The Red Box newsletter from The Times notes this morning that:
In the EU op-ed tombola, the Telegraph is the winner today and has Osborne and David Cameron jointly writing about the risks of the first ever "recession brought on ourselves".
But that's only true if "ourselves" actually means very precisely David Cameron and George Osborne.
No one, barring Nigel Farage and a bunch of Tory back benchers did, after all, ask for this referendum. We did not seek the opportunity to inflict recession in ourselves, David Cameron and George Osborne chose to provide that opportunity.
I hope that is recalled in days to come. Whatever the outcome, as an example of poor political judgement this takes some beating.
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Cameron & Osborne – born to rule – unfit to govern the poltical equivalent of a fish n chip shop.
Mike, You say “born to rule — unfit to govern”. Thank you for bringing up this particular contrast of what I would say are opposites, for I drafted an earlier response on this theme, only to find that “fat finger” on my Smartphone led to its being wiped, instead of posted! So I am typing this on my laptop!
What set me thinking was the comment from James s “Overall, whatever voting system we adopt, it has to bring about a government that can govern”, which itself produced a response from Michael, saying
“What we have now is FPTP. Means nobody gets what they want. I am not political but surely we need a voting system that gives what people want. Fewer parties would help. –
(See more at: http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2016/05/17/the-end-of-politics-as-we-know-it-or-the-grand-coalition-of-hope-that-we-would-wish-for/#comment-area)
Both these responses strike me (and I hope neither responder feels offended by my saying so) as yearning for a return to the old certainties of the post-War years of the Two-Party system, when FPTP worked reasonably well, even though it cheated Atlee of victory in 1951, when Labour polled more votes that the Tories – but Labour got its own back in February 1974, when Labour polled fewer votes than the Tories, but gained more seats, to become the largest Party – results which in themselves suggest flaws in FPTP.
To deal first with Michael’s point – FPTP demands fewer Parties, and indeed, produces Parties that are themselves coalitions of greater or lesser coherence, depending on circumstances. Once the multi-party cat is let out of the bag, there are only two solutions: either legislate for “approved” Parties, restricted in number, for electoral convenience, which is clearly a non-starter in any society that purports to be a democracy, or fashion an electoral system that recognises that fact, which simultaneously guards against the dangers of Party multiplicity, which FPTP clearly cannot do, which brings me to James S’s plea that any new system “has to bring about a government that can govern.”
For what is clearly in James S’s mind is the old contention, that one of the merits of FPTP, perhaps the main merit, is that it tends to produce stable, often called “strong” government – a term that provoked me to think about the contrast between “rule”, and “govern”.
The former is very much the implied thinking behind the description “strong”, for the term “rule” very much suggests mastery of events, and a leadership which displays a masterful handling of conflict and dissent, even to the extent of imposing one’s will on the led; but, alas, it also suggests a failure to consult, even to listen to dissent.
“Govern” by contrast, very much implies the opposite of “rule”, in that the Leader, while leading, still does so by consultation and listening, by attending to dissent and incorporating aspects of dissent into a final programme or policy.
I am probably guilty of romanticising the past, but it seems to me the Queen Elizabeth surpassed her father, Henry Vlll, exactly because he “ruled”, where she “governed”, as she herself seems to have recognised in her last speech to Parliament, in 1601, often termed her “Golden Speech”, where she claimed “yet this I account the glory of my crown, that I have reigned with your loves – (See http://www.historytoday.com/richard-cavendish/elizabeth-golden-speech#)
Considering this opposition of ideas led me to consider why FPTP is no longer fit for purpose, as it had been in 1945, and for 30 years thereafter, which is that there were sufficient checks and balances in our system of governance to prevent “government” from degenerating into “rule”
1) We had a well trusted, professional, Civil Service, that had not yet been co-opted into Party politics, has has regrettably largely proved to be the case now (think Sir Robert Armstrong and “economical with the truth”)
2) Added to that, Ministers were willing genuinely to consult civil servants, and to engage with them in a common pursuit for solutions, because there was a belief in the existence of expertise and experts.
3) Ministers were trusted to carry out their briefs, and to resign if they felt they were either at fault (e.g. Dalton), or at odds with Government policy (e.g. Peter Thorneycroft, and Enoch Powell)
And then along came the era of “Blatcherism”, and two Premiers, Thatcher and Blair, who were united in their contempt for experts, and for the “old”, effectively a “duopoly” between Ministers and their officers, and who both believed policy could be created “at will” (hence Thatcher’s disastrous “Poll Tax” and Blair’s equally disastrous “academisation” of education).
They might have been polar opposites in approach, with Thatcher having a lethal attachment to detail, which Blair found too wearisome, being a “Big picture” politician, and easily bored by detail, but they both seem to have had a “Tommy Cooper” approach to policy development, plucking ideas out of the air “just like that” (particularly Blair, who foisted academies on Malcolm Wicks at the last minute, as he was steering and Educational Framework Bill through the Commons, without any prior groundwork).
So, Thatcher, with her favourites such as Lord Young (who abolished the Manpower Services Commission, alas), and Blair with his “government by sofa and focus group”, were able to “rule”, because they did not have sufficient opposition in Parliament to their poorly formed ideas, because the major Parties, and the whole make-up of Parliament, were the outcome of FPTP, but proved themselves very poor at “governing” as I have suggested that process to be – the process of consulting, listening, and responding to dissent, and incorporating aspects of that dissent into the final programme of action and its related policies.
I sincerely believe that only some form of PR – STV, or Additional Member System, or some system that permits plurality to flourish, that compels Governments to listen and respond – to govern, in other words, and not merely to rule (as does the current Government, on 24.6% of the total electorate, and having been given a majority in Parliament by just 900 votes). This necessarily implies more Parties – perhaps the splitting of all 3 major Parties, Tory Labour and Lib-Dem, into their component factions, allowing administrations to be formed – as in many other countries – from different Parties which together express the majority sentiment of the country, but whose very difference would compel Governments to govern “with the people’s love”, to quote Queen Elizabeth l, and to be attentive to the electorate’s wishes.
To sum up – I don’t want STRONG government, I want WISE government, which I truly believe can only be achieved by some measure of true proportionality in our voting system. For otherwise, FPTP encourages Governments to “rule” rather than “govern”, as our current “rulers” so clearly show to be the case.
Wise government?
We can dream
Andrew you have summed up many of the problems with the Westminster system very well. As any study of history shows it was never meant to be a system of government of the people by the people, it was merely an extension of monarchical and hereditary rule by the wealthy and powerful through a proxy government that could only ever be formed by one of the “controlled parties” under FPTP.
Hence why we have such a democratic deficit within a country supposedly proud of its “democracy”. It’s not surprising so many people are confused and alienated by politics, because the cynic in me says that is entirely what the system is designed to achieve – a very limited number of non-representative and mostly ineffectual political parties who will never threaten the established financial power and control systems.
And so fundamental and systemic political change is the only answer, if democracy is what we do indeed want as a nation and “government” of the people by the people is to replace “rule” by a very small and powerful minority.
My sentiments entirely. On the radio today Osborne was supposed to have referred to a “DIY recession”, which I thought was a slick expression for something he really is absolutely expert at. You can only admire him for his repeated efforts:)
Trouble is that he may do it himself but there are serious consequences for the rest of us in the house..
They’ve had a hand in ‘secular stagnation’ which is worse in the sense that recessions are seen as temporary. Austerity is self harm sans pareil. Amazing what these two wafflers come out with.
We voted for this, remember that.
Who says FPTP means that minority parties don’t fair representation. FPTP is the reason we are having this vote, this would never have been a Tory manifesto pledge under PR. Interesting that the system that got them elected could tear them apart.
A bold claim from those that impose austerity
So true! Yes, so very often in politics the noise drowns out the truth.
The Tories are all chancers and gamblers, they will say whatever suits their individual (or financial backers) agendas at the time.
They care not for the outcome of the referendum or the impact it may have on the majority of people, as all they care about is that they (and their financial backers) remain in charge of the economy and finance as much as possible.
The Tory financial backers have supported both sides, it’s just another example of the casino politics played by the hedge funds and investment managers who aim to win whichever way the public choose to vote.
first ever “recession brought on ourselves”.
Isn’t that what they continually blame Labour for? What are these people talking about? Do they imagine that no-one has any recollection of their previous statements? They’ll be back to that one in a few weeks’ time, hoping we’ve forgotten what they’ve just said.
I also recall Ed Miliband being castigated for not committing to a referendum even though he warned of the uncertainty that this would create for the economy. He failed to pander to populism and so couldn’t win the General Election. What an indictment of British political culture.
Perhaps we should look for the positives. For instance its comforting to know that the taxpayers money spent on Cameron’s PPE course was not entirely wasted. Cameron is perhaps employing some of the erudition Oxford tried to impart by offering his modern manifestation of ancient wisdom.
From the Tao Te Ching as translated by Legge.
“Therefore the sage, in the exercise of his government, empties their minds, fills their bellies, weakens their wills, and strengthens their bones. He constantly tries to keep them without knowledge and without desire, and where there are those who have knowledge, to keep them from presuming to act on it. When there is this abstinence from action, good order is universal.”