It has been just short of a year since Cameron and Clegg formed the first formal coalition government in Britain since the days of Churchill and Attlee. With the country in a financial mess, the Conservative-Liberal Democrat partnership has promised reforms to the voting system, reforms to the banking sector and a reduction in the national deficit through cuts in public spending.
The coalition started well, setting about making new promises to combine the two parties’ key interests: the priority being the national deficit. It was formed smoothly and in the Queen’s Speech declared a “radical programme for a radical government”.
However, not even one year later after the promise of 23 bills and plans of reform, Britain is already noticing some of these promises are in fact no more than empty words. The most infamous being Nick Clegg’s broken promise to scrap university tuition fees.
In an interview with students on the BBC he justifies his actions as a consequence of a coalition government: “By definition, if you haven’t won an election, and you’re having to compromise with another party, it means you can’t introduce every policy. I won’t apologise for nonetheless in those very difficult circumstances, producing a system for the future of universities…”
Understandably the Lib Dems have had to compromise with the Conservative-led coalition, but if this is the future of British politics, where do we draw the line between election propaganda and party manifestos? Was there any truth behind the election pledges? In recent decades it appears that broken pledges are not unusual. Back in the 1997 election, New Labour under Tony Blair spoke those familiar words “education, education, education”. New Labour then pledged not to levy tuition fees and again, after the 2001 general election, top-up fees were introduced – which they had pledged not to do.
In 1997, the Chancellor (Gordon Brown) promised there would be no rise in income tax. Although no promise was technically broken, it still took two years for the government to change the policy. Almost ten years later, Gordon Brown promised “no return to boom and bust”, when only a few years later Britain was plunged into an historic recession, the cause of many public spending cuts today.
Although the coalition has let the country down on some policies, it has stuck to its word on the promise of a referendum regarding electoral reform. The coalition has also not cut back on NHS funding – there has in fact been a 0.1 per cent rise (some argue this is not enough to cope with new technology or the strain of a longer living population).
There are still four more years until the next general election is called. Is it possible the coalition can hold onto the public’s trust, even with the pressure of Labour picking up on every broken promise? As to date, Ed Miliband has accused the government of breaking promises ranging from a fair fuel stabiliser to health, education and even the child benefit.
Regardless of events in the next four years, it must be asked how the public are going to elect the next government in 2015. If AV is used in the next election, it is more likely Britain will have another coalition, which will be forced to compromise with other parties holding a majority. Even with First-Past-the-Post, it will be hard to trust election promises since all three major parties have broken their word in the past decade. Broken election promises are certainly something of past politics, but with recent circumstances it seems to be certain in the future too.
Claire Phillips
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