SURPRISE

Well two surprises and a shocker: First, that I have remembered that I blog.
Second: not only did Jeremy Corbyn make it on to the ballot paper but he seems to be taking the whole country by storm. My facebook has turned into a shrine to Jeremy Corbyn and I have read and written so much about him that I forgot that I had this wee blog to play with.

A few weeks ago I said

"Jeremy Corbyn may not win the vote of the membership. He may not inspire. He may not have what it takes to translate his vision into practical policies. He will make it harder for the party and the other contenders to fiddle with the edges of policy and vision because they will be challenged. He will present an alternative vision of the party and he will give a voice to people who believe that they have been silenced since 1995".

Well, I am eating my words now. Not only has he inspired, he has galvanised the party and the membership to a degree that noone predicted. He has ripped up the austerity script and told us that we are going to rewrite the agenda.

Actually, not only did we not predict it, when Corbyn was first confirmed as a candidate, the consensus seemed to flow from "Jeekers.. that's nice - we will have a bit of a debate about things now" to the foul  (in my opinion) Toby Young starting a #ToriesForCorbyn campaign. Toby, y'see, thought it would be really hilarious if Corbyn won because it would consign Labour to the dustbin of history for generations.

Meanwhile, the ever polite Corbyn got his head down and started a civil and respectful campaign to put left wing ideas to the people. It's a straightforward enough campaign. Labour should be a social movement. There's no place in the 21st century for poverty, homelessness and inequality. Austerity is a big con. And, we held our collective breath and waited to see what the people might think of this big idea.

Well, the people must have been sitting in their living rooms, waiting for the call.

Even with the evidence that something big is happening, we're still rubbing our eyes and pinching ourselves. We can't quite believe what we are seeing. And this is the shocker: Corbyn might actually win. As I write, the bookies are predicting a win. Membership of the Labour party is exploding and on every news bulletin and in every newspaper, there are debates about policy and alternatives to austerity.

A lot of people seem to think that it's pretty basic.It's about choosing your priorities. A lot of us out here are of the view that, as Tony Benn once said, "if we can find the money to kill people, we can find the money to help people". It seems so simple.

Personally, I will be eternally grateful to the MPs who swallowed their own beliefs for the few minutes it took to write his name on the nomination papers. For some reason, I feel particularly grateful to Neil Coyle and Chi Onwurah, who did it in response to requests from members even though they won't support him in the ballot and Frank Field, whose views are so far removed from Corbyn's that they should really be in different parties. But, Neil Coyle, Chi Onwurah and Frank Field recognised something that some others didn't - you can't defeat an argument by ignoring it. They acknowledged that, even if you are fundamentally opposed to an idea (or maybe especially), you have to be prepared to take it on and present your argument. Most of all, they knew that people wanted to hear Corbyn's message and they acted on that. They did not run scared and to my knowledge, they have not joined in with the appalling smear campaign that has ensued. To me, they are proper Labour people.

soundbites

The relentless use of sound bites is damaging. People in the real world do not talk like that. People do want to hear a big idea boiled down to a short sentence - but they also want to see clear ideas underpinning the short sentence. There should be no confusion arising from a sound bite. There is a difference between tapping into the concerns of people and inventing a catchy phrase. Sadly, Labour seem to have a department dedicated to the catchy phrase and no mechanism for talking to people in ordinary places. So we are constantly assaulted by sound bites.
'Hard working families', 'cost of living crisis', 'tough on (whatever)' were repeated over and over again. We didn't need to be told about a cost of living crisis - we are living it. We didn't need to hear about 'hardworking families' we are those families. We don't want Labour to be 'tough on' anything. We wanted a positive inspirational message that tells us 'we're on your side'. 

Repetition of a sound bite doesn't make it more appealing; it makes it annoying. It sounds insincere It adds nothing to the discussion. 
Sound bites had their day in 1997 - people are wise to them now.  People understand that repeating the same thing over and over again renders it meaningless. They know you're saying it because you feel you have to - not because you actually believe it. 

Sound bites are analysed, picked apart and denounced by other political parties and by the journalists and commentators. And whats worse, when someone tries not to talk in soundbites, words are picked up - out of context - and presented as a sound bite then criticised to the nth degree. 

.'Hardworking families' is a sound bite. After a day, it began to grate on the nerves of even hardworking families. A bit like 'aspiration'.

No No NO Harriet

According to Harriet Harman, 'even people who supported Labour at last month’s election were privately relieved afterwards that the party did not win power'

To be quite frank, that's a load of aul' shite. This 'fact' has been uncovered by 'Gordon Brown's pollster' who conducted focus groups to determine where it all went wrong. The words 'Gordon Brown's pollster' (or anyone's pollster) should have set alarm bells ringing after the poll debacle on election night... but that's a different story.

If you're unfortunate enough to be a person who relies on public services, the NHS, the education system, the Human Rights Act, the benefits system, social housing, then believe me you're not ' a little bit relieved' at facing a tory majority for the next five years.
If you're a public sector worker, facing more cuts to jobs, income and resources, you're not 'a little bit relieved'
If you're chronically ill or disabled and faced with the WCA or PIP assessment, you're not 'a little bit relieved'
If you're a young person leaving school or hoping to go into higher education or if you're graduated and hoping to go on to post graduate education, you're not 'a little bit relieved'.
If you're homeless or poorly housed or living in a high rent area you're not 'a little bit relieved'
if you're working all the hours god sends to hang onto a zero hours contract, or if you're on call, waiting for a few hours work, you're not 'a little bit relieved'
If your job is being undermined by people on the work programme who are paid nothing, or if you're on the work programme, you're not 'a little bit relieved'
If you aspire to have a safe, secure affordable home, a decent job with an income that will provide for a life of security and dignity, you will not be 'a little bit relieved'.

There are millions of people who are not 'a little bit relieved' - we are desperate and we feel as if there is no-one who will either stand up for us or protect our interests. 

Ordinary working class people feel that the party has abandoned them. The people who have most badly been affected by the government's policies looked to Labour and saw nothing or little that appeals to them. 

It's not hard to find these people - even if you can't get out to meet them all, they are on social media, they are in unions, they are on marches, they are in workplaces, schools, community centres. Everywhere. 
Go and find them. Hear their stories. 
Labour does not need focus groups, surveys or anything like that. They need to be in our workplaces, at our doors, in our labour party meetings, at our campaigns. They need to be standing alongside people, shoulder to shoulder. That's where Labour will hear the things that people are worried about and what people aspire to.

There are legions of people who are generally sympathetic to Labour who believe that the party is too far removed from its membership. People who are or who have been Labour Party activists have become disillusioned by the lack of influence that they have, for example in the selection of candidates.If the Labour party is connected with people, it shouldn't need pollsters, they can listen to the members, including the 40 odd thousand who joined under Ed's watch.



David Prescott, the candidate for Gainsborough, published a letter from Keziah which explained why she didn't vote Labour. She describes herself as from a background that would 'traditionally vote Labour'. Although she says that the party has become too right wing, the main thrust of her letter says that the lack of challenge to tories lies and smears was the thing that really undermined the Labour case.

It's almost as if Labour don't see the value of what they did in the Blair years and has taken personal responsibility for a global financial crash. Why would Labour do that? It does not make any sense. I am not a Blair supporter and I see so much that was wrong throughout the Blair years. But Labour also did good things and should be proud of the things that they did right. They certainly should not be taking responsibility for a global crash. Maybe they did make some mistakes in the 'good' years but that's not the same as being responsible for all that went wrong. Stand up and be proud of the good things. Explain the crash. Attack the lies.

So, instead of rushing to focus groups and pollsters, go directly to the Keziahs and others who couldn't bring themselves to put their x in the Labour box. We'll tell you in a heartbeat where things went wrong

where did it all go wrong?

A lot of people blame Ed Miliband personally: he took the party too far to the left or he didn't take it far enough to the left. Others blame the media: they attacked Labour with lies and smears at every opportunity. Others say that Labour didn't have a 'narrative' - according to some it was the 'aspiration' narrative that was missing. (You know how I feel about 'aspiration'.)

To some extent they are all true. Personally, I also think that there was a section within the party that didn't want Ed to be PM so they did everything they could to undermine him

I think the party got bogged down in trying to be 'not too left and not too right'. They didn't attack back when the media portrayed the party in general, and Ed in particular, as weak. I think that what made those two worse was that we didn't have an overarching narrative that spelled out what the party is about.

For the past 10 years, the party has been wavering and losing direction. It hasn't had a solid base of values from which everything else flows. Even businesses have this - they spend huge sums of money establishing their vision, their mission and their values. Labour on the other hand tried to make policies in response to what they thought people wanted to hear. Everything seemed to be based on 'what do The Public think?' or 'how will the press portray it?' The upshot was that nothing appeared sincere: it all felt a bit like they were making it up as they went along. 

A lot of people lost faith because they couldn't find the labour line. They didn't know or couldn't understand what Labour stands for. Labour had given credibility to the tories narrative - on 'scroungers', on 'irresponsible Labour', on immigration - instead of challenging it head on. They legitimised the kipper narrative by trying to sound tough on immigration instead of understanding why people were concerned. 

In the debates about the economy and welfare, Labour struggled to find a coherent response to the tories. The tories have religiously portrayed Labour as irresponsible spenders and the party of welfare. They've presented a picture of welfare as a huge and unmanageable expense. At the same time, they've presented people on welfare as 'shirkers', 'scroungers' or as inadequate. The tories have consistently presented 'cutting benefits' as the only way to reduce the benefit bill and the deficit. 

This should be an open goal for Labour With Principles. Instead of challenging this, however, Labour again allowed themselves to be dragged onto the tory playing field. There is plenty of evidence about the impact of welfare cuts on ordinary people, including 'hardworking families'. There is plenty of evidence that much of the rhetoric on welfare has been at best misleading or, at worst, plain lies. 

Labour could have robustly challenged the lies about the global financial crash and made a clear commitment to reducing welfare by improving the economy. Instead, they got dragged onto the Tory ground and tried to out tory the tories on cuts. 

Actually somewhere in the midst of the madness of the election campaign, they made the point that there are many ways to skin the 'reducing the welfare bill' cat. They argued that reducing unemployment and raising the minimum wage would do more to reduce the benefit bill than cutting benefits. They also argued that zero hours contracts, low pay, part time hours and high rents brought more people into the welfare net and that tackling these should be a priority. Ed argued for dignity and social justice. These are coherent and principled arguments which can be backed up with policy.

Sadly though, instead of really pushing these ideas, explaining them and defending them, using them to attack the tories, they went for headlines. They reduced the big ideas down to a sound bite and came up with 'being tough on welfare'.  

The bedroom tax was a case in point. It has been a disaster of a policy and there are social, practical and economic reasons for opposing it but Labour were all over the place on it. They were so afraid to be seen as 'weak' on spending that they couldn't bring themselves to represent those people who were being crucified by a sudden and significant increase in their household expenditure. Instead they examined it, they waffled on it, they scrutinised it, they probably formed a committee and focus groups. It was only at the last minute that they opposed it.

Along the way, the party lost many of the people who rely on benefits for their income, like chronically ill and disabled people, working people who rely on disability benefits, working people who rely on tax credits or housing benefit to survive, people who suddenly found themselves unemployed when the recession hit, people living in high rent areas who were affected by the cap, people who were made homeless or ended up in debt because of the bedroom tax or council tax charges. 

Other parties and particularly the Greens, SNP, Plaid Cymru and the kippers, capitalised on Labour's dithering. They all presented a clear alternative to the tories and / or Labour. The Greens, the SNP and Plaid Cymru presented a clear anti austerity programme, the kippers went 'immigration'

The kippers have one overarching principle, that is: 'immigration is bad and the EU is worse'. They pitch it as an 'Advocates of British Sovereignty and democracy' platform. It's a simple enough message: everything that is wrong in the UK is because of the immigrants, and the immigrants are here because of the EU. They are taking your jobs, houses, school places, doctor's time and worst of all they are undercutting your wages'

Everything that the kippers identified as a problem was related back to immigration. This is not new. What was new for GE2015 was a distinct and clear appeal to marginalised voters. In their 2010 manifesto, the kippers were determined to attract the tory vote. They went for the old tory standards of 'freedom', law and order and backing business. Somewhere along the line, they must have realised that there weren't enough tories in the UK to give them the voice they needed. So they had to make inroads into the Labour vote.

The kippers foreshadowed their intentions when they announced that they were 'parking their tanks on Labour's lawns'. On that day Labour should have been in the bunker working out who the kippers were targetting. It wouldn't have taken a genius. Labour heartlands had effectively been abandoned by the coalition. People were worried about jobs, housing, health, education, public services and benefits. The kippers knew this because it's not rocket science.

Although it took maybe six months to abandon their 'parasitic underclass of scroungers' narrative, UKIP produced a manifesto that spoke directly to the marginalised people who have fared worst under the coalition. They made promises on housing, health, education, jobs and benefits. They were out of the blocks early on the bedroom tax and they promised to abandon the work capability assessment. They did all this in the sure and certain knowledge that they would never have to implement any of their promises. They would never get a majority and if they went into coalition, they could blame their coalition partners.

They managed to get an unprecedented allocation of media time and space and they used it well. Nige even boasted that he had played the dog whistle well. After initially defending his appalling statements about people with HIV, he later admitted that he said it to 'provoke a reaction' and to appeal to the kipper core vote.

The kippers identified fears and played on them. Labour let them and instead of offering a robust challenge, allowed themselves to be dragged towards the same ground. They legitimised the tory and kipper rhetoric by agreeing that the problem was immigration. For an example, see Labour's infamous '4th pledge', forever emblazoned on mugs (which I suspect noone bought), 'controls on immigration'

Everyone knew that immigration was an issue. Labour understood that it was an issue. They knew that the debate was being hijacked by the kippers, the tories and other even less savoury groups. What they couldn't work out was why it was an issue - so instead of discussing immigration from a principled position, they tried to make themselves appear 'tough on immigration'.

But if you read between the lines of the 'immigration problem', it wasn't immigration that most ordinary people were worried about. It was jobs, wages, housing, education, health and public services - all things that should have been an open goal for Labour With Principles. They could have challenged the coalition record on housebuilding, on the NHS, on unemployment, on wages etc.

At the same time, by ignoring the issues that make immigration a 'problem', Labour lost out to the Greens, the SNP and Plaid Cymru, all of whom claimed the title of'the progressive parties'.  Labour allowed them take on the mantel of 'protectors of the people'.The Greens, the SNP and Plaid Cymru were able to tell people all over social media that Labour were dead, that they didn't represent vulnerable/ disadvantaged groups and that they would out tory the tories. Those parties were able to step in and occupy the ground that Labour had allegedly abandoned.

Labour needs to get off the defensive and get onto attacking the tories. They need to take the socialist ground back from the 'progressive parties'
People who support labour expect Labour MPs to defend and represent their interests. This means not supporting tory policy just to appear 'tough'. If there's a policy that they're not 100% happy with, then oppose it. Or at the very least offer amendments and if they're not accepted, oppose. Don't abstain, don't sit on your hands, don't give them credibility.  
Challenge every lie. 
Change the discourse: instead of speaking the tories' language, find a new language. 
Define and defend principles. 
Talk to the voters every single day; on their doorsteps, in their communities, in their workplaces, in their classrooms. 
Be at the forefront of campaigns, even when they are lead by people from other parties. 
Take the lead, 

Dear Labour Party

You'll be aware that there is a campaign to get Jeremy Corbyn on the ballot paper for the leadership election. It's all over Twitter and in the national media. Owen Jones, as always, provides an interesting analysis of why Jeremy should at least be on the ballot paper.

You probably know that the campaign isn't being met with universal approval with even the pro Labour Mirror getting a wee sly dig in about Corbyn's political history

Personally, and without taking a 'side' (for once), I think it's important that Jeremy Corbyn finds enough support within the Parliamentary Labour Party to feature in the race. Having enough nominations means that the debate about 'left' and 'right' will happen. More importantly though, it means that the members have some say about the future direction of the party. As things stand at the moment, it's not easy to distinguish between the candidates - apart from Liz Kendall, who seems to be occupying the ground between the tory 'left' and Margaret Thatcher. I may be wrong about that...

The Labour Party has a long and proud history of incorporating a wide range of political opinion within its ranks. There has always been a left wing tradition and there has always been those who lean towards the centre right. I like that - I've never been good at toeing a party line on anything so the 'outside labour' Left groups don't appeal to me. Neil Kinnock nearly closed down the voices of dissent but they are re emerging and they need to be heard.

In many respects, a broad range of opinion makes it hard for the party to show a united front on virtually any issue. That's the curse of the Left I think - we're fabulous at telling our own side that there is only one true path to socialism and then producing in detail the reasons why other left parties aren't left enough.  Sadly, we have 90 million versions of where the path starts and ends so we spend a lot of time outlining the distinctions between our version of the One True Path and the other Not Quite The Right Path or Destination parties.

While we're focusing on the academic 'think ins' about the real, true, indisputable path, those who have no interest in socialism are marching on towards their own glorious future and socialism doesn't feature in that future.

So, back to Jeremy Corbyn and why he should be on the ballot paper. While not wanting to get involved with the usual dull theoretical One True Path discussions, we do need to have a discussion about what Labour is for. Until we know that, we're basically in an argument about who the best manager will be. We need an alternative perspective - one that will challenge all the candidates to be clear about the values that guide them and the  principles and assumptions that underpin them. We need to know where the party is going and who it is representing.

Jeremy Corbyn may not win the vote of the membership. He may not inspire. He may not have what it takes to translate his vision into practical policies. He will make it harder for the party and the other contenders to fiddle with the edges of policy and vision because they will be challenged. He will present an alternative vision of the party and he will give a voice to people who believe that they have been silenced since 1995.

We should be proud of our history of accommodating all voices.

ok... just the one more mention of aspiration

‘’Much is made of 'aspiration' and this is usually defined by the armchair commentators as being an individual rather than a collective aspiration. I believe it's time that we dedicated ourselves much more to ending the gross inequality in Britain, the homeless and housing crisis, and the need for a million people to use foodbanks just to survive. We should never be ashamed or afraid to stand up for the poorest and most marginalised. Let us dispense with inappropriate words like 'handouts' in this debate. Welfare is a right that is about each and everyone of us being housed, educated, fed and kept in good health - the hallmarks of a civilised society" – Jeremy Corbyn

Pictures of Gaza:

there's a warning on this collection of photos which tells us that some of them might be disturbing. And indeed they are.

They're disturbing because you know that whatever you're feeling about the pictures, someone else, in the real world, is experiencing the noise or the silence, the shock waves and the shock, the dust, the dryness, the heart pounding, the heat, the fear, the movement of the earth below their feet, the smells of blood and death.
They're also disturbing because of the tendency we have to flick through them, almost inured to the actual content.

Looking more closely at the content, they're disturbing because you see the stark differences between what the people of Gaza are experiencing and what the Israelis on the frontline are experiencing. The people of Gaza are depicted in dusty, messy, desolate, frightening landscapes. They're mourning, running, hanging on, crying. It's mostly grey apart from the flashes of colour on peoples' clothes.

The Israeli soldiers and civilians on the other hand, with some exceptions, are depicted in much more relaxed surroundings.They're getting on with routine things - shaving, hugging, resting. They're in a land of colour.
They are of course, mourning their losses too. For each Israeli family who has lost a loved one, the grief must be as sore as it is for the people in Gaza. There's certainly anguish and sadness but not clouded with whatever it is in the faces of the Palestinians. Their grief seems to be fixed with anger, horror, tension, numbness.
It's not because Palestinians are a different kind of people. Under the pain and the fear, they're all the same. Perhaps it's because what the Palestinians experience is relentless.

I am sure that the fear felt by the Israelis closest to the front line is very real.  They must feel fear but it must be a different kind of fear. The front line for Palestinians is everywhere. There's no longer any safe place and no safe time. Even the occasional cease fire must offer no relief now - every time they think there's a break in the madness, it all comes crashing down before the deadline. In a ceasefire situation, the palms of their hands must tingle with fear, waiting for the first shell or the first rocket.

There are people sitting watching outside Gaza- spectators to a massacre. You wonder what allows them to watch or sleep or relax in an open space when there is carnage unfolding all around them. What allows them to watch trail of light and smoke left by the rockets, knowing that in that spot where they land, someone is invariably bereaved in the most horrific of circumstances.

The photo of the two lads running through Shejaiya put me in mind of the photo of Fr Daly on Bloody Sunday. Carrying a white flag seems so futile but those lads made it because they believed it would protect them. What was going on in their heads as they crafted that wee flag. They put work into that; they must have expected something from it.

If I hear 'aspiration' one more time...

The Mirror might be trying to cheer us up, but this article made me feel a bit sick. Just seven seats and under 1000 votes in total made the difference between a Tory majority and a minority government. Let that sink in - a thousand votes across seven constituencies.

Looking more closely at the outcome in those seats is even more troubling, particularly in the context of the current battles within Labour.
If the current crop of potential leaders is to be believed, the problem for Labour was that it presented a programme that was 'anti business' and/or failed to reach out to the 'aspirational middle class'. It doesn't account for the legions of voters who went to UKIP or other 'progressive'parties - not the Tories. 

The LibDem collapse does fill out the Labour vote in some areas - but it was cancelled out by those who took their vote to UKIP. Ordinary working class people who were mesmerised by the UKIP rhetoric or the 'progressives' who said that Labour doesn't stand for ordinary people any more.

My heart is sinking as I watch the candidates for the Labour leadership vie for our votes. It's heart breaking. Almost as heartbreaking as May 8th.  After the election, one Labour big noise after another appeared on TV to tell us that it was the Ed Factor that did for us or that the party had moved too far to the left. I read somewhere that the party had seen a bit of a surge in membership recently. That suggests to me that there's a lot of us out here that liked the direction that the party was moving in.

But everyone seemed to be in agreement that the party should spend a bit of time analysing what went wrong. I couldn't agree more - but I have an uneasy feeling that 'finding out what went wrong' is rapidly becoming 'we've already decided what went wrong so don't you worry your pretty little head about it. We might even tell you some day. In the meantime, aspiration'

If I hear the word 'aspiration' one more time, I will vomit.

The problem seems to be that someone in Party HQ has decided that the reason Labour didn’t win the election is that they didn’t appeal to business and Waitrose shoppers . The party, in this story, didn't connect with the aspirations of a certain kind of person. They have arrived at this conclusion by… erm… not really sure. But one thing is certain, 'aspiration' will be a key feature in this campaign. 

Worryingly, 'senior party figures' started on the aspiration narrative only a day after the full horrors of the results became clear. Dan Jarvis, in ruling himself out of the leadership race touched on aspiration as one of the reasons for the catastrophic result.

The leadership hopefuls have been aspiring all over the place. First out of the aspirational blocks was Chuka Umuna who thought the party didn't speak to 'aspirational middle class' voters. Sadly we didn't get to see how Chuka would handle the aspiration discussions.

Current front runner Andy was aspiring when he announced that he was running. Liz Kendall aspired in a different way, by pointing out that in some places outside Westminster, aspiration actually means something. It's not just a 'Thick of It' buzzword. Mary Creagh thought that Labour doesn't understand peoples' aspiration to have a better life. Finally, Yvette Cooper has decided that Labour needs to generate 'optimism' which admittedly is better than 'aspiration' but is a long way short of a principled, political platform.

It's not a new thing. Writing in 2011, Dan Jarvis (remember him?) was writing about aspiration in Total Politics. There is, he wrote, " there is deep-rooted problem with aspiration"

And he's not wrong. There truly is a deep-rooted problem with aspiration. The main problem is, as Mary Creagh alluded to, it means nothing. I have never in my life met someone who didn't aspire to better things. Everyone - working class, middle class, rich, poor, homeless, mansion dweller, working, unemployed - they all aspire to better things. What happens though is that they don't have the framework to build on their aspirations.
I'd like to put forward an alternative to aspiration. Inspiration.

Aspiration is such a passive, individualist thing. Inspiration on the other hand is much more proactive and much more collective. In inspiring someone, you're saying 'I know you want to have a better life. Here are the things that will make it happen'

I'd like the Labour Party to inspire us, all of us, together. I'd like to see a Labour Party story that tells people that by working together and sharing the spoils, everyone gets to aspire and achieve. I would like them to talk about all the positive things that they can do. Instead of buying into and reinforcing the 'scrounger' narrative, I would like to hear about the right to work. We used to fight for the right to work. Now it's assumed and endlessly repeated, that ordinary folk don't want to work. 

I'd like to hear the party talk about the right to a home - a safe, secure, affordable home, not 'getting on the property ladder'

I'd like to hear the party talk about the right to an education, and grants, right through to third level for those who are capable of and interested in academia. I'd like to see proper paid apprenticeships or meaningful training for those who want it. on offer that train people to do the jobs that the country needs done. 

I'd like to see undergraduate and post graduate courses, alongside the apprenticeships, that will put everyone,regardless of their age, at the forefront of skills and innovation.

I'd like to see the party demand the right to good quality healthcare provided by skilled and valued health workers.

I'd like to see the party demand the right to good quality, accessible public services that are provided on the basis of need and not 'the business case'.

In short, I want to see the Labour party take up the challenge thrown down by the kippers and the 'progressive' parties.I would like them to inspire us first and then fight for our aspirations - not by assuming that we all want to shop in Waitrose but by assuming that, if the framework to achieve great things is there, our aspirations will become our achievements.

Work and the workers

Rachel Reeves (Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions) and Amelia Gentleman (writing for The Guardian) unwittingly gave me my current obsession. I am now counting the 'dead cat' and 'dog whistle' stories. I reckon that the run up to the Labour leadership election in the UK will give me plenty of opportunities to write about it.

In an  interview with The Guardian, published on 17th March, Ms Reeves stated that


'... Labour did not want to be seen to be the party of the welfare state. “We are not the party of people on benefits. We don’t want to be seen, and we’re not, the party to represent those who are out of work,” she said. “Labour are a party of working people, formed for and by working people.”

The response to these fifty odd words has been quite something to behold. In essence, the commentators would suggest, the Labour Party has abandoned people who are disabled and chronically ill, unemployed, retired or otherwise unable to work. For the party that built the welfare state, this is a big retreat. Understandably, there is a lot of anger among Labour supporters and it was a gift to people who are anti Labour. 

Rachel Reeves seemed to back pedal a bit, stating on Twitter  that "Labour are the party who represents everyone, whether they are in work or out of work. That means a strong safety net 4 ppl who need support"


Then Amelia Gentleman helpfully tweeted the full quote from Ms Reeves

Now I haven't got much time for Ms Reeves. I think she is firmly embedded in the New Labour project and as such has been swept along with the much discredited 'austerity is necessary' idea. But I have some sympathy for the idea that Labour is the party of workers. That has always been the case. It has always been the case for every organisation that aligns itself with The Left. Thus we have the Socialist Workers Party, the Workers Revolutionary Party and so on. None of these organisations would tolerate the idea that they had abandoned people who don't work. 

It's part of a much wider discourse which has, effectively cast people into one of two categories: 'hardworking tax payers', who are the 'goodies; and 'those who claim benefits', who are the 'baddies'. In the real world, those categories are fraught with difficulties. Pensioners, for example, are really in the 'those who claim benefits' group, but at the moment are protected from most of the venom that is directed towards, for example, the disabled. Pensioners are perceived as righteous folk who have done their duty as far as work is concerned. People on disability benefits, on the other hand, are portrayed as malingerers or skivers, regardless of their work history. 

At the centre of the story is work and particularly how work is defined and categorised.'Work' has become synonymous with 'being engaged in remunerative employment for an employer'.It ignores the work outside that definition. So people who care for disabled or frail dependents or neighbours are not 'working' and their contribution to the overall health of our society is side stepped. Full time parenting isn't 'work' either.
In accepting this narrative, we're accepting the ideology that underpins the 'deserving' and 'undeserving' poor rhetoric. For me, I expect this kind of ideological commitment to a particular kind of work from Tories. It's unforgivable from the left. It completely ignores Marx's interpretation of the working class as a group who had a particular relationship with capitalism- not just those who are, at that moment, working. Because the left as a whole fails to address or challenge the very narrow view of what constitutes a working person means that we're in a continual battle to 'excuse' people from work instead of fighting for the rights of people who work in different ways. We don't bother with trying to ask the question in a different way. Could we ask for example, are carers workers and should they be able to demand at least a living wage, paid from taxation? 

The 'work is the saviour' narrative creates an illusion that people have no value unless they are employed in a particular way, no matter how pointless or valueless the work actually is. It measures 'value' by the income we receive from an employer - even if the income is buttons. That value is the only value. The inherent value of a person is relegated. The value of being part of a community is non existent.  Nothing matters except your place in the labour market. 

Now Rachel Reeves could have avoided the bait altogether. She could have said 'working class'. She could even have involved herself in a discussion about what 'working people' actually means (for what it's worth, I think Labour mean 'working class' but they are too afraid to say it). Her response was clumsy and the Guardian reporter who reported it is probably rubbing her hands with glee because she 'trapped' Reeves into that statement and thus generated a whole flurry of publicity for herself.

But aside from that, Labour people and people who are claiming to represent the working class must challenge this interpretation of the world and as a first step we should be reclaiming the term 'worker' and yes, even 'working people' as one that represents all of us.

Leadership conundrums

WTF is going on with the Labour Party? While Ed's seat at Labour central was still warm, the first of the 'contenders' leapt out of the blocks on the ‘b of the bang’. 'Indecent haste' doesn't even seem to do it justice.

The campaign for the leadership has been sullied already by the appearance of The Blairites and New Labour acolytes who have been omnipresent on tv and in the press over the past few weeks. There has been no comprehensive analysis of why Labour lost so comprehensively, but  the message seems to be that it was the Ed Factor and the party’s move “too far to the left” under Miliband. They argue (consistently and in a very 'on message' style) , the party didn't 'reach out' to 'aspirational'* voters. It was, in this narrative, the middle class voters that made the difference. How do they know this? The simple answer is that they don’t. They’re making it up. I know that because as I’ve said, there has been no comprehensive analysis of what went wrong.

So the ‘problem’ was represented as ‘Ed is a lefty and a rubbish leader to boot’. My own view is that the problem was the sniping and dirty tactics that went on behind the scenes and the response should have been to run the nay sayers out of the party to let Ed get on with the job.

So the outcome is that we’re now in the throes of a leadership campaign that is as disappointing and dull as it’s possible to be. In the 3 weeks since the election, we’ve had hats thrown in and pulled out of the ring, social media campaigns and the hopefuls parading themselves in the mainstream media. There’s a palpable sense of dread emerging as people watch how the campaign is unfolding.

I know that this sounds really, really cynical but it looks to me as if the policy geeks at HQ are throwing out names to see which one gets the most 'bites' and then they're going to run with that name as the ‘Next Leader of Labour'.  

Faces of potential leaders are popping up all over the place with descriptions of what their 'special gifts' are. What disturbs me though is that some of those touted as front runners have not really been vocal advocates of labour principles.

The other thing that disturbs me is that there seem to be orchestrated campaigns that have been simmering for years – long before Ed even got started on his election campaign. A bit of me wonders if Ed’s years as leader were scuppered by people within the party, starting on the day that he was elected, as a punishment for ‘stabbing his brother in the back’. Putting it another way, was he punished for refusing to back down in favour of The Anointed One?

Anyway. Contenders.

It's like a fkn beauty parade. More Rose of Tralee than Miss World, admittedly. In this contest, looking good in the swimwear isn’t enough, the leadership hopefuls need to have a party piece too. The party piece need not be related to policies or principles or anything as base as that – having some perceived advantage over ChickenDave at PMQ or 'looking the part' seem to be the main criteria. Some of the early contenders didn’t actually say they wanted to join the race – they were thrown into it by anonymous campaigners.

Chuka Ummuna (unsurprisingly) nominated himself in a video, and with a speech that must have been in preparation before voting had started. In the few hours since the election results destroyed our dreams for another five years, Chuka magically happened upon half of the candidates who stood in marginal seats. He came up with the astounding revelation that 'middle class voters went tory and working class voters went UKIP'. His election strategy, political analysis and policy proposals were strangely absent.

Nice suit though.

Then he pulled out citing "an unwillingness to be subjected to uncomfortable scrutiny". This must have been a disappointment to Tony because he was touting Chuka as leadership material as early as December 2014. 'A friend' said that the "former PM sees Mr Umunna as a "natural heir" to his New Labour legacy"

Then the anonymous campaigns started.

Dan Jarvis has a 'death stare' apparently. That’s quite a gift but I am not sure what use it would be for a party leader. I’d never heard of him at all and then his name started appearing all over social media pages as the best possible candidate. The argument was that he has no ties with the previous Labour government, he has 'done something’ outside parliament (he is a former Paratrooper) and represents a Northern constituency. Therefore, the argument continues, he is untainted, has ‘qualities’ and will appeal to the voters.

Not so much untainted as invisible though. It matters not that he doesn't appear to have spoken on any national platform about anything.   

A naturally suspicious character, I couldn’t believe that people researched the whole Parliamentary Labour Party and narrowed it down to a relative newcomer with a limited profile. Google is your friend in these tricky situations. So I googled Dan Jarvis and, much to my surprise, I found that Dan’s name has been on a few lips since way back in 2012. Over the years, The Telegraph, The Spectator, Total Politics' Caroline Crampton, Bruce Anderson  (on ConservativeHome) and the New Statesman were all tipping him as the person to replace Ed Miliband, with some implying that he is the natural successor to Tony Blair. Note that the suggestion here is that a ‘natural successor to Tony Blair’ is just what the party needs. A bit odd to be planning the next leader before the newly elected leader has a chance to get his feet under the table and throughout his tenure as leader. Dan Hodges had some interesting observations about Dan Jarvis's elevation to the Leadership. 

So Dan’s campaign was launched without a single word from the man himself with a concerted effort on social media to promote him as a contender. Dan ruled himself out fairly quickly, for personal reasons. His withdrawal from a race that he was never in hasn't stopped near hysteria in some quarters about his 'leadership qualities' which apparently he must have because he was a soldier. He probably does have leadership qualities and he sounds like a thoroughly decent man. Given Dan Hodge's claims, I wondered if he 'withdrew' because he wasn't prepared to be used as a 'spoiler candidate' (or dead cat. If that's the case, perhaps 'integrity' should have been on the list of his attributes). 

The next anonymous campaign out of the blocks was Keir for Leader. Sir Keir Starmer, the high profile, popular and talented former DPP, was elected as MP for Holborn and St Pancras a mere 7 days earlier. The campaign founder "a disenchanted Labour supporter", said “I just have a belief that he [Starmer] wants the job but isn’t prepared to say so.” That's quite a statement... how do you develop such a belief without actually speaking to the person that you're talking about? The campaign, got off to a flying start, attracting national media attention within a few days of its launch.  Even the bookies reported interest. In fact, the Keir for Leader campaign sounded a wee bit like the earlier Dan Jarvis Campaign. 

While Sir Keir's Starmer's talents are beyond question, we know nothing about his aspirations for the labour party. Is he a dyed in the wool socialist or of the New Labour persuasion? How would he transform the Labour Party's fortunes? Does he even think that the party's fortunes need to be transformed? 

It seems a bit odd to me that another ‘unknown’ (in the parliamentary sense) manages to get national media attention, without even declaring an interest. Have you ever , as an ordinary person, tried to get a story in the national media? It’s not easy. A network of contacts seems to be the key. 

The ‘Keir for Leader’ campaign commanded a spamlike influence on social media to the point where people who like him and might have given the idea the benefit of the doubt, began to get weary of the sound of his name. 

Sir Keir thanked the anonymous campaigners for their interest and also withdrew from a race that he had never entered. That didn't stop his supporters though and they're still campaigning. Watch this space - I think there is more of this story to come.

Then there was the spectre of ‘The Return of David’. It hasn’t really gathered much steam so far but there has been much discussion, particularly on social media,  about how David’s return would galvanise the party and the electorate. It might galvanise a lot of us into other parties.

Then, all of a sudden there was a flurry of activity and the ‘big hitters’ threw their hats in the ring. Andy Burnham, Yvette Cooper, Mary Creagh and Liz Kendall all launched their campaigns and to be honest, it’s hard to distinguish between them. Well, to be fair, Andy is a man. Aside from that, it’s hard to distinguish between them. If I was to sum up their collective contribution to the debate it would be ‘aspiration’. I’ve no idea what they mean by that but they keep saying it so it must be important. More of that another time.

Now as I said, I am a naturally suspicious character so it all seems a bit odd to me. As far back as 2011, we have commentators joining the rush to replace Ed as leader. In December 2014, we have influential Labour members discussing names and, while not actually condemning Ed, they were certainly using their influence to destabilise his leadership. You’ll probably remember that Alan Johnson was also rumoured (by the usual suspects) to have been approached to stand for the leadership way back in September 2014, although he also quickly ruled himself out.

I think what I am trying to say is that there was a drip drip drip of negativity around Ed’s leadership. While the campaigns didn’t amount to anything inside the Labour party in terms of a change of leadership, they did sow the seeds of doubt about Ed. The negativity emanating from within the party did enough to create the image of a man who couldn’t even command the respect of his own side. 

It’s hard to avoid the conclusion that it has been anything other than an organised campaign and that the campaign has been led by some of the New Labour old guard. It’s also hard to avoid the conclusion that losing the 2015 was an acceptable, maybe even desirable, outcome in a longer game - to reinstate New Labour at the helm of the party.

Each time a name floats to the surface, ‘friends’ of Tony and Peter seem to be implicated. As we know from the New Labour years, there are no accidents when it comes to communicating with the press.

It all seems slimy, dirty and underhand to me.

The leadership campaign so far hasn’t gripped the nation. I don’t see anyone getting excited. There’s nothing radical in any of the candidates – they all seem to be standing on platforms that were written by committees who aren’t really behind them. I suspect that before the nominations close, we’ll have a ‘surprise’ candidate. That person will be a surprise to us but not to the people who have been beavering away behind the scenes for 4 years. I don't think that the new leader, if they're not blessed by the Blairites, will have an easy ride. If we don't get their hero elected this time, watch out for a new campaign in a few years. Maybe one featuring Dan Jarvis and Sir Keir Starmer.

*watch out for more ‘aspiration’ later 

O Levels, degrees (and the alleged dumbing down of qualifications)

I wonder sometimes if there is a year planner in some central journalism powerhouse where the first day of sunshine marks the day where politicians, commentators, journalists and random bloggers start  'Students - Open Season'

It has been building for a few weeks now, with Michael Gove and his ever changing school curriculum and his uncanny knack of irritating the experts by pretending to be an expert. Today the first 'dumbed down degrees' shots were fired. 

A Times Higher Education (THE) article suggests that, in some colleges, too many students in some colleges, and not enough students in other colleges, are getting 'good' degrees. A visibly angry*  director of the Centre for Education and Employment Research at the University of Buckingham  seethed* that "the results added “statistical clout to the widely held view that some universities award more firsts and upper seconds than is justified by their intakes"

But do the statistics actually tell us that? Or are they telling us that some colleges manage to get the best out of their students, regardless of the grades that those students bring to college with them. Maybe some colleges see the potential in their students and know how to nurture it. And perhaps some colleges assume that good A levels mean good students and think that the only work that the college needs to do is put information out there and these 'good students' will absorb it by some strange process of osmosis.

Statistical information gives us bare numbers, adjusted for individual characteristics and established norms. They will never tell us much about how human intervention makes or breaks an educational experience. 

I am remembering what O Level results day was like for me (*whispers* 35 years!!) I remember being reasonably impressed with my appalling performance: C in French and C in Irish. As some wit said at the time, I could've joined the French Foreign Legion to teach the Irish men their drill. That was the outcome of  an assumed level of 'intelligence' (I passed the 11+) and 5 years of a Catholic, grammar school education. My fabulous results could never have been predicted at the point of intake.

I did redeem myself a little (much) later. But I assume that my astounding O level grades and individual characteristics (lone parent, out of education for 20 years, woman) would have put me down as 'not very likely to achieve much more than a poor third but hey, we'll give her a shot for diversity's sake'. 

In the event, I graduated second in my class, coming a bit behind the mother of four who had returned to education after 20 odd years too.  The statistics probably couldn't have predicted us. We probably couldn't have managed it without one or two lecturers who were truly inspirational and our class mates who took us seriously. We probably benefited too from a modular system which allowed us to study subjects intensely over  shorter period. The 'traditional' system of end of year exams suit some but not everyone. We certainly gained some advantage from working in small, serious groups where we had the opportunity to discuss every detail of a topic to death. I don't know if this is relevant but we also benefited from being able to smoke our lungs out in the coffee bar, for hours at a time, while we dissected the complete work of David Trimble (perhaps the dullest (maybe only) book on NI housing law that was ever published).

Those students who, by implication, shouldn't have got their firsts because they didn't fit with the statistical characteristics of a 'person with a first' are not aberrations and their colleges are not 'dumbing down'. They are people that work hard, to a high standard and who have found their way of working, with the assistance of good teachers.

Every single child that I have ever met has out done my magnificent achievement at O Level - not because their exams or getting easier but because they work harder and are generally much cleverer. Most of those young people are either at university or have graduated. The vast majority of them have strings of GCSEs and degrees that would boggle a fragile mind.

They learn about things that women of a certain age, such as myself, have never even heard of. They have learned to ask questions, to be critical about things that were accepted as gospel by those of us who had the benefit of a Catholic education. They have learned to challenge assumptions about the world. They know about random stuff that baffles me. They've learned the language of technology which to all intents and purposes is a foreign language. What's more, they can use all the random things they have learned in the world that they inhabit. Learning and education is for them a practical and useful tool, not the abstract collection of information that plagued me.

As child number one starts the build up to her finals and child number two starts into his modular GCSEs, I am astounded that anyone could think that their efforts and achievements are somehow less credible than those of past generations or more exclusive establishments. 'Old' and 'classier' is not the same as 'better'- it is just old and exclusive, in all senses of those words.

Well done to all this years triers and achievers - you're all amazing.

(*ok - I made up the bit about 'visibly angry'. And 'seethed')

(First written 22nd August 2013 and amended 18th April 2014)

No 'Everyman'

I've not seen Noah yet and I doubt if I ever will because it's a high price to pay for a couple of hours sleep in a dark room.

The comments of this screenwriter are interesting though. Ari Handel, speaking to The High Calling, says:

“From the beginning, we were concerned about casting, the issue of race. What we realized is that this story is functioning at the level of myth, and as a mythical story, the race of the individuals doesn’t matter"

So it's strange then to note that the race of individuals didn't matter to the extent that no black people appear in the film. Seems odd to me.

They discussed it, according to his own words, they were 'concerned' about it and then decided that the right way to address the 'everyman' issue was to exclude anyone who isn't white and male and speaking in an 'acceptable' Hollywood accent. Because when you think of 'everyman' you think 'pretty, shiny, straight, white, english speaking manly men'. It's not the world I live in and it doesn't reflect the 'everyman' round me.

His comments reminded me of Geena Davis' words about women in family rated films. She pointed to the quite shocking statistic that there are 3 male speaking parts for every 1 female speaking part and that crowd scenes are, on average, 83% male. She says:

"we are in effect enculturating kids from the very beginning to see women and girls as not taking up half of the space."

Looking a bit objectively at the fantasy world of movie making, women and non white people are not the only ones who are not allowed the luxury of taking up half of the space. Working class people are rarely depicted as being 'normal', gay people are rarely just part of the rich tapestry of life, fat people don't exist unless they are part of a message or the object of humour, apart from a few rare appearances i can think of, transgender people are not central characters in films (and are they played by transgender actors?) Even the very clothes they wear are almost immediately identifiable as 'normal' in the Hollywood sense.

And it's not just in the film world, our political world, work world, pub world, music world, literary world... all skewed away from the world of 'everyman'.Even on radio, where we can't see the faces, there is a 'type'. I get in a right aul' stamping rant about accents and voices on radio 4 - no matter what they are talking about, it's the same old same old providing us with a pretty two dimensional picture of how the world is. I am beginning to pine for the return of Nadine Coyle to give a bit of balance to the proceedings.

I don't know if life reflects art or if art reflects life but there must be some truth in the view that by bombarding people with a particular picture of 'everyman', we're enculturating on a grand scale.

'Inclusion' ain't all it's cracked up to be

There is a wee bit of me that thought about not sharing this article . I thought to myself, if we are really 'inclusive' and we really really believe in equality of opportunity for everyone no matter what the diagnosis, label or disability, then we should never be surprised by another person's success.

And then I gave it some more consideration. Although the policies and the legislation are great, we don't really have inclusion and we don't really really believe in equality of opportunity for all. We do get surprised when people achieve things that they really 'shouldn't'.

And I suppose we should be really really surprised that some people manage to do great things because, as a society, we put a lot of big big hurdles in the way of people that we consider to be a bit 'not quite the same' as the rest of 'us' (whoever 'we' are). Sometimes we even pay people to put the obstacles there in another person's 'best interests'.

So I am sharing, to remind myself as much as anyone else, that some people achieve great things in spite of the civilised world and not because of it. And to celebrate the people who basically tell us to fk off and let them get on with life.

(First written 14th August 2013)

'Care'? We don't give a flying f**k.

Do you remember Winterbourne View? To refresh your memory, staff at a residential establishment routinely abused people with learning disabilities.
Do you remember the story about elderly people being abused at Whipps Cross Hospital? Or Hillcroft in Lancashire?
You've heard about the abuse of children and young people in residential establishments in Ireland North and South?

Do you ever wonder why it goes on for years and years with noone intervening to make it stop? Well, perhaps this story will go some way to explaining. In case you are thinking that this kind of thing doesn't happen, that this individual was perhaps only covering up their own wrong doings, allow me to refer you to a few tiny reminders of the long and illustrious history of whistle blowers in the UK.

If there is any chance that you will be sacked and sanctioned for exposing abuse, maybe you would keep your mouth shut and your eyes closed.

When the doors are closed, all the people who live behind them are at the mercy of the people who work there and not all of those workers are good people. Some of those workers have no wish to be working in the field of care or support. They're sent on 'work programme' schemes and forced to apply for such jobs or lose their entitlement to benefits.

Let me tell you this for nothing... if you do not have the yen to work with / care for people, you should not be allowed through the doors never mind be sent there as a way of getting you off the dole queue.

It is hard work, it is challenging, it is sometimes thankless and it is sometimes desperately sad. It can be physically, emotionally, mentally and intellectually draining. It takes someone with enough chat for two mouths, the hide of a rhino, the strength and balance of a hod carrier, the sense of humour of FB God, the resilience of granite, the integrity of .... (mmm, can't decide who has integrity), the knowledge of a professor and the compassion of a saint.

If you're a good care worker in any field, you don't always have these things all the time but most of the time you have some of them and the rest of the time you rely on your colleagues and a healthy supply of genuine contrition and humility to get you through. By care work, I include cleaners, cooks, care assistants, caretakers and 'handymen' - all of those jobs that are usually filled by people who do it in spite of and not because of the financial rewards and recognition. Good care workers are people who will turn up every day and will love every minute of their day (more or less).

That's because care work is also great craic, satisfying, rewarding and a great learning experience.

But the thing is, care workers are some of the lowest paid workers in the UK and Ireland - probably elsewhere too. The pay and conditions deteriorated when governments decided to 'contract out' care services to the private sector. The private sector is thought to be cheaper and therefore more efficient - because when we are looking for someone to care for the most vulnerable voiceless people in society, the first thing we look for is 'cheap' and 'efficient'.

But generally the private sector is cheaper because it pays less. One of the biggest outgoings for a care service is staffing. The cost of electricity, food, insurance etc is pretty much the same for private or public but the staffing gives room for manoeuvre. Staffing costs can be reduced in a few ways - hourly rates can drop, enhanced rates for weekends, evenings and bank holidays can be cut, staffing levels can be reduced, hours can be decreased and increased to between zero and madness.

If we want people - ie our friends, parents, siblings, kids- to be safe, to have dignity, to be treated with compassion, to be looked after and to be happy when they come to be reliant on the kindness of strangers, we have to make sure that the strangers are people who want to and are able to give it. The strangers should be rewarded for it and they should be valued. Care work should not be the job that people do when there is nothing else in the job centre.

I think it is high time we had a good look at how we value those people who look after the people we love. We must start to acknowledge that, very often, we treat them like shite. If you don't want to be outraged on behalf of someone you love, be outraged on your own behalf - it could be your dinner getting cut up by a stranger sooner than you think.