Self-Immolating Speech



I enjoyed this opinion piece by Dan Hodges in The Telegraph in which he memorably describes Ed Miliband's speech to the Labour Party conference as a 'self-immolating address'. 

Now that's quite an arresting turn of phrase and it reminded me of this post from the blog site archive which features a cartoon of Ed Miliband shaking hands with his old boss, Gordon Brown. 
Ditching Ed Miliband will only help if Labour learns the lessons of his tragedy

By Dan Hodges - The Telegraph

New? Fresh?

On the Thursday morning after Ed Miliband’s self-immolating address to Labour Party conference, a line appeared in a couple of newspapers from an anonymous senior aide. The final draft of the speech had not been a collective effort, they said. Instead, Miliband had spent the previous week closeted away with his former university flatmate Marc Stears, working on the final text.

That briefing was politically revealing, because it demonstrated the extent to which even members of Miliband’s closest circle were distancing themselves from their principal and his performance. But there was also something strangely poignant about it. The man who had destroyed his own brother in order to secure the ultimate political prize, huddled with his closest friend, revealing how he had begun wandering Hampstead Heath in search of inspiration and affirmation. Perhaps even absolution.

Today Miliband stands alone. His tribunes and champions have either fled or been slain. The voices that told us not to underestimate him, that all he needed was time, that he has discerned shifts in the public mood that ordinary politicians could never see, let alone influence, have finally fallen silent. All that can be heard now is the sound of cold steel grating against stone.

After four years in denial Labour at last understands it has the wrong man as its leader. A few in the party’s ranks think Ed Miliband may still find a way of sneaking into Downing Street via the tradesman’s entrance. A few others think Nick Clegg or Nigel Farage may smuggle him in. But there is nobody on the Left, centre or Right of the Labour movement who is now able to contest with credibility or conviction the proposition that Miliband is the greatest single obstacle to their party winning the 2015 election.

Finally – belatedly – Labour has woken up to its Ed Miliband problem. But judging from the last 48 hours, it is no nearer to identifying a solution.

On Sunday John Prescott ventured into print with a stinging critique. Miliband was “pursuing a core vote strategy of getting 31 per cent of traditional Labour supporters with a few ex-Lib Dem voters”, he chided. According to Labour’s former deputy leader, this contrasted with Labour’s 1997 election strategy where “We recognised the need to build broad support across the country, not just in our Labour heartlands of the North and London. That’s how we got a landslide”.

Compelling. But then you search for some detail in Prescott’s article about what a plan for building that broad new coalition would look like. And you search in vain. There’s some stuff about ditching focus groups. And abandoning something called “US style politics”. And a plea to “ be brave”. But that’s about it.

Today this paper reported that some Labour MPs were advocating a more concrete resolution to their party’s predicament – a leadership challenge by former Home Secretary Alan Johnson. Mr Johnson’s credentials for the highest office in the land, as enunciated by one of his supporters, consist of the following: “He's a straight-talking sort of guy who the electorate will take to. They've taken to him before. He can relate to people, he's a smart politician.”

A straight-talking guy, who is smart and can relate to people. Or, in other words, yet another abstract, biographical construct.

Miliband was elected to move Labour into the post-Blair/Brown era. He failed. Now his party is collectively trying to work out how to move into the post-Miliband era. And they’re failing as well.

Why are they failing? Primarily because Labour is still trying to make an electoral omelette without breaking eggs. Prescott knows perfectly well why Miliband has failed to reconstruct Blair’s winning coalition. It’s because he hasn’t even tried to reconstruct it. To do so would involve reaching out to Tory voters, and no one – John Prescott included – wants to be seen overtly advocating such a strategy.

An increasing number of people in Labour’s ranks are happy to talk in general terms about broadening Labour’s appeal. But few want to be seen to be taking ownership of the hard policy necessary to turn that dream into reality. So we currently hear lots about Labour’s need to be “brave” and “bold” and “radical”. And much less about Labour’s need to be brave in advocating specific cuts, bold in curbing welfare and radical in reforming public services.

Another reason is that too many people are still contesting Labour’s destiny within parameters set by Miliband himself. To win the leadership election he framed a false choice – move Left with me, or be stuck with Blairism in perpetuity.

In reality neither Miliband nor Johnson represent the future. One of Miliband’s rare achievements is that with his shadow cabinet appointments he has managed to build a bridge across the political generations. And the Labour Party now must have the courage and wisdom to walk across it. The likes of Chukka Umunna, Rachel Reeves, Tristram Hunt and the rest of the 2010 intake are unencumbered by Brownite, Blairite or Milibite baggage. Labour’s next leader must come from their ranks.

As the search for new Messiah begins, there is one final problem confronting his or her putative disciples. Labour has no Messiah. There is nobody waiting in the wings who can click their fingers, unite both Left and Right, and swiftly bring into existence a new grand progressive coalition. The last four wasted years cannot simply be wished away; nor can they be soothed away with the balm of bland consensus.

The Labour Party has to recognise that fact. If it searches for the perfect replacement for Miliband, it will search forever.

So yes, Miliband is a broken and isolated leader. And yes, Labour would probably be better off ditching him. But only if it is prepared to undergo the broader political realignment necessary to leave the comfort zone it has inhabited since his election. And only if it is prepared to replace him with someone who would represent a genuine political step forward, not a stopgap, or retreat to the past. And only if it is prepared to select a leader who has a mandate to challenge his party, not an instruction to prostrate himself before it.

When Labour chose Ed Miliband, they chose wrong. They can’t afford to choose wrong again.



Wish You Were Here (22 April 2013)

Peter Brookes cartoon

















I must admit I was a bit puzzled when I saw this Peter Brookes cartoon in The Times newspaper at the weekend.

Because while I vaguely remembered the cover of the Pink Floyd album 'Wish You Were Here' from the 1970s - I didn't really understand the reference to Gordon Brown and Ed  Miliband - the last but one and current leaders of the Labour Party, of course.

Now it could be I still don't know what I'm talking about, but having looked into things a little - it seems 'Wish You Were Here' had two recurrent themes.

One was the loss of a previous band member - Syd Barrett - to mental illness and the feelings of regret and sorrow that this loss provoked in other members of the group remembered in the following lines:

"Remember when you were young, you shone like the sun" - or - "You reached for the secret too soon, you cried for the moon." 

Prententious rubbish borne out of too many drug and drink fuelled days - or wise words distilled from a Zen-like, mystical state of peace and tranquility?

A matter of taste, I suppose - but the 1970s were full of super groups spouting this kind of drivel and nonsense and Pink Floyd were no exception. 

Another theme, perhaps more relevant to the album cover designed by Storm Thorgerson - is that of getting 'burned' and exploited by big business - with the music companies and record lables ripping off naive musicians and bands struggling for their first big break.

In which case it seems that Ed Miliband is being set on fire - in the act of shaking hands with his old boss, Gordon Brown.

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