The natural party of business?

I would like to recommend an excellent article I commissioned for Political Quarterly on Labour's economic policy.  Unfortunately, it is only free online for a fortnight: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/1467-923X.12963

It was interesting that in PMQs on Wednesday most of Keir Starmer's questions were in relation to impacts of government policy on business.  Given current tensions between the Conservatives and business, particularly over Brexit, this was part of an effort to show that Labour can be a business friendly party.  It may be recalled that one of Tony Blair's ambitions was to make Labour 'the natural party of business' as well as 'the natural party of government'.

Keir Starmer is encountering choppy waters.  He has boosted Labour's poll ratings by nine per cent by not being Jeremy Corbyn and being competent.   However, that is not enough to pull ahead of the Conservatives, particularly given Labour's weakness in Scotland.

He does across as rather wooden and Boris Johnson's jibes about reading from a brief hit home.

It might be asked why the electorate are not more annoyed with the Government for errors made in handling the pandemic.  First, it is evident that the electorate are prepared to cut them some slack as it was a difficult and unprecedented situation to deal with for which the preparation had focused on the wrong target (a 'flu pandemic).   They are not convinced that an alternative decision-maker would have done much better (although Labour's comments about 'inconsistent messaging' may gain traction).

Second, they consider (with some justification) that the government machine in general might be deficient for handling this situation - not unreasonable given the tendency of central government to operate in 'silos' and a reluctance to let decisions be taken at a local level where there is often more immediately relevant expertise.

Some home truths about the strength of the Conservatives here from Ben Jackson: https://politicalquarterly.blog/2021/02/05/any-illusions-about-the-conservatives-being-swept-from-office-should-be-abandoned-now/

How much would independence cost Scotland?

The LSE's Centre for Economic Performance has published a report suggesting that independence would hit Scotland two or three times harder than Brexit: https://cep.lse.ac.uk/_new/publications/abstract.asp?index=7714

This is, of course, disputed by the SNP who argue that an independent Scotland would be able to attract more inward investment.

Much would depend on any independence settlement, but I would expect England to strike a hard bargain.

This suggests that there might be a case for a two stage referendum: one on the principle, and one on the negotiated settlement.   Of course, as we know from Brexit, identity politics can trump economic calculations.