By Mark Ferguson / @markfergusonuk
Today has been mostly spent in the South West, as the candidates campaigned in the Exeter by-election, and prepared for the Labour in the World hustings in Bristol this evening.
ED BALLS and team were up early this morning after a late-night drive to the South West. By all accounts Lord Jim Knight, the driver for the journey, has a someone what 1980s musical taste.
First up today Ed was at Bodmin Town Hall for a meeting with members from across Cornwall.
Ed also met up with his ‘penpal’ 15 year old David Evans. They've been corresponding for the past three years after David contacted Ed about the challenges he faced at school as an Asperger’s Syndrome sufferer. Ed played the drums with David (who is a talented guitarist). I was excited about this when I saw a photo this morning, but the video is even better:
The big question is, does Yvette let him play the drums in the house, or is he sent to play them in the garage? Today's video also reminded me of this old classic.
Afterwards Balls and his team headed to Exeter where he joined the other candidates at a brief hustings before campaigning for the local by-election.
Ed also responded to BBC research on how government cuts will impact upon different areas of the country:
"While Nick Clegg now concedes that the recovery will be choppy, he and the chancellor are steering it into more dangerous waters."
"At a time when our economy is still fragile, and there are growing fears about the US and other economies around the world, it is a short-sighted and catastrophic mistake to make deep and immediate cuts to jobs programmes, support for industry and vital public services."
Before tonight’s hustings he joined CWU members in Bristol city centre to campaign against Royal Mail privatisation. Tomorrow Ed will be back campaigning in Yorkshire, before appearing on Radio 4's Any Questions from Sheffield.
ED MILIBAND was out campaigning with candidate Heather Morris in Cowick ward for the Exeter by-elections today.
On the donations front, his team were keen to stress small donations today in an email to supporters, saying:
"We’ve now built a list of over 1,000 small donors in this campaign most of them giving £5, £10 or £20."
"Thank you — it is because of your support that we are neck and neck in this election and that it’s too close to call in these final days."
However, what isn't mentioned on their website - but was released in a press statement today - is the volume of money that Ed Miliband has received in donations from the Trade Unions. Perhaps, after today's Sun splash, the Ed campaign are concerned about being labelled the Trade Union candidate, a charge he firmly denied at a press conference earlier in the campaign...
Of the £328,000 that has been raised in total during the leadership campaign, £133 000 has been received from trade unions. What is perhaps most impressive though is the amount of cash raised from small donations - which totals £95,000 so far, including £39,000 in online efforts - more than double the amount that David Miliband has raised in similar donations.
Ed also released a video today of a speech he made at his old school, Haverstock in Camden, at the weekend:
DAVID MILIBAND announced his latest figures for fundraising today. In total over the course of his campaign he has pulled in nearly £450,000 of which £130,000 was raised in August. David said:
"I am very grateful for the generous support I’ve received since the start of the campaign. It’s humbling that people are giving up both their time and their money to help me in my bid to become the next Leader of the Labour Party."
"All candidates in this election have talked about the need to renew our party. But that costs money. We cannot pretend to be in favour of rebuilding the party if we are not willing to raise the money that requires. I am determined that the Labour Party will never again be outspent in an election."
He also attacked the Tory/Lib Dem cuts once again, following BBC Research showing that would affect the North and places with the highest unemployment hardest:
"Many areas in the Midlands and the North, like Middlesborough and Stoke, are only just recovering from the damage done by the Tories during the 1980s. The impact on lives and communities was devastating and now the Tories are threatening to do it all over again."
"The chancellor must commit to publishing a detailed analysis of the impact of his Spending Review on different regions – and set out how he plans to ensure his cuts do not disproportionately affect those parts of our country least able to cope. The Tory approach that simply shrinking the state will get the economy growing owes more to ideology not economic reality."
David also back Rethink's "Fair Treatment Now" campaign, and was out on the Labour doorstep today in Exeter, where he recorded an Audioboo with local candidate Rachel Sutton.
DIANE ABBOTT was also in Exeter today, canvassing in the local elections, before heading on to Bristol for what is one of the last of the hustings in this campaign.
Diane also outlined her stance on the arms trade today. Abbott said that she opposed government support and subsidy for the arms trade; that UK Trade & Investment Defence & Security Organisation should be closed; that export credit cover should not be used for military goods and that private military and security companies should be licensed.
ANDY BURNHAM was claiming victory today his his campaign to save NHS direct. As we reported yesterday, Andy had received a letter from health secretary Andrew Lansley - today he has revealed the contents. Andy said:
"Mr Lansley’s own department confirmed to the BBC that it was planning to scrap NHS Direct – he now says all he wants to change is the phone number."
"NHS Direct is a much-valued service that saves the NHS money. This is a welcome climb-down and great news for the staff who work for NHS Direct and all of us who rely on it. It’s an incredible victory for the campaign to save NHS Direct."
"I hope Mr Lansley will learn a hard lesson from this. Making casual off-the-cuff comments about services that people rely on is no way to run the NHS."
By Martin Tiedemann / @mtiedemann
This weekend hundreds of Co-operative Party members gather in Cardiff for our annual conference. Debates, rule changes, card votes, late night manoeuvres in the hotel bar, receptions and gala dinners we have it all. But above all, Co-operative Party members will be united in our belief that we achieve more by working together than we do alone, and that co-operative and mutual structures can build a fairer economy and better public services.
Since the launch of our comprehensive manifesto a year ago, much has happened in politics. The election saw 28 Labour & Co-operative Members of Parliament elected, with several new figures like Tom Greatrex and Stella Creasy joining longer serving parliamentarians like Louise Ellman and Ed Balls. Our Parliamentary Group of MPs and Peers is the largest it has ever been. Labour’s manifesto was the most co-operative ever, whilst the Liberal Democrats and Conservatives too put forward co-op ideas, only to ditch them one by one as they entered government, behind the convenient façade of the Big Society.
Our theme this year is co-operation at all levels, reflecting our campaign to take co-op ideas beyond Westminster to all tiers of government. Cardiff will see the launch of our manifesto for the Welsh Assembly elections next year. Scotland too sees elections, and we’ll be hearing from both campaigns. And the hundreds of co-operative councillors up and down the country will have a voice too, as we look at the exciting ideas from Labour Lambeth’s Co-operative Council and other Labour authorities like Liverpool, Greenwich and Stevenage. The contenders to be Labour’s candidate for Mayor of London will be telling us what they plan for co-ops too.
For the second year in a row, we are partnering with LabourList for our Conference weekend. From tomorrow, we’ll share with you the best from Co-op Party Conference, with contributions from some of our keynote speakers including Harriet Harman and Tessa Jowell; new co-operative ideas from our activists; and a flavour of what our members are campaigning for. We’ll look at how co-operative issues have been visible in the leadership election and how they can help Labour win again.
Whether you’re joining us in Cardiff, on Twitter via #CoopParty or through our contributions on LabourList, I hope you enjoy Co-operative Party Conference this weekend.
By Joe Caluori / @Croslandite
As the ballot papers plop through letter boxes, it’s worth taking stock in what we’ve learned through this leadership election.
Firstly, the right of the party have to work harder than ever for victories now. David Miliband, unlike Alan Johnson, has actually run a campaign rather than merely turn up to the hustings and have a website. His hyperactivity and profile speaks to his strategic need to establish an unassailable first round lead. Despite early mistakes in appearing to be the "Continuity New Labour" candidate, he relaxed into his stride and settled into a script that worked for him. The ‘oven ready’ candidate.
Secondly, play the ball, not the man. Ed Balls has done himself great credit. Not only has his aggressive but forensic opposition to ConDem education policy made the case for a clear and prominent role for him in the shadow cabinet, but it has also helped throw off some of the associations of being a bullying machine politician. We need more Shadow Ministers like Ed Balls in opposition, and his early successes deserve a decent showing in the final tally.
Thirdly, if you're on the left, talk about the future. Jon Cruddas very effectively changed the 2007 deputy leadership election by talking about future policy on housing and taxtation. In contrast, Diane Abbott will, I suspect, have disappointed many of her supporters with her non-campaign and it now seems that putting Diane on the ballot paper was a misplaced act of charity by Harriet. This election needed a sparky ideas-based campaign from the left to make the other candidates clarify their positions and refine their approaches, but it didn’t get it. Instead Diane Abbott played a role that was half modern historian and half media commentator. She was obsessed with her ‘I told you so’ messages, and never presented a vision for the future.
However, after 2007 members are now wise to the electoral system and many will give her a first preference, for a mixture of sisterhood and protest against the centre, transferring to their real choice for leader afterwards. At the beginning of the campaign I felt this might be enough to hand Diane third place in the first round. Now I’m not so sure.
Fourthly, there's no real political space for a true believer New Labour campaign. Andy Burnham started well early on when he majored on his previous brief of the NHS, but like Hazel Blears in 2007 Andy's campaign started to fall apart as his support level ossified and he increasingly painted himself into a corner, with aggressive and divisive public statements. I suppose if his campaign was about carrying the torch for the angry right of the party into the shadow cabinet, then it may well tick that box, but he was never in the race, even for the top three.
I supported Ed Miliband from the get-go, both on the grounds of his politics and likeability. Win or lose, he has emerged with great credit from this campaign. His greatest flaw in many critics’ eyes seems to be failing to appear as much the ‘politician’ as his brother. It’s a fair comment to make, but far from being a problem, it’s what tipped myself and many others who would perhaps have been expected to back David Miliband to support his brother instead.
Through his humble demeanor and well thought out public statments, Ed Miliband has emerged as Clark Kent to a hitherto unrealised Superman, and that’s a thought that continues to excite many. Depending on his first round performance, transfers from Abbott and Balls could yet push him over the line.
There can be little doubt that David Miliband would make an excellent leader, but given the luxury of voting for a candidate who represents a paradigm shift from two dimensional American style presidential leaders to a fuller, more human leadership, I would always put my mark by Ed Miliband’s name. Every time good friends tell me that David is the smarter vote on the grounds of his smoothness and presentability, rather than his policies, I feel a straitjacket tightening around our political discourse, and I wonder about where, or perhaps when, pragmatism ends and we strive for the higher ground.
It is easy to dismiss schemes such as Vote Match. A familiar response from people inclined to vote for another candidate is that they find their policy preferences match with the platform of Diane Abbott, the candidate some people are most keen to dismiss - most generously as an irrelevance but at worse as some dangerous possibility.
The strongest argument against initiatives like Vote Match is that policy preferences alone are not the only thing to consider when electing a leader. For example, you are choosing a leader who will show good judgement. Fair comment. But Diane Abbott showed good judgement that New Labour failed to. Only Diane Abbott publicly and keenly advocated Ken Livingstone as the best person to be Labour candidate for London Mayor in 2000, then suggested Frank Dobson would not have a hope if Ken ran as an independent, and advised the party machine not to seek to overturn the wishes of the London membership. She then argued for Ken's re-admittance at the earliest possibility.
Before the 1997 election Diane Abbott warned that widespread concern over pension policy, most clearly articulated by Barbara Castle, would come back to haunt the government if Labour failed to raise the basic state pension. In the year Labour increased the pension by only 75p, it lost hundreds of Council seats as a result.
As a member of the national executive committee, Diane Abbott warned against internal party reform that undermined party democracy and made ordinary members feel impotent. Not only did Labour lose thousands of members as a result, the government failed to listen to its members on issues from manufacturing and housing to foreign policy, and lost voters too.
It was Diane Abbott who stated in 1996 – warning about the policy direction of the party – that 'you can win an election appealing to middle England, but in government you have to deliver for your people'. It is something Ed Miliband rightly appeared to learn 14 years later.
None of this, however, changes the fact that policy is the most important issue when considering who should be leader. A policy platform projects a direction for the party. The party isn't just electing a personality, it is electing a political direction. By electing Tony Blair in 1994, Labour party members determined the course of British politics for the next fifteen years.
In 2010, Labour needs to demonstrate to its disillusioned left-liberal and socialist base that it is a party worth returning to, because it will scrap Trident, renationalise the railways, prioritise social housing, advocate the multicultural society and never again hand over the civil liberties agenda to the Tories. The candidate who represents the course the Labour Party should take over the next ten years is Diane Abbott and that's why I'm voting for her.
By Diana Smith / @mulberrybush
The debate on phone hacking, which unanimously agreed to refer the row to the most influential committee in the House of Commons, could have been an unpleasant affair, with heavy party political overtones. It was not.
MPs on all sides of the house unanimously agreed that there had been too much fear of the press, and that now is the time for the many issues of inaccurate and sensational reporting and underhand journalistic methods to be challenged.
The committee will now use strong powers to get to the bottom of the phone hacking allegations. More importantly though, there is now an appetite amongst MPs to look at how to help the media regulate their affairs more effectively. The Liberal Democrat MP Simon Hughes, who is himself no stranger to aggressive reporting, called for the creation of a new commission.
I am certain that this is the right way forward. I have recently been looking at our current Press Complaints Commission. This body, which is designed for the press to regulate themselves, may have been appropriate when it was created. But it simply does not have the remit or the right rules to be able to cope with the interconnected world of journalism now, where an unattributed story, which may be misleading or obtained by questionable methods can be around the world in the course of half an hour.
It is a good day for democracy, and for those people who have been damaged by an under regulated press. It is also a good day for journalism. I know that there are many good journalists who want to do their job well and want to articulate the needs of their communities. This is a real opportunity for journalists to set great standards for their profession and get the respect they deserve.
By Kathryn Perera / @kathrynperera
At last night’s Labour leadership hustings (organised by the Fabian Women’s Network and the Lead4Women campaign), we asked the candidates:
“Will you commit to restoring a full funded annual Labour Party Women’s Conference with policy making powers?”
David, Ed, Diane and Ed all gave their express support to the proposal (Andy didn’t say ‘no’, but didn’t cover the point in his response – perhaps he’ll clarify his position for us today).
This is great news. Since the general election, Labour has seen a resurgence in grassroots activism across the board and nowhere more so than within the Labour women’s movement. Many of us were frustrated at the low profile of women during the election campaign; that frustration quickly turned to anger, particularly as the unequal gender impact of the coalition’s cuts became clear. Women-focused campaigns have sprung up across the party, from the high-profile Lead4Women campaign, to the successful fight against rape anonymity legislation and the Movement4Change’s training sessions focused on women and the cuts.
It’s now time to draw these disparate movements together. Annual Labour Women’s Conferences have their roots in the earliest days of the Labour movement. They provided a central platform for policy development from the 1920s onwards. When it came to taking a lead on equality issues, such as All-Women Shortlists and the selection of people from under-represented groups for winnable seats, the annual Women’s Conferences formed a vital link across the party. They also supported leading figures such as Clare Short, who often had to battle entrenched thinking at the very top of the party.
Conferences, of course, do not need to be large-scale jamborees with expensive parties and venues. What matters is bringing people together to debate and find new ways of thinking. But without adequate funding, and the objective of making binding policy decisions, there is a real danger that any future Women’s Conference will prove unsustainable.
While in recent years there have been occasional large events (such as this summer’s one-day meeting in Leeds), the commitment to a fully-funded Women’s Conference with ‘real teeth’ had fallen off the party’s internal agenda. That’s why last night’s express commitment from the leadership candidates is particularly welcome. It is a commitment we must ensure they keep.
The Paul Richards column
There is something profoundly disturbing in the news that Tony Blair’s publishers have cancelled both book signings and the launch event for "A Journey". The book sold over 92,000 copies in its first four days on sale. On Sunday, it will enter the Sunday Times bestselling list at number one. "A Journey" has already been reprinted six times. Regardless of your views on Blair and Blairism, no-one can deny that his book is flying off the shelves. Importantly, it’s being bought, read and discussed by an audience well beyond what the Americans call the Beltway. When my book Labour’s Revival appears at the end of the month, I imagine I will know personally the majority of people who read it. Blair’s book, by contrast, has broken through to a mass audience.
Many of those people planned to get their copies signed by the author. They have been prevented from doing so by a vicious band of wreckers ranging from Stop the War thugs to the BNP. I took part in a BBC radio phone-in with a representative of the Stop the War coalition during the week. He sounded like the ranting SWP-ers I recall from student politics. It took mere seconds before he berated Israel. He was delighted that his tiny sect had denied freedom to the majority of people who wanted to attend Blair’s book signing. He viewed it as a ‘victory’. I think it smacked of fascism.
Protest is an important part of British culture. It remains the hallmark of a decent society, of the kind ruthlessly eradicated by Saddam Hussein and the Taliban. I support the rights of people to protest, picket, demonstrate and make their point, no matter how ill-informed, prejudiced and muddle-headed. Those that chose to move the book from the autobiography to the crime or fiction sections made their point with irony and without violence. But there is a distinction between the freedom to protest, and the hate-filled activities of those who deny freedom to others. When protesters deny freedom of association and expression to others, they lose their ‘right’ to protest.
I think there are people in the Stop the War coalition who think Iraq was better off under the Baath Party than the current democratic government. They regret the removal of a regime which routinely used execution, rape and torture to repress its citizens, and used weapons of mass destruction to massacre its enemies. For these people, as with the BNP, protest is not a manifestation of a liberal, pluralist democracy, but a stepping stone to a dictatorship with them in charge. The Trots call it vanguardism – they lead, we follow. Those who dissent disappear. For that reason there was more at stake than whether Blair’s suit got egged, or even the cost of policing the signings. There is an important principle in play – that if a citizen wants to meet another citizen and ask them to sign a book, no-one should be able to use violence and threats to prevent it. If you’ve followed these weekly columns over the past 14 months, you’ve have spotted that I am seldom disappointed by Tony Blair. I know it’s controversial for a Labour Party member to admire a successful Labour Party leader; it might even catch on. But I am disappointed that Blair didn’t face down the thugs and fascists, and go ahead with the Freedom Signings, as someone would have probably dubbed them. If someone wants to go to a bookshop, no-one should stand in their path.
Paul Richards’s new book ‘Labour’s Revival’ is out at the end of the month.
By Richard Watts and Graham Copp
Former senior staff members from both sides of the Europe debate believe the AV referendum is almost certain to be lost. Labour should be careful not to go down with the ship.
Before working together in Islington both of us worked on putative referendum campaigns on Europe. Richard worked in various positions for the Britain in Europe campaign, which was established to become the "Yes" campaign had a referendum on joining the Euro been held. Graham worked in both the campaign for a referendum on the EU Constitution and the subsequent "No" campaign.
Because the British experience of referenda is so limited, both sides undertook some separate work with a team of international referendum experts, including people who had worked on the various Danish referenda on the EU, the (all white) South African referenda on ending apartheid, the Northern Irish Good Friday agreement vote and many initiatives and referenda in American states.
What came out of this was the very clear message that the referendum strongly tends to favour the status quo, and that change is only possible if certain ‘key tests’ are met.
American political consultants working on referendum campaigns use a ‘Golden Rule’ to know what stands a chance of winning. The Golden Rule is that for a referendum to have a credible chance of passing at the start of the campaign Yes needs to be polling at least around 60%, No must be polling below 30% and the ratio between ‘yes’ and ‘no’ support needs to be at least 2:1.
Before the start of the formal campaign the pro-AV position is nowhere near meeting the Golden Rule. The pro-AV campaign had started well ahead; YouGov put support for ‘yes’ at 44% and opposition at 34% when they first asked voters about their referendum voting intentions in June. The lead that AV enjoyed has quickly been whittled away - already by the end of August the opponents of AV have overtaken the supporters 39 to 37%.
Referendums are often defined by the government proposing them. It’s no coincidence that the vast majority of successful referendums are held in the first year of a government’s first term of office. The referendum on establishing the Welsh assembly is commonly thought to have only been won because the early popularity of Tony Blair’s government overcame scepticism about the Assembly. Voters in the North East held very similar opinions to the Welsh when they too were offered the chance of an Assembly in 2004. But by this time the government lacked the political capital to take voters with them and the Assembly was defeated by a massive margin.
It’s no surprise therefore that Nick Clegg is trying to rush the AV referendum through, but he’s already leaving it late.
Referenda very often become a vote of confidence in the government itself. If the referendum comes when the cuts are really biting next May, it’s easy to envisage a scenario where the argument “vote no to send a message to about cuts” has a lot of resonance, particularly among Labour voters.
The effect of this is exaggerated because it is very difficult for Yes campaigners to engage the public with non-economic issues, so voters are more likely to follow the voting recommendation of people they trust. Although this may not be the case next May, the opponents of AV in the Tory party are enjoying high polling scores, while the position of the main supporters - the Lib Dems - is increasingly dire. This would suggest that more people will follow a recommendation to vote no than to vote yes.
Except in some referenda, such as that to establish the Scottish Parliament where, as John Smith said, change was “the settled will of the Scottish people”; the public’s default option is to vote no. This means that the onus is on the Yes campaign to win the case for change, which is extremely difficult. It is very easy for No campaigners to bog the referendum down in arguments about the process of the campaign, for example, the cost of setting up the North East assembly became one of the biggest issues in that vote. All No campaigners need to do is muddy the waters because they can be confident that the vast majority of undecided voters that actually turn out will opt to stick with the status quo.
The strong evidence from referendum campaigns both in the UK and the rest of Europe is that the only arguments for change that resonate with voters are economic. Unless the pro-AV campaign can conclusively show people they will be economically better off as a result of voting ‘yes’ it is difficult to see their arguments getting enough traction to break through. Certainly, their early efforts show all the signs of falling to grasp the kind of argument they need to make. Mark Littlewood makes a series of similar points here.
Whatever view one takes about electoral reform, it would be an enormous and avoidable own goal the newly elected Labour leader to introduce themselves to the public by supporting a losing cause in the AV referendum.
By Richard Watts and Graham Copp
Former senior staff members from both sides of the Europe debate believe the AV referendum is almost certain to be lost. Labour should be careful not to go down with the ship.
Before working together in Islington both of us worked on putative referendum campaigns on Europe. Richard worked in various positions for the Britain in Europe campaign, which was established to become the "Yes" campaign had held a referendum on joining the Euro. Graham worked in both the campaign for a referendum on the EU Constitution and the subsequent "No" campaign.
Because the British experience of referenda is so limited, both sides undertook some separate work with a team of international referendum experts, including people who had worked on the various Danish referenda on the EU, the (all white) South African referenda on ending apartheid, the Northern Irish Good Friday agreement vote and many initiatives and referenda in American states.
What came out of this was the very clear message that the referendum strongly tends to favour the status quo and that unless change is only possible if certain ‘key tests’ are met.
American political consultants working on referendum campaigns use a ‘Golden Rule’ to know what stand a chance of winning. The Golden Rule is that for a referendum to have a credible chance of passing at the start of the campaign Yes needs polling at least around 60%, No must be polling below 30% and the ratio between ‘yes’ and ‘no’ support needs to be at least 2:1.
Before the start of the formal campaign the pro-AV position is nowhere near meeting the Golden Rule. The pro-AV campaign had started well ahead; YouGov put support for ‘yes’ at 44% and opposition at 34% when they first asked voters about their referendum voting intentions in June. The lead that AV enjoyed has quickly been whittled away - already by the end of August the opponents of AV have overtaken the supporters 39 to 37%.
Referendums are often defined by the government proposing them. It’s no coincidence that the vast majority of successful referendums are held in the first year of a government’s first term of office. The referendum on establishing the Welsh assembly is commonly thought to have only been won because the early popularity of Tony Blair’s government overcame scepticism about the Assembly. Voters in the North East held very similar opinions to the Welsh when they too were offered the chance of an Assembly in 2004. But by this time the government lacked the political capital to take voters with them and the Assembly was defeated by a massive margin.
It’s nomsurprise therefore that Nick Clegg is trying to rush the AV referendum through, but he’s already leaving it late.
Referenda very often become a vote of confidence in the government itself. If the referendum when the cuts are really biting next May, it’s easy to envisage a scenario where the argument “vote no to send a message to about cuts” has a lot of resonance, particularly among Labour voters.
The effect of this is exaggerated because it is very difficult for Yes campaigners to engage the public with non-economic issues, so voters are more likely to follow the voting recommendation of people they trust. Although this may not be the case next May, the opponents of AV in the Tory party are enjoying high polling scores, while the position of the main supporters - the Lib Dems - is increasingly dire. This would suggest that more people will follow a recommendation to vote no than to vote yes.
Except in some referenda, such as that to establish the Scottish Parliament where, as John Smith said, change was “the settled will of the Scottish people”; the public’s default option is to vote no. This means that the onus is on the Yes campaign to win the case for change, which is extremely difficult. It is very easy for No campaigners to bog the referendum down in arguments about the process of the campaign, for example, the cost of setting up the North East assembly became one of the biggest issues in that vote. All No campaigners need to do is muddy the waters because they can be confident that the vast majority of undecided voters that actually turn out will opt to stick with the status quo.
The strong evidence from referendum campaigns both the UK and the rest of Europe is that the only arguments for change that resonate with voters are economic. Unless the pro-AV campaign can conclusively show people they will be economically better off as a result of voting ‘yes’ it is difficult to see their arguments getting enough traction to break through. Certainly, their early efforts show all the signs of falling to grasp the kind of argument they need to make. Mark Littlewood make a series of similar points here.
Whatever view one takes about electoral reform, it would be an enormous and avoidable own goal the newly elected Labour leader to introduce themselves to the public by supporting a losing cause in the AV referendum.
Today the environment will be in the Labour Leadership spotlight when SERA co-hosts the “Labour in the World’ hustings in Bristol.
Given the immediate impact that the coalition government’s public sector cuts will have, particularly on the most vulnerable, it is perhaps easy to see why green issues haven’t featured that highly in the leadership contest so far. But if Labour wants to continue to stand up for the issues that matter to ordinary people, and if we want to be the party with the most positive and compelling vision for the future, then it would be a mistake to think that the environment is not our issue.
Because the effects of it will undoubtedly be felt in the UK during the lifetimes of those voting for the first time at the next election. And there’s growing evidence that it is starting to touch the lives of people living here already. While admittedly I didn’t meet a single person wanting to discuss Labour’s Low Carbon Transition Strategy on the doorstep during this year’s election campaign, I did meet people who complained about unaffordable heating bills, draughty housing or their worries about finding jobs in the future. The longer we ignore these underlying environmental issues in favour of seemingly more pressing economic concerns, the greater these problems will become, as climate change becomes the next major economic crisis.
But tackling climate change isn’t just about avoiding disaster. It also offers a promising route out of our current economic problems. Offshore wind alone is set to generate 40,000 jobs in the UK, with more to come in areas such as low carbon vehicles. But it’s a competitive market and while the coalition government is cutting support for the new green industries, other industrialised economies are ramping up their investments in low carbon industries – global spending on clean energy in 2010 is predicted to be around $ 200bn, with around $ 47bn from just China. Securing the UK’s reputation as a world leader in low carbon industries needs a government that believes in the role of an active state – a role that the coalition is showing can only be filled by Labour.
Most importantly of all for Labour though, tackling climate change is all about changing our society. It is therefore a huge opportunity to create the fairer and better society we believe in. Although most calls to action on the environment to date have focused upon the need to safeguard and preserve what we have now, and upon solutions that appear punative and unappealing, this isn’t the only perspective. As I’ve argued before, the solutions which work are going to be the ones that focus on promoting opportunity and creating jobs rather than restricting and protecting, on increasing fairness and improving people’s life chances rather than simply limiting what we have already.
Not only does the next Labour Leader nees to put a clearly articulated and truly progressive vision for the environment at the heart of their vision for the country then, but they must also have the courage to insist that only environmental solutions that help deliver this prosperous and fairer future will do. Because getting it wrong and accepting many currently popular environmental ideas means throwing in the progressive towel and accepting that our children’s lives will be more difficult than ours. Getting it right however not only offers the best chance of tackling the environmental challenges ahead by engaging the wider population with the actions we need to take, but could also provide a new and compelling reason for people to vote Labour again.
By Mark Ferguson / @markfergusonuk
* Gender equality plan shelved, as PLP votes to retain say over shadow cabinet.
* Iain Martin in the WSJ says that shadow cabinet elections will "reintroduce an element of fun".
* A North-South divide is emerging in shop closures.
* Left Foot Forward on a London version of the "Tea Party" movement.
* Nick Clegg has urged a revamp of party funding.
* Phone hacking was "rife" at NOTW says new witness.
* And Tom Watson on the news that 52% of people think COulson should resign.
By Mark Ferguson / @markfergusonuk
Tonight all of the candidates were at the Fabian Women's hustings, which by all accounts were well attended. Today there was an important vote within the PLP - but what have the candidates been up to on the day the Fabian's Sunder Katwala declared the race over...?
DAVID MILIBAND today unveiled his "five point plan for greater gender equality":
"1. Actively promote job sharing among shadow ministers – for both men and women.
2. Supporting the drive to change the core working hours of parliament to reflect modern working arrangements.
3. Appointing a stand-alone Shadow Women’s minister and working towards a 50:50 split between women and men in the PLP by the next election. Iwill ask the NEC to put in place a process to select all candidates in opposition held seats as soon as possible and at least 50 of the top 100 targets should be all women shortlists.
4. Establishing an Equalities Fund and Leadership Academy to develop talented Labour women and ethnic minorities. Progress will be monitored to ensure money is spent well, and the party will publish quarterly information on short-listed and selected candidate profiles by gender (as well as by ethnicity). Best performing regions will be entitled to further funding.
5. Extending the right to request flexible working to all families and work, over time, towards equalising maternity and paternity rights."
David has also begun to come under fire from right-wing bloggers today. After concentrating their fire on Ed Balls earlier in the campaign (although this seems to have gone quiet lately), David was under attack today with allegations that his campaign team were planning a "victory party" for conference, and that his Movement for Change rally was stacked with organisers from London Citizens, rather than supporters.
Both of these allegations have been denied by David's team - we are told that he wishes to continue the movement whoever wins the leadership race, and wants to thank and reward those who have taken part by holding an event at conference. The only way to get people in to conference is for them to get tickets through the party, which need to be organised in advance. As for the suggestion that the movement for change is in any way fake, we're hearing that many volunteers who have taken part in the training are angered by such suggestions...
DIANE ABBOTT said Tony Blair should stop trying to run the Labour party from ‘beyond the grave’, in an interview with the Metro today. Diane told Metro:
"Tony Blair should have waited longer before releasing his memoirs. He was stabbing Gordon Brown in the back and it has not been helpful for the party."
There has also been further reporting of Diane's visit to Reading Pride, at where she was made their first patron. Abbott also pledged to introduce genuine gay marriage, saying Britain would be at ‘the forefront of Gay rights issues’ under her leadership.
While at the biggest ever Reading Pride at the weekend Diane said:
"All my life I have campaigned for equality and it makes me very proud to be the patron of Reading Pride – and I particularly like your family area, I think it is really positive."
"But what I also want to say is this – that when I am leader of the Labour Party I will put Britain in the forefront of gay rights issues. In particular, one of the first things that I will do is introduce genuine gay marriage."
ANDY BURNHAM has written to health secretary Andrew Lansley following claims that the replacing of NHS Direct with 111 was simply implementing one of Labour's plans. In it, Andy demands answers on the future of NHS Direct as 15,000 signatories to a petition to save the service have shown it to be a matter of public concern.
Later this afternoon, Andy tweeted:
"Just had amazing reply from Lansley: "I have not announced plans to scrap NHS Direct." Sounds like big U-turn & famous victory for you all."
We'll bring you more news on this when we have confirmation of what the implications of this are.
Earlier today Andy (who you may have noticed by now is a fervent Everton fan) was at the Football Governance Debate in Westminster Hall.
ED MILIBAND's campaign were continuning to do GOTV today, sending out their regionally tailored GOTV emails from supporters in each area, with an email going to members in the South today. It appears that their campaign are waiting to see when ballot papers drop in a particular area before sending out these messages.
Ed also sent a Shana Tovah message to supporters today, and released a video from GLA member Jeanette Arnold supporting him:
Today was a quiet day for the ED BALLS camp. This morning the Independent published an interview with Ed, in which he said:
"I want to escape the manipulated view of what I've done in the past."
This afternoon Balls held a members meeting in Milton Keynes, before attending women's hustings this evening. His team also released Ed's answers to questions from LGBT Labour.
We're also told that Danny Alexander has declined to debate his spending review letter with Ed on Newsnight tonight...
By Mark Ferguson / @markfergusonuk
The Press Association are reporting that the shadow cabinet will continue to be elected by the PLP, with elections held every two years (instead of every year as was previously the case).
The quota for women in the shadow cabinet rises to 6 (out of 19), but MPs rejected calls to raise the quota to 40 or 50%.
The PLP also voted to directly elect the chief whip to serve a whole parliament, in what some have suggested could be an alternative power base to whoever is elected as leader.
By James Murray
Getting people out of their homes is fast becoming the cornerstone of the new government’s plans for social housing.
On one level, they agree with Labour – that there’s not enough social housing to meet the need for it. But whereas our response is to protect the existing stock and build more, the government’s response is to get people out of their homes.
Since the election, they’ve said that if you don’t get a job, your benefits will get cut and you risk losing your home. But conversely if you do get a job, and earn a bit more, you may lose your tenancy too. And if your children move out and you under-occupy, that’s another reason to end your tenancy.
It’s all about getting people out. Presumably they think this is a smart way to address the shortage of affordable housing – but it also reveals the Conservatives’ underlying dislike of security of tenure and a view of social housing as temporary.
This is a view that we reject, particularly in inner-London boroughs like Islington. Here, social homes with secure tenancies for families on low and modest incomes play a vital role in having a stable and mixed community.
High property costs in Islington mean that owner occupation is permanently out of reach for most of our social tenants. The private-rented sector is also expensive and provides no long-term security. Social housing is not simply a safety net – it is the only way to provide stability to many in our area.
Because the government seems not to appreciate this, their responses to the shortage of affordable housing all focus on getting people out. But their plans not only undermine the fundamentals of social housing, they are also unworkable and short-sighted.
Start with the government’s plan that if you’re on Job Seekers’ Allowance for 12 months or longer, your housing benefit gets cut by 10%. On current figures, this would likely affect around 1,300 households in Islington.
Being unable to meet rent payments, many of these 1,300 households would presumably then face eviction from their landlord – most likely the council or a housing association.
There’s the obvious point that taking away someone’s home is hardly going to make it easier for them to get a job. And would an evicted household be classed as “voluntarily” homeless, and therefore not be re-housed by the council?
Then there’s the plan that if you do get a job and earn a bit more, you may lose your tenancy when your means are reassessed. Again, there’s the very obvious point that this will surely discourage some people from taking jobs.
Or rather, because you’re also likely to face eviction if you don’t get a job, perhaps people should try to get a job but just make sure they don’t earn too much?
And of course there’s the plan on under-occupation, where people have more rooms than they strictly need.
In Islington, we currently employ three under-occupation officers who help people to move to smaller properties that suit their needs as they get older. Although there are limits on what they can do, we help people move when they want to by helping them find a place, physically move there, decorate it, and so on.
This is an effective and sensitive way to address under-occupation and by implication help relieve overcrowding. Yet the government grant that funds these three officers is being cut next year. Instead, presumably they would rather we employ snooping officers to check continuously for signs that people are under-occupying?
If getting people out of their homes is the cornerstone of government policy for social housing, then getting people into decent, secure, affordable homes must be Labour’s response.
Thanks to investment under the last government, the decency of our social housing has been transformed, but we desperately need investment in new homes in Islington and elsewhere.
There’s not enough social housing to meet the need for it. We must oppose the government’s attack on tenants’ security and focus on the only long-term and effective response to the housing crisis: build more affordable housing now.
By Mark Ferguson / @markfergusonuk
Today the PLP have a real choice to make that could prove just as important for the party as the leadership election. As they vote on proposals to alter the way in which the shadow cabinet is chosen, the PLP will ultimately be choosing between a democratic and plural system, or increased levels of top-down patronage within the party. For the party to flourish in opposition, the PLP should choose the former.
The current system, as it stands, allows the parliamentary party to exert pressure upon the front bench, and carry out an overseight role that allows frontbenchers who fall foul of the PLP to be replaced by their colleagues. The party leadership has gone through the process of realising that too much of New Labour was "top-down", and has grasped the desire for internal democracy. Surely there is no sense in increasing democracy within the party, as all leadership candidates have promised, whilst removing it from a section of the party who should be the most actively involved.
Those who would favour a system based on patronage from the leader betray the desire within the party to embrace pluralism, to reach out to all sections of the movement and build on the best of all of our talents. Having a cabinet selected by the party leader is effectively playing "double or quits" with the leadership race. Want the issues that you care about to be represented in the shadow cabinet? Then you had better hope your candidate wins the leadership contest, or those who support your candidate might not be chosen by the new leader.
The issue of female representation in the cabinet is also being voted on today. It seems unlikely that the 50% target initially proposed by Harriet Harman will prevail, which is a shame. The targets which we give ourselves for breaking barriers to political participation should, be neccessity, be difficult to reach, even painful. Operating a sliding scale, which would rise to 50% during this parliament, is also a mistake, as it runs the risk of removing men from shadow cabinet posts to be replaced by women at arbitrary stages, purely on the basis of gender. The target should be high, and it should be constant throughout this parliament.
There are only a few hours left in the vote now, which is scheduled to finish at 5pm tonight. What seems likely at this stage is that some compromise will be chosen, both on electing the shadow cabinet and the percentage of women that shadow cabinet contains. That would be a shame for the party, after it has moved on so impressively in recent months from election defeat.
Of course it means that we'll see a few "big beasts" elected who the leadership might have prefered to ignore. We'll likely see more women in the shadow cabinet than before. But it won't be as plural, as representative and as democratic as it could have been - that's disapointing for the party, because democracy and women's representation are the kind of issues that we shouldn't be willing to compromise on.
By Sunder Katwala / @nextleft
So that was the Labour leadership election, 2010.
As the deadline for new members to join and get a vote ticks past as I blog, the campaign is pretty much over. In an echo of Labour's great 1945 landslide, most of what now remains is a three-week wait for the results.
Sure, votes can be cast for another fortnight. Not all of the ballot papers have reached everybody yet. I've had my Fabian ballot - with a Dear Mr Katwala letter from myself - but not my party one yet. No doubt, some voters may remain torn between candidates to the last moment, particularly on 2nd and 3rd preferences. But its very hard for the campaigns to identify and reach them specifically. And nobody could seriously claim that the three-month campaign hasn't given them a pretty full chance to come to a conclusion.
So what do the leadership campaigns do now? Do those emails, text messages and phone calls keep going to the wire, or does peace now descend even upon the Labour twittersphere? It will be worth campaigns making any final intensive efforts to check on MPs whose second preferences might still be up for grabs. A get out the vote effort to persuade more affiliate voters to vote might still yield some results. They can check their pledged supporters have voted.
Remaining hustings debates could be interesting beyond the campaign where they press on specific issues - such as the Fabian Women's Network event on equality on Wednesday. Perhaps the candidates themselves can best continue the campaigns by taking the public argument to the government.
Some final-ish reflections as the fighting phase ends ...
The BBC presents ... the ghost of hustings past
Perhaps the oddest moment in this leadership campaign is yet to come, with the Question Time leadership debate on Thursday week, September 16th. In theory, the race is still on - and there are votes up for grab. Though it will have the largest public and party audience of any leadership campaign moment, in reality, the programme can make no difference at all.
(The David Cameron-David Davis Question Time bout, two weeks after the final candidates were known, took place the Thursday night, 3rd November 2005, with members' ballot papers going out two days later. Regional hustings followed. So that could have really mattered, in a close election.) Question Time has come back a week early from its summer break, but the BBC schedules couldn't accomodate it even two or three weeks earlier.
Is the national television audience could be about to get an "action replay" of the hustings debates? Not even that. Surely it is now in the candidates' interest - especially whoever is going to win, but also their future collegues - to use the prime-time exposure to move on from the campaign, and to begin to unite. We can all expect a rather boring night.
Vote for who you want to
I have argued that "vote for who you want to" is the best case for preferential voting. AV should abolish the dodgy campaign bar graph. Labour members can and should vote for whoever they think the best leader will be, without having to think much about the tactics of the race.
Yet we have seen that political culture runs deep. Beyond wonky analysis of the second preference factor, it has felt very much like a first-past-the-post campaign. So momentum has mattered a lot in this election, with rival candidates fearing that polling and media coverage suggesting a two-Miliband race strengthens that into a self-fulfilling prophecy. Have those perceptions shifted not just second preferences, but first preferences too?
No candidate has tried to do anything creative with second preference deals. In truth, mutual affection/destruction pacts were always difficult, when two brothers had an easy way out of that tricky question. And tactical votes can still matter in theory. Andy Burnham should have made an audacious bid, four weeks ago, to hug David Miliband close, say he had his second preference, while arguing that MiliD's legs were going on the final lap - so that swtiching to (1) Andy Burham (2) David Miliband the best way to stop anyone else. But it wouldn't have been doing right by a mate.
Hence the ... Myth of the King-Maker
The dog that didn't bark? The kingmaker theory was massively over-sold. If Ed Balls was going to give a second preference to David Miliband - and any form of endorsement - he had to do it between August 31st and September 3rd. That never made much sense. It would have been reported and received as abandoning his own campaign just as the ballot papers hit members.
Balls is very clear in The Independent today - in an illuminating interview with Steve Richards - that there have been "no private discussions". By being punchiest on economic policy, and most effectively destructive in scrutinising a key coalition policy, Balls has established that he will have a significant voice of his own at Labour's top table - even winning several positive notices from his harshest media critics - though his campaign has struggled to attract support in the contest itself.
Known unknowns
My own hunch is that the race could end a lot closer than the bookies have it. We don't know about many MP second preferences. 20% of members are new to the party. The biggest unknown is how the affiliated section comes out. Nobody knows anything - or those that do aren't saying. Beyond complaints about the college's complexity, has there been even a single detailed newspaper report covering what's going on in the trade unions, and how it might affect the result? Which unions have seriously tried to mobilise, and which haven't? Are there split loyalties in some unions? How much difference do organisers on the ground think it has made? Do those Ed Miliband endorsements mean he is now doing better here than among party members? Did Blair and Mandelson hinder David Miliband here. If so, by how much?
Any serious projection of the result needs to take a view on these questions.
So, when will we find out the result
In Manchester on September 25th, of course. Yet I expect it may well be in Peter Kellner's YouGov powers to pretty much declare the result 7-10 days out. (A full projection would require some political intelligence on MP second preferences too). It is a story that The Guardian or Observer might well want to reveal, though the BBC would prefer we all hear about after their Question Time debate. Polling the affiliates section may be hazardous, given turnout factors, but perhaps it might be done on the basis of people who say they have actually cast a ballot in the election.
So the spoilsports may have it. Whatever your candidate preference, the demands of political drama may depend on hoping that any post-voting poll remains on a margin of error knife-edge. So it remains possible that - as in 1981 and 2007 - the Labour membership could gather in Manchester still not sure what the result will be on the night.
Sunder Katwala is the General Secretary of the Fabian Society, and blogs at Next Left.
The Labour movement column
The announcement of the first twenty ‘free schools’ to proceed to a formal business plan has brought the future of education into focus. Students at various schools are to learn compulsory Latin, play a musical instrument, and be trained in the arts of etiquette and fine dining (notice the none-too-subtle class differentiators?) It read like the scheduling list for a Channel 4 season of one-off specials rather than a new educational movement.
Teaching is one of those professions where you are very highly skilled, very highly trained, and hugely experienced and yet everyone thinks they know better than you. As if the stresses of the classroom were not enough then you have to deal with know-it-all parents, commentators, and, worst of all, politicians. And now in the free schools initiative they have all ganged up together.
So the ‘free schools’ initiative, which could be a fountainhead of innovation and creativity as the charter school movement has been in the US, becomes a plaything for anyone with a passing educational theory to try out. It may disappoint LabourList readers that I am not against free schools in principle. But I do see a number of likely flaws in practice. It be said that much of what is good about ‘free schools’ is already a feature of the academy programme. And the Channel 4 schedule-esque nature of many of the initiatives points to some real issues on the horizon as I’ll come on to.
Diversity and innovation of education provision is a good thing. At the same time there are models that work and they should be able to establish/takeover schools or partner them. Academies are fostering such innovation and - more importantly - improvement.
Conor Ryan reports on the latest successes of the academy programme. GCSE performance in academies is improving at three times the national average. Schools run by the educational charity Ark and the Harris Federation of schools in South London have seen improvements in the number of students getting five A-C at GCSE of more than 11%. What these schools seem to share is a refusal to accept the fate of low performance in some of the most challenging social environments. They combine the educational basics with discipline and a varied, personalised, and interesting learning environment.
They focus on pathways to success - individual success. By no means are academies the only successful schools - far from it - but many of these schools have shown astounding success. A spirit of innovation fostered by expertise works. If you speak to many of the teachers who work at these schools they will talk enthusiastically about their ability to teach and raise standards.
The days of standards not structures have gone. Standards and structures are entwined. The thing that enables these schools to raise standards is the freedom that they have over curriculum, timetabling, the length of the school day and pay and conditions. It has allowed organisations with a strong ethos to combine the managerial know-how of headteachers and other senior staff along with the expertise of teachers in (and out) of the classroom to raise standards and give children a different future. Put simply, the Academy programme gives those who know how freedom and power.
Free schools don’t quite get this right. In principle, they have one advantage over Academies in that they are able to bypass local planning obstacles which makes them more nimble. A purpose built academy for 1000 students or more is a much bigger, more complex and pricey proposition. Amongst the original twenty free schools that will go through to next stage of planning names like Ark and the Sutton Trust pop out which is reassuring. If I were setting up a school, I would be begging such organisations to run it for me. I’d hand them the keys, check in every now and then, and wait for the kids’ exam certificates to hit the mat after a few years (though please don’t think for a moment that is the only objective of a good education).
What free schools seem to get wrong is that they slightly edge the power towards parents and away from the organisations, managers and teachers who actually know about education. Of course, pretty much all the free schools so far announced will succeed - in an academic sense. How could they not?
The issues will emerge as the programme expands. Parents could assume a greater and more intrusive voice. And parents sometimes have a tendency to hark back to a golden age that never existed and see their education as the best form of education though it is unfit for purpose with today’s kids and with the future economic and social challenges we face. Boring education thus cascades down the generations. Besides, education is now better than it has ever been at every level - by a long stretch (with the caveat that many other nations are now improving more rapidly). Don’t fall for the Daily Mail nonsense - our kids are more literate, creative and better educated than they have ever been.
Politicians and commentators will increasingly interfere - and those who are the loudest tend to be either overly traditional or, at the other end of the spectrum, too rigid and inflexible in insisting on formal equality and exactitude. And all the time, education expertise will be increasingly sidelined in favour of ill-informed educational prejudice, political axe-grinding, and romantic faddism. When this starts to happen then many free schools will find it hard to recruit the right teachers - it will be a demoralising environment to have your expertise devalued. Results will underwhelm, Ofsted will hover and parents will start to turn away.
What this comes down to is the failure to recognise the separation of governance and management. Once parents are determining the curriculum rather than simply being consulted on it then that line has been breached. Before you know it, the educational and managerial integrity of the school is undermined and then it is a slippery slope. Parental voice is an absolutely essential component of a well-run school. Parental control is a very different matter. Parental empowerment requires parents to know their limits. The risk with ‘free schools’ is that they will, in too many cases, encourage the opposite.
A balance between parental voice, serving the local community, and professional integrity must be preserved if all children are to thrive in their own way in the education system of the future. ‘Free schools’ risk knocking that out of kilter though they will have significant strengths. The message is simple. Leave educational romantic faddism to Channel 4 documentary makers. At least it will be entertaining.
* A quick note of congratulations to LabourList for being voted best Labour blog in the Total Politics blog awards. And thank you to any LabourList readers who voted for www.anthonypainter.co.uk in the same poll - an honourable 12th.
Anthony Painter is Vice Chairman of Hackney Community College (he writes here in a personal capacity) and is currently involved with the establishment of a new type of school.
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