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I was moderately amused by an editorial in today’s Independent which basically called for David Cameron to spell out all his policies and how he was going to achieve his goals. It struck me as a very silly idea as the man is not in a position to know just how bad things are and will not until he gets to Downing Street.

If we add in the fact that despite the scale of the financial crisis that has hit this Country, it was only a couple of days ago that the Labour Chancellor Darling, said openly that following the election, massive cuts in public spending will be required.

The Electorate Know…

The reality is that we all know that there is the Big Problem the astronomical debt created by a desperate Brown Government trying to cover up its previous fiscal irresponsibility and fecklessness. But it is more than just that because there is also the underlying “structural deficit” that Brown has ignored. What do I mean by that ?

Even in a good year when the economy is buoyant and tax revenues flow freely, the Government is spending +50bn a year that it doesn’t have covered by income or assets, this has to be dealt with too.

After the Panto Putsch of last week, Alistair Darling and others have forced Brown to accept that whoever forms the next Government, there will be massive reductions in public spending and that will mean job losses. Brown is probably clinically insane so we don’t want another 5 years of him and the Labour Party is totally burnt out having followed a scorched earth policy in advance of a Conservative Government.

An Incoming Cameron Government

There is not a chance of Cameron introducing tax breaks for marriage or, cutting Inheritance Tax or indeed any other “Tory” aspiration, on getting into Downing Street. Getting the economy straightened out will be the priority and whatever is said now by any party, taxes will rise. Between the Global Crisis and Gordon Brown, there can be no “aspirational” aspects to the immediate future, National survival will be what it is about.

Cameron should only be talking about the themes and directions that he would want to take the Country in because it will be 5 years before he can even start down that road, he should avoid all “cast iron guarantees” or hostages to fortune when it comes to policies because it will be “events” beyond his or anyone’s control that will shape both the policy and policy delivery.

Cameron’s one key advantage is that he will come to Government with “clean hands”, the Conservatives did not cause this mess and therefore can be quite radical in resolving it because unlike Brown and Labour, they will not be hidebound by past bad decisions and therefore try to post rationalize them. This is important because if you think back to Brown becoming the Leader of Labour and PM, he was too stupid to realise that he couldn’t repudiate the previous decade when he was No.2 to Blair, he couldn’t change any major policy, he was the prisoner of his own past, he got the Job but not the Power, that had been frittered away already.

The Remedy

It is likely that the State will need to be cut back by 20 percent and regardless of whatever they say, neither the NHS nor Education are sacrosanct, the ‘knife’ will have to cut right across the board. As a Government, Cameron will not be able to avoid this but he will be judged by how “Fair” he is in spreading the pain evenly, introducing job sharing rather than job losses where possible. Encouraging substantial “volunteer” activity and tidying up the Statute Book to ensure that this can happen without the Red Tape so loved of Labour and Brussels.

The Social Security system needs a major overhaul so that people are encouraged and supported in moving from dependency to work and self employment. Governments can spend taxes wisely and create a favourable environment for business but it is only Businesses that can create the wealth the country needs, never the State. Forget the big corporations, what we need are small businesses and a fiscal environment that they can prosper in, most of our problems come from the State stifling this nation of shopkeepers.

Cameron is not an ideologue, he is pragmatic and that is what we need right now, someone who is prepared to think and act outside of the box. We do not need him to come into Downing Street with an armful of promises that just cannot be kept. The most ludicrous thing you hear are people trying to cost out this proposal or that which is totally irrelevant when Brown has spent all the money, sold the gold, in fact the only thing he hasn’t managed to do is lose the Crown Jewels in the Wash. Come to think of it, have they been checked lately, Brown could have replaced the Diamonds with paste copies by now !

I can quite imagine Brown sitting in his bunker holding on to a large Diamond, Gollum like – “One Diamond to unite them all ! It is mine, mine, mine…”