Most Popular Tags
Search
| William Hague and manifesto promises |
 |
 |
 |
| Written by Gordon Prentice | |||
| Saturday, 16 October 2010 02:02 | |||
|
Yesterday I was thinking about the Lib Dems and tuition fees. … I mustn’t be too sanctimonious. In 2004 the Labour Government legislated to bring in top-up fees despite declaring in its manifesto that it would not do so. In fact, all three of the main parties vowed not to introduce top-up fees. This is what William Hague told the Commons on 27 January 2004 in the second reading of the Higher Education Bill: With the agreement of my colleagues, I wrote in the Conservative manifesto: "we will not introduce top-up fees". The Liberal Democrats made an even grander claim, as parties do when they are more distant from office. "All fees will be abolished," they said grandly. The Labour party said: "We will not introduce 'top-up' fees and have legislated to prevent them." What an extraordinarily categoric and emphatic thing to say. He took the Labour Government to task: That was a premeditated promise, a categoric commitment, and it is a shameless and ruthless breach of that commitment that the Government are engaged in today. That is why it is a bad day for our democracy if the Bill goes through. The Government won by 5 votes. Blair said later that breaking the manifesto pledge was “the right thing to do”. (Nothing new there.) But I wonder what William Hague is saying to his Coalition partners now? 
|
|||
| Last Updated on Saturday, 16 October 2010 02:34 |