Corbyn's wishlist manifesto

It is strange to think that Jeremy Corbyn has become this popular. At the beginning of the campaign, the Conservatives were on 48% in the polls with Corbyn’s Labour in dire straits on 23%. However, over time, dissatisfaction with Theresa May’s often robotic and wooden campaign combined with the ambitious and hopeful vision of the future in Corbyn’s manifesto resulted in a surge for Corbyn. With his support climbing eventually to 40% on election day. Very close behind May and removing her majority. Now Corbyn views himself as a Prime Minister in waiting and has the momentum (no pun intended) with him. Recent polls conducted after the election have Labour on 45% and the Tories on 40%. A fairly substantial lead.

Corbyn regularly draws thousands to rallies.

On the face of it this seems to be Britain’s turn at an anti-establishment ‘rebel’ figure, ruled out of contention by many but whose charisma and promise of change attracted people in droves. Many have accredited this surge in popularity to an increase in the youth turnout, however turnout among young voters in still low, at 57%, whereas turnout amongst those aged 70+ is 84%.

The turn towards Corbyn has been one that has occurred amongst middle aged Britons, fed up with austerity and wanting genuine change after years of consensus politics. The manifesto seemed to be the turning point for Corbyn, and indeed this is borne out by statistics: 28% of people who voted Labour said they did so due to Labour’s policies, whereas only 10% of Tories did so.

However for all the ambition in Corbyn’s manifesto pledges, their compatibility with economic sense remained to be questioned. Take the issue of tuition fees for example, the main pledge which drew young people to support Labour and feel that Corbyn wanted to help them. Corbyn promised in his manifesto to remove university fees, and then said in an NME interview that he would, ‘deal’ with clearing student debt. Rayner admitted this would have costed £100bn, but played down Corbyn’s comments by saying that it was merely an ambition of his, not a promise. Corbyn himself denied ever promising to remove tuition fees but admitted that he was unaware of how large the student debt was at the time of the campaign.

On the Andrew Marr Show, Corbyn denied ever promising to abolish all debt from tuition fees.

This little mishap strikes at what Corbyn is doing wrong; promising popular things and not being able to pay for them. Corbyn’s manifesto may have been ambitious, but only because it can’t be paid for given our current economic status.

Labour supporters will be crying out, ‘It was a fully costed manifesto!’, and citing the statistics that were given. It is true that the manifesto was costed, and the Conservatives’ manifesto wasn’t. However the costings were deceptively simple. For example, Labour estimated that raising corporation tax would raise £19.4bn, and this was where the majority of Labour’s funds for the pledges came from. While it is true that raising corporation tax by 8% would achieve this, if business behavior acts as Labour expect it to after such a rise. Critics say their tax hike could cause capital flight that would lose the tax payer money

Another area they promised to get funds from is by being tough on tax avoidance, raising £6.5bn. Again, this raises money on paper but the reality is stark. It is almost impossible to close off all the loopholes that allow corporations to avoid tax, without interfering with the sovereignty of other nations. We should try to do more to prevent it, but it is extremely difficult to do without international co-operation, and even with it. Every government has tried to clamp down on tax avoidance, in many different countries, and it simply impossible to prevent it entirely or even partially to any meaningful extent. Unless you are of the opinion that the Tories allow corporate tax fraud due to the benefits that grants certain members of their party. However other progressive governments have had problems stamping out tax avoidance.

Labour’s high tax, high spend ways are not a sustainable way of running our economy

We have a debt that is 82% of GDP. The more money we spend every year having to pay off this debt, the less we have to spend on vital public services, and of course debt increases over time, since we still have a deficit. In the long term we need to rein in public spending somewhat, or grow the economy. The second option isn’t really viable since Brexit is likely to cost us a small chunk of our GDP.

Britain has one of the highest debt to GDP ratios in the world

The Conservatives are not any better on finances. Their plans for a hard Brexit are estimated to cost the UK 3.5% of its GDP, which will sorely hit public services much more in the short term and long term, whereas Corbyn’s will hit Britain in the long term. However this cannot excuse Labour’s shortcomings.

The fact is that Corbyn’s sums don’t add up. Labour’s public image on finances are not improved by leading figures such as Diane Abbott appearing confused and stumped by questions in interviews. It seems that Labour don’t seem to care about healthy public finances and ensuring debt is not passed onto the next generation, and care about short term pledges to win votes.

This seems to be working electorally, due to Theresa May’s incompetence especially on Brexit. However if Corbyn manages to be realistic about finances, he may stand a better chance of running a successful government.

#JeremyCorbyn #LabourParty #2017GeneralElection