Last Straw

Mar­ina Hyde on New Labour’s rela­tion­ship with money:

It is dif­fi­cult to think of a more per­fect test­a­ment to New Labour’s intel­lec­tual shal­lows. On the eve of the most deadly ser­i­ous budget in dec­ades, Gor­don Brown posts a You­Tube video in which he announces he has sched­uled some inquiry — pre-empting debate about MPs’ ­expenses. It might as well have been cap­tioned “I can haz bathplug?”.

MPs’ expenses are a cross-party blight, of course. But when his­tor­i­ans come to assess this edi­fy­ing period for our demo­cracy, they may well remark upon what a pity it was that cer­tain mem­bers who were so fas­ti­di­ous about their per­sonal out­go­ings were so prof­lig­ate and laissez-faire with the pub­lic purse. Olympic over­spends, a couple of wars – they waved through the lot while per­us­ing the John Lewis elec­tric­als catalogue.

New Labour just looked like … well, small-time crooks is the expres­sion … And in the end, it’s the small­ness of these people that you can’t get away from.