Prospects in 2009 for the “Do Nothing” Party?

2009 promises to be a fascinating year for UK politics watchers. One aspect I’ll be watching closely is how David Cameron and his team try to address the accusation that they are the “do nothing” party…

It was interesting watching and listening to Gordon Brown yesterday as he spent the entire morning at the BBC. First on the Andrew Marr Show and then as a guest on 5Live’s Gabby Logan, Brown frequently compared his action-orientated approach to tackling the economic downturn with what he implied was a “do nothing” approach taken by Cameron, Osborne and other leading Tories. At one stage, Brown even implied that senior Conservatives were revelling in the bad economic news. It was tough talk, but I found it resonated with me.

My uneducated reading is that Brown, Darling and Mandelson have managed to grab the headlines in the last month or two by taking direct action to address the deepening gloom. There is precious little evidence that their actions are having the desired effect, but even measures like the VAT cut will take time to feed through to consumer spending. I found it absurd (though vaguely amusing) that David Cameron should write-off the VAT cut as a total failure when it has only been in effect for 31 days - there simply isnt enough evidence to make that call.

Conservative-friendly commentators in the media are starting to focus on what the Tories can do to shrug off the “do nothing” tag. Janet Daley in the Telegraph this morning has a good go, and there will be many similar articles in the coming days and weeks. Perhaps the financial crisis demonstrates how tough it is to be in Opposition. Governements are in position to take action; the Opposition can only comment. The question is, what should their message be?