Guest post by Phil BC

Once upon a time you would be hard pressed to find a more solid Labour stronghold than Stoke-on-Trent. The potteries, the mines, and the steel works gave birth to a close-knit working class that produced generations of Labour party activists who absolutely dominated the city’s politics. But all that began to change when the wind of deindustrialisation blew through North Staffordshire. The pits and steel mill are gone, and the ceramics industry is but a pale shadow of a former colossus. In their wake came call centres, casualised retail jobs, long term joblessness and bleak prospects.

The splintering of Stoke’s working class eventually found expression in its politics. continue reading… »

This is a guest post by Tim Fenton

Crewe and Nantwich is only one of almost 650 constituencies on the political map of the UK. But the by-election there in May 2008 holds important lessons for the upcoming General Election.

Following the death of Gwyneth Dunwoody, Labour were between the proverbial rock and hard place: whether they called a snap by-election, or played a longer game, the Government’s unpopularity put them at a disadvantage. Moreover, they needed to select a candidate, and quickly.

Both Tory and Lib Dem already had candidates in place. Edward Timpson was, apparently, not well regarded by Tory HQ, but the crucial and sensible decision was made by Eric Pickles, chosen to manage the campaign, to stand by him. The Lib Dems, seemingly in a moment of panic, ditched their man in favour of Elizabeth Shenton, who then had start over with local activists. This gave the Tories a head start.

Pickles then managed expectations well, the press were fed stories of a “rock solid working class seat”, which could be easily disproved by a trip out to Nantwich – solidly Tory – or to outlying villages, and those new housing developments full of potential swing voters. But during the campaign, most of the assembled hackery saw little more than the area between Crewe station and the town centre, and so bought into the Tories’ well crafted myth.

Surprisingly, the media did little analysis on past elections, which would have disproved the myth of the working class stronghold. The last time a majority Tory Government was returned – in 1992 – Dunwoody’s majority was under 2,700. There had been only one instance of a five figure majority, that in 1997: then, the Tories had been caught in a perfect storm, unpopular nationally and disliked locally after the rail sell-offs caused delays in new train orders and the Works had to lay off staff.

Labour selected Dunwoody’s daughter Tamsin to fight the seat. Was this a good or bad thing? My take is that it had no bearing on the outcome. I reckon she was the best candidate, but Timpson’s shortcomings – he’s not a natural talker and doesn’t do charisma – were managed by Pickles guiding and coaching him, making sure he got his talking points over. It would be different in a General Election campaign, where the luxury of a personal minder would be missing, but that would be to miss the point. The matter at hand was winning the by-election.

The Tories were allowed to make the running from the start, and their focus was incessantly negative, and personal towards the PM. They stuck to this tack and their discipline held firm. Labour’s attempts to show Tamsin Dunwoody in a positive light made little impact. Elsewhere, Elizabeth Shenton was having difficulty making herself heard, despite Vince Cable being ever present.

The saturation media coverage, and the dispatch of every well known politician to Crewe and Nantwich, also had little additional impact: on one Saturday in mid-campaign, Simon Hughes turned up to assist Ms Shenton, while earlier, Jack Straw had brought his soap box to Crewe town centre, and took questions from all comers, but they need not have bothered. The same could be said of the “love bombing” of often bewildered shoppers in Asda, who for a moment were considered important enough to have even “Dave” Cameron pack their shopping. The parties’ efforts cancelled each other out.

Was the “Tory Toff” line wrong? Maybe, given that Timpson, although part of the shoe repair dynasty, is not a man of ostentatious wealth. But Labour make Cameron visibly uncomfortable whenever he is the target of such attacks, so the idea that this contest going the way of the Tories would stop them is groundless.

One controversy was generated by a Labour campaign leaflet, which Pickles called out as “racist”. I saw the offending flyer – the contentious part was the policy of ID cards for foreign nationals – and sent it on its way. Was it racist? I think not. Clumsy maybe, and more likely a policy cut and paste job. But racist it had been called, and once more the Tory discipline held: all those from the party venturing an opinion on the matter toed the line. Pickles is supposedly known for his “anti racism”, but on this occasion it seemed more a case of “accusing the opposition of racism at a time likely to cause them maximum damage, and keeping up the attack in order to prevent them effectively rebutting the accusation”. Given his role in the upcoming General Election campaign, look for that one to be wheeled out again.

The Tories then completed their mission by keeping up the campaigning until polling day. Labour did not. On the last Saturday, I spoke with a Labour supporter who assured me that they would return to get out the vote, but later that same day, a conversation with the campaign HQ on Nantwich Road left me with the impression they had given up. So it was: the evening of polling day was a quiet one in what I call “Redbrick Crewe”, the area that returns Labour and Lib Dem councillors. Labour had already admitted defeat: the Tory majority therefore flattered Timpson.

What will happen at the General Election? Well, unless the Tories score a substantial swing, Timpson will be unseated. David Williams, his next Labour opponent, has the presence and the patter: he is a natural politician. Edward Timpson will have served his purpose.

Ed Miliband, or at least his tweetmeister, has been asking for suggestions on what should be in Labour’s health manifesto for the coming election.

Now in principle, I’m against this sort of thing. Policy should be developed in branches, in CLPs, in unions and debated on the conference floor.

Even so, I have to admit there’s something quite attractive about being able to bung an idea into 140 characters and send it direct to someone given ministerial authority to pretend to be a minister online.

I think it’s a good way of picking up the odd good, practical idea for change that fits within the broad manifesto statement and brings it a bit more to life than it might otherwise.

So an experienced but now ex-nurse, as an ex-Director of a Primary Care Trust, as an experience developer of social enterprises, and as a Labour leader on a small council, I tweeted six quick ideas, all of which I think would make a decent positive difference to the NHS’s work, and all of which have the virtue of not costing that much.

Here they are, in unadulterated tweet form:

@EdMilibandMP #health Set up local social enterprises to conduct local needs and opportunities research with funds top-sliced from GP commissioning budget

@EdMilibandMP #health Re-democratize PCTs, especially if Adult Social Care functions are moved to the NHS, by creating real veto power in Overview & Scrutiny

#health @EdMilibandMP Reinforce valuable role of walk-in centres by secondment of A&E staff and provision of further emergency capacity.

@EdMilibandMP #health Provide seed corn funding for replication in medical wards of brilliant acute psychiatry www.starwards.org.uk/ idea

@EdMilibandMP #health Reintegrate fully the career development path for care workers/nurses so that nursing degree becomes possible for all

@EdMilibandMP #health Provide ‘guidance’ on minimum nursing staff levels in acute medical/elderly wards & ensure this is priority over all else

*

Don Paskini adds: Those are Paul’s ideas – now over to you. In 140 characters or fewer, which ideas do you think would improve the NHS (or any other area of policy) ?

Guest post by Ellie Gellard

The Labour Party has lost a true hero. Michael Foot was a parliamentarian held in the highest regard. One of the most outstanding orators this country has ever known and a man who defined the notion of principled politics. Tributes have been pouring in, from Gordon Brown, Tony Benn and a fitting tribute was made in the House of Commons by Jack Straw after a frankly embarrassing Prime Ministers Questions, the depressing nature of which was put into sharp focus by the news of Foot’s passing. But more on that in a moment.

Foot was the mind of the Labour Party. A remarkably intelligent writer who went from Fleet Street to Westminster with the same principles and values underpinning all his endeavours, values which were unashamedly, unapologetically socialist. Without a doubt Foot was a visionary politician, to some extent an idealist, but was one who admired, if not idolised, as perhaps the greatest pragmatist British Politics has ever known.

Reading Foot’s biography of Aneurin Bevan will have influenced, I hope, the rest of my life. It is for this, perhaps monumental impression on my future, that I am truly grateful to Michael Foot. His bringing to life of Bevan’s spirit, character and politics inspired a love of socialism and the Labour party that I would find, now, impossible to shake off. Foot was a master of the written word which framed the life of his idol, and now mine, beautifully. I would urge anyone with a political interest to devote a weekend to reading it, it will not disappoint.

Amongst the tributes that have poured in for Foot I have, however, noticed a worrying trend. continue reading… »

Nick Clegg and the Libdem leadership have insisted on a policy of ‘equidistance’ from both main parties; putting forward various policy demands as a price for their support in any kind of deal.

While this might seem like good politicking it actually leaves the party vulnerable to ‘love-bombing’ from both sides.

But polling shows that the Libdem leadership are dangerously out of sync with the sentiment of Liberal Democrat voters.

The latest YouGov poll illustrated how the attitudes of Labour / Libdem voters tend to have more in common than Conservative / Libdems voters.

Liberal Democrat voters tend to prefer leading Labour politicians compared to Conservative ones.
continue reading… »

Given the Tories’ continuous slide in the polls, there was an almost tangible feeling of opportunity at last night’s “Osbornomics” event.

Hosted by the New Political Economy network and Compass, debate was mainly focused on what can be expected from a Tory chancellor.

The audience and panel focused enthusiastically on how Labour can stop the Conservatives, and even what it can do differently if it wins. There was talk of a hung parliament with Vince Cable as Chancellor, even of a small Labour majority.

As members of the audience and panel became enthusiastic about a Labour resurgence, the understated but excellent Andrew Gamble had a small and important point to make: be careful what you wish for.
continue reading… »

So The Observer really rained on New Labour’s parade, deflecting attention away from Saturday’s policy launch and onto whether Gordon Brown is a dominating, paranoid, near-psychopathic bully.

Let’s assume – on the grounds that Andrew Rawnsley is a serious journalist and The Obs continues to keep up the pretence of being a serious newspaper – that the allegations are broadly true.

I don’t disagree that there’s cynical political maneuvering gone on here. Nor that there are partisan interests at play. But nonetheless, it seems that if these allegations are true then now had to be the right time to bring them out.

This is because a significant difference exists between the office of the Prime Minister and ordinary bosses. Namely, a normal supervisor or manager can be sacked for their unacceptable bullying of staff, or an employer taken to court over a lengthy period on harassment charges. Often the process isn’t ideal, but it’s there.
continue reading… »

In 1999 Brown as Chancellor of the Exchequer sold 400 tons of gold at the bottom of a 20 year slump in the gold market. He sold at $275 an ounce and could get closer to $700 now.

Conservative Home’s Left Watch argue that, by being patient and waiting for the price of gold to more or less triple, the French have made 50% more than Gordon Brown on gold sales having only to sell half as much.

Tim Montgomerie asks “Is there a more powerful example of Brown’s incompetence?”

When it comes to the matter of how the Gold was sold I think that is fair comment, it really does seem that Brown didn’t know how to best sell gold – and more damningly – didn’t try to find out the best way either.

By announcing the sale in advance it is reckoned that he depressed the market by around 10%. Record numbers of investors took up “short” positions on Gold in anticipation of the sale.
continue reading… »

Recently, Labour Party members in Liverpool Wavertree chose Luciana Berger, a 28 year old Londoner who works as Director of Labour Friends of Israel, as their candidate for the next general election. This has led to criticisms that the Labour Party “parachutes” loyalists from London into safe seats.

Or as Neil put it, “the selection will only increase the sense that Labour regards the role of MP as some glorified graduate trainee programme, and sees constituencies as regional call centres, expected to dilligently enact the faxed dictats from central office…Perhaps the defeat of Ms Berger would send a symbolic – but important – message from Liverpool to London that the days of carpetbagging must end if Labour is to re-establish itself with what was once its heartlands.”

Now the specific example is poorly chosen – Liverpool Wavertree is a marginal constituency, the number one target of the Lib Dems in the area. But the wider point deserves a fact check – is it actually true that Labour’s traditional heartlands are suffering from the “rise of the carpetbaggers”?
continue reading… »

If you trawl Liverpool FC’s unofficial fan forums, it won’t be long before you stumble upon a long thread lamenting the lack of scousers in the squad. Has the city’s talent pool really drained so badly that it’s producing players who aren’t even fit for the subs bench?

You can see shades of this frustration in the backlash over Luciana Berger’s selection as Labour’s candidate for Liverpool Wavertree. Ms Berger is hardly at fault for being young, for harbouring a desire for public service or for possessing qualities which have made her appealing to London’s Labour hierarchy. She may, indeed, prove to be an excellent MP.

But what I read in the exasperated responses to her selection is a refrain I’ve heard many times in & around the Shankly Gates: was there not a single person, in a city of over 400,000 people, who could’ve done as good a job? The city expects an Emlyn Hughes or a Jamie Carragher – someone who, at some level, can understand & relate to the culture & traditions of the people they serve.
continue reading… »

contribution by Lisa Harker

Most of the reaction to today’s speech to the Prime Minister’s ippr speech on constitutional reform has taken the view that it was an exercise in political manoeuvring.

Far from ‘new politics’ it is old Gordon, out to ‘wrong foot’ and create ‘dividing lines’ between Labour and its opponents. Even those more sympathetic to the need for reform, have adopted a weary tone that these ideas, coming so late in the day, are going to make very little difference.

Some of this is fair enough. Laying out a new ‘constitutional settlement’ would have had much more moral force if the Prime Minister had made it when he was new to office and secure in power. Coming now, in the dog days of this parliament with the public still fuming at the expenses scandal, it smacks of expediency.

Of course, the real pity is that when he took over at Number Ten, Gordon Brown did have constitutional reform at the top of his agenda for change. The problem was that he didn’t act on it.
continue reading… »

Bill Clinton famously said: “When people are insecure, they’d rather have somebody who is strong and wrong than someone who’s weak and right.”

And he was right too. Similar statements have been made in the past of the Labour party: that it was as it’s best when it was boldest, and stuck up its finger at Middle England hysterics by forcing through a National Minimum Wage, the Human Rights Act, civil rights for gays and more. Not, of course, when it came to Iraq, 42 days, ID cards etc.

Anyway, today Gordon Brown is giving a speech at ippr, and it’s widely anticipated he’ll say something more solid about electoral reform. The impact of that on the electorate is likely to be minimal – I’ve said for ages the electorate has switched off from what ministers have to say. The further narrowing of polls is down to voters getting a closer look at Tory policies, especially those on the economy, and not liking what they see, not due to Labour policy itself.
continue reading… »

After falling flat on his face as a result of his last foray into the realm of statistics you might think that a certain Tory blogger would have learned a valuable lesson. But, no, he’s back again and making yet another raft of daft mistakes:

Burying Bad News on NHS Waiting Times

Whenever there’s a major political event, you always need to watch what government press office put out. And true to form, today the Department of Health is trying to bury bad news. At 10.06am an email dropped into my Inbox with the alluring headline

STATISTICAL PRESS NOTICE – NHS INPATIENT AND OUTPATIENT WAITING TIMES FIGURES – 31st December 2009
I nearly didn’t bother to look, but suspicion got the better of me. It turns out that patient waiting times have increased dramatically in 2009.

The number of inpatients, for whom English commissioners are responsible, waiting over 13 weeks at the end of December 2009 was 57,600, an increase of 12,300 (27.3%) from November 2009, and a rise of 18,000 (45.3%) from December 2008.

The number of outpatients, for whom English commissioners are responsible, waiting over 8 weeks at the end of December 2009 was 74,100, an increase of 11,700 (18.8%) from November 2009, but a rise of 26,900 (57.0%) from December 2008.

Shouldn’t the press release have been headlined…

Labour Increases NHS Waiting Times by 50%?

UPDATE: The Dept of Health has been in touch to deny this is burying bad news. They say that these figures always come out on the last Friday of the month.

Credit where its due, Iain’s already sort of acknowledged his first mistake – had he checked the DoH’s website, he might have noticed that this is nothing more than a routine statistical release that the DoH does issue at the same time every month.

As for his suggestion for an alternative headline, Iain’s got that badly wrong as well because he’s forgotten – or more likely never learned – one of the cardinal rules of statistics.

One statistic does not make a trend. continue reading… »

The 26th British Social Attitudes Survey has just been published, and has some interesting findings.

They show strong support for liberal social values, a decline in support for redistribution and traditional left-wing economic intervention to help the worse off, and overwhelming opposition to spending cuts in health and education.

It has prompted a mixture of gloating about how Britain is shifting to the right and whining about evil librulses not “tolerating” homophobia from our friends in the conservative movement, so let’s have a look at what it really says:

On social attitudes, Britain is becoming more liberal, except for when it comes to drugs:
continue reading… »

I spent this evening watching a black labrador slurpily lapping the shoes of a major think-tank director whilst its owner thought up ways to lie to me about his party’s attitude to the poor and needy. In a speech given in conjunction with Progress, David Blunkett MP set out to demonstrate just why the Tories are so very, very different from New Labour.

The former Home Secretary quoted Aneurin Bevan, who described the Conservative party’s habit of using government policy to shore up the assets of the privileged as “sucking at the teats of the state”.

“That sums it up pretty well”, said Blunkett, who went on to describe how the evil, ghoulish Tories, are planning to reduce the size of the state by selling off central and local government functions to private companies in an effort to save money, because they, unlike Labour, care about money more than about people.

Mr Blunkett omitted to mention the small matter of the Welfare Reform Bill 2008, with its stated aim of saving cash by getting a million people off sickness benefits and back into work whether they are up to it or not.
continue reading… »

That is one of the questions we’re asking at Saturday’s ‘Causes to fight for‘ Fabian new year conference.

In a piece for the New Statesman’s Staggers blog yesterday, I looked at the particular challenges for Labour in reconnecting to disillusioned liberal-left voters as part of the task of rebuilding the broad electoral coalition which won it three election victories.

Here’s a snippet:

The focus of Labour’s campaign has been on ensuring the Conservatives face the scrutiny of a would-be government in waiting. That the Conservatives are ahead in framing the election year can be seen in how often Ministers seem forced to contest Tory narratives – a debt crisis, the broken society, or the (ludicrous) idea that Labour has declared ‘class war’.

continue reading… »

Possibly the worst news to come out of the failed H&H coup, for Labourites, is that Gordon Brown has been forced to expand his team of ‘election campaign chiefs’. Sure, Brown is in a weak position, but any political team should never let a range of people decide election strategy or messaging.

At this point New Labour needs one strategy and one clear message. Then it needs ministers to repeat that message endlessly in the context of their policy announcements. The political anoraks can find the policy detail if they want; for the 10-second attention span of BBC News @ 6 viewers – the message has to be coherent and repetitive (so it be internalised). That’s the way it is.

The problem with these extra chiefs is that not only will they send out mixed messages, but it gives the media an opportunity to run the narrative that senior ministers are in-fighting over the election message. They’ve been doing this for a while anyway.

I’ve said this repeatedly and I’ll say it again – there’s only one viable election strategy and that is the class war strategy. Labour should ignore the right-wing press and the Guardianistas, the polls bear me out.

The most worrying finding for the Tories is that Mr Cameron is seen to be on the side of the rich over ordinary people, by 50 to 42 per cent. By contrast, Mr Brown is seen as 64 per cent for ordinary people and 26 per cent for the rich.

continue reading… »

Thanks to all of you who made these pics and sent them in (or tweeted them). I think this joke has run its course now, although ‘Mandelkitteh’ seems to have become a favourite for most of you.

Now doubt we’ll be seeing more of him in the future.

In the meantime here is the full collection. If you create any more please just link them from the comments section.

(made by Political Scrapbook)

continue reading… »

This morning’s Times cartoon puts it quite starkly

And the media narrative also seems to have turned against him.

Financial Times: Slow response weakens Miliband
Daily Mail (John Kampfner): David Miliband – the pretender who is a serial bottler
Daily Mail: (comment): The real loser of this pathetic plot
Independent (Steve Richards): Miliband needs a lesson in political warfare
Independent (Andrew Grice): Inquest held — but no dead body
Economist (Bagehot): After the snowstorm

Steve Richards is right in saying there are only two options for Cabinet ministers in a coup: wholehearted declarations of support or insurrection. Miliband took so long, and the statement was so convoluted, that the charge of being a ‘ditherer’ like Brown is starting to stick.

I’m not that fussed.
continue reading… »

Please send in your own pics as well! You can make them from here.

(Now with 18 pics!)

(made by @lukewaterfield)

continue reading… »