Blog 2023 Malcolm Blair-Robinson

Unite

Maybe Unite is contributing vital cash and ground support for Labour, especially as a counter to Ashcroft  in the marginals, but they are hazarding their investment with the unnecessary strike at B.A. The public are very well aware that these old style cabin crews are far better paid than the rest of the industry. Air hostesses do not resonate well with steel workers or hospital ancillaries. Moreover this has sharply reminded the voters that Labour is dependent on and linked to the Unions. This will play badly in middle England and I suspect is a factor behind the stall in Labour’s advance in the polls.

Three Cheers For Obama

There are reports that the Obama administration is getting very tough with Israel over Settlements. This is high time. Resolving the issues in the Middle East is the biggest priority in the world today, because from it flows benefits to all the other tensions, Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan, not to mention homeland security. The Administration must stand firm not only against the Israeli government’s preposterous and universally unacceptable position, but with the vast Israeli lobbying complex in the U.S.

Israel and its people deserve a just and lasting peace. They have shown themselves stubbornly unable to embrace the faculties necessary to achieve it. They must now be dragged to the table by the ear.

High Water Mark for Labour?

This blog has remarked several times that Labour may have reached its high water mark. Polls are now beginning to point to this. One or two are showing the gap with the Tories growing just wide enough for the latter to win outright, all things being equal. This will be very welcome news for the Tory high command. It will be worrying, but not unexpected, for Labour.

The problem now for Labour is that they do not have many shots in their locker. In fact they never did have, but the Tories lost the plot for a spell and this helped to raise anxiety about inexperience and substance. The next phase of the campaign is going to last until Parliament is dissolved and the election is called. It is at that point that the real battle will open, with the Lib Dems and minor parties like the Greens, BNP and UKIP entering the fight at full blast, with the potential to cause upsets all over the place. Meanwhile the current new phase will be critical to the prospects of all.

Labour have before them a river to cross and as they cross it they will come under intense fire from all sides. They may not even survive the crossing as a credible force. I refer of course to the Budget. At best they will hold their position. It is unlikely they will gain ground, because Darling will not have good news, or if he does, he will be derided even more. Bad news may please Tory voters but it will put Labour off and drive them towards the Lib Dems or the BNP. Most significantly the Budget will provide the Tories with a magnificent set piece opportunity to get their campaign back on track and re-energised. Already there are signs of forces being massed for what will be, or certainly should be a, titanic attack.  Not only will there be Osborne, not perhaps the heaviest weapon around, but there will be Cameron and Clarke. From the woods will come a very heavy weapon indeed, the undoubted popular choice for Chancellor, Vince Cable.

If Labour can hold their own in all of that they will do well, very well. The Lib Dems can advance more into the limelight, which means up in the polls. For the Tories this is a shot of fresh adrenalin and an opportunity to win the argument by showing they are radical, have a purpose, can be tough and have a plan. They should have no difficulty in doing this. They must. If they lose this one, they lose everything.

Criminal Children

Dr Maggie Atkinson, the Children’s Commissioner for England raised an important point recently when she commented on on the age of criminal responsibility. Here it is the lowest in Europe. She linked her remarks to the Bulger case, still so emotive that the Government immediately had to distance itself from her remarks and an incenced James’s mother called for her sacking. Dr Atkinson was, however, heard. It is important to move away from the dreadful murder of the little boy which stills appalls the nation and look at the wider point.

There is no doubt whatever that an adult criminal court is no place for children. There is also no doubt that rehabilitating juvenile offenders who have taken a very wrong turn in their lives requires a huge investment for many years of public funds. It is important to understand that the difference between right and wrong is obvious to youngsters brought up in a loving home, but where there is little or no competent parenting, family cohesion or even love, the line is far less clear. The old moral authority of religion is now off the public agenda in most schools  in which potential offenders play little part and gain scant benefit.

Before setting the age, we need to change the Courts. I have advocated for some time that Family Courts which judge issues relating to family disputes and care orders should become Inquisitorial rather than the present Adversarial and should have their own investigating officers. The same arrangement should apply to what we could call Young People’s Courts to which all serious wrongdoing up to age sixteen should be channelled. After an enlightened and just legal process there must be a rehabilitation programme which works, so that those found guilty gain an opportunity to repay society by leading blameless upstanding lives as useful members of society, once rehabilitated and set free.

So far this does not seem to be happening in the case of Jon Venables. Maybe it cannot because he is beyond redemption. A robust system would show that also.

Hung Parliament

This is the media buzz now, with the polls pointing to a much closer finish than at the beginning of the year. This is a good moment to examine why the new parliament may lack a party with an overall majority and what it would mean.

Labour has won the first part of the campaign and narrowed the gap with the Tories, who have the huge task of having  to win nearly a hundred and twenty seats to get a majority of one, whereas Labour could lose about thirty and still have the magic one. Churchill said one is enough. It is not. Wilson had a handful in 1974, but bye-election losses meant that his successor Callaghan ended up without and had to do a deal with the Liberals. Major had over twenty in 1992, but lost his majority again through bye-election losses and ended up in hoc mainly to the Ulster Unionists. Apart from Ken Clarke who was a savvy Chancellor the rest of the government became a shambles. Nevertheless the tradition is to avoid coalitions in this country and allow a minority government to totter from one vote to the next until it spies a moment of advantoge to go the the country or the opposition is strong enough to bring it down. That it what happened to Callaghan. Thatcher’s first scalp.

The reason this election is now very difficult to call is that, for the moment anyway, the Tories do not have a big enough lead to neutralise the effects of smaller parties and really break through. They may recover their position by polling day or they may not. Labour has done well so far but may be near its high water mark. Going  into the lead and returning with a majority is still something of a dream. Now enter the Lib Dems.

The Lib Dems can suffer defeats and still hold the balance. That may happen if  some of their marginals in the south fall to the Tories and some of those in the northfall to Labour. They do, however have a strength. There is no obvious fringe party eating into their vote. This means they could stand still and gain seats if the BNP eat into the Labour vote when the Lib Dems are placed second and UKIP eat into the Tory vote where the Lib Dems are second in those marginals. Opinion polls have some difficulty with third and fringe parties because the national percentage does not translate into a universally even outcome. So without a real surge from the Tories (or Labour) a hung parliament is now a real possibility.

All across Europe hung parliaments requiring coalition goverments are commonplace and generally produce good quality administrations with a better track record of national advancement than our own. Unfortunately the terrible weaknesses in our so called Unwritten Constitution offer no clear framework of rules to which all elements of government have to abide. The string of practices, customs, laws and procedures lawyers bandy about as our constitution are in fact nothing of the kind. A proper constitution is the supreme set of rules setting out how and in what form government of the people, by the people for the people may operate. This is why, apart from Israel we are the only major democracy not to have one. It is worse than that; we are one of only three countries in the world which does not have a proper written constitution.

Few people grasp just how archaic our set up is. Because we are an absolute Monarchy at the core of the State, the Government is not the people’s government or parliament’s government. It is the Queen’s. When she dissolves parliament at the start of the election campaign proper, the entire government remains in office and getting paid, although none are any longer MP’s. This is because whilst the Queen is the titular Head of State, all her powers are notionally vested in her Prime Minister. In a proper constitution the powers of the Head of State are important political offices requiring impartial but active participation. Unless directly elected ( the U.S and France for example) the head of State is one tier above the government but acts as referee to make sure the rules are stuck to and a viable coalition agreement is signed between the parties to ensure government of appropriate quality and stability (Germany, Ireland, Italy etc). This does not mean these countries have perfect government, but it does mean they have in place the rules by which it will operate.

A hung parliament will either lead us quickly into another general election or it will bring into the open the rickety and outdated structure from which our limted democracy manages to govern so inefficiently and, at the same time, proclaim its legitimacy. Maybe both.  

Finally Nick Clegg is reported to have remarked that the largest party will have the moral authority to govern, even without a majority. That is rubbish. Until every MP has a majority of all the votes cast in the constituency as a rule of getting into the House of Commons and until Governments achieve over fifty per cent, either on their own or in coalition, of the votes cast by the people, there will be no such thing as moral authority in our government. Just power grabbed by minorities exploiting totally inadequate rules.

The British National Party

The BNP has gained significant media attention because the Court has for the second time judged its Constitution unlawful. At the same time an on line poll has shown the gap between the two main parties very much wider in the Conservatives’ favour than the general trend of other polls. It is believed that this is because the strength of BNP support is being underscored in Labour heartlands because people are embarrassed to admit their support for the far right but on line are more honest.  If this is correct a bell needs to ring the alarm at Labour H.Q. If a third party pulls enough hardcore Labour support in marginals, whether the Tories or Lib Dems are lying second, Labour will lose and lose big. Echoes of Michael Foot and the SDP/Liberal Alliance.

Election Latest

We can take it as read that in the Labour camp there is some satisfaction with the way things are going and rising morale at the realisation that contrary to almost every rational thought a few months back, they are in with a chance and have taken the initiative in the campaign. Because of the ditching of New Labour they are even managing to sound fresh on occasion, although the message is more to do with safety. Storms ahead, but we got you through the worst much better than anyone predicted. Yes Gordon shouts and throws things and he did not go to charm school, but he never gives in and he won’t let you down. High speed rail plans and a freeze on the pay of all the top people in the public sector, judges, generals, mandarins, GPs, most of whom vote Tory anyway,goes down well with the core Labour vote and with nervous international markets worried about debt.

Accross town in the Tory H.Q., there is by contrast mounting unease. What on earth is happening? How did we get here? Ashcroft, the Ulster Unionists, Samantha voting for Brown, phone calls from Bush (yes Bush.This looks as if the Americans think that the only way to get through to Cameron is to fix for one fool to call the other), plus muddles of tax, marriage, cuts and so on. Brown sobs, nearly, on Piers Morgan and up go his ratings. Cameron says he wants something more substantial and appears on Titchmarsh. I beg your pardon?  The Times laughs.

There are many reasons for what began as a prang, but is now building to a multiple pile up. Some may even be approaching despair. Yet there will be steady hands and cool, calm nerves somewhere in those steamy meetings and a plan is being hatched for sure to get the show out of the ditch and back on the road. Everyone will know, or should, that nobody thought there was any chance of Heath winning in 1970 until a few hours into polling day. Much the same thing happened to Major in 1992. What is needed is just to keep on plugging the message.

What message?

Ah, that is where the biggest problem lies.

For many generations the Conservative Party was seen as the natural party of Government. Generally it governed well. Now and again it handed over to more revolutionary groupings, for example 1945, but mostly you could rely on the Tories to govern and look to Labour to fix inequality from time to time, but they did not govern as well. This began to unravel in the nineteen seventies. The Heath government fell apart having made a mess of the economy. Labour got back in and made it even worse. There was despair. Time for another revolution. But this time it was a Tory revolution led by a multi-tasking M.P, housewife and mother of humble beginnings in a corner shop in Grantham. As the grandees whispered in corners and found themselves dismissed as wet while others were reduced to tears, this remarkable lady unfurled her banner, raised it aloft and won election after election, grinding into touch unions, socialism et al.

There was of course a legacy. A bitter one. Without her, the new Tory party was nothing. As her mighty presence faded to a shadow in the wings, the party under its new leader, won a famous victory but then lost everything and crashed to its greatest defeat ever.Four leaders later it needs 117 seats to get even a majority of one. On course to do this at the start of the campaign, this now looks impossible. But wait. The campaign has not really started yet. At the moment it is a media thing. Parliament is still sitting. We have yet to have the manifestos, broadcasts,  rallies and so forth. Yes and those debates.

Phew! It is not too late! No, but on the condition of one key understanding. The Tory party is no longer and has not been for years, the natural party of power. Thatcher changed it to a radical party of purpose. Victory depends on defining what that purpose is and getting the voters to embrace it.  It is not about fiddling with the details of education, moving control of banks from the FSA to Threadneedle St, finding a better route for the high speed line, or ’empowering parents’. It is much bigger than all of that. Those are details but what is the Mission? There is around a feeling that the Tories just want power because they think it is their right and that’s what they teach you at Eton. Leadership and power.

Votres will turn away from that.

High Speed Rail

Today’s announcement of the proposal to build a high speed link, up to 250mph it seems, between London and Birmingham as the first leg of an expanding network is one of the best transport announcements since WWII. All parties are in favour. There is some jockeying for position and the Tories, with an eye to marginals near the proposed route, are trying to make out they may have a better idea, but broadly everybody is in agreement that this makes good sense, not just in itself, but is just the kind of project to help us forward economically.

The Thatcher years left many good things in place but some bad ones too. One of the worst was the general disinterest in infrastructural renewal and of rail modernisation in particular. A trip to Europe reveals just how far we have slipped and a major drive to give us a twenty first century railway is long overdue. I would like to balance it by reclaiming defunct branch lines as rural tramways. To go eco we need to do a lot more to revolutionise transport both personal and public. Lots of opportunity here.

Education

The Tories have announced a policy of changing the leadership of 75 failing schools within 100 days of taking office. It is a good move and could play well with voters. Unfortunately Labour has a similar plan but according to Ed Balls even bolder. It is also true that Labour have introduced the  radical reforms of Academies, Trust , Foundation and Faith schools and tougher OFSTED inspections, so from the point of view of voters I am not sure there is much clear blue water between the two; more currents and eddies depending on local situations.

I have direct experience of a failing school, both as a parent and as an Addition Governor parachuted in by the LEA when the school went into Special Measures. I agree that the difference between a failing and a good school is almost always leadership quality. But and it is a very big but, the catchment area and level of family deprivation plays a big part. This does not mean schools should be expected to fail in really difficult catchments, because the value of a good school is socially all the greater when surrounded by deprivation. It means the leadership must be even better. It also has to be savvy. It needs very short lines of communication.

My school needed a change of leadership and this was  known to the LEA. However they had no powers to act, because they were not in charge of the school. They were in partnershipwith it. Only the Governors could act and they liked the leadership and would not. So down went the results and because some parents had choice, down went the numbers and because of the way state schools are nowadays funded down went the income. The result was unbelievable IT with a server wired up in a toilet and results at GCSE way below the national average. Parents who could afford to go private did and those who were mobile and could get their children into neighbouring state schools did that. The best alternative was a faith school which triggered an outbreak of religious devotion in order to try and qualify.

The only way to effect change was for Ofsted to put the school into Special Measures which put the LEA into a position where it could direct events. Unfortunately such was the decline in numbers and the state of the finances, the only route away from looming closure was to become an Academy, which has as yet to prove that it can deliver to the standard expected.  The ones who suffer are the students who need the school most from disadvantaged or dysfunctional backgrounds whose parents neither have, nor could be bothered to exercise, choice.

Now all this vast,  costly and sorry saga could have been prevented, with its huge financial drain and the incalculable cost of failed chances for the children affected because they are only in year whatever once and cannot turn their age clock back. What would have prevented it was the permanent power of the LEA to manage its school, change the leadership or do whatever was necessary to deliver a proper level of provision out of taxpayer’s money to those in need. Failure to do this would have led  the Cabinet Member and the majority party to suffer at the ballot box. It is called democracy and it is a clever idea.

Trust or Foundation or Academy schools outside LEA control may well be a good idea and add choice and competition within the free state education system. There is still a central role for LEA managed and funded  schools, especially in rural or disadvantaged areas and it should be a feature of education policy to put them back into the system. We need a return of the District Education Officer with both the power and the responsibility that goes with it. Woolly partnerships with enormous attendant process, practice and bureaucracy overlaid by pro forma inspections and rigid measures will not, whoever is in power, ever do better than disappoint. When cash is short they devour it like a wino with an endless string of bottles.

Afghanistan

David Milliband, the Foreign Secretary has just made a speech in the U.S which was peppered with anxieties and caveats about political progress in this troubled country in which we have no business to be. However since we are there and our brave troops are dying almost daily, we need to know that all these clever strategems about which we constantly hear, the surges, drives, democratisation and so on are working.

We bear in mind  the confrontational aspect of U.S and U.K  policy towards Iran and link that to news that President Karzai, in addition to taking personal  control of what was supposed to be the independent electoral commission has welcomed none other than President Ahmadinejad, describing him as a ‘friend’. His friend then laid into the American ‘occupation’ explaining with a rather sharp appreciation of the sensitivities, that it was America’s policy to create terrorists in order to fight them. All this was going on while Robert Gates, U.S Secretary of Defense and head of the most powerful military in the world, was on a simultaneous visit. Secretary Gates described the Iranian President’s visit as ‘annoying’. Indeed. Hmmm.

Are we sure that everything is going according to plan?