Blog 2023 Malcolm Blair-Robinson

Ed Milliband

By common consent Cameron gave Ed a drubbing at PMQ’s today. Since returning from paternity leave Ed’s leadership has lost its shine. Labour is getting worried. All these policy reviews are fine, but they are to take two years. Two years?  A week is a long time in politics. Two years is a generation.

Of course it makes sense to look at policy. Ed has already, correctly, declared a break with New Labour. The problem for him is he has not shifted gear from a leadership campaign to leadership itself. A campaign is about themes. Leadership is about decisions. It is not very bad for a leader to call for a review of policy without setting out what the policy should be. It is, after all, much more democratic. But it is not very good either. Leadership is about follow me, not where do you want to go?

Ed could start by getting to grips with the economy. Labour is outgunned at present on this. Blamed for everything, the profligate spending party which lost control. So far all we hear from the former party of government  is spend more for longer. We have had Ireland now. People are no longing listening. What is needed is something new. Not focus group stuff but great wisdom from a great mind. Ed’s mind.

He could begin by exploring the positives of the current taxpayer (sounds so much more personal than state) ownership of bits of the banking system and the rail network and asking whether this idea might not be extended to energy, for instance. Not on the basis of bailing out loss makers, but on the basis of investing to earn profits to pay for public services. People hate the energy market. They know it is rigged and that they are in the hands of speculators when they turn on the gas. He could ask himself whether taxation is the smart way to pay for the NHS? Might compulsory insurance be cheaper and better?

Labour has to think out of the box and re-interpret socialism in a modern context. It has to do it now. Muck about for two years and Cameron and Clegg will be too far ahead to catch.

Sarah Palin and Wikileaks

Sarah Palin is reported to have said that Julian Assange, the boss and founder of Wikileaks, should be hunted down like Bin Laden. She is not reported to have commented on the fact that Osama Bin Laden remains free after nine years of ‘hunting down’.

Nevertheless this tells us something of this fundamentalist politician as well of something of America. We have known both things all along. To the extent that Sarah Palin represents small federal government, low taxes and the right of the citizen to be free, she will do well. Whatever your politics, if she succeeds, this aspect of her platform will not harm America; it may even do it good. Against this is set the knee jerk, misguided, naive and often ignorant, aggressive and vengeful view of the world promoted with such spectacular disaster by the neo cons.

The thirst for revenge after 9/11 cost the United States its unchallenged position as the power on earth. A combination of slapdash economics, the War on Terror, Iraq and Afghanistan has brought about a  shift away from American leadership at all levels and in all spheres, right across the world. President Obama has done as much as he can to set things right, but there is a limit to what he can do, especially as the political mood back home is both polarised and divided.

Sarah Palin needs to think about this. America has many fewer friends abroad than was once the case. It cannot afford to lose any more. Wise counsel is what is needed in foreign affairs, not populist proclamations.

Deficit Deniers

We hear less about these people now. Ireland has made them wonder. They will be back if the economy slows significantly as the cuts bite next year. The issue, however is not the deficit. It is the level of national debt. This is what has brought Ireland down, brought Greece to its knees, threatens Spain and Portugal, possibly Italy and could then come our way too.  

The budget deficit is a detail. It is an important detail because it causes the debt to grow bigger every day. The debt must stop growing. Already it is too big for one generation to cope with. The markets wonder whether these debts are repayable at all. The scenario is like a bus full of people whizzing along a road which ends in a cliff. The argument rages within the vehicle at what speed the bus should go. The fact is all are doomed unless it stops. 

In the UK we have world leading combinations of personal and national debt. We have to rebuild our economy on a totally different model which avoids at all costs borrowing more money and uses every opportunity to pay it back. Any economist who says borrowing is the only forward is going over the cliff in the bus. However renowned they are.