MANDELSON PRAISES COALITION WELFARE AND PENSIONS REFORM AS REPORT PUTS THE UK BELOW SLOVENIA (South Dorset Liberal Democrats)

South Dorset Liberal Democrats <info@southdorsetlibdems.org.uk>

MANDELSON PRAISES COALITION WELFARE AND PENSIONS REFORM AS REPORT PUTS THE UK BELOW SLOVENIA

October 27, 2010 6:00 PM
In Daily Telegraph

MANDELSON PRAISES COALITION WELFARE AND PENSIONS REFORM AS REPORT PUTS THE UK BELOW SLOVENIA

. In a series of interventions the former Business Secretary went out of his way to praise the coalition for its tough action in tackling the deficit and wide-ranging programme of reforms.

He said the Government's welfare and education reforms - both of which have been criticised by Labour - were moving in the right direction.

And he praised the coalition for tackling the deficit head on - a strategy Mr Miliband has called a 'big gamble'. Lord Mandelson said: 'I don't envy ministers the decisions they are having to take.

'They are very difficult and unpalatable decisions. We may not have taken exactly the same decisions on exactly the same time-scale if we had been returned to government, but essentially we would have been faced with the same choices.'

Earlier, Lord Mandelson also backed the Government's £18.5billion package of benefit cuts, which has brought howls of protest from Labour's front bench.

He said: 'On welfare reform I happen to support in essence what the Government is proposing to do. We should have gone further earlier than we did.'

Lord Mandelson backed David Miliband for the Labour leadership and warned during the campaign that failure to elect him would lead Labour into an 'electoral cul-de-sac'.

He warned Ed Miliband against the danger of allowing Labout to drift to the left away from the centre ground once occupied by New Labour and now seized by the coalition.

Mr Mandelson insisted he had no criticism of Mr Miliband's 'personal qualities'. But he said it was vital that he 'appeals to middle England' instead of retreating to Labour's core vote.

His interventions came as a new study found that Britain's health and education services remain well below the best in the developed world despite the billions of pounds lavished on them by Labour.

The study by the Legatum Institute think-tank rated the UK in 13th place in its 'prosperity index'. But the UK was ranked only 20th for health and 22nd for education - placing Britain below Slovenia.