David Cameron is faced with the dilemma of power of all Prime Ministers that he needs to court the media but not too closely, the latter the criticism levelled at the Labour government under Tony Blair. He made a mistake it now seems in hiring Andy Coulson, the former editor of the now defunct News of the World newspaper as his head of communications, and in only now going on the offensive before parliament to demonstrate his anger should the on-going police investigation reveal that Mr Coulson was more involved in the on-going phone-hacking scandal than previously believed.
However, this has allowed the Labour leader Ed. Miliband to score another tactical victory in the Commons, exploiting what the opposition believes is the weakness of a lack of attention to detail of the Prime Minister, as demonstrated not only in the current media scandal but also over the health service reforms. Previous incumbents such as Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair both showed the benefits of better preparation and attention to detail, the latter for example with his training as a lawyer very involved in the Northern Ireland peace process and the intricacies of NHS budgeting.
Labour could undermine the government again with calls of economic incompetence if the current Euro-zone crisis further threatens the recovery of the UK economy, since British banks are still at major financial risk through the loans they have made to French and German banks more directly exposed to the terms of the second Greek bail-out being debated in Brussels today. The Euro-zone also represents around 40% and, together with the other European Union member states, some 60% of total British exports, making it critical to the success of the export-driven recovery plan of the government. As it is, total government borrowing for the financial year as a whole (following the unexpected rise in June) is now expected to be larger than the Office for Budget Responsibility predicted, its target based on an assumption that the economy would grow by 1.7 % instead of what is believed by economists as likely to be 1.4 % or even lower.
Luckily voters have longer memories of the role and responsibility of the previous Labour government in the current troubled state of the British economy, although they will progressively lose patience with those now in power if their everyday financial concerns about e.g. jobs, taxes, budget cuts, pensions, mortgages, inflation and declining real incomes, are not being competently addressed within a growing economy before the next general election. The Prime Minister also needs now to start raising his game as they say and start paying more attention to the briefing evidence presented to him by his advisors.