I
was surprised that Scotland voted to retain the
Union. I was also very relieved because
as a Labour voter in England, I knew that losing 40-50 seats in Scotland would
be a monumental hindrance
to overcome. Conversely had I lived in
Scotland, I would happily have voted to give independence a chance. Apart from anything else, the prospect of
having Tory rule banished forever was too big a prize to turn down.
The
figures from Scotland were remarkable with some local authorities recording turnouts
in excess
of 90%. The unprecedented numbers led to optimism across Britain that the 2015
General Election may benefit from a re-engagement of the electorate with
politicians in this country. Could a
Caledonian wind of change inspire more than 70% of the British electorate to
vote for the first time since it slipped below the
threshold in 2001?
It’s
a romantic theory, although unfortunately a simple explanation for the
exceptionally high numbers of people engaged in the Scottish Referendum comes
down to two factors. The first is that
the Referendum itself was a unique
opportunity, a “once in a generation” event, the result would be life-changing
without the prospect of reversing the outcome in a few years’ time. The second because the Referendum by its very
nature offered a very clear choice:
either for or against independence. It
was a polarising question: Yes or No.
There was no “maybe” on the ballot paper.
The
trouble with the British political landscape is that it does not offer that
choice. The origins of “consensus
politics” can probably be traced back
to the “Limehouse Declaration” of 1981 and the subsequent repositioning of the
Labour Party under Neil Kinnock in the mid-1980s. Tony Blair may have removed clause
IV, but it was the tenure of Kinnock which laid the foundations for someone
like Blair to lead the party a decade later.
The
result is a political debate which largely takes place on the right of the
political spectrum. It’s why issues like
immigration never stray
far from the heart of the national debate.
It explains how attacking the most vulnerable in society is widely
perceived as acceptable, sometimes even popular
with public opinion. It is also why issues like social justice and creating a
fairer society has slipped so dangerously down the agenda.
So
when Labour’s shadow Chancellor Ed Balls announced there would be a freeze
on child benefits under an incoming Labour Government, there was frustration
from grassroots Labour activists, but no real surprise. As my boss at work described, the British
electorate are not so much offered an alternative vision of how to run the
country, but a question of how they wish to be harmed: death by firing squad or
a thousand cuts.
It
is a dramatic analogy perhaps although it does reinforce the need for an
alternative vision of how to lead the country through the second half of this
decade. The obsession with pandering to
the right while sacrificing ethical socialism requires an urgent re-think if we
are not to repeat the mistakes of the past and offer the electorate the same
bland choice which has been on the table for over thirty years.
One
area where there was potential for clear daylight to be placed between the
parties came in the form of the recent parliamentary debate on military
intervention in Iraq. A Conservative
Government took this country into the first
Gulf War in 1991, a Labour Government returned the compliment in 2003 and
now a coalition of Liberal Democrats and Tories have led the way to ensure that
for the third time in 23 years, British forces will once again be engaged in
conflict in Iraq.
Labour
seized the opportunity for yet more consensus by rallying behind the
Government’s case for military intervention and helped to secure an emphatic
mandate for war resulting in just
43 MP’s voting against the motion. 24 of
the rebels
were from the Labour Party and read like a roll call of some of the finest MP’s
who currently serve as Parliamentarians.
People
like Jeremy Corbyn, the MP for
Islington north and long-time friend of the Chagossian quest for justice. There was Dennis Skinner,
the “Beast of Bolsover”, a moral conscience and thorn in the side of a
leadership which has lost its sense of navigation. Diane Abbott,
another supporter of the Chagossian cause and representative for the
constituency of my birth. And then there
is Graham Allen,MP for where I
live now, somebody who I’ve not always said complimentary things about
previously but someone I am now looking at in a different light.
Why
did they vote against British military involvement? Well largely for the same reasons that I
opposed the push for war as well. The British
record for involvement in military escapades in the middle-east has been one
disaster after another since Suez. The latest enemy is ISIS (or ISIL or IS), a
group whose very existence can be directly linked to a decision
by Washington to arm and train rebel fighters fighting in Syria once a
coalition including the UK fell at the final hurdle just over a year ago.
The
similarities with Afghanistan and the emergence of the Taliban illustrate an
all too familiar
picture in the middle-east, as the rise and fall of one Saddam Hussein explicitly
demonstrated. Driven from power a decade
ago, he was once on very friendly
terms with London and Washington who supported him during his eight year long
war with Iran. Indeed one has to
question just how vociferous the British Government’s push for war in 1991
would have been had Farzad Bazoft not been so callously executed
on trumped-up spying charges just under a year earlier.
If
Bernie Grant
had been alive, I’d like to think he would’ve voted against the intervention
too. The generation of children who (like
me) were born under the Tory tyrant's eleven year Premiership are sometimes referred
to as “Thatcher’s Children”, a phrase I loathe.
I take huge pride in the fact that I lived in Tottenham for every year
of Bernie’s tenure as the MP. We are
“Bernie’s Children”: a generation
inspired by his brand of socialist principles, desire for social justice, providing
a voice for the disenfranchised and marginalised while espousing the complete opposite
of Thatcherite values.
Bernie
Grant passed away fourteen years ago, but wherever he is now, I’m sure he gave
a nod of approval to the 24 Labour MPs who voted against military action in
Iraq. That select band of rebel
backbenchers represents the fading heartbeat of a party which has been insulted
with all sorts of derogatory terms in the immediate aftermath of the Scottish
Referendum. I am always at pains to
stress that while the party leadership may frustrate me endlessly, the party
itself still has many good MPs and even more activists who share core Labour
values.
The
key that unlocks the potential to increase voter participation lies within that
group of Labour MPs. That their influence
is so marginal is tragic and is the real reason there will be no noticeable spike
in the number of people voting in May.
The momentum created by the example set in Scotland will fade away
before the Christmas decorations are up on Oxford Street. An opportunity for change is smothered by a
cartel promoting consensus, cruelly crushing all of the new found hope and
optimism.
