Where does the Conservative Party go after Covid-19, assuming there is an after? Leaving aside current difficulties, for the dyed-in-wool conservative the mood the crisis has accelerated is not conducive to their ideological hobby horses. Yes, a left-led Labour Party was sent packing before Christmas but apart from Brexit and whatever fantasies they poured into it, Boris Johnson's government hardly bellows with a Thatcherite roar. The manifesto said very little beyond getting Brexit done, conferring on the Prime Minister considerable leeway. And this range of action saw him dump Sajid Javid, the avowed disciple of Ayn Rand, and bring in Rishi Sunak as the face for a pronounced turn to big spending. Worse, the Coronavirus outbreak has encouraged unimaginable state overstretch, from the typical Tory point of view. The restrictions on comings and goings are bad enough, but a (modest) uprating of benefits? Temporary bans on evictions? The part-nationalisation of the country's pay roll? Bad, bad, bad. All the austerity messages of a decade worth of cuts now as useful as a soiled face mask. Where do the Tories and conservative politics go from here now their assumptions have been blown up?
This was the topic of this afternoon's IPPR seminar with Nick Timothy, Theresa May's former right hand man, and Tim Bale, noted pol prof and academic authority on the Tories. Hosted by Carys Roberts, the session was about exploring some of the arguments in Timothy's new book, Remaking One Nation: The Future of Conservatism. Appearing just before the outbreak, obviously there was nothing in it about preparing the party for a pandemic but, in his opening remarks, the arguments made still apply. And these arguments? This is a polemic against what he refers to as 'extreme liberalism' on the right, left and centre of politics and makes the case for a 'communitarian correction'. What does this mean?
Timothy assured the audience he was not against liberalism. Indeed, it is the essential tradition legitimating strong institutions, a free press, elections, protection of minorities against the majority, market economics and its link to personal freedom, justice, security, and the recognition of each other and ourselves as citizens. Essential liberalism therefore is not a philosophical programme as such but more a way of doing things, a habit of convention and mind facilitating a diversity of political and policy choices. A pluralistic society does mean Interests and values are in tension, and choices made by one can conflict with the interests of another. Hence maintaining balance is difficult, and becomes impossible if liberalism gives way to extreme liberalism.
What is this? It comes in a number of flavours. Among the governing classes 'elite liberalism' means the marketisation of services and the state, light touch regulation in economic matters except for labour markets, and all the various accoutrements the left would associate with neoliberalism. In addition to this consensus, there is an ultra liberalism of the right which emphasises market fundamentalism, and that of the left which we see expressed in cultural liberalism and identity politics. Ostensibly opposing one another they are actually in a symbiotic relationship which leaves economic dislocation and social atomisation in their wake. Timothy's argument is we need to break with this and advocates a communitarian politics in its stead. This would be big on solidarity, community, reformed capitalism, and mutual obligations while rejecting selfishness and individualism. Nor does this need grafting on to our communities. During the present crisis we have seen big community responses and, if anything, government policy has largely tailed spontaneous efforts at social distancing. Readers will recall, for instance, how the Tories were initially against banning public gatherings and closing schools and it was largely the simple refusal of millions to put themselves at risk that forced the government's hand.
The problem is as we pass back to something resembling 'the before', the circumstances for the old way of doing things have passed. Those hoping for more years of austerity are likely to be disappointed for two reasons. An industrial strategy is necessary to get Britain back on its feet, and second personality-wise Boris Johnson simply isn't an austerity politician. Timothy likened him to Harold Macmillan, someone who used to burn through chancellors who disagreed with him but was concerned above all with maintaining full employment. Furthermore, the electoral logic of voter coalition building makes going back electorally painful. While Labour now commands the votes of the young, of most minority ethnicities and the public sector the new Tory voters rule out a rinse and repeat of the last decade. The party needs to find another way of keeping its coalition together, and a communitarian turn could do just that, especially when Brexit as a mobilising issue will not have the same potency in four years' time.
Taking questions, the first was how did ultra liberalism win in the Tories over one nation politics? Timothy replied there was always a right wing section of the party, albeit a minority, who were uncomfortable with the middle's enthusiasm for the post-war consensus. And then they won the party leadership Thatcher they began dismantling the post-war order, a change he thought was "necessary". But her governments conspicuously failed to avoid the consequences of deindustrialisation. After Thatcher left office the party subsequently became more Thatcherite and, under John Major, moved to market-based models for public services. Now the Tories have won a swathe of seats on places that bore the brunt in the 1980s, Timothy has a sense these new MPs are casting around for new ideas to keep hold of these seats. On this, Tim Bale disagreed. He said the parliamentary party and the party-in-the-country remained very Thatcherite and committed to economic liberalism. As such, these grumbles leak and trouble the media. They are worried the present measures and what comes next could wind back the last 10 years. Others of a fiscally conservative bent have concerns over funding, and fret splashing money about relinquishes the deficit stick they used to beat Labour with (readers might recall how the deficit and debt became a synonym for economic competence under Dave and Osborne).
Asked if they could come out on top, Bale said Johnson had made significant changes before the crisis which ensured the traditional champion of financial prudence - the Treasury - had been significantly sidelined. Replacing Sajid Javid with Rishi Sunak and integrating the functions of Number 11 and Number 10 centralised more authority in the Prime Minister's hands. Timothy agreed, as traditionally in Whitehall the Treasury is imperial and dominates all. Its priority is always prudence, and its oversight of the spending of other departments leads to second guessing them on policy. Recalling his time in the Home Office, he said spending commitments are subject to vetting and they tried to control it. Therefore any economic rebalancing or industrial strategy requires curbing the Treasury and jettisoning its orthodoxy, which is contained in The Green Book.
Early on in the talk, Timothy mentioned a communitarian turn could be taken by the left or the right, so who is most likely to take it and reap the benefit? Here, Bale thought Labour possesses a distinct advantage as social democracy is premised on collective solutions, and given their embrace of a particular form of individualism it poses the Tories real difficulties. Furthermore, there is a danger a conservative cultural communitarianism might go down the nostalgia route which only appeals to a few. It was enough to win an election under the specific circumstances of 2019 but does not offer the party a long-term solution. A communitarian economics would also be hard for the party's MPs and membership to swallow. More localism, something plenty of Tories have paid lip service to, means the actual decentralisation of powers. And that ultimately means control over localised taxation and what to levy it on. Likewise, Timothy said for those suspicious of the state need to realise services cannot be done on the cheap - a professionally provided service cannot be replaced by enthusiastic amateurs, as was the assumption underpinning Big Society thinking.
For Timothy the Tories have to get serious about difficult decisions, and nothing exemplifies this better than social care - as he found out. Care quality is generally questionable and it's leaving people to die without dignity while possibly losing their homes too. Therefore, only a number of funding options are open. He felt asking people of working age was out of the question as they wrestle with stagnant wages and galloping property prices. This leaves estates, and sooner or later they will have to be taxed properly. Bale thought social care presented the Tories a huge opportunity, with political rewards for knitting health and social care together. It would also put Labour on the back foot - though why considering the integration of the two has been a policy objective in the last three manifestos was a point left unexplored.
On the election of Keir Starmer, does this change things? Would a Tory move in a communitarian, one nation-ish direction bring the two parties closer together? Assessing the problems Labour have - a concentrated urban and university town vote, the Scotland wipe out, retreats in Wales and now in England, for Timothy the difficulty is how to bridge these diverse groups and win over the swing voters necessary to form a government. It seems Labour's early days strategy is to frame issues where they feel the party is strong: on socio-economic issues and avoid the identity questions that did for the party. The Tories have the opposite issue: they have to keep identity politics alive and avoid economic issues, but Timothy didn't think this would have much in the way of legs - banging on about human rights because Keir Starmer was a human rights lawyer isn't going to help when the questions of the age are economic. For Bale, what is going to matter in the coming years is competence and looking at work done on government performance, there is a tendency for bad but early events to adversely effect electoral performance than more recent crises. Hence what the Tories do now is crucial for their future prospects. If Starmer is able to pin problems on the government, which is presently receiving favourable coverage, that will be a big problem. Tories could be tempted to overshoot on cultural questions if the economy debate isn't going well.
Wrapping up, Timothy was asked about what three things he would do to reform capitalism. He would overhaul the way taxes are raised, look at ways of addressing pay such as empowering shareholders to determine executive pay, uprating the minimum wage, and allowing "guilds" to develop for occupations in the middle who would then negotiate sectoral salaries. Something to act like a trade union that isn't a trade union then. And lastly he would change corporate governance, which is better than micromanagement by the government. Such governance would reflect the involvement of workers, and address consumer rights and the locality footprint of the business.
Nick Timothy is interesting as far as Tory thinkers are concerned because, similar to the red Tory fad of a decade or so ago, he sees the path to continued good fortune lead out from neoliberal orthodoxies and back to one nation grounds of social peace and ontological security. A position, funnily enough, I share. Both are right to emphasise the drag the party and the political composition of its MPs has on adapting itself in this direction, but if this is Johnson's chosen destination his election-winning authority coupled with the political shock of the coronavirus crisis and the miserable state of Britain's economy might see him succeed where Brexit and hubris ensured Theresa May failed. Yet this is politics. Strategies are about maximising your room for manoeuvre and structuring the possibilities of success. Presently, it's looking like the government's handling of the crisis is slipping out of their hands as they oversee a premature return to work and, undoubtedly, a second spike in infections. And this is on top of its problem with younger voters and, particularly, how the Tories are the biggest barrier to generating future consistent Tory voters: the process of property acquisition has broken down and the compromises they've made to keep their present coalition together ensures they're unable to address this. The Tories can affect a communitarian turn, but events could damage them and the shifting composition of work and concentration of property means their voters are not being replaced in sufficient numbers. It is very difficult to see how the Tories can permanently overcome this predicament.
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Not the plot, nor his grasp on the crisis which has been woeful from the beginning. I'm talking his grip on public opinion. Since emerging back into view his performance has proven pretty lacklustre as the mounting contradictions and incompetencies of his government catch up with him. Take last night's address as a case in point. A muddled slogan, a pledge to keep the virus under control and ... calling for a generalised return to work for construction and manufacturing. Matters were no better in the Commons this afternoon. Questioned by Keir Starmer all he could do was bluster and chunter as it was revealed the rules governing the return to work hadn't been released yet. Compounding Johnson's woes are the - right - refusals of the governments of Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland to follow his plan, and the absurdity of some of the new rules too. You can arrange to meet a family member as long as the appropriate distance is adhered to, but only one at a time. With the wheels coming off, is Johnson finally in danger of being seen less Churchill, and more over the hill? Is this the beginning of the end?
I made the mistake of nearly writing Johnson off before. That was in a period of acute crisis in his party operating in a hung parliament. Now he has a huge majority and is soaring in the polls, although this has more to do with sections of the voters rallying around the government as the sole means of organising the nationwide struggle with coronavirus. Therefore, while it is obvious to the great bulk of people reading these words think Johnson is making a hash of it, is this the case for ordinary punter land? For the centrists gripped by Keir's Commons outings it's obvious quoting numbers and dates at Johnson, for whom detail is delegated to minions, are so much gotchas. But if the never-ending political crisis of last Autumn taught us anything, with larger audiences, constitutional outrages galore and some of the most awful performances ever turned in by a Prime Minister Johnson's incompetence was confirmed only among those who already thought Johnson was incompetent. For those who switched to the Tories in December, it merely confirmed his seriousness of intent.
Alas, this situation requires adroitness and skill. One cannot simply barrel through and call the opposition disloyal or motivated by petty point scoring, though that hasn't stopped some Tory outriders. What is going to do for Johnson are not the mixed up figures and stumbling delivery, but the direct experience of voters themselves. Among cohorts of workers getting sent back to work on Wednesday is that layer of older manufacturing workers who voted Brexit, and lent the Tories their votes to get it done. Giving the government the benefit of the doubt is easy when other people are in harm's way, but grows more difficult when you and your family are expected to risk yourselves. And as the infection rate goes up as per the easing of lockdowns everywhere else, so will the jitters, the worries, and the discontent. Likewise, as others start losing their jobs because they refuse to return to work, this will have knock on effects not to the Tories' advantage. Even the ludicrous switch from Stay at Home to Stay Alert, with its lists of absurd dos and don'ts is problematic because it impinges on the everyday and introduces confusion into what was an irksome but easily understood set up. When even Philip Schofield is articulating the worries of his daytime audiences and saying "if this was in a farce in the telly no government would arse it up that much", the government have got to watch themselves. But it appears not. Almost, you might say, as if they have other concerns at the forefront of their approach.
This then is the moment of maximum danger for Johnson, and is make or break time for the remainder of their government. The leeway gifted him by the situation is not infinitely wide, and while he has escaped political penalty for the accumulating count of largely unnecessary and preventable deaths, easing restrictions amidst a muddle of new rules and sending millions back to work where a new spike in infections awaits means his Covid-19 honeymoon is likely to get cut short. A pity, an entirely avoidable pity that many lives will be too. There is then no hiding for Johnson this time. This reckless and unforgivable decision is entirely his.
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About a fifth of the UK workforce is in receipt of furlough payments. Unemployment figures for March and April are yet to be released, but by the middle of last month Universal Credit applications had surged by 1.4 million. Then there are millions of hidden unemployed, such as young people who don't qualify for social security. Many more face the prospect of furloughing and taking a significant hit to their incomes, and others the awful prospect of their job evaporating completely. As matters look increasingly grim and those on the right start sharpening their knives, cheer yourself up a bit by rejoicing in the good fortune of a lucky few.
Take our old friend Chuka Umunna, for example. Since leaving parliament, he's ... done quite well for himself. According to reports, Chuka doesn't have one job. He has four. Readers will remember he found time in his busy schedule to chair a couple of meetings a month for the centrist think tank, Progressive UK. A nice non-job if you can get it. Added to his portfolio of work is Director of Digital Identity Net UK, a company that provides a one-stop shop signing in service to multiple internet outlets. Because, you know, signing in to Twitter and Facebook without clicking the remember me box is such a chore. According to the corporate blurb, "The Company is led by a team of highly accomplished individuals who have built businesses in Digital Identity, Payments, Banking, Technology and Government." Why is Chuka involved then? He's also got a gig as a Forbe's columnist writing on "leadership", and vaguely serves as a "strategic advisor" to sundry outfits on "business critical issues."
Readers might recall Chuka was a junior lawyer for the best part of the 00s (this sretch of his life is now rebranded as a "a corporate employment law solicitor in the City and central London") before latching on to the soft left platform Compass as his means of bagging a safe Labour seat. Inexplicably a recipient of much hype off the back of a couple of so-so Question Time appearances, he was recognised and elevated under Ed Miliband just as he traded the politics of Compass in for the Blairist continuity of Progress. Following a failed leadership bid in 2015 and perennial cultivator of a new centrist party, you'll remember the happy day he and his scabrous cohort left Labour. Then followed the wry amusement when their desperate project was dashed by political realities and he traded up to the Liberal Democrats - with a very brief moment of leading "The Alternative", or half of the CUK MPs who fell out with the other half.
Chuka's passage into corporate shindiggery reminds one of George Osborne move from MP for Tatton to a one-man workforce, including his assumption of the editorship of the Evening Standard without any journalistic experience. His case is instructive because it offers a template for Chuka's trajectory. Osborne was not so much purchased for his talents as for his contact book. During his six years as chancellor and 11 years as Dave's right hand man, Osborne got to know who the key players in Conservative politics are - especially the shadowy business networks whose political inputs are kept out of the limelight. He learned how the state works, and filled his contact list with oligarchs and billionaires. Given how unseemly close the Tories under Dave grew to China, he knows quite a few of the top bureaucrats in Beijing too. Chuka is small fry compared to this. Life as a Opposition spokesperson, backbencher, leader of a micro party, and celebrity recruit to the LibDems hardly confers as much social capital. But it allows for the accumulation of enough to make a decent grift possible. When Forbes, Digital Identity Net, or whatever company buys Chuka in they're buying his legend, his ability to provide access to some elite decision makers and business interests - especially those in the so-called remain movement. They buy his knowledge of how the system works, and perhaps that little bit of media magic Chuka was able to command for a short while. They're investing their economic capital in his social and cultural capital, and he in return is recuperating the time spent in cultivating these networks in ways conducive to a healthy bank balance.
From the point of view of the mainstream, politics is not a struggle but the judicious building of strategically useful relationships. Chuka's rapid rise to the front rank of British politics and his slow sink into irrelevance, while maintaining his profile commends him to companies who think they'll profit from having a celebrated hire. And, sadly, it says everything about the rotten nature of politics and the decrepitude of British business that no marks are awarded this way and it is seen to work. That means we won't be hearing the last of Chuka and his ever-increasing pile of jobs.
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The ongoing derangement of British politics is the gift that keeps giving, if by gift you mean a spiralling whirlpool of lies and doublethink. Today the stinking eddies washed up a new battlefront in the social media culture war: a bookcase. Not just any bookcase, but one of a reputed 20 belonging to Sarah Vine and Michael Gove. If eyes are windows to the soul, bookshelves speak of the thoughts bouncing around their owner's cranium. In this spirit, a few stand out titles convulsed Twitter for an afternoon. The War Path by David Irving, Holocaust denier extraordinaire (though dating from before his path to racist notoriety), Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged, and that classic of pseudo science piffle, The Bell Curve by Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray. As a number of comrades have pointed out, these matter in the context of Gove's Islamophobia, a government with a miserable record on racism, and the interminable anti-semitism wars.
I agree with these comrades. There's nothing wrong having dodgeoir books. I've also got Atlas Shrugged, a few books by Tories (some of whom were, shock horror, entertaining), and Mein Kampf, a book not so much demonstrative of evil's banality but the tedium of it. A good book mix suggests a critical, inquiring mind and what you see on the Vine/Gove shelf is symptomatic of a closed universe. For all the defences trotted out by the hacks, these are shelves full of tat confirming their owners' prejudices. Tony Blair's A Journey is as left wing as it gets: there's practically nothing on socialist politics, let alone social history. Nothing about the masses, a great deal about the classes. Bits and pieces about the Second World War, plenty of books about the establishment politics of the United States, a smattering of undemanding novels and a book on gin.
Even worse is the over-preponderance of biographies. Don't get me wrong, there's nothing up with political biographies per se. All are self-serving and axe-grinding to a degree, but they're good for bringing out the minutiae of the social lives and social circles of our social superiors. They clarify the thought processes and pressures on a politician's decision-making, providing an inside track to controversies not available as they unfolded. But when they're substitutes for other works on politics? Houston, we have a problem. It's not just that the lives of interest to the Vine/Gove house are nearly all elite and span a spectrum from the centre to the right (the sole proper leftwinger to grace the shelves, Sir Stafford Cripps, was quintessentially posh), it betrays a particular understanding of politics too. For the pair of them as consummate social climbers, their passage into the media and then the elite was eased by sucking up to the right people at the right moment, accumulating favours and political capital to ease the path of their advancement. From their point of view, the social world isn't a struggle: it's about making judicious strategic choices. Politics then is just another social activity, albeit the back and forth of elite players buttressed by institutional power and economic interests whose presence are just accepted to the point of not being thought about. It's all part of the feel for the game. Tomes of political science, theory, and sociology are therefore irrelevant. If advancement is the goal you need to understand how to play politics, not understand how it came to be. The overrepresentation of the biography on this bookshelf is more than hero worship. Rather they are etiquette manuals. Strategy guides. How to overcome the difficulties politics throws up, how to balance competing factions, ride popular waves, put down rebellions, when to ignore and when to acknowledge discontent. These are books for people who care about and want to profit from the dynamics of the small p politics of big P Politics.
When she tweeted a picture of her bookcase, Sarah Vine knew three of the books featured would press all the right social media buttons and provide a bit of distraction from her government's mishandling of the crisis. Who on the right doesn't enjoy trolling the left? However, what she inadvertently let slip was the state of mind and the inspiration of a coming power couple. She knows their game, and she's happy to be brazen about it.
Panorama on Monday night was damning. Despite recommendations to the government that it should stockpile personal protective equipment, we learned that calls to do so fell on deaf ears last summer. Gowns, body bags, visors, swabs, what should be there simply isn't. It also turns out respirators are some 20 million short than the figure in the ledger. This is more evidence, as if it needs parading, how light-minded the government were about public health before this crisis and were so slow to act, a complacency that put the Prime Minister in hospital. Considered in the round with their miserable failure to pay heed to the massive exercise undertaken in 2016 that wargamed the very scenario we're now living through, and their extreme tardiness to introduce appropriate quarantine measures, there needs to be more than a toothless public inquiry when this is all said and done. There should be trials. The worst death rate in Europe and second only to the United States, the Tories were less asleep at the wheel and more criminally negligent.
Enter stage right Guido Fawkes, the self-styled enfant terrible of political commentary. For someone who likens his tawdry website to the man who tried blowing up a good chunk of the ruling class, the establishment would be hard-pressed to find a firmer friend. For Paul Staines and his merry-go-round of here today, gone tomorrow Guidlets, their immediate response was not to do actual public interest journalism that, you know, could shame the government into preparing properly in the future and perhaps save some lives but go after the NHS workers who appeared on said Panorama. Because one GP was a Labour activist, a nurse a Unison shop steward who is on record for having a few choice words about Matt Hancock, and others who had variously criticised the government, their concerns are therefore completely invalid. If someone is "pro-Corbyn", the implication is their complaints are made up. There is no shortage, medical staff and carers aren't at risk, and shortages if they exist are blown out of all proportion for party political point scoring. All completely wretched, but the truth doesn't matter when you have vested interests to defend.
Guido's charlatanry is nevertheless lapped up by hardened Tories because it confirms so many of their prejudices. The default assumption among many Conservative activists and politicians is their opponents are as cynical and crooked as they are. For them, politics is a game, something not to be taken too seriously. The idea one can be passionate about a cause in Tory circles is an eccentricity because, so often, they are. Remember when Europe was a fringe issue beloved of extremists and freaks? The idea others might identify with the Labour Party, or genuinely care for and feel solidarity with others, or are fired by their experiences of inequality, poverty, and discrimination, or inspired by a vision of how life could be better for everyone is incomprehensible. It's either a derangement, and should be treated as potentially dangerous, or, like themselves, it's not meant at all: it's an effect of an affect.
The rote-learned right wing accusation of virtue signalling is, like so much else about conservative frames, a case of projection. A bastardised form of rational choice thought, the assumption is no one goes in for selfless activity, whether in politics or everyday life. Their abysmal view of human nature allows only for self-interested action, for personal profit. Therefore altruistic action is nothing of the sort, it's the cultivation of narcissistic satisfaction that can be telegraphed to others as examples of personal purity and moral superiority, and from this a certain status is derived. Jeremy Corbyn then and his record as an activist wasn't really driven by outrage at injustice, but so he could revel in a radical saintliness. By their logic then, the NHS workers and care workers on shift risking their health and lives aren't motivated by the desire to help (I mean, would you spoonfeed Alzheimer's sufferers for minimum wage?) but so they can throw their superiority in other's faces.
In such a mindset pickled in cynicism, it's impossible to conceive how NHS workers could speak out against Tory failings if they weren't politically motivated. That someone might become political because of their experience working in a marketised health service starved of necessary resources simply cannot happen. And so it is true of every other grievance. Young people stay away from the Tories not because they get a bum deal, but because of lefty lecturers are brainwashing them. Opposition to government policy is always down to "militants". Popular protests and movements are the work of closely-knit troublemakers of the communist or anarchist type. Their is an impoverished mode of living, of a type of thinking that absolutely resists and denies empathy and ultimately tends in the direction of dehumanising the targets of their ire. And, as we have seen throughout this crisis, as Boris Johnson tries forging a new consensus that will ultimately benefit him and his party, senior Tories have blamed members of the public for disease transmission, and medical staff for using PPE irresponsibly. Guido's cynical attacks are part of this overall thrust at discrediting criticisms of very serious government shortcomings.
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It's no secret the Tories hate higher education. And yet, you'd think they'd love it. The university sector is responsible for £14.4bn worth of the UK's export earnings and, according to the latest report, this has been increasing at a healthy rate since the Tories came to power in 2010. This has happened on their watch and should be a success worth trumpeting, surely? Instead we get crap like the attempted appointment of Toby Young to the Office for Students, public fretting about the censorious safe space/no platform culture supposedly dominating campus politics, the introduction and enforcement of complex and ludicrous metrics that serve to deepen the bureaucracy and sclerosis of the sector, and, as of last week, the refusal to provide bailout loans to universities hit by shrivelling revenue streams and a projected collapse in student numbers.
What is the Tories' game? In the age of the magic money tree, the idea of tax payer value-for-money is complete fiction. From the standpoint of the rational management of British capitalism, there's no rhyme nor reason for not printing the money and handing over the cash to keep universities going. They are anchor employers in many locations - particularly away from the big cities. Instead, according to The Times the government is mulling over a raft of conditionalities. These include mergers, a curtailment of research, and the downgrading of some institutions (in all but name) to the delivery of vocational programmes and apprenticeships. Gavin Williamson favours the tackling of "low quality courses" where "low quality" has nothing to do with teaching or course content and everything to do with so-called marketable skills and a capacity for graduates to make their future employers money.
In other words, these poltroons, some of whom have spent their political careers bigging up the wisdom of the market have decided they don't like the HE landscape the invisible hand has shaped for them. It's too lefty and too critical, despite being the most market driven and neoliberalised arm of the state. Therefore the Coronavirus crisis is an opportunity too good to pass up for bringing the sector to heel, and their thinking has nothing to do with affordability or value metrics and everything to do with the interests of the Conservative Party.
As noted here plenty of times, the Tories have a pronounced young people problem that exists across all occupational groupings, and is especially negative among young women. This isn't much of an issue for them as long as older people keep turning out in greater numbers and, as the old pass away, are reproduced by new cohorts of the elderly. However, whether one grows more conservative with age or not there's no essential reason why that should affect voting preferences. One does not retire and simply put a cross next to the Tory candidate, it is mediated by structural location and property acquisition. And this is breaking down. Millions of working people cannot buy a house or save for one thanks to exorbitant prices and the monies renting swallows up. This isn't just the lot of young people, millions in their 40s and 50s are in this position too. Add to that the immaterial labour and precarity younger people have to live with, and the replacement of their coalition of older voters is placed in jeopardy. In 20 years there will be more pensioners without property, and a memory of how Tory governments of the early 21st century made life tough for them.
The Tories know something is wrong, but most of them are groping in the dark for answers - especially when values survey after values survey shows young people to be suspicious of social security, intensely relaxed about the filthy rich (as long as they pay their taxes), and A-okay with what you might loosely describe as entrepreneurial values. Rather than putting two and two together and coming to the conclusion the party of Thatcher is the biggest block on the aspirational values she affected to champion, they cast around for alternative explanations that exonerate the Tories of all responsibility. Therefore the reason why the young are anti-Tory and why university towns pile up huge votes for Labour is because ... they're brain washed. Universities as bastions of liberal values are in the vanguard of the great crusade against social conservatism. The whip of marketisation and the introduction of the Office for Students as sector regulator-cum-watchdog has done nothing to curtail it, so why not use the hammer of debt to change them more. Limiting numbers, forcing universities to become factories for worker drones (a pill most universities have happily chomped down already, not that the Tories have noticed), limiting the provision of humanities and the social sciences and going hard on STEM, Law, and Business are, they hope, the means for depoliticising universities, their faculties and the student body.
Naturally, it's doomed to fail because the Tories misrecognise the wellspring of discontent. But the inevitable failure has the happy by-product of denuding society of critical resources, forcing students into what the Tories regard as ideologically safe programmes, and throwing out of work tens of thousands of academics knowing it will play well with a unhinged base happy to see the "liberal elite" taken down a peg or two. Never mind the economic damage and the social cost of gutting universities this way. Owning the libs is an upside most considerable.
In the age of Coronavirus, one cannot be seen to play politics. Oppositions have to tread carefully. Still, how else can you explain the dog's breakfast the Tories are cooking up for the HE sector? This is their chance to hobble an assembly of institutions they perceive as hostile to their interests, and perhaps curb the influence of the left among young people. For them, this disaster, this emergency is precisely the time to settle scores and consolidate higher education provision more congenial to their prejudices.
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At the weekend, Andrew Rawnsley drew much mockery for asking whether Boris Johnson's spell with Covid-19 will make him more honest. Anyone with a passing acquaintance with Tory custom and practice knows the answer to that one. And yet when Johnson did appear before the cameras this morning since his recovery, there was something of a change. Not a turn to honesty, but rather an embrace of consensus.
Johnson said Coronavirus was the country's biggest challenge since the war. And it was a war in which the UK was making progress. There were fewer hospital admissions, fewer in intensive care, and stabilising infections and fatalities were all signs of "passing through the peak." He thanked the nation's community spirit and collective resolve, and this had brought the country to the brink of meeting first objective: the NHS not being overwhelmed as seen elsewhere. Likening the virus to a mugger, Johnson said we've begun to wrestle it to the floor following the initial surprise. This then is a moment of opportunity and of maximum risk.
Talking up his government's woeful record, he said some might look at our "apparent success" and wonder whether now is the time to start going easy on the quarantine. He understood the impatience and anxiety of businesses and those worried about their jobs. Johnson said he knew about the long-term effects of the emergency, but is also fully aware of the risk of a second infection spike. Therefore we must beware of relaxing things too early as this risks reversing the gains so far made. Our efforts have shielded the NHS, without which it would have been much worse.
Therefore the government's five tests for lifting the lockdown still have to be met. These are falling deaths, the NHS protected, a steep decline in the rate of infection, meeting the perennial supply challenges, and avoiding a second peak. Once these have been achieved we can move over into the second period of managing the country while it lives with the disease. This process then means difficult decisions, and nothing can be spelled out about time scales and when choices will be made. But teasing consensus, Johnson said his government and the evidence behind its decision-making would be "transparent" and he's looking to build broad agreement across industry and party lines.
In all, it was a very good speech from Johnson. For punters fed up of the too much politics of the recent past, seeing parties and politicians collaborate around shared goals has a certain appeal. And from the standpoint of the Tories, going hard on cooperation helps erase the recollection of their initial complacency. Considering the press pack have the memories of goldfish when it comes to the misdeeds of mainstream, and particularly Tory politicians, this gives Johnson leeway to define the parameters of permissible politics over the coming period. By appearing gracious, open, and inviting the opposition in, criticism that does reference their multiple failings and the dilapidated inheritance bequeathed Johnson by Dave and Theresa May is ruled out of bounds. That's for the inquiry afterwards, and those banging on about it now are cranks, weirdos, and extremists. Indeed, since day one Keir Starmer has anticipated and signed up to these parameters, reinforced over the weekend by polling.
Johnson then is looking to define the political consensus and therefore the politics of Coronavirus, and will do so to reap maximum advantage. Hence why his speech was a mission accomplished moment in more ways than one. This means Labour has a difficult environment to work in, and I'm not sure capitulating entirely to Johnson's terms is the best way of being any kind of opposition, whether "constructive" or not.
It's an unspoken tradition round these parts to cover the first PMQs of a new opposition leader, and I see no reason to stop. Not that I'm a fan of parliamentary cretinism, but more so because the weekly Q&A matters. Yes, it's frequently farcical. Yes, the Prime Minister of the day rarely answers (as true under Labour as the Tories), but of all the interminable debates in the Commons it's this session that gets snipped and repeated on the evening news. The punters get to see it. PMQs is also important for activist and members' morale, and piques the attention of the more politically engaged.
How then did Keir Starmer manage at his first session? Given the physical distancing practised in the Commons, only 50 MPs were allowed to turn up while others dialled in to ask questions. This afforded the occasion a sombre atmos which suited the super serious, softly-softly "responsible" oppositional course he's trying to steer. And up against Dominic Raab, standing in for a Prime Minister who, for once, has a proper excuse for not attending, Keir put in an assured, confident performance.
He opened by asking Raab about the capacity for testing, who responded by saying we advanced to the point of being able to administer 40,000/day. Immediately he jumped in with "then why was only 18,000 taken yesterday?" Ouch. Raab fumbled and mumbled some answer about demand, which he said was not there. An opening for Keir to talk about the issues concerning roll out for medical and care workers, and having often to travel long distances to avail themselves of them. He then asked about the death rates of NHS and care home staff. Raab supplied a figure much lower than those bandied around the press for NHS staff, and had no numbers for care workers. Keir replied he was putting him on notice about asking the same question next week (Matt Hancock supplied the answer in his subsequent statement - 15). Lastly, Keir asked about PPE supply and all Raab could do was wibble about a billion pieces of kit. Superficially impressive, but opportunities were missed for acquiring more when the seriousness of the pandemic was obvious.
As you might imagine, centrist Twitter are wetting themselves with excitement. Keir's performance was competent and if matching numbers to promises is 'forensic', it was that too. Though, given Keir's commitment to not rocking the boat too much, the jugular wasn't so missed as not gone for. Nothing about previous failures and complacency. That said, I think Keir and his support will be pleased with that, as the present conjuncture in the Commons allows for measured but detailed critique. The question however is will Keir be able to ramp up to the semi-theatrical when politics approaches normality again?
When you thought Britain's media couldn't get any worse, oops they did it again. Casting our minds back to the last election, you will recall a flouting of impartiality rules, and the gentle back rub the Tories got versus Labour's time on the rack. Time and again as the campaign unfolded broadcast and broadsheet, telly and tabloid practically united to protect the government. And if they were allergic to such crudity, some supposedly of a progressive persuasion found their reasons to delegitimise and condemn Labour's challenge. It worked, it contributed to the noisy antipathy fed back to us time and again on the doors, but it wasn't an episodic thing. Different sections of the media, whether extensions of the Conservative Party or the supposedly liberal worked in concert to make sure Jeremy Corbyn was held to account, while in their turn Theresa May and Boris Johnson were afforded every courtesy.
That was then, but what does my bitter bellyaching have to do with now? Understanding why our media are miserably failing in the face of Coronavirus. Consider the case yesterday. 980 hospital deaths were reported (again, remembering the peculiar way figures are compiled these are not the deaths to have taken place in the previous 24 hours), making the UK host of the highest hospital-based fatalities in Europe. And yet, for a full day these figures were hidden away by the news sites most people use and trust. Heading to BBC News meant digging into the live feed - nowhere was it mentioned as a story in its own right. Which was in marked contrast to when Italy's toll peaked a week or so back. Given the choice between this grim toll and Boris Johnson's recovery, they splashed with his discharge from ICU. BBC Breakfast yesterday was similarly cringing, with Stanley Johnson treated as an authority on the government and "Carrie" (not Carrie Symonds) tweeting her support for the Clap for Carers hashtag deemed a newsworthy item. Meanwhile Tom Newton-Dunn, confirming how The Sun's political editorship has, in his hands, become pure grift wittered on about Johnson watching Withnail and I from the comfort of his hospital bed. Almost a thousand people dead and our fearless hacks were busying themselves with trifles.
After repeated call outs on Twitter, and the constant drip-drip of PPE shortages our professional chatterers spent pretty much all of Saturday finding their consciences, possibly because someone they respect has made helpful suggestions to spare their considerable blushes. And what do you know, at the very moment of writing today's sad tally of 917 deaths is featured as the BBC's main item. From the start our compliant media have proven indecently reluctant to ask tough questions - with pretty much the sole exception of Channel 4 News and sundry crowd-funded alternative media. Instead, collective hackdom have gone out their way to rubbish critical comments, run stories that legitimise patriotic citizens who've taken to curtain-twitching with alacrity, and amplifying Tory lines such as medical staff not using protective equipment properly, and reckless yoof going about our urban spaces diseasing people with yoga and barbecues. You can understand why some resort to conspiracy theory to explain this embarrassing shit show of coverage.
No conspiracy is needed. Hacks like to think and say no one tells them what to write, and to a degree it's true. They don't need to be told. Their employment is thanks to being part of the same networks, having broadly similar backgrounds, shared assumptions about the way the world works and, in the main, a consensus of what is important and okay to say about politics as those who oversee the media's output. And when alternative voices not beholden to the cosy spectrum of polite opinion gain a toehold, out come the knives. The hostility to critical comment within their midst is matched by their herd-like behaviour. A few key players determine the tone and they stick to their paradigm of the permissible, backed up and enforced in the final instance by the editorial office. Their failure is material, cultural, and shows no prospect of changing soon.
Which brings us to the Coronavirus coverage. Whether individual decisions or determined from above, the doxa of our media powers on the outbreak is spelled out by Allison Pearson: "The health of Boris Johnson is the health of the body politic and, by extension, the health of the nation itself." Crudely put, but true enough. With a national effort underway their responsibility is to be, well, responsible. By refusing to rock the boat, by happily assisting the push for scapegoats, by not being critical, by privileging puff stories, the Fourth Estate see themselves less an independent voice and more an adjunct of the state, the willing means by which the bio- and necropolitical priorities of Covid-19 management are discharged. Therefore as a voluntary arm of the state and at the disposal of the government, is it that shocking their coverage has proved, well, shocking?
The polls, such as they are, favour Johnson for the moment and are likely to for as long as this crisis persists. But there is frustration and anger building in the country at the visible blunders the Tories have made, its initial complacency, the lack of resources for NHS staff, tardiness over testing, and on top of it the farcical policing of the quarantine. Apologies through gritted teeth from Priti Patel won't cut it indefinitely. Discontent can't be held back forever, and when it builds up to critical levels, the media won't so much as articulate it but work to manage it. As they always have done.
Media power, however, is not unassailable. Despite the pathetic pleas of The Sun's Dan Wootton to buy a paper to keep journalism going for future generations, Coronavirus quarantine is accelerating the decline of the press and imperilling its institutional strength. Likewise, Corbynism might be over but the movement remains, above all its networks and nascent alternative media. The longer the crisis persists, the steeper the decline in circulation, and the looser its grip on opinion formation, and the more opportunities there are for left messages to cut through. If there are any silver linings to this awful crisis, a speedy collapse of the press's power to frame and disseminate their commonsense is one of them.
"It's the dregs of the Brown combined with the mediocrity of the Miliband era", so says a "senior Labour MP" finding themselves passed over for preferment in Keir Starmer's first shadow cabinet. That's one way of looking at it. The other is a candidate of the soft left fills his first appointments ... mostly from the soft left. Shocking, I know. In terms of political balance appointing Rachel Reeves the roving brief of the Shadow Chancellor for the Duchy of Westminster is a bone thrown to Labour First, while shuffling Rebecca Long-Bailey to Education is there to placate the left. Not that either wings are going to be satisfied by measly nuggets, but it doesn't matter. The left are strong, but not as strong as it might be, and the right have hitched their wagons to Keir's caravan - not the other way round.
What to make of the rest of the new appointments? Slotting Anneliese Dodds into shadow chancellor is a good shout. Upon her election in 2017 she served loyally with John McDonnell, obtaining his endorsement, and helped work up Labour's green industrial programme. She was part of the party's economics road show, for instance. This will at least mollify the left who are happy to take John's recommendation as good coin, even if they don't know her terribly well. And for those who enjoy entertaining counterfactuals, it's likely Anneliese would have got picked for this position had RLB won. Giving Lisa Nandy shadow foreign was probably not much of a surprise, though it will be noted in the scheme of the Westminster pecking order that she was awarded a more senior position than the woman who actually came second. Folks can read into that what they will. But from the standpoint of making an impact, as we saw in the leadership election Lisa easily had the best of Andrew Neil and would therefore prove more than a match for the hapless Dominic Raab in the post-Covid world. Despite an unwelcome propensity to be economical with the actualité, from Starmer's point of view a top drawer media performer with a proven ability to think on her feet will, he thinks, make her an asset to the new leadership.
Other appointments? I suppose the return of Ed Miliband is something Keir's core supporters will appreciate. Still popular in the party, politically it reconnects with the pre-Corbyn era and effectively parcels Jeremy's time off as adeparture from the norm. Now liberated from the Blairist constraints said to have saddled him between 2010 and 2015, we'll see whether there is radical mettle in his soul. The moving in of Jonathan Reynolds to shadow social security is interesting. Rare among the centre right of the party his idea of "radical welfare reform" isn't privatising and marketising everything, unlike some. But he is supportive of the basic income, which we hear today is now part of Spain's response to the Coronavirus crisis. Having an advocate for it in this position is encouraging. Scotland was only ever going to be given to Ian Murray, bringing back Charlie Falconer as shadow attorney general was entirely predictable, as was shifting Emily Thornberry to international development and giving David Lammy a prominent role (considering his exemplary work around Grenfell Tower).
Who's in and who's out - which is all of Corbyn's top team except for RLB, Jonathan Ashworth, Angela Rayner, and Emily - is jolly good fun, but what about the politics? First, Keir has not gone out of his way to troll the left and appoint some of the party's biggest idiots. Positions for the likes of Wes Streeting, Jess Phillips, Neil Coyle, and Margaret Hodge was sure to severely damage his creds as the unity candidate and, well, undermined the capacity of his team. Having one eye on the brief, while giving under the counter briefings to the lobby hacks wouldn't have done. As regards wider alignments in the party this spells the end of Unite's disproportionate influence over the party leadership. It's certainly true many trade union tops in other unions felt their nose was put out of joint these last few years, both in terms of Unite's out manoeuvring them for influence and the Corbynist pressures coming upwards from their activist wings. Why else, despite the over long contest, did many general secretaries scramble to convene candidate endorsement meetings before pressure could build from lower down the union echelons - a lesson learned from 2015 when the collective apparat were caught on the hop. And so now Unite is more out in the cold and the other union leaders enjoy more pre-eminence - again, a return to how matters were pre-Corbyn.
Overall though, folks claiming this is a neoliberal or Blairist restoration are wide of the mark. The left are right to harbour serious concerns about Keir Starmer, and his commitment to a Corbynish platform during the election probably owes more to positioning than genuine enthusiasm, but the politics of what we're seeing is a return to soft left Fabianism. A politics of brainy and socially concerned technocrats dispensing justice through a top down plan here, and tinkering with the state machinery there. This is a step back from Corbynism, which despite the criticisms that can be made of it recognised itself rooted in social struggles and class politics, whereas this - in as much as it tells itself a story of its lineage - is closest to ethical socialism (i.e. a better society is a nice idea as opposed to a material necessity) and therefore is liable to be overly wonky, remote from what's actually happening in the real world and, well, boring. But perhaps after the turbulent time we've had and the Coronavirus crisis, boring might just be what the electorate four years from now wants.
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Dear Corbyn Supporter,
With 275,560 votes (56.2%) vs Rebecca Long-Bailey's 135,218 votes (27.6%) and Lisa Nandy's 79,597 (16.2%) Keir Starmer is the new leader. Sometimes politics is totally, straightforwardly predictable. Also the left candidates for the deputy leadership didn't do fantastically, what with Richard Burgon getting 80,053 votes (17.3%) and Dawn Butler receiving 50,255 (10.9%) in the first round. Alas, the crank right had little to shout about - Ian Murray could only muster 61,179 votes (13.3%), despite my endorsement.
Fallow times for the left, then. Or are they?
I'm extremely sceptical of Keir Starmer's leadership. His pushing of the second referendum after 2017 either demonstrated conscious complicity with an obvious campaign to undermine Jeremy Corbyn, appalling naivete, or - considering how central Brexit was to the Tory revival - an unseemly tone deafness. These are not qualities that recommended Keir as a serious leadership candidate, but alas. Here we are. We're going to have to live with someone whose first instinct is to praise the government when they're doing well, and keep quiet when they're not - an approach sure to set us up for future election victories.
What does the left do now? It's very likely tens of thousands of party members are considering their position. If you're one of them, you should stay. This isn't to say the Labour Party must be the be-all and end-all of your political focus. As a number of comrades have noted, the eruption of Corbynism and the drawing of virtually the entire left into the party has left the field open for other forces to fill the street and community campaigning niches. Most obvious is the rapid growth of Extinction Rebellion and its radical liberal politics of personal responsibility and accountability, with its daft stunts like clambering on top of trains and activists gluing themselves to the front of Labour's battle bus. The end of Corbynism means this sort of organising by the left will no longer get neglected. However, the shift of focus doesn't necessarily entail dumping party membership. Especially when there are plenty of battles coming up.
Regardless of my Starmer scepticism, he was elected on a Corbynist-lite programme. And as we're seeing the editorial board of the bosses' house organ, the FT calling for a new settlement along these lines, the political room for backsliding is blocked by a largely left wing membership and an emerging bourgeois common sense - though I strongly suspect the latter will count for more than the former. But this is no room for complacency. Not only can we expect attempts at rolling back manifesto commitments, but also the limited democratic advances made in the last five years. Prepare for a lot of dishonest hand-wringing over the imminent EHRC conclusions, and the best efforts of the right to try and purge prominent leftists. We're likely to see some trolling too, with the inviting back of horrendous scabs like Ian Austin and John Mann, and finding jobs for backbench phantoms of Labour's recent past. In these circumstances there is no need for a purge if the left can be expected to purge themselves. These initiatives and moves need resisting not just because it weakens the left in the party, but because they weaken the left and, yes, the viability of the Labour Party as a whole.
Therefore comrades who've had a bellyful (and seriously, who hasn't?) should approach the matter not as an issue of ideological purity but as pragmatic class politics. Keep the membership and follow your own political priorities outside the party, but support comrades in the party when it comes to crucial votes, meetings, and selections. That's it. And as quid pro quo, for comrades whose focus remains Labour stuff they should seek to use whatever leverage they have in the party to support and publicise activism and struggles taking place outside of it. This isn't particularly difficult, nor is it a big ask. Rather it's maintaining what is already happening in a lot of places, of preserving the relative cohesion of our movement.
Consider the position of the left at the moment. Apart from a few irrelevances, for the first time in my political life the left is largely united and pulling in a common direction. Even with the catastrophic defeat and the subsequent arguments about who should stand for the left, what is unique about this moment is how the left hasn't turned in on itself. There's been a dribble of support from the active left over to camp Keir, but it has been clear sighted about how the class interests of our people are best served by Rebecca Long-Bailey's candidacy. I hope this clarity and seriousness continues as we grow accustomed to the new politics of the post-Covid era.
For the left in Labour, resistance is the name of the game but, to borrow a phrase, not opposition for opposition's sake. Criticising the new leader when Keir makes his mistakes, continuing to advocate for policies and strategies that keep our coalition together, resist the spurious Coronavirus Union Sacrée and carry on forcefully attacking the Tories and, crucially, defending Starmer from the inevitable Labour right carping so they can get back to their long 90s comfort zone and, crucially for them, their former prominence and power. The left might have very little to no confidence in Starmer, but that doesn't mean we don't want him to succeed. We do, but success is measured by the demands of the moment. Our job is to ensure he and the rest of the party are up to it.
And this is where those comrades whose focus outside of the party is crucial. We must resist the tendency to fragmentation and squabbling, but continue to learn from and keep accountable to one another. We need to keep ourselves honest. As someone who was once completely sucked into the party machinery, I know how a total fixation on the party can insulate one from wider politics and distort your perspective. Likewise, total neglect/outright hostility runs the risk of ceding conventional politics entirely to our enemies. The left then must stand with one leg in and one leg outside the party, that is how we stay united. This is our responsibility, no one else's. The future will not be kind if we fail.
Best,
Phil
A frightful ghoul stalks my nightmares. Boris Johnson makes a complete hash of the Coronavirus crisis, which is what he's presently doing (despite what the polls think), and he then screws up the subsequent peace with austerity 2.0. After all, we have to pay for all those bail outs. Yet, even then, despite a smooth new Labour leader at the helm we still lose. Because with everything else gone to pot, the Tories decide on replaying the 2019 general election. And Labour hasn't drawn a single bloody lesson from December's catastrophe and lose because significant chunks of the party can't stop banging on about Brexit.
A portent of siren calls to come hails this time from Rafael Behr, who uses the occasion of unprecedented crisis to moan about Brexit. Padding out his piece, we are pointed to the tomb of Tory orthodoxy, wherein lies the mouldering bones of laissez faire and small statism. If these can be interred in the ossuary in the first throes of the crisis, he muses, then further down the track surely a Brexit delay and an extension to the transition period - lobbied for by the European Union, but so far resisted by Johnson - could be pulled off after a few more weeks of lock down. His second argument is against the very real threat Coronavirus poses, Brexit seems like a petty, trivial, and small-minded affair which this crisis could confirm and then write off as a bad idea. Unfortunately, this sounds very much like Coronavirus-conditioned wishful thinking.
Politically, the pandemic has changed a lot. But that doesn't mean we're in Year Zero. A number of leftist writers have argued, including yours truly, how the government have skipped the most expeditious means of addressing employment and welfare problems (i.e. the payment of a flat, relatively generous basic income) in favour of measures designed to protect the wage relation, keep punitive social security arrangements in place, and guard against the principle of income deriving from anything but work. Like duh, capitalist states are going to protect capitalist economies, and that's true of any mainstream party regardless of political colours. In this sense, the Tories are ensuring that, at least where the fundamentals of political economy are concerned, there will be no great reset. Their pre-Corona budget set out a strategy for big spending, and the (intentionally blank) manifesto gives them plenty of room to liberally raid Labour's discarded document and do whatever they see fit.
And doing whatever they see fit has the dual project of preserving class relationships, which is to be achieved by their continuing political dominance. And, yes, that means carrying on with Brexit. As Rafael observes, Johnson does have wiggle room here as some two thirds of voters, or thereabouts, are chill with delaying the negotiations and having an extension to the transition period. And it's probable Johnson will take it up in time once the practicalities assert themselves. Yet, seeing as his winning formula of sticking to Brexit made his political fortune, for as long as possible he will stick with the rhetoric of getting it done. The problem then comes with what happens next. One extension is fine, but given this crisis is with us for at least six months and rolling lock downs could be a feature of everyday life for the next year, the danger lies in the number of times the talks are extended and/or its length. The longer this goes on, the politics of old, the angry impatience with delay and Brexit thwarted will find ingress back into political life, and the greater the potential cost to Johnson.
This is where the danger to Labour presents itself. Considering who we're about to make our party leader, Keir Starmer's base is, to put it euphemistically, enthusiastically pro-EU. And despite prior promises of Brexit being a settled issue, fools could easily rush in where Rafael happily treads. Coronavirus-induced Brexit delays are going to be seized upon to reopen the arguments we've enjoyed these last four years. I don't think it's going to be particularly helpful for Labour to enter into the politics of reconstruction and recovery with a prominent and vocal strand calling for a reassessment of Brexit, up to and including rejoining the EU as full members. What it would do, however, is throw Johnson and the Tories a life line when they most need it. Don't let them deflect attention from their reckless necropolitics and general incompetence, but this is precisely what reopening the Brexit debate on remain terms will do. It will then be Labour who'll be accused of exploiting a serious crisis to thwart a democratic vote, and Labour who'll be seen to disrespect the memory of those voters who didn't make it through the pandemic. And the result? The same polarisation, and the same outcome.
If the new leadership has any sense it will abandon the Coronavirus timidity evidenced by Keir Starmer's candidacy, and ignore the temptation to bang the remain drum as Johnson founders in the Brexit negotiations. If we are to believe the forensically forensic hype, surely we're not about to lose focus as the task as the politics of recovery looms over everything?
Oh noes. According to the latest poll, the Tories are on 54% and Labour are stuck at 26%. 72% are satisfied with Boris Johnson's performance and ditto for the government as a whole. There are a few points that arise from this polling, quite apart from why pollsters are requiring call centres to carry this out for them when workers should be sat at home and stymieing the spread of Covid-19.
Firstly, polling electoral intentions are utterly pointless - a point the article above concedes. It isn't just that elections are now postponed, but also the moment we're living in is fleeting and highly unusual. Voting intentions today aren't voting intentions four years hence, though it is beyond likely the politics then are still going to be dominated by this crisis and the subsequent recovery. Also, Labour isn't figuring in the wider political imaginary - apart from scabby MPs coveting the settling of scores. This isn't because Labour haven't been taking to the airwaves making their criticisms known as Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell both have ventured powerful criticisms of the government's handling that echo points long made by health campaigners and NHS workers. It is, sadly, because most people have tuned out from what they're saying. The double whammy of election defeat and the stupidly, unnecessarily long leadership contest has simply ruled Corbyn out as a contender. No doubt this will change with the election of a new leader next week, but in the mean time can't do anything but depress Labour's numbers.
The second explanation is so obviously obvious even a politics prof would get it. In times of national emergency, there is a tendency for people to rally around the government because, well, there is nothing else they can do. We see it in country after country, the support for incumbent leaders have gone up. Even Donald Trump, whose handling of the Coronavirus crisis has proven spectacularly incompetent and has doomed tens if not hundreds of thousands to otherwise avoidable deaths has enjoyed a bounce in approval ratings. Hence the criticisms, of which there are legion, that can be made about the government completely bounce off or do not find a mass audience.
Think about it like this. Facing an invisible adversary individuals are powerless against, the avenues of agency are radically narrowed. Abiding by the letter of the government's advice is an obvious means of doing something. And as someone who's been out everyday during the crisis to get in my state-sanctioned exercise, its effect has proven striking. Virtually no cars on the roads. Very few people in our local park. But staying home is not enough. As police reports suggest, we've descended into a nation of curtain twitchers with neighbour informing on neighbour, and suspicious people (i.e. anyone happening to stroll by) sparking unease and dread across the land. The likes of Derbyshire Police should be mocked for their over-the-top scouring of the Dales and Peak District by drone, but they're sublimating the eye-spy proclivities of millions of scared and frustrated people. The stymied agency does have its positives though, such as the public round of applause NHS workers received on Thursday, the setting up of mutual aid organisations, and the hundreds of thousands who've volunteered in response to the government's call. Things have got so bad that even Twitter is bearable, being used for good-natured bants and a means of whiling away the hours positively. And this in turn reflects on the government. As the state is the legitimised institutional expression of country and therefore representative of the "national community", it condenses the hopes of beating this disease and finds projected onto it what you might call aspirational agency - what its populace would like to do, but can only effect through collective effort. In this case, what the state is apparently doing on their behalf.
This cannot persist, and will not persist. China and Italy have already seen outbreaks of violent unrest, and while it would be stupid to suppose the UK has this to look forward to with any sense of inevitability, these polling figures won't last forever. For as long as the emergency is perceived, unless the government does anything else egregiously and obviously stupid most will continue to give them the benefit of the doubt. What happens when normality arrives, and how the Tories are going to try and turn the clock back, this will be the crucial time. Therefore it's not worth paying any mind to polling until then, except as a curio for future historians.
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