September « 2013 « Labour Uncut

Archive for September, 2013

Forget the black arts, McBride exposes Brown’s wasted potential

23/09/2013, 11:56:15 AM

by Kevin Meagher

Reading extracts from the intermittent release of Damian McBride’s scabrous and painfully frank account of life at the heart of the Brown political machine, there is an obvious and dispiriting parallel that comes to mind. James Gordon Brown seems to be the closest thing British politics has to Richard Milhous Nixon.

The comparison has been made before, whether it’s at the literal end of the scale – both were brooding and insular – or in what they did in office. The Nixonian paranoia and skulduggery of Brown’s operation that McBride lays bare is depressing to read; and all the more so because it didn’t have to be like this.

If you measure Gordon Brown’s record between 1997 and 2007, he emerges as one of the greatest social democrats of the post-war era, up there with Bevan and Crosland in leaving an enduring mark on reducing inequality.

Yet when you stretch the review period by just three years to include his premiership, Brown, like Nixon, is reduced to a figure despised, discredited and disgraced – or so his political enemies (including those within Labour’s ranks) constantly tell us.

This is certainly hyperbolic; the Brown government was not that bad; and, sure, he was no angel when he was at the Treasury either, running a perennial campaign to usurp Blair, but the real waste is that this didn’t all end when he realised his life’s ambition by becoming prime minister.

(more…)

Posted in Uncut | 8 Comments »

Exclusive Uncut poll shows Ed Balls’ position on spending is a vote winner – but we must be ready for the inevitable Tory attacks

23/09/2013, 07:00:48 AM

by Jonathan Todd

Much has happened since early June when both Ed Balls and Ed Miliband made speeches intended to show they can be trusted with the publics’ hard-earned money. Miliband has launched a far-reaching party reform, upsetting some, and disappointed others in his handling of Syria.

As Damian McBride’s memoirs revisit old battles, Miliband does not lack for contemporary ones but in the fog of political war he must remain focused on the economy because this is where the result of the next election will be decided.

There will be many at Labour party conference who wouldn’t welcome a belt tightening message. They’ve heard Nick Clegg deliver free school meals. They’ll want promises of goodies from Miliband too.

Miliband should tune out these appeals and tune in Don Draper. “If you don’t like what is being said, change the conversation”. The economic debate has been stuck on the deficit throughout this parliament. The cost of living is more fertile terrain for Labour. But the Conservatives retort that Labour, with its profligate ways will drive the economy into the debt ditch, squeezing households in years more of recession and austerity.

The conversation won’t be changed till this Conservative claim is rendered absurd. This means the June speeches must not be the end of Labour attempts to build fiscal credibility but staging posts. Promises of largesse to please the faithful in the hall are not what’s required, we need reassurance for those at home who will be paying a little more attention to Labour this week than usual.

These voters want Labour to demonstrate that the long, hard road of the past half-decade can end with something different and better. Miliband should focus on such a future, not refighting past confrontations. Not only with McBride but also the 2010 general election and the “emergency” budget that followed.

Labour was right to warn that this budget went too far, too fast but so entrenched was the perception of the party’s profligacy that nearly half of voters, according to YouGov, then blamed the previous government for these cuts. 9 per cent more still do so than blame the incumbent government.

If Labour were to promise, as seems likely, to keep most of the present government’s spending plans, but to borrow more specifically for public works such as building more homes, polling for Labour Uncut by YouGov reveals that those who say this would make them more likely to vote Labour outnumber those who say it would make them less likely by 4 per cent (17% more likely vs 13% less likely).

In contrast, a net 4% of voters say they would be less likely to vote Labour (12% more likely vs 16% less likely) if the party rejected any public spending cuts and instead allowed borrowing to rise.

This could be pivotal at the election. Although 55% say it would not change their vote (either for or against Labour), a 4% rise or fall in Labour’s vote could be worth upto 52 seats in 2015 (source: UK Polling Report Swingometer with a 4% increase in Labour’s 2010 vote share) and be the difference between Labour becoming the government or remaining in opposition

(more…)

Posted in Uncut | 2 Comments »

Leadership and party: how Ed can use one to revitalise the other

22/09/2013, 08:00:16 AM

by Rob Marchant

The next few days will be pretty decisive for the Labour leadership. While this is the kind of refrain you often hear from breathless journalists around conference time, on this occasion it has really a ring of truth about it. He has a project he firmly needs to make work.

Ed Miliband is no longer the new boy: indeed, he is now Labour’s second longest-serving leader of the last two decades. He is consolidated as leader of his party, with no serious challengers for the leadership; and currently presides over – just – a lead for that party in the opinion polls which has held for most of his tenure.

But, over the three years of his leadership, he has been criticised for a number of things: slowness to define party policy; a failure to reform his party; and poor personal leadership ratings.

Our new Labour Uncut book, titled Labour’s manifesto uncut: How to win in 2015 and why, looks principally to give answers to the first of these three, through concrete policy proposals backed up by painstaking polling on what will and will not appeal to the public.

But we also anticipated that Miliband might also, by addressing the second, address the third; that is, a well-executed party reform programme could help revitalise his leadership. We will come to why that is in a moment.

There was a party reform programme, known as Refounding Labour, which came and went in 2011; but it tinkered around the edges. Many of us had given up hope that any reform would come.

(more…)

Posted in Uncut | 12 Comments »

Exclusive Uncut poll: Over 1 in 4 2010 Lab voters have been lost. Here’s what can be done to win them back

21/09/2013, 01:16:40 PM

by Atul Hatwal

Forget “too far, too fast.” With less than two years until the next election, Labour has chosen its new line of attack: the cost of living crisis.

We might have a nascent recovery, but for most people, life keeps getting tougher as prices continue to rise much faster than wages.

It’s powerful, but Labour needs to be careful.

Exclusive YouGov polling conducted for Uncut reveals that almost as many people blame the last Labour government for today’s cost of living crisis as they do the Tories. 66% of respondents said they blamed the Labour government either a little or a lot for the problem while 71% blamed the Tories.

Even among Labour supporters, 37% blamed the last government. Simply attacking the Tories and saying the words “cost of living crisis” will not be enough for Labour.

Worse still, the polling shows that since the last election over a quarter of 2010 Labour voters (26%) have decided not to vote Labour in 2015.

Although the party’s poll rating is buoyed at the moment by new support, the danger is that this could be soft – voting is a habit and a quarter of Labour’s voters are on the way to breaking theirs’. The erosion of Labour’s opinion poll lead over the past year is indicative of what could happen in the run up to the next election.

Out of Labour’s lost 2010 voters, almost 1 in 5 are now supporting the Conservatives (18%) and 1 in 10 (10%) the Lib Dems. Add-in those who’ve switched to UKIP and over a third of these lost voters have shifted to parties to the right of today’s Labour party.

In contrast, just 1 in 20 have moved left to the Greens, with most of the rest (41%) undecided.

The political need is pressing. Labour needs to show wavering supporters and potential switchers how life would be better with Ed Miliband in Number 10. Actions, or in this case, policies, speak louder than words.

The announcement of Labour’s intention to repeal the bedroom tax will have lifted activist spirits. This government policy is incompetent (clearly there was never going to be enough accommodation for people to move to) and generates arrears and misery in abundance. It is the right thing to do, but whether it is the right commitment to roll-out first, is another matter.

Labour is already blamed for excessive welfare spending (as Uncut reported last week, 54% of those who think welfare spending is too high blame the last Labour government, just 5% the current government, a margin of 10 to 1) and the Tories are rubbing their hands in glee at labeling Labour as the “welfare party.”

Labour needs a broader offer, where policies like repeal of the bedroom tax sit within a prospectus that shows how everyone will benefit from a Labour government.

Next week at Labour conference, Uncut will launch a book, “Labour’s manifesto uncut: how to win in 2015 and why” that gives a fully costed, centrist vision of a progressive Labour alternative.

In it, Uncut sets out the five steps Labour need to take for Ed Miliband to become the new occupant in Number 10 on 8^th May 2015.

(more…)

Posted in Uncut | 8 Comments »

Letter from Wales: Does Plaid Cymru think Pwllheli is twinned with Somalia?

20/09/2013, 03:07:29 PM

by Julian Ruck

Yes it’s true, I’m not joking! The Byddin Ymreolwyr Cymru (for all you English speakers, the Home Rule Army of Wales as was Plaid in its original combustible form) is sadly lacking in geographical awareness. It’s official.

And how do I know this? Well now, it seems one soldier of the Army of Home Rulers (take that for those who want a Welsh only speaking sovereign state of Wales), the venerable and not so loquacious Jill Evans Plaid Cymru MEP, has apparently only spoken some 13 times to European Parliamentary plenary sessions in Strasbourg since June 2009, whilst her fellow Welsh MEP’s have each made between 187 and 227 contributions.

Quality not quantity you may be thinking? But some of her questions have related to the independence (funnily enough!) of a former Spanish colony in Africa and financial support for a Frisian language theatre (again funnily enough) – hints here I think of a minority Welsh language kindred spirit perhaps? Oh and not forgetting her question relating to Chagossians.

Chagossians? Yes I know, apparently the late Saunders Lewis, that old Plaid Cymru war-horse, hero of nationalist endeavour and pyrotechnic genius, albeit that his propensity for arson landed him in the Scrubs, had dropped in on the Chagossians for a pint of Felinfoel Double Dragon ale when he had got lost in the Indian Ocean, so the story goes. He had only gone out to buy a gallon of paraffin too!

Now, you may be wondering what Jill Evans is all about? I mean, isn’t she supposed to be representing the Welsh and raising Welsh issues? Not so, it would seem. Minority languages and the plight of Chagossians seem to be her order of priorities. This being the case, one has to ask whether the Rhonddian fire-brand, Leanne Wood – I hear she now has some English (god forbid!) elocution and make-over gurus in tow – is equally shy of atlas absorbing, because Plaid Cymru certainly seems to have difficulty deciding the order of its geographical priorities.

(more…)

Posted in Uncut | 28 Comments »

Exclusive Uncut poll: primaries don’t break the bank and a majority of Labour supporters would take part

19/09/2013, 09:56:49 PM

by Rob Marchant

As Ed Miliband puts the finishing touches to Tuesday’s conference speech, it would be very surprising indeed if it did not contain a major passage on his reform of the link between party and trade unions. It is not just that the subject of the Falkirk selection fiasco, and the resulting announcement of a programme of widespread reform, will still be very fresh in delegates’ minds.

It is that Miliband has clearly staked his leadership on that programme’s success.

As Ray Collins has set out in his interim report for the party, released yesterday, primaries are a central component of the reforms. Ed has suggested the use of a US-style primary to select Labour’s candidate for London Mayor and raised their potential use in parliamentary selections where the MP is retiring or local party membership has dwindled.

Using a primary to select Labour’s London mayoral candidate kills several birds with one stone: it aids Miliband with his current headache over who might be a reasonable candidate with wide appeal; it would prove that such a process works, on a grand scale, and clear the way for its use in selecting candidates for parliament; and, most importantly, it would ensure no stitch-ups by special interest groups, as was alleged in Falkirk over the union Unite’s involvement.

It has, however, two disadvantages. One is that primaries are costly, and the party is broke. And the second is that the risk is high: a failure in London would be a very high-profile failure indeed, and would surely kill the idea of primaries for MP selections. It could even stop the whole reform programme in its tracks.

So the debate has become somewhat heated already: union leaders see this as a way for the party to clip their wings, and party members are nervous that the party might collapse financially, or even politically.

All of these actors, then, might be interested to take note of the following.

50% of Labour supporters say they would either probably or definitely take part in this type of primary – even if non-members had to pay £1 to register – with 15% saying they would definitely take part and 35% probably (if they didn’t have to pay the £1, the total figure rises to 69%). (more…)

Posted in Uncut | 3 Comments »

16 government policies the Lib Dems didn’t stop

19/09/2013, 10:06:57 AM

by Michael Dugher

Nick Clegg looked awfully pleased with himself yesterday. I think he very much enjoys being deputy prime minister. His message to the party faithful yesterday was “I’ll be in government with anyone”, which roughly translates as “I don’t believe in anything”. And though Clegg had a carefully choreographed pop at the Tories yesterday, the truth is the Lib Dems vote with the Tories day after day.

Despite the huge cost of living crisis engulfing most families, with people on average nearly £1,500 worse off a year under this Government, Clegg told the Lib Dems yesterday that they should “feel proud that country’s fortunes are turning”. He also listed 16 policies that he had apparently blocked the Tories from introducing.

Well, just for the record Nick, here’s 16 things the Lib Dems didn’t block:

1. A tax cut for millionaires – cutting the 50p top rate of tax, giving 13,000 millionaires a handout worth on average £100,000 each.

2. Trebling tuition fees. Nick Clegg promised to vote against any rise in tuition fees. He didn’t.

3. Increasing VAT to 20 per cent. The Lib Dems warned before the election of a “TORY VAT BOMBSHELL”. Then he helped them introduce it.

4. An economic policy that choked off the recovery – which is now the slowest for 100 years. Vince Cable warned before the election that “the danger of drastic cuts in public spending right now is that it would make the recession worse and it would make the deficit worse” – but he signed up to them.

5. A £3 billion top-down NHS reorganisation, while queues grow in A&E and over 5,000 nurses are cut.

6. Cutting 15,000 police officers – even though the Lib Dem manifesto promised an extra 3,000 police officers.

(more…)

Posted in Uncut | 8 Comments »

Blunkett is right: one out of three ain’t good

18/09/2013, 08:47:03 AM

by Rob Marchant

It cannot have been the most welcome of interventions by a party elder, coming on the eve of TUC conference and a tricky moment for Miliband in his critical party reform agenda. Even less so to have chosen as his medium Labour’s favourite bête noire newspaper.

But although some things have moved on in the intervening ten days, David Blunkett’s recent Daily Mail piece certainly succeeded in one thing: he correctly identified the three areas where Labour has shown itself wanting, and in which its overall lack of success this year has surely not helped Miliband’s personal poll ratings, now standing at an historic low.

And they are these: its struggle with union leaders – as opposed to their members, who Uncut demonstrated last week think differently – over party reform; its recent foreign policy disaster over Syria; and its constant problem since the last election, the economy.

On party reform, Miliband certainly seems doing the right thing. It is a difficult path, but he stood his ground last week, we can only hope that that continues next week at party conference. He deserves the party’s praise and support, as even Times columnist and former Tory MP Matthew Parris acknowledged this weekend.

The problem he has is the other two areas.

First, it looks to be too late to recoup the losses on Labour’s Syria stance.

It is ironic that he same subject that gave rise to Obama’s now-legendary “red lines” also gave rise to the crossing of some red lines within our own party. There are some who will never forgive Miliband, although, to be fair, they are surely in the minority.

Whether you take is as an unintentional fumble or a cynical way to score party political points at a time when statesmanship was called for, it has been a watershed; one which has left Miliband consolidated in some sections of his party, yet diminished in the minds of opinion-formers who have spent the last three years treating him with polite respect, if not a warm embrace. The fickle country, despite not being keen on war, has surely yet to decide what it thinks about Labour’s handling of Syria, but sure-footed it has not been.

(more…)

Posted in Uncut | 17 Comments »

Please, no more “zen socialism”

17/09/2013, 09:45:39 AM

by David Talbot

August, clearly, was not quite the sojourn the Labour leader no doubt dearly wished it to be. The hitherto unheard of George Mudie, apparently the MP for Leeds East, initiated the dreadful barrage that was to be directed at the Labour leader over a fearsome few weeks.

Pilloried from left to right, upon his return Miliband was attacked in a different form when a disgruntled bystander threw an egg as he sauntered round a south London market. Amongst the many reactions was the question of “why?” – it was in itself a surprise to many that a member of the public had formed a sufficient enough opinion of Miliband as to be angry.

For the Labour’s leader’s strategy has been personified by that of the forever being the tortoise, and certainly not the hare, on the path to 2015. It has been eloquently articulated as “zen socialism” and, astonishingly, really is the only “-ism” one can apply to Miliband nearly three years into his leadership.

“Zen socialism” first troubled the English language in the aftermath of Labour’s bloody leadership election. In those troubled days the strategy had an ounce of sense; Labour had just been crushed in the general election and had subjected itself to a ridiculously long internal election that had split the party in two.

A sustained period of quiet reflection seemed imminently sensible. The electorate were neither listening nor cared about what the Labour party was saying or doing. Polls reflected comfortable Labour leads that were more a referendum on the coalition than anything the Labour party was doing. A safety first approach seemed attractive and sensible; time to rebuild, heal and fight renewed.

At some point in every parliament, though, the cycle of politics ceases to be a referendum about the government and turns into a choice between parties. When that point comes, as it now surely has, Labour really ought to look like a plausible party of government offering a coherent, costed and attractive prospectus. The party is, to put it politely, some way off that. Members of the public are categorically not telling pollsters and canvassers that they wish Ed Miliband would just take that little bit longer to define himself and outline concrete policies.

(more…)

Posted in Uncut | 3 Comments »

The ostriches of the left need to understand the risk of a “strivers strike”

16/09/2013, 10:16:49 AM

by Kevin Meagher

Contrary to popular belief, ostriches do not in fact bury their heads in the sand. Like most logical animals, they leg it when a danger presents itself.

Alas, many on the left do not seem to possess the good sense of our feathered friends and do, in fact, propel their heads into the ground to avoid hearing a few home truths.

I wrote the other day about how curtailing the costs of the welfare state through instituting a basic golden rule that all adults should be in paid work for the vast majority of their working lives was vital to addressing the public’s mistrust of Labour when it comes to managing benefit costs.

To recap, a YouGov poll to accompany our forthcoming pamphlet ‘Labour’s manifesto uncut: How to win in 2015 and why’ finds that over half of those who think welfare spending is too high (54 per cent) blame Labour, ten times more people than the five per cent who hold the coalition responsible.

Who do they rate best able to keep costs under control? 45 per cent trust Cameron, compared to 14 per cent who back Ed Miliband. It seems obvious that this is a not insignificant difficulty for the party looking to rebuild trust with the electorate.

Yet it’s an argument some people don’t want to hear. The Independent’s Owen Jones dropped me a line on Twitter to ask whether “perpetuating myths” about the welfare state was helpful in repairing public trust (a question framed as an accusation). I’m not exactly clear which thought crime I have committed, but expecting all adults, save for the most vulnerable, to work and contribute is clearly some sort of heinous proposal.

(more…)

Posted in Uncut | 19 Comments »