The New Government
Osborne and Laws gave an impressive and coherent performance at their news conference today. There is something refreshing about any new government and the new dynamics of coalition make this one especially impressive. The last time that there was a real sense of getting to grips with intractable problems was in 1951. The Conservatives came back to power not promising to roll back the boundaries of the Welfare State, but to make it work. This they did quickly and it gave them three election wins. Since then new governments have come to power when there have been pressing issues to deal with, but nothing on the scale of the bleak austerity, food was still rationed, of 1951. Until now.
What faces us now is bigger than we can imagine. Today a start has been made on saving money and cutting down government. The pain is yet to come. It will be a huge test of government resilience, parliamentary cohesion and public acceptance. On a recent radio programme I heard a distinguished elder statesman and an academic discussing the summer reading for MPs who wanted to mug up on the working of coalitions. Names like Pitt, Charles James Fox, Peel and Disraeli were discussed together with their various biographies. It was very wise and learned but I felt missed the point.
Britain is now different. It is no longer a country of empire, of aristocracy and class, of establishment or tradition. It is a country of celebrity and innovation, looking forward with very little collective knowledge of what has gone before. It is a Britain where British does not mean English. It is a Britain in which people are informed, through new technology, by each other and not by those in authority. It is a Britain where citizens, most of them, feel they have a stake and that their own interests are paramount.
The aspiring new MPs will need to look to the here and now for their inspiration. J.K Rowling has blazed for them a more modern literary path than Trollope, though both use symbolic fiction to make social commentary of their times. There are moments in history, not many, when what has gone before has little connection with what is due to come. This is one of those moments. The exciting thing about this government is that there are signs it knows that. It will be interesting to see if Parliament is up to speed also.