Plus ça change

Another Scottish Parliament election, and it's plus ça change. The phrase coined by the French critic, Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr in 1849, suggests that despite superficial alterations or reforms, underlying fundamental issues often remain unresolved. As none of the parties in this election even attempted to address the fundamental issues facing Scotland, this seems apposite. Turnout was dismal, but no lower than pre-2021 levels, so the voters have been 'scunnered' for a long time.

It is often claimed that the Scottish Parliament's voting system was designed to stop any party from having a majority. Sadly, this is a myth. The Labour establishment at the time offered a nod of recognition of the need for some proportionality, but thought their dominance of the FPTP seats would deliver a Labour majority, or at least something close to one. They didn't envision the current circumstances, where it delivers an SNP majority. 

Vote share

But what about tactical voting? Yes, that can work in a by-election when the electorate can roughly work out their options. It can also work in a two-party circumstance, such as the last general election. It doesn't work in a Scottish election when the anti-SNP vote, on constitutional or other issues, is split three or four different ways. I was delivering a tactical voting leaflet to a Tory voter this week. He was genuinely confused about the FPTP system and the outcome I accurately predicted in my constituency. He wasn't a stupid person, as the long drive and three BMWs probably meant he had earned a decent living before retirement. In fairness, if he had just said, I'm a Tory, and I am voting that way anyway, I would have understood. I have voted Labour, even when they stood no chance. As I have no strong view on the constitution, if there wasn't a Labour candidate, I would vote SNP before I voted for the Tories or their reincarnation as Reform Ltd.

The constitution may be less of an issue than it was after 2014, but it remains the default position for many voters. It is going nowhere after this election, much to John Swinney's private relief. There will be some performative noise, and then it will be back to business as usual. It is a lot easier to win elections when you can blame someone else. I was the Chair of Scottish Labour when Wendy Alexander did her 'bring it on' stunt. I thought she was right then, as it certainly shook Alex Salmond as much as it would John Swinney today. However, he can rest easy, as UK Labour will take the same position it always has. There will be no break from the constitutional logjam unless there is a viable route to a referendum. That is tactically and democratically the right approach, but it won't happen.

As one commentator put it this morning, "The SNP victory was made in Downing Street by a hapless Prime Minister." That is possibly true, although I think the UK Government gets insufficient credit for the positive aspects of its record, particularly reforms to the railways and employment rights. I voted for Keir Starmer, and although I recognised he may be a bit dull, but after Johnson and Truss, dull looked good.  What I didn't appreciate was how bad a politician he would be. I expected to disagree with the new government on aspects of economic policy. I knew it wouldn't be as radical as I wanted, but I didn't think it would be politically incompetent. They are also learning that the billionaire media, which has now reached parts of the BBC, will go after a right-wing Labour leadership, nearly as much as a left-wing one. All you can do is try not to present open goals, as this government has done, just as Jeremy Corbyn did.

The same commentator also said, "Sarwar could have promised voters twenty grand each and they still would have shouted at him about the Prime Minister and voted SNP or Reform." Quite possibly, but there were major homegrown errors as well. If you are going to use the slogan 'change' when the voters have several options for change, you had better have a plan for what that change looks like. The Scottish Labour manifesto was yet another piece of managerial tinkering. This left Anas trekking the country, spouting slogans without anything to back them up. Instead of a radical plan that would distinguish Scottish Labour from the pack, it dissolved into platitudes that convinced no one. The outcome was Scottish Labour's lowest vote in the party's history as a national party, with 19.2% in the constituency vote and 16% in the list vote. The Scottish Greens won more list votes than Scottish Labour in Glasgow. 

This has nothing to do with the myth that Scottish Labour policies are set by 'London'. I have been closely involved in most of the manifestos since devolution, and Westminster influence has declined in every one. The rules give Scottish Labour absolute autonomy over devolved issues, and attempts to influence that, even when there was a UK Labour government, were largely rebuffed. The best example is the rejection of a marketised NHS in Scotland, when Blair was taking England in another direction. The problem is the mindset in the Scottish Labour establishment since 2007. I was at the parliamentary group meeting after the 2007 election, and with some honourable exceptions, most of the MSPs were not prepared to shift into opposition mode. Ever since then, it has been the same. Leaders have acted as if the ministerial Mondeos will turn up the next day (Kias and Volvos today), and have gone to the electorate with bland, no-risk policy platforms.

If Scottish Labour want's to climb out of the hole it has dug for itself, it needs to become a radical insurgent party. UK Labour also needs to change as well. I am less focused on personalities than on the need for policy and strategy changes, but there is little in this morning's missives from both Labour leaders to give me much confidence that real change is likely.

It's Manifesto Time!

 It’s manifesto time. As someone who has drafted and haggled over a few in my time, I enjoy this part of an election campaign while recognising that this makes me a less-than-typical voter.  

You might think in a snap election that manifestos are hastily put together. However, in practice, the core policies will have been written months ago and tested on focus groups and polling, leaving just some updating before putting them into whatever governance arrangement the political party has. In broad terms, the manifesto is the opportunity to set out the details of party policy, rare in an era of sound-bite campaigning. It also provides a script for candidates and supporters. Some are more detailed than others, but there is pressure to say something about every policy area to avoid the accusation that the party is ignoring an interest group. Issues that are controversial, at least internally, have to be fudged to get agreement. 

 

It is legitimate to question the purpose of a manifesto in a rapidly changing world. This has been even more noticeable since devolution when most UK policy areas don't apply other than the knock-on spending commitments. There is also a strong case for more independent scrutiny of manifestos to at least reduce the dafter claims and counter-claims for the benefit of voters.

 I am only going to look briefly at the Conservative and Labour manifestos. I'm sure there are lots of interesting ideas in the Lib-Dem, SNP, and Green manifestos, but they are not going to be the next UK government. They also know that, so don't worry too much about their policies adding up. They make daft claims like the SNP on NHS privatisation and oil jobs. Only if we get a hung parliament, do they get interesting.

 

This really is a topsy-turvy election when the Tory manifesto is attacked for rash, uncosted spending commitments. The Tory tax cuts will cost £17.2bn a year by 2029-30, paid for by cracking down on tax avoidance and slashing the welfare bill by as-yet uncertain means. IFS and other think tanks warned there was a big risk the sums would not add up. 

I suspect the Tories decided they won't have to implement it, so let's chuck in many policies that appeal to their core vote to minimise the defeat. Examples are the triple lock plus, which provides a tax cut for pensioners - even if they only need one because the Tories have frozen the tax threshold. An analysis of the tax changes by the Resolution Foundation said that while the 20% of the wealthiest households would gain £1,300 a year on average, someone who paid £30,000 would see their tax bill fall by just £170. It’s not hard to see the target demographic here.

 In contrast, Labour constantly repeats the mantra that all policies are costed and funded. However, they have yet to go as far as 1997, when the party committed to Tory spending plans, even if, as the IFS points out, they are not far off that. Even Ken Clarke admitted that he had no intention of keeping to them. Gordon Brown later opened the taps, but he had a more robust economy and fiscal position to play with. I suspect Rachel Reeves is going to find it more challenging. 

 

I'm afraid I have to disagree with Keir Starmer's comparison of the Tory and Corbyn 2019 manifestos. I worked on that manifesto, and it was fully costed, with John McDonnell's Grey Book going into more detail than I have ever seen in a manifesto supplement. Peston and others make this point well. 

 

The Labour manifesto reflects a cautious fiscal approach to the election. Given the state of the public finances, this is understandable, but it is storing up problems for an incoming government. Reform can do some of the work, but the heavy lifting of putting the country back on its feet requires investment. Plugging a few loopholes is fine, but the anomalies around Capital Gains Tax need to be addressed, as does a tax on wealth.

 

I like the focus on long-term solutions – the mission-driven government. Short-termism has plagued our country in politics and business, and a new emphasis on industrial and infrastructure strategies, working with employers and trade unions, is the right approach. The early focus on national security is good, even if I want to see more urgency in getting to 2.5% of GDP. Particularly as we are wasting too much of the equipment budget on Trident. However, there is a welcome commitment to reform defence procurement, if little detail. Bringing the railways into public ownership is the right transport policy, and there are ways of doing the same with other vital infrastructure without breaking the bank.

 

The New Deal for working people is an important way forward as is bringing the cost of living into the minimum wage calculation and ending age discrimination. Consulting on implementing the plans is normal government, and practical issues over zero-hours contracts, in particular, need to be addressed. There is plenty in the energy section to like, even if it could be bolder. I doubt the 'broken energy market' will be fixed through more robust regulation. The English public service proposals will bring Scotland £470m of additional resources to tackle some of our problems. There is at least an understanding of the need to reduce health inequalities and that requires cross-cutting action.

 

The offer on the constitution is limited, an opportunity missed given that they can be radical at minimal cost. The failure to grasp the opportunities of further devolution, particularly going back on employment law, risks rebounding on Scottish Labour in 2016. After 18 months of financially constrained government, those soft SNP voters may decide they have only lent their vote. The polling for the Scottish Parliament elections is much tighter than Westminster, and the dial hasn’t shifted on support for independence.

 

Re-setting our international relationships is absolutely vital. While I would like to see stronger commitments to rebuilding relationships with the EU, that section gives a few hints that a new approach is possible without reopening Brexit. Getting Britain back on the world stage on issues like climate change is crucial.

Under devolution, UK manifestos have a limited impact on the issues that matter most to voters in Scotland. However, there is plenty to like on reserved issues like employment rights, defence, and international relations. The weakness is fiscal caution and the constitution, both areas where Labour needs to be bolder. As the IFS says, ‘delivering genuine change will almost certainly also require putting actual resources on the table’. Stability is vital after the chaos of recent years, but we will need more than managerial competence to tackle the deep-seated problems facing the UK.

Manifesto 2021 - National Recovery Plan

After more than two years of consultation and engagement, it was good to see the Scottish Labour election manifesto launched today. I have been working part-time managing the process leading up to the publication, so it is personal closure for me.

Drafting a manifesto is not the same as writing a book. That can be a solitary experience, even allowing for the research. A Labour manifesto, unlike some other parties, is not the product of a policy team disappearing into a darkened room to think beautiful thoughts. It is supported by a democratic structure and a series of consultation papers and engagement with members, affiliates and external stakeholders. There were literally hundreds of submissions, meetings and engagement events. The final document is also the product of teamwork with colleagues and elected representatives from all sections of the Scottish Labour Party.

I have been involved in many manifestos over the years, but this has been a very different experience. The pandemic not only meant the process shifted online, but it also impacted the structure and content. Most manifestos are largely done and dusted long before the short campaign starts. However, this year the lessons from the pandemic were an important influence on the final document. It also changed the focus from a parliamentary term to the immediate actions necessary to address the recovery from the pandemic. As one journalist pointed out, ‘recovery’ gets 193 mentions in the manifesto!

That is why the manifesto has two parts. Scottish Labour's National Recovery Plan sets out the immediate actions, and a second part outlines the policies that will address the underlying issues facing Scotland. I am personally agnostic on the constitutional arguments that bedevil Scottish politics. As I am not a nationalist or a unionist, it is just another policy option. What I am not agnostic about is the need to focus on the recovery from the pandemic. When 10,000 people have died, thousands more have lost their job, and 25,000 are ringing the mental health helpline; we need to forget about flags and focus on what really matters.

It is a lengthy document, which I am not going to attempt to summarise. However, it includes many radical policies that I have written extensively about in recent years, including:

• Creating good quality sustainable jobs to avoid a lost generation of young people.
• The concept of Good Work that goes much further than the current Fair Work initiative and will be properly enforced through procurement.
• A real focus on health inequalities, Scotland’s most enduring and deadly problem.
• Investing in a National Care Service with a new deal for the workforce and local democratic accountability.
• Preventative spending in areas like housing, fuel poverty, early years and the environment.
• Tackling climate change, moving from rhetoric to action with a Just Transition.
• Ending the centralism of recent years through the principle of subsidiarity and investing in the social infrastructure that helps build stronger communities.

A few personal interest favourites include supporting working-class history and protecting our battlefields and other historical sites. Sadly, I couldn’t sneak the reintroduction of steam engines past ASLEF!

I recognise that few people read manifestos from cover to cover. The contents and word search mean you can dip into the sections that interest you. However, in my less than objective view, it’s worth a read.

A very different election

Well that was different! From landslide victory to hung parliament breaks the received wisdom that the short election campaign can only marginally shift voting intention. I have been fighting elections since the age of 12, and I can’t recall anything close to this one.

First and foremost the story is about Jeremy Corbyn. He has helped increase the Labour Party's support more than any other party leader since 1945. Talking in a straightforward way, in socialism terms, about the state of our country, chimed with many more voters than we could have imagined. Most importantly, he brought many non-voters, particularly the young, into the political discourse. It’s a very broad generality, but if Brexit was about older voters, this election was about the young.

Admittedly, this was helped by a quite extraordinarily inept performance by Theresa May. Her absence from debates, avoiding real voters and ‘Maybot’ performances, showed a politician out of touch with the emotional pull of modern campaigns. The contrast between her staged events with the party faithful and the huge Jeremy Corbyn rallies was stark.

There was a positive feel about all this last weekend, when previously critical columnists like John Harris and Calum Campbell, got out of the bubble and started to talk to real people on the ground. They picked up on the impact social media had in countering the right-wing media. Here are a few of the best to enjoy. This is a point analysed today by academics, but we should also remember that the broadcast media duty to give even coverage, remains an important factor.

A number of Jeremy’s critics (here is a Ch4 news clip to remind them!) have had the good grace to admit they were wrong. Owen Smith went up in my estimation with his candid interview on the BBC yesterday. I particularly enjoyed the wriggling embarrassed interviews the likes of John Woodcock had to face. I hope more of the coup plotters will now recognise the huge damage they did at a time when the Tories were on the post-Brexit ropes. Imagine what could have been achieved had Labour started this election campaign from a higher base.

In Scotland, where politics has been stuck in a constitutional rut, the Corbyn effect also helped. I have sat through enough of Scottish Labour’s private polling presentations in the last year to know that a 27.3% share of the vote is huge progress. Even when polling was in the low teens there was some sign of hope. It was young voters that were the most willing to give Labour a hearing, and it was Jeremy who turned that into votes.

It wasn’t just the young. The manifesto commitments on issues like the minimum wage; the public sector pay cap; workers rights and ending austerity resonated with voters, including a number who took a different position over independence.

Scottish Labour’s vote share is only just behind the Tories, yet delivered only half the seats. Labour is not in a position to complain about the impact of the First Past The Post system, but it might make some pause to consider. My congratulations to all the new Scottish Labour MSPs. I was particularly chuffed with the election of the irrepressible Hughie Gaffney and Danielle Rowley, both of whom will bring something very different to Westminster. A number of others came closer than anyone expected, not least UNISON’s Angela Feeney, who moved mountains in Motherwell and Wishaw.

Of course it’s bad that Scottish Conservative MPs will be propping up the Tories in Westminster, particularly when they didn’t fight the election on the UK Tory manifesto. Whatever my differences with some of the defeated SNP MPs, I take no pleasure in their replacement by Tories. They may not have had the impact they claimed, but they worked hard on reserved issues like welfare cuts and employment rights.

Having said that, I give no credence to claims that Labour urged voters to back the Tories when they were the challenger. Kez’s interview was a simple factual statement and the outpourings of an obscure constituency official is not proof of a wider strategy. The SNP lost seats because their vote fell significantly and a number of MPs held on because there wasn’t that much tactical voting on the constitution. Contrary to popular myth, Scotland is not some socialist nirvana – the Tories won in seats they have held before Thatcher wrecked the brand.

If I have a criticism of the Scottish Labour campaign, it is that it focused too much on the constitution. I understand the tactical reasons and it is true that there was little appetite, even amongst Yes voters, for Indyref2. But sending out letters from Alistair Darling did not help the trade union case for Labour. I have said many times before that scrapping with the Tories over the perceived unionist vote is a dead end for Scottish Labour. There are a growing number of voters in Scotland who can focus on issues other than the constitution when it matters. Scottish Labour has to ignore the core flag wavers on both sides and focus on the constitutional middle ground. A point reinforced by Mark Lazarowicz in today’s Herald.

 Finally, we will of course need to see how the Westminster position plays out. After the bile thrown at Jeremy over the IRA, it is beyond irony to see the Tories working with the DUP. The DUP is going to face a level of scrutiny they are not used to. Not least the strange story of Brexit funding.

Labour needs to build on the momentum of this campaign. Even Tory MPs are beginning to realise that austerity has failed economically, as Joseph Stiglitz and others have pointed out. Also, having had an intensive conversation with their voters in recent weeks, they better understand people’s concerns over the impact on public services. When voters in places like Kensington and Canterbury are returning Labour MPs, it is surely time for a rethink.

Labour has to develop its credible alternatives to austerity and refine its offer to build on the success of this campaign, for what will be an inevitable re-run in the foreseeable future.

Election 2017 - Labour's ownership plans are the radical shift in energy policy

Not for the first time, energy policy has received very little attention in this election campaign. In Scotland, key elements are reserved so you might expect a bit more attention to be paid to it, rather than debate devolved issues that MPs have no real say over.

The Tories are not proposing any major changes to their current energy policy, other than over energy prices. The radical change is in Labour's manifesto, which attacks privatisation and fuel poverty, based on three key principles:

• To ensure security of energy supply and ‘keep the lights on’.
• To ensure energy costs are affordable for consumers and businesses.
• To ensure we meet our climate change targets and transition to a low-carbon economy. 

None of these are particularly controversial; the radical meat comes later in the manifesto.

Labour would introduce an immediate emergency price cap to ensure that the average dual-fuel household energy bill remains below £1,000 per year. The SNP manifesto also has a price cap commitment. This was 1970's socialism according to the Daily Mail, until the Tories started to use similar language. In practice the Tory manifesto commitment has been diluted to a targeted cap. So much so that the industry now welcomes it.

The big Labour idea is to take energy back into public ownership to deliver renewable energy, affordability for consumers, and democratic control. This will be done in stages, starting with the energy supply networks license conditions. Then by creating locally accountable energy companies and finally purchasing regional and national grids. As Stephen Hall, from Leeds University notes, this is not quite as revolutionary as it appears. This is happening in the US and Germany, often badged as municipalisation. It is a long way short of command and control nationalisation.

To help tackle other aspects of fuel poverty, Labour will insulate four million homes to help those who suffer in cold homes each winter. This will cut emissions, improve health, save on bills and reduce winter deaths. There should be Barnett consequentials for Scotland from this. Homeowners will be offered interest- free loans to improve their property and Landlord regulations will be changed in England. Labour is committed to similar measures in Scotland. As the Energy Saving Trust says:

"There’s no sugar coating it. From a home energy point of view the Labour manifesto is much more encouraging than the Conservative one."

Labour will ban fracking because it would lock us into an energy infrastructure based on fossil fuels, long after the point in 2030 when the Committee on Climate Change says gas in the UK must sharply decline. Putting to one side the safety and environmental issues, we simply don’t need another dirty fossil fuel. The Tories are proposing incentives in England to promote fracking and the SNP are consulting over the current moratorium in Scotland.

Labour views emerging technologies such as carbon capture and storage as the way to help to smooth the transition to cleaner fuels and to protect existing jobs as part of the future energy mix. However, the manifesto is silent on the role of gas plants in delivering flexible generation. The current capacity market has not provided an incentive to build new plants; instead it has delivered the dirtiest possible coal and diesel generation.

The commitments to renewable energy projects, including tidal lagoons, are viewed as part of Labour’s industrial strategy, to create manufacturing and energy jobs, as well as contributing to climate- change commitments. With backing from a Labour government, these sectors can secure crucial shares of global export markets.

The Liberal-Democrats would also reverse Tory cuts to support for wind farms and solar PV. They also support energy efficiency measures. However, their support for community energy and new entrants into energy retail are firmly wedded to market solutions.

Under a Labour government nuclear will continue to be part of the UK energy supply, which puts them at odds with the SNP. Labour will also seek to retain access to Euratom, to allow continued trade of fissile material, with access and collaboration over research. As part of the Brexit negotiations, Labour will prioritise maintaining access to the internal energy market. This is also important to the SNP’s independence plans, which rely on access to energy systems outwith Scotland.

The SNP energy policy is currently the subject of a consultation and I have set out the UNISON response to that consultation here. In the event of a hung parliament, outwith the Tories, most parties could support the ambition in the paper and it is fair to say that Scotland has led the way on cleaner energy. Its weakness is the shortage of specific actions and milestones, a criticism shared by the renewables industry.

Most party manifestos express their support for renewable energy and energy efficiency. The radical shift in this election is the commitment to new ownership models in the Labour manifesto. The election of Labour government this week would mean big changes for the sector.


For a full comparison of the party manifestos on energy and climate change, see the Carbon Brief's helpful chart.


Cross posted on Utilities Scotland.

Election 2017 - what side are you on?

Election slogans are generally meaningless, but in this election they clearly differentiate the offer. Comrades, left and right, should focus on that.

Today’s Scottish Labour manifesto will set out clearly why Labour is “For the many, not the few’. On workers rights, public services, tax and much else - Labour offers a positive vision of what a different country could look like. In contrast, ‘Strong and stable’ reflects the absence of vision in the Tory manifesto, which seeks to reward the rich and divide communities on age, Brexit, immigration and flags.

From a left perspective, I have to admit a greater irritation with some comrades than normal in this election. A discussion with a friend, who has belonged to an array of fringe left parties, particularly irked me last week. His reaction to the UK Labour manifesto was, ‘I suppose it’s not that bad’.  Really comrade, is that the best you can do?

Reclaiming the railways, Royal Mail, energy and water (in England) into public ownership. A huge investment in public services that will provide a major boost to devolved services devastated by austerity.

As Dave Prentis put it yesterday’s Observer, “Every Labour government in my lifetime – no matter my disagreements with individual leaders or policies – has improved the lives of the majority of the British people and delivered better public services than the ones they inherited.”

Dave also said, “Every Labour government has secured greater rights at work and made our country a fairer place”. It is on that point that I particularly despaired of my friend’s response. This Labour manifesto includes 20 commitments on workers rights that ticks most of the boxes on any trade union shopping list, including:

•      Employment rights on day one
•      No more zero hours contracts
•      Extending collective bargaining and workplace access
•      Ending the public sector pay cap
•      Raising the minimum wage to £10
•      Excessive pay levy

There is much more, as Gregor Gall (A left academic not slow to criticise Labour) highlights. This is a manifesto that would make the workplace a much fairer place and make a real start it tackling the low pay and insecure work culture that is wrecking our economy. Yes comrades, it’s time to get a grip.

Some comrades to my right also irritate me. This is well summed up by Peter Frost’s feature in the Morning Star, who gives us a timely reminder that Jeremy is not the first Labour leader to be vilified, even if this time the establishment has sunk to a new low. Even supposedly pro-Labour sites like Labour List have run several pieces about internal issues post-election. Yes comrades, it’s time you also got a grip. As Peter says, “I know what side I am on. I even know what side Kuenssberg is on. The simple question is what side are you on — and what are you going to do about it?

Labour’s Scottish and UK manifestos are not going back to the 1970’s, a much-maligned decade by the way. Even social democrat’s like Will Hutton concede, “It confronts the way contemporary capitalism is stratifying the labour market into a new mass precariat and conferring enormous rewards at the top, while crucial public services are being starved of resources or compromised by putting the profit motive first.”

Let’s not forget that this snap election was called because the economy is about to get even worse, exacerbated by the Tory approach to Brexit. After eight years of BofE stimulus - the economy is stagnant, real incomes are falling and inequality is rising. The financial markets are disconnected from the real economy and our public services are hanging on by a thread.

So comrades’ left and right, get a grip, the stakes are too high to waste on carping and squabbles. This election is a pivotal struggle for the sort of country we want to live in – it’s time to remember what side you are on.