British politics
I had this on Labour Uncut last week.
It is acknowledged that people do not join the Labour party simply to deliver leaflets or attend uninspiring meetings. This tends to go along with support for giving members more say on policy. But parties are vehicles of change, not forums for mass therapy. Party debate is a means to the end of building the world that Labour exists to create.
As our policy review continues, it’s worth reflecting on the “built to last” exercise undertaken by David Cameron after becoming the Tory leader. His government’s programme now appears anything but. His health policy is fudged, his police promises are broken, his public service reforms are rehashed and events have rapidly exposed his defence policy.
The biggest global economic crisis since the 1930s has left almost four in ten voters able to say: “I can’t imagine I’ll ever have the money I want to meet my needs.” Notwithstanding the conflation of wants and needs in this statement, this indicts Cameron’s ability to generate any feel good factor.
Running through many of the government’s failings is a refusal or inability to acknowledge the reality of Britain’s place in the world. They will not place the economic crisis of recent years in its proper global context for fear of distorting their framing of these events as entirely Labour’s fault (and the enduring strength of this frame is one of the government’s trump cards). They will not adapt their defence review to events that the foreign secretary has compared with the fall of the Berlin wall. They will not engage in a meaningful debate about the future of our continent because they are bored by Brussels, contemptuous of Athens and scared of Bill Cash. They will not concede that the UK’s position within global labour markets makes nonsense of their commitment to reduce annual immigration to the UK from “hundreds of thousands to tens of thousands”. This will, as all realities do, catch up with them.
Their immigration policy is just one instance of their being economical with the actualité. Their welfare policy is meant to be about getting people into work. Try telling that to women and council tenants who face perverse work incentives because of policy on tax credits and council housing. And, of course, we were promised “no more top down reform of the NHS” and we were given Andrew Lansley’s earthquake. Michael Gove’s schools reform has proceeded more smoothly than Lansley’s revolution. Could Gove’s relative success be because, as David Aaronovitch recently asked, “he has done pretty much what he told people before the election he would do?”
The implosion of his policy programme matters less to Cameron than it would do to Ed Miliband as prime minister. Cameron believes in nothing, but it is his nothing. It is his occupancy of number 10. It’s not about any bigger purpose. Ironically, gutting himself of principle makes his wholly pragmatic goal of remaining prime minister harder to secure. It makes his government more vulnerable to events. Pragmatism without principle isn’t pragmatic. It’s a ship without a compass. Margaret Thatcher u-turned as prime minister but by never lacking for direction these u-turns didn’t bring into question her fundamental purpose.
Miliband’s purpose is quite different, obviously. He should, nonetheless, ask: What lessons for our policy review can be learnt from the period between “built to last” and now?
The policy review should arrive at a programme that we’d be prepared to defend during the election and be capable of implementing in government. We would be reaping a whirlwind to indulge in any Lansley-like sleights of hand or to promise more than is deliverable, as the government has done on immigration.
Lansley’s reforms have jarred with Cameron’s personal identification with the NHS, which was central to his attempted Tory detoxification. Cameron was right to address negative perceptions attaching to his party, but health policy in government shows that this attempt lacked ballast. This cannot be absent as we tackle the negativity that attaches to us in various policy areas: welfare, immigration, the economy, taxation and “big government” in all its forms.
Not only do we need to show that we get it, but that we require genuinely effective and workable answers. We need also to decisively move beyond the little Englanderism of Cameron – explaining how we will prosper in the post crisis global economy, what kind of Europe should emerge post Eurozone calamity and what our role in the world ought to be post Arab spring.
Yes, robust, inclusive party debate is vital, but so much more so is having this process conclude with a programme that could meet these complex challenges and is genuinely built to last.
I had this on Labour Uncut a few weeks ago.
Tony Blair, according to his economics advisor as prime minister, isn’t much of an economist. In contrast – the only leader to take Labour to three general election victories – Blair is a politician par excellence. While others are better on economics, what Blair says and doesn’t say on the economy is politically insightful.
Let’s take four points made in his speech and the Q&A at a recent Progress event.
First, Labour should focus more on microeconomic debates and less on the macro-economy.
This seems an oddly technocratic point but reminds me of the view of Douglas Alexander and Jim Murphy that “Labour needs a draw on the deficit and a win on growth”. I suspect I took Alexander by surprise when I asked how we achieve this at a CLP dinner earlier this year.
I also suspect that Blair is giving his answer. We get a draw on the deficit by maintaining a strong line that closes it on the trajectory first specified by Alistair Darling. We get a win on growth not by making arguments about the economy as a whole but by crafting a series of bespoke policy offers sector by sector.
The combined impact of these offers would enable a win on growth and creates a series of talking points with business, which, as Blair stressed, matters because we won’t have this win until we have a phalanx of leading business people prepared to back us.
Second, these are distinct questions:
- How do we make sure the crisis never happens again?
- How do we get the economy moving again?
Separating these questions misses the golden thread of confidence. The economy won’t be moving again until we have confidence in a brighter future. We won’t have this until steps are seen to have been taken to mitigate the risk of the crisis of recent years repeating. Rock bottom public confidence attests that this isn’t coming from government.
There is opportunity in this for Labour. But we would create problems for ourselves if in reaching for this we undermine our deficit closure strategy or underplay the emphasis placed upon the tailored microeconomic offers suggested above. The priority should be these offers, rather than grasping for an elusive confidence bullet. As we roll out these offers, though, we should be thinking hard about what mix of financial, trade and fiscal policy that bullet might be composed of. We would be better placed to argue that our bullet is real on the back of some winning microeconomic arguments.
Third, the UK should join the euro when the economic conditions are right.
He’s been saying this for years. Yet the euro, at least as currently constituted, seems in contradiction with reality. As Italy looks ever more like a larger Greece, it threatens to make Lehman Brothers look like a tea party.
Blair, nonetheless, maintains that the geo-political clout of the UK would be maximised by euro membership. While this may or may not be true, euro membership now seems so far from the UK’s economic interest as to beg the question: What steps, if any, can a UK that remains outside the euro for at least the foreseeable future take to maximise our geo-political influence?
Targeting euro membership seems as 1990s as Britpop. Redolent of a time when BRICs were things you built housing bubbles with. Labour should, of course, continue to play a constructive role in the EU. However, we should also more strongly stress our support for updating the institutions of the global economy (e.g. the World Bank and IMF, including the global reserve currency advocated by Roger Bootle). Such reform would contribute towards minimising the chances of the crisis of recent years repeating. Labour advocacy would have us be the internationalist, far-sighted party that we should be.
Fourth, he rightly trumpeted his many achievements as prime minister.
While his government was characterised by much needed increases in public spending, unsustainably high tax revenues from the city afforded a large chunk of this. This un-sustainability goes a long way to explaining the deficit. These tax revenues were recycled through tax credits and similar but the distribution before this secondary redistribution was so skewed that many could only have the lives they wanted through accessing easy credit. This built up a stock of private debt that households are now struggling to pay down.
If a more equal distribution of income and wealth could be achieved without resort to secondary redistributions, these problems would be more containable. And Labour would have achieved its historic purpose. To serve this end, though, we need to return to government.
If done properly, thinking through and taking forward the ideas suggested by the economics of Blair can both make ourselves more electable and better able to realise our historic purpose in government.
I had this on Labour Uncut a few weeks ago:
“We know no spectacle so ridiculous as the British public in one of its periodical fits of morality”.
Denis MacShane sought to console speaker Martin by writing to him with the words of Thomas Babington Macaulay at the height of the expenses scandal. But was this quotation really appropriate?
Weren’t the British people right to be aggrieved by elected representatives defrauding them? Aren’t they also legitimately angry with, as Ed Miliband put it, “bankers who caused the global financial crisis” and “those on benefits who were abusing the system because they could work – but didn’t”? And can there be any doubt that the revulsion of the public against the News of the World is justified?
The spikes in outrage against fiddling politicians and phone-hacking journalists, as well as the slower burning resentment at welfare cheats and fat cat financiers, makes a nonsense of Macaulay. The people he mocks instinctively know right from wrong. And in this intuitive grasp we see ourselves for what we are: communitarians.
The philosopher Julian Baggini foreswore ivory towers and spent six months with the people of Rotherham before concluding that this is the philosophy of the English. It was, incidentally, in the same town that Gerry Robinson tried to “fix the NHS” and Jamie Oliver “taught the poor to cook”. This is a worldview that stresses the responsibilities of the individual to the community. Membership of the community entitles rights and privileges but responsibility demands that these be reciprocated.
We are a nation that wants to see itself made up of; hard working families who play by the rules. We want those who play by the rules to be supported and to get on. We want those who don’t to be punished. The ascendency of Thatcherism, with its win-at-whatever-cost individualism, has obscured the extent to which we see ourselves as members of social groups to which we owe allegiance and the execution of responsibility.
Those who can work have a responsibility to do so. Those who can work but don’t should be penalised. Law makers have a responsibility not to be law breakers. Just like everyone else, including journalists and bankers. And they should feel the full force of the law when in breach of it. These professions are, however, held to more exacting standards of responsibility than legal compliance alone. Their integrity demands more than this. The irresponsibility of hacking the phones of grieving families is about much more than breaking the law.
As Ed Miliband’s advisor Greg Beales tweeted last Wednesday: “Today Ed Miliband spoke for the country because David Cameron can’t. Very important moment”. Tony Blair drew applause from a Progress audience last Friday by saying: “Ed Miliband has shown real leadership this week”.
Cameron’s “catastrophic error of judgement in hiring Andy Coulson” ties him to the violators of the communitarian rulebook. Miliband, in contrast, has made himself a tributary for these rules. And followed this through to demands for the requisite punishments: the resignation of Rebekah Brooks, the referral of News International’s takeover of BSkyB to the competition commission. In doing so, he gave his leadership its biggest turbo-charge to date.
He had previously enjoyed one of his best days with a speech on responsibility that placed him on the right side of the rulebook on welfare and bankers. By throwing everything he could at News International Miliband generated a much bigger impact than that speech had. But he also took a bigger risk.
Because, beyond the fierce urgency of now, a risk is what being sanguine about schmoozing Murdoch – who will more than likely still be a major media player at the next election – amounts to. But smart politics is about calculated risk-taking – and, in a country of communitarians, respecting the rulebook. If the power of newspapers is as diminished as we are sometimes told and if the public standing of News International continues to decline, Murdoch’s bite shouldn’t be as feared as it has been. If Cameron keeps being on the wrong side of the rulebook, he won’t be the winner that Murdoch always looks to back.
The possibility, although still slim, that Murdoch is a busted flush and Cameron a loser suddenly appears real. If Miliband can maintain his forceful leadership on the issue, capturing the public mood then this will increase. It will require much more than a win in today’s Commons vote called by Labour or in the wider debate opened up by the News International revelations.
This debate threatens a rupture between Cameron and the people – and demonstrates that when Ed connects with popular instincts for right and wrong he can lead.
I had this on Labour Uncut yesterday. It was deemed a “must read” by Politics Home.
Stewart Lee describes David Cameron with his arm around Nick Clegg as being akin to “a bloke who has bred a prize pig”. The Liberal Democrats have been slaughtered to ten per cent in opinion polls and Cameron boasts of being “in a position in four years time where we win the general election and govern on our own”.
While Tories love this bullish talk, the plan for the “pigs” fight back is more obvious than that which will deliver Cameron this outcome. The NHS bill has shown what can be expected from the Liberal Democrats. Pick fights with their governing partners – even if this necessitates reneging on past commitments. Extract concessions. And present the outcomes as injecting Lib Dem sanity into the Tory madness.
In 2003, the Tories complained about the Liberal Democrats producing a “disreputable” campaign guide. It advised candidates to “be wicked, act shamelessly, stir endlessly”. The Tories might suspect that Lib Dem ministers have dusted it down. Chris Huhne seems eager to manoeuvre. He has attacked his Conservative colleagues as “rightwing ideologues”. He is, obviously, looking for a “win” on the environment.
Huhne’s constituency was Tory target seat number 12 last year. It is reported that Cameron will “not lift a finger to help” Huhne if he is found to have lied to the police. This disinclination may reflect bad feeling over the AV referendum. Huhne’s spoiling for a policy fight is unlikely to rebuild burning bridges.
Huhne retaining his seat through taking a joint Tory/Lib Dem ticket at the next election seems a diminished probability. As government policies are doing nothing to allow Cameron to make substantial inroads in the north of England, the prime minister looks intently upon Lib Dem seats like Huhne’s in the south.
With his scraps with government colleagues, Huhne seeks to retain his hold on his seat. Huhne won’t attack from the right in these inter-government confrontations. The Liberal Democrats are desperately trying to salvage their leftist identity from the wreckage of their entry into government. This boxes the Tories in to the right – limiting the extent to which the Cameron camp can be pitched on the centre.
Having devoured (but not properly understood) the Tony Blair books, this might unnerve Cameron. He wants to command the centre and shift it in his direction through reform, in contrast to the supposed failure of Blair’s first term. But nowhere in those books does it advise immediately firing out all your ideas, even if they are so half-baked they will inevitably fail to secure support and demand back tracking.
We know about the u-turns. The delayed white paper on public service reform also suggests that, while the Lib Dems are reduced to pettiness, the Tories are already scraping their ideas barrel. Tory ministers are risk-averse in assisting, because, as the likes of Andrew Lansley and Caroline Spelman attest, they will be hung out to dry if these risks don’t quickly come off.
There are threats and opportunities for Labour in these developments. We seem irrelevant when the debate plays out exclusively between two fractious governing parties. It is frustrating that, while it was long apparent that this was likely, the NHS bill has too often played out in this way. Huhne now threatens to extend this pattern to the environment. The need to insert ourselves into the national conversation places increased premiums on clear messaging and distinctiveness.
Senior Labour people insist that we “defend the record” of the last government. This cannot be at the expense of not learning the lessons of the last general election. We must not confuse babies with bathwaters in striking this balance. We’ve been too coy, for example, about the health gains we achieved by GP commissioning in government, which didn’t lose us any votes. Instead of being fearful of our own shadow, let’s take such good ideas to their logical conclusion. This won’t leave us in the same places as the government. It will, though, confirm Alan Milburn’s argument that only Labour can successfully reform public institutions.
Some examples of where this attitude might lead are: Labour believes that work should pay, so we want to rebalance taxation from income to wealth. Labour believes that power should be accountable to people, so we want a second chamber fully elected by PR. Labour believes that Britain is in Europe, so we will work constructively to create an EU that best enables the UK to adapt to twenty first century realities. Labour’s engagement with the EU is part of a belief in internationalism. This demands that we do not allow a narrow, ultimately self-defeating conception of national interest to stand between us and support for the kind of urgently needed reforms to global institutions championed by Mark Malloch Brown.
Advancement of these kinds of idea would show the country that we have the self-confidence to speak our truths about today’s biggest challenges. It would show the Lib Dems that if their core beliefs (on tax, the Lords, PR, Europe and global institutions) mean anything, that they could be better furthered under a Labour-led government than a Tory one. If we can secure the tactical objective of ensuring that Lib Dem MPs are inclined towards a Labour-led government, then the Tory/Lib Dem alliance cannot continue into a second parliament. If we can do this at the same time as achieving the strategic objectives of distinctiveness and relevance, then so much the better.
These strategic and tactical imperatives require candour about our beliefs and the policy conclusions to which they lead, rather than Clegg-bashing or any other form of personality driven politics.
Jonathan Todd is Labour Uncut’s economic columnist.
I had this on Labour Uncut a few weeks ago.
The Labour front bench might not welcome advice from retirees, no matter how dignified. But they’ve got some. “Be a little bit more interesting”, said Peter Mandelson, in response to a question at a recent Progress event. National recovery from the major economic crisis of recent years requires big, bold ideas. He wants Labour to rise to this challenge.
This is the stuff of pragmatic radicalism on economic rebalancing. Pragmatism demands workable solutions to national concerns. The support that politicians, of all parties, proclaim for rebalancing the economy indicates that this is such a concern. The persistence of the imbalances in our economy – between domestic consumption and exports; finance and manufacturing; the south east of England and much of the rest of the UK – attest that this support is inadequate to purpose. A dash of radicalism is needed, for not only rebalancing to be achieved, but for Labour’s arguments to cut through the white noise of mainstream politicians professing support and delivering so little.
Many more elected city mayors are the stuff of this radicalism. Our top heavy state is a drag on economic performance. Elected city mayors are the next step on the devolution journey begun by the last government. The centre for cities and the institute of government recently called for their powers to be beefed up – through, amongst other things, chairing integrated transport authorities and co-chairing local enterprise partnerships. The common sense of people in cities voting for their leaders and retaking command of their destinies should be a truth loudly proclaimed by Labour – as should be the common sense of rewarding hard work.
The tax system can further help to make us into a nation of grafters. This means less tax on income and more on wealth. A land tax could form part of this transition. It would do something to dampen the British tendencies towards property speculation and bubbles. It might also form part of a Labour drive towards tax simplification. Because taxation of land is simple, it would be difficult to avoid.
Labour could win friends from UK uncut to the CBI with a considered drive towards tax simplification. UK uncut should appreciate simplifications that make tax harder to avoid and the CBI should value simplifications that support economic growth. A land tax offset by reductions in taxation on employment would reduce the capacity of the rich to avoid taxation and increase the extent to which everyone keeps the fruits of their hard work. Tax simplification should not be owned by the right. Nor should backing for dynamic financiers and entrepreneurs.
Labour should insist that the Vickers review ends with rock solid retail banks. These, and an expansion of our credit unions, are needed to support household saving. This isn’t just important for households themselves, but to generate funds to be recycled by financiers as investment in firms. Alongside this we need a flourishing of nimble financial services firms prepared to provide capital to enterprising SMEs. Such small businesses must be developed in green manufacturing but they will be more likely to do so if a credible price for carbon can be established.
At the moment this price comes from the ineffective EU emissions trading scheme (EU-ETS). Its failure merits much stronger condemnation, which should come from Labour. It either needs meaningful reform or replacement by a carbon tax. Either approach should be taken forward at the EU level, rather than in the form of the cack-handed move towards a carbon price contained in budget 2011. The likes of Bill Cash bar sensible policy from David Cameron on this. The prime minister is unable to lead in Europe but securing a robust carbon price should be part of the more tightly focused Europe that Labour champions.
Most immediately, the eurozone needs to face up to the tough choices of its on-going crisis. The EU also needs to recalibrate itself to our Asian century. The turbocharged development of the BRICs (Brazil, Russia, India and China) and similar does much to explain the expectation of Gerard Lyons, chief economist at standard chartered, that the global economy will at least double in size between now and 2030. Europe, though, will be in the slow lane unless trade links deepen with the rapidly developing world.
This means more EU activity where it can add value – a properly functioning EU-ETS, completion of the single market in energy, and a sticks-and-carrots offer to all Mediterranean countries equivalent in ambition to that given to eastern Europe on its transition from communism – and much less where it provides little but muddle and duplication. Subsidiarity needs to be taken much more seriously. Not just in terms of Brussels deferring to member states, but to regional and local bodies, such as elected mayors, and, in turn, to communities and individuals themselves.
This hard edged devolution would be driven by a sense of mission. This is what fires the best of the private and public sectors. It’s making Apple great that motivates Steve Jobs. The profits are a by-product. The Steve Jobses of a reformed British state have to be Labour politicians. The government are u-turning themselves into an ever decreasing circle of failed reforms and unfulfilled ambitions, and not least among these is their commitment to economic rebalancing.
Labour can do better. And we will be very “interesting” indeed when we do so.
This is a shortened version of an essay that appears in the new Pragmatic Radicalism publication.
Jonathan Todd is Labour Uncut’s economic columnist.
