John Harris has written his most balanced article for the Guardian for some time, asking:
When are Labour party ‘moderates' going to do more than just moan?
That is an excellent question: the idea that Labour might split, and that Labour is bereft of ideas, appear to be notions entirely based upon the actions and thinking of those on the right of that Party.
As I have made clear, not least in the Guardian over the Christmas period, I do not see a role for me in party politics, and am quite happy about that. But, I was interested to read an article by my friend Jolyon Maugham, also published yesterday, where he indicated that he is beginning to think about these issues. He wants to do it in the context of Labour: I'm interested in the questions more generally, and because Jolyon deliberately drew his article to my attention, and it can be seen as a welcome response to John Harris, it is on his piece that I will concentrate.
Jolyon has indicated that he has interest in four themse at present, which I might summarise as:
What do we want from our State?
What should be the relationship between business and society?
What should our tax system look like?
Redistribution
All of them are important, and all vex me. But, it was the context in which Jolyon raised these that intrigued me the most since I have been asked to think about them by fellow members of my department at City University. He said:
It has been said, and often, that candidates other than Corbyn offered little in Labour's leadership elections. I think this is broadly true. But it is much less damning than might at first be thought.
Cooper, Kendall and Burnham thought they were competing against each other — and would have time after victory to put together a policy offer. This is, of course, exactly how good ideas are made. They do not spring fully formed from the mind of some mythical leader. They emerge from a process of deep and iterative thought. As I listened to the early leadership hustings what I most wanted was to hear someone with the courage to admit that they were still embarked on the journey of finding out what the solutions were.
And Cooper, Kendall and Burnham did not see until it was upon them the Corbyn steamroller. And then it was too late to respond. And in this, of course, they were mistaken — but they were far from alone.
It is the suggestion that people want to secure the leadership of a political party and then try to work out why they might do that which intrigues me. I simply do not share the view that this is how party politics should, or even does, work. A wise friend when I was a teenager told me that if I wanted to change the world I should be a poet. If I could not manage that he suggested that I should instead be a writer. His advice then, which I continue to think to be true, was that politicians trail in the wake of poets and writers, but do not create their own political philosophies.
This is entirely logical: the skills required to be a practical, working politician are fundamentally different to those needed to create a political (or economic) worldview, and vice versa. This is not to say that the practical politician should not be interested in such worldviews: such philosophies should underpin all that they do. But, I think it very rare indeed that the process of creation can be combined with the skills of delivery, and anyone hoping that they should be is likely to be perennially disappointed.
To put it another way, the three contenders for the Labour leadership (other than Jeremy Corbyn) who had not worked out what worldview they were adopting based upon some comprehensive reading and understanding before they put their position to the Labour membership had, in my opinion, simply failed to understand the task that they were being asked to undertake. They should have known exactly what they were offering by the time that the hustings arrived.
In this sense I'm also surprised that Jolyon can say:
And although I do not know what they were for I have little sense of what Corbyn's Labour is for either. His appeal in the leadership campaign was primarily to higher spending and a largely unarticulated notion of change.
Since his victory his more lavish policy offerings — for example, closing the so-said £120bn so-called tax gap or ditching the so-called £93bn of so-called corporate welfare — have (rightly) been shelved.
And the gruel that has been replaced them has largely been drawn from Labour's 2015 Election Manifesto — that and the policy platform of Stop the War.
I think much of this untrue. As example, Jeremy Corbyn made very clear in his New Year message that he is seeking greater investment in the UK economy: in the event of a downturn I have little doubt that People's Quantitative Easing will have a major part to play in that.
And, although the '£93 bn of corporate welfare' is not being referred to any more, a review of all tax expenditures is, and involves, as Jolyon notes in his own article, a greater sum.
Lastly, if Labour's tax review does not look at issues relating to the tax gap and how to address it then I will be, to be candid, absolutely astonished.
To put it another way, I think that Jolyon does know exactly what Jeremy Corbyn is about, but is in denial.
That some denial is, to some degree reflected in this comment:
But whether or not you think this analysis fair, what certainly is fair is the challenge laid down by those who remain supporters of Corbyn's brand of politics: what is Labour's rump for?
That is an interesting question, but one to which John Harris has an answer when saying:
The makeup of what might be called the coalition of the unwilling is pretty clear: a mixture of Blairites, Brownites, the inheritors of the part of the old Labour right once rooted in some of the unions, and that great swath of Labour MPs who have no great factional loyalties but are deeply unsettled by their party's sudden left turn.
My guess it is these people who Jolyon calls 'the rump'. Harris continued:
Their pain, it seems, is shared by a reasonable number of activists, some of whom have decided to quit the party altogether. But so far, most of these people have displayed a remarkable lack of willingness to even understand their own predicament, let alone do anything meaningful about it.
Their script goes something like this. Never mind 50 years of deindustrialisation, a deepening Europe-wide crisis of social democracy, or the downsides of the Blair and Brown years, to quote the Labour-aligned thinktank Policy Network: last year's election defeat could be reduced to two key factors — Labour's failure to pay enough attention to “economic competence”, and the fact that “the public did not perceive Ed Miliband as a credible prime minister”.
As and when the Corbyn project implodes, goes the apparent argument, a new leader with the right plan will finally be summoned, and Labour will be back in the game.
I think John Harris is right: that is the basis of belief in what I see of the right wing of Labour. And John Harris is also right: this predicament has arisen precisely because much of Labour has not asked itself what it is about for far too long.
I have noted the questions Jolyon wants to address. If I'm honest I doubt that there would be any very significant difference between the answers that he could provide and the answers that I would give except that I now know where I am and most in the Labour Party do not. And that is the point: precisely because Labour has not known the answer to these questions, and maybe has not even asked them, let alone looked around to see who might be thinking about them (or, when it has, seems to have looked in some very odd places to find answers given its supposed political position) it has, quite unsurprisingly, been unable to answer the questions put to it by the electorate, just as three of the four leadership candidates this summer were quite unable to explain just what they were for. They could all, including Labour at the general election, offer shopping lists of nice sounding policy agendas. What was missing was any form of coherence at all, except from Jeremy Corbyn, who ( with a little help from his friends) had what was, like it or not, something that looked very much like a consistent and logical narrative to offer.
So, I welcome Jolyon's questions. But if they need to be asked now by those on the right of Labour then I'd suggest that it is a decade or so before those on that wing of the Labour party are going to have an electoral platform to propose that makes a lot of sense because before they can get anywhere near that position it seems that they have, first of all, to work out what they are for. And that is a much harder question to answer.
In which case it might be very good news that Labour actually elected Jeremy Corbyn, because at least he knows how to answer the question, even if in ways many will find unfamiliar.
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I do not think the problem is that the right of the labour party do not know what they are for. Rather they are in the wrong party, though they do not appear to accept that. So far as I can see, those who make their lives and livings in what is often called the “Westminster bubble” believe in TINA. And that makes them tories. They also believe that everyone in the country agrees with that analysis. The evidence of Corbyn’s success does not give them pause; they assume the invisible choir of the silent majority is with them, and that the dissenters who support Mr Corbyn or the SNP are a tiny group of “extremists”.
How they came to those conclusions is an interesting speculation. And how far they do truly believe what they say is also of interest, since in their heart of hearts they must know that invisible choir does not exist. That is because they made the crucial experiment when the SDP was formed: and I do not think they will risk their careers and income by putting it to the test again.
The sooner they join the tories, the better. Then we will all be clearer about what is on offer, and they will surely be more comfortable.
I agree but I believe some present Tories will join Labour which will in effect with its friends (Greens etc) become the anti-neoliberal alliance vs the neoliberals ie what remains of the Tory party combined with the former right-wing neoliberal Labour members.
I think it’s pretty obvious what neoliberals are doing in Labour, they’re there to ensure there’s no effective opposition to the takeover of the country by corporate interests which is in full swing as we speak.
Sucha total realignmnent would appear logical
But tribalism is a big problem
I’d suggest it’s the solution as players are beginning to question which tribe it is they really belong to http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3380093/George-Osborne-slammed-bowing-pressure-banks-City-watchdog-shelves-banker-bashing-review-culture-practices-financial-crisis.html “Tory MP Mark Garnier, who sits on the Commons Treasury select committee, suggested the watchdog was pressured by Mr Osborne’s department. ‘There has always been this great argument that perhaps the Treasury is having more influence over the regulator than perhaps it ought to and certainly, if I was looking for a Machiavellian plot behind what’s happened here and the tone of the regulator, then I suppose I would start looking at the Treasury,’ he said.”
There’s an unhappy Tory right there. How long before he realises that Neoliberal ideals are opposed to Conservative ideals and starts looking for another political platform?
Garnier is neoliberal to his core
I would characterise the two main blocks within the Labour Party as Decency first, Politics second for the Corbynites and Politics first, Decency second for right wing. And none of the latter would like that as their rallying cry, so instead they carp about the political techniques and faux pas by Corbynites.
As so often a very interesting post from Richard, which I will need time to digest along with a thoughtful reply.
Ed note:
Comment deleted for seism, amongst other things
You can dish it out but you can’t take it back…and then accuse me of ‘seism’ without a right of reply or the ability for anyone to see the posting and judge… No, what you don’t like is anyone criticizing your mate Corbyn, the only person of any status to give you any real say or credibility…and you don’t want to upset him, lest it affect your own honours in due course. Have a backbone and post my message from earlier (and this one) and let the people decide… I made very valid points; that you don’t like them and that they don’t further your cause doesn’t make them untrue, merely inconvenient.
You wrote what I considered to be sexist
And I was quite emphatically not going to publish that
That’s doing nothing less than upholding standards
Please don’t post again: you will be deleted, as any good editor would do
Richard, you say “I do not see a role for me in party politics” by which you presumably mean party personalities, but if you’re advising the leader on policy and allying yourself to specific party members, you are most certainly involved in party politics (which perhaps makes you the equivalent of Lynton Crosby).
I have no formal or other role with the Labour Party, who borrowed my ideas this summer
Bit over time so have the Conservatives, Lib Dems and Greens done so. Alex Salmond has endorsed People’s Quantitative Easing. And I have met Leanne Wood
I have also met parties in Ireland
Now, which party am I advising?
Alex Salmond has endorsed People’s Quantitative Easing. – See more at: http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2016/01/02/what-is-the-right-wing-of-labour-for/#comment-area
Please elucidate/link for the benefit of a SNP supporter.
He said it on Question Time in about September
I understood that you were advising Corbyn and his cabinet from articles such as this:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/11895902/Architect-of-Jeremy-Corbyns-economic-policies-turns-down-top-Labour-job.html
Is that inaccurate?
Read http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/dec/30/murphys-law-meet-the-man-behind-corbynomics
I think Jolyon’s use of the word ‘rump’ is appropriate. Just as before the war under Lansbury, Labour need to rebuild from a solid core of anti-rentier/neo-liberal MP’s who can thenbuild a real opposition with clarity of purpose. This would certainly mean losing in 2020 but it would be better than doing a half-hearted job with fudged ideas about economic possibilities; vague deficit mania; misunderstandings about the financial system and ‘book balancing’ bullshit.
Firstly and formostly: Labour needs to start the project of ‘educating’ the public about are real ‘means’ and exposing the 40 years of hallucinations and fairy tails that we have lived through -there’s little sign of this as yet but IF it started I could cope with another loss in 2020 knowing that the change was on it s way.
Podemos and Syrizia have still not properly explained to the public why the Euro Zone is a failure and it is this educational work that needs to be done-it’s no good opposing austerity without explaining why the economic structures themselves that create it are bogus, self-contradictory and riddled with corporate self-interest.
The need is urgent though
TTIP is looming
Agreed.
Taking a holistic view at the damage that is unfolding on a number of levels waiting until 2020 is not an option never mind 2025.
I agree it’s urgent but we are STILL not hearing Labour demolish the Tory memes. Why not?-no-one really knows as they have advisor that can direct them to do this efficiently. That’s why I’m thinking there will have to be a rump Labour party to build up from – other than that it’s down to public protest.
Another clear example of the problem with two party states. Neither main party is a group of like minded individuals but instead they are a rag bag bunch of disparate souls from across the political spectrum who join one or other of the main parties for a slice of power and glory.
Sadly the Conservatives are currently managing to keep their differences mostly behind the scenes as they have learned from 13 years in the wilderness that division (in public) does not lead to power.
If the current gang of Labour MP’s and Lords are to be a credible opposition party they are going to have to learn the same painful lesson and start to work as a team again (which may mean putting a muzzle on some of their more vociferous yet simple minded members for their own good)
I susepct thbe Tories will be torn asunder before Labour is
I cannot see them surviving an EU referendum
And an economic down turn
But I could be wrong
You may well be right. But I do not underestimate the will to power and corporate control which unifies the tory party. From my perspective the tory party of the post war consensus was successfully stolen by the neoliberals beginning with Thatcher. Labour has followed, but later. What is interesting is that there has, to date, been no challenge to that within the tory party: nor even much apparent recognition of what happened.
In Scotland many post war consensus tories exist, but they have nowhere to go. They do not vote tory. Some voted labour under Blair and Brown, for obvious reasons. But with Corbyn that option is not open to them, and I do not see them turning to the lib dems. Since they are unionists they are effectively disenfranchised, because, I think, they recognise the proto fascist nature of UKIP and it does not represent them
What they did not do is stay and fight for their party. Any rift in what is now the tory party is a fight between neoliberals, some of whom are little englanders and some globalisers. But they retain the same aims, and so will not split down the middle: a few will leave over europe, perhaps, but not enough to be a real threat.
Similarly with an economic downturn: they do not actually care, because they do not suffer from it. If and when it is severe enough to hurt the elite they will have a war rather than a split, judging from past behaviour
Labour is more likely to split, because there is real ideological difference there precisely because people like Corbyn stayed even when they were effectively invisible and apparently defeated. And for that reason the possibility of change is real
Scotland is an interesting case
And I rake your point
Real Scottish conservatives do need to decide whether to quit and start again
Fiona, glad to see you commenting here. You haven’t done so recently? There is such a wealth of wisdom on Richard’s blogs.
@ Carol Wilcox
Still read here, but don’t often have much to say that seems of any worth 🙂
You are welcome whenever you want
Thanks. I sort of assumed I could post when I felt I had something to say 🙂
🙂
The only ‘corporate welfare’ the John McDonnell specific mentioned was reining in landlords (he stated at labours conference they get tax breaks undertake repairs or NOT), which given the tories said they will abolish the wear and tear allowance, I have to think does he even read the budget booklet to repeat that mantra so unless he wants to cut back on the deductible expenses of ‘actual’ maintenance (which he would want I think), which would no doubt put rents up (no doubt he would not like that) among even the more modest Landlords out there.
Campaigning against the banks being able to offset previous losses against current profits is better.
You have very clearly been reading very selectively
I only read what John does and I see him doing a lot more than you suggest
No I am not all just from what I remember at the conference when he mentioned corporate welfare that was the only thing mentioned as if that was the worst abuse/cost of corporate welfare.
I may be wrong (you could correct me) some are saying the cutting back on interest relief goes further by deeming interest due as actually income which surely is not on? Maybe not allowing it as an expense (tho some say every G7 country allow it)but deeming it income is surely too much if correct? Again if correct seems a recipe for indebted landlords to raise rent a LOT to not even receive anymore? But maybe you could correct me if wrong? If I am correct seems a recipe for the deliberate implosion of private individual landlords to a corporate model where cost will be higher and personal landlord/tenant relations nil. Just look at the 3% stamp duty charge they are exempting corporates/funds when 15+ at a time are bought which again I am disappointed Mr McDonnell is not talking about this he may not private landlords much but if he allows the slow destruction of private landlords he will face a bigger struggle once the corporate model starts being set up in earnest.
You seem to be assuming this only applies to landlords
Osborne has already stolen that thunder
Move on
For the record, this is what John McDonnell actually said about corporate welfare in his Conference speech:
“ Let me tell you also, there will be cuts to tackle the deficit but our cuts will not be the number of police officers on our streets or nurses in our hospitals or teachers in our classrooms. They will be cuts to the corporate welfare system. There will be cuts to subsidies paid to companies that take the money and fail to provide the jobs. Cuts to the use of taxpayers’ money subsidising poverty paying bosses. Cuts to the billion pound tax breaks given to buy to let landlords for repairing their properties, whether they undertake the repairs or not. And cuts to the housing benefit bill when we build the homes we need and control exorbitant rents. Where money needs to be raised it will be raised from fairer, more progressive taxation. We will be lifting the burden from middle and low-income earners paying for a crisis they did not cause. “
Seems pretty fair to me
Just musing out loud here for a moment.
The question raised here of whether the right wing of the Labour Party actually know what they are for seems to be asked within the context of the stance and performance of the ABC group in last years leadership contest.
When considering the question in general terms – which, it seems reasonable at present, should encompass this context – it would also seem reasonable to differentiate between the detail, in policy terms, and the higher level features of what the stance is philosophically and ideologically.
For sure, the three non left wing candidates seemed to have had little in their locker in terms of detailed and coherent policy on offer. However, even if they did not articulate it very well, the higher level features of their political positions, ideologically and philosophically, is well encapsulated by Fiona’s observation, above, that they represent TINA.
Following on from that Fiona is again accurate in the observation that in terms of traditional party politics they are in the wrong party. However, change the context and there remains an argument that, from the perspective of maintaining the TINA line/doctrine/faith, they are actually in the right place.
There is a body of evidence in existence which has charted the role of right wing organisations and organs of foreign states in influencing the position and trajectory of the Labour Party in the UK. From educational and training programmes for aspiring activists through to fringe bodies like the Henry Jackson type Societies (which count many right wing Labour luminaries amongst their number) and front organisations all providing a means of agenda control through direct and indirect influence within the official opposition. Many of the Labour Right Wingers in both the Party and the Trade Unions over many decades have been through this and have provided a useful conduit for neo liberal and right wing political influence.
Corbyn is a reasonable man and has gone out of his way, above and beyond duty, to be inclusive. Unfortunately he seems to be basing this position on reason and evidence based argument. There is little evidence that this has borne or will ever bear any fruit worth picking because he is not dealing with people of reason but with people of faith who have since an early stage in their careers invested themselves psychologically in a particular form of zealotry.
In that respect he would be far better taking the position of the late Terry Pratchett’s fictional character Corporal Carrot in these matters.
I have always found the Henry Jackson society thing bizarre
@ David Hansell
You raise an important point, when distinguishing between where they should be in traditional party terms v where they should be in terms of the neoliberal project.
The problem, as I see it, is whether they are conscious of their role. On the assumption that they are, one must conclude that they are true entryists, forming a party within a party with the objective of destroying the possibility of an alternative. It is tempting to think so, but on the whole I think such people are a powerful but rather small minority.
While I accept to some extent that this project is deliberate, and that it has the mechanisms in place to subvert those it sees as having the potential to influence from within, I am still inclined to believe that at least some of the hard right in the labour party are not actively seeking neoliberal outcomes. Rather they are divorced from those they seek to represent at an early stage and are surrounded by what they take to be mainstream opinion, since they hear nothing else. It is the water that they, and we to a lesser extent, swim in. They are, in short, useful idiots for the hard right/corporate interest.
I suspect that is the basis for Mr Corbyn’s conciliatory approach. He does not believe that they are ideologues and therefore presumes them to be open to reason and evidence.
I believe him to be wrong, but not because they are conscious conspirators: rather they are rather dim, and do not understand that the notion we are all in it together is always a right wing lie. They fail to grasp, even now, that we do not have interests in common with the extreme right. There is no longer a consensus of aims, with differences on how to achieve those goals: arguably that was the position during the post war consensus period. There is now a fundamental difference in the kind of society we wish to see. That difference is irreconcilable, and there is no scope for compromise
The reason the right of the labour party have no offer is simple. Their offer is the neoliberal offer, and it is impossible to articulate it without making that clear. In your characterisation they are zealots, or people of faith. This is true, but not because they subscribe consciously to the position in the way you describe. Rather it is because it has never occurred to them that it IS an ideology. They are too stupid to understand that and to narrow in their experience. They honestly believe it is common sense, and that all right thinking people agree with them.
Against stupidity the gods themselves contend in vain
Fiona you are not being very charitable or conciliatory. However I think you`re on the right track.
Fair points Fiona.
What I would add is that, talking in general terms, the default organisational form seems to be hierarchical and it would seem reasonable to surmise that a hierarchy is in play here – with groups of foot soldiers/useful idiots who are as you accurately describe and true believers who steer and control the agenda.
I recall, for example, the reluctance of a long standing trade unionist of my acquaintance some years back when talking about someone in the movement who, having passed away, had subsequently been outed as working for the security services and an interesting place to start in this field is a 1996 talk by Robin Ramsey to Labour Party Branches which is reproduced in the old Lobster magazine.
http://www.lobster-magazine.co.uk/articles/rrtalk.htm
The point being that it would be surprising indeed if vested power interests did not seek to control and steer the agendas of all parties involved in the political process.
Yes to this;
“The reason the right of the labour party have no offer is simple. Their offer is the neoliberal offer, and it is impossible to articulate it without making that clear. In your characterisation they are zealots, or people of faith. This is true, but not because they subscribe consciously to the position in the way you describe. Rather it is because it has never occurred to them that it IS an ideology. They are too stupid to understand that and to narrow in their experience. They honestly believe it is common sense, and that all right thinking people agree with them.”
Thank you, Fiona. This accurately describes almost every politi-reptile of every party I have ever met under the age of forty along with their matching corporate and union counterparts. TINA rules because they are so dim and/or narrow-minded. They have no direct personal experience of a society that is fundamentally caring and seem never to have considered that one is possible.
Having re-joined the Labour Party in the summer to support Jeremy Corbyn this stream is of great interest. Some thoughts from that perspective.
Undoubtedly there is a hard core group committed to destroying Jeremy irrespective of the damage it does. ‘Dim-witted’ is a fair description of some of these people but by no means all. Some are hard-nosed careerists calculating how best to advance; others are ideologically committed to a Blairist neo-liberal interventionist view of the world. That makes them wrong but not necessarily stupid and it would be dangerous to underestimate them. In their day Blair and Mandelson were shrewd operators in their own terms.
This hard core is today quite small and marginalised and the right of the Party has its own strains and tensions. I’m grappling with this in a constituency with an MP from what I would call the ‘soft right’, who voted ‘No’ to the fiscal charter but ‘Yes’ to air strikes on Daesh in Syria. It’s too easy to write off this group as Tories in the wrong party, even those who — like my MP — backed Liz Kendall. He has played a leading role opposing the trade union bill and backing steel workers, and in 2014 joined a march against Israel’s bombing of Gaza, none of which a Tory MP would have done.
I don’t think this is untypical, outside the hard right core. Neo-liberalism has quite shallow roots in the party, which is more comfortable with some variant of a mixed economy. I always thought that when Blair fell he would find few to defend him. Brown has kept credibility, partly because of his personal integrity but also because of his serious response to the financial crisis, even though he had been one of its architects. ‘Austerity-lite’ never generated enthusiasm. Worries that Jeremy cannot win an election go much deeper, which was why the Oldham West result was a huge relief.
The economic and domestic agenda for 2020 is promising. Good progress has been made through the autumn on turning Labour into an anti-austerity party, few members would now want to defend cuts to tax credits and public investment has wide support. We still have work to do to turn that into a coherent and credible programme, which I believe John McDonnell well understands.
Foreign affairs and defence will be much harder, as we have seen in the Syria debate and Trident disagreements. Here the right has wider support in the party and the Tories will exploit public security concerns to create divisions and justify interventions, even when these have more to do with politics than military actions. Similarly, we need a principled but presentable position on migration. I don’t know if Jeremy is going to reshuffle the shadow cabinet or not but in any case we need to think hard about these areas.
Thanks for sharing
The Blairites are rightly proud of their many achievements (and ashamed of their notable failures) but what they have to also accept is that what they really failed to do, with their 1997 mandate in particular, was fundamentally change the political and economic system for the benefit of the working people they should have been representing. It is their ideological belief in maintaining the existing establishment/class/financial/economic order that was, and still is, their achilles heel because they can only ever be seen as Tory Lite’s. From TB’s own website:
50 Achievements of the Labour Party in government under Prime Minister Tony Blair
1. Introduced the National Minimum Wage and raised it to £5.52.
2. Over 14,000 more police in England and Wales.
3. Biggest hospital and school building programme since the foundation of the welfare state.
4. 1500 failed schools turned around.
5. Academy Revolution started. By mid-2007, the UK was on course for 400 academies.
6. Inpatient waiting lists down by over half a million since 1997.
7. Cut overall crime by 32 per cent.
8. Record levels of literacy and numeracy in schools.
9. Young people achieving some of the best ever results at 14, 16, and 18.
10. Funding for every pupil in England has doubled.
11. Secured the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games for London.
12. Removed brutal regimes in Afghanistan and Iraq.
13. Interventions to defend human rights and rule of law in Bosnia, Kosovo, East Timor and Sierra Leone.
14. Employment at its highest level ever.
15. Written off up to 100 per cent of debt owed by poorest countries.
16. 85,000 more nurses and 32,000 more doctors.
17. Devolved power to the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly.
18. Maternity leave increased to 9 months.
19. Paternity leave of 2 weeks for the first time.
20. NHS Direct offering free convenient patient advice.
21. Gift aid was worth £828 million to charities last year.
22. Record number of students in higher education.
23. Child benefit up 26 per cent since 1997.
24. Delivered 2,200 Sure Start Children’s Centres.
25. Low mortgage rates.
26. Bank of England Independence.
27. Introduced the Equality and Human Rights Commission.
28. £200 winter fuel payment to pensioners & up to £300 for over-80s.
29. Put the UK on course to exceed our Kyoto target for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
30. Restored devolved government to Northern Ireland.
31. Over 36,000 more teachers in England and 274,000 more support staff and teaching assistants.
32. Gave full time workers a right to 24 days paid holiday.
33. A million pensioners lifted out of poverty.
34. 600,000 children lifted out of relative poverty.
35. Introduced child tax credit giving more money to parents.
36. Scrapped Section 28 and introduced Civil Partnerships.
37. Brought over 1 million social homes up to standard.
38. Cleanest rivers, beaches, drinking water and air since before the industrial revolution.
39. Free TV licences for over-75s.
40. Free breast cancer screening for all women aged 50-70.
41. Free off peak local bus travel for over-60s.
42. New Deal — helped over 1.8 million people into work.
43. Over 3 million child trust funds started.
44. Free eye test for over 60s.
45. More than doubled the number of apprenticeships.
46. Free entry to national museums and galleries.
47. Overseas aid budget more than doubled.
48. Heart disease deaths down by 150,000 and cancer deaths down by 50,000.
49. Cut long-term youth unemployment by 75 per cent.
50. Free nursery places for every three and four-year-olds.
Whilst it important to recognise the achievements of the Blair / Brown governments the most damning indictment against them is the ease with which Osborne has been able to undo it all in such a short space of time.
The embrace of neo-liberalism, especially by the 1997 government with it’s massive majority and mandate for change will, along with Iraq, be the focus of future historians who will look on the Blair / Brown governments as many do the Wilson governments of 1964-1970 which was described by Clive Ponting as guilty of a “Breach of Promise”
basically what you (Stewart/Fiona/ Dave) are talking about is what Ralph Milliband was saying in the early 60’s:
“he (Ralph M) argued that a new party of the left was needed. It couldn’t be simply declared, he made clear, and it would be the result of political processes that we could only in part control, including a change in the electoral system and political collaboration across party divides.
Third, what was needed in the meantime, he argued, were persistent projects of socialist education and consciousness-raising through every possible means, reaching to the grassroots of the trade unions and other social movements. Here again he worked to put these ideas into practice, collaborating at times with Ken Coates, among others who shared the same view. He talked frequently about making socialism the ‘common sense of the age’. ” (Hilary Wainright of red Pepper)
Ralph Milliband was aware THEN that Labour would feed the neo-liberal structures and the monetarists waiting in the wings. Unless there are enough Labour people to engage in education it will become an exercise in ‘pissing in the wind.’
I will be talking about this issue to my local CLP in a month’s time. I live in a constituency where labour got less than 10% but where median incomes in villages are around £14,000.
@Simon, you are so right about the need for political education. I live in Christchurch and our CLP is well served by economists, but we do need more politics, to my mind. If you live anywhere near I’d like to invite you to speak here.
Carol – I’m only just getting started with my local CLP (Cotswolds) I am planning to speak in a couple of locations soon and (as an ex teacher) get involved with going into schools.
It would be good to share ideas, though and make links with other CLPs-particularly rural areas-I remember Corbyn mentioning the need to connect with rural communities fairly early on.
Richard-would you be able to pass on my e mail to Carol via your ‘control room’?
Will do!
Could perhaps take no 3 out of the list. The PFI deals started under Major and enthusiastically continued under Blair have saddled the NHS with billions worth of debt. Will be paying rent and maintenance for these wonga deals far into the future. Need renegotiating urgently. I believe a North East trust bought their hospital back with local authority loans. Hope you don’t mind.
Jolyon Maugham gets it absolutely right (accidentally, perhaps) when he says that Burnham, Cooper and Kendall “thought they were competing against each other” and that they could fill in the policies later.
That is precisely what rings hollow about the other candidates in the leadership contest, and about so many members of the current political class.
It’s a competition not about what we should be doing as a country and why, about how we are to live and in what relationships to each other and the state, but a competition over who can project the right qualities.
And by qualities, since they are as near as possible content-free, I mean “image”.
This was absolutely crystalised for me by that moment when Yvette Cooper repeatedly asked Corbyn whether he “really wanted the leadership… *be honest, Jeremy*” – as if that was the only thing that mattered, incidentally giving the impression that it was the only thing she and the other ABCs had ever wanted since they were out of nappies.
But why is this? Why is so much of the political class so hollow? Why is a whole area of our public life – politicians and commentariat – so uncomfortable about discussing actual political ideas?
Where did this idea come from that the policies could be worked out later, or – worse, not divulged until after the votes are in?
One reason is that this is what suits the press and the media. They control image, not policy. So downgrading the latter in favour of the former enhances their power. Thus they focus on it.
I think you are right, Fiona.
It means also that, as there’s no debate on policy, the “fill in the blanks” bit is done by the usual suspects: “advisers”, policy wonks, people the leader likes or owes a favour to – who may in fact be working for corporations and party donors.
I’m still astonished that my MP, the useless Chloe Smith, worked at Conservative Central Office *as an employee of Deloitte’s* before being selected as a candidate.
It is interesting to see how the press just could not cope with Corbyn because he was outside the ‘image’ paradigm, he wasn’t packaged and commoditised like a supermarket chicken. From the media’s point of view this the equivalent of breaking the greatest taboo in refusing to dance around their Golden Calf -that’s why the attacks were so virulent and unremitting and yet so ineffective for the first time. Corbyn SCARED the media barons without trying – a marvel has actually happened here!
Your subsequent point here;
“I’m still astonished that my MP, the useless Chloe Smith, worked at Conservative Central Office *as an employee of Deloitte’s* before being selected as a candidate.”
is a perfect illustration of the permanent political careerist step-ladder that most of these hairstyle and business suited talking press releases have followed.
Actually, Sarah and AllanW, I believe even THIS is another scam on the part of Chloe Smith and Tory HQ.
As far as I know, Miss Smith was a 100% pure SPAD, who was “loaned” to Deloitte’s on a virtually fictional basis (a bit like the boneheaded “blue blood”, who came into my wife’s place of work in the City in the early 1970’s, doingg very little more than sit at his desk. Charming fellow, my wife tells me, but thick as several planks) to give Miss Smith the appearance of having had a real job, to ” freshen up her CV!
I cannot give you a definitive source for this assertion, and so it may be no more than an urban myth, but it does shed light on what commentators think Tory HQ is capable of.
What is widely believed is that Cameron appointed her to the Treasury thinking she had been an accountant as she had been at Deloitte
That was a bit wide of the mark
Managerialism.
It’s a cult that has infected the business world and is now causing woeful consequences in the private sector and politics. It’s the cult of ‘leadership’ that says only the self-selected can be the elite and deserve to be the elite and everyone elses contributions are of little worth. Personal leadership style is ALL, the rest can be outsourced to the little people; policy, execution, results, work etc So long as the VISION has been set the problem is solved and the glorious leader can bask in the adulation, grow the personal pension pot and move on to the next ‘challenge’.
All complete tosh, of course. But too many believe it; or should I say, too many surrounding wannabees allow it to happen to the detriment of the rest of us who know that hard work, team-working, motivation, personal ethics and a lot of luck need to be put in after the vision-thing has been done in order for good results to occur.
Much of all this argument can be subsumed under the reality that most of the electorate are in denial that the country is run for the benefit of Money Fascists, an elite who believe that money creation first and foremost should be for the benefit of the few and not the many.
I don’t know about denial Schofield. We are steered artfully away from the issue of money creation. I only discovered the big open secret late in life, a politicaly engaged life at that. The monetary system is a MASSIVE intellectual and theoretical black hole on the left. This applies on the right also, but in a less surprising way.
Accepted
It will be interesting to see how many of our “democratic” politicians (in the UK, US or anywhere else for that matter) come out and condemn the Saudi dictatorship for executing an apparently peaceful, pro-democratic Shia cleric who dared to publicly question the “Saudi system”.
It looks like they’ve gone too far this time and lit the blue touch paper across the region. If it was any other country we would be demanding regime change at this point!
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jan/02/sheikh-nimr-al-nimr-shia-cleric-thorn-saudi-regime-side
The problem with the right wing of Labour is they are just not in touch with reality.
I have always wondered who amongst our MPs are naive and who are not. Robin Ramsay has always emphasised that MPs general ignorance of economics cannot be overestimated, and that leaves them very vulnerable to accepting the City of London’s advice, which has unquestionably been used to full advantage.
There is also much evidence of TransAtlantic attempts to influence – Balls, the Milibands and Yvette Cooper for example, all had a sabbatical year teaching in a top US university. To my horror, Ed Balls even spent time in 2012 consulting with his former tutor, Larry Summers. Tellingly, it is even more true of the Tories. Osborne is obsessed with US politics. In fact, Osborne is usually in lock-step with the darling of the Republicans, Paul Ryan, and is very much following the Reagan economic strategy of ‘Two Santas’ and ‘Starving the beast’.
But whatever the sources and whatever the levels of understanding, there seems to be no doubt that there was a conscious decision to take over the LP and transform it into a neoliberal New Labour. Lewis Minkin, in his book The Blair Supremacy: A Study in the Politics of Labour’s Party Management, quotes a ‘wry comment from Blair describing “New Labour” as “the newest political party on the scene and the smallest. It has about five people.”’ and that it was a ‘rolling coup’ in that ‘it involved a series of unilateral major moves over several years’. Former MP Alan Simpson adds his own experience of the Blair years in a review of Minkin’s book in Red Pepper http://www.redpepper.org.uk/inside-new-labours-rolling-coup-the-blair-supremacy/
He tells of how the Socialist Campaign Group was entombed, and of rigorous selection of new parliamentary candidates to ensure that they would be on-message and the parachuting-in of such, into winnable seats.
This vetting is the reason why the vast majority of MPs supporting Corbyn are older than 60 or younger than 40 (thank goodness for Ed Miliband’s transition leadership which allowed Constituencies to choose their own PPC). It is also the reason for the disillusionment and disastrous results for Labour in Scotland… their MSPs with a few notable exceptions are ultra Blairites. The Scottish MPs worked as a cohesive neoliberal block within the PLP and an astonishing number were in the Cabinet. It seems that the plan was to abolish party members and constituency Labour Parties, to cut the links with the Trade Unions and the left, and eventually form a new party of the centre left by coalition with the LDs. Mandelson adopted Karl Rove’s idea of forming a centre party of ‘permanent majority’.
As I say, I would love to know who knew what but my guess is that the vast majority of the PLP have had no idea. However, I also have no doubt that individuals like Mandelson knew/know exactly what they are doing. Furthermore, for some, it is clear that they would rather destroy the LP than allow it to be a more left wing party (Blair even said it). The truth is that each of the mainstream political parties have experienced a coup that the grassroots were unaware of… the leaderships of all three, prior to Corbyn and perhaps Farron, have had more in common with each other than with their respective memberships. Tony Blair was even quoted by Fraser Nelson as saying that there were only two parties; one which believed in a role for the state in protecting and potentiating the needs of the population, and another which saw its role as facilitating the ‘Market’. Burnham, Cooper and Kendall had no policies because New Labour depended on focus groups (the Market) to determine them – they are Tony Benn’s weathercocks not signposts like Corbyn.
Unfortunately, the current troubles in the Labour Party all stem from the legacy of Blair and New Labour. As Mrs Thatcher said, New Labour was her finest achievement.
Great analysis
Great article by my old friend Alan Simpson
Deeply worrying
And Mandelson is still in town
One of the leaks from a PLP meeting, reported by Paul Waugh, was that:
‘Ian Lavery, the leftwing MP, hit out at Lord Mandelson, who was in the room, for briefing against the leader. http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2015/11/30/jeremy-corbyn-challenged-_n_8684668.html
At the same time, Peter Oborne writes in ‘The very surprising (and dangerous) love-in between Peter Mandelson and George Osborne’:
Indeed, Osborne has now helped to arrange for Mandelson – who was twice forced to resign from Labour governments – to become the president of the Great Britain China Centre. This is a prestigious post, which will see him promoting mutual trust and understanding between the UK and China.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-3287203/PETER-OBORNE-surprising-dangerous-love-un.html
As you say deeply worrying…
Surely “Not Labour” would be a better description than New Labour.
If you believe that labour is the servant of capital (as the Blairites clearly did and presumably still do), then I don’t see what point there is in them being members of the Labour party.
To improve the lot of working people within the established capitalist system is far more relevant to a Lib Dem or Tory one nation mindset. UK politics needs to sort its act out and get people aligned in parties more appropriate to their beliefs.
I was intrigued by your statement that the vast majority of MPs supporting Corbyn are under 40 or over 60 so I had a look at the numbers. 35 MPs nominated Corbyn. This Telegraph article from July names 14 who planned to vote for someone else at the leadership election, leaving 21 MPs
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/labour/11756688/Half-of-the-Labour-MPs-who-backed-Jeremy-Corbyn-desert-him.html
The Telegraph article also says two further MPs anonymously told the Telegraph they intended to vote for someone else, so the list of 21 probably contains at least two people who shouldn’t be there. It was a secret ballot so it’s not certain who voted for whom in some cases, and I don’t know all of these MPs well enough to make a guess. I’ve taken off Sadiq Khan, who isn’t on the Telegraph’s list even though he had at that point said that he wouldn’t vote for Corbyn but nominated him to widen the debate. This leaves 20. I’m not sure about Jon Cruddas as some of the things he’s said seem quite different to what Corbyn says, but I can’t recall him saying he would vote against Corbyn, so he keeps his place on the list.
Overall the age breakdown for the 20 is: 30s (4), 40s (5), 50s (3), 60s (4), 70s (3), 80s (1), so there are 8 out of 20 between 40 and 60.
In terms of Blair’s parachuting in New Labour candidates I think rather than age it would be better to look at when they were elected to office. Only 1 of the 20 was first elected in 2001 or 2005 (Cruddas). I would guess that the Blair machine hadn’t got going fully in 1997, when four were first elected, including John McDonnell, so if we count 1997 as before the Blair vetting took place then 19 out of 20 who chose Corbyn were from outside the Blair control years, including 7 from this year’s intake.
In full: 1970 (2), 1987 (2), 1996 (1) 1997 (4), 2001 (1), 2010 (2), 2012 (1), 2015 (7)
As you say, Miliband allowed constituencies to choose their own candidates, so 7 out of the 20 being from 2015 (plus one by-election from 2012) suggests that this had a beneficial effect for Corbyn. Overall there were 53 new Labour MPs this year, not including the recent by-election, so only 13% (7/53) of the new MPs backed Corbyn. This is interesting, firstly because I find it disappointing that only 13% of the new MPs backed Corbyn when I would have hoped it would be more, secondly it suggests talk of delselections and replacement with far left MPs are overblown if constituencies don’t appear to be that inclined to elect strong supporters of Corbyn (although this may change now if the optimism that led to Corbyn’s victory also leads to constituencies to select Corbyn supporters), and thirdly because 15% is the magic number of MP nominations needed to get into the leadership contest – whenever Corbyn steps down (hopefully after a few years as PM) I hope there will be enough MPs to nominate a suitable successor, although of course there’s talk of Corbyn altering how MPs get onto the leadership ballot to ensure a left candidate could get onto the ballot in the event of him standing down for whatever reason (being forced out, losing in 2020, standing down as PM).
The 20, with their age and year elected:
Dianne Abbot, 62, 1987
Rushanara Ali, 41, 2010
Richard Burgon, 35, 2015
Ronnie Campbell, 72, 1987
Sarah Champion, 46, 2012
Jon Cruddas, 53, 2001
Clive Efford, 57, 1997
Kelvin Hopkins, 74, 1997
Imran Hussain, 37, 2015
Clive Lewis, 44, 2015
Rebecca Long-Bailey, 36, 2015
Gorden Marsden, 62, 1997
John McDonnell, 64, 1997
Michael Meacher, was 75, 1970
Grahame Morris, 54, 2010
Kate Osamor, 47, 2015
Dennis Skinner, 83, 1970
Cat Smith, 30, 2015
Jon Tricket, 65, 1996
Catherine West, 49, 2015
A very impressive review Simon – thank you! My use of age cohorts was just an attempt to simplify the situation.
However, vetting of PPCs was probably introduced extremely quickly after Blair’s election as Leader. It was certainly in full swing, well before the ’97 election, with ‘minders’ appointed for those PPCs (like Kelvin Hopkins) who were suspect. I also know personally, a fair few individuals who were rejected as unsuitable candidates. Christine Shawcroft was a more high-profile example.
I believe that John McDonnell and Kelvin Hopkins were able to slip through the net because they were extremely well known in their constituencies. It would have been explosive to try and exclude them from the selection procedure. It may well have been the same for Clive Efford and Gordon Marsden. But in any event, it was well known that they each needed to keep their noses clean, and offer no excuse to the party machine to deselect them.. at least, until after they were successfully elected.
One of the other reasons, that I neglected to mention, which has determined the type of candidates chosen as PPC is the composition of the Constituency GCs. In spite of the new members that joined under Ed Miliband’s leadership, the constituency executives have remained for the most part the old guard… and are only slowly changing. Iraq was disastrous on many levels far more profound than just for local LPs, however, the exodus of the left post-2003 resulted in a hollowed out and much more right wing local organisation. There is still a lag-over from that period which in many places has constituted a local road-block. Namely, that it is the GC executive which draws up the short list of potential candidates from which the membership can then choose a PPC. (I should also say that the NEC also has to ratify the candidate as suitable, and until conference 2015, the NEC was also dominated by the right).
As I said above, the LP is still struggling with the structures and personalities which predate Ed Miliband let alone Corbyn…. and the Blair project was successful in dismantling an enormous amount of party democracy. However, don’t despair. It seems that some MPs are getting used to the idea of an anti-austerity party and may even end up being happier…
I forgot to say that all the Constituency Labour parties (that I know about) have tripled or more, their membership numbers following Jeremy Corbyn’s nomination/election .. so I wouldn’t assume that the political position of a new MP selected prior to the 2015 GE, reflects the current make-up of their local party.
An excellent contribution regarding the problems with the right wing of the LP, and a brilliant comment stream.Reading today’s contributions give me some hope for the future. By the way bought ‘Joy of Tax,’very good read and most enlightening.Recommending it to my friends.
Thank you
The question of who is in touch with reality is a key theme, though not the one addressed in this post. It is certainly more than possible that many of the PLP have been captured by the establishment consensus. In some ways, it would be remarkable if they hadn’t.
Something else to consider is professional discipline. Just as the need to make a profit keeps the messy business capitalism fundamentally honest, the need to get votes is the basic discipline of our messy democracy. As professional democrats, the PLP ought to understand the disciplines better than the amateur members. That is exactly their role — to know what it takes to get changes through Parliament.
None of this affects the core of the post, which the absolutely key question. What do they think Labour is for?
My reading of what the right wing of the Labour party think they are for is that they are interested in social justice but not economics. So they reckon they’ll arrive at social justice just as soon as austerity has worked. They do not seem to have any idea that, if by some miracle it did work, by then it might have destroyed much of what they hold dear and will be way too late for most of us (and them). It is surprising that the right wing has people in it who seem intelligent, but are either not intelligent enough or too comfortable or too lazy in their thinking, to amend their outlook. If this is the case then really all they have to discover is that it is not socialsm that has changed but economics. I doubt economics is core to most of their beliefs – they just have to decide if they are neoliberal socialists or PQE socialists. Surely that shouldn’t be too difficult? Although they seem to be making a great meal of it, so far.
Also, sad tho’ it probably is “The Joy of Tax” was my Christmas reading. That copy came from the Library. I’m so convinced it’s a work of reference that I’ve now bought a copy!
Thanks May
You’re lucky MayP, none of Richard’s books are available in any library in Wiltshire which probably says much about the sad state of our nation’s libraries or that Wiltshire is such a Conservative/Lib Dem heartland that the rules of supply and demand are at work here!
The right wing of Labour is there to force pass legislation like this, further enabling the persecution and harassment of the sick and disabled with eventual profits for insurance companies in mind http://www.conservativehome.com/platform/2015/12/matthew-oakley-five-ways-to-help-one-million-more-disabled-people-into-work.html Witness the author’s mention of a necessary ‘fast legislative process’ by which I think we can say he means no functional opposition from Labour.
I’ve just read that article -it is utterly vile and despicable-a world of coercion and harrying wrapped up in concepts of ‘facilitation’.
To read Howard Spring’s “Fame is the spur” and follow the main protagonist Hamer Shawcross, is to witness the subtle changes that take place in a person when in a position of power. He did not stay true to his earlier principled beliefs as most of his boyhood friends did, all except one who became a rich capitalist. Good interpretation of human nature.
Brilliant film version is a must see with Michael Redgrave as Hamer Radshaw (changed from Shawcross as I believe there was an MP with this surname). I always said it should be compulsory watching for Labour MPs (with their eyes propped open with matchsticks and their hands tied behind their backs to prevent them sticking their finger in their ears)
@MayP
You have expressed my views exactly. I finally joined Labour purely because Corbyn appeared to offer the only realistic alternative to austerity. Perhaps I have been reading Richard’s blog for too long, but there seem so many holes, false assumptions and non-sequiturs in neoliberal economic theory that I wonder that anyone should be convinced by it.
Just as I wonder how anyone looking at the evidence can believe that moving Labour closer to the Conservatives and continually briefing against the leader can make the party more electable.
Sadly, if the membership cannot sell rational economics to their MPs, it may be an uphill struggle to sell it to the voters.
The challenge that Corbyn (and the non-neoliberal members of the party) faces is that, in order to succeed in the Westminster groupthink bubble over the past few decades, the so-called ‘right’ of the party have had to internalise the core set of neoliberal beliefs to the point where their ‘weltanschuung’ (or ‘worldview’ – the Germans really do have the most wonderful words for this sort of thing) becomes shrivelled, leaving them mentally unable to consider a different perspective. To do so would conflict with their own deeply held value systems, which would undo their very personalities by forcing them to acknowledge the clear cognitive dissonance between their beliefs and the real world.
I feel sorry for them, honestly. To have to internalise a value system that is so deeply anti-human is a violence to the soul.
The TV documentary maker, Adam Curtis, wrote this frankly unbelievable blog post, which may explain why this deeply atrophied set of values has settled in the seats of power in the UK (and the West).
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/entries/fdb484c8-99a1-32a3-83be-20108374b985
Adam Curtis is worth reading