22 Nov 2019

General Election 2019: week four

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Military and fighting metaphors abound in election campaigns. In the last couple of weeks we have seen both the Conservative and Liberal Democrat leaders appear for the cameras in boxing gloves to make some point or other about being ‘up for the fight’ and ‘taking the fight to their opponents’.

This week, in the build-up to the first televised debate of the election between Messrs Corbyn and Johnson, we heard a lot about fights, boxing matches and knockout blows (and afterwards, the lack thereof). Warning – you can expect much more of this kind of talk (including from me…).

Perhaps the imagery makes it all seem more exciting than the hard, grinding reality of campaigning for both the participants and those (especially in the media) who follow them. At least in the last few days the leaders have managed to move away from a complete dependence on staged events with the launch of the manifestos by Labour and the Liberal Democrats. So have any of this week’s events shifted the dial?

First off, the ITV debate and a personal confession – I find these events hard to watch and have a deep scepticism that the public learns much from them. Disputes about participation and formats in advance, instantaneous polling on who won and heavy spinning by the parties afterwards, all combine to create a huge amount of distracting noise and obscure the substance of the exchanges themselves (or maybe that reveals that I spend too much time scanning Twitter.)

Despite my fears, I do realise they matter. In the past I have been part of prepping teams that spent days working through the key messages to deliver, the strongest ‘attack lines’ on opponents (there we go again) and defensive ploys (ditto). Even in my own modest experience of appearing on run of the mill editions of Question Time, the amount of preparation time was enormous (not that this was always obvious after the programmes went out…).

Why all of this? Because a big mistake, or loss of concentration, can create a substantial problem for the politician, their party and the election outcome. Playing it safe, maintaining discipline and surviving are the basic objectives, which can be easier for the less flamboyant to achieve than others. An understanding of these pressures by the parties and the media added a critical dimension to the build-up and post-event analyses this week – could Mr Johnson stick to a script and could Mr Corbyn add some energy to his public persona?

It turns out they could, so each modestly beat pre-match expectations and, while lacking any decisive breakthroughs, they avoided any significant damage to themselves and live to fight (indeed) another day. Like a five-day Test draw or a low-scoring baseball match, the aficionados probably enjoyed the encounter more than most of the voters, but it was a test and they both passed (the perceived margin hugely dependent on personal political inclinations).

Surviving matters, but safety-first is not exactly inspiring for voters. If inspiration is to happen, then the obvious starting point is in the manifestos. And if the early indications are accurate, then I think this time round the parties might just pull it off, assuming radicalism can inspire (or, more neutrally, perhaps, at least galvanise) voters one way or another.

Certainly the Labour, Liberal Democrat and Green manifestos have not lacked bold ideas. We will turn to a detailed analysis of the main programmes when all of them have been published (and in time for our webinar on Monday 2 December – registration details here). But already we can ask whether there has been an election in modern times where the parties’ spending plans have been on this gargantuan scale. Where the modern take on capitalism has been so openly challenged? And where upending the existing tax system enjoys a significant degree of consensus?

The huge caveat here is that the Conservatives may revert closer to the long-term mean in each of these areas, but as I have observed in previous weeks, relative to previous manifestos of theirs, the spending and tax commitments already made seem likely to be on an unprecedented scale. The unexpected reversal by Mr Johnson of the Conservatives’ pledge to cut corporation tax, when, of all places, he was addressing the CBI at the start of the week, seems to reinforce the direction of travel.

And so, with three weeks to go, the dial may not have been shifted yet, but the engineers are hovering - if it is to happen, now may be the moment to expect movement in voter engagement and perhaps voter intentions, too.

Michael Moore
Director General, BVCA


Poll Watch

Party manifestos are coming at us thick and fast. With three weeks to go it’s fair to say the campaign has now started proper. As Michael mentioned, we’ve also had the first TV debate between Boris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn, and this evening a further TV outing for party leaders on a Question Time special.

Britain Elects Poll of Polls

The Britain Elects Poll of Polls has shown some movement over the last week. It was at about this time into the 2017 election campaign that Labour started to rein in the Conservative poll lead. Any indication of that bounce in the 2019 campaign is difficult to see (poll accurate as of 5pm last night).



Manifesto watch

It’s Time for Real Change - Labour’s 107-page manifesto.

The manifesto outlines plans to nationalise rail, water, energy, mail and parts of BT, introduce a financial tax and scrap current form of entrepreneurs’ relief.


Taxation pledges

  • launch a National Transformation Fund of £400 billion and locate it in the North of England

  • create a National Investment Bank, with a network of Regional Development Banks to provide £250 billion of lending over 10 years

  • create a Local Transformation Fund in each English region

  • reverse Conservative corporation tax cuts but maintain rates lower than in 2010

  • earners of more than £80,000 pa pay more income tax

  • freeze National Insurance and income tax rates for everyone else

  • ensure tax on income from wealth does not get preferential treatment over income from work

  • launch the biggest ever crackdown on tax avoidance and evasion and reform the inefficient system of tax reliefs


Corporate Governance

  • require large companies to set up Inclusive Ownership Funds. Up to 10% of a company will be owned collectively by employees. Dividend payments will be distributed equally, capped at £500 a year. The rest will be used to top up the Climate Apprenticeship Fund

  • require employers to maintain workplaces free of harassment

  • amend the Companies Act

  • require one-third of boards to be reserved for elected worker-directors

  • introduce a public interest test to prevent hostile takeovers and asset-stripping

  • give workers a voice on public bodies such as the CMA

  • allow struggling companies go into protective administration

  • require all employers with over 250 employees to obtain government certification on gender equality

  • by the end of 2020, lower this threshold to workplaces with 50 employees

  • extend pay-gap reporting to BAME groups and tackle pay discrimination on the basis of race

  • commit National Investment Bank to addressing discrimination in access to finance


Innovation

  • create an “innovation nation”, setting a target for 3% of GDP to be spent on R&D by 2030

  • will achieve this by increasing direct support for R&D and reform the innovation ecosystem to better ‘crowd in’ private investment

  • fund R&D into newer technologies like hydrogen and carbon capture and storage


LibDems Manifesto ‘Stop Brexit, Build a Brighter Future’

Less than Labour with 96 pages with promises to revoke Article 50 and deliver a Remain bonus to the economy. Other pledges include:

  • pledge to extend activities of the state-owned British Business Bank

  • commit £5 billion of initial capital for a new Green Investment Bank, using public money to attract private investment for zero-carbon priorities

  • reform the British Business Bank’s support for venture capital funds to enable it to help funds ‘crowd in’ new backers rather than acting as a funder of last resort

  • commit major banks to fund the creation of a local banking sector devoted to meeting the needs of local SMEs

  • extend the scope of the existing ‘public interest’ test when considering approvals for takeovers of large or strategically significant companies by overseas-based owners to recognise the benefits to the UK economy, workers and consumers of protecting UK companies from speculative or short-term interests


Taxation

  • increase Corporation Tax from 17% to 20%

  • abolish the separate Capital Gains Tax-free allowance and instead taxing capital gains and salaries through a single allowance

  • simplify business taxation to lower administration costs

  • replace Business Rates in England with a Commercial Landowner Levy

  • fund HMRC to reduce tax gap and introduce a General Anti-Avoidance Rule

  • improve the Digital Sales Tax and support the OECDs proposals on multinational taxation

  • end retrospective tax changes like the loan charge


Corporate Governance

  • require all UK-listed companies and all private companies with more than 250 employees to have at least one employee representative on their boards with the same legal duties and responsibilities as other directors

  • introduce a general duty of care which would require companies to report their actions

  • new rules to ensure that all companies have a formal statement of corporate purpose

  • require binding and public votes of shareholders on executive pay policies

  • require organisations to publish parental leave and pay policies

  • aim for 40% of board members being women in FTSE 350

  • extend the Equality Act to all large companies with more than 250 employees


Boris wooing business

This week the Prime Minister unveiled several business measures, including a review of the business rates system in England (expected in the first Conservative budget), a reduction to national insurance contributions, as well as tax cuts to stimulate construction and research. Investment in infrastructure, education and technology, Northern Powerhouse rail, modern road junctions, buses, and a pledge that every business should have the convenience of gigabit broadband and 5G technology.

He also announced a Conservative government would postpone further cuts in Corporation Tax and cut business rates further for SMEs and hold a review of the tax overall.

Liberal Democrat London surge

A recent survey shows swings in marginals where three parties are in with a chance of winning. All three are London seats that were closely fought between Labour and Conservative in 2017. Whilst exciting for west London, the Liberal Democrats are unlikely to replicate this support nationwide.


Commentators' corner

Each week I pick a blogger/commentator who has something interesting to say about the campaign and the election.

This week, it is Professor Sir John Curtice, the legendary polling expert. Sir John Curtice has put the chances of a majority Labour government at "almost zero" based on the current opinion poll trends. He also suggests around 13% of voters don’t know who to back: “There is not a vast army of ‘don’t knows’ hiding in the details of the polls. Moreover, there is little sign that the undecideds are more numerous than at the same stage in 2017.” However, considerably more women (19%) than men (8%) say they don’t know. And with Boris Johnson’s perceived ‘woman’ problem that could cost the Conservatives votes. Read more about Sir John’s analysis here.

If there is anyone you would like to suggest, then please share with me. Or, if you have any views or insights on the election trail, then don’t be shy, send them my way.

Lisa Hayley-Jones
Director of Political & Business Relations


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