John Mills is entirely correct to leave the door open, hypothetically, to a coalition between Labour and the Conservatives.
There are no specific terms on which it could be done in practice, just as there are none on which the Conservatives could form a coalition with anyone else, either.
Apart perhaps from UKIP, and it is now funny to mention that, just as some of us always predicted that it would become in the run-up to the General Election.
But to rule out any deal with "the Tories" absolutely and as a first principle is to treat them with a specialness that they do not deserve.
They have not won a General Election in 23 years, and the idea of a "National Government" with them is ridiculous when they are not a national party.
Moreover, they are no worse than either the Lib Dems or the SNP. Or, to put it another way, neither the Lib Dems nor the SNP are any better than the Tories. They must be given nothing that might enable them to suggest that they were.
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As Peter Hitchens says, they've been informally in coalition for decades. Both love the EU and bog standard comprehensive schools high taxes and weak justice, "childcare" and political correctness in all forms.
ReplyDeleteThe true opposition is elsewhere. The Greens and UKIP represent the real fault lines in public opinion.
We'll see about that when we see how many seats each of them has.
DeleteThe Establishment parties will unite to exclude Ukip. With the possible exception of the DUP, they are the party the Establishment hate most. (They don't really hate or fear the Greens.) This is especially true now that the Scottish Nazi Party have demonstrated that they're little more than a New Labour ginger group. (And I use the term 'ginger' advisedly.)
ReplyDeleteThat ship has sailed.
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