Guido Fawkes wrote a little story about me this week. Shadow city minister begs for internships, eh? Now that website is not necessarily always very kind to people like me, but I liked it.
The story is right, work experiences is exactly what I am after. Let me explain.
After listening to Wirral families, I got interested in nursing homes, so a local residential care home helped me shadow nurses and care staff on the job. I helped in the laundry and kitchen. I learnt first-hand what it means to do one of the hardest jobs in the country, caring for people with dementia, whilst earning wages that are far from commensurate with that responsibility.
I learnt the kind of things you only find out when you see what work is like with your own eyes. Meeting lobbyists in London is one thing. Being prepared to be put to work by the people who really make our country tick over is another.
Now, no doubt, the legacy of the 2008 financial crisis shook Labour. Our approach to the economy had built years of stable growth. The cause of the crash was, first and foremost, irresponsible actions by a number of financial institutions, along with a global failure of regulation. Yet many Labour people have struggled to explain our vision for the future of a secure financial services industry and, even more importantly, a credible Labour plan for economic recovery.
So strong was that perception that even after five years of unrelenting Tory failure we did not convince Britons that the economy was safe with us. That needs to change. That does not just mean sound policies. It means a better understanding of what work is like for more than a million people in our country who work in financial services.
Many people will know that the United Kingdom is a world leading exporter of financial services with a trade surplus of £78.9bn. But, what is life like for the million people who work to create that surplus? I know the headlines – from forex and libor scandal, bonuses and now job losses. I want to see the reality.
Post-crash, it is the right time to ask what life is like on the front line, and how our country is changing. It is time to look behind the headlines and ask what life is really like.
Of course there are city stereotypes: blazers and flash boys, and a cold-hearted pursuit of the bottom line. But it is also an industry that employs call-centre workers, admin assistants and accountants. People who depend upon a functioning financial services sector to survive.
Not just in London. Financial services exist in most cities and many towns in our country. Like roads and railways, banks and insurers are the infrastructure on which the rest depends. Getting our approach right matters for everyone.
That is why I want to do more than just read about the City in the papers. I want to spend a day on a trading floor, get inside an investment team, take on a shift at a call centre, see what life is like for retail banking staff in all corners of our country. I want to see all of the industry, not just the bits in London.
This is why I will go to Scotland, Wales and all around England. To call-centres, to building sites, retail banks and charities. In defeat we have the opportunity to rebuild our party. Now is the time to listen to working people, and that is exactly what I intend to do.
———————————
Alison McGovern MP is shadow city minister. She tweets @Alison_McGovern
———————————
That’s right, Alison, stick it to Guido. By the way, hang out in those banks and trading floors at the right times to speak to one part of the financial services workforce that you didn’t mention – the immigrant contract cleaners who are treated like dirt.
A valuable call to understand the reality under the glossy surface of the City, but disparity in employment conditions in the London financial markets is a necessary but insufficient focus for a new approach by Labour. One question to ask is how far do the conditions for a second global financial crisis exist in Government policy and the current architecture and practice of the markets? What is our current understanding of systemic financial risk? Are there market practices that could be stopped or mitigated by Government policy because they pose a systemic risk? What kind of representation exists from asset owners or financial consumers amongst the structures of regulatory and market policy-making? What is the reality of regulatory enforcement? Let’s build Labour’s financial market competencies and experience, in order to understand what we really need to critique in today’s City markets. In that way we create respect, if not agreement, prior to enunciating new policy.