The coalition crowd-pleasers will not save them for long | Polly Toynbee
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When a million jobs have been lost and the cuts have begun to bite, the government’s talk of ‘fairness’ will turn to dust
Government by headline works pretty well – for a while. But Labour soon found spin by eye-catching announcement gets found out by the facts. The aura may last a little longer for the coalition, with so many media supporters eager to swallow the line. But the day comes eventually when even they choke on the hook as the numbers emerge to expose their previous gullibility.
Fairness is the theme of the day, seized and squeezed for meaning. In every shade of the political and media spectrum, fairness is in the eye of myriad beholders. But this government will be judged on its own words in all those Cameron, Clegg and Iain Duncan Smith pledges. How well they have adopted Labour language on poverty, opportunity and social mobility, proving Labour [...]