According to a Press Association report today, the Shadow Secretary of State for Business Industry and Skills has said the bottom line for a deal with the other political parties would be adherence to the Conservatives planned deficit reduction programme, involving early massive cuts in public expenditure.The timing and scale of public expenditure reductions is a defining difference between the Tories and the other main parties, and Clarke has also expressed doubt that these would accept the Tory proposals.
However, a legacy of "moral hazard" (see below) also applies to much of the public - and publicly funded - sectors under New Labour. In short, there has been a great deal of profligate spending and too little accountability when things have gone wrong. The problem is that the casualties of public spending cuts will not be, in the main, the people who made the wrong decisions.
Nevertheless, I do very much support Conservative proposals to scale down The Quango State, although even Mrs Thatcher found this difficult. Nevertheless, as a previous Chancellor of the Exchequer as well as Secretary of State for Health, I do regard Ken Clarke as someone capable of administering radical surgery of the kind most people accept is required sooner or later.
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