This bloody sibling stuff is dominating the coverage of the conference, much to the delight of most of the media. Soap opera is more important than politics? It’s a pity David M hasn’t the decency to simply shut up and move on.

In all fairness (and I’m not a fan of the man), David himself doesn’t seem to have been doing much to undermine Ed. It’s the Blairites who threw themselves behind his cause and feel like they wuz robbed that are doing most of the complaining.

Hahaha

The Brownites don’t like a (very very mild – so far) taste of their own medicine, do they?!

I think it’s perfectly understandable for people to be dismayed – given how he got in through the complicated voting system. Imagine if it had been Diane Abbott.
It will be a different Labour Party that gets presented to the electorate at the next election than the one it would have been under David, so people are bound to be concerned.

If it’s about policies and not personalities then why can’t we keep on arguing?

Champion of the Left Ed Balls has actually let slip that David will bugger off. On purpose, I’m sure.

Perhaps the reason Balls told the media that David M is leaving, is because he wants Shadow Chancellor, and only David M could’ve challenged him for it.

I’m not at all concerned by the fact that it will be a different party to the one it would have been if David M had won. I am delighted. As are many people who didn’t get to vote for Ed M because they had been so sickened by what happened to Labour that thy left in disgust.
The Blairites are behaving like spoiled rich kids who think they own all the toys in the playground. Maybe they are behaving that way because so many of them are, including David M if his performance this week is anything to go by.
About the only one of the people closely associated with Blair who seems able to respond properly is Alistair Campbell, who says he’s sorry his man lost but now it’s time to get on with backing the party. Quite right.

“Deliberate adoption of an immediate strategy of tension by the Blairites at this stage would be unforgiveable. Or, in vintage Blairspeak, unhelpful. You guys lost. Get used to it.”

Or even doubleplusunhelpful.

I know schadenfreude is not something you should revel in… but I just can’t help it. …. it really couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of people.

I suppose it’s a little ironic, is it not, that Ed’s refrain about ‘taking on the established thinking’ that he claims to have admired in early Brown/Blair is precisely what winds up some of the old guard.

The row in the early 1990s remember, was over John Smith’s ‘one more heave’ which Brown, Mandelson and Blair thought inadequate. The difference this time is, of course, with those who consider that, but for Brown, the 2010 election was winnable and business could have carried on as usual.

It’s not lost on some of us, that in too many areas of policy, business as usual is being carried on – but by the ConDem coalition.

10

“It’s not lost on some of us, that in too many areas of policy, business as usual is being carried on – but by the ConDem coalition.”

I suppose that’s the big dilemma for people like me: I can’t actually see all that much difference in a lot of policy areas between New Labour and the Coalition, but I’m not sure whether Ed and his supporters have the imagination, support or balls to even give New Labour the “coup de grace”, let alone to develop an agenda for a progressive, radical alternative.

And if they can’t do it, where is there left to go….?

Does anyone know what “giving New Labour the coup de grace” might mean?

I don’t recall Old Labour being especially successful.

In defense of my school, the vast majority of our alumni have the most beautiful manners John Barnes and Dennis Nilsen are good examples.

Obviously Oona and David haven’t portrayed the school in such a good light, but I think it probably has more to do with the company they’ve kept since leaving their alma mater.

Is it me but after yesterday I cannot tell the difference between Labour under Blair, Labour under Brown or labour under Miliband, he agrees with most of the cuts that the Tories are doing, he is going to stand up hard for any cuts to the NHS, but will do little to remove the ones Blair did including the NHS dentists, he has told the sick and the disabled that well JSA is the new benefit for them, so he agree with the Tories.

I sat back Yesterday thinking shit I might as well take the poison now then wait five ten or twenty years for a Newer labour to do it.

12

So the only alternatives you can imagine are Old Labour of Mr Foot’s “longest suicide note in history”, or the fully paid up Blairite control freakery we endured for the last 13 years?

I don’t know whether to be more disappointed at your lack of imagination, or the implication that New Labour were such a resounding success.

It should be fairly obvious the type of authoritarian policies killing off New Labour would consign to the bonfire of history. Getting rid of the policies is one thing, getting rid of the baleful influence on the party, and coming up with a coherent alternative is another.

I haven’t seen much evidence of either from Ed Miliband or anyone else in the Labour party.

12

Oh..and Im sure many people could start us off with a list of things Newer Labour could promise which would prove to be popular, vote winners, and have the added advantage of being the right thing to do (… not something those involved in New Labour would have much experience of I realise…but you have to start somewhere right?).

Here are a few starters:

Cancelling the Trident replacement, a living minimum wage, 50% tax rate for salaries over £100k, ….. any others people care to add?

First, good manners *requires* David Miliband to stand for the Shadow Cabinet? For goodness sake. For every person telling him it is a betrayal if he stands, there is another telling him he would be putting himself before his party if he refuses to go gentle into that good night. And both arguments are often being made by people who anyway dislike David Miliband, and simply want an opportunity to shout that he’s doing the wrong thing.

Second, who is this mysterious cadre of Blairites trying to undermine Ed Miliband? They are often accused of some devilishness or other, but seldom named. I am not aware of any DM-supporting MPs who have done anything other than say they will swing fully behind the leader (as Tom Harris has, for example). The only troublemaker referred to explicitly is Rentoul – a columnist, not a politician. But you can’t be saying you expect columnists to fall into line behind Ed Miliband, surely!

@16

Abolish private and “faith” education, nationalise the railways, put Murdoch in jail for crimes against the working-class… oh wait, you said “popular” !

( )

Oh and on-topic – D’Mil should do want ever he wants to do. And not listen to any particular faction/press briefing. My prediction is that the amount of speculation means he will “spend more time with his family”… but we shall see.

18

LOL.

I’d personally love to see faith schools abolished..but absent anyone with the cojones to do it, phasing out state funding to support them will do

Private schools..well, if they want to pay for it, fair enough..same for private health care: let ‘em knock themselves out.

I’m not advocating nationalising (or re-nationalising) anything.. think that boat has well and truly sailed: as for how the whole shambles is funded and organised…hmmnnn, that’s a discussion for another day amongst the anoraks who are interested

Murdoch… hmmnnn… jail is probably too good for him.

19

He’s not in a great position. I’d say my heart bleeds for him, but it really doesn’t… I think it’s one of those Portillo moments. He deserved all he got, which thankfully was nothing.

If he stays on it will be a nightmare, and if he wanders off into the wilderness he’ll be accused of going off in a huff, so he can’t really win can he?

I reckon if he does stay it will be a real pointer that the ghost of New Labour certainly hasn’t been laid to rest: he’s bound to become a focus for the Blairite “ultras”.

Well, there he goes then. *waves*

In honour of his front-bench memroy I’ll just leave this here: http://enemiesofreason.co.uk/2010/09/29/pictures-of-david-miliband-looking-stupid/

Soho Politico: Second, who is this mysterious cadre of Blairites trying to undermine Ed Miliband? – well, that’s the thing about off-the-record briefing: you don’t have to be (wo)man enough to say it in public or to anyone’s face.

22

Priceless.

actually, from some of those pics, I see a promising future for David as the presenter of a reality Candid Camera type TV show….

……on Channel 5

..if he’s lucky.

(Tho relaistically he’ll probably get some cushy Euro job or quango to run, whilst becoming the “King Across the Water” for the hopefully increasingly irrelevant Blairite rump…. hey, a guy can dream can’t he?)

I am slightly confused as to why it is considered a good idea to give leadership candidates jobs automatically (if they stand for election in Labour)? If you’ve just won an election (however narrowly) you have a mandate for your programme; why then introduce those (be they Messrs Balls, Milliband or Burnham) who had different programmes to senior positions in your cabinet/shadow cabinet?

After all, I didn’t notice Gordon Brown being asked to join the government after the election a few months ago, and no-one thought that was odd.

Can Mr S Pill and Galen10 just get a room please? If all you’re going to do is sit in a circle and jerk off at each other over the possibility that Labour will start going all “progressive”, please refrain from doing it in public. Kthxbye

25

Perhaps young Ed should insist on a period of “re-education” or “de-Blairification” prior to accepting any of the usual suspects into positions of influence… or perhaps in particularly intransigent cases, some form of trial and sincere confession along the lines of the Truth and Reconciliation commission?

Even then I wouldn’t trust most of the former cabinet…..

26

Aw, intruding on private grief are we blanco?

Who appointed you room monitor anyway?

Grow up.

Who is trying to undermine Ed?

Well, right now it’s mostly outside the party like John Rentoul, David Aaronovitch and Oliver Kamm.

I expect that after the shadow cabinet elections are over, then some more knives will come out.

29

So it will be very much like business as usual in the bad old days of Blair and Brown then Sunny?

The New Generation must must be thrilled!

I expect that after the shadow cabinet elections are over, then some more knives will come out.

Isn’t talking up the prospects that malcontents will try to destabilise Ed Miliband when they haven’t actually done anything itself a little destabilising?

The rich elite don’t want democracy, so they want to land the UK with 3 right wing parties. What is the point of that? Well, if you are a member of the rich elite and you like blowing up brown people, and paying no tax I guess you would be happy with 3 right wing parties, but it is not democracy.

New Labour is finished, dead, fucked gone. It served is purpose and then went out of control, good riddance. If we are going to live in low tax, no public service state, where we wage war for profit, and have our civil liberties taken away from us then let it be the tories who create that state. Then people can decide if that is really what they want. And if they do want it then everyone knows who to blame when it goes tits up. I don’t expect it to be put in place by Labour or New Labour or New, New Labour or any flavour of Labour.

When David Aaronovitch has stopped sucking Murdoch’s dick I might be interested in what he has to say on the future of the Labour party.

“The problem with that David Miliband bloke is that he obviously didn’t learn no bleedin’ manners at Haverstock Hill Comp. At the time of writing, it seemed certain that he would not stand for a position in the shadow cabinet, and would instead seek an alternative engagement for his many talents.”

That is disgraceful.. I think both brothers behaved impeccably and I think David Miliband was gracious and if he did the same thing on Sunday he would have been accused of stealing his brother’s thunder.

If he did through the speech, his main message about unity and getting behind Ed would have gone off the headlines. If he did the next day, it would overshadowed the speech. So come on folks.

And Dave – maybe you ought to learn manners rather than David Miliband.

And I am sure after David Miliband’s interview you are feeling a bit bad by writing this crap – but that much of decency from you would be hard to expect.

Perhaps young Ed should insist on a period of “re-education” or “de-Blairification” prior to accepting any of the usual suspects into positions of influence… or perhaps in particularly intransigent cases, some form of trial and sincere confession along the lines of the Truth and Reconciliation commission?

Don’t think that will be necessary. Those party hacks are pretty adept at noticing any change of wind direction and jumping onto the appropriate ship. Apparently Tessa Jowell is a shoe in for cabinet.

It’s the few back benchers who still cling onto a distant memory of political principle and personal dignity that will be subjected to the party sausage machine.

@18

“Abolish private and “faith” education, nationalise the railways, put Murdoch in jail for crimes against the working-class… oh wait, you said “popular” !”

He probably also should have added ‘doable’, but I’m with you in spirit. Cancel ASBOs while you’re at it. They somehow manage to find the spot in the human rights / public security dichotomy that is both ineffective and illiberal.

I’m a habitual floating voter and reckon I’m relatively detached from the usual run of political tribalism. That said, my reaction to much current media reporting on the Labour leadership stakes is that it has been almost entirely puerile. No wonder DMiliband has opted out of frontline politics for we would otherwise have a daily diet of reports on supposed fraternal divisions and disagreements.

“All the indications are that the Blairites are not handling their failure in the Labour leadership contest all that well.”

And yet none of these indications are provided, rendering the article nothing more than gossip.

Thankfully this kind of pointless sectarianism is increasingly rare, although a few still pine for the days when it dominated the Labour Party.

@Cherub

“This bloody sibling stuff is dominating the coverage of the conference, much to the delight of most of the media. Soap opera is more important than politics? It’s a pity David M hasn’t the decency to simply shut up and move on.”

Now you know how us Lib Dems felt when the media were focusing constantly on the “coalition/lib dem splits” line.

The media treatment of politics as soap opera avoids the difficult task for journalists of explaining issues and alternative policy options. As the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee reported in the last Parliament:

“Up to 12 million working UK adults have the literacy skills expected of a primary school child, the [HoC] Public Accounts Committee says. . . The report says there are up 12 million people holding down jobs with literacy skills and up to 16 million with numeracy skills at the level expected of children leaving primary school.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/4642396.stm

@ 20 Galen 10

Actually re-nationalising railways would be a popular policy. The privatisation of the was never popular, even Norman bloody Tebbit called it “the poll tax on wheels. Blair when he was oppostion said New Labour would re-nationalise the railways only to rat on the pledge once in office.

Railways are now subsdised by the state to an extent British Rail could only have dreamed of. Train operating companies are now losing money and the East Coast main line was re-nationalised last year after National Express gave up on it because it was losing money.

Last year a poll showed 51 per cent of the public support full nationalisation, this included Tory voters. Only eleven per cent of voters thought that the current set up should be maintained.

Of course, in the present political Alice-in-Wonderland political climate where the free market has become a quasi-religion re-nationalisation will never happen.

Let’s not carried away. In the end Ed M won by skilfully positioning himself precisely one inch to the left of his brother. Worked a treat. He wasn’t my choice but if he runs the GE campaign half as well I won’t be complaining.

“All the indications are that the Blairites are not handling their failure in the Labour leadership contest all that well.”

Some of us aren’t as fond of losing as the flat earthers.

@ 29. Sunny Hundal

‘Who is trying to undermine Ed?’

Well from the look of this piece Ben Bradshaw, Jim Murphy, Oona King (christ, not her again) & The Lord Mandelson of the Dark Arts and any New Labour MP associated with the Progress wing nuts for a start.

http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art.php?id=22572

(No, I am not in the SWP and never have been)

I’d add Alastair Darling, who had a face at Ed Miliband’s speech like a bulldog licking piss off a nettle, Nick Brown (sacked) and Alan Johnson.

“It’s a point of view”….

can i just ask why anyone was behind David Milliband? All summer I’ve been looking for soemone to offer a reason as to why he’d actually be worth voting for. His supporters might be upset about the win, but for me the problem was that we were never given any sense of why he might be the best man, aside from being vaguely good-looking and having served in the cabinet. Generally the supporters like Kamm and Aaronovitch linng up behind him could offer nothing mroe than a ‘clearly he’s the best’ which, given their general demeanour and previous track record, wasn’t likely to convince.

Surely that was part of the problem?

40

“Of course, in the present political Alice-in-Wonderland political climate where the free market has become a quasi-religion re-nationalisation will never happen.”

Agreed. I think there is actually a better case to be made for renationalisation of the railways than just about anything else, but it’s hardly likely to happen. Some form of re-organisation could probably be sold to the public as a good idea… tho what form it would take I’d have to leave to those more involved and knowledgeable than me!

The way the system was privatised was always barmy, as even most Thatcherite nutters soon admitted.

worryingly – I agree with cjcjc

What matters right now is that the blairites, after years of vicious tactics by Gordon Brown, fear that they will continue to suffer at the sharp end of those tactics now that his underlings run the party.

And that’s a reasonable concern. It was not for nothing that when the plot to brief scandal against the Tories was exposed – much of the labour party reaction was relief that finally Brown’s bullies would be targeting the Tories instead of labour.

Personally I’m optimistic the like of Ed Balls and Ed Miliband are not likely to behave the same way of their own volition. It was Brown’s uniquely pernicious nature that drove the problems before.

And yet, while I am willing to put faith in leading brownites not to be like their mentor, articles like this one suggest their supporters are less worthy of faith.

Since the result David has been utterly glowing about his brother and gracious about his defeat. (I didn’t vote for him btw – just in case anyone wondered)

And yet still people who have backed the Brownites seem to want to keep attacking a defeated man, and do so by accusing him of mildly behaving lie a Brownite. (Would that be a Brownlight?) when in fact all he has done is not announce a snap decision, which would have been cast as a snub and thus would have been very damaging.

So I hope Ed M is a little more decent than some of his far flung supporters seem to be.

His sacking of Brown’s chief whip is a good start. A big position for Andy Burnham would be a strong next step.

Maybe it’s just me but I care sweet FA about all this personality politics.

What matters in practice is the differences in policies and priorities. The personality stuff is just a monumental distraction.

@43

In what way did any of that SWP article serve to undermine Ed Miliband?

For example, how was Jim Murphy quipping that having been told he was a good campaign organiser, that he was seemingly not good enough, an attack on Ed Miliband?

Simon Carr’s (only semi-serious) article ion the Independent is an attack

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/simon-carr/the-sketch-ed-the-ruthless-now-reveals-his-true-colours-2093493.html

BobB

Thing is – at the moment there is only personalities. Until Labour has a shadow cabinet and draws up a strategy and policy positions, we have little by which to guage anything.

My bet remains that despite dropping the phrase, Ed will be just as new labour as gordon and tony.

49

I agree it’s probably a bit early to expect much in the way of detail, but I don’t see how the new leadership can afford to be (or even be seen to be) too much like New Labour, unless they want to endure the kind of wilderness years the Tories did after Major.

It is a somewhat worrying sign that there has been no really effective progrramme laid out by anyone either within the party or outside it which encapsulates “not New Labour”.

De-toxifying the brand is going to take time, and Ed probably has a limited honeymoon period in which to convince people that he isn’t just Blair-lite.

I wish him luck. He’s going to need it!

Galen

I fear we may have somewhat different views of what New Labour is.

I take it, more than anything else, to be summed up by the phrase “tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime” – in that while Labour traditionally focused on reducing poverty and rehabilitation to cut crime, it needed a better recognition of the public’s understandable and just demand that criminals be punished.

That sort of thinking spans all areas of activity – still wanting higher spending and better wages, but also acknowledging that the public wanted changes to the way services were delivered. Still redistributiing wealth to those in need while recognising that alongside it had to be a duty placed on those who recieved.

I fear some people think New Labour was a grand project concieved of to enable us to invade iraq. Which is clearly nuts. Iraq, whatever it might have been, was not “new Labour” any more than it was old Labour. (Remember, old labour had been war-mongerers before – many lefties even unilaterally went to Spain to fight Franco).

New Labour was not big on civil liberties. But then neither was old labour. Labour was never a liberal party. It seems likely to become one now as left-leaning liberals need a party to vote for having been left without one.

But that’s just a fortunate case of opportunity presenting an open goal. In every other regard New Labour will live on.

btw – I hope it is clear I was being facetious in the fourth paragraph – and don’t actuallt think anyone sees new labour as a nine year conspiracy to get hold of Iraq’s oil.

51 margin

I fear you are right, we do have different views about what New Labour is… although I’d prefer “was”.

If in your (unintentinally?) chilling phrase “New Labour will live on”, many on the left will want nothing to do with the party. The exact ideological terminology for the “new” party is less important than what it stands for, and what it actually does when and if it gets into office.

New Labour was an authoritarian, illiberal deeply flawed experiment. You don’t have to be a Bennite, or of the far left, or even an Orange Book type liberal to see that there was something of the night about the whole New Labour project. The good things it did are far outwighed by the bad.

Whether Ed can de-tox the brand and convince enough people that he represents a progressive, radical force on the centre left remains to be seen.

If all he and his supporters want is to carry on the permanent New Labour revolution, they can count me out.

I agree with a lot of Margin4errors points.
I also want to add that the Blairite wing of the party has been tactically dumb and self defeating throughout Brown’s tenure

They failed to reach out across the party and insisted on putting up candidates/assasins without enough cross party support.
By the Time Davids campaign got going it was probably too late .
We’ve had to experience a series of attempts to get rid of Brown that did nothing but harm the party .

They had their chance’s and they failed to take them quickly and decisively enough.

The lesson the ‘right’ of the party needs to learn is to show a bit of loyalty, otherwise they are in danger of cutting themselves out of the debate. we need the strength of argument from all wings of the party.

I dont understand the whining about the affiliates section – FFS the deputy contest showed everyone how you win .

Yes David, they shouldn’t, but they are – rightwing ex-Bennites, anyone?
http://clemthegem.wordpress.com/

Galen

“New Labour was an authoritarian, illiberal deeply flawed experiment. You don’t have to be a Bennite, or of the far left, or even an Orange Book type liberal to see that there was something of the night about the whole New Labour project. The good things it did are far outwighed by the bad.”

No

We’ll overlook that I consider the good (jobs, better healthcare, much reduced poverty, minimum wage, and so on) far far more important than the civil liberties bads. I accept that my priorities reflect my background the tangible benefits of things like the NMW for me and my family. As such I’m somewhat biased by a not particularly noble working class self interest.

Instead try to understand that Labour was authoritarian and illiberal before the “New” bit came a long and stayed that way under the “New” bit.

The Bennites were illiberal. The far left definately are. Indeed lets not forget that “New” was added to distinguish from an “old” that warmed to communism at times. (Labour activists of a certain age stil reminisce about fighting of the communists who tried to take control of local parties in the 70s)

“new” Labour was perhaps more economically liberal than “old” labour. But it socially it was just about the same. Inclined towards equality as ever, but inclined as well towards utilitarian central authority.

What you want isn’t a reversal of “new”. You want a reversal of the authoritarian streak that Labour has had running through it since its inception.

I’d quite like to see the same. Ed talks like he wants to see the same. But that will happen alongside the continuation of the changes that make Labour nowadays “New”

@56
‘old’ Labour was never an explicitly liberal party. But it always had social liberals in it (as well as a social conservative wing). For example the 1960s labour government under Harold Wilson legalised abortion and homosexuality and abolished the death penalty and theatre censorship etc.

@56: “We’ll overlook that I consider the good (jobs, better healthcare, much reduced poverty, minimum wage, and so on) far far more important than the civil liberties bads.”

C’mon.

“The chances of a child from a poor family enjoying higher wages and better education than their parents is lower in Britain than in other western countries, the OECD says”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/mar/10/oecd-uk-worst-social-mobility

“Housebuilding fell to its lowest level for more than 60 years in 2009 – with just 118,000 new homes completed, according to government figures. The number is the lowest since 1946, when official records began and represents a 17 per cent drop on the number completed in 2008.”
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/construction_and_property/article7032641.ece

This was the headline in the FT on 28 June 2006 – a year before the financial crisis broke:

“Fears over surge in high risk mortgages”
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/e8f9d3b2-060e-11db-9dde-0000779e2340.html

Nearly two years further on, this was the headline on 8 April 2008 when the financial crisis was already well underway:

 “Lenders withdraw no-deposit mortgages”
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/dd76f4f2-04d6-11dd-a2f0-000077b07658.html

The horses had already bolted.

I think that the “Blairites” are morally and intellectually bankrupt (and probably always were) and judging by their recent outbursts have become increasingly paranoid and hysterical.
The fact is they have absolutely nothing new to offer except more of the dreary discredited politics of the last 20 years.

The Labour party has thankfully (narrowly) realised this and rejected them and their siren voices. And has made the right choice in doing so.

@49: “My bet remains that despite dropping the phrase, Ed will be just as new labour as gordon and tony.”

I do hope not but then my particular problem is that I have long regarded Blair as a political charlatan. In case anyone thinks that’s really absurd, try these news reports:

Tony Blair’s youthful enthusiasm for radical socialism and his admiration for socialist theorist Karl Marx are revealed in letter written in 1982.

In the 22-page letter, the 29-year-old Mr Blair tells then Labour leader Michael Foot how reading Marx had “irreversibly altered” his outlook.

He also praises Tony Benn, agreeing with the left-winger’s analysis that Labour’s right-wing was bankrupt.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/5081798.stm

Blair’s radio interview with Des O’Connor in 1996:

The first sound of bats flapping in his belfry was heard even before the election, in December 1996, when he told Des O’Connor that as a 14-year-old he had run away to Newcastle airport and boarded a plane for the Bahamas: ‘I snuck onto the plane, and we were literally about to take off when the stewardess came up to me…’ Quite how he managed this without a boarding card or passport was not explained. It certainly came as a surprise to his father (‘The Bahamas? Who said that? Tony? Never’), and an even greater surprise to staff at the airport, who pointed out that there has never been a flight from Newcastle to the Bahamas.

A couple of years later, he told an interviewer that his ‘teenage hero’ was the footballer Jackie Milburn, whom he would watch from the seats behind the goal at St James’s Park. In fact, Milburn played his last game for Newcastle United when Blair was just four years old, and there were no seats behind the goal at the time.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,230340,00.html

@57

And New Labour legalised civil partnerships, bought in disability rights to access, and banned discrimination on the basis of sexuality.

It still has social liberals – but the exceptions don’t make the rule.

Bob B

About OECD social mobility

Don’t be silly. That study looks at the wages of sons and daughters at the age of between 30 and 35. Anyone starting their secondary education under Labour (1997) would presently be… 23. Not only i8s it ridiculous to pretend Labour could have impacted on social mobility in such a short space of time – but the concequences of Major’s introduction of a National Curriculum isn’t even being picked up yet. That is a stat showing the state resulting from Thatcher’s time in office.

Housebuilding

How wonderfully constructive of you to highlight housing stats from the bottom of the deepest recession suffered in about a century. Basically all you have done here is attack Labour for the economic downturn.

Which is fine. It was in culpable. No question about that. But that’s hardly an argument that they didn’t introduce ther NMW, invest in much better NHS healthcare and so on. (My nane went to hospital four years ago for a hip replacement, after waiting three months. Ten years earlier her other hip had to wait over a year. – any warped stats out there explain how that’s not progress?)

Graham

What do you think Blairites are? I have them, and Brownites, pegged as being ideologically exactly the same – but formed into two different camps because of which of two leaders the individuals involved fell into line with.

I can’t think of much if anything that Brown believed that Blair didn’t, other than that Brown should be Prime Minister.

Their methods might have been a little different. (Brownites have tended to go for the juggular while Blairites have tended to subtly subvert) but that’s about as close to a fag paper as I can get between them.

61 margin

Even critics of New Labour can’t see that good things were done; obviously there WERE achievements which have to be recognised. However, that being said, how much more could have been done under a really progressive governement? It’s not that there was a total lack of progress, it’s a matter of how well directed and efficient it was.

Acknowledging the achievements whilst forgetting the manifest and egregious failures of the New Labour experiment is a bit like listening to those who try to justify Thatcherism by saying that things before 1979 needed to be changed. It’s not that there isn’t something to the argument, it’s just that the ends don’t justify the means.

Yes, there are continuities between the authoritarian impulsesof Old and New Labour. Conversely there has always been a social liberal element running through the party too.

The issue now is whether Ed Miliband and the New Generation can effectively detox the Labour brand. If not they could always form a dance troupe

Bob

politicians lie and youthful memories get a bit mixed up at time. But agree there is no doubt Blair was keen to present a positive face to everyone about everything. He worked too hard managing his image and was very good at doing just that- Brown worked just as hard but was awful at it.

Sadly the electoral lesson here is that being good at that helps in politics. A lot.

Galen

I think you have missed my point here.

There was good and bad – and some people (you, I would imagine) feel the bad outweighs the good, where as other people (me for example) feel the good outweighs the bad.

This will be largely a result of different priorities (mine being better wages for working class people and better healthcare for all, yours being the over-active state over-riding of civil liberties.)

That’s not like defending the tories in the 80s by saying things had to change so any change was good. It is simply a difference of opinion, or more accurately, a difference of priorities. My defence of Labour is not “at least it was better than the tories” – it is that “It was a good government”.

Where I suspect we agree utterly is “how much more could have been done under a really progressive governement?”

I completely fogive Labour for being timid in its first four years. After 18 years out of power resulting largely from being too radical and too ambitious in its proposals for the country – playing safe was utterly the right thing to do.

In 2001 though, the public voted overwhelmingly for parties that openly said in thier campaigns that they would put up taxes to improve services. (Labs and Libs). So it should have been a lot more ambitious and could have achieved a lot more had it been.

Sadly the last few years under Brown turned into lame-duck drift.

In 2001 though, the public voted overwhelmingly for parties that openly said in thier campaigns that they would put up taxes to improve services. (Labs and Libs). So it should have been a lot more ambitious and could have achieved a lot more had it been.

Interesting. Why wasn’t this done then? Spending started to increase as if it had been, so was this simply a political calculation, in which case there is a serious criticism available here?

66

It’s not that I missed your point, I just don’t agree with it

Yes, I do think the bad things outweighed the good, but I also think that in general the good things that WERE done could have been done better, and that more could and should have been achieved. The fact that more wasn’t achieved was the direct result of the wrong headed-ness of much of New Labour policy.

I utterly disagree with your judgement that they were right to be cautious in 1997: they should have been more progressive and more radical, not a pale imitation of what we had endured for the previous 18 years of Tory government.

Galen

I assumed you had misunderstood, given your use as an analogy of defending thatcher years as ok becuase something had to change. Perhaps that was just an abberation.

But be clear – I don’t say it was better than nothing. I say it was good. I also just don’t let the perfect serve as an enemy of the good.

I also disagree that it was a pale immitation of the government it ousted. That government worked hard to force wages down, ignored unemployment as “a price worth paying” cut real spending on services and undermined safe working conditions across huge sectors of the economy. Labour reversed that completely with the minimum wage, the social chapter, the New Deal (among other schemes) and big increases in spending.

That’s all good stuff and the reason I’m one of those nasty lefties that so many of my girlfriends parents don’t really approve of. Its not perfect. They could have been more ambitious and I want them to be just that in future.

But as I say, Ed Miliband is New Labour, and his rhetoric so far has not challenged that one inch – except to consign the term itself to the dustbin. There will be no major redistribution on his watch. At least no more than came before under New Labour.

Oh – my little winking smiley dissapeared from the first paragraph.

Dagnamit!