Though Cowards Flinch

Perhaps this bloke could help us?

In his latest piece in a series of articles that lay out the case against all the candidates for the Labour leadership, Hopi Sen, whilst setting out the case against Diane Abbot, seems to have taken on the unlikely mantle of political Guru to the Labour Left.

As he’s said at the beginning of each of these articles, he’s hoping to ruin any chance of future employment with the party. Perhaps he’s feeling a bit rebellious, I might send him a membership form for the LRC..

I don’t usually like reading anything from devout centrist types, that sets out to discuss the left of the Party, it tends to raise my blood pressure somewhat. But surprisingly Hopi has some pretty good pointers for us.

The next few years are a major opportunity for the Labour left.

Labour has just lost office thanks to a crisis in capitalism and the failure of the Labour centre-right to respond to that crisis it in an electorate pleasing way.

As a result, we have a government which will run an anti-public services, anti-social spending, anti-housing benefit and welfare agenda, while pursuing policies that will, at the very best, slow the decline in unemployment.

For the first time in a generation, the left could have a coherent intellectual and electoral argument. If the face of the left is Diane Abbott, that argument will be less likely to be taken seriously.

I find it hard to disagree with that. I think the left should be careful not to allow Diane to become our default mouthpiece once she loses the election, though Hopi go’s on to say pretty much the same thing of John McDonnell and Jeremy Corbyn, with which I don’t agree.

John is by far a more effective communicator, in fact I think the only reason Diane is on the ballot is because David Miliband was shit scared of sharing a platform with John! And rightly so, he would have embarrassed him on any number of issues, up and down the country for weeks on end.

I’m glad Hopi points out that this is an opportunity for the left-wing, in fact its nice to hear someone say it. Too many lefties seem to have got into a perpetual state of despair about the Labour Party, to an extent that a vital opportunity may be missed.  

I especialy liked this last bit;

Instead they should focus on developing a new generation of strong voices for whom the chance to stridently oppose the government, challenge their own party to be more radical and win applause from party members will be attractive. Most of these won’t be in Westminster – they could be council leaders, or trade unionists, or simply fluent, passionate activists.

The challenge for the left isn’t winning this leadership election, it’s becoming strong enough to ensure that in conference, NEC and shadow cabinet, it’s people and ideas are taken seriously.

I would say that this wouldn’t just be a good thing for the left of the party, but for the whole. Regaining a more pluralistic type of politics is essential for the Labour Party, the only other option is a slip back to the top down, control freakery of the Blair years.

So I wonder. If the time really is now, and the above were used as a loose set of aims for the left over the next couple of years, how would we best start to get things moving at a grass-roots level? This will no doubt be the subject of numerous meetings in the coming months, but hey, if we don’t put the comments section to use for things like this, then whats the point in having it!?!

Great post from Sunny here, asking whether or not it is the Centrists in the Labour Party who have become dogmatic. It’s a compelling case for those who’ve never really thought about it, now more than ever. Though it has been my opinion for quite some time. I’ve often enjoyed pointing out the hypocrisy of people, who’s greatest supposed achievement is vanquishing the dogmatic, uncompromising hard left, developing their own creed (a counter-creed if you will), to which they have clung to righteously ever since. And upon closer examination of the positions of the Labour centrists, it is clear that a dogmatic approach to politics is quite common.

I don’t like the idea of defining the center ground, and I like the definition less, especially when delivered to me by its proponents. Too many people who tell us the center ground is the only way, often forget that the development of centrist politics was born out of a recognition that the publics beliefs and expectations, are not static, but evolutionary. And instead they give us a list of things that aren’t acceptable, positions we can’t afford to abandon, policies we can’t risk to support… the counter creed.

The problem is obvious, if this creed remains dominant, then we will fail to realise what needs to be done to regain our lost support. Weather that means abandoning the center, or reinterpreting what it means in practice, under the ideological guidance of those that refuse to budge on certain issues, particular (potentially succesful) policy ideas will simply be ignored. Left out of the process of consideration altogether, based on the premise that even contemplating certain reforms will lead to defeat. This completely ignores the idea mentioned above, that what may have been considered off-limits in 1997 is not necessarily off-limits in 2010.

Since the election I’ve heard some people suggest that the results showed us the country has moved to the right, and that Labour either strayed too far from the center ground (which I think is laughable), or failed to reinterpret the center ground whilst taking into account this supposed move to the right by the electorate. These voices of pessimism warn me that any contemplation of a “move to the left” by the Labour Party (whatever that means), will leave us exiled by an electorate humming a more right-wing tune.

Frankly I think this is nonsense. For one there was only a swing of around 3.7 to the Tories, the failure of David Cameron to secure his party an all out majority. Second, the Lib Dems clearly positioned themselves as a left of center party, and together with the Labour Party took a larger share of the vote than the Conservatives did, who only managed to increase their share of the vote by just under 4% of the vote. Hardly the sign of a mass right-wing realignment.

The voters the Labour Party lost havent flooded to the Tories in search of something a little more right-wing, they just haven’t come out to vote. This isn’t a new problem, its been going on for some time. Those who claim Labour needs to stick with the “triangulation” with Tory voters, that defined New Labours political strategy, fail to acknowledge that 4 of the 5 million lost voters left whilst Blair was leader. Almost as soon as the coalition of ’97 was put together, it was beginning to fall apart again. Jon Trickett wrote a good piece on this not too long ago.

I agree with Sunny, the financial crisis had a massive impact on people’s political attitudes, especially on issues such as corporate power, and the very nature of our economic arrangement. If the next Labour leader neglects this shift, they shall do so at their own peril.

But at the same time we shouldnt ignore the fact that on certain issues, the country may feel it is to the right of us. On those issues, the Labour Party really needs to consider a strategy for selling ideas to the electorate. Winning elections alone isn’t good enough, after all, politics is more a battle of ideas than a battle of the ballots. At least it should be.

So here’s to hoping the creed fades into insignificance where it belongs, and people will ask the right questions. Has the nation turned to the right? Or has the left of center failed to properly motivate parts of its base? I would have to say it is the latter.

Richard Watts has an interesting piece up on LabourList today, discussing how Labour Councils should respond to the Governments spending cuts. I’m sure that Labour Groups around the country have been discussing this for some time, but I’m glad Richard is discussing a possible approaches more publicly, after all, cuts to local government will be just as much of an issue as cuts to centralised infrastructure, and the Party, and the broader movement needs to contemplate how this will be handled.

It’s interesting to consider the role of Labour councils in this process of savage spending cuts. The Party has a strong presence in Local Government, Labour Councillors possibly have more of an opportunity to limit the effects of cuts, than members of the Parliamentary Labour Party do. Labour MP’s aren’t setting the terms from opposition, and lack any real input on the agenda, whereas Labour Councillors, as Richard points out, are the ones making the final decisions in many areas, and as such can exercise a certain amount of discretion.   

Now I know a lot of lefties aren’t going to like this idea, but we must accept that Labour Councils are going to have to make cuts, and we should be ready to contribute to a debate about how we can implement cuts forced on us by central government, whilst attempting to limit the effects on the most vulnerable.

Now of course there are calls from some sections of the left for some kind of “no surrender” policy from local councils, along the lines of that attempted by Militant in Liverpool;

There are some, largely in groups linked to the Socialist Workers Party, calling on councils to ‘resist’ the cuts by setting illegal budgets. But along this road madness lies. Aside from the illegality of setting an unbalanced budget, local authorities doing this would very quickly just run out of money; services would collapse and the losers would be the most vulnerable who depend most on council services. If councils run out of money to pay for meals on wheels, it won’t be middle class Trots that go hungry.

Whilst I’m not keen on the “middle class Trots” jibe, I agree with Richard’s point that setting illegal rates are bound to fail, both financially and politically.

Opposition is all well and good, and I don’t want to give the impression I am discouraging any kind of protest. But we must accept that these cuts are happening, and occupations, marches etc. are only going to help weaken the Government over a period of time, as opposed to actually reversing the initial decisions. Perhaps I’m being pessimistic, I’m sure that’s what more Militant Comrades will say anyway, but it’s what I think.

It will also be the responsibility of local Labour Parties to make sure the people in their areas know who is responsible for these cuts to services that are coming, we can’t let the Tories shift the blame to local government!

So how might Labour Councils protect the most vulnerable as I have said above? How do you decide what is more important when the choice is the local library or funded leisure activities for unhealthy kids?

And obviously the only problem isn’t the loss of services, but loss of jobs too. The economy in some areas completely depends on the Council for employment, either directly or indirectly, and sadly again, Job losses just can’t be completely ruled out!

This reminds me of a story my Grandma told me recently, about her time working for the local Council during the 80′s recession. The local leader of the Labour Council Roy Oldham,  (who sadly has just passed away) gathered all the Council’s employees at a local football ground, and discussed the possibility of people taking a pay cut as opposed to redundancy. The staff appreciated his candour, and agreed to lose a small amount of their monthly wages, on the condition it would be repaid to them during better times.

This is an example of the kind of things labour councils could be doing to, and we shouldnt shy away from discussing such things in the interest of the greater good.

But no one approach will be appropriate in every area, and now is the time to start considering what we exactly can be done.

I’ve just read this post over at Max Atkinson’s blog, which admittedly I would have never encountered were it not for an eye-catching tweet containing the link, which insinuated that if elected, Ed Miliband would take the Labour Party back to the dark days of 80′s class warfare.

The main point being made in the post is best summed up in the following paragraph;

Now that Ed Miliband has won the backing of the big unions, whose support Ed Balls had been hoping for, the question is: can Labour afford to back Ed Miliband on his journey back to 1979 and the wonderful world of old Labour?

The implication, that Ed Miliband is some sort of militant figure one might expect to find on the hard left, wo is comparable to the likes of Michael Foot or Tony Benn, is simply laughable, and is something I’ve heard repeated several times recently.

After showing a 5 second long clip of Ed in which he says, “I’m standing because of my values, values my parents taught me” Max go’s on to say;

Although I know nothing at all about his mother’s values, I do know that his father, the late Ralph Miliband, was a militant Marxist and a highly influential member of a generation of sociological theorists who (in my opinion) contributed towards undermining the credibility of a once respectable discipline

Well Max, his mother said Jon Cruddas would be her preferred candidate in the contest if that helps at all…

Quality of Ralph Miliband’s work aside (which I would recommend by the way), there is nothing about Ed Miliband’s ideas on the practical approach to politics, which would lead one to believe he is following in his fathers ideological footsteps. Indeed quite the opposite is true. One of Ralph’s key works, Parliamentary Socialism: A study of the politics of Labour, he questioned the possibility of advancing the Socialist cause through parliamentary politics, as opposed to more militant mobilisation of the working class favoured by his father. So we can safely assume that in this regard Ed isn’t following in his fathers footsteps. Perhaps his mothers more centric, Crudassite tendencies balanced him out a bit!

This kind of lazy, sensationalist analysis bores me. The fact that anyone to the Left of Tony Blair is instantly labelled as deluded, unelectable etc. is a common knee jerk response from anyone who views center ground politics as the Holy Grail of modern political thought, the expression of which sometimes borders on McCarthyism.

So besides the fact that at least one half of his moral inspiration was a Marxist academic, is there any other evidence that Ed is the Revolutionary Class warrior some seem to view him as?

The main philosophical points of Ed’s campaign, that there is more to society than the market, that the state has a responsibility to protect the most vulnerable from the excesses this market produces, and that greater social equality leads to a more cohesive society. All pretty common amongst the left of center, Social Democratic lexicon. As Comrade Doran quite eloquently articulated it recently he is a ”Moderate Radical“.

Indeed, when the leadership candidates were asked at a recent hustings event, “are you a Socialist – and what does the word mean to you?”, Ed’s answer certainly seemed to confirm his commitment to Social Democratic Reformism;

“Being a socialist for me is about being willing to criticise capitalism – and saying capitalism produces many injustices, which politics must tackle. It is not about abolishing capitalism but it is about changing it”

It often annoys me how people who claim to want to see “change” in British politics are so wiling to denounce anything that appears to step even slightly outside the current status quo, and to do it with such half-baked observations as this is even worse.

The whole debate about center ground politics in Britain, and more specifically the urgent need to hold on to it, is often distorted by highly opinionated, stubborn points of view, that essentially end up with two sides who disagree shouting long-held, fiercely rigid dogmas at one another, bringing into question its right to even be called a debate anymore.

That in mind, I don’t have any desire to get into the “center ground debate” today, which Carl decided to start some discussion on last night. I just wanted to point out how bloody stupid it was to try to imply Ed Miliband might be the next Tony Benn.

Having very little to do this weekend, I have spent a fair bit of my time sitting around and browsing twitter for people to argue with. Arguably not the most constructive way to spend ones weekend, but hey, its been a busy week, and winding people up on the internet is underrated. The economy seems to be the main topic of discussion for most at the moment, nothing new there, and as such the opportunity for passionate conflict of opinion is rife.

For anyone who’s tried to debate anything in detail via twitter it is well understood how difficult it is to make a point with just 140 characters, especially when discussing potentially complex issues such as economics. So I thought Id take this opportunity to elaborate on some of my twitter-based discussions of late, in an attempt to repudiate some of the fallacies that are becoming second nature to anyone with an opinion on the matter.

The most common bit of nonsense is, unsurprisingly focusing on the argument surrounding the Coalition’s cuts to public spending. I have been attempting to remove this argument from the political sphere in my discussions and asking people to look at this objectively, solely from an economic point of view, in an attempt to break this idea that there is no alternative, which due to politicos admiration for acronyms, seems to have been boiled down to TINA. 

The lack of substance in the economic arguments being offered by the government and their cheerleaders really is quite appalling. Paul may have already explained some of this in an earlier post, but seen as this illogical rubbish is spreading through the debate like a wild-fire, repeating it once, or even a hundred times is hardly going to be a problem!

The main line of argument go’s like this; the Labour government was to frivolous, for 13 years we lived beyond our means, and now as a result of such reckless spending on schools, hospitals and other public spending, the country has no money left!

In a brief appearance on BBC news, Chancellor George Osborne explained to us mere mortals how the government is like a family that has been funding a lavish lifestyle via their credit cards. We are spending more than we can afford, i.e. more than the government generates through tax revenues, and this must be put to an end!

This line of argument has been seized upon by Tory activists attempting to paint themselves as the defenders of common sense, and it resonates well with the average person (with little understanding of economics), who can relate to the “living beyond our means” part of the argument. The problem is, this couldn’t be further from the truth.

This can best be described as a “fallacy of composition”, which can be defined as follows:

A fallacy of composition arises when one infers that something is true of the whole from the fact that it is true of some part of the whole

So what Mr Osborne and his minions are trying to explain to us, in no uncertain terms, is that the British government, like individual households/firms, must operate in a manner which recognises it operates with a revenue constraint, i.e. that it can only spend as much as it raise through taxes and bond sales.

The absurdity of such a statement is obvious to anyone who has studied modern economics, even slightly.  Osborne, and everyone who follows his lead, is trapped in the thinking of the 1930s, before the development of macroeconomic theory, which coincidentally arose from the inadequacy of trying to rationalise the actions of the whole on the basis of the part, exactly as Osborne is doing today.

As Keynes and his pioneering colleagues in the field of macroeconomics understood, trying to rationalise the outcome of the wider economy based on the reasoning of the individual (microeconomic) level, just doesn’t work. A perfect example is Keynes theory on the “paradox of thrift” which observes an individual trying to increase savings can do so by putting money away, but when applied to the economy as a whole, attempting to increase savings can lead to exactly the opposite of the desired outcome, i.e. lower savings. So trying to frame the debate of the broader economy in the terms of the individual is disingenuous at best, but highly cunning when you wish to convince everyone that TINA.

TINA also neglects another historic economic development, as if circumventing the most basic concept of macroeconomic thought wasnt bad enough! It neglects to recognise the true nature of monetary operations in modern Britain, (as opposed to the Eurozone, which I shall go into later) and in doing so removes the most obvious alternative from the realm of possibility altogether.

British pounds sterling, are an example of a “non convertible, fiat currency”, which is simply a currency declared to be legal tender by a sovereign state, that unlike the Gold Standard system of days gone by, the issuer is in no way obliged to redeem the holder with anything whatsoever. Ever heard someone say you can go into the bank and redeem your pound notes/coins for the appropriate weight of gold bullion? Well you can’t, because that was only true under the Gold Standard, which was ended some time ago.

Why is this point relevant? Because in the old days, governments were genuinely revenue constrained, the money they spent represented blocks of gold in a vault, and if people wanted to redeem money for which there wasnt enough gold, then there would be a problem! So the money they spent, either had to be borrowed or raised via taxation.

This raises an interesting point with regard to the operation of the modern system, do governments need to tax in order to spend money? For anyone who understands the practical operation of a monetary system with a non-convertible, fiat currency, the answer is quite obviously no!

This isn’t to be misunderstood as labelling taxes as pointless, they’re not, they’re just not necessary as a means of ensuring government spending under the current arrangement. An explanation of what they are for under this type of arrangement would be enough for a post of its own, which I shall perhaps attempt to write sometime in the near future.

At this point we come to the Greek fallacy, which like the “governments are like households” argument, is totally void of any practical significance, and is regularly being invoked at the highest levels of government. The argument here being that if spending isn’t bought under control, there will be mass panic, riots on the street and eventually we will have to default and go bust (which the same people claim has already happened in close succession).

Some people, such as Labour MP Rachel Reeves, have tried to argue this away in what I believe to be an entirely inadequate manner, which completely misses the most basic flaw of the argument.

Unlike in Britain, the Greek government is faced with a revenue constraint, (as explained above, it can only spend what it raises via taxes or borrowing [bond sales]). But the Greek government uses the Euro, which is also a non-convertible, fiat currency, right? So why do they face a revenue constraint when we don’t?

Well that’s simple, because unlike in Britain, Greece does not have control over its own monetary policy, the European Central Bank does, one of several reasons I’m completely opposed to Britain joining the Euro.

So it’s important to make a distinction here, the European Central Bank has no revenue constraint, it can spend as many Euros as it likes without having to worry about running out, which in practice essentially boils down to someone changing numbers on computer screens! But the states that operate within the Eurozone do operate with a revenue constraint, and as such can’t spend, spend, spend without facing the risk of insolvency. Upon realising these practicalities it quickly becomes obvious that the debate regarding Britain’s budget deficit cannot be framed in the terms of the Greek situation, just as the micro-level observations cannot be applied at the macro-level.

I don’t know if George Osborne understands all of this, and frankly I don’t care; he has chosen his course of action and is neglecting reality as a result, the question of whether he is aware of all this or not is not something I shall concern myself with when attempting to discuss the economic implications of his actions. But if people who wish to oppose what he is doing don’t realise the absurdities of the claims being made about our fiscal position, then he shall succeed with a notable level of ease.

Sadly, many in the Labour Party have already accepted the fallacies of Mr Osbornes argument, and are instead seeking to present an agenda motivated by the same reasoning, in a more “humane” way, the only road this shall lead to is failure.

Update: See Andrew’s and Peter’s comment below for some further clarification regarding the Grassroots Alliance.

Labour Uncut today reported on the “shenanigans at the grassroots alliance”, which for those who don’t know, is a coalition of left wing-Labour orientated groups that presents slates of candidates in internal Labour Party elections.

The problem they are referring to, is one of the Alliance’s chosen candidates, sitting NEC member Peter Willsman, has not secured the support of his own CLP Erith and Thamesmead, which candidates standing to the CLP section of the NEC must secure. As the Uncut article explains, rumours are afoot that Pete intends to try to quickly switch CLP’s in an attempt to secure nomination, something which to my knowledge, is at best flimsy on a constitutional level.

As Paul has noted before, the means by which the slate is formulated is somewhat of a mystery, largely decided by negotiators representing the various groups that make up the Alliance, including CLPD, the LRC and Compass youth. Each group chooses its preferred candidate/s from within its own ranks, and then tries to agree which ones make it onto the final slate.

As far as I’m aware the LRC is the only organisation that ballots its membership, with hustings being held at last years Annual Conference, in which LRC Vice Chair Susan Press, and sitting NEC member Christine Shawcroft were selected as the LRC’s preferred candidates.

When the LRC National Committe met for our February meeting, it was affirmed that our position of was to push for both the candidates selected by our conference, to be included on the final slate. The reasoning being for this, that owing to the size of our membership in relation to the other organisations, two places was a reasonable outcome.

As can be seen on the Grassroot Alliance’s website, only Christine Shawcroft made it onto the final slate. Due to there only being 6 places on the CLP section of the NEC, someone is always going to be left out, leading to a rather frustrating and drawn out negotiation period, which for these reasons, I am glad to have avoided!

Now in my opinion, all the candidates considered are more than worthy of being elected to the NEC, including Pete Willsman. During his time on the NEC he has been a refreshing voice of opposition to the failures of New Labour dogma.

The problem is, the nomination process for the NEC elections have already started, and if Pete can’t secure nomination then someone is going to have to replace him on the slate.

Both Susan Press and Peter Kenyon, failed to make the original slate, and if Pete can’t stand, then logic dictates one of them should replace him, in doing so maintaining the very purpose of the slate, in presenting a united, broad left choice of candidates in one of the most important internal Labour Party elections.

As Susan mentioned on her blog last week, she has already secured enough nominations to stand, so would be an obvious first choice to replace Pete if he can’t secure the required nominations. It is not currently clear, what Peter Kenyon’s intentions are, as far as Im aware he hasn’t secured nominations, at least if he has he’s been keeping it pretty quiet!

Either way, I think both would do good work, Peter has a proven track record of transparent, and member focused work on the NEC, and Susan (who is a friend and colleague of mine on the LRC National Committee) has a long history of committed service to the Labour Party, and indeed the broader movement. I feel fairly confident that most on the left would have no issue supporting either!

So, events regarding Comrade Willsman shall be followed closely in coming weeks, and in the meantime I would advise all who consider themselves a part of the “broad left” of the Labour Party, to start lobbying for the election of the other members of the Grassroot’s slate, all of which would be a welcome breath of fresh air, to the NEC’s proceedings.

Whilst having very little to do with my time today, I just sat and watched a charming little interview on BBC News about the need to cut public spending. The subject of the short piece was the Conservative leader of Nottinghamshire County Council, Kay Cutts (yes that is really her name!), who sat below a picture of Margaret Thatcher (you couldn’t make it up could you?), whilst trying to justify why its necessary to cut such frivolous programmes as the local village Library and elderly care services.

According to the wisdom of Cllr Cutts, the thing the majority of the public is most concerned about, is the “bloated Public Sector“. Yes of course it is Kay, that’s all anyone ever tells me on the doorstep. Obviously at a time when unemployment is still rife the one thing most people are waiting for government to do is send even more people to the jobcentre. Makes sense I suppose.

The problem here is that Councillor Cutts is confusing her own narrow ideological beliefs with the will of the public. I think if we probed a little deeper than the Nottinghamshire County Council chamber, we might just find that people are actually concerned about their

Some of the lovely pensioners Councillor Cutts is intent on punishing.

children’s schools, whether or not they’ll have a job at the end of the year, or whether they’ll be able to pay all the bills this month.

The idea that there is some massive consensus about cutting public spending is simply laughable, especially as seen as the majority of the electorate didn’t vote for the Party that put slashing the budget at the center of their manifesto. This is just another prime example of a politician (and I’m not hinting just at Tory ones here either!) that really isn’t in touch with any of the “real people“, outside her close group of political insiders.

Anyway, kudos to the BBC cameraman who made sure the picture of Thatcher remained in the frame during the interview. Combined with the interviewees’ name, it really did make an otherwiswe laborious few minutes of video quite enjoyable.

Just saw this press release through the Unison website, explaining how Mark Fox of the BSA (an organisation representing private sector firms that bid for public sector contracts) has emailed local authorities, informing them of provisions on budget policy to be announced in the upcoming emergency budget.

It’s nice to know that the government feels the need to brief people such as Mr Fox (who happens to be a former Private Secretary to William Hauge when he was leader of the Opposition), before they feel the need to brief the House of Commons, showing blatant disregard for Constitutional procedure.

I think it’s a nice first example of just how we should expect this government to function, a revolving door relationship with the business elite, many of whom just happen to be Conservative party supporters too. This shouldnt be a big surprise, these are the people the Conservative party exist to represent, they are simply doing what they have always done.

The real problem here is not just that Mark Fox has been privy to this information, but that he has seemingly been involved in discussions that have produced a policy which financially benefits the firms he represents, at the expense of the low paid workers they employ.

This is just another case of private enterprise influencing government decisions to protect their own narrow interests, in this instance to reduce costs of pension provision for the already low paid. Sadly I think this will be quite common throughout the reign of the ConDem government.

I often find myself agreeing with Jon Cruddas and his analysis of where Labour went wrong. I was greatly looking forward to his speech at the Compass conference, which sadly due to travel difficulties I didn’t make it to London for. Thankfully Alex has posted the text of his speech on LabourList for our viewing pleasure.

The whole thing is a pretty good read and I’d recommend it to all who are interested in the various strains of opinion currently held in the party. But one paragraph in particular caught my eye regarding the candidates for the party leadership.

“Sure, the four ex-Cabinet Ministers now running for the Labour leadership all agree that it’s time to bury New Labour.

Yet none has so far made a profound break with the assumptions and practices that defined it at the end.

Far be it from me to compare modern politicians to Soviet apparatchiks.

But we will not recover by adopting the mentality of Soviet Politburo in the late 1950s for whom reform meant little more than denouncing Stalin while keeping the policies and structures of Stalinism intact.”

Having being slightly annoyed by, what I’ve perceived to be blatant opportunism by more than one of the candidates and their denunciations of New Labour, this perfectly summed up that which I’ve being struggling to articulate.

For those of us who have spent some time making such criticisms, it has been quite reassuring to hear similar criticisms from the candidates. Their comments, weather opportunistic or not, confirm there is wide ranging opinion that certain dogmas within our party need to be addressed.

Now I’d like to think I’m not one for dismissing people purely on what they may have done in the past, though obviously it is an important factor. I’d like to be able to give all candidates the benefit of the doubt, a chance to convince me their opinions stem from conviction, and not from a desire to tap into widespread disillusionment in a vain attempt to grab votes.

The comparison to the post-Stalinist Soviet Union is a valid one. After Stalins death, Nikita Kruschev addressed the 20th Congress of the Communist Party with his analysis of the ills of Stalinism. He criticised the deterioration of democracy, the dogma that had thrived in the Stalin years and repeatedly stressed the original values of the Revolution. He knew there was an appetite for change and he used that to convince his Comrades that he was the man to lead them.

Sadly, Kruschev didn’t exactly act in the spirit of his words, the dogmas and contradictions of Stalinism were perpetuated for some time after he laid out his analysis on the state of the party.

There is an important lesson in political history to be learned here. When a political organisation loses touch with its values, it is vital for a proper analysis of its errors to be translated into consistent action. Moving past New Labour will require much more than crowd pleasing speeches that voice what most people were already thinking.

Of course, its difficult to predict how sincere politicians are being when they present us with their vision of the future, and we can never really be sure how serious they are until they are given the opportunity to put principles into practice. As Cruddas points out, we will see whether or not the succesful candidate is for real, when they are confronted with the choice of whether to transform, or maintain “the policies and structures” of the New Labour years.

In this respect, its important to note how much emphasis is placed on the role of individual figures in effecting change. Whilst a leader can play an important role in presenting the programme of their movement, we must stress the importance of its membership, firstly to develop this programme, and secondly to ensure it becomes a reality.

The current debate in the Labour party has so far been rather interesting and I suspect it shall remain so throughout. As we confront our errors as a party and formulate our response, we must consider how we will ensure this response comes to life, once our new leader is in place.

If we want to avoid the “thirty years of stagnation” as Cruddas calls it, of the post Stalinist years in Soviet Russia, then we must make sure that the criticisms of the last 13 years are more than just pre ballot soundbites.

Hopefully our candidates will learn the lessons of history and ensure we don’t repeat past mistakes. More importantly, I hope our activists learn those same lessons, and play their role in getting us back on the road to success.

Universities Minister David Willetts has angered students by claiming those studying towards a University degree are a “burden on the taxpayer”, a burden that apparently, “has to be tackled”. The comments were made in anticipation of a speech which intended to start laying out the Governments policy on University funding in more detail.

Now I knew some member of the new Government was bound to get my blood boiling over the issue of University education, I just didn’t expect it to come quite so quickly! During the speech Willett’s said that, “The so-called debt [students] have is more like an obligation to pay higher income tax.” Really? I think a lot of indebted students from families less well off than his own might disagree.

Since the formation of the coalition, higher education has been singled out by many as one of those issues that could cause the ConDem arrangement some bother. Seen as the Tory’s didn’t rule out removing the cap on tuition fees, and the Lib Dem’s pledged to do away with them altogether, any decisions are bound to be taken with extreme caution.

Both the Tories and Lib Dem’s claim they want to substantially increase the quality of higher education (they’re hardly going to say they want to make it worse are they?), claiming that social mobility will be central to any reforms. But Willett’s comments make me wonder, who do the Tories think benefit from Universities?

My first and most obvious assumption, is that they see higher education through the same individualistic prism which they view most areas of social policy. A belief that further education is a matter of the personal development of individuals, a necessary prequel to going making lots of money, and firmly outside the remit of a state which is unable, or unwilling to provide. After all, we can’t have all these bloody students burdening the taxpayer for no good reason now can we!? What do they think it is a charity?

The problem is, this kind of approach distorts the duties and benefits of University education in a fair society, not just for the student but for society overall.

I believe that education should be a right, one that society as a whole should guarantee. I don’t just believe this because I’m a lovely person who thinks the Government exists solely to distribute goodies to those who want them. A properly funded higher educational system is essential, not just for personal development, but also for the economy and the country in general.

If the British economy is to have any hope of performing sufficiently in coming years, then it is essential that the we have a highly trained workforce, with the skills that ensure we can achieve full employment in an ever-changing global economy.

Our Doctors, School Teachers, Pharmacists, Research Scientists, Accountants and Engineers need a strong Higher Educational system so that they can perform their variously important roles, and in doing so make a contribution towards society that warrants the investment of the state in the first place.

If we want to see a meritocracy flourish in Britain then it is essential that this right is recognised as such and granted to all, my worry about the current governments reforms being that they will do exactly the opposite.

Indeed the Minister’s comments seem to highlight a train of thought that, if continued, would lead to gross inequality in the delivery of education in Britain. His claim that students are simply burdens on the taxpayer without any recognition of the benefits their education bring to us all indicate that he’d rather be rid of the bother altogether.

Leftwing education activists have for some time argued that tuition fees have no place in an egalitarian education system, and although the last government was of no help in this regard, the current one seems to be going even further in the opposite direction. As Willets told his audience today having tuition fees is hardly perfect, because the Treasury has to lend students the money to pay it back again, which he referred to as “unsustainable”.

So now for us, the argument seems to naturally take a bizarre turn to the right, putting us lefties on the backfoot a bit. Before we were trying to justify why the state should fund our education for us, now it seems we’re going to be trying to justify why they should even bother lending us the money to pay for it ourselves! This is less Cameron’s “Big Society” and more Thatcher’s “No Society“.

The natural progression of this kind of thinking, if translated into policy, is a “everyone for themselves” mentality where only the rich can afford to pay for a decent, full education. If that became the case they could kiss goodbye to producing any kind of results on the social mobility front.

Besides this frightening glimpse of our new University Minister’s social philosophy and the Coalitions decision to reduce the number of new University places by 10,000, there is still a lot to learn about what exactly the Government plans to do with our Universities, but if what I’ve seen so far is anything to go by, it isn’t going to be good. Students need to be ready for any attacks on their education, and if recent resistance to educational cuts is anything to go by, they will be doing exactly that!