{"id":961,"date":"2018-02-20T11:00:06","date_gmt":"2018-02-20T11:00:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thewitnesspoliticsjournal.wordpress.com\/?p=961"},"modified":"2020-02-06T13:21:19","modified_gmt":"2020-02-06T13:21:19","slug":"the-debate-this-house-has-no-confidence-in-our-government","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thewitnessexeter.co.uk\/?p=961","title":{"rendered":"The Debate: \u201cThis House Has No Confidence in Our Government\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n \t<\/i> Read Time:<\/span>5 Minute, 59 Second <\/div>\n\n <\/div>

Our government, led by Theresa May is being fired upon from all sides. The Labour Party accuses it of incompetency in its approach to Brexit and bemoans the handling of the NHS and cuts to public services. Meanwhile, remainers across the political spectrum claim the government is pursuing a needlessly hard and damaging exit from the EU, whilst committed brexiteers are pressuring the Prime Minister to make it harder still.<\/p>\n

This messy national political picture was well reflected in the panel for the debate. On the Proposition in support of the motion Kyle Spencer, a third year law student and Conservative remainer, was joined by independent Devon County Councillor, Claire Wright. James Taghdissian and Matthew Burton mounted the Opposition. Taghdissian was the Exeter Conservative Party candidate in the 2017 General Election and now chairs the local party branch, whereas Burton is chairman of the Conservative Association at the university.<\/p>\n

The Proposition\u2019s opening position rested on two central arguments: that the government is both leading a chaotic charge in its Brexit negotiations and is following a policy programme that is leading to increased social and economic hardship. Spencer emphasised the former by claiming \u201cA key argument advanced by brexiteers and now the government is how Brexit Britain would have its pride back, it\u2019s place in the world back\u2026 yet day after day we seen headline after headline from CNN to Fox, from Sky to BBC reducing Britain to a laughing stock\u2026 we have had enough U-turns to make a driving instructor dizzy\u201d. Nonetheless, Spencer was at pains to stress that his qualms weren\u2019t with the Conservative Party but its leadership. A view likely not shared by his non-Conservative partner on the panel.<\/p>\n

“Devon County Council\u2019s government grant has been cut by \u00a3155 million, that\u2019s 76% since Austerity began in 2010”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Wright\u2019s focus was broader in emphasis. Her speech began with a blitz of damning statistics against the government. \u201cOver 1 million people regularly using food banks, one in every 200 people now homeless in inadequate accommodation according to Shelter\u2026 Devon County Council\u2019s government grant has been cut by \u00a3155 million, that\u2019s 76% since Austerity began in 2010\u201d. She also attacked how cuts in local services has been coupled by the fact that \u201ccouncil tax in Devon has soared by around \u00a3250 a year in just seven years for an average band E property\u201d.<\/p>\n

Then came Taghdissian\u2019s robust rebuttle in defence of the government\u2019s Brexit economic policies. On Brexit he argued that the \u201cBrexit being pursued by the Prime Minister is an entirely sensible one. She seeks the closest possible relationship with our soon to be former European partners whilst making sure that phrase that captured so many people and their votes of \u2018Take Back Control\u2019 is honoured\u201d. As for the government\u2019s performance as a whole, he asked the audience \u201cWhy should we dislike a Conservative government?\u201d. Rather than let the audience reply, he answered himself: \u201cYou shouldn\u2019t. It\u2019s a very good government, it\u2019s been doing very good things for the past seven years and it will carry on doing very good things because it\u2019s a very good government with a plan of how to change this country for the better\u201d.<\/p>\n

Whilst Tadhdissian chose to oppose the motion by defending the government\u2019s policies, his partner on the Opposition did not. He preferred to rely on a bizarre mixture of caustic wit (that seemed more rude than funny) and hyperbole to advance his argument. Burton begun with an insult: \u201cI must admit that I am rather nervous when it comes to public speaking so it\u2019s a relief to be here so I can rely on the small audience\u201d and went on, asking us to \u201cimagine for one moment that this august body, this motley crew of the Friday night DebSoc regulars were to suddenly become members of the lower house, \u2026 this dark parallel universe where Got help us the DebSoc caucus has a deciding vote on a no confidence vote\u201d.\u00a0 He finished by warning of the danger Corbyn\u2019s Labour Party pose and declared: \u201c I have confidence in this government because I have confidence nothing else\u201d.<\/p>\n

In short, whether you supported or opposed the motion hinged on your views on Brexit and the government\u2019s economic policy. And after getting past the internal squabbling between the two EUCA <\/em>members on the panel and the rudeness projected towards the DebSoc audience in Burton\u2019s opening speech, the second half of the debate saw some important issues discussed.<\/p>\n

One question pointed out that the public are fed up with Brexit and want domestic issues such as nationwide inequality to be addressed to which the opposition replied with a degree of contradiction. Responding to this Tadhdissian argued that \u201cthere was a real attempt in the manifesto to address some of those points\u201d \u2013 a reference to manifesto commitments such as introducing a double lock on pensions and the so-called \u2018dementia tax\u2019 to pay for social care. However, his colleague on the panel seemed to disagree. Burton stated he thought it \u201cnot worth having a debate about what policies are in one manifesto and not in the other\u201d, preferring to restate that it\u2019s simply a choice between May or Corbyn, and that we should choose May<\/p>\n

\u201c I have confidence in this government because I have confidence nothing else\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Speaking for the Proposition, Wright argued that the problem with social policy is that the government \u201cdon\u2019t know what else to cut\u2026 they\u2019re spending billions on free schools but they aren\u2019t putting the money into state schools\u201d. She asked: \u201cHow\u2019s that justifiable?\u201d. Specifically, on social care she lamented the current situation by maintaining that \u201cthere have been massive cuts to social care, the NHS has had its funding squeezed\u2026 and as a result there is not enough care in people\u2019s homes to keep up with demand\u201d.<\/p>\n

To close the debate Spencer spoke for the Proposition. He began with a jibe to his fellow Conservative on the Opposition: \u201cWe heard from Matthew what can probably be best described as a lengthy Christmas cracker joke: it just went on and on, you just wanted to get to the wine at the end of it\u201d. He then begged the question why one should have confidence in a government \u201cbeholden to someone [presumably Jacob Rees-Mogg] who doesn\u2019t believe a woman should have an abortion\u2026 transsexualism is a concept\u2026 and gay people should get married\u201d. Tadhdissian surmised for the Opposition by affirming \u201cthe reason you can have confidence in the government as it is currently formed is that it is doing wonders for the British economy, it is negotiating a very difficult set of circumstances in terms of our departure from the EU and doing it well\u201d.<\/p>\n

That brought the debate to an end. Important issues surrounding Brexit, austerity and social policy both nationally and locally were successfully brought to the fore \u2013 despite the at times superfluous exchanges between certain members on the panel.<\/p>\n

The final vote saw the motion upheld in favour of the Proposition: \u2018This House Has No Confidence in Our Government\u2019. \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

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By Will Parker<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":963,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-961","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-british"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thewitnessexeter.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/961","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thewitnessexeter.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thewitnessexeter.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thewitnessexeter.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thewitnessexeter.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=961"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thewitnessexeter.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/961\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thewitnessexeter.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/963"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thewitnessexeter.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=961"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thewitnessexeter.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=961"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thewitnessexeter.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=961"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}