All years have unexpected and bizarre events, but in terms of British politics, 2010 has been extraordinary. Had you told me exactly 12 months ago the political events of 2010, I would have believed it. In fact, I still find it hard to believe.
Labour losing the election and David Cameron becoming Prime Minister were expected, but a Coalition between the Liberal Democrats and Conservatives was inconceivable. And yet, Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg is a reality.
In the end, the bill past and tuition fees will rises. The protests have achieved little to change the will of the government. In dictatorships, change can often come from the streets as that is the only place where the people's voice can be heard, but this is not the cases in democracies where the government is chosen by the people.
Voting in elections is where the people are heard and their will expressed. Ironically, the demographic least likely to vote are those who were protesting last week. People aged between 18-25 (a group to which I belong) are far less likely to vote than any other age group. If they want their voices to be heard by those in elected office, they should actually vote in elections instead of rioting in the streets.
A week today the House of Commons will vote on controversially removing the cap on tuition fees. The Minister who has written the Bill, Vince Cable, has said that he may abstain on the vote.
It seems a little bizarre than Mr. Cable will not be supporting his own legislation, but it shows how nervous the Liberal Democrats are on this issue.
Most Liberal Democrat MPs signed a pledge before the election stating that they would vote against any rise in tuition fees. This was economically unadvisable, but most Liberal Democrats didn't think they'd get into government.
Now student protesters are burning effigies of senior Liberal Democrats. If nothing else, it's a sign that the Liberal Democrats are now powerful, though in a democracy, that can be toxic to a political party.
I don't remember it happening as I was only five-years-old (and in Berlin) but the resignation of Margaret Thatcher would greatly effect all British politics that came after.
In 1957 Prime Minister Harold Macmillan gave a speech in Bedford in which he said "most of our people have never had it so good." At the time, the speech was said to be optimistic (if not arrogant), but in fact it was meant as a warning. Mr. Macmillan was trying to say that the recent years of prosperity wouldn't last forever.
He wasn't a member of the government (he was the PM's enterprise adviser), but it is still embarrassing for David Cameron.
It must be especially annoying for Lord Young as what he said was true. People who are in work and have a mortgage are doing quite well. As interest rates are so low, mortgage repayments are very small.
This group of people (which is sizeable) suddenly have more money at the end of month and can't be feeling too bad at the moment. However, they have job losses and public service cuts to come.
To me, Lord Young's ill-advised words seem like a Macmillan-style warning.
The history of the relationship between Ireland and Britain is not a happy one. Centuries of oppression and atrocities followed by war and partition means that few Irish people view their island's time under British rule with nostalgia.
However, in recent years there have been moves to improve relations between the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom. There is agreement and cross border cooperation on a large range of issues, most notably with Northern Ireland (where both the Republic and UK agree that the sovereignty of Northern Ireland should be determined by its people).
For most of the last decade Ireland was known as the Celtic Tiger due to the extraordinary growth of its economy, much to the benefit of its people and its closest neighbour and trading partner (the UK). However, the Republic's economy was very closely linked to the property market and thus was hit hard by the economic downturn.
It now looks increasingly likely that the Republic of Ireland will require a bailout from the EU, and today David Cameron stated that it was in the UK's national interest to help Ireland. The Prime Minister was talking about the very close economic and trading links, but he could also be referring to something less tangible.
Most British people (including myself) have Irish ancestry and the links between the two nations are far closer than most neighbours (which is why the prefix 'Beyond Blighty' has been omitted from this post).
However, the Irish are an incredibly proud people, and accepting a bailout from their former occupiers will not be appreciated in all parts of the Republic. But perhaps it will help heal some of the wounds of the past and make the future prosperous for all the people of these islands.
This afternoon Downing Street announced that Andrew Parsons (the PM's photographer) and Nicky Woodhouse (the PM's filmmaker) have been removed from the civil service. The two had been referred to as 'vanity staff' and the Prime Minister was widely criticised for paying them with public money.
The removal of Mr. Parsons and Ms Woodhouse from the civil service is an embarrassing u-turn for the Prime Minister, but oddly, the press haven't covered it much today - they seemed to have had another story to talk about.
The happy and historic news of a Royal wedding has also buried some sad news for the readers of political blogs. Tom Harris, the Labour MP for Glasgow South, has announced that he is to give up blogging as it was getting him "into too many squabbles". A lesson for us all!
Today thousands of prospective students, current students, lecturers and ordinary people peacefully marched through Westminster in protest to the government's proposed lifting of the cap on tuition fees.
Sadly, these peaceful protesters will not on appear on the front pages of tomorrow's newspapers. Instead, images of the violence at Millbank Tower (the location of Conservative party HQ) will be what millions of people will see when they read their daily papers tomorrow morning. And none of this will change the governmen's policy - if anything, the violent protests have now made the new fees more likely to happen.
This morning the Liberal Democrat MPs were very nervous about the changes to funding. At PMQs today, the Deputy Prime Minister (standing in for the David Cameron who's in Seoul) faced question after question about his party's sudden change in opinion on university fees. Many of Nick Clegg's MPs were terrified that this issue could lose them their seats and where talking about voting against the Bill when it comes to Parliament. However, the British public tend to support the campaigns of ordered and civil protesters, but quickly turn against those who resort to violence. Meaning those Liberal Democrat MPs probably feel a little safer now.
Direct action simply doesn't work in a democratic society, and it often has the opposite effect than that desired by its proponents. If you want to change policy in a democracy, debate the issue, convince people of your point of view, and scare the MPs with your support, but don't start smashing windows as it will get you nowhere.
In my last post I commented on the brutality of Labour's suspension of Phil Woolas. Today Labour MPs, in their own words, mutinied against their own leadership as a result. In a meeting of the Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP) the Deputy Leader, Harriet Harman, was heckled by her own MPs who were angered at the treatment of Mr. Woolas.
The thing is, Labour MPs don't normally do things like this. Unlike the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats, Labour is boringly loyal to its leadership - for most of the time. Of course, Ed Miliband is on paternity leave following the birth of his son on Sunday. Meaning, Macavity-like, Mr. Miliband wasn't there to face the resentment of his party.
Although Mr. Woolas is still fighting the decision to remove him from parliament, there will be a by-election in his constituency as that decision cannot be overturned. All that Mr. Woolas can hope for is that the three year ban from standing for parliament, imposed on him by the court, can be lifted. If he wins on this point, Labour will have to make a difficult decision as to whether to readmit Mr. Woolas into the party and allow him to contest his own seat as a Labour candidate.
The problem for the leadership is that they'll look foolish if they let Mr. Woolas back into the party, but their own MPs will mutiny again if they don't.
It's not uncommon in the United States for the results of close elections to be determined in court. Who could forget the 2000 presidential election, which in the end was resolved by the Supreme Court - not the voters. But things are different in the UK, or so I thought.
I hadn't bothered to blog about the election court, convened to decide whether Phil Woolas' election literature was lawful or not, because I had thought the result was a foregone conclusion as no UK court would overturn the decision of the British voters. Clearly Ed Miliband had come to the same conclusion as me, otherwise he wouldn't have recently made Mr. Woolas the Shadow immigration minister. However, Mr. Miliband and I were completely wrong.
Today the election court found Phil Woolas guilty of deliberately making false statements in his constituency of Oldham East and Saddleworth during this year's general election campaign. As a result, Mr. Woolas has been banned from standing for Parliament for three years and the election result in his constituency has been overturned – meaning there will now be a by-election to fill the seat.
The Labour party quickly suspended Mr. Woolas, and Harriet Harman forcefully condemned his actions, even though they had been serving together in the same Shadow Government just yesterday. It all felt a bit like Labour was over compensating. Of course, as a result of the verdict, Labour (along with the other parties) is now in election mode.
It is easy to forget that, even though the government has a comfortable majority, there is still technically a hung parliament, and every seat counts. The by-election will also be the first real chance to gauge the public's opinion of the new politics and to see how the coalition parties cope with fighting against each other in an election campaign.
One thing that worries me about this case is the precedent it sets. In years to come, as a result of today's decision, will close elections be determined by the courts instead of the people?
This sort of thing happens at the end of all midterms, what makes this time different is that the result of this election means we already know the result of the next – Barack Obama will win a second term.
Of course, using history to predict the future is very dangerous, but there are other things to cheer up the Democrats today. Tea Party candidates did very well in many states, which has unnerved many moderate Republicans as the Tea Party's views are significantly to the right of most American voters. And yet, this insurgent group will have a great influence over the next Republican Nominee for President, who may end up being unelectable as a result.
One other thing that might make Pres. Obama feel a little better. With Republicans in charge of the House of Representatives, the President can blame them when things go wrong.
Boris Johnson and David Cameron went to Eton together, they both went to Oxford, were in the Bullingdon Club at the same time, and they were in Michael Howard's Shadow Cabinet together. However, you would be wrong to think that this makes them friends.
The rivalry between the two men has been much documented and at the same time remained in the shadows, never overtly coming out in public, there have just been suggestions of its existence here and there. This has made it one of the most tantalising political stories of the moment.
I predict that Boris Johnson's description of the government's housing policy as 'Kosovo-style social cleansing' is just the opening skirmishes in a much longer battle between the Mayor of London and the Prime Minister. Some of this was inevitable, Boris Johnson will be fighting for re-election in less than 18 months, and he needs to separate himself from the government. Mr. Johnson knows people tend to vote against the party of government in mid-term, especially one which is rising taxes and cutting public services. As a result, the Prime Minister will probably tolerate these differences of opinion - for now.
In the meantime, I'm guessing the Mayor will enjoy snipping at his old schoolmate and it is probably are foreshadow of Conservative Party conflicts to come.
I must confess, although I love politics, I have little knowledge of economics (budgets speeches tend to send me to sleep). However, I had no problem understanding the Spending Review - we've run out of money and all need to cut expenditure (all of us).
Even the Queen faces a 14% cut, although having been on the thrown for almost 60 years, Her Majesty has been through spending cuts before - unlike many of the civil servants currenlty working in government departments.
For the last decade, government departments have seen increased spending and investment every year, and for many who have grown up with that culture, it will be very difficult to change.
The UK we see today has come about as a result of the investment culture, what the UK looks like after a parliament of the cutting culture is anyone's guess.
Some nerviness before your first Prime Minister's Questions as leader is understandable, and an uneasy performance from Ed Miliband would have been more than forgivable. However, Mr. Miliband seemed neither nervous nor uneasy at his first PMQs as Labour leader, in fact, his questions were measured and clever, his delivery was smooth and he actually had some genuinely funny jokes. David Cameron however seemed rather uncomfortable at times, and was often unable to give a clear response to questions from the Leader of the Opposition. Even the Father of the House, Conservative MP Sir Peter Tapsell, complimented Mr. Miliband on his performance.
Fortunately for the Prime Minister, and unluckily for Mr. Miliband, the media gave near blanket coverage to the extraordinary rescue of the 33 miners from the San José Mine in Chile. During the rescue, Mr. Cameron telephoned the President of Chile, Sebastián Piñera, to congratulate him. The Prime Minister really should have also thanked the President for rescuing the miners on the same day he was trounced at PMQs, thus pushing Mr. Miliband's success off tomorrow's front pages.
Ed Miliband always has next week's PMQs to get the media's attention, although I suspect victory will be a bit more difficult next time - Mr. Cameron will want to learn from today's defeat and make sure he is ready for his next meeting with Mr. Miliband.
One thing PMQs does do is give a sense of the personality of the party leaders. Today Mr. Miliband seemed calm, cool, clever and funny. The big test for a successful leader is whether they seem 'Prime Ministerial'. In my opinion, I don't think Mr. Miliband did that today, but this was mainly due to the fact that he wasn't the guy answering the questions.
At the start if the conference season, I had thought that, in comparison to Labour and the Liberal Democrats, the Conservative conference would seem rather dull. In fact, it was one of the strangest and most interesting conferences due to it being hijacked by the Chancellor's announcement that child benefit would be cut for families with high incomes (most of whom are Conservative voters). George Osborne apparently announced his plan without talking to the Cabinet, something for which Mr. Osborne used to criticise Gordon Brown.
Many Conservative delegates and MPs were greatly angered at the announcement but an opinion poll suggested that 83% of people support the cut. Although, as most commentators pointed out, about 83% of people aren't affected by the cut and it's easy to support someone else losing money.
David Cameron's speech on Wednesday was good, but not his best. There was a very sweet moment when the Prime Minister talked about Niamh Riley, a six-year-old girl from Salford who sent Mr. Cameron a £1 from the tooth fairy to help with the deficit. Mr. Cameron apparently returned the money with a thankful note advising Miss Riley to 'treat herself'.
To me, it seemed as if the bad headlines were affecting the PM (either that or his newborn had been keeping him up). George Osborne however was unaffected and unapologetic, he knows that there are worse cuts needed and that the government is going to become very unpopular in the next few months.
However, the next general election is a long way away, and the coalition hopes that by the time polling day comes, the economy will have been repaired and the government will get the credit. In the meantime, they will have to suffer through some very bad headlines and a few more hijacked conferences.
Sunday, 3 October 2010
Observer journalist Andrew Rawnsley, in his take of the week, compared Ed Miliband to a mafia boss. This image is rather strange as Mr. Miliband in the rest of the media is portrayed as soft and cuddly. Guardian cartoonist Steve Bell even drew Ed Miliband as a panda.
Yet to stand against his brother took bravery and steal. Then, one of his first acts as leader was to attack his former boss (Gordon Brown) and removed one of Brown's closest allies in the party, Nick Brown.
When Tony Blair first became Labour leader in 1994, he was described as 'Bambi', perhaps Mr. Miliband's panda image will be proved to be as erroneous. British voters tend to like the idea of a strong leader, Gordon Brown's polls numbers increased when he was accused of bulling his staff.
This week is the Conservative party conference. Then, on Wednesday 13th, Don Ed Miliband (as Mr. Rawnsley called him) meets the capo di tutti capi (Prime Minister David Cameron) at noon in the House of Commons for PMQs. It will be our first look at the new order in Westminster. I can't wait!!
Public service cuts will no doubt be the main talking point at the Conservative Party conference. Although the cuts will be unpopular with many workers, David Cameron is not risking his life by implementing them. This is not the case for Rafael Correa, the President of Ecuador.
Last Thursday, President Correa was shot at and had tear gas thrown at him by this own police and military after the President announced a cut in their pay. Loyal troops were able to rescue Mr. Correa from a hospital where he'd taken refuge, but for short time it looked like the democratically elected President might be forced from power.
Military coup d'états are not uncommon in Latin American countries, Ecuador has seen several coups and military juntas, as have most South American nations. The last coup in Ecuador was just five years ago when President Lucio Gutiérrez was forcibly removed from office at the point of a gun.
The number of coups in that part of the world is partly due to culture, but another reason is the system of government. Almost all Latin American countries are Presidential republics where the head of state is also the head of government and Commander-in-chief, very similar to the system set out in the United States Constitution (once described as America's most dangerous export).
It would be wrong to condemn all Latin American counties. Today voters in Brazil are electing a new President. Opinion polls suggest that Dilma Rousseff will win comfortably and become Brazil's first female President. Brazil is seen as an emerging superpower and a stable government is an important part of this success story, but Brazil's history is not trouble free, having had a few coups of its own in the 1960s. Like Ecuador, Brazil's constitution is very similar to that of the United States.
The text of the US Constitution seems very sensible and democratic. The states are given great autonomy with the Congress to deal with federal issues and a President who acts as a unifying national figure, dealing mainly with foreign policy and defence. When put into practice however, it doesn't work like that. The executive branch is incredibly powerful and there is little accountability for the President. In countries which use versions of the US Constitution (although not the US itself) this has led to dictatorial Presidents who could only be removed by the military in a coup.
In 2008 the Economist Intelligence Unit ranked the countries of the world in order of the state of their freedom and democracy. This list was called the 'Democracy Index' and out of the thirty countries classed as 'full democracies' only four were presidential republics (the United States, the Republic of Korea, Uruguay and Costa Rica). Most of the world's presidential republics were classed as 'authoritarian regimes'. By contrast twenty-five out of the world's thirty full democracies have a parliamentary system.
It is no coincidence that former Iberian colonies (which almost universal became presidential republics) have a history of military dictatorships and economic instability, whereas former British colonies (which almost universal became parliamentary democracies) have a long history of stable government and economic prosperity. There are several exceptions of course, but in general parliamentary systems protect democracy.
A parliamentary system gives systemic accountability as the executive is directly answerable to the legislature. If a Prime Minister in a parliamentary democracy suddenly became tyrannical, he or she could be removed by their parliamentary party, by the parliament itself, or even by the head of state. It is incredibly difficult to peacefully remove a President in a presidential republic (hence the number of military coups in such countries).
I am not saying that presidential republics are doomed to become tyrannical, but if you happen to find yourself choosing a new system of government for a country, I'd suggest a Parliament and Prime Minister, not a President and a Congress.
A large amount of Ed Miliband's speech today could have been given by David Cameron, and even more of the speech could have been given by Nick Clegg. The new Labour leader wanted to show that he is very different to the past few leaders of his party.
The Iraq War, the removal of civil liberties, mass emigration, even how to combat the deficit, Ed Miliband said that the Labour government had been wrong. He was trying to show that under his leadership, Labour will be a very different party to the one that lost the election last May (even though it was Ed Miliband who wrote the 2010 Labour manifesto).
Although there was a lot of criticism of the Prime Minister, which was expected, there was nothing about the Deputy PM. Perhaps Ed Miliband is thinking of a future coalition government of his own - or maybe he'd like to gain the support of those Liberal Democratic voters who feel disillusioned with their party's union with the Conservatives. At the general election, the Conservatives received 36% of the vote, Labour had 29% and the Liberal Democrats 23%. The most recent poll showed the Conservatives at 39%, Labour in the lead at 40% and the Liberal Democrats down to just 12%. In order to become Prime Minister, Ed Miliband will have to keep those Liberal Democratic voters who have switched to Labour.
The speech itself was good, but Ed Miliband is not yet as good an orator as Tony Blair, President Obama or David Cameron. However, such skills often come with time. The wounds in the Miliband family, caused by the leadership election, will probably heal with time as well.
All the indications are that David Miliband will not seek election to the Shadow Cabinet, and thus leave frontline politics. So there will be no Miliband equivalent of the Blair-Brown rivalry on the Labour frontbench, and from now on when I say 'Mr. Miliband' I shall be refereeing to Ed.
So, Ed Miliband, MP for Doncaster North, is the new Leader of the Labour party, beating his own brother by just 1.3% in the last round of voting. It will take some time to get used to Mr. Miliband and see how his leadership will affect the party.
One thing I noticed was David Miliband, who looked devastated. He led the vote in every round except the last when he was overtaken by his younger sibling. Speculation about a Ed-David split in the party has already begun, but Ed Miliband can take some comfort from a look at recent history. At the height of Gordon Brown's unpopularity, David Miliband was given the opportunity to challenge Mr. Brown for the leadership on three occasions, and he was never able to go through with it. On that record, it seems unlikely he'll find the courage to unseat his own brother.
So Ed Miliband is the Leader of the Labour party and the Leader of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition, but is he also the next Prime Minister and First Lord of the Treasury?
After a four month campaign, the Labour leadership election is over. As of 5pm today, the polls have closed. Of course, we won't know the actual result until 5pm on Saturday, but at least the candidates can now rest without worrying about missing a hustings or a canvassing opportunity.
So, who will win? Well, if Diane Abbott, Ed Balls or Andy Burnham wins it will be seen as a major upset. If Diane Abbott gets it there is a strong possibility of a civil war inside the Labour party between the left wing (which includes Ms. Abbott) and the right wing (which is the majority of Labour MPs). Ed Balls will be able to keep the party together (his somewhat stern reputation will see to that) but he has a similar problem to Brown in that the public don't warm to him.
Andy Burnham is an unknown. He will appeal in northern voters, but he looks young and innocent (although so did Tony Blair when he became Labour leader in 1994). David Cameron should fear Mr. Burnham as Labour leader. In politics, figures who come from nowhere tend to win elections (Barack Obama, Tony Blair, David Cameron are good examples of this).
Speculation about the hypothetical leaderships of Abbott, Balls and Burnham are interesting, but it would be extraordinary for the winner not to be called 'Mr. Miliband'. Which 'Mr. Miliband', of course, is a matter of debate.
This leadership election has been given a unique dynamic due to the fact that the two frontrunners are sibling. This dynamic is unlikely to end when the result is announced on Saturday, it will have a great influence on the leadership of the eventual winner. The loser will almost certainly stand for the Shadow Cabinet, which will be led by their brother. The Blair-Brown rivalry influenced the Labour party and the country for over a decade. I wonder what influence will a Miliband-Miliband rivalry have?
I'm Philip, and the idea for this blog was suggested to me by my friend, Deborah. I suspect that she may be the only one who’ll actually read it, hence its name.
It is my hope that this blog will give an impartial commentary on politics (often rare in the blogosphere) for those people who are perhaps not avid followers of politics, but nevertheless want to know about the goings on of the political world.
