zhisou (a blog)

Labour are shockingly shit at picking leaders.

Being a party leader is three jobs in one. First, you have to lead the party; then you have to lead the opposition and challenge the government, appearing like a Prime Minister in waiting; and third you have to lead the government and be a world statesman, actually be a Prime Minister. These are three very different things.

Neil Kinnock was probably the best party leader Labour have ever had. He transformed Labour from the shattered mess of 1983 – a party that polled just a smidge over 27% and was toying with a Tony Benn leadership – to near victory in 1992. This was an astonishing accomplishment, only failing to win the 92 election because he failed as leader of the opposition. He never convinced the country that he was a Prime Minister-in-waiting and failed far too often to hold the Thatcher and Major governments to account. This meant we never got to see how much a real PM he’d have been, I suspect quite an effective one. Unfortunately once Major had replaced Thatcher, and the 90s had replaced the 80s, Kinnock looked as old-fashioned as an episode of Swap Shop. The country wanted John Smith.

Tony Blair was probably the most effective leader of the opposition in history. He completely dominated parliament during John Major’s latter years and his 1997 victory felt as certain and inevitable as any election I can remember. Major looked tired and incompetent, Blair bright, clever and energetic. He was unstoppable and caught perfectly the mood of the nation. He was a rubbish party leader though, large parts of Labour couldn’t stand him and didn’t believe in his policies. He ploughed on anyway, never bringing the party with him, surviving on electoral success partly achieved by positioning himself against his party. He failed to build a next generation, which meant they stumbled blindly on with the highly unsuitable Gordon Brown for lack of serious alternatives. This led to the 2010 meltdown, getting only 29% in the election, second only in rubbishness to the 1983 nadir.

Even as a Prime Minister, whilst certainly not a bad PM (Major, Brown etc), he greatly under-achieved given he had 10 years, landslide victories, a sustained economic boom and dominated the political scene.

One has to go back to Clement Attlee to find a really effective Labour PM in terms of achievement. The ambition of the 1945 Labour government was breathtaking, and their achievements equally staggering. They made mistakes, could have done a lot more, and eventually lost timidly in 1951 (although did get more votes than Churchill’s Tories who won more seats), but Attlee was undoubtedly a successful and convincing PM.

So, since “Lucky” Jim Callaghan, a Tony-Blair-like well-respected dominant figure who was unloved by his party, through the lovable and lovely, but entirely ineffective, Michael Foot, to the brilliant party leader Kinnock who entirely failed to convince the public he was PM material, to John Smith, someone who was shaping up to be both a mediocre party leader and mediocre leader of the opposition when he his career was tragically cut short by his death.

Four leaders spanning nearly 20 years and not a single election victory.

Tony Blair won the leadership because the Labour Party realised that you need to elect someone electable if you want to get elected. This obviously worked, but it’s an exception by Labour Party standards and left many wondering what was the point of being in government if you were not governing as a Labour Party anyway (unfair criticism in my opinion). Picking leaders for “electability” is a dangerous game, it’s like picking someone you think everyone else will like but you don’t really like them yourself – see Mitt Romney, John Kerry etc. for examples.

So why did Brown then get the job? There were not many alternatives: John Reid, Alan Johnson, David Miliband, maybe even Charles Clarke … some people even (wrongly) mentioned Jack Straw. Mostly either too old, too young or too rubbish. Mainly he got it because it was his turn. That’s no way to run a party.

That said, Brown was not as bad as people remember. He was initially very impressive, leapt ahead in the polls, looked the part and sounded confident and capable. Then it all went wrong and everything that was wrong with Brown dominated the next three years apart from when he saved the world from economic collapse. He just couldn’t turn it round and got worse and worse. Labour stuck with him, bless them.

So, we get to 2010. Following that short shambolic period of government and election disaster, Labour actually had several very able options open for the next generation: not just the five who stood (I would question whether Diane Abbot falls into the category of potential leader), but also other who didn’t like Douglas Alexander, Alan Johnson, Hilary Benn, Sadiq Khan and the person who I hope becomes the next leader, Yvette Cooper.

They choose Ed Miliband.

First, let’s get past this nonsense about him being ruthless and standing against his own brother. He wasn’t actually the only candidate standing against his own brother, David Miliband also stood against his own brother. I don’t see that Ed was any more to blame in this than David, if blame is even relevant. Being older doesn’t make you superior. If they couldn’t work it out between them, like the Balls/Cooper household did, then that’s the fault of both brothers not just Ed, and why shouldn’t they stand and let the party decide rather than cook up a deal between them, Granita-style. That way doesn’t always work out either.

Second, David was another Blair. Capable and all that, clearly much more PM-material than Ed (at least in 2010) but unloved by his party as someone too far to the right. Ed, a Gordon Brown man, was seen as more ideologically attuned and was adept at playing that card, cleverly becoming the only feasible not-David-Miliband candidate. Had he not stood, I don’t see Burnham, Balls or Abbot being able to bring together the same coalition and I guess David M would have won.

I have got over this. I supported David Miliband because I thought he was good Foreign Secretary, is PM material and went to the same school as I did, briefly – although not at the same time as I.

Since Ed’s election, Labour have barely put a foot right. His initial shadow cabinet selection was laughably shit. Putting Johnson as Shadow Chancellor was weak and incompetent, it had to be Balls or Cooper (I’d have picked Cooper and put Balls at Business to take on banks and university fees). Then shoving Balls as shadowing the Home Office made about as much sense as giving Cooper the Foreign Office. The two most talented people in the shadow cabinet in the wrong jobs, looking absurdly ill at ease and seeing their talents wasted.

Since then, Ed has failed entirely in PMQs, trying to be something he isn’t. The pithy one-liners someone else wrote read from a script at best sound like pithy one-liners someone else wrote read from a script. More usually they just sound a bit crap. He should focus on the big picture and the policy, areas where he shines. He should build a long-term narrative that shows off his qualities not a short-term tactic that plays to his weaknesses.

On vision he’s actually doing quite well, but because he’s failing to lead both the opposition and the party, he sounds like a reedy little kid shouting on his own. The rest of them should be lined up echoing his themes, exploring the ideas and painting in the colours in their departments. When he talks about a moral capitalism this does make sense, it is what people want to hear, but then why aren’t we hearing from Burnham, say, on what this means in health, or the invisible Khan about how this applies to justice.

(I don’t expect anyone’s read this far, if you have type the secret keyword “handlebar” in the comments section so I know at least someone did).

The other big failure is how Labour have allowed the Tories to paint the financial and economic collapse as a Labour problem. This is clever, a failure of capitalism and a greedy deregulated financial sector is painted as a failure of social democracy with a neo-liberal solution. What? I would love to hear them explain how Labour’s decision to fund health and education in the UK led to the collapse of Lehman Brothers?

It’s a pity. Ed Miliband, like William Hague was for the Tories, is a brainbox bright young thing and a real talent for the party and the country, but that doesn’t mean he’s the right man to lead them, but now nor is David, his moment has gone, he probably should have challenged Brown in 2009. The right man to lead Labour now is Yvette Cooper.