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Will the Last Ex-PM Out, Please Turn Off the Lights?

Does anyone have a greater insight into the potential of a Gordon Brown Premiership than Tony Blair?

Can it this be coincidence that his first act after handing over the reins of power will be to leave the country? Perhaps we should all follow his lead.

Blair’s Departure

So what will be the verdict on Tony Blair’s time as PM once it has ended in three or four hours from now?

There are many issues that most Tories will point to with some degree of negativity. These include the mess he has made of the UK’s constitution, the stripping of civil liberties, unfair tax rises, the pensions crisis, sale of peerages, creating a culture of spin and leaving the NHS in a mess of muddled management. For some only one word is needed: Iraq.

For me, his biggest sin was something he didn’t do. Actually, there were many things he didn’t do but the sin was not to have focussed on one really big initiative and see it through. Blair squandered one of the greatest inheritances of any politician in the modern era. Ken Clarke had left him with a strong economy that enabled him to count on public revenues to pay for major reforms. His huge parliamentary majority would have enabled him to push through unheralded changes. On top of that, Blair had a personal approval rating that would have allowed him to blast through opposition from any other quarter.

Instead, the economic harvest has been reaped to pay more for the same level of public services. The Commons majority was used to push through more new legislation and to put more crimes on the statute book than we have ever seen but all of it in little bits and pieces, nibbling the edges of our freedoms with little benefit to the British public but significant additional burdens. His personal support was used up on convincing to go to war in Iraq. Where was the vision of the Atlee government that created the modern welfare state? Where was the resolve of the Thatcher government that reformed public spending and brought about a new era of economic growth? Blair wasted his inheritance and he should not be forgiven for that.

That is not to say that I think Blair is evil, he is clearly not. I also think he was generally well intentioned. As a political operator and media puppeteer he was without equal and the Labour Party, as a machine, will miss him. His skill is no more aptly demonstrated than by the way he was able to transfer his close relationship with President Clinton to an even closer one with President Bush, in spite of their political differences. Sadly, this came at the price of a great deal of national pride (remember, “Yo, Blair!”?) and the loss of much credibility with other countries as this cartoon image well indicates.

There were also some successes. Sierra Leone was one where no other country could have stepped, as I have noted before. London has seen the first new hospitals built since the second World War, even if they were initiated under a PFI system originated by the Major government. In my view, though, the positives are still heavily outweighed by the negatives.

I am less convinced about his role in Northern Ireland, where I believe John Major deserves more credit, but that is not to say that he made matters worse. He enabled others to do the job, and there is skill in that, too.

As he looks into what happens next, maybe the role as Middle East envoy though, is one to which he is ideally suited. The US and Israel will have confidence in him and it is they that need to be moved in this debate. A more obviously impartial candidate may be unable to impart any real momentum into the process. His skills as a political operator could face no sterner test but I am glad he is no longer going to be a actor on the UK’s domestic political stage.

Gordon, it’s over to you to carry on the show.

Quentin Davis Defects to Labour

Quentin Davis’ decision to defect to Labour is a shame but no disaster. He is a capable politician but not an exceptional one. Neither side of the House of Commons will really notice his movement, I suspect.

The timing of this statement can be no accident. The resignation letter to David Cameron that Davis has chosen to release looks as though it may well have had some input from the Labour press office. So I wonder if some of the commentators on ConservativeHome may have the wrong idea. This is not a statement about Europe from a die hard pro-European. There is more that binds members of the Tory Party together than that one issue. If that were not so, many more would have left during the Hague and IDS administrations.

There are several others there who comment on Davis’ failure to reach a top office and then wonder about whether he is about to make it to the Lords as a thank-you from the new PM.

I would suggest that with Gordon Brown stepping into those big shoes tomorrow and announcing a new series of ministers, Davis may be looking for a pay-off earlier than a retirement seat in the upper house. Brown has mentioned several times that he was hoping to draw in people from across the political spectrum and maybe this was his Tory. What’s more, the job he is rumoured to have offered Paddy Ashdown was as Northern Ireland Secretary. This is an area where Davis has worked before, having been shadow to that job under IDS, and perhaps he fancies a return to the active side of things.

We should not be worry about the wobble created by the move of Quentin Davis. Calm will resume shortly. Cameron has the Conservative Party set on broadly the right course and that will be rewarded at the ballot box.

Tony Blair to Resign as an MP

If the rumours are true and Tony Blair does step down as an MP tomorrow, I suspect that there will be one beneficiary that has not been discussed, and that is Gordon Brown.

One of Brown’s biggest problems is that has not had the chance to ratify his leadership with any kind of election. A by-election in Blair’s constituency would give him a chance to use it as a proxy on his leadership and if the result comes out well by any measure it would be greeted as a triumph for team-GB.

What other fireworks can we expect to mark the Brown coronation special?

A Week in Politics

You have to hand it to Labour, sometimes. They can manage a party if not a Party.

The event, yesterday, at which Tony handed over to Gordon has been part of a well planned week of activities designed to make the best of the political high ground during the start of the slow summer season when most people switch off politics completely. Whatever will happen when things hit fever pitch on Wednesday?

However, I can’t help thinking that Harriet Harman getting the Deputy Leadership role was not really in the script. After all, can you really picture Gordon offering her a senior job in his new team? Alan Johnson, yes. Hilary Benn (the one I would have worried about from a Tory perspecitve), yes. But Harriet? No.

It would be harsh to say that she only won because she is a woman, although that certainly helped, even if it was not enough to save Hazel Blears. But do remember that this was the woman who was sacked by Blair from her post as Social Security Secretary. Her record is not a stellar one that gives you a sense that the Labour Party would be in good hands in the event of her having to deputise for Gordon.

In fact, I am reminded of a story about a Democrat senator in the US who once met Dan Quale, then the Republican Vice-President and her sworn political adversary. She had not met him before but she was so shocked by his lack of intellect that she swore to herself there and then to pray for the well being of President Bush Snr, every night.

More Brown Spin Failings?

As the story of what Brown did or did not offer Paddy Ashdown, and when he did (or didn’t) do it, roles on there promises to be a great little insight on the Politics Show this morning. I have just seen the trailer in which Brown is quoted as saying that the story as covered by the press is a “travesty of what happened”.

That may be the case, but if it is so it is the fault of Brown and his team. It was his office, after all, that was keen to confirm the story that he had offered the jobs in the first place, to try and show what a big political boy he really is, and so magnanimous, too.

Brown has said he wants to give up the spin culture. Good. He does not seem to be able to get to grips with it. After all, he has been out-spun by the Lib-Dems!

Bad Spin or Bad Faith?

As more details emerge about the story of Gordon Brown offering jobs to Lib-Dems, it is not clear whether this is an act of spin that has gone wrong or a deliberate attempt to scupper the Lib-Dems through deceit on the part of Brown. Either way, he has not covered himself in glory here.

What appears to have happened is that Brown spoke to Ming Campbell on Monday and said he wanted offer a couple of Lib-Dems junior jobs. Ming asked for time to think about it and on Wednesday morning he said no to Gordo who then ignored him and offered Ashdown a job on Wednesday afternoon.

Now you can see what Gordo wanted to do here. Labour and the Lib-Dems talked about a coalition in 1997 and it has caused ructions among the Lib-Dems ever since as some of them just want power and some would rather die than partner with Labour.

What really seems to smell bad about this, though, is that on Monday the job was a junior one and on Wednesday it was a Cabinet one, specifically Secretary of State for Northern Ireland. Did Brown really think that he Ashdown would defy his leader’s instructions in exchange for a bigger job? That would be mischief making on a grand scale and show Brown as a man ready to play cheap shot politics with one of the trickiest roles in British politics. Not a good sign for the man that man that says he wants to end the Blair-spin method of working.

So what now? Well Gordo insists he wants a cabinet with “all the talents”, so perhaps he will be offering a job to Peter Mandelson, unquestionably the most able MP of Blair’s era after the (soon to be ex) PM himself.

Is Brown Yellow?

It seems Brown has offered a few Lib-Dems some junior ministerial jobs.

I have previously posted about the merits of Paddy Ashdown. He is a truly exceptional man and someone whose talents are needed in many of the trouble spots of the World. However, I am not sure that the best place for them is in the Cabinet team of Gordon Brown. While I think that Paddy is a great guy, what does this really say about Gordon’s faith in the rest of the candidates he has to chose from among the Labour ranks? Not a lot I would think.

Does Gordon Have Any Friends?

John Cruddas has quite a few. So does Alan Johnson. David Cameron has a lot, as do some of his opponents.

I am thinking of friends among the bloggers out there. On 18 Doughty Street this evening, we were chatting about bloggers’ reactions to Gordon Brown but could not think of one friend that he has out there.

There seems to be an extraordinary lack of enthusiasm among grass-roots Labour members for old-Gordo. Does anyone know of a blogger who has stood up for him?

His friends among the union movement seem to be thin on the ground, too.

Why Voters are Stupid

I love the Economist.

As a single, weekly digest of global news and opinion I don’t really believe that it can be beaten. The name is not completely correlated to the contents, as there is a good mix of arts and politics in with the financial and business stories.

In particular, I love the columnists that each cover one of Britain, Europe and the US. This week’s US column, written under the sobriquet “Lexington”, offers a summary of a book entitled “The Myth of the Rational Voter”, by Bryan Caplan of George Mason University, that explains something that I have never truly understood: why voters are stupid (although being a book of US-origin, it is less blunt than me).

The theory of modern democratic decision making has long since abandoned the idea that everyone in the population needs to understand the most complex problems in order to make a decision. Based on an economic theory sometimes known as the “miracle of aggregation”, the idea is that in any large herd (like a bunch of voters) the vast majority can make decisions based on not really knowing what is going on but provided there is even a small minority that can make well-informed decisions it will all work out in the end. The bulk of people will behave in a way that is almost random and thus cancel each other out at the ballot box. The few that are informed or knowledgeable enough will then swing the balance. As Lexington points out, this works pretty well in most parts of life. The audience of “Who Wants to be a Millionaire” is right 91% of the time, for example.

Sadly, when it comes to voting, Mr Caplan suggests that the system breaks down. This is because the voters that are not making their decisions based on sufficient information do not behave randomly.

Caplan suggests that instead, they are motivated by four main forms of bias. The first is that given a lack of economic understanding, many people fail to understand the benefits of a market economy and tend towards an anti-private profits bias (look at the anti-Tesco movement in the UK). Secondly, they do not see the benefits of interactions with foreigners and tend to be anti-foreign. Third, most people believe that everyone having a job is more important than what everyone is doing, which is simply not the case, and leads to bad economic decisions. Finally, most people think that things are worse than they actually are so are open to manipulation and (sometimes) unnecessary changes that address problems that do not really exist.

The sad part of this is the way in which politicians exploit these traits in the knowledge, frequently, that they are promoting behaviour that is not in the long-term interests of their electors. This explains the anti-immigration tendancies of the Republicans and the anti-trade tendancies of the Democrats, for example.

The book would appear to be a useful read to both aspiring politicians and their critics. I am off to order my copy on Amazon.

Informal Constitution

There is a British Constitution; it just happens to be a whole series of arrangements rather than one document.

The advantage of this arrangement is that the system is easier to change and does not become so “sacred” that is unable to respond as society develops, as has happened in the US.

However, the quirks of the UK system can still throw up funny results from time to time. Just such an exception has now brought David Maclean’s private members bill to a shuddering halt. This was the bill that was interpreted by its critics as an attempt to introduce new excemptions to the Freedom of Information Act in order to protect details of MP’s expenses. However, having passed through the Commons on a narrow vote, the bill has now entered limbo. In order to pass through the Lords, a bill must be adopted by a Peer prepared to put their name to it and promote it. However, no member of the upper house has stepped forward to put their name to this particular bill, so it will hang about for bit until time runs out.

I am a great believer in the benefits for the House of Lords and this quirk somehow seems to have dissolved a highly volatile issue without creating a media frenzy. No one would have been able to think of this as a solution to such a prickly issue. That’s the advantage of an organic constitution that can be tested on its utility: you can see if it works. The House of Lords does work. It should not be replaced.

Update – 16 June 2007 

Without the Maclean bill being in place to protect MPs, the Information Commissioner has indicated that more information about expenses should be revealed.

TRG By Invitation: Sir Malcom Rifkind Responds to Tony Blair

Sir Malcolm Rifkind KCMG QC MP, a patron of the TRG, responds to Tony Blair’s recent article for the Economist.

As he comes to the end of his time in office, Tony Blair has felt the understandable urge to defend his foreign policy record. In an article in the Economist entitled ‘What I’ve learned’, Blair attempts to justify his decision-making. Regretfully, he does not appear to have learnt very much. As usual, his analysis of the threats and challenges that we face is broadly correct. It has been in his proposals for action that he has fallen down, with terrible consequences for both the UK and the wider world.

more…

June Poll: Should the Media be Limited?

Given Tony Blair’s speech, likening the media to a “feral beast”, there are calls to introduce new limits on the freedoms of the media. Critics of the press suggest that the collective mood is overly negative and short-termist, preventing serious decisions from being made without fear of unreasonable criticism. Those in favour of the press see it as the ultimate provider of safe guards against abuses of power by politicians.

But what do you think? Vote using the poll on the right.

There is an interesting post on this topic by the BBC’s Nick Robinson on his blog.

Poll Results: TRG Supporters Favour the Union

In for our May poll, we asked:

Do you support the Union of Scotland with England, Wales and Northern Ireland?

The responses were as follows:

• Yes – there should be no changes – 57%
• Yes – but the ties should be loosened into a federal structure – 24%
• No – Scotland should be independent – 19%

That is a pretty clear result. TRG supporters would appear to favour the Union much as it is, today, with over-whelming (81%) support for the Union to continue in some form.

Sadly, we can’t see where voters are from to understand whether that was a major factor in the views expressed.

Time to Agitate for Mugabe to Go

The University of Edinburgh made the extraordinary move, today, of stipping a previous recipient of an honorary degree of their award.

In this case the recipient was Robert Mugabe.

There are many people in the UK with links to Zimbabwe. The colonial legacy means that this is true at the governmental level, too. Sadly, rather than those links leading to a movement within the UK to agitate more strongly for Mugabe to go, we seem to be weighed down by history, to the point where it has prevented us from expressing the outrage that the appalling conditions in Zimbabwe demand. For the Conservative Party the situation has seemed even worse. Many senior figures seem cowed into silence for fear of accusations of Imperialism. Michael Ancram has been a notable exception. We should be ashamed.

On his recent trip to Africa, Blair backed a “softly-softly” approach to dealing with Mugabe, echoing the stance of South Africa’s President Mbeki, who leads the one country that could topple him quickly by cutting power supplies to the country without resorting to military force.

Blair has, effectively, ignored Zimbabwe as he has many of the other problems in Africa (Sierra Leone is a notable exception for which Blair deserves credit). The excesses of the Mugabe regime have taken place during his time in Downing Street and he has consistently failed to address them. Kate Hoey stands as an example to the Labour Party for her efforts in drawing attention to the problems and the need to be more active in dealing with the situation.

Since independence in 1980, under Mugabe, Zimbabwe has gone from being the bread basket of Africa to being a net food importer. Three out of every four adults is unemployed. Thousands have died in the clashes between political supporters of Zanu PF, Mugabe’s party, and opposition groups. Farms have been seized and razed. An education system that was the envy of Africa has been decimated. According to the World Health Organization, life expectancy for men in Zimbabwe is now just 37 years for men and 34 for women, the lowest of any country on earth.

One man’s desire to hold on to power at any cost is the root cause over all of these ills.

Both Labour and the Conservatives have been too timid in dealing with Mugabe. The time has come to recognise the part the UK played in bringing him to power and to become more active in supporting efforts to remove him.

TRG By Invitation: Why legal abortion is compatible with Tory values

Ann Furedi, of BPAS (the British Pregnancy Advisory Service), discusses why Ann Winterton’s Ten Minute Rule Bill should be opposed.

The last 8 months have seen three Conservative ten minute rule Bills seeking to limit the provisions of the Abortion Act 1967. The latest, from Ann Winterton would compel all women requesting abortion to receive counselling and further information about the effects of abortion, and introduce a seven day cooling off period before a doctor is permitted to give the woman treatment. This intended legislation may sound reasonable on the face of it, but – whether members agree or disagree with legal abortion – this Bill should be opposed, as unnecessary and disingenuous.

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Getting the Message Out

For sometime it has seemed to me that the Conservative Party has, for whatever reason, not always made the best of news opportunities. In some cases we have not been able to get the key messages of a policy announcement or other event into the media in a way that maximises the potential impact. This occurred, for example, when ideas for potential green taxes that were discussed in the spring were portrayed as a series of six additional taxes to be combined together, rather than the intended list of six alternative ways of achieving what needs to be done. Another case was the failure to make clear in the media that Greg Dyke had approached the Conservative Party about running for London Mayor, rather than the other way around.

I didn’t see that the problem was the fault of one person or team, although it is hard to know why this has been the case without having been involved, but it is good to see that some decisive action has been taken by the leadership team to address the situation.

Let’s hope that the appointment yesterday of Andy Coulson, former editor of the News of the World, as the new Director of Communications, will do what needs to be done. Best of luck to him.