The general election is in full swing with the manifestos launched and all policies are in the open. The issues that have stuck the most so far have nothing to do with Brexit. Labour candidates have been tweeting that the public are very disappointed in the Conservative’s Social Care policy, dubbed the ‘Dementia Tax’. Fox hunting has also been a key issue that has affected the Conservative’s lead over Labour drastically.
Whilst the polls cannot be entirely trusted, the latest YouGov poll shows Labour’s deficit to the Conservatives has been cut to single figures.
Along with shortening odds amongst the bookmakers, current trajectory levels would see Corbyn elected as Prime Minister.
Damian Green quizzed by Andrew Marr
The social care plan proposed by the Conservatives doesn’t tackle the issue of basic funding, this is according to the Institute of Fiscal Studies (IFS). They warned on Friday that the complex manifesto promise will not tackle the underlying problems of the funding and would force more elderly people to pay for their own care. Some households will be better off because of threshold increase to £100,000 but the overall system would be less generous. It fails to tackle the “insurance problem” and that mean more would have to pay for the ever-increasing costs to social care.
This morning Pensions Secretary, Damian Green, was quizzed by Andrew Marr and didn’t really have an answer for the lack of costings on the Conservative manifesto and said that this weekend will “focus peoples’ minds” on the election. Stated that some pensioners would still receive the winter fuel allowance but the removal of it from most will free funds for social care, he clarified that the Conservatives would consult on who gets the allowance.
He was further quizzed over the Conservative’s U-turn on social care policy from the 2015 manifesto, and after being asked why should people vote for Conservatives when they are facing a hike in care costs? Green responded by claiming it was a ‘much fairer system’ and that it will allow people to pass on £100,000, even though it has been shown that this will not be the case as firms would be able to extract the equity and wealth after death.
Even the centre-right Conservative think tank, The Bow Group, labelled the policy as a stealth tax.
Green ruled out the Conservatives having another look at the social care policy, he said to Marr “No. What we said in the manifesto, to put that no in context, is that we have set out this policy, which we are not going to look at again.” Boris Johnson may not share the same view though after stating to Robert Peston, that he “understands reservations” about the policy and that “there will be consultation on getting it right”.
Jeremy Corbyn with Sophy Ridge
Meanwhile Jeremy Corbyn has been on Sky with Sophy Ridge and then receiving a rock stars welcome as he visits a Libertine's gig at Tranmere Rover’s stadium, Prenton Park in Wirral as gig goers treated him to a Seven Nation Army style chant.
Corbyn defended Labour’s immigration policy but didn’t specify numbers, he said “Freedom of movement obviously ends when you leave the European Union because it’s a condition of the membership”, further adding “I want there to be fair immigration based on the needs of our society. That is the proper way of approaching it.”
After being pressed on the issue by Sophie Ridge, he clarified that he didn’t want to get into numbers because he doesn’t think it works like that. Further echoing the response by Barry Gardiner who stated in an interview with LBC the other day, that Labour would put the needs of the economy first. Sophie Ridge asked if he wanted “numbers to increase or decrease”, Corbyn replied “What I want is a society that works and what I want is fair migration. “It’ll probably be lower but I don’t want to start making predictions on that because the issue has to be the needs of our economy.”
