As 2021 draws to a close, the situation facing the Labour Party can be regarded more positively. The government have suffered immense damage to their credibility and Covid-19 strategy over accusations of numerous Christmas parties in 2020. Boris Johnson’s status as an election winning machine has been called into question with the Liberal Democrats taking North Shropshire in a controversial by-election. The party have also managed to claw ahead in opinion polls following the government’s waning vaccine bounce.
However, Sir Keir Starmer can be far from optimistic and complacent about his chances of becoming the next Prime Minister. From a purely electoral perspective, the challenge facing Labour is utterly immense. Even to get the government in Hung Parliament territory would require an immense swing. After all, it is most difficult to change your party allegiance the first time round. Second time onwards, not so much. Given Labour is, by and large, a party whose main strength is losing general elections, it can become tempting to look back nostalgically to when they have won. Opponents of the Conservatives regret the short times Labour has enjoyed power, highlighting the immense change they apparently can offer in government. Indeed, one of the many criticisms Jeremy Corbyn was subject to was an inability to sufficiently praise the New Labour government. Not from me. Keir Starmer’s critics from the left have been irritated partially by the number of new shadow cabinet ministers favourable to the New Labour agenda. Whether it’s Yvette Cooper or Pat McFadden or looking to former New Labour advisers, I’m getting a sense Keir Starmer feels an immense reliance on where Labour has won before. He is nostalgic for a time where Labour were triumphant in elections. Lord Adonis - someone I believe could be part of a fascinating discussion on transport policy - repeatedly called for the return of Tony Blair to Labour leader. It is clear, given the number of interventions Blair makes, he now feels, politically and intellectually, at his most capable to serve as Prime Minister. Given leaders like Gladstone were in charge long into their 80s, Blair, in an ideal world, would I’m sure love to return. His self imposed exile after leaving Downing Street taught him an immense amount about foreign policy. However, whatever his flaws, even Blair has enough self awareness to recognise that just isn’t going to feasibly happen. And nor should we want it to. For, despite its repeated electoral success, there remain numerous ways in which the New Labour government should be criticised. Its success among voters compared to what has come afterwards has, in recent years, led to an almost silencing of criticism of this government. Where criticism does arise, it often falls into two camps: Iraq and Spin. In this blog, I intend to outline how the New Labour administration can be analysed and criticised beyond those two factors. It is not to diminish their importance. The Iraq war can and must always be a part of New Labour’s legacy. But the arguments against intervention (I have little time for those who genuinely believe Blair was a war criminal) are well documented elsewhere. The criticism of Iraq almost exclusively compared to any other policies, frankly, lets Blair and Brown off the hook. With regards to spin, seeking to frame the news agenda and policies in a light that is beneficial to the reputation of your government is something done by every government. There have been and always will be spin doctors designed for this very purpose. Alistair Campbell, now a prolific tweeter, was just the most notable of them, partially because of his immense focus on strategy and ruthless media communications. Furthermore, the rise of social media and 24 hour news under New Labour can mean the unique way in which this government is regarded as furthering spin can be, at best, deeply exaggerated. So I wish to put forward a blueprint: to highlight ways in which New Labour can most definitely be criticised beyond those two factors. This article should be seen just as much for Labour supporters as it is for their opponents. Only by learning what you have done wrong in government can you seek to implement more effective decisions next time. The narrowing of criticism to Iraq and Spin beyond all else is both ahistorical and negates other failings which that government most definitely undertook. Before my criticisms: a note. One common misconception often given by Tony Blair’s critics is that he was a Tory in disguise. I don’t believe it for a second. Blair was, on the whole, socially liberal in policy: repealing Section 28, backing same sex adoption and wishing to further equality. These positions were not popular in the Tory party at the same. Similarly, Blair’s own father was a Conservative. He had ample time to decide the Conservative party was for him if it had been. That he didn’t join suggests a radical spirit he felt the Conservatives would prevent. Indeed, the legal profession, in which Blair initially trained, likely contained numerous Tories. There was plenty of opportunity, if Blair had really been a Tory, to join the Conservative party. New Labour as a political project can fundamentally be regarded as a movement that distrusted the public. This was evident both in its campaigning and governance. It was forged out of a desperation to understand why voters had repeatedly rejected Labour, seeking to move towards a position that could please them. In reality, the party’s changes were far less radical. Some statements on recognising the good of businesses and fiscal constraints, messages on taking Britain forward (which government doesn’t want that?) But ultimately New Labour was not such a deviation from Old Labour. Its campaigning was a form of deception. In government, this distrust and management of voters was evident in piece after piece of legislation. Mainly introduced in the government’s ‘war on terror’, which occurred just as much domestically as it did overseas, it massively curved individual civil liberties in our daily lives and our relationship with the law. From the massive extension of CCTV to extended detention without trial, double jeopardy to ASBOs, the New Labour government was an inherently more authoritarian, surveillance culture state. Far too often, individuals were having to prove themselves innocent rather than be presumed innocent. The extension over the lives of individuals advanced into an attempt to manage the politics of individual behaviour. Citizens sought to be nudged into making the best decisions in their lives. Though I support the Smoking Ban, not least because of the impact of smoking on others, New Labour were far too willing to micromanage the actions individuals took. One can’t help but wonder whether this was because of a loss of faith in believing the political system could be used as a tool of wider, long term change. The disregard for voters therefore perfects loops up with my second criticism of New Labour: the prioritisation of depoliticising and outsourcing explicitly political decisions. QUANGOs (Quasi Autonomous Non-Governmental Organisations) can always be regarded with an air of criticism, where governments seek to outsource political decisions to a separate body while retaining a degree of control. As FullFact showed, under New Labour, the cost of QUANGOs increased from £18.6 billion in 1997 to £38.4 billion in 2009. While some of that can be placed down to inflation, the cost would suggest an ideological attachment to managerialism through the creation of government bodies, rather than a vision framing the country. Do not forget, New Labour were always terrified about being thrown out of power again. Given many of its key architects had found their political origins in Labour’s long spell in opposition, it is understandable that its leaders were so desperate to hold onto power. What this meant however, is that every policy, speech or vision had to serve a purpose. That purpose was often ill-defined, changing and again sought an ideological hollowing out of any vision. Take art and culture. New Labour’s approach towards the creative industries dramatically altered from seeking to make the arts accessible to all - demonstrated through free museum entry - to focusing on an instrumental approach that required a specific economic purpose. Naturally, this would mean the funding allocated to the creative industries would be far more limited and specific. This instrumentalist ideologically was sadly just as reflected in education. I am a supporter of exams and tests, believing they can be a valuable instrument for determining what a pupil has or hasn’t been able to grasp. However, the near obsession with tests under New Labour meant that critical thinking became far tricker as a test was prioritised over a depth of wider knowledge. This instrumental approach towards learning meant that, while spending may have increased, the quality of knowledge available in the classroom was weakened. Instrumentalism was prioritised over a celebration of knowledge for its own sake. The terms ‘radical’ and ‘moderate’ are easy labels applied in modern politics which can sometimes lack concrete definitions. Ultimately, there are subjective terms dependent on where one stands on the political spectrum. For this article, I will define a radical policy under New Labour as one that sought to change the status quo, while a moderate policy was no departure and just tinkered with the edges. In example after example, New Labour behaved in a radical way, when they should have acted with moderation. For example, the widespread expansion of devolution - only controlled when North Eastern voters rejected their own Assembly - did not mitigate the prospect of Scottish independence but only furthered it. In banning new grammar schools outright, the government ensured selection by wealth and house price became a dominant part of our education system. By removing law lords and creating the Supreme Court, the UK government hugely Americanised the political system with no proper consultation. Indeed, there are two radical decisions the New Labour government took, both of which are now widely praised but, I believe, deserve more criticism. One of Gordon Brown’s first decisions as Chancellor was to give control over interest rates to the Bank of England. Widely praised for depoliticising an economic area, that is precisely what was wrong with the decision. Economic decisions are political and Brown’s move only represented taking this away from democratically elected policy makers. Alongside this, the Good Friday (or Belfast) Agreement contained within it a clause that certain Irish terrorists would be freed. How this can be regarded as acceptable I do not know. I support an amnesty for neither side, believing that prosecution should take place against British forces and Irish terrorists, regardless of what side there were on. As the violence in 2021 has shown, this agreement was not a long lasting solution for peace. Where New Labour also failed was acting in far too moderate a manner when they could have been so much more radical. This is a common criticism of their governments, not least given the huge majorities the party enjoyed. Whether it’s on the House of Lords (abolish the chamber entirely), focusing far too often on education and health funding over structural changes or failing to make a proper argument in defence of the EU, I’m sure Tony Blair looks back and recognises his government could have delivered so much more. How will the New Labour government be judged? Clearly, there were positive elements. But the government, which in essence, was the Blair and Brown government, often involved the sidelining of potential future talent. Naturally, that approach prioritising centralisation can clearly be seen as a weakness, not least when Gordon Brown was not seen as a truly capable Prime Minister. To focus in Iraq in its entirety as a sole criticism of their government lets New Labour off the hook. Policy after policy, alongside a grand vision, did not benefit the UK. It is an indictment on their government and one that deserves far more attention.
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