Labour party

‘Governing from the middle for the middle’ was the message of Nick Clegg’s unapologetic speech to Lib Dem conference. His effort to redefine the Liberal Democrats continued as he tried to move the party away from its traditional yoghurt-weaving concerns and instead focus on appealing to ‘alarm clock Britain.’ Clegg’s view is that the left wing protest votes that the party used to get are gone for the foreseeable future, repulsed by coalition, and that the Lib Dems need to reach out to new voters. The calculation is that Labour is seen as being for those on benefits and the Tories for the rich, so the Liberal Democrats should try

Curiouser and curiouser. We in Coffee House have been saying for some time now that – whatever Mervyn King thinks – Britain has the worst inflation in the Western World apart from Greece. An OECD report out today shows we’ve got it worse than most eastern countries too. Korea, Turkey and Estonia are the only eastern nations with higher inflation: But what strikes me most about today is that food prices are soaring here, to an extent far worse than the rest of the world. This is what voters notice most: putting food on the table is very expensive. As Micawber might put it: annual food price inflation 6.3 per

Ah, there it is, in the final sentence of the fourth paragraph: a flattering reference to Ed Miliband. Phew. Good job David Miliband squeezed his brother’s name into his article on Labour’s future (£) for the Times today, otherwise it might have been July 2008 all over again. As it is, MiliD’s third newspaper article in as many days is enough to suggest that he’s keen to remain a prominent figure, if not yet an actual rival for his brother’s crown. In some respects, though, the recommendations made by MiliD are a challenge to his brother’s Way of Doing Things. His suggestion that the left be “an ally of wealth

Eric Pickles is no longer a genial giant. His speech to the Conservative Spring Forum was the rallying cry that many Conservatives in local government, some of whom will be scrapping for survival in May’s elections, have waited to hear.   ‘Ed Miliband,’ Pickles said, ‘is weaker than Neil Kinnock.’ The Labour leader could not take on his unions and militant councils, the Communities Secretaries said before turning an example: ‘Take Labour-run Camden. Ed Miliband’s local council. His councillors are cutting the Surma Community Centre, coincidentally visited by Samantha Cameron. Yet the council has spent twice as much on its town hall newspaper. His councillors are now cutting back tax

    You may notice that the Liberal Democrats don’t feature in the first two graphs of the by-election result in Barnsley Central last night. Or, rather, they do – they’re just subsumed under the ‘Others’ category, having finished in sixth place. Second in the general election, sixth last night. The 1,012 votes for the Lib Dems put them behind Labour, UKIP, the Tories, the BNP and an independent candidate called Tony Devoy. Their share of the vote has fallen by 13.1 points on last May’s result. This was an unequivocal, almost ritualistic, beating. Blood everywhere. And the other half of the coalition hasn’t escaped unbruised either. The Tories finished

Attack, attack, attack. That’s the temper of George Osborne’s article for the Guardian this morning, which sets about Labour’s economic credibility with a ferocious sort of glee. Perhaps the best passage is where he asks how many times Labour can spend their ubiquitous “bank tax,” but this is more pertinent to the recent debate: “Where does all this leave Ed Miliband’s newfound enthusiasm for the “squeezed middle”? Let’s pass over his failure in every interview to define it – his last effort included around 90% of taxpayers. Where we can all agree is that these are difficult times for family incomes. There are two root causes. One is global: rises

Ed Balls has been warming up to this one for a while, and now it has finally come: an all-out attack over rising prices. In an interview with the Sunday Times (£), the shadow chancellor warns of Britain’s “cost of living crisis,” and demands that George Osborne reverse the VAT increase. Much of his pleading is made on behalf of motorists, who – as I pointed out a couple of days ago – face punishment at the petrol pumps. He doesn’t even mention spending cuts once, especially not where his own party’s are concerned. Rising costs, clearly, are the new weapon of choice. And it’s not just Balls. Ed Miliband

Some speculation (£) today that the Office for Budget Responsibility will shortly downgrade its 2011 growth forecast – and hence the growth forecast in next month’s Budget. If so, then you can expect Ed Balls to crow on and on about it. He did, after all, prime the attack in his recent clash with George Osborne across the dispatch box: “With consumer confidence falling, with inflation rising, with no bank lending agreement, no plan for jobs, no plan for growth, no plan B – does he really expect us to believe he can meet this forecast for economic growth this year or will he have to stand here at the