Last week’s Labour announcements on welfare reform and economic policy were vital set-piece events on the road to the 2015 general election, now under two years away.
They took place in the context of a volatile polling situation, with the United Kingdom Independence party scooping up anti-government (indeed, anti-politics) protest votes, some of which might otherwise go to us as the main opposition party.
Labour under Ed Miliband has already achieved something we have never done before. We have avoided the lurch to the left and blame game that has historically accompanied Labour losing power, and maturity at all levels of the party has meant that, while there are inevitable spats and arguments, we haven’t indulged in sectarian infighting as we did in 1931, 1951, 1970 and 1979.
This may not be a 1997 scenario but it is certainly not a 1983 one and that owes a lot to Ed’s skills as a party manager and conciliator. In this regard he resembles Harold Wilson who took a bitterly divided party and had to play a tricky balancing game between competing factions.
Where I hope and believe Ed will not resemble Wilson is in getting our economic policy right so we don’t get derailed by successive crises; not raising expectations unrealistically so that we then disillusion both our core voters and members; and having some touchstone policies that the next Labour government will be remembered for. I always think there is a great pathos to Wilson’s pride in the Open University as the main legacy of his eight years as prime minister. A fine institution that has given enhanced life chances to many people, but hardly comparable with the NHS and welfare state left us by Clement Attlee, or the minimum wage and massive investment in new schools and hospitals left us by Tony Blair and Gordon Brown.
That it has taken three years for us to start setting out some of the tough choices we will have to take on the economy and welfare is a primary reason why we don’t have a commanding poll lead, just a decent one, and why the political space for the UKIP bubble to grow has existed.
Voters are not happy with the coalition. Its hyper-austerity has not delivered an economic recovery, just as Labour predicted.
But the fundamental reasons why voters rejected Labour in 2010 did not start to be addressed until last week. Voters blame us (unfairly, but that’s their prerogative) for causing the economic crisis that the coalition has failed to resolve. So they want hard evidence that we have matured in our economic policy. And they blame us for not addressing their concerns that welfare seems in many cases to be rewarding the wrong behaviours. They want hard evidence that we have learned that we have to confront the political issues that they are most enraged about – be it welfare or immigration – rather than hope they will go away and shift the debate onto something else.
My argument is that Ed (nor any other hypothetical Labour Leader) had to start addressing these difficult policy questions now to become a credible future prime minister. But he couldn’t have done it any earlier because the party wasn’t ready to go there – it was still in shock from defeat and swaddled in a comfort blanket that if we just protested enough against the evil Tories the pendulum would swing back to us. To have tried to push these issues too early too hard would have precipitated a civil war in the party on 1979-83 lines and put us out of power for a generation, or perhaps forever. This nearly happened in January 2012 with Ed Balls’ unexpected speech to the Fabians on economic policy and the explosive trade union reaction to it, which I saw at first hand as an NEC member at the full NEC meeting that month.
This time around the lessons of that previous attempt to shift economic policy have been learned. Ed Miliband and Ed Balls have got their management of the expectations and communications with the parliamentary Labour party, affiliates and party in the country right to such an extent that Len McCluskey on the left and Dan Hodges on the right both praised the same speech, and the howling denunciations of betrayal have only come from the furthest fringe of the hard-left.
The Labour party and labour movement showed last week it is serious about being in government again, both in the realistic (but inherently social democratic) policy prescriptions put forward, and in the measured and responsible reaction to them by other party stakeholders.
Labour has shrugged off its oppositional comfort blanket and put on its suit to go to work again for the British people. We won’t get an overnight retro-rocket under our polling figures because of this but we have started the two-year task of persuading voters that we have changed and listened to why we were rejected in 2010, and are serious about managing the economy and tackling the issues they care about most.
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Luke Akehurst is a councillor in the London borough of Hackney, writes regularly for Progress here and blogs here.
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Harold’s legacy was much more than the OU, Luke. His govt from 64-70 saw a huge progressive shift in attitude and the implementation of stunning social changes. He was something of a north country puritan it is true, and didn’t trumpet social legislation enough. Nonetheless he was a social democrat who advanced equality.
Think you are a tad unfair on Harold Wilson Luke. He had to overcome the negativity of 13 years of Tory rule which cowed the party in the same way as the Thatcher/Major years did for Labour prior to the 1997 landslide. His 1966 landslide was as good as any.
Going forward Ed Miliband needs to start to make regular policy statements so that the public get to know him as a statesman.
I think Harold Wilson is much maligned and his record needs to be reassessed : I agree with John Bateman on ‘stunning social changes (e.g. capital punishment,homosexual rights reform,abortion rights and legislation to reduce the carnage on our roads including a 70mph speed limit,the breathalyser,seat belts and the MOT annual test ; unlike New Labour he kept us out of an unnecessary war ( Vietnam).
Hmmm. Lets see if we can spot the sleight of hand here. Why do we have to take “tough choices” on welfare? Because of voters “concerns that welfare seems in many cases to be rewarding the wrong behaviours”. Not that welfare is rewarding the wrong behaviours, not even that it seems to be rewarding the wrong behaviours, but that voters are concerned that it seems to be. Two steps away from reality. So you’re trying to smuggle in a right wing agenda while simultaneously ignoring the evidence (pretty much a definition of New Labour). Do you believe there is a dependancy culture? If so, cite your evidence. Do you believe that the lower orders are scroungers? If so cite your evidence. Or do you just believe that there is no progressive value that can’t be abandoned in pursuit of a career? (And if so, cite your evidence)