by Peter Watt
There has been a lot of discussion in the Labour party recently about the narrow pool from which the current parliamentary Labour party (PLP) is drawn. Basically the concern is that there are too many white middle class graduates who don’t represent the community as a whole.
So this month we have seen Chuka Umunna launch a Future Candidates Programme aimed at encouraging more business figures to stand for the Labour Party. As the shadow business secretary said:
“Our party – all parties in fact – must reflect what Britain looks like and the jobs which people do. Not only do we want more people setting up businesses, leading businesses and working in businesses, we want more people from the world of business in our ranks – from our councillors to our MPs.”
And then this week Dennis MacShane has expressed concern about the paucity of working class MPs. He has suggested “all working class shortlists” for some parliamentary selections. The idea being that we could use quotas to increase the numbers of non-middle class candidates and ultimately MPs.
Dennis proposes that 10% of parliamentary selections should be reserved for people on the minimum wage so that the pool from which our politicians are drawn stops being so narrow. As Dennis said:
“The country desperately needs new political ideas, but the intellectual reservoir from which we draw our political leaders has become a paddling pool, when what we actually need is a raging torrent to get the country going again,”
The Labour party already has a long and honourable tradition of using quotas to increase the representation of women MP’s and indeed councillors. At regular intervals there is also discussion of using quotas to increase the representation of other underrepresented groups and in particular minority ethnic candidates.
But I think that all of these initiatives increasingly start from the wrong diagnosis of the problem. The diagnosis is that the Labour party, or any of its rivals, are basically sound.
That as presently constructed, political parties are the best way to achieve social justice and progress and that once people realise this then they will want to be a part of it.
Yes, there are some institutional biases that influence selections; but overcome these by some form of positive action and all is well.
I no longer think that this is right.
