Progressive Nick?

Nick Clegg’s article in the Guardian last week surrounding the issue of equality and his favourite catchphrase ‘fairness’ has finally laid bare his ideals for the more progressive and fair society he campaigned with such vigour about earlier this year. For many who chose to vote for him in May this may well leave as bitter a taste as his and the Lib Dems decision to raise tuition fees.

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Clegg states that “Social mobility is what characterises a fair society, rather than a particular level of income equality.” As many progressives know social mobility is essential in creating a more equal society but as Clegg fails to ascertain it is only truly beneficial, never mind plausible, in a society with high levels of income equality.

The UK currently finds itself with its largest ever gap between the richest and poorest in society and thus a very low level of income equality. With Clegg’s refusal to support greater income equality by deeming supporters of maintaining the 50 pence high tax rate as ‘old progressives’ he fails to understand that without it social mobility is nigh on impossible.

The closer the income gaps in society the easier it is not only to climb up the salary scale but to come down. The higher the income gaps the harder it is to step up, no matter what tools are in place, and more importantly the harder it is for the highest to come down. Also Clegg’s inability to talk about how, if at all, the UK’s tax system needs reforming highlights how he is in favour, systematically at least, of the status quo.

But of course does the ConDem government really want greater equality after all??? For as George Eaton stated in relation to Clegg’s article in the New Stateman “greater inequalities of outcome make it easier for rich parents to pass on their advantages to their children.”

As coincidently many of the government happen to be millionaires who are privately educated we can rest assured that the ‘new progressives’ may well be new but are in no way progressive.

New is the New New

We were trying to write a short paragraph to sum up this blog and came across a problem. As we were attempting to pick appropriate adjectives we suddenly became aware that we sounded eerily like the Conservative manifesto. For a leftist blog this was a slight concern. Were we Tories all along? Luckily I have a politics degree so went through my extensive notes and happened across the answer below:

Great, that proves it then. Definitely not Tories. So why does every attempt to describe what we believe in sound like the result of some sort of overpaid PR yuppie? The answer unfortunately is that modern political debate has descended into lowest common denominator newspeak that is so simple it means everything and therefore nothing. The simplest message not only can be understood by the most people, it is also harder to challenge. A great example of this is “change”.

Change is generally used to combat incumbent administrations and was used effectively both by Obama and David Cameron. You can’t argue against change. Everyone wants it. If I lived under a government that gave me alone one million pounds a day I would still want change. I would want a million and one pounds a day.

“Progressive” is the newest gem. In the 90s Clinton’s New Democrats found that if you are “new” you are again beyond criticism. New has no precedent that can be held down and scrutinised. This was then copied by New Labour and then again by David Cameron. However, Labour’s new third way was very different to the modern Conservative approach. Whilst they genuinely tried to reposition themselves to straddle the centre ground (leaving them with an ideological deficit), the Tories have instead adopted the language of progressive politics without changing at all. This does mean though that occasionally they tie themselves in knots though. They are carrying out age old Tory policy under banners of “choice”, “responsibility” and “progressive politics”. The ConDem coalition helps them immensely in this regard as it can be sold as a new progressive system of government.

So where does that leave the young writers of a blog who find party politics unrepresentative of their knowledge and beliefs, who are trying to engage in a genuine debate to find left of centre answers? Well just as that sentence demonstrates, by using words like “engage” and “genuine debate” it leaves them looking like a bunch of Tories.