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The War of the Roses

Apr 19

Posted by Natalie in Elections, Holyrood, Parties, Westminster | 3 Comments

hearts 2In 1999 I wrote a dissertation for my CSYS Modern Studies entitled: The Autonomy of The Scottish Labour Party. In conclusion, I realised that “or lack thereof” should have been included in the title.

It was, perhaps, the best thing I have ever written. It was certainly one of the best researched pieces I have ever produced. I spoke to both Dennis Canavan and the late, much missed, Alex Falconer MEP for some background.

They had, by 1999, both fallen foul of the Labour machine constructed and peopled by those acceptable to the UK leadership. Traditional Labour elected representatives, Alex and Dennis did not fit the mould of the shiny New Labour brand, and they resisted pressures to adapt. Alex Falconer was on the cusp of retirement, but Dennis Canavan had a point to prove, and a constituency which reacted to protect its own; electing him with an overwhelming majority as an independent. It was an early indication that traditional Labour would bite back. They may be sedated and lie dormant, but somewhere they are concealed.

I did invite opportunity for the establishment to contribute – on more than one occasion and through more than one media – but the then General Secretary Alex Rowley didn’t pay me the courtesy of a response.

What was apparent then, and is apposite now, is that there is a fight for control of the heart of the Labour Party. That fight is currently being waged on two fronts; in Westminster and in Holyrood for the heart of the Scottish Party and for the heart of the party as a whole.

This isn’t a new fight. The change of focus and ownership of the party started over twenty years ago. The Labour Party does not lose elections well. When it loses the party goes in to decline and becomes absorbed in a vacuum of policy ideas and ineffective introspection. History is strewn with examples of the folly of the Labour Party in the years following loss of power. They take a long time to regroup.

That Thatcherism prevailed almost unscathed during the Blair years is testament to how far the party had moved from its traditional stomping grounds on the left in order to appease and appeal to the moderate voters of middle England. That there is current debate about reform of the welfare state and the pernicious changes which the Tories have enacted and the Labour Party have no concrete alternative policy ideas shows just how unprepared for the next general election they are and how much traditional ideology has been sacrificed for electoral success.

Democracy demands strong opposition. It demands effective opposition. What we have at Holyrood and at Westminster is neither of those things. The Labour Party in opposition are devoid of ideas, bound up in useless rhetoric, and seemingly incapable of presenting an alternative ideology. Their opposition is a magic box of illusion, fairly transparent and centred on illuminating what the Scottish and UK Governments are doing wrong but without the honesty of giving the public something else to aspire to. In essence, practising opposition for opposition sake. The Labour Party is the biggest opposition in both parliaments, and they mirror each other exactly for lack of foresight and substance.

There are some great representatives within the amassed Labour ranks – some of the work Kezia Dugdale is doing on legal loan sharks for example proves this – but there are some there, it seems, merely to keep a seat warm without contributing much to debate or in helping to provide credible discourse.

Success is both a prize and a curse. Success breeds careerists like rabbits, allegedly. I don’t know much about rabbit reproduction but I know a boom in careerists when I see one, and the Labour Party have had plenty of them, and now, so have the SNP. Careerists, career politicians – or whatever you wish to call them – are not good for the heart of a party. Every party draws them when it looks like they’re about to get out of opposition. Careerists are not representative of any particular ideology but of Thatcherite self –aspiration. Talk to them and they could pretty much represent any political party which was successful.

Career politicians are – usually – university educated and go straight to work for political parties without any life experience. They are not particularly active at grassroots level, but have their eyes on the shiny prize of election to parliament. Not for them the traditional route through the ranks. We all know who these people are.

The Blair years attracted many careerists. Even the brothers Miliband don’t have sufficient real life experience to bring to the fore, and it shows. The amassed ranks of both the Labour Party and the Conservatives are packed with people who were selected through patronage and the Labour Party’s current ennui is evidence of the damage they cause. Traditional routes to government have been eroded and the forums for building real, effective policy removed. The policy vacuum is mirrored by their vacuum of real life experience.

Ed Miliband doesn’t have the support of the Labour Party. He was elected by the unions possibly hoping for a partial restatement of some Labour values eroded during the Blair years. However, I’d warrant that even they won’t be delighted with his lacklustre performance and inability to frame the debate within a Labour prism.

The parliamentary Labour Party and the membership did not vote for Ed, and that makes his hold on the leadership shaky. Furthermore, it doesn’t bode well for the regard they hold him in and if he doesn’t have this, he doesn’t have their respect.

The seams are creaking on Ed’s leadership. Even Tony Blair has taken time out from saving the Western world to stick the boot in. The leadership election and the previous Blair/Brown tensions have left carcasses and grudges strewn throughout the Labour Party. It remains to be seen if Ed can find the mettle to really unite them. Basing an opinion on current murmurs which are increasing in crescendo, I’d moot the answer is no. Ed Miliband will not win a general election for the Labour Party.

In the UK the Labour Party are ahead in the polls, but we have seen them lose a 20 lead to the Tories previously as an election looms and people concentrate on the issues at hand. Tories = Bad is not going to stack up as a manifesto. Iain Gray tried SNP = Bad at Holyrood in 2011, and look where that got him? From 2007-2011 the Scottish Labour Party completely failed to conjure their own narrative and in 2011 they were soundly punished for it. They were riding high at over 10 points in the opinion polls less than six months before the election too. Ed Miliband should take note.

And what of Scotland? I’d doubt even the staunchest Labour Party stalwart would express – privately – that they think Johann is doing a sterling job. They may like her, and think her capable, but she is not currently demonstrating that competence. She walks a very difficult line and her problems are compounded because she doesn’t appear to have the support of Labour MPs who seem very surly toward her having supremacy over them and over Scottish Labour policy. I have no idea if persistent rumours which abound about MPs not attending the Scottish Labour conference this weekend are true, but I would warrant there is no smoke without fire.

It seems that the attempt to really establish a policy making Scottish Labour Party – missing at the time of writing my dissertation – is not without its own detractors. SNP support in the polls is quite enough for Johann to be worried about, but the addition of low level, but constant and destabilising, sniping from Westminster can’t be helping.

Dennis Canavan was unusual in 1999 that – beast of a figure at Westminster he was – he wanted to represent his constituency Scottish Parliament. Who can forget the “pretendy wee parliament” and “parish council” remarks about the Scottish Parliament? It seems some of the Labour MPs haven’t changed their mind. Westminster is where they perceive the talent and power to be.

After 2011 there was much introspection and a leadership contest in Scotland. There was much harrumphing about getting back to basics, but where are the new policies which were meant to be developed as a result? All too often Johann Lamont announces the creation of new groups to consider new areas of policy, but where are the fruits of this?

The hastily constructed proposals yesterday on a Devo Plus model were rushed, and it showed. They were not the considered plans which the public have the right to expect. If you are going to announce new policy, plans, proposals or consultations, they should be able to stand up to rigorous scrutiny, not fall foul of less than 6 hours half-hearted considerations.

Until Johann Lamont can capture the heart of the Scottish party, she is not going to recapture any ground from the SNP. It has been almost two years since the 2011 elections. It must terrify proud Labour members that the leadership are failing to articulate any new ideas.

The Labour Party won’t be a credible force in either Scotland or the UK until they abandon opposition for the sake of opposition, quash their detractors and develop alternative policy. And Ed and Johann should never forget that no leader is indispensible; look at Margaret Thatcher.

Shetland phoney.

Apr 6

Posted by Dom in Constitution, Democracy, Equality, Governance, Holyrood, International, Parties | 1 Comment

If Tavish Scott is serious about Shetland’s Scandinavian heritage, he would do well to consider the advantages of an independent Holyrood.

Tavish Scott is a sort of self-styled Lord of the Isles. As a constituency MSP Shetland is most definitely his, and he seems to have a habit of seeing himself as its de facto president. He also loves going on about the islands’ Scandinavian heritage whenever distancing himself from any whiff of nationalism. Shetland needn’t be independent with Scotland because it has as much to do with Norway as it does with Edinburgh, he claims.

And fair enough perhaps . I was wandering around Scalloway this week and took a look at their shiny museum, opened by Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg last year. Likewise, Lerwick’s magnificent new arts centre would not be out of place on a quayside on the other side of the North Sea. You can sit on the beach and tune in to Norwegian local radio, and Lerwick is the only place in the British Isles to have tourist signage in Faeroese.

But it has even less to do with London than with Edinburgh. Tavish wants Shetland to assert its northerness, but not for Scotland to do so.  Now Scotland will never be a Scandinavian country, just as Shetland will never be entirely Scottish perhaps, but they both share a pervasive Northernness.

But does Tavish speak for Shetland, and if Shetland is serious about some sort of political autonomy, would it really want to be reduced to a Westminster territory? There is a phrase loved by certain Scottish liberals, home rule, which will always be inextricably linked to the establishment of the Irish state, and which is also about the last time liberalism was the hottest ticket in the burgh. Tavish can beat his drum, but considering that less than half of the electorate voted for him, his claims to be the voice of the islands are somewhat tenuous.

To quote a respected colleague, “The SNP are centralising f***ers.”.  There is a serious case to be made for Shetland, Orkney and the Western Isles to be given far greater powers over their day to day existence. The council tax freeze which both of the big parties signed up to is an assault on the ability of communities to take charge of their own futures. What works well in Livingston or Ayr will not necessarily be right for Harris and Lewis.

If Tavish wants to have a genuine conversation about appropriate powers, local devolution and Scandinavianism, he should probably pick up the phone and give Patrick Harvie a call.

Men for independence

Mar 25

Posted by James in Elections, Equality, Europe, Parties | 25 Comments

KILTSThe SNP’s six-man shortlist for the European elections was announced at the weekend. Sorry, not quite: five-man and one-woman. In 2009, the last time the SNP selected for Europe, they managed exactly the same poor gender ratio. In 2004 they selected eight candidates, of whom only the seventh was a woman. In that election Janet Law would have been elected only if the SNP had won every single MEP slot going.

Their list for 1999 was somewhat better, with three women out of eight, although again none were in a winnable position. You have to go back almost twenty years to the pre-PR days of 1994 to find the last time an SNP woman was elected to the European Parliament: the indomitable Winnie Ewing, of course.

There’s been plenty of chatter about the gender gap on the referendum, and rightly so. Yesterday’s figures showed 47% of men in favour of independence compared to just 25% of women. What with the European elections coming just a few months before that vote (which is therefore inevitably being seen already as a mock referendum rather than the election of mere MEPs), you might have assumed the SNP would have taken this opportunity to select a decent gender-balanced list.

There’s still a second stage to go, of course. Predictions of Alyn Smith’s deselection following the NATO debacle might yet effectively come true. Questions might be asked about Hudghton’s total absence of public profile. It’s possible that the one woman on the list, Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh, will come out ahead of those two sitting MEPs, but I wouldn’t bet on it.

Even if she does, it’s no good for the sexist old guard in any party to claim they just select on merit when over and over again they keep picking more men than women. After four selections in a row, it’s not possible to claim that’s a coincidence, especially when more than 70% of the MSPs the SNP elected in 2011 were also blokes. The SNP do in fact have a lot of first-class women, both activists and those already elected, and more of them should have got the nod here, through a formal gender balance mechanism if necessary. It can be done.

Why do I care? First, I want to live in a society where the best people are selected and elected, not one where being a bloke comes with a massive advantage – and yes, I know there are other inequalities to consider too. Second, until the referendum’s won or lost, that vote is the prism through which almost all of Scottish politics is examined, and I want a win. How the SNP behave is inextricably and unfortunately tied to public perceptions of independence itself, and results like this make it look like a future Scotland will be a business-as-usual boys’ club.

Declaration of interest: Natalie McGarry, of this parish, was one of the women not to make the cut, which I think is unfortunate. This post was all my own idea, and I have shown her it once complete only for any factual corrections.

The Byrne Legacy: the messy reality of the workfare vote

Mar 20

Posted by Guest Blog in Parties, Westminster | 50 Comments

A wee guest this morning from Duncan Hothersall on the Westminster workfare vote. Duncan’s a Labour member who (he says) talks too much on Twitter. He used to be big in LGBT rights, now he dabbles in broader politics. He helps to run Scottish Fabians, a left-leaning members-led think tank, blogs less often than he’d like to for various sites including Labour Hame and Bella Caledonia, and eschews the description “unionist” despite favouring Scotland remaining within the UK. In real life he works in online education.

Liam ByrneYesterday evening the bulk of the Parliamentary Labour Party in Westminster followed instructions and abstained on a vote about the government’s widely disliked workfare scheme. Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary Liam Byrne is not a popular figure on the left – or even in the centre – and if anything the list of rebels who voted against was smaller than might be expected.

After all, it is not hard to understand the principle that work without pay is immoral, anathema to Labour values, and Labour should oppose it at all costs.

And indeed the wailing and gnashing of teeth has been loud and long, and Byrne is probably only spared a more vicious bout of in-fighting by virtue of the fact that the budget will take over the headlines tomorrow.

But why would Labour fail to oppose workfare? Why would we abstain on a measure which is clearly an undermining of the fundamental right to fair pay? The answer, it seems to me, is that this vote was not about workfare or the right to fair pay. It was, as real life often is, far more complex, and messy, than a choice between right and wrong.

First of all, we need to remember that last month’s judgement by the Court of Appeal did not rule workfare to be forced labour, for all the rejoicing at the outcome. In fact the court ruled substantially in the government’s favour, only failing them on how they described the schemes in regulations. So far from welcoming this judgement, we should have been regretting it, because all the government needed to do was change the regulations – which they did the very same day – and then work out how to avoid repaying docked benefits, which was always going to be relatively easy for a government with a working majority.

And that solution – not workfare as a whole, not the principle of withholding benefits, just the issue of avoiding repaying previously docked benefits – was the subject of yesterday evening’s vote. So Labour did not abstain from a yes/no vote on workfare after all. Workfare is already in place, and the result of the vote would not have changed that.

Byrne has been criticised most vocally for asserting that Labour agrees with the principle that the DWP should have the power to impose sanctions. This has been painted as a shift to Tory ground. But in reality, Labour’s flagship programmes of recent decades – including the widely praised New Deal – had sanction provisions. This is no change in Labour policy, and those making hay out of it now must surely know that.

Messiest of all, Byrne believed he could, in return for abstention, secure concessions from IDS which flat-out opposition would not achieve. Among them, he sought a guarantee that wrongly sanctioned JSA claimants could still appeal that decision. And he asked for an independent review of the sanctions regime, to report to parliament quickly. Most significantly, he called for a Real Jobs Guarantee for young people, involving a paid job for six months, rather than unpaid workfare. It remains to be seen whether these concessions have been achieved, but they are surely worthy aims.

There is no question that yesterday evening’s vote didn’t look good, and those who want to will be able to make trouble within the party over it. And Liam Byrne may quite reasonably be unpopular for past choices. But if we are to debate the rights and wrongs, let us at least do so with reason. This was not a vote in favour of unpaid workfare; it was abstention on an issue the government would win anyway, in order to try to achieve a slightly better outcome for those affected.

That’s not a great soundbite, is it. But aren’t we always saying how much we hate soundbite politics? Here is politics in the raw. It’s an ugly thing and people get hurt by it. Let’s make sure we argue it honestly, and place the blame correctly.

Political parties must trust voters

Mar 17

Posted by Andrew Page in Parties, Society | 3 Comments

Whenever a political party finds itself in a self-created crisis, the common diagnosis is that its ills are a product of the public losing trust in that party. This is true of the Conservatives in the 1990s, of Blair’s Labour Party in the aftermath of the Iraq invasion and the Scottish Liberal Democrats following their electoral annihilation in 2011.

The notion that parties suffer as a direct result of public losing trust in them is a compelling one, not least because it contains a great deal of truth. But such an analysis is a superficial one that observes the symptom rather than the cause.

The loss of faith in political parties – and in politics itself – is simply a by-product of politicians losing faith in the people they represent. Party structures are often archaic, products of old ways of thinking, inward-looking and relating only to an ever-decreasing number of party faithful and untrusting of public opinion. If that is what political parties remain, then it is little wonder that people will lose faith in what they offer.

When parties become disconnected with voters, it is because the vital conversations are not happening. And they don’t happen because, whether they realise it or not, parties don’t trust the public. Only last weekend, Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg suggested that even the party membership could not possibly understand something as complex as the Justice and Security Bill. This condescending attitude, the assumption that mere voters can elect a government but cannot be trusted to grasp policy detail, is not an uncommon one. It is evident in Clegg’s dogged defence of coalition, George Osborne’s obstinacy in sticking to economic plans that are evidently not working, Jeremy Hunt’s patronising and frankly insulting assertion that NHS reforms are being carried out in the public interest, and (until 2011) in a misguided refusal to allow Scots the opportunity to vote in an independence referendum. This is a far from exhaustive list of examples.

When politicians don’t trust the public, they become defensive. Very defensive. It’s not an attractive trait in someone elected to serve the public. Generally, it does little to win votes. Clegg’s refusal to do anything in response to the public verdict on his party reflected in recent elections – other than to “take it on the chin” and stubbornly carry on – is further evidence of an unwillingness to listen to and trust the voters’ expressed views, and again does very little to aid his or the party’s appeal.

Political parties must learn to trust, in order to be trusted. How does this happen? Any political party aspiring to future success needs to think beyond innovative campaigning methods, however useful new approaches to political evangelism might be. Instead, parties need to root themselves in people’s experience, move beyond the tribal political landscape to engage and listen, become a focal point for a vibrant, open, national conversation and be able to bring people together to argue, collaborate and negotiate.

Party politics is closed for many. There is very little public participation. But as the voluntary sector and pressure organisations such as 38 Degrees and Unlock Democracy have shown, this isn’t for lack of interest. What these organisations recognise is the centrality of relationship to conversation. Political parties, on the other hand, are too focused on delivery. Clegg is particular is keen to play up the role his party have played in “delivering” on various fronts. All that matters for him is that something measurable occurs which can be claimed as an achievement. That, however, is not how the public works. They care little for management speak. Instead they prefer approaches that suggest compassion, understanding and empathy. The managerial language itself is a product of a misguided attempt to convince those that don’t trust to do so, without ever showing a willingness to trust what the public are saying.

As a growing number of popular causes demonstrate, the public are not shy about expressing their concerns, fears, aspirations and hopes. This is changing our politics, but perversely many of the newly politicised don’t see conventional party politics as their natural home. The reaction of parties to such groups, especially single issue campaigns, is often one of suspicion – thus reinforcing the mutual inability to trust.

Top-down approaches and obsession with “delivery” is born out of an inability to trust and in turn breeds distrust. This is the politics of the past. Not only do parties have to start trusting people, but those people have to feel this to be true.

The instinct to direct, control and lead the conversation speaks of a mindset that cannot trust voters; an imperial mindset that, even in the 21st century, believes that a disconnected cabal knows best. The desire to control and command does not lend itself to trust others, or indeed to being trusted. Neither do such inclinations do much for furthering positive relationships, whose centrality and importance to fulfilled living is self-evident. A political party that trusts the public will not only listen but be receptive. It will seek to empower rather than control. Its identity will stem from experience of engaging with voters, rather than vice versa. It will promote relationship above delivery; working with people rather than for them. Such relationships will inevitably be challenging but they will also be supportive.

In the 1980s, the SDP realised this. The SDP trusted people, perhaps insufficiently – but they were quick to style themselves as an alternative to the politics based on mistrust of “ordinary” people. The SDP failed to break the allegorical mould either electorally or culturally, but a new approach was pioneered: trusting people to stand up for their own interests. Perhaps the sad demise of the SDP is one reason why trusting voters didn’t catch on – it seemed there was little electoral advantage to be gained from it.

The SDP (and, for that matter, their Alliance partners) knew that voters respond more positively to discussion about the kind of society we want to create rather than precise policy details and programmes for government. They dared to suggest that people were more important than manifestos and political institutions – something also identified by Alex Salmond’s SNP who were elected to majority government in 2011 in spite of, rather than because of, their key political objective.

Why should politicians trust voters? Firstly, because they need to abandon the false belief that it is politicians, and political parties, that wield power. This notion is faintly ridiculous today, not least in the aftermath of a global recession. Secondly, when today’s political parties all have a problem with diversity and rapidly shrinking memberships, trusting voters and daring to engage positively with them will bring much needed vitality and freshness into the political sphere. And thirdly, because if parties refuse to change they will inevitably die.

Labour mistakenly placed its trust in PR consultants, managers and professional politicians. For all the talk of “the Big Society”, the Conservatives show insufficient willingness to do things very differently. The Liberal Democrats are focused on “delivery”, lacking the insight to recognise that the attitudes at the heart of this emphasis are entirely at odds with their claimed ethos of empowering society. The SNP is no stranger to centralising instincts and its victory in 2011, while admittedly the product of voters trusting the First Minister more than his Labour counterpart, was the result of a brilliant campaign to achieve an immediate need rather than an indication of longer-term change of political culture.

A parent or teacher hopes that they can, via their efforts, help a child to fulfil his or her potential. They place trust in the child. It is through such relationships that the child in turn learns to trust. This is a simple metaphor but it applies to modern politics. A politics that is above this reality of human relationship and interaction does not deserve to survive. As the desire for love is everywhere, so is that for democracy – even those cynical about politics support democracy. That democracy must be deepened rather than demeaned, expanded rather than diminished as people are enabled to positively impact the world in which they live.

That is the reality, and it is one central to party development. People treated as strangers and outsiders are not trusted, and thus it is no surprise when they don’t trust in return. Learning to trust could be either the key to a revival in electoral fortunes or for securing future success. But electoral good fortune cannot be an end in itself. Trevor Jones once told Liberal Assembly “I love those votes!” but times have moved on and we must be more focused than ever on the voter rather than the vote. Real pluralism demands quality conversation between political parties and the public – with support groups, charities, trade unions, service users and non-partisan political groups.

Political conversation in recent decades has essentially been a matter of politicians presenting their pre-conceived schemes to the public and asking for their approval. That arrangement is no longer fit for purpose. Our political parties must learn to lead democratic conversations, trusting the public to do what politicians themselves do: talk, debate, argue, negotiate, find solutions, work together, look forward, consider options and make plans.

Trusting is never easy but, if our democracy is not only to survive but be strengthened and revitalised, it is essential. Who is up to the challenge?