Closing the gap?

Only if the gap is between David Cameron and Nick Clegg. Watching the latter on the Andrew Marr show this morning, I am a little bit bewildered. Was he floating a balloon or did he really say the health service (at all levels, it sounded like to me) was to be funded by a top-up to local income tax? If the latter is the case I can only think one of two things – either the Liberal Democrats have come up with one of the most divisive and least progressive policies of modern times, or he is using the trite language of localism to make what he thinks are meaningless statements. Either way he looked pretty cheap.

So, if cash for the NHS is to be raised locally, presumably on a local authority basis if it’s to be a top-up to local income tax, how is that possibly going to be a progressive policy? Of course funding of the health service has to reflect local need. But would it be fair if they were funded locally? Take the former coal mining areas. They are doing much better than they were ten years ago, with far higher employment rates than seemed possible then. But are they, while working hard rebuilding their local economies, also to find the money to deal with the health consequences of fuelling Britain through most of the last century?

This sounds like a fairly solid example of a Thatcherite era Tory policy. Even if there is a safety net for areas with lower incomes, the gap will only get bigger when areas with better health and more money can keep their resources to themselves. Clegg always makes sure that he mentions his Sheffield constituency when he talks about his plans, in order to let people know that he could not possibly be a Tory. But that won’t fool anyone if he really starts to articulate these ideas.

But the other option is that he is just trying the easy hit of the language of devolution, and he doesn’t actually mean to announce such a policy. This is a pretty dangerous move. We need local leadership, and it needs to cover all areas, including health, as health is likely to be the main cause of social exclusion this century. What we don’t need is politicians of any party who are too ashamed and afraid of the power of central government, (and the arguments we have to have about how we use it), to narrow the gap in the interests of everyone.