Labour Uncut

UNCUT: Break out the nose pegs and vote for Livingstone

18/04/2012, 03:12:48 PM

by David Talbot

You would be forgiven for thinking that the only segment of the United Kingdom that is to vote this May is London. But on May 3^rd elections will take place in 180 councils across the country, with 5000 seats up for grabs. Over the Easter break I duly volunteered to distribute leaflets in my home CLP back in rural Warwickshire. Amidst the endless open countryside, hamlets and villages I could not have been more removed from the hectic London political scene.

Until, that is, I stopped in the hamlet of Ardens Grafton and frequented the sole shop. A picture of Ken Livingstone weeping greeted me as I picked up the front page of the Guardian. Much has been said about the authenticity, or not, of the performance since. But with accompanying prose underneath the picture spilling over to page two, and a double-page spread adjoining pages seven and eight, it confirmed, if nothing else, just quite how London-centric our media is. It also focused the mind on the London mayoral election ahead – and what those with serious doubts about Livingstone should do come that Thursday in early May.

I am seemingly in a large rump of Labour voters who do not view Ken Livingstone favourably. YouGov put the figure at 31%, ComRes 17%. In a tight election these numbers are more than enough to secure significant defeat for the Labour candidate.

The charge sheet against Ken Livingstone has been heavily trailed in recent weeks. Commentators ranging from Jonathan Freedland in the Guardian, Philip Collins in the Times, Nick Cohen in the Observer and, more troublingly, the Jewish Chronicle have voiced serious concerns about our candidate. Coupled with the usual antagonists; Andrew Gilligan in the Telegraph is his usual obsessed self, and the Evening Standard, who have effortlessly slipped back to where they left off in 2008; vast swathes of the media, and ordinary Labour members, are, to put it politely, at best lukewarm about Livingstone.

Ken Livingstone is the problem of this campaign. To pretend otherwise is to, wilfully, miss the point. At a time when Labour has opened up the biggest lead over the Tories since the aftermath of the general election, Livingstone is trailing the London Labour vote by 6%, whilst Boris Johnson is outperforming the Tories in the capital by 10%.

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UNCUT: Cameron’s Olympic fail: Over 1 in 3 no longer back the games as the numbers of young taking part in sport fall

18/04/2012, 07:05:17 AM

by Atul Hatwal

With 100 days to go until the Olympics, new figures uncovered by Labour Uncut reveal how public support for the games is slipping while participation in sport amongst 16-24 year olds is falling.

In 2011, the numbers who were either opposed or indifferent to the games rose from 33% to 36% compared to 2010/11, while the numbers backing the Olympics dropped from 66% to 63%.

The fall in public support is the first to be registered since 2008/9 and means that more than a third of the country no longer backs the games.

Any drop in public support will worry the government which has committed hundreds of millions of pounds in officials’ time and marketing resources to promoting the games to the public.

Public support was critical to London winning the games when it topped 70% and the government will be vulnerable to charges that their stewardship of the Olympics since 2010 has seen support steadily leach away.

Among those who back the games, one of the main reasons given is the anticipated benefit for the country’s health. 26% of those who are strongly supportive of the games cite either the positive impact on promoting fitness or the benefit of the games for children as the reason for their backing.

However, the latest survey figures also reveal that participation in sport among 16-24 year olds has fallen by 4% since 2009/10. The period of decline coincides almost exactly with the arrival of David Cameron’s government in May 2010.

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INSIDE: Powell’s victory on first ballot in Manchester Central selection

17/04/2012, 03:14:57 PM

Labour Uncut understands that Lucy Powell’s victory in the race to become Labour’s parliamentary candidate for Manchester Central was won on the first ballot.

Powell topped the poll on the first round of voting with 93 votes.

Local councillor Mike Amesbury came second with 55. Fellow Manchester councillor Rosa Battle was third with 24 while London charity chief Patrick Vernon came fourth with 11.

The party’s refusal to allow postal voting was threatened by legal challenge last week, forcing party officials to relent and allow proxy voting instead.

However turnout appears to have suffered with just half the membership voting.

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UNCUT: Mothers who have babies through surrogates deserve equal rights

17/04/2012, 01:38:20 PM

by John Healey

Today I’m bringing a Ten Minute Rule Bill as a first step towards closing a legal loophole meaning mums who have babies through surrogates aren’t entitled to any maternity leave or pay.

I’m doing so on behalf of two Rotherham women who came to see me at one of my constituency advice surgeries in January.

Amy Bellamy was seven months pregnant with twins for her cousin Jane Kassim. Jane had been told at 15 she could never carry children and Amy had selflessly offered to be a surrogate.

When Amy became pregnant it was the news Jane and her husband had longed for. Implntation of Jane’s fertilised eggs had failed twice, so they were elated when the third attempt was a success. Then they found out they were expecting twin girls!

Like any other mother Jane started to prepare for the birth.

She asked her employer for maternity leave, but was stunned to find out that she had no legal right to maternity leave or pay. She had fully expected to take up to 52 weeks off and get 39 weeks’ pay, just as mothers who have their own babies or adopt are able to do.

I was also astonished to find this gap in the law when I checked the facts.

Maternity rights are to help mothers and their newly born babies through the earliest months of the child’s life, when time together is most needed.

Mums like Jane need this support just like any other new mother. They nearly always start to care for their baby full-time soon after the birth. It’s unfair and unreasonable to deny mothers whose babies are born through surrogates the rights that those giving birth themselves or adopting automatically have.

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UNCUT: What Lord Ahmed’s suspension reveals about Labour’s relationship with minorities

17/04/2012, 11:36:15 AM

by Atul Hatwal

The Lord Ahmed affair neatly encapsulates Labour’s problem with minority communities. It illustrates the dangers of a decades old neo-colonial deal that the central party has concluded with several so-called community leaders.

This isn’t just an issue for the Muslim community, a trip to Leicester, Southall or Harrow would reveal similar arrangements with the Hindu and Sikh communities.

The key to the deal is votes. This is what the community leader brings to the table.

Ahmed has long been one of Labour’s gatekeepers to the Pakistani community in the north. His position in the early 1990s as one of Labour’s leading Muslim councillors combined with his links to Mirpur in Pakistan (where the vast majority of Pakistani migrants to the northern mill towns originally came from) made him a kingmaker across northern parliamentary seats with large Pakistani communities, particularly when it came to Labour candidate selections.

He sat atop the pyramid of biraderi or clan based community politics which traditionally delivered result-swinging vote banks, happily doing the bidding of the central machine for several years.

In return for these votes, the party bestows two privileges on the community leader: establishment legitimacy that distinguishes them from other local leaders and a free hand within their community to do what they will – as long as nothing bad leaks out into the national news.

In Ahmed’s case, Tony Blair elevated him to the peerage. Lord Ahmed was the nation’s first Muslim peer. The party coddled and respected him and asked few questions about what he said or did within the community.

Until of course news of his offer of a “bounty” on President Obama’s head surfaced. Within hours of the story hitting the news, as per the deal, he was in trouble.

But the reality is that Ahmed has held and espoused similar views for several years. In this particular instance, whether he did or did not say what is claimed about Obama is irrelevant. He should have been suspended and potentially expelled because he was sharing a platform with and supporting Hafeez Saeed: an international terrorist who heads Lashkar-e-Taiba, the group which killed over 150 people in the terror attack on Mumbai.

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UNCUT: Did we get Blair and Brown in the wrong order?

16/04/2012, 02:37:34 PM

by Kevin Meagher

When it came to public services there were always two New Labours: Tony’s and Gordon’s.

In Tony’s, public services needed “reform”. This meant structural change, private sector involvement and tough performance management. Convincing his reluctant party this was necessary gave him those famous “scars on his back”.

In Gordon’s version, the paramount consideration was pumping in extra “resources”. “Prudence with a purpose” would deliver catch-up investment. The water of public finance would be liberally sprinkled over parched schools and hospitals. More would lead to better. A lot more would lead to a lot better.

Throughout their decade-long rule, these discrete emphases of the Romulus and Remus of New Labour became intertwined; two narratives wrapped around each other. Twin approaches to governing.

But what would have happened if they had developed sequentially rather than simultaneously? What if Labour had explored the limits of investment first before embarking on reform? Would we have ended up with a better sense of how to govern and an understanding of the limitations of public spending?

Conversely, we might also have recognised that reform cannot be a perpetual condition – and should be a reluctant expedient – followed by a decent period of consolidation – rather than a panacea, or even worse: a test of a minister’s modernising credentials.

Instead, reform and resources got bundled up together. We were spending money on things we were also changing at the same time. We kept pressing the buttons on the dashboard harder and faster in order to get a response. As we thudded away, we over-governed and under-evaluated.

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UNCUT: Ed’s funding proposals: Nearly but not quite

16/04/2012, 07:00:55 AM

by Peter Watt

Yesterday morning Ed Miliband used his slot on the Andrew Marr show to outline some eye-catching new proposals on funding political parties. It sounded good and it almost was, but it could end up being a disaster.

First let’s expose some myths.

The Labour party does not receive the majority of its income from the trade unions. In an average, non-general election year, income comes roughly from the following sources:

£8 million in affiliation fees from trade unions;
£7 million from the tax payer in Short money and so on;
£5 million from individual membership subscriptions.

This gives a “definite” income of about £20 million per year. In addition the Labour party gets:

£2 – 5 million in donations from individuals, companies and trade unions; and
£5 million from other things like commercial income, legacies and dinners.

This gives a potential income of £27 – £30 million per year. Clearly in the run up to an election you would expect an increase in donations. So Ed’s cap of £5000 per year will hurt. Under his proposal this will impact between £2 and £5 million per year and more in the year before an election.

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UNCUT: The Sunday review: “The Righteous Mind” by Jonathan Haidt

15/04/2012, 08:00:19 AM

by Anthony Painter

The other day a bus passed by me adorned with an ad from the campaign group, Stonewall. On a bold red background, white writing declared: “Some people are gay. Get over it.” The “get over it” was in black lettering. I thought “uh-oh, that’s dumb”.

To understand why I thought that, you need to read The Righteous Mind by Jonathan Haidt.

For many years, Haidt has deployed the tools and insights of psychology, sociology, anthropology, philosophy and economic theory to understand the nature of human morality. He essentially breaks our moral instincts down into categories: harm; fairness (which is actually about reciprocity); respect for authority; commitment to an in-group; sanctity and purity which is associated with religious and tribal ceremony; and, for this book, he has added a sixth – liberty/oppression.

Those who believe in equality for homosexuals are generally motivated by reducing harm and liberty from oppression. Cards on the table – I happen to be one of the people with this instinctive moral sense. I am closer to a left-wing (liberal in Haidt’s terms) than a conservative morality. The problem is that there are different moral senses too. Those who are adamantly against homosexuality – a minority in recent years in our society – may feel that they threaten their group which may be a church, for example, or there is something impure about homosexuality. They may also feel that legal changes to advance equality oppress their liberty to reject homosexuality.

And this is why I felt discomfort at the “get over it” message. Presumably, the objective of a campaign is to persuade. This slogan almost seemed designed to mock, belittle and entrench positions against it. It seemed likely that there would be a reaction.

On Thursday, the reaction came. A group promoting “gay cure” therapies bought ad space and mimicking the original ad, deployed the slogan: “Not gay! Ex-gay, post-gay and proud. Get over it!” The entire notion of “gay cure” is harmful and oppressive.

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GRASSROOTS: Class war? No thanks

13/04/2012, 03:54:13 PM

by Amanda Ramsay

The Labour Party should be seen as heroes not villains when it comes to the economy. Don’t let anyone tell you any differently. Having Labour leaders that understood economics with Gordon Brown and Alistair Darling at the helm, meant the global financial crisis of 2008 did not turn into a depression as might otherwise have happened.

Can you imagine U-turn Dave, multi-million pound wallpaper trust fund beneficiary George Osborne or calamity Clegg running the show then?

“We don’t live in isolation, as the crash of 2008-09 illustrates as do the riots of last year. These events highlight our mutual dependence,” Chuka Umunna, shadow business, innovation and skills secretary told a group of Labour supporters this week.

“The key is active government strategy, to create more productive capitalism, working in partnership with business. It’s incredibly important to get the policy framework right. The progressive offer should be a common sense approach and then people will vote for us.

“Not in terms of being left or right, but you’re either right or you’re wrong. Giving a tax break to 14,000 millionaires, that’s just wrong.”

In the wake of a global banking-led crisis, the backlash against wealth and privilege aimed at bonus-rich bankers and the UK’s cabinet of millionaires, is understandable.

Class war has always been a factor in British politics, but as a narrative is not the canvass with which to paint our policies to win us government again. The politics of fairness and efficiency is where Labour will win.

With such a huge middle class in this country, traditional working class and also large non-working class on benefits or with caring responsibilities or disabilities, the politics of class is a minefield in its complexity and as divisive as the politics of elitism or envy.

Who gets up in the morning thinking about class?

The issues that matter most to voters are anti-social behaviour, the economy and jobs. The issues that come up time and time again on the doorstep in Bristol South, even in areas that are seemingly peaceful and quiet residential areas. Our policies need to clearly demonstrate that our solutions are interlinked.

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UNCUT: Livingstone’s scripted tears

13/04/2012, 08:00:54 AM

by Atul Hatwal

16/04/12 10.30 Update: Fair’s fair: it looks like the party press officer who told the Guardian that the PEB used actors, was wrong. We know that some weren’t and the Guardian piece was at least partially incorrect.

So the record needs to be set straight for this article. It looks likely that the people featured in the PEB weren’t professional actors, they were supporters. It is certainly the case that no-one has contradicted the Livingstone team’s contention that they were supporters.

But whether these were actors or carefully selected supporters, the central point of the piece remains the same: to cry in response to a video montage of your own supporters, reading your script , about how much they want you to be mayor, that you have already seen, is more Pyongyang than London.

13/04/12 10:51 Update: Well, there’s been quite the flap following this piece. The Livingstone campaign are resolutely denying that any of the people in the PEB are actors. This is the relevant section from the Guardian on which the article is based:

On Wednesday Ken Livingstone revealed his emotional side, sniffling at a launch of his new party political broadcast. “The people you saw on the screen represent hundreds of thousands of Londoners who desperately want a mayor who is going to make their life easier in this city,” Ken said, as Ed Miliband patted him on the back. For sure, the broadcast is slicker than anything his team has previously produced; it features a boxer, a groundsman, one posh woman and an extremely cute baby. But who exactly are they? The Labour party confessed yesterday that the Londoners are all actors – but actors who support Ken. Of the crying, it said: “It was very genuine. It really was.”

Clearly there has been some form of breakdown in communication between the Livingstone campaign and the Labour party press office. The issue at the heart of this article is authenticity. The key question is: were the people in the PEB were scripted?

If their words were drafted by the campaign team then it is disingenuous to claim these are the authentic responses of ordinary Londoners that prompted a heartfelt reaction from Livingstone. If their words were their own, then patently that is more powerful.

At the moment it looks like team Ken are saying that people were scripted. We will update as we receive more information.

***

Another week, another new depth plumbed in the mayoral campaign.

In yesterday’s Guardian diary, there was a little snippet about Labour’s latest party election broadcast (PEB).

For those who haven’t seen it, the PEB is very effective. Engaging and well-paced, above all it shows rather than tells. It features Londoners speaking about their issues, directly into camera, edited tightly together. The climax at the end where they each ask Ken to win for them carries some real emotional weight.

I’m no fan of Labour’s candidate but even I was impressed.

Until, that is, I read the Guardian diary. This told me that the plaintive and persuasive Londoners were in fact all actors. Not a boxer, a mother, a groundsman or a businessman. Just actors, hired to do a job. “Labour supporting actors” is how the party press office described them, as if this somehow helped.

This mini-revelation robs the PEB of its authenticity. It remains a very good piece of political communication, but watching the broadcast again, knowing that these folk were shipped in from London’s version of central casting, drains the emotion out of the piece.

Oh well. “Disappointing” was my take. And then I thought, “hang on.”

Most people will have seen this photo of Ken Livingstone, overcome by emotion, crying at the screening of his election broadcast.

At the time the explanation given to reporters was that Ken was moved by the genuine words of Londoners and the responsibility he felt to win the election for them.

Stirring stuff. Shame it was rubbish.

The actual situation in the room was this: Livingstone was crying after watching a series of actors that had been carefully selected by his team, read out lines that his writers had penned, in a style directed by his staff. He knew that these were not typical Londoners. He knew that this was his script.

But still the tears flowed.

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