Is Cameron running scared?

[Cricko]

Is David Cameron running scared of the TV debates,or is he too worried his playground bullies behind him in PQT won't be there to support, roar and wave their white papers in the air.

5 years ago when he was in opposition he was all for TV debates when Brown was in power. He then insisted on those debates, now he is in power he is shying away.

I have my own thoughts but what are yours?

 

[C C Csiders]

Part of some devious plan, I reckon, to make it look like he is running scared. A reverse psychology thing.

 

[Uncle Leo]

There is minimal upside for the incumbent in a TV debate - he has a record in power to defend while the others (bar Clegg) do not.

That said, he should man up and get involved.

 

[Cricko]

Lib Dem and coalition partner leader Clegg, says: "If David Cameron is too busy or too important to defend the record of the this government with Ed Miliband then I offer myself. I'll do it instead.

I just can't get over the pomposity of the Conservatives that they should now deign to tell us that they're too busy, too important , to lower themselves to the level of everybody else and actually have a debate with everybody else.

It's as if they are ordering a drink in the drawing room of Downton Abbey and telling everybody else what they should do.

It's not for one party to grandly tell everybody else what's going to happen".

 

[Uncle Leo]

Here's a fuller explanation of my point from above. By Danny Finkelstein, Times writer and former campaign manager for William Hague (that went well!)

It was once my job to prevent a chicken defecting to the Labour party.
In 1997 the Conservative party hired an actor to dress up as a chicken and follow Tony Blair around. Unfortunately, the more the actor saw of Mr Blair, the more he liked him. And so the idea took hold that the chicken might, as it were, cross the road. This would have been a PR disaster even greater than having involved ourselves in such a stupid stunt in the first place.
So I was given a job. I was to have lunch with the chicken on a regular basis and keep him onside. I proved myself worthy of the trust placed in me.
You may be wondering why (apart from idiocy) we hired the chicken. We wanted Tony Blair to have a TV debate with John Major and he wouldn’t. So we thought that at least we could make Mr Blair pay for his refusal by having a chicken appear at all of his campaign stops.
The idea, I suppose, was that voters would reflect upon Mr Blair’s refusal and conclude that his policy programme would collapse if exposed to scrutiny. They would then decide it was safer to stick with the Conservatives. Brilliant.
Except that it wasn’t. Voters were not remotely interested in the question. If asked, they might mildly have said they wished for a debate. But they didn’t care all that much. And their view on the question certainly wouldn’t change their voting behaviour.
Which was exactly Mr Blair’s calculation. He had a big lead in the polls. A debate might alter that position. Refusing the debate wouldn’t damage him. It wasn’t a hard decision.
This is worth recalling when considering David Cameron’s decision about whether to agree to a debate with Ed Miliband, Nick Clegg and Nigel Farage. His position is not exactly the same as Mr Blair’s in 1997, obviously, but I think the debate decision similarly is not a hard one.
Let me take you through the argument.
Last week, the communications regulator Ofcom made an important decision. Indeed politically, it is by far the most important thing to happen this year. The regulator decided that Ukip should be regarded as one of the major political parties by broadcasters covering the general election. It also decided that the Greens should not be.
This will have a significant impact on the outcome of the election. It imposes on broadcasters the responsibility to give Ukip due weight in their coverage. This guarantees that Ukip will be a substantial presence on the news throughout the campaign.
Now, it is possible, I suppose, that this coverage will end up being damaging, exposing flaws in Ukip’s team and policies. This is not, however, what I expect to happen.
A great deal of political science demonstrates that lots of people do not have consistent opinions. They are heavily influenced by how a question is put and by what happens to be on their mind when the question is put. The prominence of an issue or of a politician at the critical moment carries more weight than carefully-honed arguments.
Ofcom’s ruling means that Ukip now has the chance to help establish the big issues of the general election campaign, and ensures that it will feature prominently in it. The academic evidence strongly suggests that this will help Ukip. It certainly helped the Liberal Democrats in previous campaigns.
While there is room to question whether Ofcom is right about the Greens, it is certainly correct about guaranteeing Ukip this exposure. The regulator’s job is to help to ensure that the election is a fair contest, and it has done its job.
David Cameron’s task is different. It is to try to win under whatever rules are set. And this strongly militates against agreeing to the debates.
Sometime early on in the preparation for the 2010 debates, it began to dawn on the Tory team that they might have made a mistake by agreeing to have them. They were right to think that Gordon Brown couldn’t recover and that the debates would emphasise this. But they had forgotten Nick Clegg.
And as they practised they realised what a big mistake that had been. The outsider had all the best lines. It was almost impossible to hold him to account, and attacking him would seem absurd. Yet he could casually lob in things like “there the two of you go again” and emerge as the people’s champion against the Westminster insiders.
Even without taking into account his considerable skill at exploiting the opportunity he was given, the very structure gave Mr Clegg an advantage that could not be overcome.
If Mr Cameron agrees to a debate this time with four parties in it, the same thing will happen. Nigel Farage would win it. He would be able to do what Nick Clegg did in 2010, attacking the insiders on behalf of the viewers without being held to account himself.
If the Greens were also in the debate the structure and impact might be different. Without them, Mr Farage would have to himself the role of viewers’ champion. He has no record to defend and can pretty much say anything.
Why on earth would Mr Cameron want to agree to allow that to happen? When he knows, in advance, what the outcome would be?
Well, actually, there is a reason. It is if he believes that not debating would be even more damaging. Because people would call him a chicken. Does that remind you of anything?
People who don’t want to vote for Mr Cameron anyway will use his refusal as part of their case against him. Ukip supporters, quite naturally craving the advantage a debate would give them, will claim that refusing is undemocratic. Journalists may agree. And together they may — indeed probably will — ensure that the failure to agree to debates does the Tory leader some harm with undecided voters.
Yet this harm would have to be quite substantial before it outweighed the damage of appearing in the debates. Will it be? It would be unusual, to say the least, for voters to take more than a minor interest in an issue of political process.

 

[Another Surrey Shrimper]

It's crazy that he is allowing himself to look like he doesn't have conviction behind his policies. Politics is a percentages game at the moment and Cameron knows he seems more competent than Milliband and is clearly not confident that image will survive close scrutiny and is willing to take the hit from ducking out as the safer option. As it stands he only wants to appear on a show as one of seven leaders - safety in numbers. He is the PM - surely he is brave enough to have an open discussion.

 

[Yorkshire Blue]

Tactically Cameron has nothing to gain and everything to lose from a debate.

Leader debates are weird. It's not about who has the best ideas about the direction the country needs to go, but about who exceeds expectations and the level of expectation is so low for Miliband that if he manages not to stumble on his way onto the stage he'll be considered to have performed better than expected.

I therefore think part of Cameron's strategy of delaying the debates is to dampen the expectations. If he was the one who was reluctant to have them then the narrative maybe becomes one about can Cameron getting through the debates unscathed.

I was keen for the debates to take place in 2010, but I ended up being distinctly underwhelmed by them. Little policy was discussed and with hindsight holding debates only seems to encourage the Presidentialisation of British Politics with ever more emphasis on personality and looks rather than policy or qualifications. I think I'd rather there only be one leader debate and to have the relevant spokesmen battle it out on policy in their respective areas. The debates need better questions and moderating though.

 

[Another Surrey Shrimper]

The fact this has been a news item that has been bubbling away for weeks means the negativity for Cameron keeps building.

 

[southendkid]

Clegg is good in debates and Milliband can't be any worse than people expect him to be, a TV debate would just help the other parties out.

 

[superblue24]

I just can't get over the pomposity of the Conservatives that they should now deign to tell us that they're too busy, too important , to lower themselves to the level of everybody else and actually have a debate with everybody else.

Sorry, I must have missed where they said that. Do you have some citation?

Be careful what you wish for, Ed. Given that Cameron routinely wipes the floor with Miliband in the Houses of Parliament, I'm not sure whether taking a pasting in front of main stream television is going to help Labour return to power.

I'm annoyed that screeching harridan, Sturgeon, is getting any airtime. That's what the "mute" button is for I guess. The left wing version of Katie Hopkins if ever I saw it. More worryingly with an element of political influence!

As a few have said, possibly tactical, but definitely not running scared in my opinion

 

[Yorkshire Blue]

The fact this has been a news item that has been bubbling away for weeks means the negativity for Cameron keeps building.

Is wanting the Greens involved that much of a negativity for him though?

In some ways his best result is if the Greens aren't invited. He then looks green for demanding they are included and doesn't get held to account for the lack of green policies. I think overall he'd prefer them to get the extra exposure as they'll take a few votes away from Labour.

 

[Another Surrey Shrimper]

Is wanting the Greens involved that much of a negativity for him though?

In some ways his best result is if the Greens aren't invited. He then looks green for demanding they are included and doesn't get held to account for the lack of green policies. I think overall he'd prefer them to get the extra exposure as they'll take a few votes away from Labour.

I don't think anyone saw it as sticking up for the Greens though - I think it has mostly been viewed as a succession of ways to avoid appearing / reduce the amount of appearances he has to make / reduce the amount of time he will get on screen by packing out the podiums. The proposals from the TV companies were for 3 debates - he has sort of agreed to 1, sort of.

 

[Another Surrey Shrimper]

Sorry, I must have missed where they said that. Do you have some citation?

Be careful what you wish for, Ed. Given that Cameron routinely wipes the floor with Miliband in the Houses of Parliament, I'm not sure whether taking a pasting in front of main stream television is going to help Labour return to power.

I'm annoyed that screeching harridan, Sturgeon, is getting any airtime. That's what the "mute" button is for I guess. The left wing version of Katie Hopkins if ever I saw it. More worryingly with an element of political influence!

As a few have said, possibly tactical, but definitely not running scared in my opinion

Cameron should relish the opportunity to do that in front of a bigger audience then - he can wipe the floor with him and go for a majority rather than another coalition. Its like a striker scoring in every round of the cup (apparently) and not wanting to play in the final.

 

[Cricko]

Sorry, I must have missed where they said that. Do you have some citation?

Be careful what you wish for, Ed. Given that Cameron routinely wipes the floor with Miliband in the Houses of Parliament, I'm not sure whether taking a pasting in front of main stream television is going to help Labour return to power.

I'm annoyed that screeching harridan, Sturgeon, is getting any airtime. That's what the "mute" button is for I guess. The left wing version of Katie Hopkins if ever I saw it. More worryingly with an element of political influence!

As a few have said, possibly tactical, but definitely not running scared in my opinion

Rubbish he has not answered a direct question in the past near on 5 years (TBH no Politician does)..just uses the turn around spin as per normal...PMQ is farcical. To the point of knowing all the questions that are going to asked beforehand (so their researchers can look up a good answer) and to their own prescribed side standing up and once again saying something they have been briefed to raised before in praise of themselves.

 

[Cricko]

I don't think anyone saw it as sticking up for the Greens though - I think it has mostly been viewed as a succession of ways to avoid appearing / reduce the amount of appearances he has to make / reduce the amount of time he will get on screen by packing out the podiums. The proposals from the TV companies were for 3 debates - he has sort of agreed to 1, sort of.

He has semi agreed to one as long as the water is diluted enough within as many parties as he can bring in to make the debate mean nothing. If he has any conviction that his policies are what is best for the whole people of this country and not just the rich. Stand up be a man and welcome all debate.

 

[Ricky Otto]

He knows that he is going to have to do them, he's not running scared just trying to manipulate the debates so they do as little damage as possible. He'll do the debates and he'll still be prime minister after the election

 

[Another Surrey Shrimper]

He knows that he is going to have to do them, he's not running scared just trying to manipulate the debates so they do as little damage as possible. He'll do the debates and he'll still be prime minister after the election

Strange though that he sees the best mode of debate is the one that allows him as little time to speak as possible.
Spend millions on electioneering then when a chunk is offered for free try to use as little of it as possible. Not sound economics there.

 

[Cricko]

Strange though that he sees the best mode of debate is the one that allows him as little time to speak as possible.
Spend millions on electioneering then when a chunk is offered for free try to use as little of it as possible. Not sound economics there.

More to the point he insists it must be done this month, hopefully then people will forget what he said come May..it's a farce but nothing I had not expected of these corrupt ******s.

 

[Cricko]

[h=1]David Cameron accuses Gordon Brown of 'bottling' television debate plans[/h]
Last Updated: 1:28PM BST 29/09/2009
[h=2]David Cameron has accused Gordon Brown of either ''dithering or bottling'' plans to take part in a televised election debate amid confusion over what the Prime Minister intends to do.[/h]Reports had suggested that Mr Brown was planning to throw down the gauntlet to Mr Cameron and call for a leaders' debate in his keynote speech to Labour's conference in Brighton.
They were instantly dismissed by Downing Street sources as ''excitable and ill-informed''.
But the BBC reported that Mr Brown had in fact, rewritten his make-or-break address at the last minute to drop references to a TV debate after deciding to focus on policy rather than tactics.
Mr Cameron and Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg have already made clear their willingness to take part in televised debates during the election campaign.
They both moved swiftly to publicly welcome the Prime Minister's apparent decision to join them.
The Tory leader on Tuesday urged Mr Brown to ''get off the fence''.
''I've been absolutely clear for over a year that we should have television debates in this country between the leaders,'' Mr Cameron told Sky News.
''I cannot believe that the Prime Minister is still sitting on the fence.

 

[superblue24]

Lends credence to the suggestion that it is a tactical manouevre rather than a "cowardly" move.