Published: Thursday, 14th January, 2010 10:00am

Martin Salter's Westminster Diary, January 14, 2010

by Martin Salter MP

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Members of Parliament celebrated new year in a variety of different ways back at Westminster.

The Conservatives' much-vaunted "election launch" featured posters showing a slender looking Mr Cameron attempting to look like a serious statesman with, as some uncharitable members of the media suggested, enhancement by a team of air brushers.

The spin doctors could instead have done with air brushing the message, especially on the NHS, when the same David Cameron wrote the last Conservative manifesto which would have made patients not rich enough to go private pay for up to half the cost of their operations!

It was turning into a good week for Labour with the Tory tax plans unravelling and a strong performance from Gordon Brown at Prime Minister's Questions until two former ministers decided a couple of months before a General Election was the perfect time for a leadership coup. The plot collapsed within minutes, with angry backbenchers - myself included - emailing the plotters telling them exactly what we thought of their actions.

Not one Cabinet Minister or mainstream Labour MP supported the botched initiative and by teatime the disgraced pair were running for cover. It beggars belief that amid the heaviest snowfall in recent memory, with people suffering at home and on the roads, any politician should engage in such self-indulgent nonsense.

Meanwhile, back in the real world, the Tories began quietly rowing back from their commitment on tax breaks for married couples. Again they show they can't be trusted over economic decisions to help families and small businesses weather this global economic crisis.

Not only did they oppose the fiscal stimulus that kept the economy afloat during the worst of the recession, but they are now refusing to say what cuts they will make in office.

In contrast, this Labour Government has cut VAT and income tax to help people and support the economy, given 150,000 businesses more time to pay tax bills and introduced measures to help 300,000 keep their homes.

Many in Reading will remember the last economic recession when 2,000 homes here were repossessed as mortgage rates hit 15%.

This time we have a Government on the side of ordinary people not - like the Tories in the early nineties - walking away from them.