Review of the Year 2009

With the possible exception of 2001 and 9/11, seldom has any political year in recent history been dominated by a single story to the extent that the MPs expenses scandal dominated this one.

Most people have a fairly cynical view of politicians, casually and sometimes wrongly assuming them to be in it for what they can get.

Few taxpayers however imagined that they might be footing the bill for the cost of cleaning MPs’ moats, mowing their paddocks, and doing up their second homes to enable them to make a killing on the property market.

The scandal that broke over the summer will, quite literally, change Parliament – and the nature of the relationship between the public and their elected representatives – for ever.

The sad thing is, it could all have been averted, with a little foresight and some courageous leadership on the part of the Prime Minister and his fellow party leaders.

If Gordon Brown really was the strategic political genius his admirers have always claimed him to be, he would have seen it coming a mile off and pre-empted it by introducing measures to clean up the place.

Okay, so MPs would probably have voted him down – but that would have left him in an even stronger position when the storm finally broke.

As it was, Gordon’s inability to regain the political initiative was another of the themes of a political year that seems likely to be Labour’s last full 12 months in office for some time.

At one point, it looked as though Mr Brown’s handling of the continuing economic crisis, and in particular his role in brokering the global recovery plan, was winning over the public.

But his difficulty is that when it comes to the economy, too many voters see him as part of the problem rather than part of the solution – thanks largely to his hubristic claims to have “abolished boom and bust.”

It all threatened to come to a head in May when the sequential resignations of Hazel Blears and James Purnell seemed to herald the start of a Blairite counter-revolution against his leadership.

Had South Shields MP and Foreign Secretary David Miliband followed them out of the door, it would have been – but Lord Mandelson saved the day for Gordon by talking him out of it.

Mr Brown’s troubles were by no means over though. Another long-running story that caused big problems for the government over the summer was its alleged failure properly to equip British troops in Afghanistan.

It coincided with a terrible spate of British casualties as soldiers embarked on a perilous mission to drive back the Taliban in order to allow elections to take place.

And the year ended with startling revelations about another war – the 2003 Iraq conflict which is now the subject of a wide-ranging inquiry under Sir John Chilcot.

The disclosure that former Prime Minister Tony Blair knew there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq ten days before the invasion seems likely to further sully his already tarnished reputation.

But to return to MPs’ expenses…one consequence of the saga is that it adds an extra element of unpredictability to the election which must now be held this spring.

More fringe party candidates are certain to be elected. The incumbency factor which traditionally favours sitting MPs may go into reverse. And the turnout may well be lower, leading to more volatility in outcomes.

Some believe that the scandal will ultimately lead to a better, more diverse House of Commons, a political culture in which MPs genuinely see themselves as the servants of the people rather than their masters.

Others, and I have to say I am one of them, take a more jaundiced view: that it’s an ill wind that blows no good.

Brown's losing hand

The Prime Minister's belated decision to send more troops to Afghanistan is all of a piece with his failure to anticipate the MPs' expenses row. Here's today's Journal column.

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As the dust settles on the 2009 conference season, the key issues which will decide the 2010 general election are becoming clearer – some of them the kind which arise at every electoral battle, others unique to this contest.

There is, as ever, “the economy, stupid” – the central question on which most elections are won and lost, and on which, in all probability, this one will be too.

In terms of a strategy for plotting our way out of the recession, the two main parties are about even, the main differences of opinion being over precisely how and when to start cutting the £175bn budget deficit.

On the question of who was to blame for the meltdown, however, David Cameron’s Tories have an unassailable advantage, thanks largely to Gordon Brown’s hubristic claim to have “abolished boom and bust.”

Then there is the “leadership” issue – which in essence boils down the question of which of the two main party leaders is (a) the most likeable person, and (b) the most convincing Prime Minister.

Mr Cameron has always been way ahead of Mr Brown on the first point. But he is now beginning to overhaul him on the second too, after a conference which saw him set out his vision of post-recession Britain.

But beyond the perennial questions of who can best be trusted to run the economy and who will make the best leader, there have been two other issues in the headlines this week which also seem likely to have a big influence on the 2010 contest.

The first of these is of course the MPs’ expenses scandal. The second is the conduct of the war in Afghanistan.

It would have come as no great surprise to world-weary MPs to find the expenses issue making its way back onto the front pages as they returned to Westminster this week.

There has to be some question as to whether civil servant turned witchfinder general Sir Thomas Legge has been making the rules up as he goes along in his letters to MPs calling for sums claimed in respect of cleaning and gardening to be repaid.

But such is the public mood of anger towards our elected representatives at present, that, however ersatz Sir Thomas’s recommendations, no-one dare defy them - not least Messrs Cameron and Brown.

And so the list of political casualties from the scandal continues to grow, with Tory MP David Wiltshire the latest to be forced to walk the plank at Mr Cameron’s behest on Thursday.

Mr Cameron knows he is in a win-win situation when it comes to expenses. Whenever another Tory MP transgresses, it merely gives him another opportunity to look tough on sleaze.

At the same time, his party as a whole continues to benefit from the “anti-politics” mood thrown up by the whole affair, a mood which invariably harms the incumbent administration.

Mr Brown, by contrast, is on to a loser. He had one chance to claim the moral high ground on MPs’ expenses, namely by reforming the system before the full horror of the abuse came to light.

But he failed to take that opportunity, and ever since his calamitous YouTube video in which he announced a belated and half-hearted attempt at reform, he has been on the back foot.

It’s been a similar story with Afghanistan. This week, the Prime Minister announced that hundreds more British troops would be sent to the war zone – some six or seven months after they were initially requested by the military.

It really does beg the question why this was left to fester over the summer as the casualties in Helmand Province piled up and the issue became more and more politically toxic for Labour.

To do it at this late stage looks very much of a piece with Mr Brown’s response to the expenses scandal – an attempt to shut the stable door long after the horse has bolted.

Afghanistan. Expenses. Leadership. The economy. The sad truth for the Prime Minister is that on none of these key election issues is he currently holding what looks like a winning hand.

Political calculations

No change in the weather for Labour

I'm finally back from my late-summer break so without further ado here's today's Journal column rounding up the events of the past week and some of those which occurred while I was away.

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Sometimes, the end of the summer holidays and the start of the new political season in the autumn can herald a change in the weather – in the political as well as the meteorological sense.

Governments or parties which have been going through a bout of unpopularity often come back rejuvenated, as people forget why they were unpopular in the first place.

But such is the trough of unpopularity in which Gordon Brown’s government has been mired for so long that this was never likely to be one of those kinds of Septembers.

Indeed, with the hugely damaging controversy over the release of the Lockerbie bomber still continuing to rumble on, Mr Brown’s position has, if anything, worsened over the course of the summer break.

The primary complaint against the Prime Minister’s handling of the issue is not so much whether he did or did not agree to exchange Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi as part of a new trade deal with Libya, although that may very well have been the case.

Rather, it has been his reluctance to speak out about an issue of such fundamental importance, when contrasted with his eagerness to comment on, say, the demise of Jade Goody or the fortunes of the England football team.

Mr Brown’s attempts to palm off all responsibility for the decision onto the SNP-led Scottish government have been exposed for exactly what they were – an abdication of leadership.

His close ally Ed Balls’ declaration on BBC Radio this week that “no-one in the government” had wanted to see al-Megrahi released has only further added to the impression of a government trying to face all ways at once.

Neither has it been a good summer for the government in terms of its handling of the conflict in Afghanistan, with the eight-year political consensus over the war visibly starting to fray.

Ministers have been accused both of failing to provide adequate resources for British troops on the ground, and of conducting a smear campaign against Army chiefs who dared to point this out.

Whoever was behind the negative briefings – and Veterans Minister and Durham North MP Kevan Jones has denied claims that it was him – the perpetrators demonstrated spectacularly poor political judgment.

People are not fundamentally interested in whether the new Army chief’s daughter is a Tory activist, or how much his predecessor claimed on expenses. They want to know whether our boys in Helmand are getting the tools they need to do the job.


The government’s dismal performance over the summer – its ratings only went up when Mr Brown was on holiday – contrasts sharply with that of David Cameron’s Tories in the first week back.

There was nothing particularly sophisticated or even original about Mr Cameron’s speech on Tuesday in which he pledged to cut back on MPs’ perks including subsidised food and booze. Indeed some might even see it as cheap populism.

But what it did show once again is that Mr Cameron remains far more in tune with the public mood over MPs’ expenses than the government has been.

Likewise, his decision to demote Shadow Commons Leader Alan Duncan was a long overdue punishment for a politician who has continually demonstrated that he simply does not ‘get’ what the public are angry about.

Mr Cameron is now riding the wave of the “anti politics” vote that, in former leader Charles Kennedy’s day, was once the preserve of the Liberal Democrats.

As well as ending the gravy-train which entitles MPs to the cheapest beer to be found anywhere in London, his speech this week pledged a cut in their numbers, the abolition of the unelected regional assemblies, and fresh curbs on quango spending.

The amount of money saved – about £120m a year – is but a pinprick compared with the £175bn budget deficit facing the country – but that’s not really the point.

No, what matters is that Mr Cameron is being seen to take a lead in reforming what the public now views as a corrupt political system - something Mr Brown has continually failed to do.

So with the Tories looking increasingly like a government-in-waiting, what, if anything, can Labour do to fight back?

Post-Megrahi, a collective despair appears once more to have gripped the party, with many MPs and activists resigned to election defeat next year, yet seemingly unable to conceive of any course of action which could avert that.

The backbencher Jon Cruddas summed up the party’s predicament in a speech to the think-tank Compass this week in which he argued that the government no longer knows what it stands for.

“There are plenty of initiatives and announcements but no sense of animating purpose, no compelling case for re-election,” he said.

One blogger this week posed the question whether another coup attempt against Mr Brown this autumn was possible in view of the Blairite plotters’ failure to unseat him last May.

Well, against the current backdrop, it doesn’t only seem possible, it seems inevitable.

The stark reality of the situation is that there is currently as much chance of the public giving Mr Brown another five years in Number 10 as Colonel Gadaffi putting Mr al-Megrahi on a one-way flight back to Scotland.

In other words, the summer break has come and gone – and for the Prime Minister, absolutely nothing has changed.

Could it be the war that finally does for Brown?

The current mood of unease about the war of Afghanistan constitutes a dangerous moment for Gordon Brown. Here's today's Journal column.

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It is one of those enduring yet misleading clichés of British political life that in times of war or national emergency, the public invariably and instinctively rallies towards the government.

Certainly, when civilian lives are threatened on the mainland, it is a rule that by and large holds true. It is not so very long ago that Gordon Brown’s popularity soared in the wake of a series of terrorist incidents which he was deemed to have handled well.

But history shows that wars more often break than make governments, and for Mr Brown, the war in Afghanistan is proving a rather different proposition.

The loss of 15 British soldiers’ lives in a fortnight has not only seen the conflict return to the top of the political agenda for the first time in seven years, it has led to some searching questions for the Prime Minister about the purpose and conduct of the whole operation.

There has always been a hard core of outright opposition to the conflict, ever since it was first launched as part of George Bush’s ‘War on Terror’ in the wake of 9/11.

But those who opposed the war on principle have now been joined by a growing number of people who, while sympathetic to the cause, believe the government is guilty of letting down ‘Our Boys.’

Mr Brown insists that none of the recent losses were down to shortages of equipment or helicopters or men, as has been variously claimed by Opposition MPs and Army chiefs.

Nevertheless, the suspicion persists that government penny-pinching is, if not directly leading to solidiers’ deaths, certainly hampering their task in what is an already difficult situation.

That was the essence of the accusation made by the Commons’ backbench defence select committee in its report this week.

Although it stopped short of saying that servicemen were dying because of a lack of helicopters, the committee clearly believes the government is making things more difficult than they need to be.

Chairman James Arbuthnot said: “Operational commanders in the field are unable to undertake potentially valuable operations because of the lack of helicopters for transportation around the theatre of operations.”

Head of the Army General Sir Richard Dannatt, who is becoming increasingly outspoken as he approaches retirement, added that “more boots” were needed in order to keep the Taliban at bay.

The mood of dissatisfaction with Mr Brown’s conduct of the war has also been reflected in criticism of his choice of Bob Ainsworth as defence secretary in his recent reshuffle, and his subsequent ranking as 21st out of 23 in the Cabinet hierarchy.

This is desperately unfair on Mr Ainsworth, a stalwart minister who is one of those increasingly rarities in today’s Labour Party, namely a fully paid-up member of the working-class.

But Mr Brown’s decision to appoint a relative unknown to such a pivotal post in the midst of a desperately difficult conflict has inevitably raised questions over his judgement.

It does not help Mr Ainsworth’s cause that he is the fourth defence secretary in as many years, following in the footsteps of John Reid, Des Browne and John Hutton.

This point was well made by the former head of the Army, General Sir Michael Jackson, who himself worked with three defence secretaries in his three and a half years in the job.

“I think as a matter of principle it is better that such key positions as defence secretary are held on a longer term to provide continuity,” he said.

Michael Codner, director of military sciences at the Royal United Services Institute said defence secretaries needed “stature and respect” which had to be earned over time.

It seems we have moved a very long way from the days of Denis Healey and Michael Heseltine when the defence job was seen as effectively the fourth great office of state after Chancellor, Foreign Secretary and Home Secretary.

But this is essentially a row not about personalities or status in the Cabinet pecking-order, but about money.

The crux of the accusation against Mr Brown is that, as Chancellor, he failed to give a high enough priority to defence spending, and that, as Prime Minister, he is now paying the political price of that.

At a time when more and more British lives are being lost by the day, this is a highly dangerous accusation for the Prime Minister.

At the current rate of casualties, it is only a matter of time before a specific death becomes linked to a specific cutback, and that would be a perilous moment indeed for Mr Brown.

The ‘War of Terror’ has never been the great vote-winner for Labour that, for instance, the Falklands War was for Mrs Thatcher. Coupled with the Iraq conflict, there is a strong argument for saying that the entire New Labour project was blown permanently off-course by it.

It helped do for Tony Blair. Could it now help drive the final nail in Mr Brown’s political coffin, too?

It has been said that the war in Afghanistan cannot be won in Helmand Province, but it could be lost there, and a similar point could be made about Mr Brown’s premiership.

The war in Afghanistan will not win the Prime Minister the popularity he so desperately seeks - but it could well lose him what little support he still retains.

Government statistics

More on the current spate of casualties in Afghanistan and their potential political impact in tomorrow's weekly column.