It’s OK to spin (as long as you spin well)

By Emma Burnell / @scarletstand

At the same time that the term “spin” has gone out of fashion, the call for a Labour narrative has become ever stronger. We need to have a better understanding of how communications can and must work as a vital part of modern British politics. Before I go on, I should add that I have never worked for the party in any capacity, and while I work in communications, I’m far from being a spin doctor. This isn’t a self-justification, but a call for an understanding of the art and necessity of political communication.

Good Political Communications people don’t lie. They know it’s dumb. I know that most of the responses to this post will use the phrases “sexed up” and “dodgy dossier” (especially if the commentators don’t read past the headline) and I totally understand why. We have a misunderstanding of the role of political communications officers. We see a Malcolm Tucker/Alastair Campbell model of macho swagger and intrusion into policy making as the norm, when in fact a lot of what got Campbell into such trouble towards the end (and I’m sure inspired the character of Tucker) was well outside the usual communications remit.

Party communications are about presenting the arguments in favour of our policies, and against the Tories. They are about tying the policies together to form a coherent story of what Labour is about, what we are for and why we deserve the trust and votes of the electorate. They aren’t there to set policy, nor are they there to debate its pros and cons. That’s what the party itself is for. That’s where Campbell’s generation went wrong. They confused the medium with the message and as a result the outcome of communication trumped the outcome of policy too often.

As the world develops, and the way messages are distributed change, the Labour press and comms team will have to learn to be flexible. They will still craft the message, but its dissemination will more than ever happen through members on Twitter, Facebook and blogs like this. Innovative spinners will see parallels on this to the trend towards community organising as a model. People trust people who aren’t paid to tell them things. We’ve always known that the best way of getting our messages out is on the doorstep, but technology is expanding what our notion of that “doorstep” is and can be. Good spin doctors will want to utilise the different ways members will adapt the message to suit their own audiences, rather than try to retain central control at the expense of nuance.

So far, so positive. But there is another side to political communication that we are failing on too often. In the West Wing, when being taught how to handle a press conference, Vice Presidential candidate Leo McGarry is told “If you don’t like what they’re asking you don’t accept the premise of the question”. All too often, we accept the premise of the Tory attacks on us, on the government we left behind and on the things we hold dear.

If we start using the language of “non-jobs”, if we start to accept not that cuts are going to happen (they are) but that its ok that they are going to happen – particularly cuts that lead to unemployment – we accept the premise of the question. Nobody does a “non-job”, they fulfil the functions they are employed for according to the priorities of their employer according to their strategic plan. If we want to return to being able to provide all but base utilitarianism in the future, we need to stop denigrating jobs which perform those “nice-to-have” functions that actually make life worthwhile. Like diversity workers and arts officers.

Labour would make cuts, yes, we would be forced to. We are also being forced to implement Tory cuts on a local level. But we don’t want to change either the employment prospects of those who work for the state and its agencies, or the provision of services of clients of the state and its agencies in a permanent way. Our cuts would be a brutal necessity, not a rebalancing away from inefficiencies.

I understand that in the short term and to all of us who are frightened about the effect the cuts are going to have on our lives, this may sound like the worst of spin. But ideas are important, and they are important because they effect change. If Labour is going to be in a position to build anew a thriving public sector, we need to lay the foundations now. And at least a part of that is in convincing the people of the necessity of doing so. We need good effective communication, clear red lines of difference between us and this government and their cruelty and we need to remember not to accept the premise of the Tory attack on the most vulnerable and the things we cherish.