Several days after meeting John Prescott as he kicked off his campaign to be Labour’s next treasurer, we visit the Unite offices in Holborn to hear Diana Holland’s pitch for the position. The new Theobald’s Road building was opened by Tony Blair in 2002, and from Diana’s office can clearly be seen the big letters of UNISON atop their new building, rising up the north side of the Euston Road and bright white visible across Queen Square. Times may be changing for trade unions – consolidation has been a recent theme and so has renewal – but a new government brings new immediate pressures, as Holland reflects when I ask her about her own background:
‘Sadly I think a lot of the skills I developed in those early years are coming back to the forefront again. Some of the same debates are coming out again. In fact I’ve been looking at old leaflets reminding me how important it is that when we’re fighting things that are wrong that we also lay down positive foundations for how we do things in the future’.
Holland’s experience is deeply embedded in the movement, including bringing trade unionism to new areas, from unusual quarters:
‘I got involved in the trade union movement because I worked in youth training as an advice worker. I was working in an area that wasn’t traditionally trade union organised and I suppose I was a bit unusual because I was young and a woman and didn’t come from a traditional trade union sector but I found important alliances that could be built, battles I had to fight, so that’s what I’ve done all my working life’.
The question of what pressures will be brought to bear on the relationship is never far away – but both Holland and Prescott are unwavering in the close relationship between the union movement and Labour. She goes beyond simply defending the relationship to remind us that the shared history runs deep:
‘I don’t see the relationship as a financial one, simply. It’s part of the fabric of the party, the same as with the other affiliated organisations. It’s part of what Labour’s about and it broadens the kinds of people linked to it in a really positive way’.
Indeed, broadening out the scope of membership is a theme of both campaigns – how can it not be for two committed Labour people – but the need for new ideas to make this happen is something that needs to be happening now. As to her noble rival, we put to Holland the idea of one @ProgressOnline follower of members paying what they wish. Her response is honest and thoughtful:
‘A completely open “pay what you feel like” I can see potential problems with, but I think it’s probably right that some people could give and would give more if it was a bit more open-ended and we should explore that. But perhaps you need the bottom line in some areas as well.’
She adds: ‘I think we should do the same for trade union levy payers converting to membership; we want a special target for them,’ another idea which could be examined and tested. Membership remains a central plank of rebuilding Labour. Another journey Labour has gone on is rebuilding its finances, something which it needs to do for its own internal health, but also to demonstrate it can manage its own affairs and hence those of the country:
‘Increasingly I’m aware that if you don’t have security in your finances as a political party then you’ve got to get it. People have to have confidence in the finances of the party. The bottom line is we have to be a party with an active and growing membership. Everything we do has got to be from that starting point. I also believe it’s really important for the party’s strength and history and broadest possible reach that it has affiliated organisations, whether trade unions or socialist societies that are also part of that membership base that provide that stability.’
What would her own role be? She is clearly keen to innovate and ensure the top and the bottom of the party and linked and talking to each other, and seems determined to remain the collegiate candidate that she is already known for: ‘I think as treasurer you are part of a team; there’s no benefit in people going off on their own and doing stuff’, and on local Labour activity she says there is ‘already lots of great fundraising activities but it’s a bit separated out… I remember in the past we used to do all sorts of campaign packs in the centre that could be used in local parties. All of that needs to come back with a vengeance.’
External challenges remain that will have to be dealt with, not least the onset of a Tory-Lib Dem government and possibly toxic mix of state funding and attacks on trade union support to the party. Holland is unsure how likely state funding is to come in, nor that the public would tolerate it, but is concerned that debate around it could be a smokescreen for starving Labour of cash:
‘I’m extremely cautious and slightly cynical about how this argument will play out. It can sound like a decent debate when actually what it’s about is undermining the financial security of the Labour party. I’d be very concerned that we don’t do anything to put that relationship at risk while at the same time it would be really helpful if there were some sort of state support, for example for political education.’
There’s no question that high-value donors will remain welcome – it would be silly not to, as she realises: ‘If people want to give large amounts of money to the party and we can use that money then obviously that’s something we don’t want to discourage’. But the party has to be stricter than strict and whiter than white when it comes to such funding: ‘It’s got to be completely transparent. If there’s any question that it’s linked to particular policies then it’s very detrimental. We have and have had in the past clear scrutiny over what we’re accepting and who from and checking it out.’
Making sure that members who donate on a smaller value and individual basis do not feel crowded out is also a challenge to be met:
‘I value all the amounts of money that come through however much it is. While there’s a huge amount of money from one person who has a lot of money the equivalent of that could be someone who’s got very little giving a large amount of their money.’
When asked whether she would stand up to leadership demands for extra campaign spend, a story of past general election campaigns that John Prescott outlined in his interview, her immediate response to push the scenario back a step:
‘That question sets out a relationship that’s wrong. It has got to be that you’ve all agreed how you’re going to operate and you’re then going agree any changes that might come along. You have to be able to as a party machinery have the strength to say ‘we’re in this together’.
The prospect of an elected party chair and too many chiefs at the top is one that she thinks can be dealt with:
‘If you haven’t got clear roles then yes but there are roles to do and that’s where the treasurer role has got to be part of a team…’
Some experience of Labour institutional history may help illuminate the way through navigating the hierarchy – as NEC chair, and hence Labour party chair:
‘I was an elected party chair! In 2002-3. But if the method of election changes you’d have to look again at how that relates to the role of the NEC and whether that’s bypassing election to the NEC so I think that it would need to be looked at. It may be that you then have two elected positions.’
Holland has had a strong involvement in the equalities agenda, tackling underrepresentation and fighting discrimination. ‘In the past’, she says, ‘I had a lot of responsibility for taking tribunal cases but mostly I’ve tried to create an environment when you prevent the discrimination happening in the first place. The same with health and safety – you don’t wait until someone has an accident before you deal with it.’ As the victory for part-time workers’ entitlement to paid holiday, which she was also involved in, shows she is the type of candidate who will fix things and make sure they run well, and better.
‘I have the sad brain that quite likes going through things methodically and working out that they’re being followed properly. That’s a very important part of the movement’ she says self-deprecatingly, but probably pretty correctly when it comes to ensuring the movement functions successfully. There always needs to be at least a little bit of machine in a movement to make sure the wheels are properly oiled.
She’s clearly grounded in the party and willing to think through and manage all the different pressures and institutional actors that will be centring around the treasurer role, a team player quietly sorting things out, reminiscent of Cathy Ashton’s unassuming but realistic adage: ‘There’s no limit to what you can achieve in politics, as long as you don’t mind other people taking the credit’.
In a similarly modest vein Holland finishes our meeting with:
‘I’d be that kind of a treasurer if you like, just getting on with things, finding out who’s really doing things on the ground, bringing them together and saying what works, what doesn’t and how can we extend best practice as widely as possible.’
Here we go again asking members for more money, I use to give the odd tenner, I’d not waste my time anymore.
The fact is since your all so busy chasing the middle class go ask them for a £100 or two.
Why anyone would want to give money to a party but of course UNISON might well want to have a few extra people on Labour committees or a few more in the house of Lords, but since Labour gave sod all to the working class why should anyone believe that we would be getting anything if a Miliband wins.