Arise Lord McConnell of Wishaw

It can’t be easy being Jack McConnell. First you line up a dream job in Malawi, then your party say they can’t risk a bye-election, so you have sit at the back of the chamber as you watch your successor get regularly trounced by Alex Salmond. Then, just as Scottish Labour is starting to look for a new leader in the wake of Brown and with the realisation that Steven Purcell isn’t coming back anytime soon, just when you think it’s safe to start making noises as a prelude to a leadership challenge, you’re in the House of Lords.

Now, I doubt that McConnell is going to lose his Scottish Parliament seat after Brenda waves her sword about his head. After all, Motherwell and Wishaw is Labour heartland and the SNP are 23% behind McConnell in the seat. What he has just lost is any future as a Leader of the Labour Party in Scotland (as the office is clunkly titled).

Labour is no stranger to having peers in their ranks. Tony Benn was, of course, a heredity peer who renounced his title, while one of Labour’s list MSPs, Lord Foulkes retains his red seat. There are also in the region of two-hundred and twenty-five Labour peers currently sitting in the House of Lords. Having a peer as a leader on the other hand, is something alien to Labour. I suspect, it’s something that the Scottish people as a whole wouldn’t be particularly keen on, with the title ‘Lord’ dripping in feudal symbolism and the privileged imagery of the type which does not sit well with Jock Tamson’s bairns. It doesn’t help that Lord McConnell will be able to claim additional expenses and further wages for swaggering around in ermine while his constituency remains an area of considerable social deprivation, the legacy of Ravenscraig.

With this last gift from Gordon Brown and no sign of up and coming Labour talent to replace Grey, McConnell may well have helped to sink Labour’s chances in the Scottish Parliament for some time.

The Red Pill or The Blue Pill

The Liberal Democrats are in a historic position. The choices they make over the next few days will set the political agenda for years to come.

Should they go into coalition with Labour, Plaid, the SDLP, Alliance and the Greens, they will be lambasted by the right for propping up an unpopular government who helped to place the UK at the heart of the economic crisis. This rainbow coalition would be forced to make some of the most sweeping cuts in British history, tarring both Labour and the Lib Dems.

The idea that such a coalition would last four to five years is fantasy. Sooner of later, there would be a sufficiently large rebellion which would manage to either pass or nearly pass a vote of no confidence. If indications from John Reid, Tom Harris and David Cairns are anything to go by, the rebellion would likely be over a referendum on implementing a  single-member constituency single transferable vote election system. It is even possible that some of those who are more resolute in their opposition to coalition and on the right of the Labour party, such as Tom Harris, could defect.

Either way, I would suggest that the long-term outcome of such a parliament would be a Tory majority in the next election, a slashed Lib Dem vote share and Labour heading to the political wilderness.

The alternative is coalition with Tories. This has the potential for the creation of a stable government which would require the whole of the Lib Dem parliamentary party to cross the benches in order to pass a vote of no confidence. However, the Lib Dems face both a voter rebellion and a grassroots rebellion if they support the Tories. Over the past few days, I’ve seen Lib Dem voters, mainly young people, go through various stages of anger and disappointment at the positive progress made between the Tories and the Lib Dems in coalition talks. This is just a taste of what could happen.

The Tories would also face a backlash against the ‘age of austerity’ promised by David Cameron, as cuts begin to fall across all areas of government. That could usher in either another hung parliament in the future or a Labour government. They’d also face alienating the right of their party by making concessions to the Lib Dems. Lord Tebbit has already positioned himself as a cheerleader on that matter, and no doubt figures such as the US-style neo-con MEP Dan Hannan will be able to rally voters against coalition.

And which option is best for the United Kingdom?

Truthfully, neither of them. Like the Lib Dems, the UK is stuck either way. There isn’t a right answer, just two wrong ones.

And what of the the SNP and Scotland? Well, the party has made it clear that coalition with the Tories is not an option. Douglas Alexander, Tom Harris, Jim Murphy and others within Labour have rather foolishly made it clear that they are unwilling to work with the SNP at all. No doubt this will have repercussions, when, in just under a year, we elect a new Scottish Parliament.

A Bad Day For Scottish Labour

To qualify the title, I must first confess that I thought Iain Grey did much better in First Minister’s Questions today then has been doing in past few months. I’m wondering if he’s been benefiting from some kind of coaching. Regardless, it’s good to see some debate going on in FMQs.

Elsewhere, Labour have been doing less well today.

First of all, the replacement for Jim Devine (the former MP for Livingston, currently charged with false accounting) has himself been referred to police by the Chief Executive of West Lothian Council. Councillors Willie Dunn and Graeme Morrice, the latter the PPC for Livingston, have both been alleged to have committed offences under the Public Bodies Corrupt Practises Act, which prevents bribery of officials. This apparently comes in the wake of accusations against a third, independent councillor who raised the matter. While these allegations may not result in further action, it is press that Labour do not need in an area where the SNP are seeking to gain a seat.

In Strathclyde meanwhile, events rumble on. The Scottish Sun has reported allegations that Labour councillor Ruth Black was involved with drug handling within the City Chambers. This is the second time councillor Black has hit the newspapers in recent days, with previous reports claiming she had been questioned by Strathclyde Police, denied handling drugs and allegations over improprieties relating to a contract to run an LGBT centre in Glasgow.

Finally, following confirmation this week that Steven Purcell has been suspended from the Labour Party, the Crown Office has confirmed that an investigation into the affair is ongoing. This last is at least some compensation to the people of Glasgow for the actions of a man who brought their city into such disrepute.

No doubt the various Labour PPCs around Glasgow will not be terribly happy with this news. Not least because both the SNP and Liberal Democrats are making headway within several Glasgow constituencies. They can only hope that in the imminent debates, Brown does well.

Indygal and Jeff at SNP Tactical Voting have also provided their slant’s on the day’s happenings, here, here and here.

Manifesto Review: Labour (England & Wales)

Due to other commitments, I was unable to take time to read the Labour manifesto (the actual one, not the cartoon version) on it’s day of launch (although I did have time to look at the cover). By the time I got sat down with the document in question, I’d already read comments in the papers and online about the manifesto, which led me to expect much more meat in the manifesto then I found there.

I was expecting policy to leap out at me, things that Labour candidates on the doorstep could point swing voters to as something which would aim to visibly change things for the better and make a snappy soundbite, similar to Tony Blair’s Tough on Crime message in 1997. Instead we have pages of promises of investment and admendments to older Labour policies, such as shaking up the hospital system again.

A few policies take my interest however:

• No Stamp Duty for first time buyers on all house purchases below £250,000 for two years, paid for by a five per cent rise on homes worth more then £1 million. – I find it hard to fault this policy, given that the house prices in Scotland are considerably lower then elsewhere and this could really help get people into the housing market up here.
• Legally binding guarantees for patients including the right to cancer test results within one week of referral, and a maximum of 18 weeks’ wait for treatment or the offer of going private. - This goal can’t really be faulted given that cancer is one of the biggest killers in the UK, however the legally binding aspect of it could increase difficulties for already over-streched NHS resources.
• A new national care service to ensure free care in the home for those with the greatest care needs and a cap on the costs of residential care so that everyone’s homes and savings are protected from care charges after two years in a care home. – This could have been a much larger part of Labour’s manifesto, but seems to have been scaled down, probably due to questions over funding it.
• Achieve around 40 per cent low-carbon electricity by 2020 and create 400,000 new green jobs by 2013. - This policy (like much of the green policy in the Labour manifesto) is largely due to targets set in international treaty, which DEFRA is already on target to meet.
• Referenda, held on the same day, for moving to the Alternative Vote for elections to the House of Commons and to a democratic and accountable Second Chamber. - Gordon Brown has already come under fire for his damascene conversion to constitutional reform. It will be extremely interesting to see if it appeals to voters, after all, the Lib Dems have had limited success with their similar policies in the past.
• Legislation to ensure Parliaments sit for a fixed term and an All Party Commission to chart a course ti a Written Constitution. - Fixed term Parliament and a written constitution are much needed in Britain. They are unlikely to have great appeal to the British public however, with vocal support for a constitutional generally coming from academics and those who are extremely familiar with politics in the UK.

A few things I was genuinely surprised to see:

• Control immigration through our Australian-style points-based system, ensuring that as growth returns we see rising levels of employment and wages, not rising immigration, and requiring newcomers to earn citizenship and the entitlements it brings. – I am extremely dubious about any political party rushing into immigration policy or taking an election stand on it, not least when they trumpet “British Values” as a reason to exclude people from the UK. This policy could only to extend immigrants from countries outside the EU and possibly the Commonwealth.
• A golden decade of sport with the 2012 Olympics as a great national and world-wide celebration. - True, the UK is hosting the 2012 Olympics, 2014 Commonwealth Games and 2015 Rugby World Cup, but this policy has very little other then new facilities in London and increased sports in schools in England and Wales to back it up.
• Reform the UN, International Financial Institutions, the G8 and G20 and NATO to adapt to the new global challenges. - Britain is one of nearly 200 states participating in the UN. As COP-15 demonstrated, Britain isn’t even a particularly big player in the modern world, with India, China and the collective EU providing much stronger voices. The idea that Britain could drive pretty far reaching reform of these bodies within the next five years, having done little to them since 1997, is utterly absurd.

Overall, the Labour Manifesto for England and Wales is a document which seems lacking in style and substance. Compared to previous Labour manifestos, it seems that having been in government for 13 years, Labour are struggling to find policies to engage with the public on. If swing voters do pick up a copy of the Labour manifesto, I think they’ll have to look hard to find something to convince them to vote Labour.

5 out of 10.

A Future Past For All?

There is something which is bothering me about the front cover of the newly released Labour Manifesto.

It’s a highly stylised image, clearly meant to invoke the idea of the ‘green and pleasant lands’, economic prosperity and family. Nothing wrong with that, given it’s something which all politicians attempt to invoke.

What’s bothering is is it’s resemblance to a propaganda poster I saw years ago. I think it was a Soviet poster, but it could equally have been British or American, but I can’t quite remember enough about it to place it. It was in the realist style, depicting a group of worker archetypes shielding their eyes against the sun and looking out over a wide plain planted with corn. Similar to the below poster in fact.

If anyone knows the poster I’m referring to and recall who exactly came up with it (and what it was called), I’d be grateful for the details, if only so I know I’m not suffering memory failure.

In other poster news, while I don’t particularly like negative campaigning, the latest SNP take on a Labour poster is excellent. Not only does it make it’s point well, it’s a great photo.

I was particularly impressed by the fact it appeared before the Labour manifesto launch was finished.