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| October 2008 »
From being in the thick of it at Labour Party conference I've gone to being an arm chair observer of the Conservative's conference. Probably a good thing too seeing as the weather (if no one else) has abandoned the Conservatives. But there's no sense of drama. Everything important is happening elsewhere.
Cameron has just made his statement to the Tory faithful in light of Congress' slapdown vote. It is interesting stuff. Very calm but earnest, it must ache having to look that serious and not crack a front-page smile.
God he's slick. Patiently he takes his time to set up the 'people think' points that always end up pointing to an implicit conclusion - "you're better off with the Conservatives". But seriously, "people get nervous when they hear about the fall of capitalism"?! Ha! Only if you're still waiting on a bonus...I just don't see it: people are worried about their savings, their mortgages, their jobs, etc but that doesn't point to a definite ideological anchor.
But that's the Cameron danger. He says "we mustn't let anger cloud our judgment" and that thinly veiled code of "I'm not going to stand here and hammer business, executive pay...don't be silly" sounds vaguely credible. Listen to him, it is incredible. Yesterday Osbourne says that they'll be tough on business, earlier BoJo says they wouldn't. Now Cameron is saying both at the same time!!
After all the rhetorical fluff, and yet his main point of action is to support the Government. Well there you go. Problem sorted. No wonder 36% (Daily Politics poll) think that GB and Darling are better in the crisis, six points up on the Tory duo.
The statement is professional but there's just so much in the background - spending cuts, no action on over zealous bonuses, or billionaire non-doms like Lord Ashcroft.
It may not work as a slogan but everything about this conference smells of New Conservatives, old danger.
Vincenzo Rampulla
Gordon Brown’s well received Labour Party Conference speech mentioned how he felt ‘stung’ by the reaction to the abolition of the 10p tax rate and he pledged that ‘where I've made mistakes I'll put my hand up and try to put them right’.
This month, basic rate taxpayers earning between £6,035 and £40,835 will start benefiting from the increase in the personal allowance announced following the abolition of the 10p rate. According to the Institute of Fiscal Studies this gives £120 to ‘almost all' of these basic rate taxpayers. The first £60 is included in the September pay packet - which is currently being received by taxpayers - with subsequent payments of £10 for the rest of the tax year.
Although not a huge sum, the money arrives at a time when many are feeling the pinch of higher food and energy prices. Will the public feel that the payments combined with the Prime Minister’s words of contrition do enough to make amends?
Omar Salem is chair of London Young Labour and a member of the Young Labour executive
Now that the leadership election has been ‘postponed’ Gordon Brown can start to define his vision for Britain far more clearly. In politics expectations are everything: keep them low and most people stay reasonably content but raise them too high, and you run the risk of disappointing everyone. Gordon Brown learnt this – to his cost – last year when he teased the public with the promise of an early election and then cancelled it (or if you prefer, bottled it) when he realised that it was too big – and unnecessary – a gamble.
Twelve months on and both Gordon Brown and the Labour party are bruised, battered but, and it is an important but, not yet out for the count. The past year has seen the government stumble between one bad news story after another – be it the loss of the income tax details of 25 million people, the 10p tax fiasco or the loss of the ‘safe’ seat of Crewe. Yet the recent financial turbulence (which, potentially, could prove catastrophic for the British economy) presents Brown with the opportunity to lead from the front and - to a certain extent – to set the perimeters for the next general election.
Brown’s speech to conference went some way in presenting him as a man of strong convictions as he attempted to define the remainder of his premiership around the virtues of fairness, strength and trust. The question is: will it make any difference? Well it just might because the truth is that no matter how they try to re-package themselves, the Tories see inequality as natural and inevitable and Labour sees it as abhorrent and avoidable. I have no doubt that Gordon’s appeal for ‘fairness’ will strike a chord with many traditional Labour voters who may now feel that they have been given the green light to ‘come home’ to Labour.
Brown’s confident and impressive speech has given him some well needed breathing space. He should therefore take the opportunity he has been given to rethink the direction and the very purpose of new Labour. For example he should reconsider the arguments for the windfall tax on the energy companies, act to end the anomalies in NHS provision between England, Wales and Scotland and make clear the government’s preferential option for the poor. History shows that the public trusts leaders who have the courage to lead. It is surely no coincidence that, in recent history, when the government has acted boldly on issues as varied as debt cancellation, the introduction of the congestion charge or smoking bans, public support has quickly crystallised behind it.
If Labour is to achieve a fourth term then its best prospects lie not in appealing to what it has done, not in defending the status quo but rather in campaigning against ugly realities of health and education inequalities and showing why these warrant further state action. So come on Gordon, seize the moment and put end to the era of fuzzy politics and show the nation that what divides Labour from the Tories is far greater than any of the marginal policies on which the parties are united.
The PM really socked it to us, it was crystal, confident, optimistic and full of clear policies to take straight to the doorstep (free nursery places to be extended to 2 year olds, winter fuel payments this year going up by 100-200 for OAPs). He was honest on a personal level re. his personality (ALWAYS the best policy in these kinds of speeches!) and lightly humourous, slammed the Tories without going on about them too long and concentrated strongly on the economy. The conference hall responded, there was a fantastic atmosphere and no sliver of disunity or suggestion that Gordon was not the man for the job. Couldn’t have gone better in my opinion! Let’s hope the media get the picture.
I admit that conference fatigue set in shortly after that and after some recovery I finally completed a trawl of the exhibition hall – joining the odd society here and there and picking up information on others and then decided to see a bit more of Manchester. So as my conference draws to a close, I realise that I have gained confidence politically, become more sure of my Labour values and developed a clearer picture of where I want to go with it. I will come away enthused and with a will to campaign that I certainly didn’t have before coming to conference – to win a 4th term!
Ceri Hollywell is a first time delegate from Islington North CLP
Gordon Brown’s big speech was sometimes more mangled by the subtitling on the TV screens in Manchester Central than John Prescott’s most garbled comments. Pieties became “pie yots”. Applause was “platz plau”. This kaleidoscopic interpretation parallels another conference reality: simultaneously breathing in a news event and being less aware of the news than on a normal working day. It seems to take a special effort at conference to seek out a TV to see how events are being reported (and fringes, receptions and bars are always more attractive to me). In contrast, in this highly networked, 24 hour news age, news coverage often seems virtually drip fed to us in more normal circumstances. The view from conference is one that is sufficiently close-up and worms-eye to create both a visceral sense of occasion and doubt as to the completeness of this perspective.
Brown’s speech inspired a sincere sense of purpose, determination and hope amongst the conference attendees that I spoke to. However, as I made my way to an IPPR fringe on the future of progressive politics, I was entirely in the dark about the extent to which this mood was reflected in media coverage and public opinion.
At the IPPR event Peter Kellner drew warm applause for the observation that there is a good case to be made for Labour changing our leader, as there is also a good case to be made for not doing so, but the worst of all worlds is created by the hobbled, half-way house that recent snipping and manoeuvring have created. He, consequently, implored Charles Clarke, another panellist, “to put up or shut up”. The presence of Sky News’ Glen Oglaza in the audience was my one window on the media. He enquired of Clarke whether Brown’s speech would resonate beyond Manchester. Clarke declined to answer directly but gave a hint as to his future intentions by saying to Kellner that he could take this to mean that he was “shutting up”.
John Denham and John Harris completed the cast of panellists, with all being fulsome in their praise of Brown’s speech. John Harris said that he received a text from a member of the government boasting that, “it was the most openly progressive speech he has ever made”. Harris argued that New Labour has pursued progressive ends by stealth but that popular concern about financial convulsions and their impacts created space for more overtly doing so. The government should rise to this “progressive moment” was his message.
Whether “progressive moment” is entirely the right description for a flirtation with a calamity of Great Depression proportions is a moot point. Certainly the political context seems to be rapidly evolving – and in ways potentially to Labour’s advantage. The end of the “Regan/Thatcher era” is being spoken of by such economic luminaries as Paul Krugman. One doesn’t need to be excessively enamoured with Marxist-structuralist reasoning to see economic events as forging a new path for politicians to follow. Catherine Mayer of Time argued at a fringe on Monday evening that this changed backdrop was to Barack Obama’s advantage in the presidential election but that Labour had so far failed to capitalise on the political opportunity that is presented to us, as a party more comfortable with market regulation and intervention than the Conservatives, by a much less laissez-faire popular attitude to laissez-faire economics.
Labour’s best hope would seem to be to have the grumblers/plotters (you decide) “shut up” and to unite behind Brown’s attempt to make a better first of this opportunity. As Brown takes forward the “new settlement” that his speech promised, we should work to ensure that the media is ultimately left to conclude that this also yielded a new Gordon; a popular, respected and general election winning prime minister.
Jonathan Todd is a Consultant at Europe Economics and a member of Dulwich and West Norwood Constituency Labour Party
As the excitement subsides over Gordon’s speech of his life, it’s not just Labour who’ll be packing up their troubles in the old kit bag. The party’s conscience has also been in town although they’ve not attracted any media attention which is probably how the high command would want it. While the Labour Conference this year had an entrance fee payable for party members and corporate sponsored vol-au-vents’n’ booze a plenty, another more scaled down freebie was in town: Convention of the Left. I found myself down to speak at the parallel event to the official Labour Party conference on Saturday PM in a parallel break-out session on “the break up of Britain” which it seemed wiser to honour than end up being replaced by a tub of lard, so I showed up, despite disapproval from Labour chums, in the name of constructive engagement with opponents. It felt to be honest like entering a parallel universe. Controversial remark of the day was me saying that to my mind the idea of an English Parliament had rather dispossessed type “Powellite” leanings about it. One audience member walked out.
So what can be concluded from all this? It seems that a fair number on the self-proclaimed left these days reckon an English parliament and “new” English nationalism will be the path to revolution. As a Labour party member, I vehemently disagree with this prescription for a Tory takeover. Excluding two parts of the UK that have consistently voted leftwards and ensuring constitutional gridlock will not usher in a new worker’s paradise. I still think we’re stronger together: that applies to the British nation-state, the centre-left and even that much uttered category at CoL the working class. The best bet for all of the above is Labour rather than any exotically acronymed sub-sect or party calling itself English “democrats” when clearly they aren’t.
Travelling back at the end of it all one nagging question remained: can you apply the term "class traitors" to people who identify so closely with the lumpen proletariat, but remain so achingly middle-class?
Rupa Huq is author of Beyond Subculture (2006, Routledge) and a former Labour European Election Candidate (North West, 2004).
More here at Comment is Free.
This post first appeared on the New Statesman Conference blog
Gordon Brown's Labour Conference speech was never going to be the
'make-or-break' point which many commentators were trying to engineer,
but he certainly used the opportunity to take on his critics and win
back the public.
Progress's editorial
in its conference edition of the magazine argued that the crucial thing
the Prime Minister should do in his speech was to take responsibility
for the government's mistakes in the last year, and the 10p tax debacle
in particular. So it was good to see that he admitted early on in the
speech that it was indeed a mistake and that taking the side of
hard-working families will be a priority henceforth. It wasn't as
explicit an apology as Tony Blair made over the 75p pension rise in
2000, but it was welcome nevertheless.
We also suggested that the PM should use his speech to argue that
the government can no longer make the changes to Britain it seeks by
governing by central dictat and that there needed to be a new contract
between citizen and state. There was a reference to the changing role
of the state when Gordon said: "Let us be clear the modern role of
government is not to provide everything, but it must be to enable
everyone." It was a shame, however that he didn't go much further than
that.
There were other elements which suggested he'd listened to people's
concerns. For instance it was a good move to pledge that as families
have to "make economies to make ends meet" so the government too "will
ensure that we get value for money out of every single pound" of
taxpayers' money. Though he didn't go as far as we did and suggest that
the size of Whitehall should be cut by a quarter or that the number of
government ministers should be whittled down, but I guess he needs as
many members of the PLP on the payroll as possible at the moment...
Progress has long campaigned for greater UK commitment to expose and
act on the human rights abuses in Burma, Zimbabwe and Darfur, so
Gordon's reiterated plea from last year's conference speech that the
words 'never again' should not become "just a slogan" and should be
instead "the crucible in which our values are tested" was welcome. But
as in so many areas of government, the fine words of a speech are
barely translated into practice when the stage set is dismantled. Let's
hope that this year sees more action from our government in putting
pressure on those regimes which think they can transgress international
law without fear of retaliation.
I wasn't so sure whether the more populist measures in the speech
might be storing up problems for the future. For example, while I can
see why those suffering from cancer will see real benefit from the
pledge to not charge for their prescriptions, won't this simply create
even more inconsistency in an already byzantine system of charges and
how do we respond to patients with other potentially life-threatening
illnesses? More popular on the doorstep by far would have been to agree
to abolish hospital car parking charges and telephone charges.
I also wasn't convinced that the move to charge migrants for use of
public services will work in practice and doesn't it send the wrong
signal at a time when our economy will increasingly rely on migrant
labour? Are we ready to charge them for the use of schools and surely
not for emergency health care?
But in all it was a well-executed speech for a Prime Minister under
siege and as ministers and activists pore over the detail in the weeks
to come, it may well provide the starting point for a wider debate
about the direction of the government and party. Jessica Asato is Deputy Director of Progress and a Member of the Fabian Society Executive.
This post first appeared on the New Statesman Conference blog
George Orwell's essay on Politics and the English Language many moons
ago warned politicians against the overuse of clichés and dead
metaphors. He argued that political discourse at the time suffered from
two problems: a staleness of imagery and a lack of precision. I expect
he would find the situation has worsened ten-fold if he were to read
and listen to some of our discussions at the conference, and in
particular, the use of the word 'narrative' to describe the lack of a
guiding direction for the party.
This was made plain to me when Andrew Neil's first question as I sat trembling on the Daily Politics set yesterday was: 'so Progress has called for a new narrative', what's that when it's at home?'
I had to concede that this was not a particularly audience-friendly
word for sure, and suggested that a better way of expressing it to the
viewers at home would be to say that the government lacked a story.
Oasis after all, didn't write 'What's the narrative, morning glory' ...
So why, after accepting that Orwell would thumb his nose at the
word, and its poor translation to the wider public, do I think that
'narrative' is still a good shorthand for describing what is
desperately needed at the moment? The first reason is that simply
coming up with a better 'story' about what the government is doing or
has done, won't be enough to reconnect to the public and win a fourth
term. Using the word 'story' suggests we are talking about something
fictional rather than factual. The actions of Prescott et al are
definitely needed to motivate the troops and to make sure we remember
that elections can't be won without action on the ground. But what the
troops are crying out for is a distinctive and enervating 'narrative'
to be able to relate to voters on the doorstep. A bit more PR with a
few touchstone words which resonate with the public won't achieve their
'go fourth' ambitions.
The second reason is that the word narrative is one of the few words
which relates how future events might unfold. So it's not about simply
regurgitating Labour's successes over the last 11 years, and certainly
not the endless list of statistics and schemes which David Miliband
criticised at Progress's Rally
on Sunday. Instead Labour needs to devise, and agree, a vision of the
changes we wish to bring about in our country in the next decade and
how we will achieve them.
Which brings me to my third reason for sticking with this graceless
word. In creative writing at school, you were told to remember the
narrative - the beginning, the middle and the end. And it is precisely
this progression through the process of determining what Labour is
going to offer the public at the next election which is missing at the
moment. How we will get from where Britain currently is, to where
Labour thinks it should be in the years to come. This is something
which Progress has been working hard on and last week we launched the
first of a number of interventions which we hope will help the process of debate. I can't apologise in the
future though if we're still bemoaning the lack of a narrative - it's
the only word in town.
Jessica Asato is Deputy Director of Progress and a Member of the Fabian Society Executive.
Is Gordon Brown behind the curve in the push for changes to the regulation of global finance? In his speech an hour ago he called, to applause, for more checks on the way the city works - including caps on bonuses of individual deals and a new responsibility for bank board members. But in this morning's Unions 21 fringe in the Midland Hotel the Work Foundation’s Will Hutton and Leo Gerard from the United Steelworkers (the US union set to merge with Unite) agreed unions need to galvanise around 2 or 3 key ideas to change global finance - to remake globalisation in the image their members want. Their idea is based on the leverage the state now has on the banks bailed out by millions of dollars of tax payers money. Surely we should now have more of a say on how they operate? the argument goes. Leo Gerard said globalisation based on the current model of “no rules or standards” should be refounded. Will Hutton's big idea was that banks underpinned by the public purse should now only be allowed to lend to companies that recognise unions.
This conference has given the opportunity for influential people from across progressive politics to come together and start to come up new ideas for a different kind of globalisation. The aim is to turn the financial crisis into an opportunity to make the world more fair. The philosophy is that if things can change so quickly for the bad – could they turn just as quickly for the better?
There have already been calls from the US Democrat Party for a new global financial governance system. In Gordon Brown’s speech he called for measures that will only happen if Labour too embraces that idea.
The trap to avoid is ignoring the established policy making processes and make decisions that will down the line damage the economy and Labour politically.
Dan Whittle is a member of Lewisham Deptford CLP
Well I don't know about anyone else but Gordon's speech was the best political speech I've heard in ever so long. Never mind about just doing enough to secure his job, it was like a call to arms to not just the Labour Party but for the country.
He did what he said he would: he faced down the criticisms, he explained his vision and he called the Tories out. But it was also moving. No really!
It was touching, when he said he was proud to be Sarah's husband, everyone felt moved. And when he talked about his experiences of the NHS and his eyesight, you heard the fears, hopes and pain of that time in his life. But it wasn't just about the oratory.
He did what I hoped he would do, he explained exactly why Labour's progressive values matter, what they mean in real life to real people and therefore why we have to fight for them. He then, and most importantly, set out what those values demand that we do next - policy but individual policy. Yes it was long (I wish I had got a seat earlier!), but it covered everything. Health, crime and justice, education, the whole lot. And he mentioned the whole cabinet individually, emphasising the teamwork.
Over the next days (and I truly think, if it is met by actions, over a long number of years) people will pore over that speech and say it framed a new chapter in our progress. It set out what we're fighting for, why we fight for it and why the Tories aren't up to the challenge. Cameron will say it is all unaffordable, but he'll miss the point, it's what the people want so we must find a way to get it to them.
So yes, ok let's be pragmatic. It was a political speech. But the challenge for progressives is now not to abdicate our responsibility and simply to demand from Gordon and the rest. We now need to do the work ourselves. We have the vision, now we need the action.
Vincenzo Rampulla
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