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EVENT
After the election: what next for centre-left politics?
CAMPAIGN
High Pay Commission
PUBLICATION
The Advertising Effect
THINKPIECE
#60 Responses to Recession
Compass welcomes key measures in the PBR: including levy on bonuses
Today we welcome a Pre-Budget Report that drew clear dividing lines between Labour and the Tories - containing some bold policies that emphasised greater fairness. Crucially it marked a moment when the Government finally showed The City who is boss. The political significance of today's announcements should not be underestimated.
We are particularly pleased with proposals for a super (or windfall) tax on individual bank bonuses that formed centre-stage of the Chancellor's statement. Over recent months it was Compass who led calls for the Government to rein in the so-called ‘masters of the universe' and curb excessive pay as part of our campaign for a High Pay Commission. We also specifically campaigned for a Banks Windfall Tax in the short term - either on profits or bonuses. The Chancellor finally opted for a windfall levy on the latter and we welcome this as a positive step.
It's worth noting the consistent campaigning of our members and supporters who first helped re-popularise the very concept of windfall taxation last summer and who over recent months helped campaign on high pay that has now led to the one-off levy on individual bonuses. We have shown what a difference we can make in campaigning for positive change.
The one-off levy on bonuses is just the sort of bold and decisive progressive policy a Labour Government should be about. A clear signal to the country that Labour is on the side of the many not the few. While David Cameron may once have offered the empty promise of a ‘day of reckoning for bankers' it was left to a Labour Chancellor to actually deliver it. On that basis we hope today's PBR translates into a further narrowing of the polls and with it the diminishing likelihood of a Tory victory at the next election.
On a more cautionary note we would reaffirm that whilst it's right to intervene and impose a one-off tax on excessive bonuses for the short-term, the Government must now recognise that this will not on its own sufficiently address the fundamental problems associated with excessive pay in the long-term. That is why we believe the urgent case for a High Pay Commission has now never been greater.
We also regret that the PBR did not go far enough in addressing the structural problems with our economy and in particular the country's over-reliance on financial services for jobs, growth and tax revenue. We are also concerned that most of the figures contained in the report are all based on growing consumption levels and rising house prices. We therefore would have liked to have seen greater investment in a Green New Deal - which has the potential to diversify the economy, create new jobs, build energy efficient new homes and deliver sustainable growth. This much needed extra investment to help restructure the economy could of course have largely been paid for by immediately announcing plans to scrap Trident renewal. We also do not believe that our public sector workers - nurses, teachers and cleaners - should be forced to pay for the mistakes of bankers through massive pay restraint.
However, other positive measures we do welcome include the Government's commitment to further close in on tax avoidance at the top and scrapping top rate tax relief for pension contributions. It was good to see a greater emphasis on tax justice and ‘those with the broadest shoulders' being called upon to ‘carry the greatest burden'. Particularly as the Chancellor has now promised to scrap plans to raise the inheritance tax threshold. Many of these ideas were put forward in our recent groundbreaking tax report In Place Of Cuts. We further welcome the real terms increase for schools, hospitals and policing, along with the extension of free school meals and new measures to tackle youth unemployment.
So whilst the Chancellor's announcements may not go far enough towards the radical 21st century economics we should now aspire to, it does mark a further step away from the Neo-Liberal economic agenda of the last three decades. An agenda that allowed those at the top, in particular The City, to shirk their responsibilities to society and a tax policy that allowed high earners to be taxed proportionately less than those on middle and lower incomes. Some may feel this is all a little too late, but the PBR did continue the journey away from Thatcherite taxation policy, a journey first embarked upon in the Budget last March and therefore further evidence of a change of direction in the Government's overall tax and spend policy.
This Pre-Budget report has shown that Labour may be starting to get off its knees, taking the action the economy needs and the people want. This must be the start of a trend to put society before the market that continues right through to the next election and beyond. But finally it is just that - a start - much more must now be done to build the good society we want to see.
What do you think about the PBR? Please offer your views below
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Comments
on 15 December 2009, 7:02:46 PM
Lee - I think what you may be saying is that tyrants kill out of carelessness rather than wickedness and it gets easier so I'm told.
****************************************************************
My guess is that this is Frances.
To me, the real issue is not the relish with which they kill, or the slogans they chant while they are doing the killing. If there is "evil" involved, that would be the principle of the "dispensability of people in pursuit of a higher cause". I make no distinction among those who kill in accordance with that doctrine.
Islamic terrorists kill a child in a suicide bombing. US troops drop a bomb in a civilian area, claiming they are targeting terrorists, and kill a child. In both cases a child is killed under the doctrine of "the dispensability of people in pursuit of a higher cause." If either can reasonably be expected to understand that their actions could lead to the death of a child, I regard them as equivalent. My own view of their "higher cause" is irrelevant. Could I imagine some circumstances that may be mitigating ? Yes, but the argument would have to be fantastic to change my mind. It is almost never fantastic. The onus shouldnt be placed on me, but on the killer to come up with that fantastic argument. The only ones I have ever encountered are straight off BBC sci-fi....imagine that the whole world is going to be destroyed unless you sacrifice one child...that only happens in Torchwood, not in the real world. The suicide bomber and the US bomber pilot are both quite capable of deciding not to pull the trigger.
I cannot imagine an issue of principle more important than this, and I look forward to Jon's Left transparent policy forum debating it.
on 15 December 2009, 6:25:59 PM
on 15 December 2009, 6:16:41 PM
Lee - I think what you may be saying is that tyrants kill out of carelessness rather than wickedness and it gets easier so I'm told.
So when we had healthy Labour branches with a cross section of the community coming to meetings - and meetings debated policy - someone in the meetings would have had a relative who was sick and claiming benefit and there would have been knowledge in the room and concern flagged up and sent in. Similarly when MPs were more involved in the real community. Now the party is detached and lives in the stratosphere with millionaires and has 'lost touch, with real people.
Detaching from the roots hasn't just been from the political roots but from the care and concern for people. Broken party.
on 15 December 2009, 5:52:45 PM
As I completely agree with the substance of both your posts I will do as Frances suggests.
However I hope I won't be the only regular contributor from here, not in the least because if I have anything relevant to say it is largely because of the intelligent atmosphere fostered by so many knowledgeable and good people who have given their time and opinions for free.
And what could be more democratic and socialist than that!
on 15 December 2009, 5:41:16 PM
Because neither the LRC nor Compass are transparent and accountable is the reason why we so need a genuinely transparent Left Think Tank.
People should not only be able to see both how decisions are reached and who supports them - but they should be encouraged to contribute
on an equal basis to those who administer the way this is conducted.
Thanks for the support of my suggestion Dugsie.
on 15 December 2009, 5:39:54 PM
Why doesnt Britain have a Noam Chomsky ?
Richard Crossman was probably Labour's leading intellectual, but so wrong on so many issues ? Why has a "correct" Richard Crossman not emerged since his death ?
on 15 December 2009, 5:34:05 PM
I think you have reached the point that CarerWatch reached. We got tired of inhabiting other people's boards and started our own.
It costs almost nothing and you only need a small core group to manage the sites and repel the inevitable trolls and cyber attacks.
As long as management is restricted to admin and disaster control everything else is in the open and anyone can join you have a transparent group. As soon as mangement are having secret policy meetings you lose that.
You have a core group here. Go for it.
on 15 December 2009, 5:31:17 PM
Jon: Isnt it odd that a far more conservative country like America, has a number of left-wing policy think-tanks, but in Britain they are so rare (or so uninfluential) ? Think-tanks arent bad here on specific issues. Tim Jackson's Sustainable Development Commission (funded but ignored by the Government) produces some fairly decent policy analyses. There are many universities here with first class topic-specific think tanks or research groups. When I was involved in an analysis on the Ethiopian genocide under Mengistu, I found that the genocide centers here were among the best in the world. Of course, there is East Anglia, which is actually an outstanding environmental research center, now being mangled by the flat-earth media.
I guess the problem is where does the initiative come from ? The Unions are enthusiastic supporters of neo-liberal policies where they are seen to provide employment. Labour has been raped. Demos has been Purnelled (although Alan Simpson is involved). The Fabians seem to have given up on serious analysis. The state of the left in the UK really does look like a bomb site. I am lucky enough to read Italian and French, and I often look at left-policy sites from both countries on the internet. Italy, for example, gives much higher status to intellectuals than is the case in the UK, and many newspapers in Italy carry quite impressive articles on political issues, way above the level of the Guardian, for example. That tradition either never existed here or is lost. nonfatlooking
on 15 December 2009, 5:20:20 PM
No one organisation is taking advantage of this, yes there are lots of well meaning groups, but no real figurehead or champion of the left. I think that it is the lack of a rallying point that is very frustrating. Lots of people are still to the left of politicians, look at the furore over bankers, MPs expenses. There is also a potential backlash against welfare. Recently made redundant workers are stunned into shock when they find out how much JSA they are entitled to. Again historically the labour movement was and should be the rallying point to fight back. As Lee stated, Blairism has practically destroyed this response. Also a generation brainwashed into consumerism, cheap credit and corporate robotism certainly has'nt helped.
Uniting and mobolising the labour movement again is a huge task but certainly not impossible. It was done when this country really was a world power, running free market capitalism ruthlessly. Surely it can be done again not only to combat injustices of the free market, but the mortal danger of climate change. One hour of handing out relevant leaflets in a city or town square can work wonders. This is where Compass and other groups should aim, i as a member have no problem giving my time. Maybe the management commitee can help with this?
Emails to Gavin.
on 15 December 2009, 4:42:07 PM
on 15 December 2009, 4:20:24 PM
and facts that 'get in the way' of strategy and decisions. The left and in particular the far left has been there and done that - and look where that
has got them.
I can't believe for a minute that Dugsie would disgree with any of this by the way.
An independent and wholly transparent Left Think Tank would probably be very helpful - but this would need to be created as there isn't one at present. (With all its meetings and debates put online etc).
The longer the left delays this - the longer they will remain irrelevant and
out of touch with both the political arena and the wider population.
on 15 December 2009, 3:50:54 PM
What we both know Lee is that the project to establish a social science failed. There were reasons for that, which remain valid today. Most of the time physical scientists say they don't know, which is why I take a lot of notice when they say that they do know something. This doesn't mean that we shouldn't try to be rigorous in our approach. It does mean that it is usually easier to understand things in retrospect, than it is in prospect. A political project is based as much on faith as on reason. I think that the socialist project is an appeal to human decency. I place a lot of emphasis on the role of ideology in society. As long as we are bombarded with propaganda in the form of commercial advertising, it is difficult to move much beyond the low view of human nature. However, we do know that human beings are capable of all forms of emancipation. Once religion ruled not just people's lives, but their very understanding of reality. This generation knows that it is at least possible to think for ourselves, both individually and collectively.
on 15 December 2009, 3:04:40 PM
I am also a details person. I spent my professional life designing and implementing very costly projects and policy programmes in the developing world. What success I achieved would not have been possible if I were content to live with abstract principles and ideological labels, even although my actions were always consistent with some fundamental principles and beliefs. I know that on occasions, I irritate Dugsie no end with my demands to be detailed and concrete. I know he is angry with me when he calls me a maverick. But I have a huge need to know how things are going to work, mainly because most of the time, they dont work. I also know I am a lousy committee member. I am either an insufferable pest because I demand examples and details, seen as a spoiler to the goal of comfortable consensus, or spend my time doodling and sketching the other people. I was loved by my clients and hated by my colleagues.
on 15 December 2009, 2:45:51 PM
core issues (like climate change and welfare) and demonstrate how 'we' need to combine such supposedly unconnected problems into a realistic programme of action. I'm sure you are as sceptical about the present obsession with 'single issue' campaigning as I am and this is my attempt to encourage actvists to 'pool' their resources (witihn reason).
Your point below actually supports my contention:
'The strongest arguments being made on the climate front come from a group of ecological economists who were themselves children of neo-liberalism, but saw how continued, unregulated economic growth was destroying not only the social fabric but also the environment.'
Politics has clearly changed and resorting to dated words and labels will
not help anyone. I think the 'left' or 'progressives' need to realise that as the 'rules' have changed so much so should our response. 'Neo-liberals' who for whatever reason have realised that their ideology is flawed (as in your climate change example) are no longer 'neo-liberals' and should be encouraged to make common cause with their former opponents.
But this still means that core concepts such as reform of Parliament etc have to be agreed on for them, and their activists to have any traction.
Frankly if enough people combined under this kind of platform I'm not concerned over what word was used to describe it - as long as it carried
the same meaning and message to most people who saw it (I.e. words or phrases that sent out different meanings to different people would only confuse far more than they informed - they would clealry be counter productive).
on 15 December 2009, 2:45:43 PM
My poor old father used to say that it is always easier to win popular support for a silly but simple idea, than it is to get people to think..even about their own self-interest. The more scrupulous you are the less influential. If the message cant fit on a placard, the message is too long.
on 15 December 2009, 2:35:43 PM
How much does it matter whether the motives behind the welfare reform legislation is "indifference" compared to "evil intent" ? Philosophically there is an important difference. The "indifferent" or "negligent" are at least theoretically accessible to education and influence.
It is hard to believe that Purnell intended the suffering that is being caused. He is looking at different things to what you are looking at. He has evidence that convinces him that hundreds of thousands of cheats are drawing money from a cash-strapped social welfare programme; that that is socially destructive and unjust to those who have genuine need; and that he has to do something about it. He decided on the strategy of "distrust everyone, the honest will emerge, and we can nab the rest". Its certainly cheaper than simply chasing down all the crooks, and he was probably sold as well on the idea that his strategy would be a much stronger disincentive. As a cabinet minister dependent on the Treasury for his budget, he probably didnt have the option of saying..."look, any method we use will be so socially destructive and costly, that its better and cheaper to simply pounce on the crooks when they are obvious" (which I think is the French position).
Before he made the decision, I am sure he was advised by his experts, that there were winnowing out systems that would keep the suffering of those in genuine need to a minimum, and he decided that in terms of the bigger goal, it was worth the risk. Once he made the decision, the systems builders took over, and he left it to others to give the assurances and talk about the safeguards.
Now that is a very different scenario to an evil or extreme person pushing through a system regardless of its impact. I imagine many other decision-makers we may decide are extreme or evil, go though a similar process. Perhaps more than we would comfortably concede. I dont regard such an analysis as mitigatory. I am just as opposed to what Purnell did.
In essence, the issue is almost always about the "necessary or unavoidable dispensability" of people in the face of higher policy objectives. Very few tyrants just kill people with no purpose. The USA calls them collateral damage, which is an advance excuse allowing their troops to do more or less what they want...but just killing civilians isnt the goal. When a terrorist blows up a bus, his goal is to force a power much greater than his, to agree to terms, to see the struggle as futile, to turn public opinion against the enemy.
While we each have our own most hated examples of "necessary or unavoidable dispensability", we will probably agree that such policies are always dead-ends. They will never work and always result in failure. I know that what turned the tables in South Africa was not the guerilla tactics of the military arm of the ANC. Instead it was growing, massive, civil disobedience, an unwillingness of the apartheid government to risk additional huge casualties; Mandela's commitment to a multi-racial society (he rejected the pressure from the American civil rights movement and Steve Biko who advocated black power); and the emergence of imaginative and committed negotiators from the government side under Botha and then de Klerk.
on 15 December 2009, 2:22:05 PM
Supposing that I wanted to mount a popular campaign against the war.I could make an appeal to the class allegiance of the majority of the British population and call it a capitalist war. But this ideology is not as well rooted as nationalism. So I'll use nationalism. I'll attack the government for betraying the British nation in its subservience to American foreign policy objectives. What sort of false patriots are these, I'll ask, without an independent British foreign policy ? British troops are being killed to defend American interests in a far away country.
Justified ?
Perhaps I'm just being satirical.
on 15 December 2009, 1:54:32 PM
If you were a neo liberal and very committed to docile, compliant workforces you would support the whole of the Welfare Reforms. But you would stop short of threats to the very sick because it is extreme, cruel and serves no purpose. The Taliban probably believe in lots of good things we never hear about but are characterised and demonised by their extremism. That sort of dedication to dogma to the point of being blind to the cruelty of your actual behaviour is a sign of an extremist. Someone who has lost the plot. We have a hit list of evil people who went too far and are demonised.
So a conviction alliance would be on humanitarian grounds and could include people from NewLabour. But it doesn't. Why not? Are they all so far gone that they are all extreme. They are responsible for wars and many deaths. That must make it hard to sleep at night unless you blank a lot out. Their grasp of the expenses scandal wasn't a good sign - tenuous at best. What is the state of the inside of the head of a Labour MP these days? Not normal or this campaign wouldn't be necessary.
The sick seem to have no one to speak for them and are often disorientated, weak and vulnerable but that shouldn't mean they are an easy target. It's like attacking babies. Civilised people shouldn't need to be told not to do it whatever their beliefs.
The left are organising a campaign against the whole of the Welfare Reform Bill. That's not the same thing. That is an argument to be had with the neo liberals.
on 15 December 2009, 1:27:36 PM
I dont know any socialist group right now, that has stronger arguments based on socialist ideology. In fact, these ecological economists have become adopted by both the Bolivards and many third world left-wing movements. Although I believe in socialist principles, I am not a great admirer of ideological purity.
on 15 December 2009, 12:45:07 PM
'I suggest that conviction alliances, based on shared values and views, are different from strategic and tactical alliances.'
I think Dugsie is absoutely right about this - and short-term 'emergency' coalitions are very important against something like the far right. (And to be fair the 'obsessive sectarianism of the extra-Labour Party Left' is down
to the fact that they have fundamental differences between each other despite the lable given to them).
I also think Brian is just as right when he points out:
'I also think that climate change and the urgency for CO2 emission reduction and the relevant campaigns. Are spreading the left supporters pretty thinly, there are so many different fronts to fight on.'
As in Frances when she makes it very clear that the mentally ill and the terminally ill are being bullied and threatened because there is no one to stand up for them. As the 'illegal' strikers at the power plants showed earlier this year - only those who stand up for themselves and fight back are able to defend themselves against the merciless cuts being aimed at almost everyone.
Which is why there is no alternative to the 'conviction alliance' as Dugsie
puts it so well. Olny when enough people can combine will any attempts
to try and subvert the 'neo-liberal paradigm' have any chance. When we realise that values such as the environment, sustainability, caring for all those who can't, for whatever reason stand up for themselves, all point to the fact that people, and what sustains them need to be placed before
all else, then maybe a 'conviction alliance' would be very much within our
reach.
on 15 December 2009, 12:38:27 PM
I have been wondering what measuring tools we use to characterise the politicl orientation of an individual, a group, or a party.
The most powerful, which applies of course to all MPs and Lords is voting record. But when one takes groups like Compass or the Greens etc, we do not have that. So it seems to me we have the kind of campaigns they have run/supported, the statements they make, and the alliances they forge.
That is relatively slim pickings. As Dugsie points out, there are many different types of alliances forged for many different reasons, and it could be quite misleading to interpret every alliance on the same basis. Campaigns supported also point to alliances, and likewise there could be a range of motives aside from clear conviction.
Historians place strong reliance on documents recording speeches or statements of political position. It is my hypothesis that although what Tony Blair introduced was not new, it took a new form and significance. He introduced what Compass calls the "NARRATIVE". There is a huge difference between a speech (in its old-fashioned form) and a narrative. In a speech the politician says what he believes about a specific set of issues, and we deduce from that speech, the politician's ideological position. We have always, of course, had to make allowances for lies and misleading statements.
A Narrative is very different. With a Narrative, the politician or group decides in advance what it wants readers or listeners to believe is their ideological position, and facts and arguments are employed to lead to that result. It is the invention in modern times of the adverising and publiuc relations industries (although it clearly existed at the time of Machiavelli).
Today, we very seldom hear speeches. Even in short BBC interviews, we get truncated narratives. Our capacity to tell what the politician really thinks and stands for has becomne severely diminished. David Miliband, like Blair, is a master of the narrative. He knows just how to deliver it to make it sound convincing to the more gullible majority of the audience. Both Straw and Mandelson have created their own highly personal versions of the narrative technique. Its a difficult art to master, and when it falls apart, it is equivalent to losing one's pants in public. Gordon Brown and Harriet Harman are exmaples of people quite incapable of making the narrative work, so they end up providing public presentations of their lingerie.
Compass is almost entirely an organization of alliances. It would not exist without them; it is their modus operandum. That means it has to make alliances with what is there to make alliances with. I continue to believe that when Compass has alliances with selective Blairites, its purpose is to seduce them, or convince them, to move to the left. Inevitably, allies to the left of left-of-center, would experience efforts to persuade them to move to the right, or at least abandon aspects of their left beliefs that would make the alliance fall apart.
With a strategy like Compass's based on alliances, it follows that the broad movement can focus ONLY on the most generalised of goals...hence the Good Society, or campaigns, like save the Royal Mail, where the overall goal is popular. "Get the Bankers", Commission on Wealth", and PR, are other obvious general campaigns that a broad alliance could work on. "Indict Blair" would only become a goal when its the feeling of at least half of the PLP, and supported by some big fish in the Labour cabinet. I dont see that happening now, or even after an electoral defeat. Blair produced a cowed party full of appeasers, and there is no reason to expect that they would behave differently to the way they are.
on 15 December 2009, 10:55:11 AM
But we could complain to an Ombudsman if we could find one. Isn't there an Ombudsman for this? We've done well like that in the past. We had a schozophrenic who was lent £15,000 secured on his house by a High Street Bank when he had no job and was psychotic and a year later they foreclosed on the house and demanded £32000 which they said was the penalty for default after one year. It was all legal and in the small print but the Omsbudsman made them pay the excess back. Omsbudsmen are actually allowed to use common sense.
on 15 December 2009, 10:14:33 AM
on 15 December 2009, 10:04:57 AM
policies that target the sick and vulnerable. Hence the reason that Liberty is looking at this from a human rights stance. Here's hoping that they proceed and reverse this injustice. Historically Labour, the trade unions and liberal and left coalitions would have fought these bills. However nowadays how many "labour"
MPs attend rally's, very few indeed, new labour has seen to that. The political enemy being of course not only the Tories but New Labour. I also think that climate change and the urgency for CO2 emission reduction and the relevant campaigns. Are spreading the left supporters pretty thinly, there are so many different fronts to fight on. Caused by the profit before all merchants, as Jon rightly points out. However i do agree that more needs to be done and Compass can and should be involved. Letter to the Guardian and Email campaigns are all well and good. Change has only came by feet marching on the streets, so how about a green/left alliance rally organised by Compass. Now that would be different!
on 15 December 2009, 9:00:42 AM
With prisons there is an Inspectorate. When banks sell unwisely to the mentally ill we go to the FSA and they are empowered to ask banks to return the money on compassionate grounds. Who do you go to when the DWP goes rogue?
Liberty think Human Rights legislation could be used agaisnt the DWP.
But sick people are trying to stay healthy - they aren't supposed to be fighting Goliath. The senior military spoke up and said the state had broken its covenant. But they are trained fighters. The Chair of the Select Committee at DWP has taken to voting in both lobbies. So far most commentators think he is just confused.
ESA is only being used on new applicants. And if you are newly sick you are completely disorientated. The program will be rolled out on existent claimants after the election. Each claimant will go in alone and have no idea what is happening. Mostly it will be endless private pain.
We are being asked all the time by journalists and charities to find people going through the new ESA bullying for them to use as evidence. We can't reccommend sick people to journalists. It doesn't feel safe. The charities are safer because if you get involved in their research you get their protection but that makes their researches meaningless.
The Tory lead said they were being asked to sign a blank cheque. It was going to be one enormous social engineering experiment and would be watched and ammended as it went live on real sick people.
Surely that is unsafe and cruel. Isn't someone supposed to be there like some sort of Omsbudsman or Inspector to watch over sick people. Who?
on 15 December 2009, 8:44:54 AM
I suggest that conviction alliances, based on shared values and views, are different from strategic and tactical alliances. My conviction alliance ought to be the Labour Party, but it isn't because the Party is dominated by people whose views are not just different from mine, but profoundly different. So it's the small LRC, but, even within that, there are members whose views are significantly different from my own.
A long-term strategic alliance may be based on an important overlap of objectives, such as exists between, for example, green socialists in the Labour Party and green socialists in the Green Party.
I can imagine situations in which short-term tactical alliances may be justified. If the far Right menaces the existence of any kind of democratic practice,then we would surely be justified in working with the more liberal members of the Conservative Party in order to keep fascists out of power.
Sometimes I argue with myself. What kind of alliance is appropriate when the id collides with the super-ego ?
on 15 December 2009, 8:09:57 AM
The disability charities are not fighting charities. They have always worked along with the government and are completely disorientated by this attack.
The only organisation speaking up is the CAB. But their role is to advise people how to deal with government regulations. If the government bring in cruel regulations the CAB are limited to advising how to comply with them.
Constituency MPs seem to be tied to their parties. The pastoral role has dried up and become formualaeic. 'I sent your inquiry to the Minister and he sent back this fob off letter.' Sick people seem to have no one to fight for them against rogue initiatives by their own state.
All extremists are characterised by putting ideology before humanity and common sense. And converts are always overly zealous. When is someone going to blow the whistle on this.
on 14 December 2009, 11:38:13 PM
for work is not only obscene but being fiercely against this should be a minimum requirement of anyone to qualify as having any compassion - let
alone taking the epithet 'progressive' - it also demonstrates how utterly
ineffective 'big tent' politics has been in defending people against both markets and those who control them.
But it isn't an isolated policy which merely shows the limits of New Labour
and its obsession with using markets to 'solve' all our problems - it is the logical outcome of placing profit above people. Once you believe in the latter there really is no alternative but to let markets into every aspect of our lives. The dividing line between so-called neo-liberals and almost everyone else, is really whether you believe markets are the best form of allocation to be actively encouraged or an unavoidable but lethal fact of economic life that needs to be vigilantly policed.
on 14 December 2009, 10:39:52 PM
It is only relatively recently that parts of the Labour Right dropped the term, ‘centre right.’ Hugh Gaitskell and many of his supporters used the term. They were rightwing social democrats, substantially to the Left of any part of what became ‘new labour.’ Compass and Labour neo-liberalism more generally have to be characterised as something, but ‘centre right’ does not really do the business. In any event, characterising Compass as ‘centre-right,’ has the effect of lumping all Compass members together, - to the disadvantage of those not part of the small ruling group. I would hazard a guess that beyond this group, (a group not necessarily co-terminus with the Management Committee; nor indeed including all of the members of said committee,) that Compass includes the range of social democratic opinion within its membership. For this reason, I try to differentiate between the neo-liberal reformists whose career and networking platform Compass is, and the rest of the Compass membership.
In other circumstances, ‘centre-right’ would denote the legitimate Right of the Labour Party with whom it would be possible to be in creative dialogue and genuinely comradely disagreement. Sadly most of the legitimate Right of the party went with the ‘new labour’ faction. Those who did not take the faction’s shilling appear to have neither the capacity, nor ideas, to assert themselves at all.- Still less as distinctively Labour. Small wonder then that ‘centre right’ should have become just another synonym for Labour neo-liberalism.
So far as the Iraq and Afghan wars go, I suspect that the ruling group within Compass were split and still are, on these matters. If Robin Cook had lived they would have followed his lead. - Which I suspect would have been anti-these wars and more cogently expressed by the day. As it is, there is not an intellectually credible, nor personally popular ‘new labourist’ critic of foreign policy in the mode of Robin Cook. In the absence of such coat tails to which they might opportunistically adhere themselves, the dominant group within Compass remain silent. Whatever the ultimate outcome of these wars, the dominant group will declare Compass to have supported that outcome all along.
For the moment Iraq and Afghanistan are so divisive, that to make a public statement of any kind now, would prejudice whatever reality there is to the Lawsonian claim of influence within ‘new labour.’ We may take though that some things are been said by Lawson and others behind the ‘new labour’ scenes. After next year’s election, what ‘Compass’ says in public and behind the scenes will be interesting to see.
on 14 December 2009, 9:19:01 PM
The only argument you can make that you want to threaten very sick people with loss of benefit for their own good because they aren't trying hard enough to get work is that you beleive in neo liberal economics and compliant labour markets to the point of absurdity.
It has to be pure blind political ideology to the point you can't see what you are actually doing on the ground because the bells of the promised land are ringing in your ears.
So just ask people if they will sign up to this and you will separate the conviction neo liberals from anyone still retainign a sense of perspective and common sense. Job done.
on 14 December 2009, 8:55:13 PM
As they're built on opportunism they are particularly vulnerable to those who are adept at manipulation. In the 30s it was Stalin's Bolsheviks and in the 90s it was Blairites. (many of whom learnt their tricks as former Trotskyists and other types of communists).
The only way to build solid alliances that can take the inevitable strain of
personality clashes, external criticism and robust debate etc is to base them firmly on agreed policy objectives and shared values. Which in this case is very difficult if groups insist on being silent on key left positions - such as being against Imperialist wars and invasions and by generally being opaque about other important matters like internal elections and who they draw a line at, when considering who to co-operate with.
You can criticise McDonnell for being too 'purist' but since Compass are willing to champion Cruddas, who supported the Iraq Invasion and was against a genuine Inquiry being held about it; invited the contemptible Purnell to speak; ignored the members when they voted against having
a referendum on PR at the next election and refuse to answer questions about their mandate and so on.
Not only does this foster an atmosphere of distrust - it inevitably makes negotiating for alliances all but impossible. Until Compass realise this and
act on it - no one on the left will trust them, no matter how many times they claim they are 'centre left' or 'progressive.' (And being 'centre left'
and in favour of a broad church' is an oxymoron. No matter how much Gramsci you read).
on 14 December 2009, 7:41:56 PM
on 14 December 2009, 6:35:12 PM
on 14 December 2009, 6:16:41 PM
Paul, if he is correct then we are all wasting our time. However i don't believe that he is, and even he can make mistakes.
Compass may not be as left as the LRC, but i don't believe they are right wing either. Campaigns have proved that time and again, also there is a consensus to work with other organisations. Thus forming a green/left wing alliance with other parties, groups and individuals. Nothing like that has come from LRC or McDonnell, who although i agree with most of the time. Appears sometimes like a voice in the wilderness waiting to be offered some form of leadership. After the election this might change, and we could see a split with new labour and the left. Again a reason to unite with left leaning groups across the spectrum i would have thought. As postings have said there are precious few real left wingers left. One other thing though,the LRC could benefit from Compass's web site that is for sure. At least you can actually debate on this site, as opposed to the question and answer sessions on the LRC site.
on 14 December 2009, 3:49:05 PM
appear quite small by comparison. And if Lawson is disturbed by this lack of mandate then he is doing a very good impression of being quite the opposite as he continues to speak, write and represent nobody but his own narrow view point.
And if the 2009 election had an even lower turnout...
on 14 December 2009, 1:48:24 PM
The ‘centre-right’ designation is somewhat charitable. But in addition, there is the fact that the LRC has its roots in the Parliamentary Left, whereas Compass is rooted in that process which has out-sourced Labour policy making beyond significant PLP influence. - That of course, and it has to be said, the slightly different ambitions of not much more than a handful of deeply self interested individuals. This perspective may be part of the explanation of why the participation in Compass’s MC elections is so low. Of course I have not seen the election figures, (who beyond the MC has?) But I suspect that if the 09 figures were a significant improvement on the captivatingly unimpressive 08 turnout of 11%, a gushing and self-congratulatory piece would surely have been posted for wider delectation.
Compass will doubtless remain centre right and tactically neo-liberal reformist. But in the context of one influential Labour MP fixing his own career in significant part to Compass; and at least one other likely MP doing the same, the dynamics of the Right as represented and expressed by Compass could change to some degree, - if only because it will have more than one major stakeholder; - a stakeholder moreover who has no significant democratic mandate. Of course, the point about stakeholding is that its democracy it is a product of corporatism and does not require democratic mandate, or democratic accountability, as social democrats would understand it. But with two MPs, both keenly ambitious for themselves, who knows how Compass might contribute to the centre right after next May?
on 14 December 2009, 12:18:18 PM
I don't disagree with that Jon. The domination of FPTP makes a more flexible politics necessary. I noted John McDonnell's reference to Compass as being 'centre-right', which perspective may be part of the explanation of why there hasn't been more collaboration between it and the LRC.
My constituency is Tory property, so how I vote is rather academic, but it will only be Labour if the candidate is to the Left, to some degree.Otherwise I will look for an alternative.
on 14 December 2009, 12:04:18 PM
Comrades and colleagues may have heard what Julia Hartley-Brewer had to say about the possibility of an early (i.e. 25 March 10) election: Labour is broke and therefore has little option but to combine the General Election with the Local Gvt elections on 6/May.
on 14 December 2009, 11:18:56 AM
As John McDonnell wrote last month:
'I’m not giving up on the general election yet. It could go either way. There could be a tsunami in which Labour is comprehensively swept out of power, or we could be in a situation where the Tories do not win as they expect to – there is a hung parliament, or Labour has a very small majority.
If there is a hung parliament, or something close to it, it is going to be very interesting to see what power the left can exert with a minimal representation in Parliament but a much wider representation in the trade unions and in the constituency parties.
There will be post-mortems, of course. The response from the right will be to evade any responsibility whatsoever for Labour’s electoral fortunes. They will reject any critique of past policies. They will argue that it’s simply the electorate becoming bored with the Labour government after a long period in office.
What I would describe as the centre-right – Compass and so on – will formulate a critique which will appear to be from the left, but will be significantly tainted because it will stay within the narrow bounds of New Labour’s fundamental neo-liberal practices. I think it will be seen as opportunistic.
The question is whether the left can mobilise at that stage, and not only in the Labour Party and the trade unions but also in the wider society, for a real critique of what has happened under New Labour.
In the Labour Party itself, there will be the usual bureaucratic manoeuvres to close that debate down. We have got to break those barriers, but more important is to win the wider movement to the discussion.'
And he was my 'source' for the possibility that there might be as little as two socialists left in Parliament after the next election - presumably he is referring to Corbyn and himself.
on 14 December 2009, 8:19:05 AM
'That's bad news about Lynne Jones. I hold her in high regard. She more than any other Labour MP exposed Blair's lies.'
Those of you who watched the progress of the Welfare Reform Bill in the Commons on TV, will have noticed how closely Lynne Jones worked with John McDonnell in opposing it. She announced her unfortunate retirement some time ago.
Whatever the merits of George Galloway, there are Labour MPs who have much better parliamentary records than he does.
on 13 December 2009, 10:41:21 PM
That's bad news about Lynne Jones. I hold her in high regard. She more than any other Labour MP exposed Blair's lies.
on 13 December 2009, 10:27:53 PM
Lynne Jones is apparently standing down at the next election and there may be others in your statistics who are too (hence the LRC's point that
there might only being two socialist MPs remaining after the election).
Which is why the stranglehold that the New Labour leadership have on prospective candidate selection, is so key to the overall direction of the Party.
But it is striking that McDonnell and Corbyn's voting records are so far apart from that of Galloway's! There is also a sharp difference between the LRC and the Lib Dems - which raises questions about which can claim to be the most representative of 'progressive' politics (if this phrase does
mean anything more than being anti-Tory).
(As for Gummer was this caused by eating that beef!?!!)
on 13 December 2009, 10:22:39 PM
on 13 December 2009, 9:42:12 PM
90.0% Willie Rennie Dunfermline & Fife West LDem
75.0% Peter Law Blaenau Gwent Ind
72.2% Pete Wishart Perth & Perthshire North SNP
71.1% Alex Salmond Banff & Buchan SNP
71.1% Charles Kennedy Ross, Skye & Lochaber LDem
69.8% Angus Robertson Moray SNP
69.7% Mike Hancock Portsmouth South LDem
69.1% Stewart Hosie Dundee East SNP
69.0% Michael Weir Angus SNP
68.6% Mark Oaten Winchester LDem
66.1% John Gummer Suffolk Coastal Con !!!!!!!
CLOSEST LABOUR MP:
60.5% Lynne Jones Birmingham, Selly Oak Lab
on 13 December 2009, 9:33:56 PM
Here is some other possibly interesting information from Public Whip:
MPs WHO VOTED MOST SIMILARLY TO CORBYN:
94.6% Alan Simpson Nottingham South
92.5% Robert Marshall-Andrews Medway Lab
92.4% John McDonnell MP, Hayes & Harlington
91.9% John Smith Vale of Glamorgan Lab
88.9% Robert Wareing Liverpool, West Derby whilst Lab
87.9% Kelvin Hopkins Luton North Lab
87.0% Mark Fisher Stoke-on-Trent Central Lab
86.4% Michael Meacher Oldham West & Royton Lab
84.4% Katy Clark Ayrshire North & Arran Lab
CLOSEST LIB-DEM
76.6% Willie Rennie Dunfermline & Fife West
MPS THAT VOTED MOST SIMILARLY TO MCDONNELL
92.4% Jeremy Corbyn Islington North Lab
91.1% Robert Marshall-Andrews Medway Lab
88.5% John Smith Vale of Glamorgan Lab
87.9% Alan Simpson Nottingham South Lab
85.2% Mark Fisher Stoke-on-Trent Central Lab
LABOUR MP VOTES AGAINST THE GOVERNMENT
Kate Hoey Vauxhall Lab 25.5%
Jeremy Corbyn Islington North Lab 25.2%
John McDonnell Hayes & Harlington Lab 24.9%
Alan Simpson Nottingham South Lab 20.9%
Lynne Jones Birmingham, Selly Oak Lab 16.3%
David Drew Stroud Lab 15.8%
Kelvin Hopkins Luton North Lab 14.8%
Robert Marshall-Andrews Medway Lab 13.5%
Mike Wood Batley & Spen Lab 12.8%
David Taylor North West Leicestershire Lab 11.7%
Frank Field Birkenhead Lab 11.1%
Mark Fisher Stoke-on-Trent Central Lab 10.5%
Glenda Jackson Hampstead & Highgate Lab 9.3%
Andrew MacKinlay Thurrock Lab 9.2%
on 13 December 2009, 8:54:39 PM
Presumably they also think that a hung Parliament is very posssible - so 13 of them would be able to have more influence than their tiny number would suggest.
And finally - realising how parlous a state left of centre politics is in at the
moment, maybe they think that the 'left' has to start somewhere.
But reading their website and the statement that accompanies it doesn't give me a privileged insight into their motives of course! And it is highly unlikely that anywhere near 13 of them would win in any case, as no doubt you will agree.
on 13 December 2009, 8:07:18 PM
Paul: I see it more simply. Blair had far more impact on the policy thinking of as party than is usually the case. The party had already been softened up by Callaghan and the reaction to Foot. Blair, because of his deep personality flaw, his effeteness and self-doubts, was strongly attracted by the macho characteristics of far-right political leadership, so he was instantly attracted to Thatcher. Although Blair is far too vacuous to have a well-formed political ideology, he found some aspects of Thatcherism, in addition to her dictatorial style, deeply satisfying. Among them were her hatred and attempted marginalisation of unions. Blair knew he would never carry any credibility with unions and left-wing workers, and so that became a deep bond between him and Thatcherism. The other deeply satisfying point of coincidence was his huge attraction to the very wealthy, and his aspiration to become like them. He knew, from his own personal ambitions, that an alliance with the corporate private sector was essential, and his desire to woo and be recognised by celebrity.
Because of the confusion and profound cowardice within Labour, Blair was able to mount a coup and install a dictatorial administration in which his frequent tap-dancing stage acts, and his fake moral cameos became his method of seduction. Thatcherism, not Labour's past, became his political raison d'etre. So what you see as the Newlabour project, was in fact continuity of the Thatcher era. Blair surrounded himself with people who, despite their largely bourgeois background, had no Labour credentials, but were all too unpolished and uncredentialed to make it in the Tory Party. So they created their own Tory Party within Labour's skin.
My old late Dad was an old fashioned determinist who hated politics explained in terms of personalities. But sometimes they are important. I dont think that the rape of Labour was inevitable. It was a carefully planned and executed coup, and is successful until this very day. The people in charge are fiercely loyal to the Blair "vision", ideas, and methods.
on 13 December 2009, 5:07:49 PM
'Socialist Unity have identified the following 13 (out of 646 candidates) as being worthy of support from the left' Even if they all won, what kind of majority would they have ?
Lee
I've never featured in Blair's biography ( Cherie never thought that I was the kind of person who should be invited to dinner, as I couldn't afford to pay )so I don't see why I would have even a cameo role in his hagiography.
Paul
Sorry mate, I don't feel guilty about New Labour just embarassed. I've never stopped condemning them since before the Project was thought of. I think that you have not fully abandoned the concept of original sin.
on 13 December 2009, 4:40:08 PM
Caroline Lucas (Green, Brighton)
Dai Davies (independent, Blaenau Gwent)
George Galloway and Abjol Miah (Respect), John McDonnell and Jeremy Corbyn (Labour) (in London);
Peter Tatchell (Green, Oxford);
Dave Nellist (Socialist Party, Coventry);
Salma Yaqoob (Respect, Birmingham)
Gayle O’Donovan, Kay Phillips (in Manchester; Green and Respect respectively);
Peter Cranie (Green, Liverpool);
Val Wise (independent, Preston).
They also say that '...there may well be many more', though what this hope is based on is far from clear.
on 13 December 2009, 3:02:40 PM
I agree that the division between LP socialists and LP neo-liberals is not necessarily clear to the electorate: indeed this same division is not necessarily clear to many Labour members. In this context its useful to bear in mind the attempts by some neo-liberals to re-brand themselves as other than ‘new labour’ and to associate their colleague Labour neo-liberals exclusively with the identity of ‘new labour.’
Socialists outwith the LP will of course condemn those who remain in it. Such is the condemnation of comrades who for all their criticism are comrades in ways which the ‘new labour’ coalition simply are not; - and in reality never were. The dilemma of supporting the Labour Party whilst opposing the dominant coalition is not going to become less acute in the weeks and months ahead. In the LRC we have a wide spectrum of legitimate Labour opinion, whose Left, Right and Centre are committed to Clause 4 of the LRC constitution. In furtherance to that commitment there is undoubtedly a range of views on the tactics to take towards a dominant, but by no means monolithic coalition.
The Project in its own terms has collapsed in a specific way. In doing so it has made hypocrites of us all. - All including reformist and non-reformist neo-liberals. Specifically. The Project posed a ‘new labour’ deal. In exchange for enthusiastic Labour participation in and commitment to restructuring the economy and society on neo-liberal lines, there would be substantial investment in the public sector; there would be an increase in the level of subsistence for the poorest and an increase in the disposable income of the lower and middling quartiles of that part of the working class habitually referred to as the middle class.
Almost all of the above is about to fall away. And it will most certainly do so after the next election. The Many, the working class are going to be made to pay for the bankers, for the failure of the Project. It makes hypocrites of ‘new labour’ self-evidently; indeed the pretend attacks on the banks and the deployment of class by a deeply class based gvt of the Right, only adds to ‘new labour’ hypocrisy. I have said before: people are not fools. The Labour Left are made hypocrites because we chose to be brought off by public expenditure and to persuade voters in our constituencies to support a Labour Gvt that was not a Labour Gvt in substance.
The hypocrisy for all parts of the LP, (not least its ‘new labour’ parts,) continues. But Labour neo-liberals have the consolations that the political economy and civil society they have done much to create remains largely in place. The new corporatism, which has commodified the NHS and other public services, will continue. Local Gvt restructured as a coalition of private sector contractors will continue. The retreat from representative democracy in favour of market driven elites will continue. In that sense the political and social structures laid down by Thatcherism and extended and expanded by ‘new labour’ show that the Project continues. In its domestic manifestation, the Project remains central to the advance of a new, neo-liberal corporatism.
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