Posts Tagged ‘Labour’s manifesto uncut’

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The price of credibility for the Left is accepting welfare and immigration are real concerns

18/10/2013, 03:34:18 PM

by Kevin Meagher

One of the more depressing aspects of the Labour’s 2010 general election campaign was the party’s pledge to bring in an “Australian points-based system” to curb illegal immigration.

This was the party’s “line-to-take” on the doorstep – a subterfuge to be deployed when asked what Labour would do to as a fig-leaf for actually having a working immigration policy in the first place.

It was, of course, disingenuous tosh. Having presided over a decade of mass immigration, with net three million migrants coming to live here during the noughties, the real, unspun view of most people on the left is pretty clear: immigration simply doesn’t matter.

Worse, it’s a solely a hobby-horse of the angry and ignorant. It’s a view that was perfectly encapsulated in Gordon Brown’s unguarded dismissal of Rochdale pensioner Gillian Duffy as “that bigoted woman” when she posed an entirely reasonable question to him about the effects of high levels of migration during that same election campaign. One, if we remember, Labour didn’t win.

Others on the left believe people like Mrs. Duffy, and the million like her, are victims of black propaganda peddled by the Tory press. Strip away the right-wing “scaremongering” about immigration reveals there to be no problem whatsoever. Instantly, the first-person experiences of those at the sharp end of competing with newcomers for jobs and houses are rendered invalid. They’ve simply got it wrong. Unless they really are bigots, of course.

And yet the public doesn’t see it that way. Poll after poll tells us that the British public are concerned about the stresses mass immigration it can have on jobs, public services and community relations.

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With Labour’s lead narrowing, the next election is now too close to call

16/10/2013, 07:00:02 AM

by Rob Marchant

Setting aside for the moment the fact that the Westminster lobby seems to be yet to clock the political turmoil in store for Labour over the next six months as it approaches its special conference, there is another issue to which Labour must pay attention if it is serious about winning: its polling.

As we start to edge towards the home strait of the electoral cycle, new polling tells us some interesting things.

The conventional wisdom has become, owing to its consistent poll lead since early 2012, that “Labour is on course to win”. Meaning that, even if it means winning as part of a coalition, it would be hard for it to lose the election from here.

This is rather dangerous thinking, for two reasons.

The first is that it overlooks a statistical fallacy, in extrapolating a poll lead in a hypothetical election tomorrow directly out to an equal poll lead in eighteen months’ time. A lead now is patently not the same as a lead then.

If you ask someone the question “if there were an election tomorrow, who would you vote for”, this is not the same as calculating the expected value of their future answer in 2015, for the simple reason that there is not an election tomorrow, nor will there be, barring the “political lightning” of an unexpected no-confidence vote.

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Despite his advances, Ed still has women problems

08/10/2013, 10:44:09 AM

by Kevin Meagher

Ed MIliband’s changes to the shadow cabinet yesterday have increased the number of women sitting at Labour’s top table to 44 per cent. Yet despite this symbolism, Labour’s support among ordinary women voters’ now lags behind men on a range of key political and economic issues.

Exclusive polling by YouGov for Labour Uncut reveals that while many women are unhappy with the coalition, they remain consistently less enthused than male voters that Labour has a coherent alternative.

While 31 per cent of men think a Labour government led by Ed Miliband will create ‘more jobs and reduce unemployment’, just 26 per cent of women feel the same.

Asked which party is best able to build more homes, 29 per cent of men say Labour but only 24 per cent of women.

Questioned about who will deliver ‘high standards of health in NHS hospitals’, 33 per cent of men support Labour, while only 27 per cent of women back the party’s approach, with 38 per cent of women saying neither Labour or the Tories.

While the Tories retain a large lead over Labour when it comes to ensuring ‘less crime’, the figures for women voters are stark, with 29 per cent backing the Tories and Labour left trailing on just 13 per cent.

And despite the party’s toughening stance on immigration, Labour remains behind the Tories on which party will deliver ‘the right level of immigration’ by a similarly large margin, with women voters choosing Cameron over Miliband by 23 per cent to 12 per cent.

The figures will come as a disappointment to Labour given the consistent efforts of the frontbench in articulating how the cost of living crisis is hurting families and spending cuts are particularly harshly felt by women.

The poll was commissioned for Labour Uncut to coincide with the publication of our new book ‘Labour’s manifesto uncut: How to win in 2015 and why’ which explores what the party needs to do to win the next general election and govern effectively afterwards.

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There is a simple Tory response on energy prices and Labour needs to beware

30/09/2013, 09:42:23 AM

by Jonathan Todd

Ed Miliband provided answers to some questions posed by Uncut in the book we launched at Labour conference. Less so, others.

We asked where the money will come from. He committed to 200,000 extra homes a year without – unlike David Talbot’s chapter in our book – making clear from where the extra public resources needed to deliver this will come.

Miliband did tell us where the money for his promised energy price freeze will come from, the companies themselves. It is an imponderable whether this will result in reduced profits for them or diminishment in the green investment that Miliband treasures.

It is clear, however, that without the costs of this investment, there would be greater scope for lower household bills. Whether this investment will sufficiently dampen the impacts of climate change to justify its hefty cost is another imponderable.

The incoming prime minister of Australia is among those who doubt it. The prime minister of this country will have noted this and knows that reducing the green push will increase the scope to minimise household bills before May 2015. If Cameron were to take this option, the energy firms will align with Cameron, as both leaders would be telling them to reduce prices but only one would be enabling them to reduce costs – assuming Miliband remains faithfully green.

The public may see their bills fall before 2015 – a record of delivery for Cameron, potentially to sit alongside a steadily improving economy. Rather than return him to office, the public would be asked to vote for a freeze in energy prices by a Labour party likely to be enamoured by the green lobby but less so by business, at least big business.

Miliband needs to get on the front foot about the assistance he has offered to small businesses, while considering exactly how wedded he is to imposing green costs on energy firms. Unless these small businesses become Labour advocates, the party risks being painted as anti-business. Without some flexibility on green costs, Miliband may risk Cameron achieving more on lower energy prices before he is even in a position to implement his freeze.

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Labour’s manifesto uncut: How to win in 2015 and why

26/09/2013, 01:50:49 PM

Launched at Labour party conference 2013, Labour Uncut’s first book, “Labour’s manifesto uncut: How to win in 2015 and why” maps out a centrist view of what the party’s electoral offer could be at the next election.

It directly answers the question of how to fund a radical Labour alternative in a time of austerity with a suite of fully costed policies that would redraw the current political dividing lines and reduce peoples’ cost of living.

The whole of this book is greater than the sum of its parts. Individually, each chapter tactically addresses a discrete area for action. Together, they paint a picture of how Labour can win the next election and change Britain for the better.

And now the book is available online.

Click here to read or download.

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Today the Tories are happy. That’s all you need to know about Ed’s speech.

25/09/2013, 12:08:40 PM

by Atul Hatwal

And so it begins. Last night’s doubts about the leader’s speech, widely expressed in the bars and receptions of Labour conference, are crystallising into a genuine fear on what happens next for Labour. The newspaper headlines were appalling, the party is on the defensive and the Tories are jubilant.

In his address to Labour party conference, Ed Miliband answered the widespread pleas for policy substance with two eye catching announcements – a two year price freeze on energy prices from 2015 and a target to build 200,000 homes. Both were well received in the hall, but are unravelling at an alarming pace.

The urge to act in a clear and unequivocal way on energy prices is understandable. It hardly bears repetition that soaring energy bills are an enormous problem for households. But at the moment the public don’t believe that either the Tories or Labour will do anything to help.

Polling conducted for Labour Uncut by YouGov shows that voters narrowly place greater trust in Ed Miliband and Labour over David Cameron and the Tories, to keep gas and electricity prices down, by 21% to 15%. However, the majority – 51% – trust neither to help with these bills.

In this context, a firm pledge to freeze prices will likely persuade sceptical voters that Labour will take effective action.

But, it is a big step to impose price controls even for a limited period. Such a move is redolent of the prices policies of the 1970s Labour government and has sparked another argument with business.

The public might be supportive of a price freeze that punishes unpopular energy companies, yet equally wary of a party that is happy to intervene so heavily in the market and fearful of the threats of blackouts.

In the 2005 election, the Tories found that although voters liked their punitive rhetoric on immigration, it validated Labour’s broader charges that the Tories were a hard-right party who would merrily privatise the NHS and cut benefits for pensioners.

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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

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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.

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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 8th May 2015.

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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…)

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