George osborne

It's not just Ed Miliband who’s facing pressure over HS2. George Osborne’s famous political antennae must be twitching furiously by now  — does he really want to be the last man in England backing this? Alistair Darling’s case (£) reeks of cold logic: he has become the latest public figure to withdraw support for HS2 because the costs now outweigh the benefits. The facts changed; he changed his mind. This is what rational people do. Unless you’re ideologically wedded to the idea of HS2, then there’s now not much grounds for supporting it – as a glance at the latest the Institute for Economic Affairs report attests.

I have never quite understood Ed Miliband's appeal. He always reminds me of Cuthbert Cringeworthy from The Bash Street Kids. I find it hard to imagine him becoming Prime Minister. Something just feels wrong about that. I'm not alone in wondering about this. Brian Wilson, the former energy minister, wrote yesterday that Miliband still has a kind of credibility problem. People just don't think he's quite ready for the top job. They may not be able to say exactly why they're unimpressed by Miliband; they just know they are. Not so fast my friend, responds John McTernan today. Ignore all the chattering and blethering about Labour's slide in the polls and focus on the core picture: Miliband is still likely to be leader of the largest party after the next election. Everything is fine.

As if many true blue parts of England didn't dislike the Chancellor enough, today's Financial Times adds to his misdemeanours renewed support for High Speed 2. Their splash (£) reports that despite fresh concerns from Treasury officials over the sums, George Osborne is still pushing ahead with the new line. According to the pink 'un, Osborne sees the project as 'an emblem of the coalition's commitment to spread growth more evenly across the country'. I'm sure many of his fellow Tories will be disappointed that he isn't backtracking instead. Osborne's rallying cry doesn't drown out the scary new figure that the FT has for the cost of HS2.

Fresh polling (£) from The Times and YouGov today says that the Tories still have much work to do to convince voters that they will directly benefit from an improving national economy. The good news for the Conservatives is that confidence in the economy is up. Nearly a third of those polled think that they will be ‘satisfied’ with the economy this time next year. This is a eleven-point jump from the last time the question was asked in June — and a steady trend upwards over the last year: But only 16 per cent think that their personal finances will get better over the next 12 months. On pay, 58 per cent of those working full-time and part time (more than eight hours a week) believe their pay will go up by less than inflation, or go down.

Shale has been back on the front pages this week, with exploratory drilling at Balcombe in West Sussex and Lord Howell offending sensibilities north of the Watford Gap. The leading column in this week’s issue of the Spectator makes this point: ‘Lord Howell’s comments add grist to the arguments of those who complain that the government only supports fracking when it is well outside Conservative constituencies. This is an impression which the government needs to correct very quickly by supporting the case for fracking in Sussex — where this week celebrity protestors have joined locals to oppose an exploratory test bore for oil and gas (not yet involving fracking) — every bit as much as it supports fracking in the Labour heartlands of Lancashire.

In the last few months, the Tories have--quite deliberately—behaved like an aggressive opposition. They’ve sought to constantly attack Labour, trying to force them onto the back foot. Even with David Cameron and George Osborne away on holiday, the Tories are determined to keep doing this. On Wednesday, Grant Shapps will launch the Tories’ summer offensive against Labour. He, in the kind of language more commonly used to promote summer horror films than a political agenda, will invite voters ‘to imagine a world where Ed Balls and Ed Miliband end up back in Downing Street.’ This is all part of the Tories’ efforts to link Miliband to Gordon Brown and memories of the last Labour government.

Hooray for George Osborne! I never imagined I’d ever write those words, but George has done his country a great service. He’s put £60 million behind one of the most inspiring British inventions of our age: Skylon, a space plane with a revolutionary new engine. When Skylon’s up and running, it'll be able to transport satellites – well, anything -- into orbit for a 20th of the current price, and go at a scorching 3,500 mph. It’ll be the envy of the world – which sounds like hyperbole, but isn’t. The Spectator championed Skylon four years ago, pointing out that the world is on the brink of a new space race, and that the UK could lead the way, if only our government only had the balls to back British invention.

The Spending Review was a political device that the chancellor clearly hoped would get him through to the end of this parliament. But if the spin doesn’t match the realities of life, I don’t think the public will buy it. A big risk for both governing parties is that high increases in the cost of living define the next election. The Liberal Democrats cling to their £10k personal tax allowance as the policy that will get them through the general election in 2015, and the dry-run coming in next year’s local elections. 10k’s a natty round number that’s easy to remember, and I would be the first to admit that straight forward practical solutions that the public can understand are important in politics.

The Labour party used to joke that the Tories would act as their cleaners: win, take the political pain, abolish the deficit by 2015 and then hand over a balanced budget when they lost the election. George Osborne has, at the very least, put paid to that. His Spending Review this week made it clear how painfully little progress is being made. Whoever wins the next election could close every school, open every prison, cede Northern Ireland, close every embassy and sack every soldier, sailor and airman — and it would still not be enough to put the government back in the black. Britain is a terrifyingly long way from fiscal sanity. If the Chancellor had actually cut the government machine when voters expected him to, the pain would be almost over by now.

Boris Johnson's powers of persuasion have once again wooed George Osborne. In today's spending review, the Chancellor has put aside £2 million to investigate Crossrail 2 — a new underground line for London. The fact the Mayor was able to bag another win from Osborne — Crossrail 1 was protected from funding cuts in 2010 — is testament to the political power of both the Mayor and the capital. Boris doesn't even have re-election to think about this time. Crossrail 2 is key to Boris' London legacy.