Conservative commitments - 28, 23 fails

 Negotiating new EU rules so people will have to be earning in the UK for four years before they can claim tax credits and child benefits

Again, I don’t have a problem with this one. But there is a problem with both of these policies: they’re a waste of time. The amount of money that the government loses from EU welfare or paying £3,000 extra to people with numerous benefits claims is tiny. And by tiny, I mean in a government context. I’m sure any person would appreciate £3,000 extra, but the government spends billions. Government rounding errors are in the tens or hundreds of millions. Furthermore, civil servants identify over 1,000 legal changes a year that are needed and require parliamentary approval; Parliament gets through no more than 100. Every policy that takes ministers’ time pushes away long-standing needs in the backlog.

It is, of course, right to pursue justice even when implementing it might not seem cost-efficient. Justice is priceless. But negotiating with the EU has so many more problems: loss of international respect, a lot of time and money, possible withdrawal of benefits and tolerance for UK citizens abroad etc. That’s why this policy is a waste of time. It’s more public relations management, playing to voters’ fears rather than educate them about how important these things actually are. I can just imagine someone in Conservative head office thinking ‘we need to seem anti-EU and anti-benefits…. Hmm, let’s put the two together: we’re against EU migrants getting benefits!’ Yet again, the Conservatives have conflated a stroke of PR genius with sensible policy, which is unacceptable from the party claiming to be responsible.