Over at The New Statesman, the Littlejohn of the Left - aka Laurie Penny - is up in arms about welfare reform. It's at her usual level of hyperbole and melodrama - note the hint at a link between government policy and suicide. But her case, such as it is, can be summed up in the final paragraph:

There used to be a liberal consensus that it was the government's responsibility to provide employment and ensure that those unable to work were entitled to a minimum standard of living. As the Welfare Reform Bill oozes unchallenged through the Commons, the real scandal is not that the government is lying through its teeth in order to justify its evisceration of the welfare state. The scandal is that no one in Westminster is prepared to make a moral case for welfare provision as the honest heart of social democracy.

First up, there is, and has never, been a liberal consensus in this country. Indeed, "liberal" is a word that has been truly stretched beyond its elastic limit. It is largely meaningless now. Besides, there is a strong case that what Penny is alluding to is actually socialism rather than liberalism, and there are many liberals who have argued that socialism is an enemy of liberalism.

Secondly, we have the term thrown in there about a "minimum standard of living". Fine, you might think - until you start to examine what that phrase might actually mean. Then we hit the problem of the fact that there is no consensus on what a minimum standard of living is. It could just be having a roof over your head and food on the table; it could be much more than that. A lot of this boils down to the old debate about whether poverty is absolute or relative, and that's an important distinction for the case that Penny is trying to make. See, if poverty is absolute, then I might agree that we can find and then ensure we deliver a minimum standard of living for all. But if it is about relative poverty, I rapidly lose interest. At that point a minimum standard of living drifts towards the redistribution of wealth as a means of delivering an equality of outcome - an idea I find intolerable, nonsensical and idiotic.

Then we have the accusation that the government is lying - we aren't given any real evidence for that, we just have to take Penny's accusation at face value. Which is a real problem, given her tendency for hyperbole and hysteria. Yeah, the government might well be lying - wouldn't be the first time. However I would like a little more evidence than just the say-so of Ms Penny, though.

And "evisceration of the welfare state" is a class Penny-ism - it can't be welfare reform or harming the welfare state. No, it has to evisceration - only that is melodramatic enough.

Then we move onto the heart of the matter - Penny's assertion that no-one is making the case for social democracy. Note, as an aside, how we've moved from liberalism at the start of the paragraph to social democracy at the end - the two are not synonymous, Laurie, not in any way. But the real point is that Penny seems to think that making the case for welfarism (which is effectively what she's calling for) is not as easy as she makes out. Yeah, you can do as she does and tug on the heartstrings. You can talk about destitution, about suicide and about the long-term sick having to go out to work (which surely isn't a problem if they are able to do that work despite their illness). But you also need to explain at what level welfare provision stops and at what point people should have to go out and work for a living - just as those who are paying the welfare claimants (i.e. the taxpayer) have to do. There is a moral question here, and there is also an economic one - how is any welfare state going to be funded? The money just doesn't appear by magic, you know. It comes from those who pay tax.

And as a final point it is worth noting that this is not an attempt to destroy the welfare state, but rather to reform and improve it. The tone of Penny's article is typical of her general style but also gives away the innate conservatism that she now shares with so many of her Labour/left-wing brethren. There's nothing radical about opposing reform to an imperfect institution such as the welfare state. In fact, it is conservative bordering on the reactionary. Which is perfect, really. Laurie Penny as reactionary conservative. More and more like Littlejohn with every passing day.