as a hard-working entrepreneur, I’d laugh fit to bust if Labour ever represented itself as on the side of people like me.

Best stick to appealing to the unions. No-one else will believe you.

Such lessons from a bygone era show no understanding of basic economics, have little or no relevance in 2009 and are utterly irresponsible. Social unrest, here we come. Efficiency savings are one thing, but fiscal retrenchment now would be a disaster for ordinary people.”

The Tories are proposing to cut the wages and/or sack millions of working and middle class people – if that’s not an example of class warfare, what is?

As for “(interestingly not mentioning that Labour are also committed to doing this but not until after the election – not biased in any way?)”, Blanchflower and most economists would draw a distinction between cutting now and waiting until the economy is recovering.

What improvements to schools and hospitals? I concede Labour has SPENT a lot of money on education and the NHS, but what actual tangible results has it had?

And no, it has everything to do with whose side your on. The Labour party is (for the most part) on the side of working people the Tories are on the side of millionaires. If you think that Labour has done nothing for the working classes in the last 12 years your’re a blinkered moron. Who do you think benefited from the improvements to schools and the improvements to the NHS. Who do you think benefits from child tax credit? and who do you think benefitted from the minimum wage?

How is that about class warfare; it is a link to an article praising the PBR, and commenting on the inadvisability of cutting the state as the Conservatives propose (interestingly not mentioning that Labour are also committed to doing this but not until after the election – not biased in any way?).

Class warfare does not equal supporting or opposing a large state. There are perfectly valid arguments for small state socialism or large state capitalism (if we accept either of those as proxies for class warfare, which is probably unfair).

http://www.newstatesman.com/economy/2009/12/public-sector-spending

That’s facile. Labour has been attacking Cameron et al for their Etonian credentials purely and simply because of WHO they are, it has had nothing to do with whose “side” they’re on.

And in any case, New Labour’s track record hasn’t exactly been on the side of the working classes. Brown has been cosying up to the City for years, and only now has his moral compass suddenly spun 180. Nothing at all to do with the fact that the working classes have been deserting Labour in droves, of course.

In that case class war is a really silly idea, since everyone is on the side of the voter. After all, the point of class war is a dividing line, but if you can’t clearly distinguish between Mr Cameron as a toff and Mr Brown as a, well as a figure from the Scottish upper middle class establishment, because their backgrounds are irrelevant, all you’ve got to go on is there pronouncements.

Try selling people the line that the man saying he will tax everyone who does well is on their side. I doubt it will win many votes.

It’s not about where you came from it’s about whose side your on.

I’m Mr. Swing Voter, the kind of person Labour probably ought to be targetting. Who do you think is going to attract my vote: the party that tells me why I should vote FOR them or the party that tells me why I shouldn’t vote for the others? Labour needs to tell me what it is that’s so great about them instead of just flinging poo at the opposition. Negative campaigning isn’t effective and tends to backfire.

In any case, New Labour isn’t in any position to fight on the basis of class – the likes of Harriet Harman, Quentin Davies, Lord Mandelson and Shaun Woodward are hardly working class heroes.

One more thing: bashing bankers may seem very populist, and no doubt you relish it (many on the Left cannot resist being catty towards those who are more well off than they are) but consider that it is the bankers, and only the bankers, who can make good on all that cash that Brown and Darling splurged to prevent them going bust. Unless we want to see those billions of pounds frittered away, we need the bankers to succeed and pay back the bail out money. Taxing the hell out of them and bashing them in your manifesto doesn’t generally give them a great incentive to do that, Sunny.

Britons are more fairminded than they are tolerant of naked greed

Perhaps, and much of what Sunny says has some merit, or would do if the last 12 years hadn’t seen New Labour demolish any credentials of genuinely standing for the poor, vulnerable or dispossessed, as opposed to remembering them just months before an election.
It’s the phoniness and insincerity, the taking of the poor and vulnerable to be f***ing gullible and belief any old shite, despite the lived evidence and experience of the winner-take-all model of economy Brown promoted.
Yes, the Tories are vile toffs, but Labour can no longer be properly trusted to have principles, and certainly lack credibility as class warriors. They might be the nearest thing among the major parties, but that doesn’t make them the real thing. It might be hypocritical, but the UK public loathes phoniness.

Now, as far as emphasising policies that aim at the targets of popular rage rather than emphasising policies designed with ‘aspirational voters’ (whatever the Hell that means) goes… well, that’s just common sense right now. The swing voters have swung and will not swing back until they find themselves on the wrong end of the Tory axe. This leaves Labour will an obvious electoral problem, the only solution to which is to try to encourage more of the party’s weak supporters to go to the polls.