Rebuilding our youth movement to win again

By Ed Balls MP

It sends the right signal about the future of our party that Labour’s first formal leadership hustings this evening will be for young members. Not tacked on at the end as an afterthought or a box to tick – as happened during the deputy leadership election three years ago – but young members front and centre of this campaign.

And as we choose a new leader to take on the Tory-Liberal coalition and reconnect with the voters whose support we need to win again, we must rebuild the Labour Party from the grassroots up. A diverse and outward facing party that represents, stands up for and is in touch with the communities we serve, whether that’s as Labour MPs, councillors, trade union members or school governors.

Rebuilding Labour’s youth and student movement is central to this task. This can’t simply be because Young Labour and Labour Students are amongst the hardest working footsoldiers in some of our toughest campaigns – though many councillors and MPs, including myself, are grateful for the dedication they have shown in marginal seats, in countless by-elections and in their campaigning against the BNP. It’s also about developing Labour’s campaigners and elected representatives – as we can see in many young people elected as councillors this year and in this talented new intake of Labour MPs. And it’s about making sure young people have a voice on policy which is listened to. That has to be about more than simply discussing climate change and votes at 16 – a victory for young members on the National Policy Forum, which was sadly watered down in the manifesto.

While these issues are important and have helped to inspire many young people to get involved in our party, all the young members I’ve met are just as passionate about tackling crime, making sure we have more skilled jobs in a green and growing economy, widening educational opportunity, improving transport or providing more decent housing.

And these challenges can only be dealt with by a Labour Party that is in touch with the concerns of the British people – and which is more than just a pressure group, but has a radical and credible programme for government.

So I believe there are two key tasks to win again with young people. First, we must understand young people’s hopes and fears and show how Labour, as the only progressive party in British politics, can address them.

In my constituency, for example, despite all the progress we have made in widening educational opportunity there are still too many young people with low aspirations who do not stay on at school or college at 16 or who do not apply for university even when they have the ability to succeed. And while some of that can be tackled by raising aspirations, it’s partly about the current system of financing higher education.

We were right to bring back grants and abolish up-front tuition fees. But for many families on modest incomes in seats like mine, the fear of taking on debt through top-up fees was still a deterrent. That’s why I think we need to move to a graduate tax – with no upfront costs and no assumed debt. It’s a fair system in which graduates pay a contribution to the cost of their university education, but only once they are in work and based on their ability to pay.

At the same time, we must resist any attempts to allow variable tuition fees which would create a market in higher education that shuts out those from modest and disadvantaged backgrounds from our best universities.

On the economy, it’s vital for workers of every age, but particularly those about to enter the labour market, that we secure economic recovery and invest in the skills and jobs Britain will need for the future. That’s why we must stand firm in opposing the Tory-Liberal government’s ideological, short-termist and dangerous cuts to university places, the youth jobs fund and support for businesses.

On crime and anti-social behaviour, during some of our period in office our rhetoric often sounded as if we were demonising all young people, when the truth is that young people are the biggest victims. ‘Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime’ was not simply a good soundbite, it was the right approach to policy too. But sometimes we forgot the second half of that mantra.

That’s why as children’s secretary I was determined to make sure we did much more to prevent young people going down the wrong track by investing more in things for young people to so after school in the evenings and weekends. While we may have started this investment too late in our time in office, the new government is already cutting it and we must defend it.

But we can only respond to the concerns of young people if we build a stronger youth and student movement in our own party too. Our party structures and constituency meetings must be more welcoming to new members and young people – with debates on policy, politics and campaigning, not simply procedural discussions and minutes from the previous meetings.

Many of our CLPs do this already – and where there are active Young Labour groups, young members can easily get together with others. But while Young Labour has grown over the last few years, it does not have the support it needs to be as active as it could be. It’s astonishing that at Head Office there is no dedicated full-time member of staff for Young Labour.

I think that is now too much of a missed opportunity. So as leader one of my priorities for rebuilding our party will be to ensure we secure the funding to employ at least one full time youth officer again. But that must not come at the expense of the three full time Labour Students officers – who work incredibly hard all year round, as do hundreds of Labour Students in campuses across the country. And since young members fought for and won a youth membership rate, we must now make the most of that opportunity by recruiting more members and giving them a voice in the party.

So we must support the youth and student movement to grow stronger and more diverse, while making sure we listen to young members so that we get our policy right. That is the only way we will strengthen our party for the future, gain the trust of young voters and win the next election.

This is the second in the series of LabourList pitches from the leadership candidates.