The biggest speech of his life – what does it need to do and can it work?

The Labour movement column

By Anthony Painter / @anthonypainter

And so here we are. What a strange Parliament it has been. 2005 seems a world away. These will be remembered as the credit crunch years. It will be remembered for the nadir of expenses corruption that gripped the nation’s legislature. But that is for the historians. For after almost four and half years, the election starts now.

Next Tuesday, Gordon Brown will have to deliver the speech of his life. Nothing short of that will do anything to restore Labour’s fortunes. It is easily forgotten that he came up with the line of the conference season last: it was “no time for a novice”. But it hasn’t stuck.

A year later and the country seems absolutely willing to consider passing the keys of the kingdom to a novice. Not only that, but to a novice that has shown himself incapable of getting any of the big calls right.

To return to a theme that I have touched upon before, the election of a Conservative government risks economic disaster. Don’t take my word for it. Take the word of Lord Skidelsky. He put the argument with pithy disdain in The Telegraph a few days ago:

“Almost all that Osborne said is right and sensible in conditions of full employment; most of it is wrong and wrong-headed when there is heavy and persisting unemployment. Although he understands that we have been in the deepest recession since the war, his strategy for recovery assumes that there is nothing to recover from – except a Labour government!”

But nobody is listening. Instead, the cuts bandwagon gathers momentum. Sirens in reverse – those who warn passing ships away from the rocks – are ignored, and instead we obsess about the fiscal deficit. To add the necessary caveat here, by no means do I wish to suggest that when normal times return serious fiscal retrenchment will not be necessary. Put simply though, we are not in normal times.

So when Vince Cable makes an excellent contribution to the discussion about how to close the deficit and reduce national debt, he fails to add an equally necessary caveat – ‘when the time comes’ – in any meaningful sense. So he describes as a ‘fiscal crisis’ what I hope he knows is actually an economic crisis with very serious fiscal consequences. The nuances are important.

My concern with the cuts dynamic is not partisan. My concern is substantive. If it gathers an unstoppable momentum – as it may already have done – the political driver will be towards bad economic policy.

For all of this, any alternative message has just not got through. The reason? The public are not receptive to it.

Nor will they be receptive to the ‘global influence’ narrative. The time to make this case was after the G20 Summit but very quickly there were distractions – smear emails and the like. If Gordon Brown’s speech next week is just a litany of ‘big decisions’ made at big international conferences then that also will be water of the duck’s back for the electorate.

Nick Clegg chose to use his platform this week to indulge in a series of tactical manoeuvrings that started off with the bizarre and has continued on to the perverse. On Saturday, he opposed holding a referendum on electoral reform on the basis that, “Anything Gordon Brown proposes now will turn to dust.” So who’s going to do it for you, Nick? David Cameron? Because, in case you haven’t noticed, you haven’t got the parliamentary votes. You are the third party.

He then proceeded to characterise a vote for the Green party as a wasted vote. Things have got a bit silly in Bournemouth – and just for or a change it wasn’t the delegates who were culpable. It was the party leader. It wouldn’t have happened in Ming’s day.

David Cameron has the easiest job in the world. He could read his conference the entire works of Marcel Proust and the media would characterise it as charismatic and visionary. They will marvel at the sight of a bipedal standing without support. He could bounce on one foot while singing the frog song and it would excite comparison with the best of The X-Factor compared with Strictly’s finest moments. You get the picture.

But Gordon Brown has to reach a whole new level. Perhaps there were hints of what he could do at the TED conference – but a one liner won’t be enough this time; a rabble-rouser will hit the wrong note; an aloof statesman act will fly invisibly above the clouds – he has to do something more.

He has to convince that he has the ideas, and determination to continue. He doesn’t want to win just in order not to lose. He has to have a notion that connects his personal philosophy with a better Britain. He has to acknowledge mistakes, ditch the political baggage, and free himself for the good fight. He has to speak to the nation and say we’re better than to give up in an economic storm, things aren’t so bad that we have to turn to the first travelling salesman who passes through town, the years ahead are tough – and when things are tough you see the best in us.

And now is not the time to give up on social justice. Now is the time to advance it: less inequality, less environmental destruction, greater opportunity for all, a world united in facing up to its enormous collective problems, and a politics that is more open, democratic, and involving. If there is one lesson from financial calamity, it is that we must build a different way of doing things.

Perhaps we were complacent in the good times. It would be amazing if in twelve years of government mistakes weren’t made and we didn’t have regrets. But we did make this country a better, fairer, place with greater opportunity. We could and should have done much more. But that is not reason enough to give in.

If Gordon Brown mixes this humility with determination, optimism with honesty, and speaks to the nation on its terms, then he can begin to shift the political mood. If he ditches tactical manoeuvring and instead presents a vision of a different Britain that can inspire then just maybe David Cameron will be begin to lose his lustre.

That is the challenge. Over to you, Prime Minister.