Labour has just set out on a comprehensive policy review process co-ordinated by Liam Byrne.
These full-blown reviews don’t happen that often, at least not in this formal way. The last one I can remember was Neil Kinnock’s policy review in 1988, which was the catalyst for me joining the party and turning up at Canterbury Branch Labour Party as a rather precocious 16 year old to argue why Labour should abandon unilateralism. Kinnock’s review is usually panned for not being far-reaching enough in terms of addressing the fundamental unpopularity of our tax-and-spend approach to economics and public services, which scuppered us in the 1992 General Election. Whilst it was a useful vehicle for dropping some of the more obvious high-profile vote-losing policies of the 1980s such as unilateralism, thereby making me a very happy 16 year old activist and horrifying the rest of my CLP, it left untouched much of the rest of the policy agenda Labour already had on the stocks.
An earlier policy review provides an even more instructive guide to how not to do the current one. This is the policy review that followed the 1970 General Election defeat. The minutiae of this (wholly internal) Labour process are covered in detail in Michael Hatfield’s highly readable book “The House the Left Built: Inside Labour Policy Making 1970-1975”. This review took place in the context of a grassroots and union backlash against the disappointments of the Wilson government, with a newly radicalised Tony Benn in the key position as Chairman of the Party in the critical year of the process. It resulted in a policy programme that was the most leftwing for three decades and included commitments for nationalisation of a shopping list of industries which an NOP poll found were only supported by 37% of Labour’s own supporters, let alone those of other parties. It thus responded to defeat by shifting Labour further away from ordinary voters, not towards them. The electoral result is sometimes overlooked: although the headline result of the February 1974 was Labour returning to power as a minority government, its 301 seats were only 13 up on the 1970 defeat and its vote went down by nearly 6%. Labour’s Programme 1973 with its radical proposals for further state control of industry contributed to Labour losing 600,000 votes despite the hugely unpopular Heath government, and to an initial breakthrough by the Liberals which started the end of the two-party system.
The flaw in both these reviews was that they were pre-determined, internal to the Party rather than outward facing, and not evidence based. In 1988 the Leadership ran the review having already decided the outcomes they wanted. In 1970 the insurgents from the left who had gained control of key party committees ran the review having already determined the outcomes they wanted.
My memory of 1988 was of a much-lampooned “Labour Listens” campaign linked to the review which my fellow columnist Paul Richards reminds us “involved shadow cabinet ministers telling small public meetings what was good for them”. In the case of the 1970 review Labour activists and affiliates had strong voices but there was no input for opinions or expertise from outside the formal structures of the Party.
This meant that in both cases the policies emerging from the reviews were based on the prejudices of the dominant faction in the Party, not on objective evidence about what society was like or what voters wanted from a party of the centre-left.
Gregg McClymont MP gave an excellent explanation to Progress readers recently of the history and current significance of revision as a method for renewing Labour’s ideology and policies.
He defines revision as an approach which involves two key principles:
• “The first is the danger of conflating ‘means and ends’ or, as we might put it, policies and principles. This trap is best avoided by beginning any period of renewal with a simple question: what is the ‘end’ – the fundamental objective – of the Labour party?”
• “The second revisionist lesson is the importance of studying the society in which we live. Revisionists saw the world as complex and rapidly changing; as such, they understood that politicians were always running to stand still in identifying social change. The revisionist answer to this perennial problem was a deep and continuing engagement with Britain’s leading economists, sociologists, and social scientists. To absorb the latest social science, and reflect on its implications for politics, was to equip Labour with an analysis of social change – one against which to measure the instincts and intuitions that politicians inevitably bring to policy development.”
The approach being taken by Ed Miliband and Liam Byrne to the current policy review is thankfully avoiding the flaws of the two historical examples I’ve quoted, and following the revisionist methods Gregg highlighted.
There isn’t a pre-determined outcome – that’s what Ed meant by the derided-by-Cameron phrase “blank sheet of paper”.
It isn’t a closed internal process limited to views within the Party. According to Byrne, as well as involving Party stakeholders, “changing our policy platform will focus on reaching out to the public”. The Party aims “to have had a million conversations with the public before the end of July to solicit public views.” “A major campaign of engagement and consultation” involves 75 Shadow Cabinet-led events by March, covering 130 constituencies.
There is also a serious effort to seek independent expert advice – alongside working groups chaired by Shadow Cabinet members a “number of taskforces will be headed up by external experts and report directly to the working groups on specific issues, like small business and fair pay. We want this process to be about the party engaging with the wider world, not turning in on a conversation just with itself.”
All this leads me to have confidence that the current review is going to be rooted in the best of Labour’s revisionist traditions, and reach conclusions that help us develop a manifesto which reflects and responds to with popular policies the reality of Britain as it is today and the real concerns of voters.
I would encourage Progress readers to get involved and send in their own policy ideas and those of their branches, CLPs and affiliates to the relevant Shadow Cabinet members.