Originally published @ 12:41 am, Thu 9th Jun 2011
The Guardian is reporting the initial findings of a Labour Party consultation as -
“a sense that people have responsibilities as well as rights. .... In addition they want to cut crime and anti-social behaviour, reform welfare, reduce immigration – this is tied to a sense of fairness at work and protecting wages as well as to the issue of benefits."
And this is - according to the Guardian – a right-wing agenda. Yep, from the newspaper that said vote for Nick Clegg, when it should have been obvious that he’d gone Orange. http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/jun/08/voters-tough-agenda-ed-miliband?INTCMP=SRCH
Well at least the consultation appears to have picked up what we found on the doorsteps, including – being "anti-politician – closely related to the issue of MPs expenses".
Now then, a reminder of what Labour’s values – as constitutionally agreed – say -
The Labour Party is a democratic socialist party. It believes that by the strength of our common endeavour we achieve more than we achieve alone, so as to create for each of us the means to realise our true potential and for all of us a community in which power, wealth and opportunity are in the hands of the many, not the few, where the rights we enjoy reflect the duties we owe, and where we live together, freely, in a spirit of solidarity, tolerance and respect.
Is it really beyond our wits to address the public’s concerns and fashion meeting them into a programme for Britain in the 21st century that comes from our values?
Will Hutton has written an article suggesting it’s not enough for Labour to say what it is against. http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/may/29/will-hutton-labour-needs-rebranding
To which you might argue – well it worked for the Conservatives.
In 2010, they said that a lot of things had gone wrong and that they didn’t like Gordon Brown. Every new Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire Tory MP cited these as the reasons why they won.
They certainly didn’t say what they were for.
Cameron said they would not be flint-faced turbo-charged accountants slashing at public expenditure.
Will Hutton points out the economic mess we are set to endure still. To which you’d say – keep on saying you’re against it.
But the article taps on the notion that Labour is not doing well enough. Last week’s polls has Labour back at leads of 5, 6 and 7 points, despite the visit of Barack Obama, for which only Cameron was allowed to escort him on “moving pictures”.
It seemed as though the Obama visit to London was going to be a PR event whereby he got good pictures for his forthcoming re-election campaign and David Cameron would try to pick up some of his stardust.
Interesting them to see some of the write-ups that emphasised that that Obama was giving clear signals that his views differed from Cameron – most particularly on his celebration of Gordon Brown’s actions to tackle the recession.
Sure, there are free-marketeers around to paint a different picture. Ruth Lea says how good Britain was under Thatcher cos they were trying to get us to be more like the Americans and we weren’t tied down by debt.
Meanwhile, other free-marketeers appear to be losing the faith. The Chief Executive of Ryan Air seems to think that the public should pay if volcanic ash in the air stops his planes from flying, even when the choice not to fly is his.
Will Hutton meanwhile asks us what kind of capitalism does Labour endorse? Tricky, cos it didn’t really get discussed like that on the doorstep. But if I had to answer it in those terms, my pitch would be -
· an accountable capitalism, where there are rewards for true merit and judgement on investment and provision, rather than allow firms to be reckless when they know they are too big to fail;
· a capitalism that recognises that in the 21st century, you need partnership to develop the products and serve the markets of the future;
· a capitalism that doesn’t tolerate the extremes in wealth in the country and the world – and couldn’t a financial transactions tax (the Robin Hood tax) make such a difference at percentage levels that trading firms wouldn’t notice;
· a capitalism that understands the value of local jobs for local people; a capitalism that respects people at the workplace; a capitalism that more clearly advocated better managers working smarter rather than working longer hours;
· a capitalism that faces up to the challenges of the future – an ageing population, climate change, the peak in the production of oil.
The scale of progress in technology and living conditions is extraordinary, thanks to business and, dare I say it, physicists, AND people’s graft. Market mechanisms may well have won the arguments over governing by committees and rationing systems; but everyone knows it needs more. And it might be called capitalism. But it ain’t free markets and the public aren’t free-marketeers either.
We still have time to fashion a programme and our headline pledges. And when we do, we can confidently cast them firmly in our values.