Labour traps the coalition will most certainly walk in to

[TheBigotBasher]

and perhaps on the Conservative side with some glee.

Student finance is the first one that springs to mind. I would lay a bet that the review of student finance recommends removing the cap on fees. Mandlescum removed £.5 billion from university funding shortly before the election. hat money needs to be found somewhere so my guess is that the cap on fees will go. I would also bet that Labour, now in opposition will oppose that (just as they said that they will oppose Dearing).

What else? Would Labour oppose Trident? I can see them playing to the Daily Hate and accusing the coalition of being soft on terror when things like ID cards are repealed.

Where else will it go wrong?

[muriel_volestrangler]

1. I think you're right on student fees and ID cards

but I can't see Labour completely reversing their policy and opposing Trident. None of the likely next leaders (McDonnell may get enough signatures to stand, but I can't see him winning) did anything at all apart from support the Blair/Brown replacement of Trident.

Criticising the removal of the student fees cap won't necessarily be wrong; just somewhat hypocritical, since they were, as you say, painting the next government into that corner anyway.

[T_i_B]

2. I agree that Labour are highly unlikely to oppose trident.

What is more important for Labour however, is that they put the rest of their defence policy in order. They might like to admit that invading Iraq was a colossal mistake for a start.

[tjwmason]

3. Tuition fees could a massive contention within the coalition

There is a lot of LibDem support from higher education and they are opposed to the current fee arrangements, never mind even more exclusionary higher fees...whereas most Tories wouldn't much mind if they doubled or tripled.

Removing the cap would prove to be very devise in terms of social mobility, the Russell and 1994 Groups would push them up as high as possible immediately; University Alliance and Million+ would probably only take a small increase, if any. Then potential students from disadvantaged backgrounds are going to be even less likely to apply to those charging dramatically higher fees.

[TheBigotBasher]

4. The sale of it to the press and the previously near silent NUS

was that the higher fees would be attached to a requirement of a minimum level of bursaries so that the top Universities would have to accept people from low income households (or those good at sports etc) to justify the fee.

There is some logic in that, however I would prefer a student income tax, the original argument of complex paperwork is now gone. Tax is computerised. Also employer paid tax credits are far more complicated than an alternative income tax rate.

The issues I see causing difficulties are changes to corporation tax, the Daily Mail and Telegraph are really going to battle that one and the soft on terror stuff.

[TheBigotBasher]

5. Benefit cuts may be the biggest trap.

Some of the proposals tha the Civil Service were told to shelve are being handed to Ministers again. These include the scrapping of the local housing allowance top up, so tenants will no longer be rewarded for finding property below average rent levels and far more disgraceful a potential ban on private rents in "high priced" areas of London. The savings from that ban were already pocketed by Neo Con Labour in their budget estimates.

Passport to Pimlico.

[dipsydoodle]

6. ban on private rents in "high priced" areas of London

Whats' that ? :shrug:

[TheBigotBasher]

7. The last Labour Government

proposed a ban on payments of HB to the those properties in the top 8% of the market. They would also remove them from the calculation of "Local Housing Allowance" the amount most claimants are paid on, which reduces the average, therefore reducing the level of HB payable. An 8% exclusion would essentially exclude all Central London Boroughs from HB. It follows on from this

http://dwp.gov.uk/docs/hb-consultation.pdf

and is in response to articles in certain papers complaining about Housing Benefit claimants getting £200,000k per year etc. There is a simple solution - build HA and Council houses. What I find funny (of sorts), Labour were highly successful in beating the Brent Lib Dem / Tory coalition over the head about one claimant getting nearly £200k on benefits - it was however because of their Government it happened.

The Ealing case that the papers had been going on about the Government solution of limiting HB payments to no more than that of a six bedroom house as resulted in even more expensive solutions than the problem the papers were on about. Normal HB is no longer available so temporary accommodation must be obtained at an even greater expense to the taxpayer. It does however keep the Daily Hate happy. "Something was done".