One Nation Labour is about building a more equal and fair Britain where all share in prosperity. This powerful vision rejects the ‘divide and rule’ politics that define the Tory party. The Tories have a habit of rewarding favoured special interests above the public interest. One Nation Labour aims to correct this imbalance so that all can benefit, not only a chosen few. We can fight back even more effectively against Tory critics by viewing One Nation Labour through the politics of hope it can deliver. It can deliver the Britain we deserve.
The key election issue for 2015 is the problem of insecurity—as I have argued for previously. This is clear at meetings or on the doorstep whenever voters are asked about what matters most for them. People face insecurities of every kind. We can see this with concerns like housing and employment where any recovery remains a long way off and personal aspirations are left unfulfilled. People have insecurities about a criminal justice system needing urgent reform and improve the poor experience too many victims have pursuing justice.
But how should these insecurities be addressed? Tories have chosen a politics of fear that divides citizens from each other where they claim there is no alternative to broken promises they offer. Tories argue that a less secure workforce lacking adequate protections from arbitrary hiring practices is central to making businesses succeed. Economic recovery should not be about improving conditions for some and failing to share the benefits with all. The politics of fear wants us to accept inequality and unfairness as to how the world is and how it should be. A broken and underperforming economy, housing shortages, a lack of opportunities, eroding public services such as our hospitals and public transport, a criminal justice system that fails victims and an immigration policy built on ideology without evidence: Tories believe this a future we must endure.
One Nation Labour defends a politics of hope. It challenges conventional thinking by demanding we break from the divisive political culture the Tories attempt to impose and redefine the progressive politics we need to deliver the optimistic, forward-looking Britain we deserve. But what can we achieve?
Victims must be put at the heart of the criminal justice system. Too often they can feel like bystanders and not participants. Victims rarely have opportunities to have their day in court, to communicate to offenders how their crimes impacted on them and have this acknowledged.
I argue in my award winning book, Punishment, and in a recent policy ‘impact’ essay for leading think tank Demos that victims should be empowered through embedding restorative justice more deeply in our criminal justice system. Restorative justice brings victims and offenders together to facilitate understanding and better target offender risk factors. As I am quoted in the Labour party’s current policy consultation on Stronger, Safer, Communities, ‘We can and should improve public confidence in criminal justice by giving victims a greater voice in sentencing decisions through a restorative justice model’—and this reform is required urgently.
This is a One Nation approach to criminal justice that is sensibly ‘tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime,’ in the spirit of Tony Blair’s oft-repeated declaration. It’s because restorative justice has delivered less reoffending and greater victim satisfaction at significantly reduced costs. But we should go further in expanding the range of restorative options to give them greater purchase and wider potential applicability to more cases.
Immigration is often highlighted as a problem by voters before it seems to bring together the many insecurities they are concerned about: insecurities about declining employment opportunities, a lack of decent housing and rising crime are serious problems. Immigration may not be their cause, but it remains difficult to convince people on the doorstep who struggle in a divided Britain working for some more than others. As an immigrant to Britain, this is an issue that I grapple with almost daily as I advocate central changes to how the system works – so that it can work better – through simplifying the hundreds of pages of immigration law and policy, revising the ‘Life in the UK’ citizenship test so it is more a bridge than a barrier and improving fair requirements for English language ability for permanent residents. We must engage the public in an open, evidence-based discussion about migration to address the insecurities that give rise to deep concerns about border control to produce a system that better reflects a Britain open for business leaving no one behind.
One Nation Labour can deliver the optimistic politics of hope we need to challenge the Tories’ divisive narrative that there is no alternative to their ideology. We have a positive vision for a progressive future that extends far beyond the few policy ideas raised here. This is so important because winning the next general election is about much more than electing a Labour government, but delivering the more equal and fair Britain we deserve.
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Thom Brooks is professor of law and government at Durham University and a candidate for the Progress strategy board. His website is http://thombrooks.info and he tweets @thom_brooks