No, I'm not talking about the 'Estuary English' accent that Blair famously developed when he was interviewed on the Des O'Connor show back in 1996. This relates to something only slightly more authentic; a film about the strike at the Ford plant by the sewing machinists that led to the Equal Pay Act in 1970. It's a typical 'uplifting' little Brit pic that groans under the strain of following the dramatic curve demanded by mainstream cinema and leaves you with the profound conclusions that: Rosamund Pike is flawlessly beautiful but not a very good actress and that the 'young Margaret Thatcher', Andrea Riseborough, has great legs but doesn't look good in a beehive. I'm sure that these were not the key messages I should have taken home from a film about women's rights.
What a pity, because Sally Hawkins is wonderful as the leader of the strike. Unfortunately, much of the film is a misjudged mixture of light-hearted comedy and hot-panted 1960's cliche. In a film about sexism how ironic that we again have to put up with a scene of a hapless husband burning the dinner. In one of the better exchanges in the film, Sally Hawkins tells her husband that all the things he thinks are his good points, like never hitting her, are a right not a privilege. Rights not privileges! It should be the banner cry to any response to the spending cuts. The Tories like to talk a lot about responsibility but not a lot about rights and amongst the Tory press rights are central to the 'political correctness gone mad' school of journalism. They assure us that the reforms will be 'fair' but what is fairness without rights? Only with rights can our society be just.
In her speech to the TUC, Sally Hawkins asks the representatives when they gave up fighting for what is right? Her opponents are constantly wrong-footed, not because of her experience or political insight, but simply because she is fighting for a just cause. What a pity that the film-makers did not have the strength of their characters' convictions because they could have sent a timely message. Rights not privileges! This pretty much encapsulates what is wrong with the attack on the public sector. In a nation as rich as ours: good pensions, safe working conditions, excellent health care, free education and equal opportunities should all be rights not privileges. These are the bedrock of a just society and should be our bottom line.
In what has been described as the most important philosophical work of the 20th Century John Rawls argued,
"Justice is the first virtue of social institutions, as truth is of systems of thought. A theory however elegant and economical must be rejected or revised if it is untrue; likewise laws and institutions no matter how efficient and well-arranged must be reformed or abolished if they are unjust." John Rawls, 'A theory of Justice', 1971, p1
Oh, and please don't bother looking at Blair's book for his views on women's rights because he doesn't mention them. He does say he was in 'awe' of Cherie for giving 'birth on time and to order.' How enlightened.
Tuesday, 26 October 2010
Wednesday, 20 October 2010
Page 265 - Standards Not Structures?
The Coalition Government have announced the most radical cuts to public services the UK has ever experienced. For months Osborne and his colleagues have prepared the ground by trying to convince us that the deficit is about as sustainable as a Welsh Tory and that the cuts will be fair. Yet with the figures in, the most striking aspect of the reductions is their uniformity. Only Defence has avoided the seemingly obligatory 25% cuts.
It begs the question what sort of analysis preceded this historic spending review? Was it the traditional shot in the dark method? ‘Clutching at straws’ roulette? Perhaps they drew the figure out of a hat? What is without doubt, is that the imposition of a blanket 25% reduction reveals these cuts for what they really are, an attack on the public sector with only political rather than practical ends.
Surely any sort of genuine analysis would have thrown up some sort of balancing act between individual departments abilities to make savings whilst still doing their jobs? instead the Coalition have imposed a seemingly arbitrary figure that will no doubt have significant but arbitrary consequences. So much for fairness!
Article first published as Standards Not Structures on Technorati.
Tuesday, 19 October 2010
Housing - No Comment
Scrapping aircraft carriers may grab headlines but for eight million people living in social housing the government has fired a full broadside into their future prosperity and, no doubt, hulled many below the waterline. The announcement that the social housing budget will be reduced by 50%, allow rents to reflect market rates and phase out tenancies for life will send shock waves through many households.
Housing is an essential for any basic quality of life to exist yet over the the Blair years the average house inflation was 7.5%, with family homes well beyond the reach of people on the average wage of roughly £26,000. For the low paid, social housing has provided the safety net for many to remain working and maintain a family. Aren't they the people that all political parties say we should be helping? As private rents have increased to reflect the rises in house prices we are left with a greater need than ever to provide people with some secure accommodation, especially as the announcement that housing benefit levels will be capped. The policies together will condemn many families to poverty and poor living conditions.
What will come next? Increased prices and less social housing will inevitably lead to homelessness and since there is a statutory duty to house homeless people the cost will ultimately fall back upon the government anyway, or will that duty be removed?
Oh and please don't bother looking for Blair's views on housing. Social housing, an old fashioned bread and butter Labour Party issue was distinctly out of favour during the New Labour years when the boom was largely fuelled by house price rises caused by the abundance of credit and government policy that saw the number of new homes being built by the public sector fall well below the level to meet the demand. Once again the market was left to provide, but as Toynbee and Walker conclude in 'The Verdict, "Supply did not respond because property companies bought land, then sat on it, letting its rising value decorate their balance sheets and share price." p139.
Housing is an essential for any basic quality of life to exist yet over the the Blair years the average house inflation was 7.5%, with family homes well beyond the reach of people on the average wage of roughly £26,000. For the low paid, social housing has provided the safety net for many to remain working and maintain a family. Aren't they the people that all political parties say we should be helping? As private rents have increased to reflect the rises in house prices we are left with a greater need than ever to provide people with some secure accommodation, especially as the announcement that housing benefit levels will be capped. The policies together will condemn many families to poverty and poor living conditions.
What will come next? Increased prices and less social housing will inevitably lead to homelessness and since there is a statutory duty to house homeless people the cost will ultimately fall back upon the government anyway, or will that duty be removed?
Oh and please don't bother looking for Blair's views on housing. Social housing, an old fashioned bread and butter Labour Party issue was distinctly out of favour during the New Labour years when the boom was largely fuelled by house price rises caused by the abundance of credit and government policy that saw the number of new homes being built by the public sector fall well below the level to meet the demand. Once again the market was left to provide, but as Toynbee and Walker conclude in 'The Verdict, "Supply did not respond because property companies bought land, then sat on it, letting its rising value decorate their balance sheets and share price." p139.
Monday, 18 October 2010
Page 679 - "The Keynesian 'state is back in fashion'"
People often say we can learn lessons from history. It's not always that easy. Should we scrap our democratic system because Anne Widdcombe is still in Stictly Come Dancing? Perhaps? It seems to me that one of the conclusive lessons from history, is do not cut public expenditure during a recession. Time and again, from FDR to Thatcher, politicians have seen economic conditions worsen cuts in spending.
Yet, today, 35 of Britiain's most powerful business leaders have given their support for the planned spending cuts by the government. In a letter to the Telegraph the bosses argue that reducing debt will improve confidence and that the private sector will be 'more than capable of generating additional jobs to replace those lost in the public sector.'
I am a little baffled how confidence will be improved by making a large section of the population unemployed? Surely these public servants buy their pants from M&S just like private sector workers? Where are all these new jobs going to come from? Where were they during the boom years? No doubt the private sector will fill some of the void left by the cuts. They must be rubbing their hands with glee. People will end up doing the same work under much worse conditions. Is this the business confidence they allude to? There are certainly opportunities to exploit yet another sector of society, after all, 21% of the workforce are currently working in the public sector, that must represent huge possibilities for future dividend growth.
Although the headlines talk about top earners and huge pensions, the real story is that the public sector provides a powerful brake on the private sector's attempts to exploit its workforce. The majority of public servants are not rich but they do work under reasonable conditions. We are talking about a living wage and pension entitlements that are not generous by any means except when you compare them to the levels in the private sector. Have we fallen so low that we no longer aspire to improve worker's conditions? Instead, we allow our political parties, in league with business groups, to manipulate the public. "Ihaven'tgotitsowhyshouldthey" seems to be the watchword.
Blair argues that Brown lost the 2010 election by returning to the old Labour culture of tax and spend. He highlights the moment when 30 business leaders came out against Brown's rise in National Insurance as the point when the game was up. He concludes that,
"If thirty chief executives, employing thousands of people in companies worth billions of pounds, say it's Labour who will put the economy at risk, who does the voter believe?"
Clearly not the politicians! That would be ridiculous, wouldn't it? But doesn't it show such a sad, lack of ambition when we can't expose business leaders' statements for morally repugnant self-interest? We know who will profit from these cuts.
Yet, today, 35 of Britiain's most powerful business leaders have given their support for the planned spending cuts by the government. In a letter to the Telegraph the bosses argue that reducing debt will improve confidence and that the private sector will be 'more than capable of generating additional jobs to replace those lost in the public sector.'
I am a little baffled how confidence will be improved by making a large section of the population unemployed? Surely these public servants buy their pants from M&S just like private sector workers? Where are all these new jobs going to come from? Where were they during the boom years? No doubt the private sector will fill some of the void left by the cuts. They must be rubbing their hands with glee. People will end up doing the same work under much worse conditions. Is this the business confidence they allude to? There are certainly opportunities to exploit yet another sector of society, after all, 21% of the workforce are currently working in the public sector, that must represent huge possibilities for future dividend growth.
Although the headlines talk about top earners and huge pensions, the real story is that the public sector provides a powerful brake on the private sector's attempts to exploit its workforce. The majority of public servants are not rich but they do work under reasonable conditions. We are talking about a living wage and pension entitlements that are not generous by any means except when you compare them to the levels in the private sector. Have we fallen so low that we no longer aspire to improve worker's conditions? Instead, we allow our political parties, in league with business groups, to manipulate the public. "Ihaven'tgotitsowhyshouldthey" seems to be the watchword.
Blair argues that Brown lost the 2010 election by returning to the old Labour culture of tax and spend. He highlights the moment when 30 business leaders came out against Brown's rise in National Insurance as the point when the game was up. He concludes that,
"If thirty chief executives, employing thousands of people in companies worth billions of pounds, say it's Labour who will put the economy at risk, who does the voter believe?"
Clearly not the politicians! That would be ridiculous, wouldn't it? But doesn't it show such a sad, lack of ambition when we can't expose business leaders' statements for morally repugnant self-interest? We know who will profit from these cuts.
Friday, 15 October 2010
"I know we can make all the difference" - Tracy, Sure Start Manager
"How much difference may depend on how well Labour impressed on voters and future policy-makers the necessity of Sure Start and the need to make them all as good as Carousel." The Verdict p166
It is ironic that when I come to talk about one of New Labour's successes, Blair barely mentions it in his memoirs at all. The announcement that the coalition intend to extend Sure Start to allow the poorest 20% of families to receive 15 hours of free pre-school education a week from the age of two (rather than three) is to be applauded. It was also a labour Party manifesto promise. Given the sweeping cuts across the public sector it is a thorough endorsement of one of New Labour's early initiatives.
In a book about leadership, perhaps a straightforward success story is simply too undramatic to warrant much attention, but, Sure Start represents New Labour making a real difference by embarking on some old fashioned social engineering. Research indicated that less intelligent children from well-off backgrounds had overtaken brighter children from poor backgrounds by the age of six. Sure Start aimed to bring under 5s from poor backgrounds up to the same educational standards as their contemporaries from better off backgrounds at the point they started primary school. The success of the programme is best indicated by its popularity with middle class parents.
Childcare provision has doubled in Britain, with a mixture of private provision and 3500 state centres in the most neglected areas. This also allowed many parents to get training or a job for the first time. In 2008 a team of researchers from Birbeck University concluded that the programme was working. “In [Sure Start] areas children showed better social development, with more positive social behaviour and greater independence, and parents showed less risk of negative parenting and provided a better home-learning environment.”
The test, of course, is to see how well they do through school.
It is ironic that when I come to talk about one of New Labour's successes, Blair barely mentions it in his memoirs at all. The announcement that the coalition intend to extend Sure Start to allow the poorest 20% of families to receive 15 hours of free pre-school education a week from the age of two (rather than three) is to be applauded. It was also a labour Party manifesto promise. Given the sweeping cuts across the public sector it is a thorough endorsement of one of New Labour's early initiatives.
In a book about leadership, perhaps a straightforward success story is simply too undramatic to warrant much attention, but, Sure Start represents New Labour making a real difference by embarking on some old fashioned social engineering. Research indicated that less intelligent children from well-off backgrounds had overtaken brighter children from poor backgrounds by the age of six. Sure Start aimed to bring under 5s from poor backgrounds up to the same educational standards as their contemporaries from better off backgrounds at the point they started primary school. The success of the programme is best indicated by its popularity with middle class parents.
Childcare provision has doubled in Britain, with a mixture of private provision and 3500 state centres in the most neglected areas. This also allowed many parents to get training or a job for the first time. In 2008 a team of researchers from Birbeck University concluded that the programme was working. “In [Sure Start] areas children showed better social development, with more positive social behaviour and greater independence, and parents showed less risk of negative parenting and provided a better home-learning environment.”
The test, of course, is to see how well they do through school.
Thursday, 14 October 2010
Tuition Fees
"But he suffers [Ed Balls] from the bane of all left-leaning intellectuals. As I have remarked elsewhere, these guys never 'get' aspiration. They would deny it of course, but they see the middle class - apart from the intellectual part of it - as an unnatural constituency...they would think that a person worried about their tax rates was essentially selfish, and therefore by implication morally a little lost." p484
I admit I have more than a little sympathy with the Ed Ball's school of thought. It is not that I don't 'get' aspiration. I am aspirational. However, as somebody who came from a working class background with none of the advantages of educated parents or friends to guide me, I saw what a lottery life was. Aspiration was all very well, but in the face of enormous cultural pressures and even opposition, my friends looked, almost entirely to the state for our opportunities and, in providing good schools and free universities they gave us the chance to pursue our ambitions. The aspiration to build a better life needs to be nurtured with opportunity. It should not be a lottery and barriers to opportunity need to be removed. Opportunity brings with it the weight of a social agenda. You are being backed by the state. It provides individuals with a legal and material framework to succeed in their goals and, in exchange, those individuals should recognise their debt and pay appropriate levels of taxation.
The problem is, that aspiration in one generation can quickly become privilege in the next generation. The private school, the foreign holidays and the enormous opportunities that money can buy. Is there anything worse than the self-made man who pontifcates about how he did it all by himself and other people should try doing the same. Often these people don't seem to recognise their own immense achivement. They are often exceptional people and have achieved what would be extraordinary in any walk of life but more so given their own circumstances. Luck, of course, can also play a big part in anyone's life, but rarely in the story of the self-made man. Nor is luck recognised by the most privileged groups in our society. The luck of being born rich and in a country where their inherited privileges are protected by the state should place a heavy social responsibility upon that person.
Blair wanted his legacy to be a new tradition that would create a permanently electable Labour Party. But can you build anything by pandering to the market driven aspirations of people only interested in material wealth and by extension self-indulgence. It may have been where "the people were heading" (p485), but that doesn't mean you couldn't have tried to change their direction. This was not leadership but following the crowd. This lack of ambition is best illustrated by his rebuff of Ball's suggestion that tuition fees be repaid with a progressive graduate tax dependent on income. Blair argues, "I didn't like this at all. It broke the essential link between what a student got and what they gave back." When did paying tax turn into a retail transaction where you only pay for the goods you consume? Can you really claim to be a progressive politician or party if you don't believe in a progressive tax system?
We have to be more ambitious than this. As the banking crisis has shown, we can't afford to simply pander to the self-interested anymore.
I admit I have more than a little sympathy with the Ed Ball's school of thought. It is not that I don't 'get' aspiration. I am aspirational. However, as somebody who came from a working class background with none of the advantages of educated parents or friends to guide me, I saw what a lottery life was. Aspiration was all very well, but in the face of enormous cultural pressures and even opposition, my friends looked, almost entirely to the state for our opportunities and, in providing good schools and free universities they gave us the chance to pursue our ambitions. The aspiration to build a better life needs to be nurtured with opportunity. It should not be a lottery and barriers to opportunity need to be removed. Opportunity brings with it the weight of a social agenda. You are being backed by the state. It provides individuals with a legal and material framework to succeed in their goals and, in exchange, those individuals should recognise their debt and pay appropriate levels of taxation.
The problem is, that aspiration in one generation can quickly become privilege in the next generation. The private school, the foreign holidays and the enormous opportunities that money can buy. Is there anything worse than the self-made man who pontifcates about how he did it all by himself and other people should try doing the same. Often these people don't seem to recognise their own immense achivement. They are often exceptional people and have achieved what would be extraordinary in any walk of life but more so given their own circumstances. Luck, of course, can also play a big part in anyone's life, but rarely in the story of the self-made man. Nor is luck recognised by the most privileged groups in our society. The luck of being born rich and in a country where their inherited privileges are protected by the state should place a heavy social responsibility upon that person.
Blair wanted his legacy to be a new tradition that would create a permanently electable Labour Party. But can you build anything by pandering to the market driven aspirations of people only interested in material wealth and by extension self-indulgence. It may have been where "the people were heading" (p485), but that doesn't mean you couldn't have tried to change their direction. This was not leadership but following the crowd. This lack of ambition is best illustrated by his rebuff of Ball's suggestion that tuition fees be repaid with a progressive graduate tax dependent on income. Blair argues, "I didn't like this at all. It broke the essential link between what a student got and what they gave back." When did paying tax turn into a retail transaction where you only pay for the goods you consume? Can you really claim to be a progressive politician or party if you don't believe in a progressive tax system?
We have to be more ambitious than this. As the banking crisis has shown, we can't afford to simply pander to the self-interested anymore.
Wednesday, 13 October 2010
Page 480-7 - Tuition Fees
'We had a manifesto commitment not to allow top-up fees, it was true, but frankly it would have been absurd to postpone the decisions necessary for the country because of it.'
No, it's not Cable and Spineless, ditching yet another manifesto promise. It is Tony Blair justifying his own about-turn on tuition fees following the 2001 election.
The 2001 Labour manifesto stated that, 'We will not introduce 'top-up' fees and have legislated to prevent them.' That is about as clear a declaration as you ever get in politics, but, as Blair explains, the promise had only been put into the manifesto because 'worries that we were planning to do this [introduce tuition fees] had been circulating among the PLP and NEC and, David [Blunkett] felt that we had to kill the story.' Quite right too, it would have been extremely inconvenient for Labour supporters to know the truth that they were planning to introduce tuition fees. So, what we are being told is that Blair was considering introducing fees but it would have been extremely awkward to admit it with an election coming up. After all, they didn't want to upset the membership because somebody needed to deliver the leaflets and it wasn't going to be Tony.
Remarkably, considering the excellent economic conditions during the time, 'shortly after the election the challenge for our universities became clear.' I must have missed this sudden and inexplicable 'run' on our universities, but, following the Labour victory, Blair started formally exploring the introduction of fees. He argued that the success of American universities was 'due to their system of fees...their bursary system allowed them to help poorer students and their financial flexibility meant that they could attract the best academics.' For Blair, our economic well-being relied on world-class universities producing a competitive level of 'human-capital.' This may be true, but, while fees might produce a few institutions that can attract the best in the world, it is not entirely relevant to the largely parochial aims of most of our universities.
There is nothing intrinsically wrong with churning out over-qualified admin staff. Education should not all be about career opportunities and all education enhances our life and in turn our society. If you have read Ulysses you may want to punch James Joyce but you are not likely to go around punching old ladies. However, with 59% of graduates in the last two years failing to find a job in a field related to their degree and with graduate unemployment hitting 44%, one must question the wisdom of encouraging young people to begin their adult lives with debts up to £30,000 that will take up to 30 years to pay off. Inevitably, it will encourage students to consider the job prospects of their degree courses, but what a grubby country we will have when the arts and humanities have disappeared from out universities and we are left with only sensible vocational degrees. Who knows, old ladies beware, perhaps gangs of literature students will soon be roaming our inner-cities with an eye to feeding their modernist literature habit.
No, it's not Cable and Spineless, ditching yet another manifesto promise. It is Tony Blair justifying his own about-turn on tuition fees following the 2001 election.
The 2001 Labour manifesto stated that, 'We will not introduce 'top-up' fees and have legislated to prevent them.' That is about as clear a declaration as you ever get in politics, but, as Blair explains, the promise had only been put into the manifesto because 'worries that we were planning to do this [introduce tuition fees] had been circulating among the PLP and NEC and, David [Blunkett] felt that we had to kill the story.' Quite right too, it would have been extremely inconvenient for Labour supporters to know the truth that they were planning to introduce tuition fees. So, what we are being told is that Blair was considering introducing fees but it would have been extremely awkward to admit it with an election coming up. After all, they didn't want to upset the membership because somebody needed to deliver the leaflets and it wasn't going to be Tony.
Remarkably, considering the excellent economic conditions during the time, 'shortly after the election the challenge for our universities became clear.' I must have missed this sudden and inexplicable 'run' on our universities, but, following the Labour victory, Blair started formally exploring the introduction of fees. He argued that the success of American universities was 'due to their system of fees...their bursary system allowed them to help poorer students and their financial flexibility meant that they could attract the best academics.' For Blair, our economic well-being relied on world-class universities producing a competitive level of 'human-capital.' This may be true, but, while fees might produce a few institutions that can attract the best in the world, it is not entirely relevant to the largely parochial aims of most of our universities.
There is nothing intrinsically wrong with churning out over-qualified admin staff. Education should not all be about career opportunities and all education enhances our life and in turn our society. If you have read Ulysses you may want to punch James Joyce but you are not likely to go around punching old ladies. However, with 59% of graduates in the last two years failing to find a job in a field related to their degree and with graduate unemployment hitting 44%, one must question the wisdom of encouraging young people to begin their adult lives with debts up to £30,000 that will take up to 30 years to pay off. Inevitably, it will encourage students to consider the job prospects of their degree courses, but what a grubby country we will have when the arts and humanities have disappeared from out universities and we are left with only sensible vocational degrees. Who knows, old ladies beware, perhaps gangs of literature students will soon be roaming our inner-cities with an eye to feeding their modernist literature habit.
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