‘She was the best thing going for them’, was how one wonk world insider described the departure of Caroline Macfarland from ResPublica after three years last month. ResPublica’s wonky reputation was established by the original ‘red Tory’ Phillip Blond, one-time theology lecturer and formerly of Demos, where he ran its ‘progressive conservatism’ project. In 2010 he released Red Tory: How Left and Right Have Broken Britain and How We Can Fix It, a work which sought to fuse social conservatism with economic egalitarianism. But the following year the thinktank gained itself an audience beyond the usual Westminster Village types when it found itself the subject of lurid press stories centring on cashflow issues and Blond’s alleged expenses for travel to exotic climes. Since then the ship has been considerably steadied, in large part thanks to Macfarland’s efforts, so ResPublica’s future in the competitive world of full-time public policy thinking will be monitored with curiosity.
Since its heyday, the idea of ‘red Toryism’ has somewhat died a death – not unlike the ‘big society’ and other eyecatching labels that have occasionally been glued over the cracks in the body Conservative – losing early advocates, and with little red, Tory or otherwise, visible in the blue part of the coalition’s activities.
The same cannot be said of its leftwing cousin, blue Labour. It too experienced a dip in fortunes, about a year after it emerged onto the political scene when its primary thinker, London Metropolitan University lecturer Maurice Glasman, came under fire from commentators for suggesting immigration should be frozen. Blue Labour was also variously critiqued for being allegedly ‘anti-women’. Following this period of turbulence, as Glasman told Progress last year, he ‘stayed completely silent for six months’, but during this time blue Labour’s emphasis on solidarity and community continued to infuse the thinking of the Labour high command, which last month announced plans for a string of regional banks across the UK to transform the way small and medium enterprises fund themselves. This had been a long-time Glasman idea. In March 2011 he wrote for Progress magazine’s Big Idea column on Why We Need Regional Banks. ‘This should be tied to a renewal of vocational training and corporate governance reform that would promote real skills and the balance of interests’, he argued – again, language notable for its later echoing by Ed Miliband with his emphasis on the ‘forgotten 50 per cent’ and interest in institutional reform. Miliband’s leader’s speech at Labour party conference last year was also felt to be heavily influenced by blue Labour thinkers, some of whom were seen celebrating in the aisles (and in Costa Coffee) at the end of his address.
Finding ways to strengthen regional economic capacity is something often talked about but too often tackled haphazardly. The government has strengthened city-regions with its negotiated city deals (admirably examined in detail by the Centre for Cities in a set of recently released reports), but, as a recent IPPR North report, UK First? Improving Northern Access to Foreign Direct Investment, discovers, the coalition’s precipitate abolition of regional development agencies resulted in a ‘difficult and incomplete transition, with problems replacing lost capability and a much-degraded capacity less able to promote local and regional opportunities’, meaning the infrastructure in place to attract much-needed FDI to the north of England has weakened and fragmented. The report is part of the tank’s Northern Economic Futures Commission, which set out to articulate a 10-year strategy for economic growth across the region and released its final report at the end of last year.
But back to departures from wonk world. Another thinktanker saying goodbye, though only temporarily, is Progress’ own deputy director, Richard Angell, who is heading to Australia for four months from May to work for the New South Wales Labor party, campaigning in a marginal seat in the forthcoming general election there. Progress is recruiting an interim deputy director in the meantime, but we wish Richard and colleagues all the very best in returning a majority Labor government down under.
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