To the Guardian on-line this morning after night of insomnia ( got to sleep 5.30am but got through 300 pages of Michael Palin's Diaries) to read that changing Brown with Miliband would make absolutely no difference to Labour's poll ratings.
Maybe I'm just exhausted from lack of sleep but is anyone really suggesting this is front-page news. Why, exactly, would changing the face ( but not the policies) change anyone's mind? In the ICM poll, when people were asked to choose the best prime minister between Cameron and Brown, or Cameron and Miliband, the Tory leader beat both men by the same 21% margin.Well, he would. Because no matter how much fresher-faced he is , Miliband has exactly the same policies .And frankly people have wised up to that.
Labour MPs still sunning themselves in Tuscany or wherever need to take that on board and come back determined to change direction. A change of leader, in itself, would change nothing. A change of leader, and a change in policy towards the left-of-centre, would. Interesting. though, that more Tory voters are minded to vote Miliband. Will this news stop a coup in its tracks? We shall see in Manchester........at the moment we are still on course to lose 140 seats.
Tuesday, 19 August 2008
IT''S THE POLICIES, STUPID.....
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8 comments:
Oh, I dunno. I think Labour still has hope of picking a winner for the top job. (Or not.)
Lets hope this is not offensive to you.
Labour has a problem Blair looked like a winner, Thatcher looked like a winner to many, the Tories still to this day have a problem people will say we must stick with Thatcherism, in the future people will say the only way to win is through Blairism.
Labour had no policies except those of Thatcher, yes we had the min wage and tax credits but these were really sweeteners not really policies.
Miliband looks and sounds like New Labour, like it or not a lot of people liked Blair and thought he was right, they were not interested in his policies they were more interested in the man.
God I've been to Labour meetings in which I was told to sit down and shut up when I asked what were the Labour parties policies on disability, they were talking about Blair's new baby. one Labour member even sent a card around for us to sign saying welcome to the New Labour party, when Blair had his new arrival. people are fickle and lets be honest a horse on drugs would be better then Brown at least he would kick out at something.
A change of leader, and a change in policy towards the left-of-centre, would.
Funny, I didn't notice a question about policy direction being asked in the poll - you simply *want* that to be true.
Bloggers 4 Labour, in poll after poll, issue after issue, the general public has been to the left of New Labour on many issues. Doggedly, and mystifyingly this Govt takes the TINA line. We know there is .Tony Blair used to say he had no reverse gear - now Brown is stuck in same undortunate - and inexcusable - groove
Pollsters tell their customers what they want to hear. If you ask people "Do you want X", they say yes. "Do you want tax rises to pay for X", answer no.
With the Tories in the lead, you need some evidence that a lurch to the left for Lab would actually be popular with the electorate (rather than just long-time party members).
I'm too young to remember - didn't Lab react to its last landslide defeat in government by giving grassroots party members much greater power, and going further left? Followed by disaster at the polls in 1983?
If you mean by "landslide" defeat 1979, and you probably do, ordinary members in those days had far greater democratic input than they do now. Parliamentary members of the NEC were elected by the grassroots, Annual Conference determined Party policy ( even if the leadership didn't always agree) and MPs were much more accountable to their CLPsand were selected/de-se;ected without top-down control.
In 1981 ,Labour called a Special Conference to change the means by which Leader/Deputy were elected. ie so it was no longer the preserve of the PLP. At the time this was seen as a move to aid Tony Benn's bid for Deputy leader - in practice it meant for the first time that trade unions and CLps got to vote.The rules were later changed to make things more difficult. If you look at the"moderate" 1979 Manifesto ( and I am!) it included measures to ensure public sector workers were paid in line with the private sector, called for state intervention to create jobs and increase productivity, including more public ownership, suggested planing agreemets with stautory powers , expansion of worker co-operatives, expansion in council housing the NHS and social servioces. There was support for public secvtor banking, annual wealth tax, and extension of manadatory grants (no fees) for hiugher education. Though not then committed to unilateral disarmament (that was 1981) the Labour manifesto rjected calls for a new generation of nuclear wapons. In short, the 1979 Manifesto was/is WAY to the left of where Labour is now.The notion that 1983 was some sort of Trotskyite coup is utterly wrong. Whats more the 1979 Manifesto was mainstream stuffand agreed by people like Callaghan and Hatted;ey who were on the RIGHT of the Party.
Susan,
Thank you for taking the time to write so much.
You clearly don't agree that the 1983 manifesto was the result of a lurch to the left caused by extending power to rank-and-file members? Or do you? Sorry, not having a go, but you mostly wrote about 1979 there.
You wouldn't believe Roy Hattersley supported the 1983 manifesto from reading his book!
Let me try another tack. The membership are clearly to the left of the leadership. The tories are way ahead in the polls. Is it your belief that the left-wing policies you champion would be popular with the electorate, and reduce the tory poll lead?
Put another way - is the country *really* to the left of the government?
Would love to ask you this in the F&G, but opportunities are limited now-a-days. A shame.
Cheers.
I don't actually think that people are saying they will vote Tory because they are intrinsically right or left wing. Most people (in my experience, and I have taught politics) haven't a clue what those terms mean anyway.
They are sick to death of labour, and opt for the Tories because they still remain the alternative government.
I think its clear that there are some voters who are sick of Labour but who won't vote Tory - and I would suggest that they are core working class voters, and the left-liberal voters. Those groups would, I think, respond to more left-of-centre policies.
The others may do so if they felt they were working.
But also, and here I disagree with Susan - they need to be sold and presented because this is the age in which we live. And Brown can't do it.
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