3 - Turning up the thermostat: the Conservatives, social policy and public opinion

Summary

Introduction

This chapter examines shifts in public attitudes towards public spending and welfare provision in the period from 2015, following five years of austerity under the Coalition government. In the period leading up to and following the 2010 general election, there was some evidence of declining support for public spending and a hardening of attitudes towards benefits recipients, which aligned, in some respects closely, with the austerity agenda of the incoming Coalition government (Taylor-Gooby and Martin, 2008; Curtice, 2010b; Defty, 2011). Recent studies have highlighted a further hardening of attitudes towards those in receipt of state benefits under the Coalition government (Pearce and Taylor, 2013; Taylor-Gooby and Taylor, 2015; Defty, 2016).

While there is a growing body of evidence of anti-welfare attitudes in the UK, studies of public attitudes have long highlighted the contested, and sometimes contradictory, nature of public opinion in this area (Hudson et al, 2016b; van Oorshot, 2000). Drawing on historical data on public attitudes, Hudson et al (2016a) have questioned whether recent claims for declining public support are based in part on ‘nostalgia narratives’ of a ‘golden age’ of public support for welfare, which is not supported by historical polling data. Others have argued that fluctuations in support for tax and spend can be explained by reference to a thermostatic effect in which support for spending is linked to public perceptions about whether government is increasing spending or implementing cuts. According to this argument, cuts to public spending prompt a rise in support for tax-funded increases in provision, while increased investment in services will eventually prompt the public to urge spending restraint (Stuart and Wlezien, 2005; Curtice, 2010a, 2010b; Curtice et al, 2021). Some have questioned whether public attitudes may be impacted by factors other than public spending, such as the level of unemployment (van Oorschot, 2006), while recent studies have suggested that after a prolonged period of declining public support the thermostat of public sympathy may become stuck in the ‘off’ position (Taylor-Gooby and Taylor, 2015; Defty, 2016).