Category Archives: Labour

Business as usual

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- Foiled terrorist attack
- Public service sector strike
- Prisoners released early
- People overreacting to one-off events by calling for wholesale reform
- Left-wingers feeling alienated
- Tories making futile noises they know will have no effect
- Lib Dems being useless and indecisive

I’ll keep my fingers crossed for the outcome of the Cabinet meeting that’s just starting – that they won’t get distracted by an unexploded car bomb (which used to be ten a penny during the IRA campaigns), and get on with explaining precisely how the government is going to work now that various departments seem to have been split in two or abolished and we have a Lord Chancellor sitting in the House of Commons.

More later, no doubt.

Update: Gordon explains some of the departmental reorganisation in that wonderfully stilted blend of management speak and Blair-like platitudes he uses when trying to be populist.

Still no explanation of precisely what Jack Straw’s job is, though – I’ve even been skimming through the Constitutional Reform Act 2005 to try and work out what role the “Justice Secretary” might have. Very confusing.

Brown’s first cock-up: the British constitution

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Update note: It’s entirely possible that there should be a question-mark in the headline to this post. He’s not stupid enough to have made this move without thinking it through, but I can’t for the life of me work out what he’s got planned.

Update 2: This post is now largely obsolete, and so has been edited down – Jack Straw is indeed Lord Chancellor. Had a bit of a scare there though – and it’s still very confusing…

—

Via email and the like, I’ve been having heated discussions with a couple of mates about precisely what’s happened to the office of Lord Chancellor in this reshuffle. It looks rather like Brown may have made a major cock-up, and the current TV coverage hasn’t mentioned it a jot.

[Update edit - removed paragraph]

There is, technically, no constitutional reason why Jack Straw couldn’t be Lord Chancellor while remaining in the Commons, from what I can tell. But it’d be very, very odd indeed and I can’t see any way it would work in practice. [Update edit - removed speculation]

What the hell is going on? [Update edit - removed sentence]

They’re now announcing a special Cabinet session to change the constitution – but how, exactly, and where does the Cabinet get the authority to do that?

David Miliband gets the Foreign Office

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Little Dave has come in for quite a bit of stick in blogland, largely thanks to his own blogging efforts, but this strikes me as a decidedly sensible choice – not least because, in person at least, he’s an impressive public speaker.

He’s also (and more importantly) got a nice European background (grandparents being Polish Jewish, and his decidedly respectable father born in Brussels, fleeing the Nazis in 1940), plus has studied in the United States – so should have a decent chance to balance the tricky transatlantic divide. This has been the major stumbling block for pretty much every Foreign Secretary since the late 1950s, and no one (bar possibly Robin Cook) has quite got the balance right yet – least of all Beckett.

Admittedly, Miliband’s made little progress in sorting out the mess at Defra caused by his predecessor (again, Margaret Beckett)’s disgraceful mishandling of CAP payments, but his short time as Environment Secretary will, at least, have given him some direct insight into the workings of the EU.

With Douglas Alexander in as International Development Secretary and the NHS Blog Doctor’s favourite Alan Johnson tipped for Health (Update: confirmed), Brown seems to be off to a promising start…

Plus, most importantly, there’s going to be no John Reid. Huzzah!

Update (11:08am): I may have spoken too soon – apparently Hazel Blears is meeting with Brown now… Come on, Gordon – don’t give her a job… please?

Oh, and this pictoral guide to the Cabinet from the BBC looks to be useful and all – handy comparison of Blair’s and Brown’s.

Look! Bad pictoral satire!

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It's awful, isn't it?

Because, you see, in The Wizard of Oz, they all head off to the Emerald city in the expectation that the Wizard will be the answer to all their ills, only for him to be revealed as little more than a confidence trickster with a gift for spouting platitudes.

Clever, isn’t it?

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why I’m not in comedy. I do love the expression on Jack Straw’s face though… (Straw, see? He’s the scarecrow, like wot’s full of straw! And Alan Johnson, who didn’t have the guts to run against Brown, is the cowardly lion! And Harriet Harman’s Dorothy – because she’s female! And David Miliband’s the tin man for some reason! Hurrah!)

(Sensible post later, most likely – in the mean time, no more Margaret Beckett as Foreign Secretary! Yaaaaaaay! Oh, and you may want to brush up on the latest influx of unelected backroom advisers…)

Oh, the irony, etc.

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That dear Mr Blair (today’s his final full day in office, don’tchaknow?) has outright rejected a referendum on the new EU treaty is no surprise.

What is rather entertaining is the sheer gall of the man, arguing that a referendum campaign “would suck in the whole political energy of the country for months”.

This, of course, from the man who took two and a half years to finally announce the date for his resignation (tomorrow! Huzzah!) after the initial hints, prompting a solid 31 months of constant media speculation and petty distractions from the business of government, as both government figures and the opposition have jostled to gain the most from his departure.

Do you think he says that sort of stuff on purpose, or is he genuinely too dense to see the double-standards?

Meanwhile Blair seems to be about to be given a new job sorting out the mess in the Middle East, much like a less likeable British Jimmy Carter. That should keep him nicely out of the way (though not – what a shame – necessarily out of harm’s way) for a few years. As long as he doesn’t get his grubby, incompetent mitts on the proposed EU presidency, I honestly couldn’t care less.

Gordon Brown, meanwhile, must really love Tony right now – this new EU treaty business looks to be the nastiest problem Blair could possibly have left him with. Unless, of course, we manage to invade Iran or North Korea in the next 24 hours…

The UK’s current EU policy: nonexistent

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A revealing interview with Geoff Hoon in Le Figaro (in English) has confirmed something I’ve suspected for quite a while now – the UK simply does not have an EU policy.

Hoon, following his poor showing with the Defence portfolio was demoted to Leader of the House, which he also messed up, leading to further demotion to Europe Minister. On the surface, Hoon’s appointment could have been seen as a sensible move – he did, after all, spend almost a decade as an MEP, so should know what he’s talking about. But this is Geoff Hoon we’re talking about. In his year in the post, what contributions has he made to the EU debate that’s been raging in other member states? Let’s see…

On December 6th 2006, Hoon asserted that “The Government have a very clear policy on the European constitution,” and that policy was set out in a Written Ministerial Statement of 5th December 2006. The key points?

1) Pursuing British interests
2) Modernisation and effectiveness
3) Consensus
4) Subsidiarity (working at the right level)
5) Use of existing Treaties
6) Openness

How well has this been done? Well, considering that no changes to the EU can occur without consensus, point 3 strikes ma as the most important. How well has the UK done in building a consensus of opinion in the EU in the months since Hoon outlined the (decidedly vague and management jargon-heavy) British approach?

- 20th February 2007, Geoff Hoon: “There is no consensus among member states at this stage”
- 20th March 2007, Geoff Hoon: “At present there is no consensus among EU Governments”
- 1st May 2007, Geoff Hoon: “There is at present no consensus among EU partners on the way forward”

Oh dear.

But go back to the interview with Hoon in Le Figaro, and little wonder Britain’s not managed to get consensus. For one thing, it’s pretty clear that our Europe Minister – and therefore our government as a whole – is concerned less with what actually happens in terms of EU reform, but in how it appears, as with an EU foreign minister:

“We are worried because the title ‘minister’ would inevitably have a state connotation. But the aim is not to create a European state. This title will have to be reconsidered”

And again, “These are politically sensitive issues”, and the classic “We will have to discuss the details” followed swiftly by “I do not want to go into details”…

Meanwhile, has Hoon actually pressed ahead with any major meetings? Well, no. The big EU meetings, face-to-face with heads of state and the like, have been handled by Tony Blair (when he can be bothered, or if he’s been invited…). The regular policy discussions are handled at the monthly meetings of EU Foreign ministers, which Hoon’s boss Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett attends.

So, has Margaret Beckett got anywhere?

- 1st May 2007, Margaret Beckett: “At present, there remains no consensus among EU partners”

Oh dear… And as her opposite number William Hague noted when Mrs Beckett reported back from the European Council in December, “The Foreign Secretary… failed to mention one thing—the European constitution.”

This prompted a long and rambling response from Mrs Beckett that ended quite simply and revealingly with, “we will see what proposals are put forward”.

Yep, it’s John Major’s “wait and see” all over again. Which has, it would appear, been the British government’s policy towards the EU for at least two years now. As Hoon’s statements in that interview with Le Figaro make clear, no one in the British government is willing to go on record saying anything other than the most vague nonsense about the next steps for the EU.

Do we support a multi-speed Europe, as proposed again yesterday by Romano Prodi (and as Nicholas Sarkozy seems to be vaguely pushing for with his “Mediterranean Union” idea)? It seems an obvious position for Britain to adopt, after all – avoid all the nasty ramifications of the constitution, get fresh opt-outs in economic and judicial policies, and don’t hamper our partners at the same time.

If we don’t support different tiers of EU participation, are we simply looking to pick a fight with our neighbours by putting the brakes on their plans for further integration? Does Gordon Brown henchman Ed Balls’ talk of a “hard-headed pro-Europeanism” indicate a new way forward, or is it simply (as I strongly suspect) the same old prevarication dressed up in fancy new language? Does anyone in government even know what Britain’s EU policy is any more?

And the next UK Prime Minister’s attitude towards the EU? It’s anyone’s guess, as he has yet to make his position even slightly clear. All we do know is that it’s not on his list of priorities – which hardly bodes well for the future of EU reform.

As one of the largest and most economically powerful countries in the EU, the UK should be at the forefront of discussions – not just to have her say, but also because no other EU countries can possibly reach the “consensus” that is Britain’s declared aim without knowing the position of one of the big three. Yet throughout the German presidency Britain has shirked her European responsibilities, just as she did when the UK herself held the EU presidency. Once again, the UK is holding the EU back – more subtly and less confrontationally than Poland, perhaps, but just as effectively.

If the EU is ever going to get a consensus on the future of the EU, the core problem has to be tackled – and that problem is not nor ever has been the precise nature of the much-needed institutional reforms, it’s the ambiguous attitude and apathetic reluctance of the United Kingdom whenever the European Union is mentioned. It’s almost as if the British government has its fingers in its ears, humming to itself, pretending that the EU doesn’t exist and that maybe if they ignore it long enough it’ll just go away. Well, surprise surprise – it won’t. Consensus doesn’t come without discussion, the one thing the British government seems to hate above all else.

Will Gordon Brown change anything when he becomes Prime Minister? Well, just like the government when it comes to the EU, we’ll have to wait and see. But I doubt it very much indeed.

Update: More on this from the Telegraph

Where’s a Francis Urquhart when you need one?

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In honour of Blair’s little announcement (and Ian Richardson’s untimely death earlier this year), I’ve just started watching the superb House of Cards again. It really is excellent – and wonderfully timeless. Here’s a transcript of the opening monologue, with alterations only to pronouns, job titles and names, marked by square brackets…

Nothing lasts forever. Even the longest, the most glittering reign must come to an end.

Who could replace [him]? Plenty of contenders – old warriors, young pretenders.

[Gordon Brown], say, the [Chancellor]. Too old and too familiar, tainted by a thousand shabby deals.

[David Miliband] – too young and too clever.

[John Reid] – a bit of a lout, a bit of a bully-boy. Yes, it could well be [Reid].

[David Cameron], the people’s favourite. A well-meaning fool – no background and no bottom…

Of course, the wonderful thing about House of Cards is that none of them end up as PM.

Sadly for us, though, there’s no Urquhart waiting in the wings – and his modern-day, real-life equivalent as Chief Whip is the no-mark “Blair babe” Jacqui Smith. Something tells me the only way she’ll be entering Number 10 when Blair exits on 27th June is when she’s summoned so that Gordon Brown can sack her. Ho hum… (Still, the image of her chucking Nick Robinson off the Palace of Westminster roof garden’s one that’s got something going for it…)

Blair’s resignation speech (yawn)

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The version on the Labour website is slightly different to that emailed out to the “Labour supporters network”, the latter seeming to be a transcript of what was actually said, rather than merely the notes.

Still, a couple of interesting admissions that reveal a lot: First, Blair only reached “political maturity” in his mid-30s (a tad late, one might think), and secondly (only in the email version) he admits that “none of it [pre-1990s British politics] made sense to me”. Quoting the full paragraph (as it’s not on the website) will show amply just how little he understood:

“I looked at my own country. A great country with a great history and magnificent traditions, proud of its past. But strangely uncertain of its future. Uncertain about the future, almost old fashioned.

“And all that was curiously symbolised you know in the politics of the time. You, you had choices, you stood for individual aspiration and getting on in life, or a social compassion of helping others. You were liberal in your values, or conservative. You believed in the power of the state or the efforts of the individual. Spending more money on the public realm was the answer, or it was the problem. And none of it made sense to me.”

Not only does he seem to have confused pre-Blair British politics with late-20th century American politics (liberal vs. conservative rather than socialist vs. capitalist, etc.), but also please note how none of the words “unions”, “workers”, “democracy”, “the poor” or “socialism” appear even once in the entire speech… (“Iraq” appears once, “education” once, “the NHS” not at all…)

Update: The Times has the full version

Local election results – an immediate analysis before even half the results are in (from someone who doesn’t really care anyway and didn’t vote thanks to being in London)

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Slight winners? Labour, I’d say. In real terms, at least. They’ve still got the Scottish Parliament (despite – or perhaps because of – dire warnings about the rise of the SNP). They’ve still got the Welsh Assembly. In both cases, it looks like they haven’t lost anywhere near as many seats as everyone was expecting. That, under their present circumstances, is a major victory.

Losers? The Tories – they look not to have made anywhere near the gains that they should have done, considering just how God-damned AWFUL and unpopular Labour have been for the last few years. Hardly any progress, once again, outside England – meaning that all other parties can paint any Tory attacks on Gordon Brown thanks to the West Lothian Question as mere sour grapes because the Scots and Welsh don’t like Tories. (Not that that will stop them.)

The major losers? The Lib Dems (bar our very own Nick Barlow – long-time blogger and contributor to both The Sharpener and Fistful). Looks so far like both Labour and the Tories have increased their overall share of the vote at the Lib Dems’ expense. The last couple of General Elections were, after all, an aberration. As the Tories begin to be taken more seriously again, little surprise that the third man of British politics is forgotten once again – people like to back the winner.

More major losers? The Electoral Reform Society. In Scotland it’s being claimed that “tens of thousands” of ballot papers have ended up spoiled – in (at least) one constituency with so many spoiled ballots that they outnumbered the votes of the winning candidate. This doesn’t appear to have been a coordinated “None of the Above” effort, but sheer confusion at the experimental and muddled electoral system north of the border. Which will, for years to come, be used by politicians across all parties to show that proper electoral reform is silly, and shake off all calls for a better system of electing Westminster MPs. This is a very bad thing.

The major winners? The electorate. Despite problems in Scotland, by the looks of things they didn’t allow themselves to get carried away with anti-Blair and anti-Iraq war nonsense, nor with ill-considered nationalist rhetoric in Scotland. The voters of the (still) United Kingdom would, it would appear, generally have based their local votes on local issues – just as they should have done. They also aren’t stupid enough to have got so annoyed with Labour that they’ll vote for the Tories in a landslide, as so stupidly and damagingly happened the other way around in 1997. This is A. GOOD. THING. – replacing a Blair with a massive majority with a Cameron with a massive majority is just about the worst thing that could happen to this country (bar Charles Clarke in charge*)

* Note how the Sun was the only paper stupid enough to interpret Clarke’s comments praising Brown as “faint praise” indicating a last-ditch challenge. No one else (who noticed) did. What a bunch of idiots.

Another reason for the lack of British politics here of late

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An unsolicited email from the “Labour Supporters Network” (to which I have found myself signed up, despite not being a Labour supporter), purporting to be from General Secretary Peter Watt, and encouraging the Labour party’s members to follow their Chancellor’s example when it comes to their personal finances:

“The Labour Party receives £15 for every Co-operative Bank credit card account opened. That could pay for 2,000 campaign leaflets in crucial elections, or allow us to make calls to dozens of voters in key areas who will help decide the results of those elections… For every pound you spend on your credit card (regardless of whether you clear the monthly balance or not), the Labour Party will receive a further contribution”

Ah! Fiscal responsibility!

We’ve buggered up our finances by being rather dodgy with those loans (that may still see charges brought) combined with, erm… spending far more than we can afford. So we need you to bail us out by getting yourselves into debt. Just like wot Gordon’s done with the economy – borrow borrow borrow, spend spend spend, dip into the pension fund (because you can always top that up later, right?) and keep your fingers crossed that it all somehow works out in the long run.

One of the many things that pisses me off about British politics at the moment, that – the pathetic desperation and saleman-like approach to the electorate that seems to be the case with all the main parties. It was only a matter of time before they started flogging us credit cards, let’s face it – it’ll be life insurance next, and double-glazing.

By the by, newsflash to Labour supporters who’ve drifted away during the last few years: no matter who succeeds Blair, nothing’s going to change other than we get taken even less seriously on the international stage. (And that message goes just as strongly for Tories who think Cameron can change things…)

Margaret Beckett, the future of Europe, and rampanty hypocrisy

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You thought David Cameron’s EU vision was full of platitudes and meaningless phrases? Check out those of Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett – oddly published in a Romanian newspaper, far out of sight of the British public… (via)

Lots of guff about climate change and “building the world’s first competitive, energy secure, low carbon economy” – and precisely tit-all on the more important, short-term problem of, erm… precisely what is the UK’s current position on the much-needed reform of the EU and the constitution?

And then, of course, there’s the (by now all too familiar) hypocrisy of the whole thing:

an analysis showed that [Beckett] had taken 134 flights on ministerial business between 2002 and March 2005, clocking up 102,673 miles and 191.08 tons in CO2 emissions.

The latest figures produced from a careful study of all flights by Mrs Beckett include long-haul flights on scheduled airline services, not included in the list of trips she made using the Queen’s Flight, which caused an outcry yesterday. She has used the Queen’s Flight for short hops from London to East Midlands airport, near her constituency, and also for one-day return trips to Brussels for EU ministerial meetings.

And that, please note, from BEFORE she was Foreign Secretary and actually had the occasional genuine reason to jet off all round the world…

Nice one, Marge. Ever heard of “practice what you preach”?

Blair and the EU constitution, part 2

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On Sunday, the News of the World claimed that Tony Blair has already decided to ratify the EU constitution – with or without the support of either the public or his party (let alone his heir, Gordon Brown).

Today, the News of the World’s weekday sister paper, The Sun – despite being owned by the same company, and despite usually adopting whatever political line big boss Rupert Murdoch wants – had precisely the opposite story:

TONY BLAIR and Gordon Brown have vowed not to let in the hated EU Constitution through the back door.

The Prime Minister and his expected successor plan to stop Euro fanatics resurrecting a bid to give Brussels more power…

Next month EU leaders will discuss a new “declaration” to celebrate the union.

But its precise contents are unknown — causing worry among UK politicians who fear a further EU power grab.

And privately EU leaders will also talk about a new constitution at the summit.

Number 10 insists they will not agree to including elements of the old constitution

That pretty much refutes every single claim that the News of the World made on Sunday, from the contents of the declaration through to Blair’s enthusiasm for the existing text.

Which means, of course, that you can probably trust this report just as much as you could trust Sunday’s. They’re most likely both nonsense.

Were I the sort for conspiracy theories, I might suggest that the two utterly opposed stories were run in such quick succession because dear Mr Murdoch – notoriously anti-EU throughout his time as a newspaper magnate in the UK – wants to demonstrate through the reaction of his readers precisely which course of action should be taken. And in case you can’t tell which one that is:

The Sun Says…

The Sun instinctively mistrusts edicts from Brussels. They are almost never in our nation’s interests. This will be no exception.

Tony Blair has pledged to fight tooth and nail to prevent the rejected constitution being sneaked in by the back door.

We will hold him to that — as we will any future Prime Minister.

By “we”, read Rupert Murdoch – the owner of the top-selling Sunday broadsheet the Sunday Times, top-selling Sunday tabloid the News of the World, top-selling daily broadsheet the Times, top-selling daily tabloid the Sun, plus dominant satellite/digital television broadcaster Sky.

This is Rupert Murdoch using his power to ensure that “Europe” is not an issue at the next general election, by blackmailing both Labour and the Tories into doing what he wants – rejecting the constitution completely and utterly.

It couldn’t be clearer – the News of the World article was a teaser trailer to get up a bit of reaction. Two days later, with the reaction in, the Sun comes up with the real story.

There may be no facts in the Sun’s story either – but what it does have is detailed instructions for Blair, Brown and the rest of the Labour party, letting them know precisely what their next course of action had better be if they don’t want the single most powerful media group in the country to smash them with all its might.

Update: Just realised this was actually yesterday’s Sun. Murdoch works faster than I thought…

Update 2: Murdoch is definitely up to something…

Blair and the EU constitution

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As you may have noticed, I’ve spent a fair amount of this week highlighting the lack of British involvement in the ever-increasing moves towards reviving / revising the EU constitution. Now, via Iain Dale, it seems that the (anti-EU Rupert Murdoch tabloid) News of the World reckon they’ve uncovered what Blair’s up to:

the Prime Minister intends to rubber-stamp the European Constitution without consulting his likely successor Chancellor Gordon Brown — not to mention British voters.

Mr Blair has PERSONALLY pushed forward plans for a permanent EU President and Foreign Minister as one of his last acts before he stands down as premier.

He will travel to Berlin on March 25 to sign the 50-page agreement, Declaration on the Future of Europe.

Far from a simple “declaration”, this is a binding treaty which embodies “basic laws” for 490 million people in 27 countries.

Quite how the News of the World think they know what the final text is going to contain when it hasn’t been written yet is anyone’s guess. But, of course, although the major proposals the NOTW mentions are hardly new (an EU President, EU Foreign Minister, EU Defence Minister and greater powers for the – democratically-elected, lest we forget – European Parliament), they all, the paper claims, add up to a move towards the eurosceptic bogeyman of “federalism”.

Is this take justified? It’s impossible to say.

The News of the World asserts (with little in the way of evidence) that this Declaration on the Future of Europe will be legally binding, forcing all signatories into handing over ever more power to Brussels. But considering that this will hardly be the first such declaration (similar ones were issued in 2001 following the practically useless Treaty of Nice and the Laeken EU Council), and that its predecessors were – as the term “declaration” implies – simply declarations of the intention to find a way to move much-needed EU reforms forward, with little in the way of specifics about what those reforms might be, it seems highly unlikely that any such document is going to contain any specific promises to implement new ways of working. Instead, the likelihood is that the latest version is going to be much like its predecessors – nothing more than a public acknowledgement that the current EU system is increasingly unfit for purpose.

And in any case, as my recent run-downs of the ongoing debates about the constitution have surely made clear, there is no consensus amongst our European cousins on precisely what is the best way forward in any case. Even if Blair does sign the thing (seemingly without the promised referendum), there’s little chance that all the other nine member states yet to ratify the original constitutional treaty will do likewise.

It’s far too risky for any of the French presidential candidates to commit to at the moment, the Netherlands are likewise unlikely to ignore their referendum (especially with the Dutch government so precarious), and it’s highly likely that Denmark, the Czech Republic and Poland are also going to have a few things to say about any attempt at straight revival of the old constitution. Yet without unanimity amongst all 27 EU member states, there is no way that the constitution can come into force.

Even if Blair does sign the thing – against the wishes of a decent chunk of his cabinet, not to mention the country – and even if we take the News of the World’s word that this new declaration is somehow legally binding and going to come into force as soon as it’s signed (as they strongly suggest), there’s a very strong probability that at least one other EU country will refuse to, and the whole thing will be scuppered.

Either way, I’m intrigued to know where the News of the World got all this information from – because not only is the declaration yet to be finalised, making their claims about its content speculative at best, but also they make the bizarre claim that “Downing Street played a major role in the latest negotiations”. Because of that there is precisely no evidence whatsoever – in fact, precisely the opposite. Why else would the more enthusiastically pro-EU types across the Channel have been complaining so much about Britain’s lack of involvement over the last year or more?