Behind Abbott’ s interview blunder is a sensible and costeffective policy
By Matthew Clifton
This week Diane Abbott unfortunately was let loose onto the radio and her interview was about as successful as a 10 care pile up. However, if you look at the details and beyond the interview and the costing drawn up by Labour, it shows an effective method. Meanwhile Theresa May would probably be happy about the coverage Mrs Abbott was getting because she has been under fire this week over her campaigning.
The policy in question is the promise that Labour will put 10,000 extra police officers on the streets. Raising questions about how it will be funded.
Labour outlined that it will be funded by reversing the cuts in capital gains tax( CGT) made by George Osbourne in April 2016. Firstly, the figures show that in 2017 / 18 it will cost £ 64.3 million for a police recruitment drive, then a further £ 139.1m, £ 217.2m and £ 298.8m in 2018 / 19, 2019 / 20 and 2020 / 21 respectively. This total £ 771m, or almost £ 800m, the figure cited by media outlets. Whilst this seems like a lot, according to page 85 of the treasury’ s 2016 red budget book, reversing the cuts would yield £ 2.745 billion over the course of 5 years.
The common argument against hikes in taxes such as these, is that companies wouldn’ t want to invest in the country. However, that doesn’ t make sense considering the cuts in CGT happened in 2016, meaning it was 6 years of a Conservative government who pushed heavily for global investment irrespective the cost to the taxpayers. The number of officers on the street peaked at 143,770 in 2009 but fell to 122,859 in 2016 and it was Theresa May as Home Secretary who authorised a 18 % cut in police funding. Whether there is link to the recent rise in gun-crime to the number of police on the street is debatable and as the Guardian pointed out, gun-crime a decade ago was more prevalent.
However, the crimes aren’ t secluded to just the violent kind and there are other kinds of violence other than guns, knives and common assaults. There is sexual assault and within the society that often blames rape victims, more police could deter in the worst hit areas. There could be better responses to domestic abuse call-outs, as often officers arrive after the incident and are unable to make an arrest if the victim is too fearful to speak out, along with faster responses to burglaries etc.
The numbers make sense and the reasoning isn’ t as simple as preventing gun and knife crime, that can only be truly achieved through education. There are other factors involved but at the time that Labour announce this policy and Diane Abbott made a series of blunders in the interview. Theresa May continued her private tour of the country by visiting Cornwall. Where she banned local media coverage of the event, she has no real
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Issue # 2, 22 nd April
plan and will continue to cut public services. May’ s continuing inability to convey a real message and the series of closed events outlines her contempt for democracy, fairness and equality.
A local election brief
The local elections by many were going to be an indicator over how well Jeremy Corbyn was doing as Labour leader. But this was always going to be the wrong way of looking at them. It should be an indicator of how the public feel about politics itself and as the results prove, no-one cares that much about national politics, let alone global politics. The result isn’ t who won or who lost but who turned up to the voting booth.
The west of England Metro Mayor election saw a 29.72 % voter turnout for a significant position, the Metro Mayor controls a budget of £ 1bn and chairs the new West of England Combined Authority. Bristol is traditionally very politically active but only saw 31 % turnout for the vote with the general election being touted to have overshadowed the local elections. Manchester saw just 28.93 % turnout to vote Andy Burnham as Mayor, who will have substantially more powers than London’ s Sadiq Khan over the city itself.
The problem with reading too much into the local election results, traditionally a lower turnout favours the Conservative Party. But also, the lack of voter turnout highlights the feeling that people either don’ t think how much these make a difference to areas or don’ t feel like their voice is being heard. Significant reform is required and education on local elections and the importance of them to the community.