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Tax, Labour and cynical deception

By Daily Mail Comment
Updated: 16:44 EST, 1 April 2010

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Rattled: Lord Mandelson

Yesterday, an uncharacteristically rattled Lord Mandelson accused 23 business leaders who wrote a letter applauding the Tory plan to halt most of Labour's National Insurance increase of falling for a 'cynical deception'.

Never mind the fact these captains of industry - who denounced next April's one per cent rise as a 'tax on jobs' - were later backed by every major business group in the country.

Never mind that the real 'cynical deception' is Lord Mandelson's insistence that the Tories are promising a 'tax cut'.

Rather, shadow chancellor George Osborne is vowing not to implement a tax increase which Labour is planning, but - crucially - has yet to inflict on millions of workers and employers.

The most insidious deception of them all is Labour's claim that it is impossible for the Tories to reduce state spending (and thereby find the £6billion required to prevent the punitive NI rise) without hurting the NHS, schools or policing - all of which could make sensible savings without in any way harming efficiency.

As Next boss Simon Wolfson says: 'The principle is a very simple one. It is a question of, do we pay for government profligacy through increased taxes or do we urge them to save money in a way that businesses have?'

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True, the Tories have not yet been entirely candid or open about the scale of the cuts required after the election to reduce Britain's £1.4trillion debt.

But at least a clear election choice is emerging. On one side are the Tories, backed by wealth-creating private sector bosses who had to make cuts to survive this bitter recession and who, in many cases, have emerged the stronger for it.

On the other stands Labour, committed to never-ending spending on the bloated public sector, and its paymasters, the union barons who yesterday threatened 'very difficult' industrial disputes against any party which dares to make cuts.

The stakes could not be higher.

A rotten affair

Even by the standards of a Government that sexed-up dossiers on the case for war, the story of how officials of that bullying social engineer, Ed Balls, manipulated a supposedly-independent Ofsted investigation into the Baby P scandal is deeply shocking.

At one stage, his civil servants even urged Ofsted to 'beef up' a paragraph about Haringey children's director Sharon Shoesmith so Mr Balls would have an excuse to sack her.

Doubtless the ambitious Mr Balls hoped that, by removing Ms Shoesmith, he would ingratiate himself with the red-top tabloids baying for her head.

But the result of his incompetent and unethical interference is that the box-ticking Ms Shoesmith, herself guilty of neglect and incompetence, will almost certainly receive £1million for unfair dismissal. What a rotten state of affairs.

An open verdict

Truly, the line between censorship and Press freedom is frighteningly fine. Witness Simon Singh, the science writer who has spent £200,000 of his own money fighting a ruthless libel action brought by the British Chiropractic Association.

Mr Singh insists that his comments about the BCA were 'fair comment'. Justice Eady ruled they were facts. Yesterday, three of the country's most senior judges backed the writer.

But had the Appeal Court gone against Mr Singh, it would have been a blow to journalists' freedom to comment.

The courts - in the words of the Lord Chief Justice, Lord Judge - would have become an 'Orwellian ministry of truth'.

Their decision is a small but significant victory for a more open society.