Labour leadership candidates face off over education, Europe and Scotland

The second unofficial Labour Leadership hustings event took place today with all five candidates (Jeremy Corbyn MP was a last minute addition after his late announcement) speaking on a panel at the Fabian Society summer conference.

They started out being asked for the six words that could encapsulate their vision for Britain. Your author has tried her best to take these down word for word (not all of them stuck to six):

Andy Burnham said “A Labour Government will help everyone get on”.

Yvette Cooper said “Jobs, Growth, Fairer county for all”

Mary Creagh said  “Power, wealth and opportunity in the hands of the many”

Liz Kendall said “Power, wealth and opportunity for all”.

Jeremy Corbyn said “Housing, world peace, equality and human rights”

Throughout the session there was quite a lot of agreement on the issues that face the party and the country politically. The fact that we are a country with a very divided identity was central to challenge that all the candidates recognise for the Party and the fact that we are a country that will be confronted with fundamentally huge challenges on whether we look inwards or outwards. These mean existential challenges on immigration, Europe, Scotland and our varying and conflicting identities.

There were some areas of disagreement. In policy terms these were probably most stark over education. There was a definite sense – both from the questioner and throughout the day – that there was not enough focus on education in Labour’s 2015 campaign nor that we had made it the feature it should be. Education has always been a key issue at Fabian conferences – a great many members are also teachers.

Jeremy Corbyn and Andy Burnham were both furthest to the left when it came to defending the comprehensive system. Mary Creagh and Liz Kendall chose instead to focus on the effects of education – with Kendall describing it as the key to tackling inequality and Creagh quoting Einstein while attacking Michael Gove.

The related issue of tuition fees also divided the candidates, with Corbyn offering to abolish them and both Andy Burnham and Yvette Cooper proposing to move to a system of a graduate tax. Liz Kendall said that she would not abolish fees, putting her spending emphasis instead on the early years.

Other disagreements were more organisational. Andy Burnham was challenged over the perception that he supported an independent Scottish Labour Party. He responded that he hadn’t wanted to dismiss the idea – put to him by some Scottish Labour members – out of hand, but it instinctively didn’t feel right to him. Yvette Cooper argued that we must not break up the Labour Party and must cherish the values of our solidarity. People struggling to achieve their dreams in Scotland have more in common with those doing the same in England than divides them. Liz Kendall also expressed opposition to the idea. She argued that Labour had campaigned in and won the Scottish referendum by arguing that we are stronger when we pool our resources and share our risks and that should be as true for the Labour Party as it is for the country.

Mary Creagh – on the other hand – did not rule out supporting a independent Scottish Labour Party explicitly, but did say that we need to tell the story of how over movement works across the union to provide better for everyone.

Jeremy Corbyn probably went the furthest in supporting the idea of a separate and independent Scottish labour Party arguing that devolution has meant we are moving towards a more federal Britain and that could well mean we need a federal Labour Party.

The other key campaigning difference was on where Labour should place themselves during the Referendum campaign over our membership of Europe. This was not largely over which side we should be on (though Jeremy Corbyn did call for the Party to guarantee MPs a free vote so they could campaign on both sides, and expressed some misgivings over the pro-corporate nature of post Maastrict Europe) but on how Labour should campaign.

Andy Burnham made a passionate case for having a Labour “yes” campaign that was separate from the official yes campaign. This would he believed solve the issues we have with being too closely associated with the Tories as happened to us in Scotland.

Liz Kendall however argued that this would lose Labour the opportunity to be seen as on the same side with businesses and unions together all making a progressive case.

The final question was the rather bleak “is Socialism dead? While no candidate was quite willing to challenge a standing room only Fabian audience to the point of saying yes, their responses and the responses to them were quite telling.

Jeremy Corbyn related his answer to the socialist response to corporatist movements taking land and resource rights all over the world.

Andy Burnham and Yvette Cooper argued that the fight against inequality matters now more than ever and will only matter more over the five years of a pure Tory government.

Liz Kendall drew gasps from the crowd when she said that while Socialism isn’t dead, it must fundamentally reform itself and that Labour must care as much about wealth creation as wealth redistribution (as it is that wealth that pays for public services). She also found a possibly unlikely ally in Jeremy Corbyn when she expanded the point to say that we must not confuse Socialism with Statism and we should redistribute power as much – if not more so – than money.

The candidates are at the start of a long journey and will have many more hustings and a good few more disagreements. But the Fabian session today did start to tease out the difference between them.