Cameron’s big society is just big talk – in reality, you’re on your own

By Ed Mayne

David Cameron has always struck me as a man of contradictions. He promises more “localism” but then says he’ll centrally impose a Council tax freeze on all local authorities. He says our deficit is too high but when Labour tries to reduce it through a small increase in National Insurance he opposes it. And now he is promising big society and small government.

This is all designed to show you that the Conservatives have changed after all. Forget “Broken Britain” and the “Age of Austerity“, for the time being anyway. The Tories are once again presenting themselves as the Blair-lite party Cameron had in mind when he became leader in 2005. Don’t be fooled.

The emphasis on “society” is clearly intended to distance the Tories from Margaret Thatcher, who once famously said, “There is no such thing as society”. However there is a second half to Mrs Thatcher’s famous quote that is usually forgotten. She followed this sentence by saying:

“There is living tapestry of men and women and people and the beauty of that tapestry and the quality of our lives will depend upon how much each of us is prepared to take responsibility for ourselves…”

And what is David Cameron promising in this election? Less central government and more power to individuals. The state won’t help you. You’re on your own. It’s Thatcherism, pure and simple.

Anyone who has read my previous posts will know that I am a strong advocate of localism. What David Cameron is promising today is not localism as I define it. It is a continuation of the Thatcherite policies of the 1980s.

When Mrs Thatcher said she had “rolled back the frontiers of the state” she had reduced state ownership but not state control. For all the privatisation she oversaw, the state regulations that controlled the newly created utilities made the state stronger than ever before. Devolved boards that ran nationalised industries were replaced by quangos and regulators.

And for all that Thatcher claimed to be “returning power to the people” – a phrase she often used – she actually did anything but. By greatly reducing the power of local government, aiming to bypass it in most cases, she made central government much more powerful. To give an example, after the Tories abolished the Greater London Council in 1986, London was governed by an unelected “Minister for London ” appointed by the Prime Minister.

Expect a similar kind of “localism” from David Cameron. For all that he claims to want to empower local communities and charities he is just increasing the power of the state at the expense of local government. The policies unveiled in the Conservative manifesto all rely on Westminster to empower – not the locality. The extra costs and bureaucracy needed to oversee these proposals will inevitably come from Whitehall. This makes the state even more powerful and it makes a mockery of Conservative plans to find even more “efficiency savings” than Labour. It simply isn’t possible and it certainly isn’t localism.

It is Labour that has done more for the cause of localism than any Conservative government. By devolving power to Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland and giving local people the chance to decide whether or not they have elected mayors, power is finally shifting from the centre. There is much more to do. But on this issue the electorate has a clear choice, Conservative gimmicks or Labour action. Only Labour has so far shifted power from Whitehall to the Town Hall while protecting the nationwide frontline services that are so greatly valued.

And as for council tax, this should be a choice for local people and their local councillors, not central government dictat. In Hounslow, where I’m standing as a local council candidate, Labour is campaigning for a council tax cut in the forthcoming local elections – to be held on the same day as the general election. The Tories merely want a freeze. This is the way to set Council tax rates – by giving the electorate a clear choice.

Call me a cynic, but if you ask me, all this Tory talk of the big society is just a PR ploy to take the media’s attention away from their hidden plans for the economy, tax and cuts. And judging by the amount of coverage this ludicrously flawed set of ideas has received, they’ve succeeded.