Political Narrative Battlegrounds for 2015 (the May 2012 Crystal Ball)

It's obviously far too early to be predicting the narrative battlegrounds on which the expected 2015 general election will be fought. So here goes...!

I think it's plausible that both the Coalition parties will have a similar top-level narrative:

The economy is on the right path again, but the task is not finished.

The country was in a terrible state five years ago. Britain was being dragged down by a dreadful deficit. The banks had got away with massive profligacy because of an unhealthy bonus culture. There was no money left to secure the future of our vital public services.

So when we took charge, we stopped the rot of Labour overspending, we clamped down on the banks, and we reduced taxes for hard-working people. Tackling the deficit needed tough, unpopular decisions. The country would be far worse off if we hadn't taken those  decisions.

Now, we need to finish the job. Get Britain working again. Use the solid foundations we have put in place to build a strong and lasting prosperity. Labour would put the recovery at risk. But we can make Britain the envy of the world once again.

Labour, of course, will be saying the opposite:

This incompetent government has unnecessarily damaged Britain's public services and created mass unemployment; if you let them get back in, they will slash-and-burn all that we hold dear.

Five years ago, the world was faced with an unprecedented international economic crisis, caused by bankers who only cared about their bonuses. But the Labour Government led the way in preventing a global meltdown, and put Britain on the path to recovery.

But this Tory-led government dealt with the world economic crisis in the worst possible way. It cut spending too far, too fast. It created an entirely unnecessary double-dip recession. Britain would have recovered years ago, if it hadn't been for this mismanagement. The Tories cut taxes for their rich cronies, while the rest of the country suffered unemployment and cuts to schools, hospitals and other public services. Trebling tuition fees. The Granny Tax. The Pasty Tax. Picking on the disabled. Privatising the NHS. The Liberals were complicit in all this.

Now, what about the next five years? The Tories don't believe in public services. They want to cut and cut until there's nothing left. Don't let them finish the job.

This is over-simplifying things a bit, but then political narratives need to be simple.

But come down a level of abstraction, and the narratives are murkier at this stage in the parliament.

Conservatives

The Conservative Party is torn between, on the one hand, traditional fiscal prudence (reducing government over-spending, and slightly increasing taxes to pay off debt); and, on the other hand, free-market libertarianism that says that a radical pruning of the state can set wealth creators free and thus benefit everyone. Critics say that belt tightening can slide into stagnation and diminished public services. Meanwhile, radical pruning is a gamble that might result in mass unemployment and inadequate safety nets for the most vulnerable.

It could change, but currently the prudence chaps dominate the pruning brigade.

The likely Conservative narratives, one level down, would therefore be along the lines of:

After the turmoil of the Labour years, the firm grip of the Conservative-led Government was absolutely the right thing for the country. Now we need stability and steady growth. We need to nurture the recovery; we mustn't imperil it again with Labour's wild spending.

We've put the economy on a firm footing, so now it's time for us to sort out other socialist legacies: Fight back against the EU's invasion into our affairs. End profligate subsidies for inefficient energy generation. Reduce taxes on enterprise and hard work. Cut bureaucracy in social services. Allow museums and hospitals to charge foreign visitors. Renew Trident. Fund our armed forces properly. Give schools back the right to select pupils... etc. etc.

Labour

Meanwhile Labour is torn between, on the one hand, the New Labour vision that public services deliver targets best when they are given as much freedom as possible from state regulation and are funded by partnerships with the private sector; and, on the other hand, the socialist ideal of the state looking after everyone in society, and spending money to keep the economy going. But critics say that New Labourism helped to create a situation in which irresponsible banks plunged the country into economic crisis; and in which hospitals and schools ended up lacking democratic accountability for their decisions. And the socialist ideal can easily slip, they say, into spending beyond our means and into weakening enterprise by sucking more and more of the nation's wealth into central government.

It's not clear to me how this tussle between New Labourism and neo-socialism will play out. Ed Balls was thoroughly implicated in New Labourism but Ed Miliband is (probably rightly) keeping his policy options open for now. My guess is that nearer the election there will be some kind of public catharsis: "It was Gordon Brown who wanted PFI. And the CBI was pushing for less regulation. We've learned from those mistakes."

It will be tempting, I think, to just stay on the attack:

Inhumane cuts. Ideological economics. Out of touch. Incompetent. etc. etc.

But journalists will press for firm plans, and the public don't like politicians who are resolutely negative without getting into detail about how they would do things differently. So a possible positive Labour narrative, one level down, would be:

We need government to offer alternative models to uncaring capitalism: Address our housing crisis using cooperative and mutual models. Give tax breaks to businesses that fund apprenticeships. Give energy consumers, hospital patients and parents the power to call managers to account. etc. etc.

Liberal Democrats

The LibDems have a number of narratives that don't offer alternative futures to each other, but compete for attention. For example, one narrative is about being in coalition in the first place:

The national interest demanded we help repair the economy while doing our damnedest to protect public services. We sacrificed our popularity to help the country overcome Labour's economic crisis.

A parallel narrative is a defence of the things the Conservatives were able to do because the LibDems weren't sitting on the Opposition benches:

Would you have wanted an unfettered Conservative Government? Or right-wing Conservatives in league with the New Labour zealots who got us into this mess? We helped tame the worst excesses of the Right, although you have to box clever when your Coalition partner is five times the size of you.

There's an obvious risk of a LibDem general election campaign consisting entirely of re-runs of the arguments about tuition fees, the Welfare Reform Act, the Health and Social Care Act, the so-called Granny Tax, etc.: the arguments that failed to convince the first time round.

Another narrative is:

Look at all the liberal stuff we managed to deliver, despite our under-representation in Parliament: shifting taxes from low and middle earners to the richest; getting extra money to schools to help poorer children; creating more new apprenticeships than Britain has ever had before; creating the world's first Green Investment Bank; restoring the link between pensions and earnings; setting up proper regulation of the banks; restoring many of the civil liberties thrown away by Labour; increasing social housing for the first time in 30 years; halting Labour's post office closures; and so on.

Unfortunately lists don't make for great narratives. It's also not easy to explain concisely what makes this good stuff "liberal" in the same way that Conservatives and Labour stances are easily grasped.

All of these LibDem narratives are also too rooted in the past: they don't impel you through to an obvious LibDem future. I'm sure the manifesto will be packed full of good ideas, costed and crafted as usual. But, again as usual, it will somehow lack a coherent narrative to string it together. Some random slogan combining "free", "fair" and "opportunity" won't cut it.

Another problem with these LibDem narratives is that they don't offer congruencies with both possible future coalition partners.

An alternative plan might be to piggy-back on a less antagonistic version of the first half of the Conservatives' message...

After the turmoil of the economic crisis, it was absolutely right for the Conservatives and LibDems to come together for the good of the country. Now we need stability and steady growth. We need to nurture the recovery.

... and then build a distinctively LibDem narrative:

We've got the economy under control, but what's to stop the crisis happening again? If big business is unaccountable to its employees, customers and shareholders, it will simply repeat the same risky behaviour. Meanwhile, if public services and quangos are unaccountable to the people they are supposed to serve, their spending of your taxes will again rocket out of control. We need to encourage  democratic principles and innovative models of mutualism and cooperatives, and not just unconvincing "consultations". We need to navigate a narrow path between cold hard capitalism on one side, and overweight statism on the other.

And we also need to make central government more accountable by devolving more powers to our cities and counties to kickstart local economies, to sort out endemic housing issues, to take advantage of green opportunities, to support your hospitals and schools...

And most importantly, if we don't take greater action on climate change fast, the global economy will be threatened by a crisis that will make the last few years pale into insignificance. We need a massive programme to build more renewable energy capacity; to increase home insulation; to encourage businesses that tackle their carbon pollution responsibly; and to enhance the Green Investment Bank. These measures will help prevent climate change wrecking our economy, but they will also help stimulate our industry and create jobs right now.

Concluding remarks

Crystal ball gazing is a notoriously unreliable practice in politics. And I have a lousy reputation for accuracy. But although the details may change rapidly, I suspect that many of the overriding concerns of Conservatives, Labour folk and LibDems are quite slow to change.

Narratives need to capture those concerns, to fix in voters' minds afresh what these parties stand for.

And narrative building takes years.

Acknowledgements

• The three battle pictures [1, 2, 3] are by Flickr user Dave Pearson, and are CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.
• The cats were adapted by me from Microsoft Clip Art [license terms]

The LibDem local election campaign was not LibDem, local or a campaign

NB I wrote this post a month ago, but decided not to publish it before the local elections, to avoid undermining candidates.

What are the LibDems campaigning for in the local elections?

The party website highlights the following key points...

• A £3.5bn tax cut for working people
• Biggest single ever uplift in tax threshold
• 21 million people getting an extra £220 tax cut

Are these three different things or different facets of the same thing? Not sure. Either way, they're not a campaign.

OK, maybe the party website is still trying to promote the Budget rather than looking ahead to the local elections.

So let's turn to Andrew Stunell MP, Communities Minister and Chair of the Liberal Democrats Local Election Campaign Team.

Andrew tells us that the Liberal Democrat local election campaign has already launched. Oh well.

According to Andrew, the big messages are:

1. Your local record of service

"all year round, not just at election time. Lib Dem councillors across the country work hard for local people. We listen to our communities and try to give them a voice in decisions made that affect them. In power we work to protect the services people most value, and to protect the most vulnerable in society."

2. Putting more money back in the pockets of hardworking people

"On the local front, this year every single Lib Dem-run council has frozen their council tax bills... Nationally, from this Friday, Liberal Democrats will deliver another £130 income tax cut to every basic rate taxpayer. That's 25 million people getting a tax cut and 1 million people lifted out of paying Income Tax altogether thanks to us. ... The second year of record rises to Pensions, with pensioners set to benefit from a rise of £5.30 a week this year, on top of the £4.50 rise last year."

3. Making the rich pay

Including increased capital gains tax, an annual banker’s levy, VAT on private jets, caps on tax reliefs and an extra £900m to tackle tax evasion.

4. The Pupil Premium

An extra £1.25bn, targeted at the most disadvantaged pupils.

5. Encouraging employment

"We’re creating jobs, and supporting young people in the difficult path back into work by driving a record expansion of apprenticeships to over half a million, and the Youth Contract, announced yesterday, designed to get over 400,000 young people earning or learning."

6. Giving power to communities

"... we’re giving real power and control back to local areas, particularly over planning... Planning is set to become a bottom-up community-driven process, not the top-down imposition it’s been for far too long."

What's wrong with that?

(i) It's not a campaign

So this, all of this, is about actions that have already been taken or that are already underway. There's no sense of actually campaigning to do something.

Maybe that's not entirely fair: More of this kind of thing is implicitly the pitch. But it's very implicit.

And, again to be fair, there is an invitation:

"Lib Dems across the country should be getting out on the doorstep and canvassing their communities to see what they want in their local plan. What kind of development do they want to see and where? It’s a huge campaigning opportunity for the party, and is just the kind of 'community politics' we’ve championed for decades."

But asking people on the doorstop what they want is not much use in this election if you're not explicitly proposing to do it. Or proposing anything.

This is not a campaign.


(ii) It's not about local issues

The first message is effectively "Fill in your local stuff here". The rest of the messages are entirely about things the Government has done: the Budget, the Pupil Premium, the Youth Contract, the Localism Act. There's nothing about what councils want to do in relation to social housing, energy efficiency, energy generation, recycling, transport, education, health, fire, police...

To be fair, it's often been remarked that maybe the concept of a "national" local campaign doesn't make sense. The whole point of localism is that different areas need different things, and it shouldn't be up to a central authority to dictate what those things are. Far from being a single national campaign, this is 184 separate local campaigns. In which case, a key point to get across is exactly what it is that makes Liberal Democrat councils distinctive. And that's the third big failing.


(iii) There's no Liberal Democrat narrative

Let's look at the overarching message for these elections: effectively We've done good stuff.

In relation to "your local record of service", I'm unconvinced that Liberal Democrat councillors are automatically harder working or wiser than other councillors; and I'm sure all candidates say they care about protecting the vulnerable. But I do think that giving people "a voice in decisions made that affect them" is a distinctive aspect of Liberal Democrat philosophy.

And nationally, I happen to agree that it is good stuff, although even that is being questioned by respected organisations such the IFS. And let's leave aside for the moment the desperate need for an explicit liberal narrative linking all this good stuff together.

But shouting about good stuff that's happened can trigger people to recall the bad stuff (the voters' cost-benefit calculation). They will be prompted by Labour to remember...

• tuition fees (not just breaking a promise but breaking a promise to end broken promises);
• the new sickness benefit tests and the Welfare Reform Bill (appearing to penalise the vulnerable)
• the Health and Social Care Bill (appearing to muck up the NHS)
• the alleged Granny Tax, Pasty Tax, and Tory tax cuts for the richest

So how does the "campaign" deal with these claims? It doesn't. And, after all, you wouldn't expect politicians to emphasise opponents' talking points. But Tories have a powerful narrative that explains these actions (Cutting a bloated state and encouraging private enterprise). Liberal Democrats at best would be offering a response along the lines of It's not as bad as it would be if we weren't in Government and There are some good things in these measures and The bad things aren't as bad as Labour says. There's no powerful counter-narrative.

As an aside, I'd also question how likely it is that on-the-ground activists will be passionately motivated to celebrate the good stuff, when memories are still raw about...

• the dismal AV campaign (ending chances of electoral reform for a generation);
• the ludicrously poorly thought-out and explained Welfare Reform Bill;
• the universally acknowledged turd-fest that was the passage of the Health and Social Care Bill;
• and now the way in which the leadership seemed cluelessly oblivious to how the Government's surveillance proposals ran completely counter to fundamental Liberal Democrat principles.

(iv) It's counter to the key narrative of the Coalition

More even than not being a campaign, not being about local councils and not having a Liberal Democrat narrative, though, the message being pumped out now by every LibDem politician, activist, website and leaflet is essentially: Unless you're rich, we're giving you more money.

What the arsing hell does this You've never had it so good complacency do to the core justification for being in the Coalition in the first place? The key narrative is that Liberal Democrats accepted the offer of coalition so as to sort out the national economic crisis. Nowhere, NOWHERE, in any of this local messaging is it clearly explained why giving people more money helps this core mission of the Coalition.

I can imagine a number of ways in which this is the case, but I'll be damned if I can find it given equal prominence with all the "putting more money back in the pockets of hardworking people" messages.

So, to sum up...

(i) It's not a campaign.

(ii) It's not about local issues.

(iii) It doesn't have a LibDem narrative.

(iv) It serves to undermine the rationale for LibDems being in government in the first place.

Please feel free to tell me it's actually a brilliant LibDem local election campaign.

Lon Won's Evil Liberal Masterplan

Tackling the problem of the deficit is causing much misery. And regardless of the Chancellor's apparent optimism in last week's Budget about unemployment and growth, the signs are that things are likely to get much worse before they get better.

I believe there's a liberal idea that might help.

What's grinding your gears?

The basic idea is to give local government more autonomy to decide what services it wishes to provide, what mechanisms will provide them, and what taxes will fund them. These powers would then be balanced by a right for local voters to use petitions to trigger binding local referenda.

Note: Some of what's envisaged is already possible, and a shift in power from central government to local authorities is the major theme of the Localism Act 2011. But to keep the discussion simple I'm just going to focus here on the principles rather than these details, because I think that even after the Act we might be left with a mixture of different types of localism that are inadequately accountable to citizens. Note also that I'm mostly talking about England here. Similar considerations might apply to Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland, but drawing the Scottish Government, the Welsh Government, and the Northern Ireland Executive into this blogpost would complicate the points being made about the balance between "central" and "local" government.

More costs, more uncertainty, more chaos?

It's not a glamorous idea, and at first glance it sounds like one of those "It'll cost lots of money; the gains are uncertain; and chaos is guaranteed" type of ideas. At times it's almost as if we revel in such ideas in this country.

But actually there needn't be any costs at all: councils could choose to do just the same as they do now. Or they could make different choices about services to provide.

This might mean losing economies of scale from doing some things nationally (e.g. in relation to roads, health, income tax, or benefits); so councils would need to convince voters about the financial implications of proposals. Perhaps there might be efficiencies from cooperation between councils that want to do similar things. Or perhaps a council might choose to award a contract to a local firm in order to save jobs that would otherwise incur redundancy and unemployment costs. Or perhaps a council might take a chance on a new technology or method in a way that central government couldn't.

It might be sensible for councils to jointly fund some kind of contract advisory service, to help councils build on proven contracts. It would also be very sensible to pay for a longitudinal research study following the progress of a range of these local government innovations. But it would be up to individual councils to choose to invest in such things.

It's true that the gains are uncertain; but at a time when national economic stagnation looks like the most optimistic future for the next few years, liberalising state services encourages the opening up of new possibilities. Rather than so many of us whining about "The Government" is doing or not doing, councils could actually put new ideas to the test.

It's also true that there might be a little bit more chaos than we're used to, but surely such liberalisation is better than the monolithic control freakery that has taken root in our state since the Second World War? And liberalisation isn't all or nothing: it's possible to have a bit more localism without the country necessarily descending into some kind of Yugoslavian-style civil catastrophe.

No, the more profound objections to this proposal are not to do with costs, uncertainty or chaos. These objections appear once the rationale for the proposal is made clear.

Rationale
What's good for London isn't necessarily good for the Lake District. Giving councils greater power over what they do for a locality enables them to weigh up the pros and cons of what has been done nationally, to innovate, to test, to refine, and to be judged by the voters on their success.

Pleasant land
and satanic mills

1. Empowering local engines for growth: It's clear that economic growth is needed to avoid worsening economic misery. The UK Government is focused on stopping the deficit increasing, but different parts of the country should be able to take advantage of their own particular local strengths to encourage growth. More autonomous decision-making enables this.

2. Enabling different local priorities: Councils focus on the problems that particularly matter in their area. Everybody everywhere wants to fight crime, help the sick, educate the next generation, and so on; but maybe Devon wants to put more resources into helping the elderly, Southwark into tackling knife crime. Priorities differ. More autonomy allows for more flexibility over rebalancing of resources, in the light of local knowledge about what needs attention over time. Devolution of certain powers to Wales and Scotland has been a great success, and no-one wants to return to the previous over-centralised system. Local people should be able to decide on their priorities for schools, hospitals, police, post offices and so on, within a freer national framework.

3. Taking account of different local conditions: Let's stop pretending that conditions are the same everywhere. Why should teachers in Toxteth get paid the same as teachers in Tatterford? The ability to attract staff with the appropriate skill set, the cost of living, the demands made and so on are quite different. We know that housing benefits, disability support, water costs, VAT receipts, fuel costs, and the like differ depending on local conditions; so why not put councils in charge of how to raise and allocate local resources?

Petitions don't have to be signed using quills

4. Fostering postcode democracy: Much is made of a "postcode lottery". What about postcode democracy? It is mad for Westminster and Whitehall to be trying to micro-manage great cities like Birmingham and Manchester, and counties like Kent and Yorkshire. Meanwhile, the lines of local accountability for organizations such as Academy Schools, Foundation Hospitals, Serco, Virgin, May Gurney and so on sometimes seem unclear. It should be the people's locally elected representatives who call such organizations to account in relation to local work, and there should be mechanisms for action to be taken. Simpler lines of accountability lead to better control of costs. Local referenda are also an important brake on potentially disastrous plans that councils might choose to implement between elections.

5. Winning local buy-in for developments: Planning processes are often seen as Byzantine, and weighted in favour of developers, who get multiple bites of the cherry, who only need to obtain approval once (even when circumstances change or have been misrepresented), and who can get away with tokenistic contributions to the community. More autonomy would allow councils to set conditions on developments, such as a proportion of receipts, a tax on subsequent sales, or inspections. There might be referenda to choose between (say) a wind array on the horizon, a nuclear power station on the beach, or imported energy.

Oh I do like to be beside the seaside

Teletubby turbines

6. Tackling climate change: Following on from the previous point, climate change is a critical issue for this proposal. Obviously many kinds of concerted initiatives to deal with climate change need to take place at national and international level; but many aspects of energy generation, energy efficiency, mitigation and adaptation need considered decision-making at local level. Citizens need to be able to experience both the benefits and costs of their decisions locally, or we will continue blithely down the path towards environmental calamity.

7. Enabling innovation and piloting: Liberalising local government does not necessitate either Thatcherite union-bashing corporatism on the one hand, or profligate PC jobsworth totalitarianism on the other. Councils would be free to pursue their own preferred ways of delivering particular services, whether that's in-house, contracts with companies, or in conjunction with other organisations. Freedom to innovate is motivating. It is disgraceful that poorly thought-out legislation such as the Health and Social Care Act get imposed nationwide with proper rounds of piloting and evaluation. More autonomy allows ideas to be put to the test. Of course it's true that councils might choose to go for the monorail rather than more frequent buses; they might choose to build the casino rather than the theatre; the nuclear power station rather than the wind farm. But councils must be allowed to make mistakes, so long as there is complete transparency and accountability to local voters.

Key objections

1. Privatisation: The furore over the HSC Act suggests that "privatisation" is a powerful concern of the public. This is slightly odd as many GPs have always been self-employed on the whole, with contractual arrangements with the NHS; i.e. they're not employees of the NHS. And the recent re-opening of health service delivery to non-profit and charitable organisations is also perhaps not widely appreciated.

Not George Obsorne

Nevertheless, the arguably emotive label "privatisation" points to a number of very reasonable worries, of which the possibility of fees for previously free services is just one. Another worry is that because private companies need to make a profit, they either provide a worse service (to cut costs), or they overcharge compared with an entirely state-run service, or they make savings in relation to employees (e.g. paying them less, providing worse conditions, failing to fund training, reducing job security, cutting pensions, and so on). A third worry is that such companies are less accountable and less transparent in how they operate. Finally, some people see such companies as less caring, less generous and less honestly motivated than state-run services.

Response: These worries in relation to privatisation are legitimate. However, the right to trigger referenda should reassure citizens that they can veto the possibility of fees for previously free services, and that organisations affecting local people cannot get away with bad behaviour. Moreover, if they wish, voters can choose councils that have nothing to do with private companies at all.


2. Lack of belief in localism: As I've argued previously, localism is a hard sell for a variety of reasons, resulting in scepticism about its value and a lack of engagement by the public in local government. I've also noted that there are at least three types of localism, so the disadvantages of one type are sometimes seen as applying to others. In addition, the "postcode lottery" slogan resonates with many people: differences in practices always lead to unfairness, it is objected.

see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil

Response: The widespread lack of belief in localism is admittedly challenging. Under this proposal, the shift in powers from central government to councils means that voters have more to lose, so this should help to increase awareness of council powers and to increase the motivation to engage. But I'm not sure the perceptions of local politicians would necessarily improve.


3. It's more complicated than that: Some will say that much of what's proposed is already happening; that the Localism Act 2011 is providing the rest (including a "general power of competence" for local authorities); and anyway this proposal says nothing about how to resolve existing problems with complex relationships between councils, citizens, companies, and central government.

Response: Fine. I'd like to hear more about that. More importantly, I'd like more people thinking about whether the balance in power between central and local government is about right or whether it could be usefully adjusted.

Evil Liberal Masterplan

Autonomous localism needs a change in mind-set from "What's the Government doing about it?" to "What can we do about it?" This could be parodied as JFK-lite, or Cameron's "Big Society", or "just more" community politics. But it's actually very liberal: increasing freedom for local citizens. Of course that freedom could be used to limit the size of the state or to address social issues; to enhance civil liberties or to increase law-and-order; to get more private sector involvement or to run all services in-house; to cooperate with other councils or to compete.

So it's a liberal proposal that could be used to do things that you very much don't like. If you don't trust the voters in your area to vote against these things locally, the alternative is that you continue to rely on voters in other parts of the country to vote against such things nationally. So, I think attitudes to this proposal might very well be influenced by what you think the next UK government is likely to do and by what you think of people in your area.

Acknowledgements

1. "Local government gears" by LonWon. [CC BY-SA 3.0]
2. "English ceremonial counties 1998" derived by Dr Greg from work by Nilfanion.[CC BY-SA 3.0]
3. "petition" by League of Women Voters of California. [CC BY 2.0]
4. View to Sizewell along the beach taken from Wikipedia. [CC BY-SA 3.0]
5. "Windfarm" by Russell Smith (rasmithuk) [CC BY 2.0]
6. "The not so slim controller" by Lee Turner [CC BY-NC-ND 2.0]
7. "See No Evil" by Tim Ellis [CC BY-NC 2.0]

LibDems: We must do better than this

Now I know how unbearably holier-than-thou my Labour friends must have found me when I incessantly derided their support for a Labour Government that took us to war in Iraq, that threw away hard-won civil liberties, and that contributed to causing the deficit crisis by overspending and under-regulating.

But here we are, just two years into a Conservative-LibDem coalition, and already the Government has passed the counter-productive Welfare Reform Act, gambled recklessly with our inestimable universities, and failed to fertilize the green growth that would invigorate this barren economy.

Now this weekend, Liberal Democrat voting representatives have shamefully failed to stop the Health and Social Care Bill, when it was within their power to do so.


Why "shameful"?

Well, I'm not going to rehash the arguments here about why this is a bad bill. Instead I will simply point out that despite all the efforts of LibDems to fix its flaws, the Bill still lacks a mandate, it is still dreadfully unclear, and it still has no professional buy-in.

But there's a far bigger failure here.

In his first inaugural address, talking about the deficit facing the US, Ronald Reagan declared "government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem."

He was wrong. Coming together as a country and electing a small group of people to make decisions to our collective benefit is, I think, generally better than not doing so. Where he might have a point is that in trying to do good, governments can often end up doing bad.

This isn't surprising. It's hard to get cost-benefit calculations right because even simple actions in complex societies can have unintended consequences, and because freedom, social justice and future states of affairs are so hard to quantify.

This means we as a country should be a little forgiving of governments getting things wrong. But if they fail to stick to their mandates, fail to study the research evidence, fail to engage with expert opinion, fail to commission pilots, and fail to be scrupulously transparent in their decision-making, we have every right to condemn them.

A key objection is that if governments take time to make laws, the Opposition seizes the media agenda and accuses the Government of dragging its feet, losing its way, being indecisive, etc.

Big deal. We shouldn't let the media management tail wag the legislative dog.

This is not a liberal or democratic way to make laws. LibDems must do better than this.

Doing some good

It is stupid to blame the LibDems for everything the Coalition does. The LibDems have very little power: the voters in 2010 gave them just 57 seats out of 650 seats.

So it is to the credit of the LibDems that they have managed to leverage this limited power to...

• shift taxes from low and middle earners to the richest
• get extra money to schools to help poorer children
• create more new apprenticeships than Britain has ever had before
• create the world's first Green Investment Bank
• restore the link between pensions and earnings
• set-up proper regulation of the banks
• restore many of the civil liberties thrown away by Labour
• increase social housing for the first time in 30 years
• halt Labour's post office closures

Do you think the Conservatives would have done these things if they'd had unbridled power?

Even more shaming: why did it take a Conservative-led coalition to do these things that a Labour government should have been doing?


But is it enough?

When it comes to the next election, the voters will do their own cost-benefit calculations. They will look at the Government's success in tackling Labour's deficit, and the inevitable costs to society.

And the voters will also separate out the LibDems' role.

Sure, they will look at the good things that were possible because the LibDems were sitting on the Government benches.

But the voters will also look at the things the Conservatives were able to do because the LibDems weren't sitting on the Opposition benches: the tuition fees debacle; the stifling of green growth; the many spiteful cuts that save little money but assuage Daily Mail readers; the Welfare Reform Act 2012; and the Health and Social Care Act 2012.

Is it enough?

I don't know.

But I do know that our bad bill-making practices are not winning us the media war in any shape or form.

We must do better than this.


Acknowledgements

• "pray" by Samantha Celera [CC BY-ND 2.0].
• "Alastair Campbell talking to staff in Labour's HQ" by the Irish Labour Party [CC BY-ND 2.0].
• "Beavers Breakfast" by Property#1 [CC BY-NC-ND 2.0].
• The list of LibDem achievements is derived from Mark Pack's infographic.

When councillors get fixated on "progress"

John Lewis is coming to Exeter. That's terrific news. Everyone's delighted. Great success. Congratulations all round.

Unfortunately, officers and councillors of the County Council and the City Council are planning a weird scheme (pdf document) to make the road outside John Lewis one-way. It's at the point where New North Road joins Paris Street, an area known (apparently) as London Inn Square.

The proposal is to remove the route marked with a red line

What's so weird about that, you might ask. After all, the road has 22,000 pedestrians crossing it daily. It "acts as a physical barrier between the main shopping area and Sidwell Street", and "Sidwell St / Paris St has seen 20 collisions in a 3 year period (14 involving pedestrians)". Moreover, "People should be able to enjoy their surroundings without concerns about crossing busy roads, or being subjected to poor air quality caused by cars and lorries which need not be in the middle of the city." (All quotes from the scheme flyer linked above.)

Yes, fine. It would be better for cars not to be cutting through the shopping area at all. But the big question is: Where will the traffic go then?

What the proposed scheme mostly doesn't fix

Before I come to the question of where the traffic will go instead, I want to look at that "20 collisions in a 3 year period" statistic. It's potentially very misleading. There's no indication whether this refers just to the immediate area affected by the proposed scheme or to the whole of Sidwell Street and Paris Street.

And this ambiguity matters: the plethora of signs and road markings at the top of Paris Street and the intersection between Sidwell Street and Cheeke Street are dreadful, with different rules for cars, buses, taxis and bicycles.

Paris Street will be unchanged

So, for example, Paris Street is one-way for cars, but two-way for bicycles. Drivers who want to go straight on have to cut in front of buses leaving a bus stop at a pedestrian crossing; a crossing that also has 3 sets of traffic lights, two with a "straight on" filter (so the red lights confusingly only apply to the right-hand turn); and at just at that spot when cars are having to uncomfortably squeeze in front of the buses (and take in all the lights and road markings), a bike box, some bike racks, and a route sign suddenly become visible (they're likely to be obscured by a bus before that point). The route sign, by the way, tells you nothing about what happens if you turn right, but lots about what's straight on (Crediton, Tiverton, railway stations and the University) and if it wasn't visible until you're at the lights, you're also likely to be in the wrong lane for going straight on, so you'll somehow have to break lane discipline, while taking account of pedestrians, cyclists, buses and other vehicles all doing different things. Meanwhile the cycle lanes come and go.

Paris Street was two-way not so long ago, and it was all much less confusing. There was also a central island for pedestrians in New North Road, which the council removed.

Incidentally, having a taxi rank right next to this confusing semi-one-way intersection is also daft.

Meanwhile, inadequate signs at Cheeke Street mean that cars sometimes go the wrong way up Sidwell Street, a route on which only buses and taxis are allowed. In fact there are two cars in Google Streetview doing precisely that. They end up having to turn right out of Sidwell Street into New North Road. I once saw a small boy almost mown down crossing New North Road when the pedestrian light was green. It's possible the driver had gone through a red light, but I think it's more plausible that the lights in Sidwell Street assumed that buses would be going straight on into the High Street, rather than turning right.

Wrong

Wrong

As I say, the proposed scheme mostly wouldn't fix these threats to safety, although, to be fair, the layout of the taxi rank would be improved, and most traffic would be removed from Sidwell Street between the High Street and Cheeke Street.

Where will the traffic go?

Current route in red (New North Road, Sidwell St, Cheeke St)
Encouraged route in blue (Bonhay Road, Western Way)

At peak times, 300 cars an hour travel along the route to be closed. So what will happen to this traffic?

Firstly, the councils say that they will "encourage drivers crossing the city to use more appropriate roads such as Bonhay Road and Western Way".

I can imagine that suiting people driving from the areas around Crediton, Tiverton and Exeter St David's station, although the perennial bottleneck that is Exe Bridges might be a reason why they are not using Bonhay Road currently. People driving from the areas around Exeter College and the University might take more persuasion.

My guess is, though (and it'd be nice if the councils published their research so that we can be working with actual data rather than guesses), that most of the traffic going east via New North Road
originates far from easy access to Bonhay Road or Western Way. They will be heading to places like the hospital, the business parks, industrial estates, edge-of-city retail parks and the M5. A route via Bonhay Road and Western Way is going to seem a big diversion. Moreover, buses from the Cowley Bridge direction (the north-west of the city) will still need to get to the bus station, just off Paris Street.

In fact the councils estimate that "half of the existing traffic turning left into Sidwell Street is expected to divert onto Blackall Road and York Road".

Current route in red (New North Road, Sidwell St, Cheeke St)
Likely alternative in blue (Blackall Rd, Pennsylvania Rd, York Rd, Summerland St)
Note the bus station is off Bramfylde Street, hence all the bus stops there

This alternative route is unarguably residential, with four zebra crossings, two mini roundabouts, and several severe speed bumps. St James is a conservation area, but this seems to count for nothing.

Blackall Road is residential

Mini roundabout and zebra crossing in Blackall Road

The alternative route also features a left-hand turn from Pennsylvania Road into York Road that often results in long waits by cars coming out of York Road and by cars turning into York Road from the other direction. And at the top end of York Road, there are often jams by the traffic lights. This is not a route that can sustain much more traffic. Yet it is estimated that 150 an hour additional vehicles would be travelling along these roads if this scheme is approved.

The junction of Pennsylvania Road, York Road and Longbrook Street The junction of York Road, Sidwell Street  and Summerland Street

This route also goes directly past the gates of the local primary school.


It's at this point that the councils need to be reminded of their own stern warning:

"People should be able to enjoy their surroundings without concerns about crossing busy roads, or being subjected to poor air quality caused by cars and lorries which need not be in the middle of the city."

The councils trumpet the importance of making it easier for people to cross the road and of minimising air pollution, but somehow this doesn't apply to the children at the school.

Another likely alternative route is via Longbrook Street and then (again) up York Road. This is again a largely residential street.

Longbrook Street

So what are our councillors doing?

The ward that will suffer from the proposed scheme is St James. St James has two Liberal Democrat city councillors (Natalie Cole and Kevin Mitchell). The City Council is in minority Labour control. Labour is strongly targeting this ward. The election is in May 2012.

But it would be too simplistic to suggest that it's just a case of Labour hoping St James residents will punish sitting city councillors for failing to stop this scheme. St James also has a Liberal Democrat county councillor (Philip Brock) and the County Council is held by the Conservatives. Moreover, an improved area around John Lewis could be trumpeted as a Conservative success by a Conservative challenger to the sitting Labour MP.

Meanwhile, the three councillors for St James (Cole, Mitchell and Brock) support a further alternative proposal that sends traffic down Longbrook Street and then right along King William Street. This alternative avoids the majority of the residential areas and the school, but still sends traffic along quiet streets, and also past the front door of a community centre.

The Labour candidate for the forthcoming city elections (Keith Owen) notes the concerns of residents, expressed forcefully at a meeting last month when council officers explained the scheme. Yet he is careful not to indicate his opposition to the scheme. [But see the update below] When it comes to planning matters, Labour councillors in Exeter tend to vote en bloc, often in favour of development, rather than each individual making up his or her own mind on the merits of the particular case.

None of these councillors seems to be arguing the merits of the status quo, on the basis of the scheme's damage to the quality of life of St James residents. [Again, see the update below]

Many Exeter people want Paris Street made two-way again

It also seems that none of the councillors is arguing that the decision to make Paris Street one-way was a huge mistake, and should be reversed. Rather than travelling a few hundred yards to get to the bus station, bus passengers were sent a long way round, clogging up Sidwell Street. The new proposal sends bus passengers on an even bigger diversion, via narrow residential streets. Taxi drivers are also unhappy with the current situation. Moreover, Sidwell Street is clearly currently more dangerous for pedestrians and road users than it was when Paris Street was two-way. It would be good to know how the figure of 7 collisions a year compares with the rate before Paris Street was made one-way.

Over the past decade there have been large numbers of changes to the road layout in the area of the new John Lewis. And yet somehow it is still worth spending up to £2m on yet another scheme, at a time when the County Council is implementing cuts of £40m, on top of £55m last year. It has been claimed that John Lewis would not come to Exeter if Paris Street were to be made two-way again. Well John Lewis is coming. Has a commitment been made on Paris Street?

In Exeter, the quality of decision-making when it comes to planning decisions is very poor. Just read the minutes of planning meetings, or go along to one. Attendance is variable; details are glossed over; reasoning is typically nebulous or tautologous; officers' opinions are often accepted uncritically; "progress" is automatically seen to be a good thing, even if it isn't actually progress.

Parties can afford to make these kinds of cavalier decisions, because it is just one ward out of many. But the real question is how councillors get fixated on a particular idea as representing "progress". Is it that they get jazzed up by grandiose words in "vision" documents? Or a desire to leave their mark on the city? Do they somehow talk themselves into corners through macho posturing? Or are they somehow intimidated by developers, officials, lawyers, or business imperatives?

I don't know. I doubt it's any of these reasons; and it's rather than councillors simply believe that this is the best way forward. But in that case, rising above the issue of whether this proposed scheme is sensible or not, is a bigger concern: I resent the fact that councillors and would-be councillors treat residents disrespectfully by failing to provide well-reasoned arguments for their decisions.

So come on councillors and would-be councillors, whatever ward or electoral division you represent. Your decision on this issue is affecting my community. You owe us an account of your personal decision.


Update 3 Dec 2011

I'm pleased to note from this week's Express and Echo that at least some councillors are giving the proposal careful consideration.

Jill Owen, county councillor (Labour) for Priory and St Leonard's, comments on the displacement of traffic from Sidwell Street:

"I don't think the displacement issue has been made clear enough to everyone and I hope that it is looked at very clearly and in great detail. This is a very important scheme but it seems it is being done with indecent haste. If we do something that is not right then it will be very difficult to turn back."

Meanwhile, James Taghdissian, city councillor (Conservative) for Polsloe, notes that Mount Pleasant Road, Stoke Hill Road and Prince Charles Road might well turn into rat-runs.

And last week's Express and Echo carried a very welcome letter from the Labour candidate for the St James ward on the city council, Keith Owen. He comes out as opposed to the plans, and gives clear arguments about the various options. I'm delighted to note that he makes a case for the status quo.

These proposals go before Devon's cabinet on 14 December. I hope they will take the concerns of residents seriously.

Liberal Democrat tribalism is the real danger

A Liberal Democrat friend was at a barbecue just before the AV referendum, and he was arguing (unsuccessfully) for a greater range of voices in politics.

"For example, I might not agree with everything the Greens want to do" he was saying, "and I certainly don't have much in common with UKIP, but a lot of people in this country do like what the Greens and UKIP are saying, and I think it's important those voices are heard."

There a little silence in the crowd, and then a cocky Labour voice quipped "I don't see why we need to hear the Greens or UKIP for christ's sake !!!"

Then Labour and Conservative supporters alike guffawed heartily in agreement together at the cheeky bravado of admitting to this in public.

I'm reminded of the pigs and the humans at the end of Animal Farm (oops, spoiler!)

And in fact we now know the AV referendum was won by an alliance of partisans, and not the gentle pluralists.

Don't you just hate the Labservatives? Don't you just hate all those who oppose progress? Don't you just wish a plague on both their unapologetically authoritarian houses?

Well, er... actually, no...

Over the past year, the Liberal Democrats have been on the receiving end of so much undisguised tribalist hatred that it sometimes seems impossible to ignore the bile. And the referendum and recent elections, gaffes and scandals have added to the misery. So it feels great to let loose a fusillade against the unprogressive majority.

But I think this might be a profound mistake.

It's true that despite being the junior partner, opposed on both sides by the sizable authoritarian elements within both the Labour and Conservative ranks, the Liberal Democrats are managing to be nimble about helping to encourage policies in liberal and social democratic directions.

There are many examples of positive achievements...

• the pupil premium
• the higher income tax threshold
• halting ID cards
• higher Capital Gains Tax
• the restoration of the earnings link for pensions
• the Great Repeal Bill
• ending the practice of imprisoning the children of asylum-seekers
• maintaining NHS spending
• prison reform

... and many examples of defensive achievements, in the sense of forestalling potential illiberal initiatives such as:

• more PFI
• enforcement of the Digital Economy Act
• new and worse kinds of control orders and imprisonment without trial
• upfront university tuition fees
• the enfeebling of local government
• another illegal war
• NHS dismemberment
• knee-jerk law-making
• secret support for torture

But this state of affairs is only possible (paradoxically) because of traditional Conservative discipline in following the party leader. Cameron, for all his faults, has set a mostly liberal Conservative agenda, and has been a man of his word in keeping to the Coalition Agreement. And this state of affairs is also only possible because the Labour leadership has decided to indulge in gratuitously oppositional politics, so that it has been easy for the Conservatives to maintain party discipline.

Coalition intensely irritates the tribalists within the Conservatives and Labour because it sidelines the Conservative right-wing and obliges Conservative ministers to negotiate formally with Liberal Democrat ministers rather than to make backroom deals with the authoritarian elements in Labour.

Of course, given the nature of Coalition, triumphs are rarely unalloyed. For example:

• It would be better to repeal the DE Act and start again, but authoritarian elements within Conservatives and Labour would resist this.
• The funding of Higher Education in England is a mess: there has been a huge leap in tuition fees; and while the repayment plan is better for students, it is far worse for the taxpayer. All parties are now however committed to the fees principle for this Parliament.
• Reforms of the libel and privacy laws are moving slowly, shaped more by the judiciary than politicians. Over-regulation of media activities is a risk. As too is under-regulation of media ownership.
• Conservatives and tribalists within Labour united to defeat the AV referendum.
• Conservative traditionalists and Labour tribalists will again unite to try to defeat the introduction of democracy into the House of Lords.

However, if the diverse authoritarian or partisan elements within the Conservatives and Labour were able to maintain common cause over the course of this Parliament, as they did successfully over AV, the liberal and social democratic agendas would be lost. Moreover, if the next election sees the (unwarranted) smashing of the Liberal Democrats, only the liberal and social democratic elements of the Conservative and Labour parties can keep alive liberal and social democratic influences over law-making.

So despite a good record in government over the last year (for which they will never gain credit) Liberal Democrats do not have the luxury of mopping up the middle ground by antagonising supporters of Labour and Conservatives. Liberal Democrats need to foster liberal and social democratic elements in the other parties. Building common cause, not indulging in tribalism, is the only way to keep these ideals alive.

It means looking for those at the barbecue who are not guffawing quite so loudly with Napoleon and Pilkington... those who are, deep down, a bit uncomfortable with a simple binary divide of all political thought... those who would like to hear what others have to say.


Credits: Photo "Kitbash Mercenary" by Shaun Wong

The Big Society v Liberalism

(wild cheering)

In the BLUE corner... from the Home Counties of England... weighing in at... not-very-much... with no knock-outs but one win on points... and with a right hook that's pulling punches... the challenger... BIIIIIG SOCIETEEEEEEE!!!!!

(wilder cheering, thunderous applause)

And in the YELLLOW corner... needing no introduction... from quite-a-long-time-ago... slightly doddery, but still standing... the very disputed heavyweight champion of political philosophies... IIIIIIIT'S LIIIIIIBERALISM!!!!!

(polite clapping)

I'm not sure Nick Clegg did exactly say that "Big Society = Liberalism", as reported, but he has said in the past that "David Cameron’s eloquent description of what he calls the Big Society is what I would call the Liberal Society". So the report is not very far off.

So what to make of this upstart idea "Big Society"?

I would suggest that the question is not whether the Big Society idea captures all of liberalism (pace Cameron the would-be political philosopher, the answer to that is obviously no), but whether the Big Society idea is compatible with the aspects of (what is commonly understood to be) modern liberalism that are relevant to Big Society themes; or, more specifically, how the Big Society compares with the contemporary vision of the Liberal Society.

Mark Pack of Liberal Democrat Voice has compared Cameron’s vision of the Big Society and mainstream Liberal Democrat beliefs in community politics, and found "grounds for agreement, grounds for disagreement".

Pack highlights a common dislike for an overly bureaucratic, centralised, top-down state. Such a state is not only inefficient but disempowering.

There is a consequent shared demand for (1) decentralisation of power, particularly in relation to planning decisions and control of local assets; (2) an unbundling of public services, so that anyone can offer to provide them; and (3) volunteerism and philanthropy.

The areas of disagreement or tensions that Pack notes lie firstly in language, such as whether one is primarily talking about personal responsibility or the freedom of the individual; secondly, in the extent of the decentralisation, whether simply to local government or beyond that to neighbourhoods and communities; but perhaps most pertinently in relation to the fraught question of who should provide public services.

My view is that the key tensions here are less about freedoms, localism and diversity, in relation to which Cameron conservatives and Lib Dems share a huge amount in common; and more about democracy:

• Not so much "Who takes which planning decisions?" but "How should the decision-makers be held to account?"
  
• Not so much "Who controls which assets?" but "How are stakeholders in the assets involved in decisions about those assets?"
  
• Not so much "Who should provide which public services?" but "How should providers be held to account?"
  
• Not so much "How do we support volunteerism and philanthropy?" but "How is it decided what should be left to volunteerism and philanthropy to provide?"

It is telling that Cameron's speech makes no mention of democracy or of councils, of mutualism or stakeholders; or even of "decisions". The closest he gets to mentioning accountability is in relation to public service providers being "held to account with transparent information to enable people to make informed choices". I would suggest he means consumer choice rather than stakeholder choice or voter choice. He also draws attention to a form of market accountability in that if the business community (taken as a whole) is socially responsible the result will be economic stability, lower taxes and minimal regulation. These two mechanisms may be liberal but there's no sense of direct democratic accountability for actions.

In conclusion, this is not at all a boxing match between ideologies: it seems we are all pragmatists now. It's entirely possible I've misunderstood the Big Society idea. However, my worry is that this agenda of decentralisation, public service unbundling and third sector growth will be pushed without sufficient attention to the kinds of mechanisms that would provide the democratic checks-and-balances that a healthy democratic society needs.