Uncut « Labour Uncut

The vajazzled middle.

26/11/2010, 07:00:41 AM

by Dan Hodges

Harriet Harman or Katie Price. Who is the most compelling role model?

To us, it’s an easy answer. The glamorous, media savvy stunner was always going to edge out the artist formally known as Jordan. Alex Reid? Tough? Has he ever met Jack Dromey?

Sadly, our view is not shared by the producers of Today. Seasoned BBC journalists are up in arms at news that the retired page 3 empress will guest edit their program. “It is showing a certain contempt for the audience”, said one BBC source. “They are quite a high-brow lot”.

The BBC aristocracy may cringe. But we sneer at our peril. Because whether we like it or not, for a significant proportion of young working class women, Katie Price is their Harriet Harman. Tough. Successful. Empowering.

My wife recently attended a debate on the “Pricey phenomenon”. One contributor described her as “Vichy France with tits”. Katie Price that is, not my wife.

It’s a great line. But whether we regard Price as an appropriate ambassador for post-feminism, or a Trojan horse in a g-string, is irrelevant. We’re not her market. They are: “Bernadette and Keilly McCrory, 26 and 24 respectively, who think she is “brilliant, just dead down to earth, just a really nice, normal girl”. Ashley Ribair, 22, who says: “She’s just someone you can relate to. She’s been through such a lot but she’s just a real role model in the way she’s dealt with it”. Kayleigh Sansom, 19, who said she’d read her first book “when I was pregnant and was going to be a single mother and I just thought if she can cope, then so can I”.

That’s not some ad blurb. That’s from the Observer: “she inspires the kind of devotion that will inspire nearly 1,000 women to queue in the freezing cold outside Borders in Wallsend on a Wednesday morning in February”.

Katie Price may not be our cup of tea. But her constituency is our constituency. And if we can’t start to connect with her audience, we’re not connecting with our own. (more…)

Posted in Uncut | 6 Comments »

Who the new Lib Dem president really is. And why.

25/11/2010, 03:00:43 PM

by Jonathan Todd

For all Nick Clegg’s slightly vague talk of “giving the party with the biggest mandate the chance to govern” it wasn’t hard, given opinion polls, to see a Tory/Lib Dem government as a potential outcome throughout the general election. I warned Westmorland and Lonsdale that they might vote Liberal Democrat and end up with such a government. They didn’t listen. I was less surprised by the government we ended up with than the extent to which the motivations of my Liberal Democrat opponent, Tim Farron, recently elected president of his party, seemed so close to those of Labourites.

He professes “anger at the injustice” of Margaret Thatcher. At hustings he’d offer impassioned rhetoric on whatever social problem was most germane. Whether this was the struggles of hill sheep farmers or global warning, he challenged market iniquities. His stump speech tells of watching a repeat of Cathy Come Home as a teenager and being so compelled to do something about the injustice he’d witnessed that he decided to use his pocket money to join a political party instead of buying a Smiths single. While he was far more profligate in Biblical quotations than me, at hustings we battled to colonise the language of poverty and oppression.

Farron’s constituency once belonged to Tory grandee, Michael Jopling, whom Alan Clark famously recorded saying of Michael Heseltine that “his trouble is that he had to buy his own furniture”. Jopling stood down in 1997, bequeathing Tim Collins a majority of over 16,000. Collins was defeated eight years later by a candidate fired by rage at a Prime Minister in whose government Jopling served.

Farron first contested the seat in 2001, when Collins was a shoo-in. The next year he switched jobs to work in the constituency and at some stage – long before it was thought a potential site of a Tory “decapitation” – he settled his family locally. All of this suggests reserves of self-belief and a willingness to play the long game.

He may sometimes sound like a lost member of our tribe, but part of the reason for Farron turning a safe Tory seat into a solid Liberal Democrat one has been a ruthless crushing of Labour. His annihilation of me came after all Labour councillors had been vanquished. As considerable Tory support remains in the more rural parts of the constituency, which have recently formed the backdrop to Rob Brydon and Steve Coogan’s The Trip, he has assiduously worked wards that were once Labour.

Good Labour councillors have been crushed by Farron’s machine. While it would delight me to see these councillors returned to office, Farron represents a different kind of Liberal Democrat from, say, David Laws. In effect, they are now in different parties.

As Tim Montgomerie observes, this is a governing ensemble in three parts:

the almost indistinguishable front benches;

the Tory right;

the left of the Liberal Democrats who, in their hearts, would still have preferred a deal with Labour.

Farron is one of the leaders of the latter and Laws seeks – with, for example, his crass dig at Ed Miliband for buying a round of teas – only to help the former.

The difference between being a human shield happily (Laws) and begrudgingly (Farron) may seem trivial when you are protecting a prime minister as destructive as she who inspired Farron to go into politics. But there is significance in the distinction. The willing human shields will be appealed to by Cameronites like Nick Boles who intend the Tory/Lib-Dem alliance to endure beyond this parliament. Longevity in this axis is to be feared by Labour.

Immediately upon becoming Lib Dem president, however, Tim Farron dismissed the notion as “absolutely stark raving mad”.

Labour might build upon this by following the advice offered by Liberal Democrat David Hall-Matthews in Renewal:

“There might be more to be gained for Labour by trying to woo the Lib Dems – or at least by highlighting their (huge) differences from the Tories, rather than condemning their similarities. It would be a disaster for the left if a 2015 balanced parliament created the possibility of a clear Lib-Lab majority but five years of mutual carping had poisoned the well”.

It would be in tune with the post-tribal sensibilities of the public for Labour to be upfront about where we can agree with the Liberal Democrats and where we can’t. This should uncover a considerable basis of common ground, potentially on issues like a land tax and a second chamber elected by full PR, which the Lib Dems share with Labour and which neither can share with the Tories. The election of a social democrat like Farron as president and quotations like that from Hall-Matthews indicate that there are plenty of Liberal Democrats looking for common ground. For them, perpetual governance by the Boles-Law class is almost as nightmarish as it is for us.

We shouldn’t forget, and should continue to resist, the damage that Farron has wrought on a CLP. We should be suspicious of his ambitions (having been told he was crazy to think he could beat Collins, he may now secretly think he can lead the Lib Dems to be the largest leftist force). We should expect him to over-egg the progressive credentials of the Liberal Democrats.

But we should probe these credentials fairly and seek – rather than firing endless rounds into the human shields – to build bridges and back-channels with those of Farron’s bent. This will expose the greatest enemy: David Cameron. And we may even discover that Farron got Stockholm syndrome not six months ago but soon after watching Cathy Come Home.

Jonathan Todd is Uncut’s economic columnist and was Labour’s Parliamentary candidate in Westmorland and Lonsdale at the 2010 general election.

Posted in Uncut | 3 Comments »

Osborne’s regressive VAT bombshell is both mad & bad

25/11/2010, 07:00:35 AM

by Sally Bercow

There was certainly no age-of-austerity angst or belt-tightening blues in evidence at the big blue and yellow box in Wembley earlier this week. Ikea was rammed – not just the downstairs marketplace with its Xmas decorations, tealights and festive bits and bobs – but the entire store. Consumer confidence may be falling (the Nationwide index now sits at its lowest level since March 2009) but there were more people sprawling on Klippan sofas, bustling by Billy bookcases, bouncing on Sultan mattresses and measuring up Faktum kitchens than you could shake a stick at.

Now, of course, I appreciate that Ikea is almost always busy, not to mention nightmarishly stressful (all couples argue in Ikea right)? Nonetheless, the member of staff I (eventually) found agreed that there were even more shoppers than usual. More interestingly, he divulged (after only one leading question and the teeniest amount of prompting) a theory as to why: namely, that people are enjoying one last hurrah; a final spending splurge before the VAT increase hits in January.

What is more, this is borne out across the high street: although John Lewis last week reported a booming 6.8 per cent increase in sales on the same time last year, their MD, Andy Street, observed: “The imminent VAT increase is a major issue. We are seeing customers already talking to us about bringing forward big home purchases, such as carpets and kitchens, before the VAT increase and who can blame them frankly”. (more…)

Posted in Uncut | 6 Comments »

Alan Sugar is right. Nick Clegg is wrong. It’s people that matter, not “progress”.

24/11/2010, 03:30:09 PM

by Anthony Painter

Lord Alan Sugar couldn’t care less where you’ve come from or what university you’ve been to. All he cares about is how you acquit yourself both personally and professionally. Your individual performance matters, but so does your emotional intelligence and ability to work in a team. He judges people on their merits as he sees them. To impress him you have to think on your feet, adapt yourself to the task in hand. It’s not merit in a formal sense. It’s about creativity and worth.

Nick Clegg has sought refuge in “social mobility”. Politicians at a low ebb of creativity and imagination tend to. Let’s take social mobility to mean ending up with a higher status or in a more elevated social class than your parents. In this regard, Lord Sugar is highly socially mobile. Nick Clegg is pretty static. The former was luckily enough to be born into a north London working class family; Clegg had nowhere to go really, but good for him in maintaining his family’s class and status.

Straight away we are seeing how ludicrous social mobility can be as a concept. It gets worse. By focusing on social mobility we exacerbate that very British bad habit of obsessing with class and status. Do we really want the measure of “success” to be your class (economic position) or status (social standing)? In measuring success in this way you only exacerbate social division and stigmatise “failure”. In a highly mobile society, anyone who doesn’t end up with a higher status or in a higher class has failed. And to achieve the supposed idyll of perfect social mobility implies a monumental and brutal task of social engineering, the like of which won’t be contemplated- rightly, because it’s monstrous.

Just before the left gets too smug, it has a similarly divisive view of the world. Nick Clegg’s Hugo Young speech has been adversely criticised by some on the left for failing to appreciate the link between inequality and diminished social mobility. This is just as bad. First, it accepts the end of social mobility unquestioningly. Second, it reduces the means to that end to greater “equality” (a lower Gini coefficient). The attitude is basically “we’ll set you the goal and give you help to fly up the social ladder and when you don’t we’ll compensate you anyway then we’ll play the game again with your kids and their kids”. Politically, it’s a nonsensical proposition. (more…)

Posted in Uncut | 9 Comments »

Can Martha teach the government not to think it’s Google?

24/11/2010, 12:00:13 PM

by Tom Watson

I find it difficult not to like Francis Maude. He’s affable, decent and thoughtful. Unlike many of his colleagues, he’s making a difference. It’s easy for Francis, though. He has a secret weapon. He has Martha Lane Fox. And, as every geek knows, Martha is the kindest, most charming revolutionary internet genius you can ever wish to meet. On top of that, she runs the best karaoke bar in all of London town.

This week, Francis, in customary fashion, chose not to steal too much of the limelight from Martha when they jointly launched her report into the future of government internet services. It’s possibly the second most radical policy initiative from the government so far – after transparent budgeting. It’s one of those policies that we should wholeheartedly endorse. We should even throw in a mea culpa for not doing it ourselves when we had the chance. (more…)

Posted in Uncut | 5 Comments »

The Tories can’t have the Irish crisis both ways

23/11/2010, 03:00:55 PM

by Pat McFadden

The UK government has been determined to paint our economic situation as a domestic one, blaming the Labour government for the deficit and thus for their response to it in terms of the spending cuts set out in the CSR. This politically-led approach to the crisis also requires them to play down or ignore the international nature of it. After all, the more they talk about common problems being faced by countries across the world, the more threadbare their case against the previous government becomes. It can’t all be Labour’s fault if a number of countries are going through the same difficulties.

You could see this approach reflected at the recent G20 summit. Instead of shaping the agenda as Britain did when Gordon Brown chaired the G20 summit in London last year, we appeared to play a marginal role, with little to say about how countries should work together, or what the response should be to the exchange rate tensions and the discussion of trade imbalances that dominated the summit. When the prime minister was asked what he had been doing at the summit, he said that he had been lobbying for England to host the 2018 world cup – a good goal to aim for but not the reason he was there.

Enter Ireland, with a flight of deposits causing a crisis of confidence in the country’s economy – and this after the country has implemented the kind of austerity programme the UK government is setting out on. Yet when government ministers talk of the Irish economy’s problems, they don’t want to talk about the Irish government’s fiscal policies. No. They insist that In Ireland the issue is all about banks, not the actions of the government.

This contradictory stance exposes their political strategy in the UK. How can it be all about banks in Ireland but all about Labour government profligacy in the UK? The truth is that the last few years has seen the unfolding of a banking crisis across the world to which governments of all stripes have had to respond. In the UK, the Labour government responded in a way that was determined not to let recession turn into depression. That’s the reason for the deficit, not government profligacy. And in the same way, it is a banking crisis that lies at the core of Ireland’s economic problems.

I hope the Irish economy recovers. It is true that as neighbours and trading partners, it is in the UK’s interests to have a healthy and stable Irish economy. But it does no one any good for our government to offer one version of events when it comes to talking about our own economy and another one entirely when talking about others.

Pat McFadden is Labour MP for Wolverhampton South East and a former BIS minister.

Posted in Uncut | 3 Comments »

Time is not on Ed Miliband’s side

23/11/2010, 10:00:57 AM

by Dan Hodges

Were Ed Miliband ever to tear himself away from the poetry of his shadow minister for political and constitutional reform, an admittedly tough ask, he should try a little Kipling. The youngest ever recipient of the Nobel prize for literature knew a thing or two about the virtue of patient fortitude.

“If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting”.

To many around the Labour leader, those words could serve as a political mission statement. You have time, they argue. Definition is important. But early mistakes will prove more definitive than early successes. Tread carefully. No slip-ups. Trade time for political space.

Words of caution invariably fall upon keen ears when addressed to politicians. They are by nature risk-averse. Our senior statesmen occupy precarious positions; their office windows overlook an imposing drop. The decisions they take have consequences few of us will replicate in our own working lives. (more…)

Posted in Uncut | 14 Comments »

Seven (deadly) tests for Ed Miliband

22/11/2010, 04:30:49 PM

by Nick Pearce

Returning from paternity leave, Ed Miliband has set out his stall on how Labour will rethink its policies under his leadership. Most leaders of the opposition establish policy reviews of one kind or another, to wipe the policy slate clean. David Cameron set up a number of policy review groups that produced little but headaches for him, in contrast to his wider brand repositioning, which was largely successful. In his first two years in the job, he established a clear character for his leadership of the Conservative party: liberal, green and centrist. In those early days, the direction of travel was much more important than the detail.

Referring to Cameron’s scene-setting Arctic jaunt, Mr Miliband has said he ‘won’t do huskies’. So what will be the character of the Labour party under his leadership? What will be the core components of its political identity? To help work this out, here are seven character tests for the Labour leadership.

1. Will Labour be a liberal party?

As the shadow of 9/11 has receded, British politics has become more liberal. Barring a catastrophe, it will remain that way. Parties are also more liberal in opposition than when they exercise the levers of power for themselves, and in this Labour will be no different. Younger cohorts of voters are more tolerant and diverse than older ones and so the underlying trend is towards a more liberal polity.

Ed Balls’ weekend comments confirm the liberal direction of travel set out by Ed Miliband when he became leader. The challenge for Labour is to reconcile this liberalism with currents of small ‘c’ conservatism among the electorate, which is now both increasingly liberal and more conservative in unpredictable ways. In particular, it will want to respond to the public’s desire for swift and tough action to be taken against incivility and antisocial behaviour, which spans the social classes but is particularly acute in Labour-held seats. No political party can safely allow itself to be seen as indifferent or unresponsive on low-level crime and antisocial behaviour. (more…)

Posted in Uncut | 9 Comments »

Have some ministerial jobs become too hot to handle?

22/11/2010, 02:00:41 PM

by Kevin Meagher

PHIL Woolas’ current predicament owes at least something to his being a tough immigration minister in the last government. With a large Muslim population in his Oldham backyard and with boundary changes making his marginal seat more ethnically diverse, his day job hardly endeared him to a big chunk of his local electorate. The rest is history.

Would Woolas have faced the same little local difficulty if he had not been immigration minister? And would he then have run the campaign he ran?

However this story eventually plays itself out, what it serves to remind us is that there are certain ministerial jobs that are not for the faint-hearted. Immigration minister is the obvious role that is always difficult for Labour politicians. It is the type of posting where you are not going to get any thanks, whatever you do. Too hardline for some, too wishy-washy for others.

Ironically, for such a complex issue, there are, ultimately, only three positions you can have on immigration. There is too much of it. Not enough of it. Or the balance is just right. You can discount the last option because no-one is ever happy with the status quo. Most people in the country opt for the first. Many in the Labour party for the second. On this issue, more than just about any other, you will never please all of the people all of the time.

Labour is, of course, instinctively sympathetic to the plight of refugees and immigrants. And justly so. But the hard reality is that not all deserve to stay. Most rational people accept that. Some, however, do not want to follow through the brutal logic. (more…)

Posted in Uncut | 5 Comments »

The cost-free, universally popular, radical new ideas box

22/11/2010, 08:49:59 AM

by John Woodcock

It is no secret or surprise that ministers and advisers in the last government got hooked on seeing themselves satirised in The Thick of It. But there was one line in particular that summed up the exasperation of office so well that it was quoted back in Whitehall meetings: the line where an irritated adviser responds to a request for an agenda-setting new policy by sarcastically rummaging around in his “radical, cost-free, universally popular” ideas box and declaring it to be empty.

Partly, that just demonstrated how knackered the last administration had become and highlighted Labour’s need to renew and recharge. But The Thick of It did not simply dramatise the Labour government’s decline; the scene mentioned also points to the difficulty faced by any political party when the proposals it seeks to generate to win support actually need to be put into practice.

It is a problem the Tories and Liberal Democrats are facing in spades as they move from opposition to government. Suddenly, the stuff that sounded so catchy on a single-sided press release doesn’t seem quite so realistic when in charge of the department tasked with implementing it.

Tuition fees are the obvious example, of course. Vince Cable even had the chutzpah to explain that he would never have advocated scrapping fees if he had known he was going to be in a position to do something about them – a line beyond satire. (more…)

Posted in Uncut | 1 Comment »