Monday, November 12, 2007
An even match
Sunday, November 11, 2007
A programme, not a vision
Friday, November 09, 2007
The arrogance of Sir Ian Blair
In another episode, about which I would love to be able to say more, a deputy chief constable's administrative error resulted in police officers being paid so much overtime it practically bankrupted the force concerned. Once again, despite attempts by the local police authority to bring him to account, the man concerned was allowed to retire on a full pension, and his misdemeanours were never actually made public.
So it doesn't greatly surprise me that Sir Ian Blair clearly views the de Menezes case less as a question about whether anyone should be seen to take responsibility for the tragic death of an innocent man and the systemic failures in the Metropolitan Police which led to it, and more about the much more important issue of principle of whether he should be allowed to keep his job.
It's frankly beyond belief that he hasn't quit already, but he is clearly not on the same planet as most of the rest of us. It's almost as if he sees the case as just part of a much bigger battle between the forces of conservatism and the forces of liberalism, a battle in which he sees himself as being on the side of the angels.
If so, it explains why all of the support for Sir Ian remaining in his job is coming from the political left. While the right and centre are at one in their calls for him to go, the Labour establishment, from Home Secretary Jacqui Smith to London Mayor Ken Livingstone, is adamant he should not.
I am as convinced as I can be that this is less down to the merits of the case and more down to tribal loyalties. Sir Ian is seen as "Labour's man," and more generally as a force for "modernisation" and "reform" in a force that, not so long ago, was found to be institutionally racist. Therefore he must not be allowed to be forced out by those nasty reactionary elements.
To base one's view on the internal political ramifications for the Met, however, or even on the ramifications for policing in London, is to lose sight of a much more important issue of principle - the fact that restoring trust in public life requires that those at the top start taking responsiblity for their actions.
Sir Ian Blair's removal - and in my view it's a matter of when, not if - may well result in him being replaced by a more conservative figure - a "copper's copper" as they are known in the shorthand. But if that helps restore a culture of accountability to our public life, it will ultimately be a larger victory for the liberal-left.
An edited version of this post appears on Liberal Conspiracy.
Thursday, November 08, 2007
The Top 10 Political Turning Points
1 The Winter of Discontent, 1978
Modern political history turns on the question of what would have happened had Margaret Thatcher never become Prime Minister. We would now be living in a quite different country, a less prosperous one maybe, but a more civilised one too. It was the industrial chaos of 1978-79 that paved the way not just for her election victory, but for the whole tenor of her premiership. Outgoing PM Jim Callaghan captured the shift in public mood in his famous comment "I believe that there is now such a [sea] change - and it is for Mrs Thatcher."
2 England 2 Germany 3, 1970
Or was it the balance of trade figures that were to blame? Either way, days later Harold Wilson lost an election he was universally expected to win, and this proved to be the pivot on which the subsequent history of the 1970s, and arguably also the future of the Labour Party turned. Had Wilson won in 1970, Roy Jenkins, not Jim Callaghan, would have succeeded him. Had Heath lost, he would have been replaced as leader, possibly by Enoch Powell, but certainly not by Mrs Thatcher. Peter "The Cat" Bonetti has a lot to answer for!
3 The Death of Hugh Gaitskell, 1963
This had profound consequences which weren't really appreciated at the time. It didn't affect the result of the following general election - Labour would have won that anyway - but it did affect the way the Labour Party developed thereafter. Had he lived, Gaitskell would have turned Labour into a modern social democratic party. He would have established a revisionist line of succession from Jenkins to Healey to Hattersley to Brown. There would have been no need for the SDP breakaway, and arguably, no New Labour either.
4 Black Wednesday, 1992
The counterpoint to the Winter of Discontent. Whereas that destroyed Labour's credibility as a governing party for a generation, this destroyed the Tories' - perhaps unfairly as the Labour frontbench of the time under John Smith had been committed to exactly the same monetary policy that caused the debacle. The only leading politician who opposed this unholy consensus was Bryan Gould, who ended up running a university in New Zealand. Which only goes to show that there is very little justice in politics.
5 The Falklands War, 1982
People now talk about the Thatcherite hegemony of the 1980s as if it were a historical inevitability. But up until this point, her government's long-term survival was seriously in doubt. The recently-formed Liberal-SDP Alliance was riding high in the polls and even Michael Foot's Labour Party was more popular than Thatcher's Conservatives. The Falklands campaign, which could easily have turned into the biggest military debacle since Suez, changed all that. It gave us back our self-belief, and Thatcher her aura of invincibility.
6 The Miners' Strike, 1984
The defeat of the miners destroyed not just a union, but also an industry, a movement, and eventually an entire Northern British and Welsh subculture to which the film Brassed Off now stands as a memorial. Politically, the strike reinforced the Thatcher legend that had been born in the Falklands conflict but socially, its effects went much deeper, and I don't think many of them were positive. When I started out in journalism in North Nottinghamshire, the pit villages in the area were vibrant places. Now most of them are riddled by drugs.
7 The Profumo Affair, 1963
Of course I was too young to remember this, but it did occur in my lifetime - just! It's a turning point not just because it contributed to the downfall of Harold Macmillan and the loss of the 1964 General Election for the Conservatives, but also because it captured a decadent ruling elite in its death-throes. Up until this point, the British ruling class thought it could behave moreorless as it liked. Afterwards, as Nigel Birch put it poetically, it was "never glad confident morning again" for Macmillan and his ilk.
8 Healey v Benn, 1981
Much of the credit for transforming the Labour Party in the 80s and 90s has gone to Neil Kinnock for his "grotesque chaos" speech and Tony Blair for his New Labour reforms. But Big Denis was the man who really saved the party. By fighting off Tony Benn's challenge for the deputy leadership, he turned the tide of the left's advance and prevented a haemorrhage of support to the SDP. Together with the Falklands War, it was this that dished Roy Jenkins and Co. Had neither happened, Labour would now be the third party.
9 The Bombing of Canary Wharf, 1993
This one will probably get me hate mail, but the cold hard facts are that it was only when the IRA started targeting big financial institutions on the mainland that they finally succeeded in bombing their way to the negotiating table. After this the Major government realised that it could not defeat the provisionals militarily and set about achieving a political solution. The Anglo-Irish Agreement, then the Good Friday Agreement, and finally the restoration of devolved government earlier this year, was the end result.
10 The Death of Dr David Kelly, 2003
It was not, I think, the Iraq War itself that turned the nation against Tony Blair, but the realisation that we had been systematically lied to about it. Dr Kelly's death was not just a personal tragedy, but the moment we knew that the core value our country had to defend was not democracy, nor even national security, but the sainted reputation of its leader. It was a moment of profound disillusionment that affected the way many people now view politics, and from which the reputation of our political system has not recovered.
Wednesday, November 07, 2007
Which famous leader are you like?
More on Gordon and the Vision Thing
I've already given my initial reaction to yesterday's Queen's Speech on my own blog, pointing out that while there are some very good things in the package from a progressive or liberal-left point of view, politically the whole thing suffers from the lack of a single "Big Idea" or connecting narrative which would enable Gordon Brown to regain the initiative he lost by not calling an election.
I'm not about to depart from that view. While ideas like giving all parents the right to request flexible working hours are extremely welcome, it is not the kind of thing that is going to stuff the Tories, particularly when they are claiming they thought of it first. By contrast scrapping ID cards, or announcing a Speaker's Conference on proportional representation, or even bringing in fixed-term four-year Parliaments to ensure no repeat of this autumn's non-election debacle, would have done.
However Jonathan Freedland in today's Guardian has a slightly different take on it. While acknowledging that Brown effectively stitched himself up by promising to set out his "vision" when he made his election announcement, he argues that in fact it was the wrong word, and that what Brown can really offer the nation is a programme -"something less than a grand vision but more inspiring than a mere to-do list."
Is he right? Does Brown need a new over-arching vision or narrative to renew Labour in office, or is the country sick of all that kind of stuff after ten years of Blair? I'm not going to attempt to answer this question, but I think it will provide a good talking point!
Tuesday, November 06, 2007
Tell Gordon what his vision is
So if it's true that the Prime Minister has to be told what his vision is, we may as well try to do that ourselves than wait for the Tories to supply the answers.
I've drawn up a list of ten policy suggestions which I personally would like to have seen in today's programme, ranging from progressive ideas such as extending maternity pay over a full year and doing more to tackle inequality to democratic reforms such as an elected Second Chamber and giving the people their rightful say on the EU Treaty.
To see the full list, and to vote on your own preferences, click HERE.
Good luck Bob
Julia G 4 Us!
If the results of my recent poll are anything to go by, what most of you really wanted to see was a generational/gender contest between Julia Goldsworthy and Charles Kennedy. I certainly agree that those two would have made it a much more interesting battle.
Question: Who would you have voted for in the Lib Dem leadership contest had all these candidates been standing?
Julia Goldsworthy 28%
Charles Kennedy 24%
Nick Clegg 8%
David Laws 8%
Vincent Cable 7%
Steve Webb 7%
Simon Hughes 6%
Chris Huhne 6%
Susan Kramer 4%
Ed Davey 1%
Still waiting for that Big Vision
Sad to say, I think today's Queen's Speech lends some further credence to the Gove analysis. If this is the full extent of Gordon's Big Vision, then heaven help us.
In my Saturday Column a few weeks' back, I wrote: "If [Mr Brown] is regain the political initiative, he will need to set out an agenda which people will see as authentically and distinctively his own - one based on fairness and social justice."
While there is some stuff in today's package that might merit that description - for instance the initiatives on housing, hospital cleanliness, flexible working and the school leaving-age - in terms of the overall message they will be completely drowned-out by the renewed focus on anti-terrorism measures, and the pledge, from a self-proclaimed champion of "liberty," to extend the detention-without-charge period to 56 days.
Furthermore some of the more "progressive" aspects of the package are themselves problematical, for instance the pledge to build 3m new homes, which will involve some difficult trade-offs with the environmental lobby, and the requirement to keep all under-18s in some form of education, which some will see as another infringement of individual liberties.
I will probably have a bit more to say about this on Liberal Conspiracy tomorrow and in my next Saturday column at the weekend. But take out the stuff about housing - a notorious blind spot of the last Prime Minister's - and what we have here is a Queen's Speech which Tony Blair could have delivered.
Monday, November 05, 2007
Why I am joining the Liberal Conspiracy
After much planning and hard work, most of it by Sunny, the new site, Liberal Conspiracy, is now live. Here is a piece I have written to explain why I will be getting involved, which also appears HERE.
A Labour government in its tenth year of office is reduced to nicking ideas off the Tories. The leading contender for the Liberal Democrat leadership is a pro-market “Orange Booker.” And the political blogosphere has degenerated into an increasingly shrill right-wing mutual admiration society.
“What’s Left?” you may well ask yourself. It’s as good a summary as any of the state of British politics – and British blogging – today.
Different people will have different interpretations as to how we got here. From where I’m standing, the responsibility lies very clearly with the last Prime Minister who, though armed with two majorities of 160 plus at a time when the opposition couldn’t run a whelk stall, failed to build that progressive consensus of which he so often spoke.
Damaged irreparably by the Iraq War and its grisly aftermath, he also failed to stand down soon enough to give his successor a similar opportunity to capitalise on the Tories’ weakness, waiting instead until they had revived under a new and charismatic young leader before finally departing the scene earlier this year.
As a result, Gordon Brown now finds himself trapped in a lethal political conundrum by which he dare not set out an agenda that is too distinctively his own for fear ceding the fabled “political centre ground” to David Cameron, even though that centre ground has already shifted several degrees to the right.
The Tory intellectual Michael Gove last week described Brown, woundingly, as a tragic figure, a thwarted idealist now unable to give effect to any of his old ideals, and for whom staying in power as long as possible has become the only remaining political objective.
I am not sure things are quite as bad for him as all that, but the problem was well illustrated by a single headline in the Comment section of The Guardian last week: “Brown's fightback must be built on a real shift to the left.”
Jon Cruddas and Jon Trickett, the joint authors of the article so headlined, did not use those words. Like “Crisis? What Crisis?” they were convenient journalistic shorthand. But they demonstrate how hard it is for those who articulate a liberal-left or “progressive” vision of society to explain that without recourse to labels the public finds unhelpful or alienating.
In a sense, that’s also the challenge facing liberal-left bloggers: how do we make left politics engaging, exciting even? It’s easy to take refuge in the old saw that blogging is essentially oppositional, that it’s better to be a right-wing blogger when Labour is in power - harder to do anything about it.
The truth is the right has had things its own way for far too long. The liberal-left blogosphere, still divided over Iraq and more generally over the whole New Labour project, has been too disparate to mount an effective challenge to the right-wing uber blogs, which by virtue of their size are now effectively part and parcel of the mainstream media
The opportunity has long been there for a group of like-minded bloggers to come together to offer an alternative perspective on current political developments, and to set out an alternative vision for where politics might go in the post-Blair era.
Liberal Conspiracy which is being launched today, is a possibly somewhat belated attempt to fill that vacuum. I am very pleased to have been asked to be a part of it.
Saturday, November 03, 2007
Gordon Brown and the sound of chickens coming home to roost
Of all the politicians in the UK, Gordon Brown bears more responsibility than any for the ongoing "English backlash," given his repeated refusal to reform the grossly iniquitous Barnett Formula despite a critical Treasury Select Committee report on the issue as long ago as 1999.
In my column, I argue that Labour had a great opportunity to tackle Scotland's disproportionate share of public spending under the formula in 1999/2000 when the party was riding high politically and public expenditure as a whole was rising so sharply that the adjustment could effectively have been concealed.
That opportunity has now been lost. The politics of the situation have changed utterly, with the SNP now very much in the ascendant, while public spending is no longer rising anything like as fast.
"New Labour’s refusal to reform the Barnett Formula when it was in a position to do so is a metaphor for its entire performance in government. It had two majorities of 160 plus. It was faced by an opposition which wasn’t capable of running a whelk stall. It had a chance to do difficult but necessary things for the long-term benefit of the country. And it didn’t do them."
The piece can be read in full on my companion blog HERE.
Friday, November 02, 2007
What England means to me
***
England is the land of my birth, and the land where I hope to end my days. The land of my fathers and mothers, and the land where I too will raise my children. The land from which I have sometimes travelled far, yet always longed to return to whenever I have left its shores. The land where I have enjoyed all my happiest moments, from the childhood summers in Sussex by the sea, to the Lakeland mountain walking holidays of the middle years. The land of music as varied yet as quintessentially English as Elgar and Vaughan Williams, Genesis and The Smiths. A land of beer drinkers and pub culture, of bar-room camaraderie and foaming pints beside roaring log fires. A land of temperate sunshine and richly varying seasons whose weather is reflected in its politics, free from harsh extremes. A land rich in history, symbolised by the continuity of a royal line stretching back fifteen centuries, and by the more ordinary human stories which bear out the truth of TS Eliot’s beautiful verse: “A people without history is not redeemed from time...History is now and England.” A land which people have fought and died to save, and a land which, in my grandparents’ generation, stood alone against the most atrocious tyranny the world has ever seen. A land where the words of its greatest leader Winston Churchill forever bear witness to its indomitable spirit: “We will defend our island, whatever the cost may be...we will never surrender.”
I hope to dwell in this land all my days and enjoy its safe pasture, and to bring up my children to love it as I have done.
November 2007
Thursday, November 01, 2007
More good advice for Brown
Blair must go
David Davis, Nick Clegg and Iain Dale are right. He should go. Am I the only person who finds it both surprising and depressing that it is a Labour Government that should be seeking to defend him?
Not the election day
Interestingly one of the key calculations in Gordon's dilemmma over whether to hold the first November election in living memory would have been the state of the weather, with conventional wisdom suggesting that the month's customarily gloomy days and dark evenings would have hit Labour's turnout disproportionately more than the Tories'.
Well, I can't speak for the rest of the country, but up here in Derbyshire today it's been positively summery, so if the weather really was a factor in the Prime Minister's decision, he probably needn't have worried.
But autumn sunshine or autumn rains, would Brown have won? No, I don't think so. I think the main movements in terms of seats would have been from Labour to SNP in Scotland and from Lib Dem to Tory in the South, with a small number of marginals changing hands directly from Labour to Tory.
The upshot of all that would have made Labour the biggest single party in a hung Parliament, which would really have been the worst of all outcomes for all three party leaders.
Gordon Brown, having thrown away a majority of 66 in a reckless gamble, would probably have had to resign. Sir Menzies Campbell would have tried to put together some sort of Lib-Lab coalition, but Nick Clegg and David Laws would have stopped him, and he would probably have had to go too.
As for David Cameron, he might have struggled to persuade his party to give him a second chance in a situation where many Tory MPs would have expected him to win outright.
The end result would almost certainly have been some sort of caretaker administration, and a second election next spring, quite possibly with three different party leaders. In a word: chaos.
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
Brown is his own Chancellor
"No one seriously expected the new Prime Minister to surrender all interest in his old department, but recent weeks suggest Mr Brown still has an office there," he says.
I'm not sure Ben or anyone else should be terribly surprised by this. History shows there are two sorts of Chancellors - those who have their own independent powerbase, like Denis Healey, Ken Clarke and Brown himself, and those who owe their power entirely to the Prime Minister, such as Anthony Barber, Norman Lamont, and Mr Darling.
From this list it will be seen that the more successful Chancellors tend to be the former variety, which bodes ill for Mr Darling's tenure. I continue to take the view that Jack Straw would have been a more sensible appointment.
Is there more to Clegg than meets the eye?
"If the legislation is passed I will lead a grassroots campaign of civil disobedience to thwart the identity cards programme ... I, and I expect thousands of people like me, will simply refuse ever to register," he said.
Clegg has spent most of this leadership campaign giving progressives like me reasons not to vote for him - all the talk about the Lib Dems needing to stop "looking inward" is really just code for saying the party needs to travel lighter in ideological terms.
But if he really is prepared to become the first party leader in living memory to go to jail for his principles, then perhaps he is not quite the identikit member of the "political class" that on the surface he seems to be.
As I pointed out in my Saturday column last week, Gordon Brown's pretensions to be a champion of "liberty" will be pretty hollow unless he is prepares to reconsider the ID card scheme.
Loath as I am to urge him to nick any more ideas off the Tories, David Cameron's mob have put themselves on the right side of both popular opinion and liberal opinion on this one - two things that rarely seem to coincide.
Of all the crazy ideas put forward during the Blair era, this is the very first that Brown should have dispensed with in his determination to put some distance between him and his predecessor.
By comparison, supercasinos and the law on cannabis are pretty small beer.
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Blair's last reshuffle
Seldon goes on to claim that Blair then formulated a plan to give the job to David Miliband, but got cold feet at the last minute before settling on the third choice, Margaret Beckett.
The fascinating question here is why he decided not to promote Miliband, a move which, according to Seldon, Blair himself believed would have "renewed" the government.
Perhaps it would. But what it would also have done, of course, was hugely destabilised the government, in that the appointment to a major office of state of such an obvious potential rival to Gordon Brown for the succession would have been viewed as a declaration of war by the Brownites.
The Brownites would then have pushed harder to get the Prime Minister out, and would quite possibly have succeeded in removing him earlier than June 2007.
Seldon says that Blair decided against Miliband in the end because he had only been in the Cabinet a year, but this doesn't really ring true. I think he decided that the appointment would simply be too divisive, and opted for Beckett as the safe option.
The other interesting counterfactual question is whether, had the debacle over the deportation of foreign prisoners not happened and Clarke gone to the Foreign Office as originally planned, would he have been able to mount a successful challenge for the top job?
What it all goes to show is that, even though the Brown coronation ultimately assumed an air of historical inevitability, it never really was. Any number of circumstances could have led to a different outcome - these are just two of them.
What should Gordon do?
"One strong aspect of the New Labour project that must be jettisoned is a rather dry economic puritanism which sees work as the solution to every moral and social problem. Clearly, the effective management of the economy is critical and Brown has been brilliant at it.
But a tendency to prioritise the market inverts the principal point of social democracy - to ensure society is the master and that social justice and cohesion are our objectives. Left uncontrolled, the market leads to the growth of inequality and social recession across all classes."
I really couldn't agree more. But the paraphrase contained in the Guardian's headline - "Brown's fightback must be built on a real shift to the left" - doesn't really help matters in my view.
Monday, October 29, 2007
English Votes by English Laws by just another name
As Gareth points out on the Campaign for an English Parliament Newsblog, not the least problematical aspect of the proposal is the idea that the Speaker would have to rule on which bills, or parts of bills, were English-only, or English-and-Welsh-only on those areas which are devolved to the Scottish Parliament but not to the Welsh Assembly.
"If, as suggested, it is up to the Speaker to decide what is and what is not English legislation then the impartiality of the Speaker will be compromised. A brief look at Gorbals Mick’s record on impartiality should alert people to the dangers of this. Even if it were up to some higher, or more impartial, authority than the Speaker to designate bills as English-only then it would inevitably cause arguments before the bill is even drafted."
To be fair to Iain Dale, he is a supporter of the CEP and he argues that an English Grand Committee would be a stepping stone towards that eventual aim. Possibly in the longer-term, but I would argue that in the shorter-term, the introduction of further assymetric devolution into the constitution will actually make things worse rather than better, and make it more likely that the end of all this will not be a union of four equal autonomous nations but four wholly independent states.
That said, the distinction between an English Grand Committee and an English Parliament will probably be lost on most voters. The Tories will doubtless get some public support for this, simply for being seen to do something about the problem while Labour continues to bury its head in the sand.
The upside for Labour is that, with the next election not due until 2009, Gordon Brown has 18 months to expose the policy as unworkable, and maybe even to come up with an alternative proposal that is, although if I knew how he could dothat without handing his Scottish heartland over to the SNP lock stock and barrel, I'd probably be sitting in his chair.
Scrapping the Barnett Formula would take much of the current heat out of the issue, but Brown cannot now do that without handing a huge propaganda victory to Alex Salmond. The sensible time to have done it, as he was warned at the time, would have been in 1998/99, when Labour was still reaping the benefit of the devolution dividend.
I have taken a fair amount of mockery down the years for taking an interest in this subject - when my son was born the joke in the Lobby was that he would be fed on Barnett Formula Milk - but I always knew it would become a big political issue one day, and now it has.
A wider choice, please
Meanwhile, readers of this blog have been making clear their own view that they would have appreciated a wider choice in this leadership election, as indeed I would. My two polls show Huhne narrowly ahead of Clegg in a head-to-head contest, but well behind Charles Kennedy and Julia Goldsworthy in a notional poll involving all the candidates who previously ruled themselves out.
To say how you would cast your vote between Clegg and Huhne, click HERE. To choose between Vincent Cable, Clegg, Ed Davey, Goldsworthy, Simon Hughes, Huhne, Kennedy, Susan Kramer, David Laws and Steve Webb, click HERE. And if you think I'm paying far too much attention to the Lib Dem contest, please say so in the comments!
Saturday, October 27, 2007
Brown must be bolder
In particular, he needs to take a fresh look at proportional representation for Westminster. The first-past-the-post system, by encouraging the parties to target their messages at voters in a hundred or so marginal constituencies, has resulted in the effective disenfranchisement of most of the population and thereby increased the public's alienation from the political process.
In addition, if Mr Brown is going to starting banging the drum for "liberty" as he did in his Westminster University speech this week, he must look again at the ID card scheme. As well as being potentially the biggest infringement of individual liberties in this country since rationing, it will also cost an estimated £15bn to implement which most people think could be better spent elsewhere.
More in this vein in my weekly Saturday round-up of the week's political events, which can be read in the Newcastle Journal and HERE.
A sick society
Friday, October 26, 2007
The top 10 acts of political altruism?
My initital, perhaps rather cynical reply was to doubt that there were actually ten politicians who had been prepared to sacrifice their careers in such a way, but I am open to being proved wrong!
Politaholic, writing on Westminster Wisdom, nominated John Hume, saying:
"I can think of one act of political altruism (or at any rate putting public interest ahead of party interest): John Hume's participation in the Hume-Adams talks. Bringing Sinn Fein into the political mainstream was something from which the SDLP could only lose. I don't think this was a misjudgement: Hume knew what he was doing."
I can think of one other example - Roy Jenkins' decision to rebel against the Labour leadership in 1972 and vote with the Tories in favour of joining the EEC. Readers will have different views as to whether this course of action was good or bad for the country, but ultimately it cost him the Deputy Leadership and the inside track in the race to succeed Wilson.
Are there more examples? If readers can find at least ten, I will duly compile the list based on your nominations.
Less than bostin Austin
Oborne on 18DS
Oborne's analysis of the ills of current-day politics and journalism is spot-on and, in the light of recent events, his bewailing of the tendency of career politicians to come into the House without any previous experience of life is particularly topical.
This point is usually made in relation to people with no experience of running a business. Indeed Dale himself makes that very point in his interview. Oborne however reminds us that it is not just a lack of business experience we are talking about here but a lack of any sort of experience outside of machine politics.
Military experience is a good example. During the latter stages of World War 2, the Allies staged an amphibious landing in the area of Anzio, Italy, intended to outflank the Axis forces and enable an attack on Rome. The Military Landing Officer for the British assault brigade at Anzio was Major Denis Healey, who went on to become possibly our most distinguished postwar Defence Secretary from 1964-70.
My fellow Newcastle Journal columnist, Denise Robertson, recently expressed her frustration at the downgrading of experience as a political virtue with her own characteristic bluntness.
"I thought Cameron had a nerve standing for leader of his party after four years in the Commons. Now Clegg and Huhne are doing it after two, while some Labour ministers look as if they are still shaving their bum-fluff."
Thursday, October 25, 2007
I've still not made up my mind
"Can they bring themselves to vote for someone whose views they know to be well to the right of their own, in the knowledge that he is the candidate most likely to win them more seats?"
I am still unsure in my own mind what the answer is. So, for that matter, are at least three of the Lib Dem bloggers I have the most respect for - Jonathan Calder, James Graham and Paul Walter.
What I am sure of, as I argued HERE, is that the choice is a very real one which will have repercussions not just for the the Lib Dems but for the whole balance of British political debate.
There was no such dilemma last time round. Up against Sir Ming Campbell and Simon Hughes, Chris Huhne was easily the most right-wing of the candidates, and thus the one most likely to win seats off the Tories. But his views were still identifiably social democratic in a way that Nick Clegg's are not.
My heart still says Huhne. He is much the more centrist of the two candidates, has made clear he is prepared to use the tax system in the cause both of greater equality and a greener environment, and has insisted that proportional representation should remain a precondition of any post-election deal with the other parties.
By contrast, Clegg appears to be the establishment candidate, favoured by the very same numpty MPs who thought replacing Chatshow Charlie with Mogadon Ming would restore the party's fortunes.
Part of me admires his courage in that he is clearly running against his party in this election, but like Matthew Huntbach I have no illusions about what that will mean - that most of the principles the left of the party has most held dear will end up being sold down the river.
So if what was at stake was simply the future of the Liberal Democrats as a progressive, social democratic party, it would be a no brainer: vote Huhne.
But what is at stake goes much wider than that - specifically, the fact that the choice could have very clear implications for how many people end up voting Conservative at the next general election.
If the greater cause of British social democracy requires that David Cameron has to be stopped in order that the governance of this country should continue to reflect the views of its natural centre-left majority, then Clegg is clearly the more sensible choice.
It's a tricky one, isn't it? Maybe you, dear readers, can help me make up my mind by casting your preferences HERE.
Political misjudgements - the debate continues
Thanks also to Comment is Free, Tim, Rupa, Some Random Thoughts, Vino S, Guido and of course Iain for linking - I'll leave you to guess which one was responsible for the most traffic!
A siren Lib Dem voice?
"In particular, I find merely for raising concern about the way Britain is becoming more economically divided, the rich getting richer, the poor getting poorer, I’m getting dismissed as some old style lefty who shouldn’t really be in the party by Clegg supporters. Well if that’s what you lot are really like, it’s bye-bye Liberal Democrats from me if Clegg wins. I wish I hadn’t bothered with all the work I put in helping to turn Lewisham from a LibDem black hole into an area where we’re now seriously considering winning at Parliamentary level."
- Matthew Huntbach, commenting on Lib Dem Voice.
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Obviously sound judgement
Danny Alexander
Norman Baker
John Barrett
Tom Brake
Colin Breed
Jeremy Browne
Malcolm Bruce
Paul Burstow
Vince Cable
Alistair Carmichael
Nick Clegg
Edward Davey
Don Foster
Andrew George
Julia Goldsworthy
Nick Harvey
John Hemming
Paul Keetch
Norman Lamb
David Laws
Michael Moore
John Pugh
Alan Reid
Dan Rogerson
Adrian Sanders
Robert Smith
Jo Swinson
Matthew Taylor
Sarah Teather
John Thurso
Jenny Willott
MPs who are supporting Nick Clegg in the current Lib Dem leadership election:
Danny Alexander
Colin Breed
Jeremy Browne
Malcolm Bruce
Alistair Carmichael
Ed Davey
Tim Farron
Don Foster
Julia Goldsworthy
Nick Harvey
Mike Hancock
Mark Hunter
Paul Keetch
Norman Lamb
David Laws
Michael Moore
Greg Mulholland
Mark Oaten
John Pugh
Willie Rennie
Paul Rowen
Sir Robert Smith
Sarah Teather
Steve Webb
Stephen Williams
Phil Willis
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
The Top 10 Political Misjudgements
I myself speculated in a recent column: "The danger for Mr Brown is that his government, like Major’s, is now entering a period of what the Germans would call Gotterdammerung – the twilight of the gods. Far from renewing Labour in office, it could be that his destiny is to spend the next two years fighting back the inexorable Tory tide, while Mr Cameron prepares for his inevitable victory."
I have already listed my Top 10 political gaffes - so what's the difference between a gaffe and a misjudgement, you may ask?
Well, it's a qualitative one, really. A gaffe is primarily a one-off mistake, often humorous and with few lasting consequences. The misjudgements listed here, by contrast, are ones that arguably changed the course of history, and certainly adversely affected the careers of those who made them.
Five of them were mistakes made by Prime Ministers in office which either ultimately brought them down or, as in the case of Harold Wilson, set their governments off on the wrong course. Three were mistakes made by people who went on to become Prime Minister before the said mistakes in question came back to haunt them. Two were mistakes made by people who could easily have become Prime Minister had they not made them.
And yes, Callaghan is not only at the top of the list, but is the only politician to appear twice....
1. Jim Callaghan not calling an autumn election, 1978
What happened: Prime Minister Callaghan ducks out of an autumn 1978 election after private polls show it might result in a hung Parliament. The ensuing Winter of Discontent puts paid to Labour's credibility as a governing party and leads to 18 years of Tory hegemony which ultimately removes all vestiges of democratic socialism from the British state.
What might have happened: Narrowly re-elected, Callaghan serves for a further three years as Prime Minister before handing over to Denis Healey, who, buoyed by North Sea oil revenues, goes on to establish Britain as a stable, continental-style social democracy. The defeated Margaret Thatcher is replaced by Francis Pym and relegated to a historical footnote as only the second Tory leader of the 20th century not to become Prime Minister.
2. Enoch Powell playing the race card, 1968
What happened: Enoch Powell, spiritual leader of the Tory Right, makes a speech about immigration prophesying that the streets of Britain will soon be "foaming with much blood." He is immediately sacked from the frontbench by Ted Heath and becomes a peripheral figure on the margins of British politics, eventually joining the Ulster Unionists.
What might have happened: After distinguished service as Defence Secretary in the 1970-74 Heath government, Powell successfully challenges Heath for the leadership in 1975 after his two election defeats. Using his supreme oratorical skills to destroy Jim Callaghan at the Despatch Box in the late 70s, he becomes Prime Minister in 1979 at the age of 66, serving for one term before handing over to his faithful protege, Margaret Thatcher.
3. Tony Blair joining the US-led invasion of Iraq, 2003
What happened: Tony Blair, the most electorally successful Labour leader in history, gambles his career on joining a US neo-con inspired military adventure to get rid of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. Although militarily successful, it later becomes clear that the public has been duped into supporting the conflict by a tissue of lies, destroying their trust in the Prime Minister.
What might have happened: Using his world-class diplomatic skills successfully to keep Britain out of a disastrous conflict, Tony Blair is re-elected by a third successive landslide in 2005 and immediately announces his intention to fight a fourth election in 2009. In spring 2007, Gordon Brown accepts the presidency of the International Monetary Fund, and Mr Blair appoints David Miliband as his Chancellor and heir-apparent.
4. Margaret Thatcher implementing the poll tax, 1987
What happened: Believing herself to be politically immortal after a third successive election triumph in 1987, Margaret Thatcher decides to implement a 13-year-old pledge to reform the rates. Her decision to introduce a flat-rate tax unrelated to ability to pay sparks off a popular revolt which ultimately sweeps her away.
What might have happened: Continuing to see-off all pretenders to her crown, sometimes by deliberately over-promoting them as in the case of John Major, Margaret Thatcher secures a fourth term in 1991, albeit by a narrow margin over Labour whose leader Neil Kinnock antagonises some floating voters with his triumphalism. Despite having vowed to go "on and on and on," she serves for only three more years before handing over to her young acolyte, Michael Portillo.
5. Ted Heath's "Who governs Britain?" election, 1974
What happened: Prime Minister Heath, his authority under constant threat from union unrest, ups the stakes by calling a general election on the theme of "Who Governs Britain?" The voters respond: "Obviously not you," and deliver a hung Parliament with Labour as the largest party. Heath loses a further election the same year before being toppled by Margaret Thatcher.
What might have happened: Heath delays the election until the following year and trumps Labour's calls for a referendum on Britain's membership of the EEC by calling one himself, and leading the "Yes" campaign. With the two votes held simultaneously, the public votes overwhelmingly in favour of staying in and returns a triumphant Heath to No 10 for a further five years. He is still succeeded eventually by Mrs Thatcher, though.
6. Harold Wilson not devaluing the pound, 1964.
What happened: Newly-elected Prime Minister Harold Wilson ignores the good advice of his best economist, Tony Crosland, and decides not to devalue the pound, believing it will merely strengthen the widespread belief among voters and the financial markets that Labour governments always devalue. In 1967, Wilson is forced to devalue, thereby strengthening the widespread belief....
What might have happened: Knowing that it pays politically to get the bad news out of the way at the start of a government's lifetime, Wilson overrides the objections of George Brown and Jim Callaghan and devalues in 1964. Recovering from this initial hit, Wilson establishes for Labour such a reputation for economic competence that he is twice re-elected, in 1966 and 1970, finally passing the baton in 1972 to his long-serving Chancellor, Crosland.
7. Michael Heseltine resigning over Westland, 1986
What happened: Tiring of Margaret Thatcher and her autocratic ways, Defence Secretary Michael Heseltine ignites a row over the fate of a small West Country helicopter company which gives him the excuse to stage a dramatic resignation. But his bid to set himself up as the Tories' king-over-the-water backfires when he is defeated by John Major for the leadership in 1990.
What might have happened: Remaining studiously loyal to Mrs Thatcher throughout the late 1980s, Heseltine's steadfast support in the face of a bitter attack from Sir Geoffrey Howe is widely-held to have headed-off a potential leadership challenge in 1990. After Thatcher is gently persuaded by the men in
8. Jim Callaghan opposing In Place of Strife, 1969
What happened: Big Jim takes on Barbara Castle over her plans to curb union power and wins. His gamble in appointing himself as Labour's Keeper of the Cloth Cap appears to pay off when seven years later he wins the leadership, but nemesis awaits in the shape of the still-unreformed unions who sweep away Callaghan's premiership in the Winter of Discontent.
What might have happened: Capitalising on the public acclaim engendered by his tough stance against the unions, Harold Wilson wins a comfortable victory in the 1970 General Election. Overtaking Asquith's 20th century record of continuous service as PM in 1972, Wilson hands over the leadership to his long-time heir apparent, Roy Jenkins. But tiring of the endless battles with the Labour left, Jenkins quits in 1977 to become President of the European Commission, leaving Callaghan in charge.
9. John Major entering the ERM, 1990
What happened: After years of saying "no, no, no" to British membership of the European Monetary System, Margaret Thatcher is finally prevailed upon to enter by her new Chancellor, John Major, at a rate of 2.95DM to the pound. The level proves unsustainable, and on Black Wednesday in 1992, Prime Minister Major is forced to withdraw from the EMS and effectively devalue sterling.
What might have happened: Siding with Mrs Thatcher against her pro-European Foreign Secretary, Douglas Hurd, Major decides the time is not right (or ripe) for ERM entry. Hurd and Geoffrey Howe resign, precipitating a leadership challenge by Michael Heseltine. Thatcher is brought down, but Major emerges as Prime Minister and reaffirms his decision to stay out despite sustained Labour criticism. Two years later, his stance is vindicated and the Tories' reputation for economic competence reinforced.
10. Gordon Brown not challenging John Smith, 1992
What happened: Gordon Brown, seen as the natural leader of Labour's modernising faction, declines to challenge John Smith for the party leadership in 1992. Over the ensuing two years, he is eclipsed by his younger rival Tony Blair, and is forced to stand aside in his favour when Smith unexpectedly dies in 1994. Blair goes on to serve for 13 years as leader, ten of them as Premier.
What might have happened: Brown loses to Smith, but establishes himself as the clear heir apparent. He is elected unopposed in 1994 on Smith's death and become Prime Minister in May 1997, winning again in May 2001 before handing over to Tony Blair after ten years as leader in 2004 as previously agreed between them. Blair goes on to win another landslide for Labour in 2005, but faced by the prospect of a Tory resurgence, embarks on a radical plan to renew the party in office under the banner "New" Labour.
This post was featured on "Best of the Web" on Comment is Free.
Monday, October 22, 2007
Barnett strikes again
There is a real choice
Unfortunately, however, Messrs Clegg and Huhne themselves seem to be doing their best to encourage what Kettle terms this "cynical and disdainful" view of political debate.
If the two candidates have indeed signed up to a non-aggression pact over policy, it is a particularly daft move on Chris Huhne's part. Huhne is older, greyer, duller and more cerebral. He cannot possibly beat Nick Clegg in a style v style contest, only by presenting it as a battle of style v substance.
For my part, I continue to believe there are real policy issues at stake in this contest, even if the arguments between the candidates are slightly nuanced. Electoral reform is one such issue.
This morning, Huhne makes clear that PR for Westminster should remain a pre-condition for any post-election deal with either of the two main parties. By contrast Clegg is on record as having said the Lib Dems should stop banging on about PR, because it "makes people think we are only interested in getting our bums on seats."
I am not suggesting for a moment that Clegg does not believe in PR for Westminster, just that it clearly isn't as high a priority for him. Given that politics is the language of priorities, it is nonsense to suggest that such differences of emphasis do not matter.
Friday, October 19, 2007
Alan Coren RIP
On an edition of the Quiz that went out on the morning of Saturday, 30 August 1997, Coren uttered the words: "I don't know a lot about landmines or Princess Diana, but I do know you would be mad to poke either of them."
Legend has it that, after the Princess's death the following day, a BBC flunkey was despatched on a search-and-destroy mission to ensure that every last copy of the offending tape was safely disposed of.
Clegg decoded
Nick Clegg's campaign launch this morning only served to strengthen my view that he intends to define himself in opposition to his party's traditional supporters, Here are some highlights, with some slightly tongue-in-cheek interpretations from yours truly.
What he said: "Ming is a man of integrity, honour and decency. Over the years he has also shown himself to be a man of impeccable judgment and extraordinary political courage."
What he meant: He made the right decision to resign.
What he said: "Over the last two years or so, the Liberal Democrats have been looking inwards too much."
What he meant: Don't vote for the candidate whose political views are closer to your own, vote for the one who the press tells you is the biggest vote-winner.
What he said: "If the Liberal Democrats are to change the tired old pattern of British politics, we are going to have to be bold, we will have to move outside our comfort zone and take greater risks than we ever have before."
What he meant: I'm going to sell our principles completely down the river.
What he said: "I want us to extend our reach and broaden our appeal to voters beyond the "Westminster village."
What he meant: I'm better looking than Chris Huhne.
Thursday, October 18, 2007
Clegg in the driving seat
Webb was to have been the candidate of the social liberal, pro-redistribution wing of the party and had he stood the Huhne camp will have been reckoning on the majority of his votes transferring to their candidate on the second ballot.
Not only will that not now happen, but Webb is actually signalling that people who would have voted for him should support Clegg, enabling the Sheffield MP to claim that he is the candidate who can unite both wings of the party.
It's a very shrewd move on Webb's part. He wouldn't have won the leadership, but by backing the candiate most likely to, he has almost certainly earned himself a top-ranking job in Clegg's new Shadow Cabinet line-up.
My question is whether the social liberals who have decided to back Clegg rather than the more left-leaning Huhne - Julia Goldsworthy is another - will end up getting decidely more than they are bargaining for.
I think he could well turn out to be a Tony Blair figure in more ways than one, defining himself in oppositon to his party's traditional supporters. Under Clegg, the social liberal agenda could end up as dead a duck as democratic socialism under Blair.
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Ming for Speaker?
For my part, I can't see it happening. After two Labour Speakers on the trot, the Tories will rightly regard it as "their turn" and would view any attempt to shoehorn Campbell into the job as some sort of consolation prize from his old mate Gordon Brown.
It is also extremely unlikely that Labour MPs could be persuaded to vote for Ming in large numbers, given that many of them hate the Lib Dems with even more of a vengeance than they hate the Tories.
Personally, I would have loved the next Speaker to have been Ann Widdecombe, but she's stepping down from the Commons at the next election. I wonder if Ken Clarke would be interested?
Hobson's Choice
- Reader comment left on Ben Brogan's Blog earlier today.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Whither the Lib Dems?
Chris Huhne stood in that election as the change candidate, putting forward a clear and compelling message which combined economic credibility with strong social justice and environmental credentials. Instead, the party opted for the "safe" option of Sir Menzies Campbell.
It was a mistake, and some of us said so at the time. That said, having put its trust in Ming to lead them up to the next election - then, as now, expected in 2009 - the party ought to have had the decency to stand by him.
A party which chops and changes its leaders cannot expect to be taken seriously by the electorate, and increasingly, this seems to be the Lib Dems' fate.
Having backed Huhne last time, it would seem logical for me to do so again, but given that this is unlikely to be a generational contest in the way that one was, I think the arguments are slightly less clear-cut this time round.
Over the ensuing 18 months, Huhne seems to have become unfairly categorised as a "left" candidate who reaches out more to Labour voters than to Tory ones. I am not at all sure that this is true, but he needs to overcome that perception if he is to put himself forward as a plausible leader at this particular juncture.
It would not in my view send out the right strategic message were the party to appear more interested in outflanking Labour at this stage. In terms of defending their key marginals in the south, and maybe even building on that base next time round, the Lib Dems need to choose the person who is going to cause maximum difficulties for the Tories.
There seems to be a common consensus that this would be Nick Clegg, although I personally am far from convinced by him. As someone said on this blog last week: "He was impressive as an MEP but since arriving at Westminster has given off an air of dessicated self-satisfaction" - another way of saying he just assumes the job is his by right.
For my part, I'd like to see a slightly wider choice of candidates. Julia Goldsworthy is bright, telegenic, and female, and 28 years after Margaret Thatcher became Premier it's high time we had another woman at the top of British politics. And David Laws, not Clegg, is the real intellectual engine of the "Orange Bookers" and deserves a crack at the top job.
But it is a sad fact about the Lib Dems that most of their most able figures have their best days behind them. By far the most impressive and substantial figures in their ranks are Paddy Ashdown and Shirley Williams, while Vince Cable is head and shoulders above the rest of the MPs, even though yesterday he looked like a mafia boss telling us that Ming was sleeping with the fishes.
Either way, I hope for the Lib Dems' sake that whoever wins is granted the automatic loyalty that the party's leaders used to merit and allowed to fight at least two elections as both Ashdown and Charles Kennedy were. That is how they used to do things in the Lib Dems in the days when they were successful, instead of giving a poor impersonation of the nasty party.
British politics needs a successful Liberal Democrat party. It is high time it got its act together.
Monday, October 15, 2007
Is it all over for Ming?
In January 2006, they got rid of Charles Kennedy knowing that his successor would almost certainly be Ming Campbell. Indeed some of those who signed the no confidence letter that brought Kennedy down were already pledged to support Ming in the ensuing contest.
Now, less than two years on, they apparently want to get rid of Ming as well, on the grounds that he will probably be 68 by the time of the next election. But shouldn't they have thought of that when they elected him?
Before all this Gordon Brown snap election nonsense was even a twinkle in Dougie Alexander's eye, it was overwhelmingly likely that the next election would be in 2009 and that Ming would therefore be, er, 68 at the time of it. Whatever it is the Lib Dems now stand for, it's certainly not loyalty.
Sunday, October 14, 2007
The sincerest form of flattery
- Andrew Rawnsley, in The Observer, Sunday 14 October.
"His conference speech in Brighton was easily the best of the season, and even contained the best joke - the line about Dave wanting to be Tony but not Maggie, and Gordon wanting to be Maggie but not Tony, and Ming not wanting to be any of them."
- Yours truly, on This Blog, Tuesday 9 October.
Pleased to be of service, Andrew - as ever.