Old school unspooked

It isn’t really a spoiler to talk about the end of The Italian Job, is it? It’s become a classic. The coach teetering on a cliff edge, its back wheels over a sheer drop, its front wheels still on the road. The bullion robbers are at one end, the bullion itself at the other on a wheeled trolley. If they try to move near it, the gold rolls away towards the back of the bus, threatening to plunge the whole coach into the abyss.

“Hang on lads, I've got a great idea,” says Michael Caine.

I've got a great idea

And the film ends. With absolutely no suggestion of what the idea might be. Or whether there is any possible outcome other than the coach going over the cliff, taking the gold and the gang with it, or at the very least, the gold.

Len McCluskey is one of Britain’s most powerful trade union leaders. One of the keys to his grip on power is the ruthless way he protects it. Challenged for re-election to his post as leader of the Unite union by a fellow official, Gerard Coyne, he ensured that his rival was dismissed from his union role the day before the election. McCluskey won by a narrow margin, with his vote less than half what he had obtained the previous time.

Even more appalling was that the turnout for the election was just over 12%. McCluskey won with a 4% margin over his adversary, among fewer than one in eight of the union members, but the power that gave him was immense.

McCluskey: unrepentant, unspooked, unrepresentative

For instance, look at what happened to the defeated candidate. Coyne sued for unfair dismissal, but McCluskey had the financial clout of the union behind him and could bring up legal firepower far in excess of what his rival could afford. Eventually, Coyne dropped his case.

In the US in the nineteenth and well into the twentieth century, party bosses held sway over city neighbourhoods or even whole cities. They controlled huge funds and used them to offer favours to supporters, whether in the way of jobs or housing or other forms of wealth, to ensure their continued support – or to keep them under control by threatening to withdraw it. They were unprincipled, ruthless and effective.

One of the more famous of the Republican Party bosses was Mark Hanna. He said, “in politics, there are only two things that matter. One is money. I can’t remember the other one.”

McCluskey’s use of his financial clout reveals how true that remains today.

It’s highly ironic. Hanna was a man of the right. McCluskey a man of the left, head of the union which is a huge contributor to the Labour Party. But both men were political bosses, ruthless in their pursuit of power and their crushing of opponents. Both belong to that Old School of politics in which sheer brute power is all that counts, and money provides it.

In particular, McCluskey is ruthless in his support for Jeremy Corbyn as leader of the Labour Party. McCluskey is indeed believed to favour rule changes so that there would always be someone from the same left-wing current in the party, in any future election for leader. In other words, he wants Corbyn kept in his post and, even when he finally goes, he wants to do all in his (considerable) power to ensure he’s succeeded by someone out of the same mould.

This is curious. Because McCluskey’s stated aim is to see a government in office in Britain that will legislate genuine Socialist policies. And yet the man he’s backing to lead the party has taken it to a constant loss of standing in the polls and, only ten days ago, to its worst performance in a national election in nearly 120 years.

So why did I start by talking about The Italian Job? Not because McCluskey is as interesting a character, and certainly not because he’s as entertaining, as that rip-roaring film. No. It was because he told TV presenter Robert Peston, “my message to the Labour Party is don’t be spooked by these euro elections”.

We in Labour have long laughed at the poor third party, the Liberal Democrats, while we contest the position of top dog with the other big player, the Conservatives.

Well, the latest polls have the Conservatives, thoroughly discredited after their lamentable performance over Brexit, on just 19% of the vote – a disastrous level.

And Labour, who should by now have a 20-point at lead at least, are level-pegging with them. Just behind the hard right Brexit Party, itself behind – the Liberal Democrats. For now at least, they are in poll position.

“Don’t be spooked”? Well, no, one shouldn’t be. Spooking means panicking which never serves a useful purpose. But that’s not what McCluskey means. What he’s saying is “stay firm, stay the course”. In other words, just keep going as you are, however clear it may be that you’re on a hiding to destruction.

That’s why I thought of the Italian job. “I’ve got a great idea”. While the whole bunch of us wait to go over the cliff.

Taking all the gold we fought so hard for, down into the depths with us.

The four-stage strategy for dodging a bullet

In ‘A Victory for Democracy’, one of my favourite episodes of that excellent series from the eighties, Yes Prime Minister, Sir Humphrey Appleby, Cabinet Secretary, and Sir Richard Wharton, Permanent Secretary at the Foreign Office, outline the standard Foreign Office response in a time of crisis. 

This takes the form of a ‘four-stage strategy’.

In stage one we say nothing is going to happen.

In stage two, we say something may be going to happen, but we should do nothing about it.

In stage three, we say that maybe we should do something about it, but there's nothing we can do.

In stage four, we say maybe there was something we could have done, but it's too late now.

Donald Pickering as Wharton and Nigel Hawthorne as Appleby
explaining the Foreign Office Four-stage Strategy

I’ve always found this one of the best pieces of writing in the series, a hard-hitting satire on British politics, cynical but somehow believable.

What makes it believable is that it’s a great way for people who are more comfortable sitting on a fence to avoid being forced off it. That’s happening right now in Britain. Just look at the top of the Labour Party, over the question of Brexit. The top of the party is made up of lifelong Eurosceptics, almost certainly in favour of Brexit, but who don’t dare say so. After all, they lead a party that is massively anti-Brexit, to the tune of nearly 90% of the members. These leaders claim to want to give power over policy back to the membership, so they can hardly admit to wanting to override their wishes on this key question of our time.

So instead they just try to avoid taking a position. Their resolution is beginning to crack, with two close Corbyn allies, the trade union leader Len McCluskey and the MP John McDonnell, both saying that any new referendum on the EU should exclude the option of remaining a member. Even so, they would rather not have to say openly that they back Brexit.

What this does for their claim also to represent a new, refreshing and honest approach to politics I leave it to you to judge.

Honest or not, they need a way out of their conundrum. I humbly submit that they are, in fact, following their own four-stage strategy.

Let them to allow nature to imitate art and adopt a four-stage strategy of their own. Keir Starmer, the Party's Brexit spokesman, has come up with six tests for any Brexit deal the government negotiates. He’s made it clear that they will not back any deal that does not meet those tests.

Let’s leave aside for now the minor objection that it’s not quite clear what ‘not backing’ a deal means. Will they propose an alternative? No one has said yet.

The tests includes this one:

2. Does it deliver the “exact same benefits” as we currently have as members of the Single Market and Customs Union?

I’ve quoted it as it always appears, with quotation marks around “exact same benefits”. What’s that about? Quotation marks usually suggest that the statement within them is open to suspicion. So are we saying that we don’t really mean exactly the same benefits?

Because if we do mean exactly the same, we already know that no deal the EU will accept can meet that test. The EU has been absolutely unambiguous on the subject: the only way to enjoy the exact same benefits as conferred by membership is by remaining a member.

Maybe that’s why the leadership doesn’t want to be drawn on what it would propose as a deal that would meet its tests. Because the only realistic proposal would be to remain in the EU. That’s hardly a position Eurosceptics can adopt.

What they may therefore want is that Theresa May comes up with a disastrously bad deal so late that Britain is forced out on lousy terms, at which point the government falls and Labour wins the the general election that follows. That way Jeremy Corbyn, John McDonnell and co get to form a government without ever having to address the thorny issue of Brexit, because it’s already done.

Without their ever having to get off the fence.

Smart, isn’t it? They could then pursue the radical agenda of massive public investment and job creation that they propose. The only circle they would still have to square is how they could fund such a programme after the British economy has tanked following Brexit. They may not yet have cottoned on to the fact that far from creating new jobs, in government they would be spending all their time minimising the job losses Brexit will entail.

Ignorance is bliss. They’re clearly enjoying their moment of denial. So, in the meantime, they gaily pursue this four-stage strategy:

In stage one, we say we have our six tests and we will not support any Brexit deal that doesn’t pass them.

In stage two, we say this deal may not pass the six tests but we should do nothing about it for the moment.

In stage three, we say that maybe we should actually propose a deal that passes the six tests, but since we’re not in government, there’s no point so there’s nothing we can do.

In stage four, we say maybe there was something we could have done even in opposition, but it’s too late now that Brexit has already happened.

Most amusing. If only it weren’t for the victims who’ll be left picking up the pieces for the next generation or two.

Britain going rudderless to the chasm

Leadership is hard to define. But it’s easy to recognise when you see it. And easy to spot when it’s missing.

Take Winston Churchill pronouncing perhaps the four most important words of his career: ‘We shall never surrender’. They sent a shiver up the spine of my mother when she heard them in 1940.

‘We were alone against the Nazis,' she told me. 'We knew a great many people near the top of government wanted to open peace talks. Churchill’s words told us the fight would go on.’

My mother never voted for Churchill in her life. But she recognised this act of leadership for what it was.

A counter-example? George W. Bush paralysed in a classroom of children when told his country was under attack on 9/11. And then taking longer to get to ground zero in New York than it took Bill Clinton, though Clinton had been in Australia at the time of the attack and there was a ban on international flights into the US for several days afterwards.

No wonder Dubya struck that pose on the deck of an aircraft carrier, under a  ‘Mission Accomplished’ banner, after US troops had brought down Saddam Hussein. Having failed to show leadership when called on to do so, he needed to ape it later to try to make up.

Britain today is on the brink of the most serious step since watching the breakup of its Empire in the 40s and 50s. The EU has given the country access to a huge free trade area since 1973, and with that access has come investment, trade and jobs. In less than nine months, it is due to leave and there is still no clear vision of what future it will face.

The uncertainty is itself a factor in the country’s economy. Companies, with no indication of how Brexit will look, are beginning to plan for its being abrupt and violent – a hard Brexit where Britain leaves with no agreement in place for continuing trade with the EU or, indeed, with other countries. Investment plans are going on hold or even reversed, with plans to transfer production to other countries.

The impact on jobs and the economy generally is likely to be massive.

Why are we in this position? Because Theresa May as Prime Minister, though she claims to preside over a Cabinet, is in fact doing little more than refereeing a constant battle between a group of warring ministers. Some seem more than ready to accept a hard Brexit, if only as a way to break completely from EU regulation, whatever the cost. Others favour different levels of ‘soft Brexit’ where Britain continues to accept some parts of EU regulation in return for some of the benefits.

May keeps her position unclear, ostensibly because she doesn’t want to reveal her hand during negotiations, though most of us suspect that she actually has no definite position. She’s trying to hold the ring between diametrically opposed contestants, and therefore refuses to pick a side of the argument.

All she claims to want is to keep as many as possible of the benefits of EU membership, such an open border between the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland (which is remaining in the EU) and ‘frictionless trade’ with the EU. In return, she wants to accept little or no regulation by the EU.

It’s not surprising she feels this way. To accept almost any degree of EU regulation might be regarded as remaining the EU ‘by stealth’ and a ‘betrayal of the will of the people’ expressed in the referendum vote for Brexit. On the other hand, the benefits of membership are vital. She’s trying to square a circle, trying to take benefits without obligations, a position the EU has already rejected. They claim, correctly, it’s an attempt to have one’s cake and eat it.

May: she may be doing her best but no one knows what it is.
So it's not good enough.
No leader she

Whatever May’s approach is, leadership it ain’t.

Opposite her is Jeremy Corbyn, leading the Labour Party. His position is equally difficult. There is a trend in the Labour Party, mostly in its leftmost reaches (from which, as it happens, Corbyn emerged) that opposes EU membership. It’s an odd tendency that seems never to wonder why it ends up sharing platforms with the far right. If you’re agreeing with people with whom you have nothing in common, it’s worth asking whether you might have gone wrong somewhere.

If you have odd bedfellows, it might be because you’re in the wrong bed.

But there are other more practical problems emerging for Brexiters of the left. Most notably, they’re in a minority in the Labour Party.

Even Corbyn’s biggest trade union backer, Unite, is now questioning whether Brexit really is good for its members’ health. They can see the jobs going, along with the workers’ rights the EU imposed on the essentially right-wing British regime. They’re beginning to demand that Corbyn endorse an explicit pro-EU stance.

This is an embarrassment to Corbyn, who needs Unite support but has been as assiduous as May in avoiding any clear position on Brexit. He’s caught between his roots in left-wing Brexitism and the unpleasant realisation that the majority of Labour, and even of his fan base, increasingly backs staying in the EU.

Corbyn with his pal McCluskey of the Unite Trade Union
But Unite members are beginning to ask for more from Corbyn.
He's not giving it. No leader he

So he’s as paralysed as May. Unable to take a stand on Brexit. Unable to lead his party or nation either towards a hard or soft Brexit, or towards remaining in the EU.

Again, I say, whatever that is, it ain’t leadership.

The worst of it is that a government as weak as May’s could fall. Rumours reach me that we should prepare for an election in October. That might leave Corbyn in number 10, with just five months to Brexit day and everything to negotiate. He might, at last, be forced to take a position.

I have friends who claim he would choose to stay in the EU rather than accept a hard Brexit. That would be a courageous position to take: he too would be assailed by Leavers high and low accusing him of betraying the will of the people. Would he really do that? It might be easier, politically, just to claim it wasn’t his fault that the Brexit was hard, and that he had no choice but to accept it.

That would be followership, of course, not leadership. But if nine months out, he still can’t even say that remaining in the EU might be an option, how can we be sure that he would just weeks before the fatal day?

Either way, what’s certain, is that Britain stands on the brink of a historic decision. And in neither of the parties likely to be in government to make it do we see any sign of leadership on the question. Just when the country needs it more than usual.

Not a prospect to inspire much confidence.

Anyone but Corbyn? Don't be silly...

It began to feel like a trend when the third person in two days referred to me as belonging to the “Anyone but Corbyn” group, neatly abbreviated as “ABC”.

It seems this is the latest term that supporters of Jeremy Corbyn, current and flailing leader of the Labour Party, have come up with in their increasingly desperate attempt to label everyone else as part of one, homogeneous and, it goes without saying, despicable group.

We were all at one time “Blairites”. It was hard to get that label to stick to people, like me, with a long track record of opposing Blair as energetically as they now oppose Corbyn.

“Red Tory” didn’t work for people who’d spent a career opposing the Tories, in some cases winning elections against them. 

The label “plotters” (because they supported the supposed “coup” against Corbyn) suggested that there was a conspiracy embracing a couple of hundred thousand people, and you have to be profoundly paranoid to believe such a plot even possible.

They still, though, seem to need a single, simplifying term to brand us all. “ABC” is the latest attempt. Sadly, though, it merely shows how hopeless it is to impose such a simplification on a phenomenon far too complex for it.

I would never go for anyone but Corbyn. Why, we could end up with someone even worse – and there are people who would make an even more dire job of leading the Labour Party than Corbyn. John McDonnell, his Shadow Chancellor, for one. If we can cast the net beyond Parliament, the devious and authoritarian leader of the Unite union, Len McCluskey, would be another.

Perhaps “ABTC” would work: anyone better than Corbyn. Unfortunately not. I thought Ed Miliband, the previous leader, was desperately weak. More lamentable as leader even than his own predecessor, Gordon Brown. But either of them would be an improvement over Corbyn, and the last thing I want to see is either of them back.

What about “AALBTC”, anyone a lot better than Corbyn? I’m not sure that works either. You see, Tony Blair was massively better than Corbyn (or Brown or Miliband) at winning elections; he was dismal at resisting the lure of power and therefore followed the then most powerful man in the world, Dubya Bush, into the catastrophic Iraq War. That’s Dubya who was himself the worst President of the United States, or so I imagined until I discovered Trump.

No. We need someone with the ability of Blair to win elections but the guts to say “no” to power. An earlier Labour Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, was good that way, refusing to take Britain into the Vietnam War, but he wasn’t exactly the straightest of individuals and he does suffer from the inconvenient handicap of being dead.

Harold Wilson: said no to LBJ over the disaster of Vietnam
But not exactly pure as driven snow...

So what we really need is anyone but Corbyn who’s a lot better at winning elections without being opportunistic about essential principle or kowtowing to inept political leaders. Sadly ABCWALBAWEBWBOAEPOKTIPL doesn’t exactly trip off the tongue.

Which perhaps makes my point. We’re talking about a complex view, not susceptible to simple summary. Trying to encapsulate it with a single word or pithy abbreviation is bound to fail.

On the other hand, if you absolutely insist on coming up with a single term for those of us who oppose Corbyn within the Party, I do have one that I feel goes a long way towards filling the bill.

I like to think of myself as a Labourite.

Shooting the messenger

People tell me it’s commendable to speak truth to power. My inclination is to scoff in reply but then I’ve lost a couple of jobs by irritating powerful people with unwelcome truth. Generally, power isn’t interested in hearing the truth – what it seeks is confirmation.

This week the UK’s ambassador to the European Union, Sir Ivan Rogers, resigned. This highly-experienced diplomat, an expert in dealing with the EU, had warned the government that it might take ten years to finalise British separation.

Sir Ivan Rogers:
the messenger shot when he told the truth to power

That feels like the kind of judgement he’s qualified to make, and the kind of information a government negotiating Brexit needs. It wasn’t what Theresa May wanted to hear. This being a time when experts are regarded as unnecessary at best, and at worst a positive hindrance to the fine things that the Trumps and their ilk want to do, Rogers had to go.

The problem for May is that she has to walk a fine line in the Brexit negotiations. Many in her party or its voter base would like to remain in the EU or, if they have to leave, do it on terms that maintain as much as possible of the benefit of membership – they favour what’s known as “soft Brexit”. They support that position even though it comes at a price, in particular giving up some of the control over immigration which was the objective of a great many Leave voters. She’s working to keep those soft Brexiters on side without losing the hard ones, who want to get clear of the EU and all its works.

So far, she’s done a good job on that political front, holding the two wings of the centre-right together. She’s done it by refusing to come down clearly on either side of the fence, by being all things to all men. It could all end in tears, when she has to make a definitive choice, but she’s a skilful opportunist and she’s riding her current wave of popularity masterfully, hoping no doubt that it’ll take her far enough that the crunch, when it comes, won’t be too painful.

Things could not be more different in the ranks of the main Opposition Party, Labour. Ironically its leader, Jeremy Corbyn, seems as disinclined as May to state clearly where he stands. Officially, the Labour Party backs the Remain position, and its spokesperson on Brexit, Keir Starmer, has been promoting a soft Brexit: he accepts the people’s decision to leave, but wants to retain as much as he can of the trade and tariff system that comes with membership. Here, on the other hand, is what Corbyn said in his New Year’s message:

2016 will be defined in history by the referendum on our EU membership. People didn’t trust politicians and they didn’t trust the European Union.

I understand that. I’ve spent over 40 years in politics campaigning for a better way of doing things, standing up for people, taking on the establishment, and opposing decisions that would make us worse off.

We now have the chance to do things differently. To build an economy that invests and works for everyone across all our nations and regions.

Labour accepts and respects the result of the referendum. We won’t be blocking our leaving the European Union, but we won’t stand by.

At first sight, this doesn’t seem to favour either side of the debate. But, reading between the lines, words like “we now have the chance to do things differently” suggests he rather backs Brexit than the contrary. That’s awkward for him, not just because it conflicts with Party policy, but because it’s known that something like 5 million out of 7 million core Labour voters are Remainers.

I’m no supporter of Corbyn, but I do understand why many in the Labour Party still do – after all, I voted him in his first leadership election. I believe his admirers see in him a man of principle, who has fought long and hard against powerful opposition, for a clearly socialist view of the world we live in and the solutions to its problems. He’s a pacifist who utterly rejects nuclear weapons, he’s firmly on the side of the poor and downtrodden, speaking out forcefully against cuts in benefits and in favour of greater investment in healthcare.

It seems to me that his supporters feel that if only this message could be communicated to voters, they too would see how obviously true it is and would come flocking around to back Labour under his leadership.

Unfortunately, when I see Corbyn dodging and weaving on the Brexit issue, speaking in code and in hints, I see a man who is trying to trim, to hide his true colours and hang on to some at least of his support. That’s exactly like Theresa May. It’s also exactly like Tony Blair, regarded by most Corbyn supporters as a monster of mendacity: ‘Blairite’ is a favourite term of abuse for Corbyn opponents even if, like me, they abhor Blair’s appalling behaviour. There are times when I feel that, despite the obvious difference in policy, in political behaviour Corbyn is no breach with the Blairite past, but Blair’s worthy heir.

The difference is that Blair was good at it, as Theresa May is still. She may be all things to all men on Brexit; Corbyn, by trying the same trick of balancing on two stools, is managing only to fall between them. The result is disastrous for Labour and for all those whose livelihood depend on it. The Fabian Society, one of the organisations that first founded Labour, has published a report analysing the dire state of the party and warning that it could fall to below 150 seats at the next election, the worst result since 1935.

That seems a far from implausible warning. I recently wrote about the poll position of Labour now and at the equivalent point of the 1992-1997 and 2010-2015 parliaments. Here are the figures completed with the results at the election that followed:
  

Parliament	Poll standing	Election Result
1992-1997	20% lead	Victory wih a 10% lead
2010-2015	3% lead	Defeat with a 7% deficit
2015-date	7% deficit

Labour is less well placed today than it was in either of those previous parliaments. In both those cases, its result in the election was worse, whether in victory or in defeat, than the polls suggested. The worst news of all is that even the 7% deficit today is only the result of a single poll (the most recent); in others, the deficit is far greater.

Len McCluskey, leader of Britain’s largest union and one of the architects of Corbyn’s second leadership victory, warned recently that if the poll position didn’t improve, Corbyn would have to consider his position. That’s code for “resign”.

You can see where he’s coming from, can’t you? After all, Corbyn promises to do far more for the poor and the working class than the much-maligned Blair ever did. But Blair delivered far more than Corbyn’s likely to. Why? Blair got into government. Corbyn’s far from well-placed to equal that feat.

But his supporters don’t want to hear that. They hammer me for suggesting it on Twitter. And within the Labour Party, they’re the ones in power.

Power, I’ve observed, doesn’t want the truth told to it. It wants to hear what it wants to hear. And, as Sir Ivan Rogers shows, it’s happy to shoot the messenger otherwise.