Holding the mirror to Labour: what political reformers most need to fear .

On Thursday I am going to have to plead the virtues of coalition to a combined campaign group of Greens, Respect, Lib Dem, Labour & Citizen party activists as part of the campaign group Fair Votes 4 Dorset. It is something I can only approach with discomfort.

Among the left, the repeated accusation against the Liberal Democrats for entering the coalition is one of betrayal; of selling out. But what makes me even more uncomfortable is what these accusations suggest about whether or not we are mature enough as a political culture to accept the outcome of electoral reform as a system. Because that’s the thing about coalition government: if we want electoral reform we are going to have to learn to live with it.

Why is it so threatening ? Is it because the history of UK politics has been until recently the history of class struggle ? Is it because politicians are loyalists & obsessives, intensely focused people who don’t lead normal lives, & because radicals are used to being positioned on the outside, powerlessly looking in ? Or is it because of tribalism ? Tribal politics makes working with anyone else almost always intensely uncomfortable.

In the immediate aftermath of the General Election I had some interesting tweets from Labour activists: one of them predicted that the Lib Dems were about to be assimilated by the Tory party & we should joyfully expect annihilation at the next election.

So I’m intensely uncomfortable about assimilation too. I’m on the left of my party – what Kinnock would describe as a Lloyd George Liberal – strongly refusenik, non conformist & commuitarian.

But if we are to convince the public & the other parties that coalition means anything other than assimilation & that coalition government is good government, then it will be precisely because it involves challenging the tribalism of British politics.

Why does coalition work ? Because when you abandon tribalism you are left simply with problems – and the choice of whether to turn your back on them or to explore a variety of solutions. That usually involves something that is practical rather than political. Evidence based politics that is about doing things that will work rather than about ideology; guided by political principle but not dictated by it. And it always involves some form of compromise – but then none of us can be self righteous or arrogant enough to claim that we have all the best ideas in every policy area, surely ?

But in discussing PR we have to look beyond coalition - we also have to ask, ‘what sort of a country is it that we want?’

We may say we want fairer voting & more democracy in a variety of places: the anomalous House of Lords; for elected Mayors; for local government. More power for District, Borough, Town & Parish Councils to influence the lives of local people. Power for organisations & services to innovate, develop & respond to local need. A devolution, empowerment & self determination agenda.

People who engage in politics are by and large interested in activism, in community, in volunteering their skills for the benefit of others. But these qualities are not merely restricted to politicians & they always involve a decision to make an impact on your own life & on that of your community.

What vanished from British culture during the course of the 20th century was precisely that sense of community & self determination. I won’t call it responsibility because that smacks of Cameron’s ‘big society’ - an ill defined spin of an idea. People want control over their lives & they want to influence them for the better. In our historical journey from industrialisation to consumerism community got lost along the way. Why ? Because the centralisation of power in the state & the decline of local market systems transferred all power to the centre.

So what kind of society do we want ? Well, peak oil indicates to us that reliance on globalised trade may well not last beyond our lifetimes. Local markets & economically as well as environmentally sustainable solutions are going to have to be recreated.

The centralisation of the State & the global economy have over the past 500 years taken away local self determination. Only in some less developed parts of some European countries can we in the West see how local small scale agrarian & industrial systems can deliver prosperity effectively – in regions of France, parts of Spain & Italy. Being a small country & the first to industrialise & develop global trade, we lost this local infrastructure long ago.

So what does the sustainability agenda have to do with voting reform ? This: people are profoundly dissatisfied with their lives because they have no power; localism gives access to a smaller, more clearly defined political arena than that of the state; a smaller environment – one where it is possible to genuinely & effectively influence the local economy & well being. One which is much more accessible to groups currently excluded from the political process – one which , given the current debate at a national level, is much more accessible , for example, to women.

Instead of the vast mechanism of central government, there will be a series of interconnecting honeycombs – interdependent but with independence - & yes, monitored at some level by the state so that exploitation & corruption don’t occur; but by & large self monitoring: it’s called local democracy – and we don’t do it well in Britain.

Changing our voting system is one of the steps we have to take to reverse the historical decline in the ability of ordinary communities to determine their own lives. Why ? because with a wider variety of parties in Parliament & local government we encourage a pluralism of ideas & a greater ease with sharing an agenda in politics.

I believe that single party government produces bad government – it produces a hierarchy rather than a honeycomb. Both Margaret Thatcher & Gordon Brown & his henchmen represented all that was wrong with this system. But returning Parliament to a place of genuine debate, where an ordinary MP can influence the political agenda & encouraging dissemination of power down the hierarchy of government from central to local levels creates participation & it creates involvement.

Until this election I had never believed this involvement was really possible – it was more of an idea. Now I do . Not just because the British people voted for a hung parliament, but because talking to voters on a daily basis in the 4 months running up to the election I discovered something I’d never expected to see – the British people engaged in & feeling deeply about politics.

something about the nadir of the expenses scandal & enduring that last 5 years of poor government had exploded their habitual cynicism & positively energised them. Again & again I saw repeated a real anger ‘I certainly won’t be voting for Gordon Brown’ – and that was from Labour voters: it largely explains the result here in South Dorset 4 weeks ago.

After the election the results were all people in the pubs & on the streets could talk about. They were intrigued. They were even talking about how things might have been different with electoral reform !

So if now IS the time to seize the day, what do we need to do & how can we make the changes that so desperately need to happen ?

There’s one main obstacle to achieving electoral reform in this country & it’s not, as you’d expect, the Conservatives: they’ve been brutally honest about this all along, they don’t want change & they’ll campaign hard & vote against it. The real obstacle to electoral reform that we have to plan for & deal with , the real danger to genuine reform of our political system, comes from the Labour party.

Why ? We’re back to that word again - tribalism; & its accompanying dementors - centralisation; stratification; paralysis of ideas. Despite all the talk of going back to roots, we are watching in the leadership race, a contest based virtually entirely on the very dramatis personae that propped up Brown agenda.

The problem lies in the contradiction between the two very different sides of the Labour movement that I will call 'radicals' & 'authoritarians'. It is manifested in two points of view expressed in the newspapers in the past week.

As Alan Johnson in the Observer, May 23rd puts it:
The Lib Dems missed a golden opportunity genuinely to re-shape politics in this country by failing to negotiate seriously with us on constitutional reform.
It is time for Labour to end the ambivalence that prevented us from honouring our 1997 manifesto commitment to a referendum, offering the British people a choice between the current system or a proportional alternative……….

So what now? The Labour leadership election has spawned much necessary internal contemplation and will produce more rhetoric about empowering the electorate. Here's how we turn the platitudes into policy.

The new government is committed to a referendum on a new voting system. It will contain two options — the current first-past-the-post system and the alternative vote. It will be the first time in the history of our democracy that its citizens will have a say in how their votes are translated into political power. What possible argument can there be against adding the recommendation of the Independent Commission on the Voting System, AV+ as a third option? It retains the constituency link, extends voter choice and is broadly proportional.

I hope that all the opposition parties, backed by a popular movement throughout the country, unite to press the Tory-Lib Dem government to give the public the option of genuine electoral reform in a referendum. If not, I will certainly be making the case within my own party to submit legislative amendments to that effect.....

Martin Kettle however in the Guardian on May 28th paints what I fear will be the more likely picture:
…..the AV referendum will be a moment of historic choice for Labour. Its future will hang on the decision it makes. On the one hand …it can support a move towards greater electoral fairness…even though the effect of a yes victory will be that labour must change into an alliance making party if it is to govern again……

On the other hand, Labour could abandon AV under the smokescreen of antipathy to a reduction of Commons seats…..it can campaign for a no vote & hope that someday a new Tony Blair will emerge….to deliver an overall majority under a continuing first –past-the-post system.

On past form, lacking the steel to face up to hard issues…Labour will jump on board the no campaign…..but a Labour party with strategic sense & principle would do the opposite....


That is why what is happening in the Labour party at the moment is so important to our campaign. I believe we should be encouraging what Alan Johnson suggests – campaigning with Labour for inclusion of AV+ in the referendum. But I think we are far more likely to get what Martin Kettle predicts.

Remember that tweet: you will be assimilated & you will face annihilation at the next general Election.

After all that is what the rump of the Labour party really wants. Why ? Because just like the Conservative party, New Labour is all about power. Obtaining, holding & maintaining power at the centre & doing whatever it can to preserve it. Its preferred aim is to re-establish itself as the Leviathan of the left, regardless of its centralist & antiquated ideas: alteration of this is the change the Labour party least wants to make happen.

The Labour that would support PR is the Labour of the co-operative movement; the early trade unions & early dissenters & social reformers – a Labour party that left leaning Liberals would quite happily support. But not New Labour : not this Labour party.

So as electoral reformers what must we do ? Because the only way we’ll get this change is with their support. They have the resources, the man-power ,if they so decide, to make this change happen. Without it only 25% of the vote will support the change this country desperately needs to see.

For me that’s the central issue – we have to turn the mirror onto the Labour movement, just as they are doing now with the Liberal Democrats, & ask them to face the same hard truth: what kind of a party are they ? What has happened to radical Labour ? Can it possibly survive the authoritarianism in the party ?

Radical Labour has far more in common with Respect, with the Greens & with radical Liberals than it does with authoritarian Labour – but I have to be honest with you, I don’t hold out much hope - & why – because it too is the victim of tribalism. It will be too hard for Labour to give up.

It’s the curse of always believing that you are the underdog – that you have to fight hard against everyone, all the time, in order to survive – even your friends. And of course, if you are working class, or disadvantaged in any way at all, that’s true . But it’s also the fatal legacy of the class struggle in British politics. It makes even the thought of coalition government unpalatable.

That is why we must support this coalition at the same time as supporting electoral reform: so that the coalitions of the future are not restricted to a version of ‘small state’ versus ‘controlling state’ politics, - the power of the market against the power of the state - but so that we can include a precious third option, the option of genuine, devolved democracy & radical power-sharing reform.

Unfortunately we can only achieve this if we bring the Labour movement with us.. I’m not by any means suggesting that you should all go out & join the Labour party ! But yes, those of us who are union members need to think about how we use our vote & I am saying that I will be supporting whoever has the reform of the Labour movement at heart & whoever commits to the vision proposed by Alan Johnson.