James Graham has been making much noise proclaiming the end of Equi-distance thanks to a pamphlet written by Nick Clegg that’s been published by Demos. He might be right, but it doesn’t seem that way to me from what I’ve seen so far. Then again, I wasn’t able to listen in to the briefing given to us bloggers, so perhaps this is why I’ve not yet put it into the proper ‘context’ so to speak.
It’s the most overt appeal to disillusioned Labour voters I’ve yet seen – specifically those ‘New Labour’ voters that fell to the charms of Tony Blair, rather than the hardcore collectivists that consider loyalty to Labour a virtue in and of itself. It looks like part of a strategy, not *the* strategy. The talk of “progressivism” I blame, entirely, on Obama-mania – but I seriously doubt anyone but political anoraks talk about a ‘progressive future’ anyway. This is not aimed at the general public. It’s aimed squarely at Polly Toynbee and other left wing opinion formers.
Of course, I can mostly agree with stuff like this*:
As I will argue below, liberalism’s starting point is the fairer dispersal and distribution of power. From a fairer tax system to the protection of civil liberties, from the reform of our clapped out Westminster politics to the break up of monopolistic banks, from devolved public services to a new concept of green citizenship, from social radicalism in education to a more accountable and effective European Union, dispersing power more fairly and holding the powerful to account runs as a thread through all of my ownliberal beliefs.
… except for the bit about Green Citizenship as you can possibly guess. The only environmental issues that really concern me are those relating to polluting the water supply, polluting the air with chemicals that cause breathing problems, etc. You know, the quality of our environment.
But I’ve digressed. See, Nick’s biggest problem is the Green issue, for me. If you accept that action needs to be taken, then the only real way to achieve that is co-ordinated international action, because we all know that anything we do is pure token gesture for the benefit of sending ‘a message’ – crippling token gestures at that, too. The danger is that in demanding devolution of power with your right hand whilst centralising other powers – in fact much more important powers – with your left confuses everyone and makes people doubt you’re sincere about either.
Sadly for everyone, this pamphlet is 92 pages long without an executive summary so the odds of being able to read this properly are quite low. I certainly can’t do it before I head off to work.
So far I’ve not been able to find the bit where he rules out propping up the Conservatives (as claimed by James), but I have found a bit where he says he refuses to ‘even contemplate’ doing the same for Labour. In other words… nothing’s really changed there. We’re not going to prop up either.
Hopefully more on this soon… if I can get time to read it. Where’s the executive summary for those of us not able to listen in to the briefing call? Think of the churnalists! Please, won’t someone think of the churnalists?!
*With the caveat that this is clearly in language not aimed at me. If you actually look at the principles expressed then yes, I can see some seeds of common ground.
Andrew Hickey said...
17 Sep 09 at 10:41 am
I, and I think most people, *do* accept that something needs to be done about the environment, and therefore yes, some kind of international co-operation is needed. I don’t think that’s at all in conflict with greater localism and freedom – in fact done properly they can go hand in hand.
I suspect here you’re letting your worry that capitalism and environmentalism are incompatible (which I don’t believe is true) blind you to real problems…
ayld said...
17 Sep 09 at 10:57 am
The question is whether our plans for the “green revolution” involve any centrally imposed cuts, or engineer changes on a similar scale using new taxes and new subsidies, or some nice ‘liberal encouragement’ (lip service?) backed by free training for the large pool of unemployed labour and capital that we have at the moment. None are perfect by a long shot, and I don’t think there are other ways to force businesses and industries to take them up.
Jack Hughes said...
17 Sep 09 at 11:18 am
“something needs to be done about the environment”
A committee ?
A report ?
Maybe a plenary session ?
Why not a committee about a report ?
Or a report about the committee ?
Have I stumbled into a Ned Flanders convention ?
Alix said...
17 Sep 09 at 12:18 pm
“The danger is that in demanding devolution of power with your right hand whilst centralising other powers – in fact much more important powers – with your left confuses everyone and makes people doubt you’re sincere about either.”
This is essentially the Tory argument, that it’s impossible to contemplate localism and Europeanism as part of the same outlook. I really don’t get why people think this. Clearly it’s more helpful to, for example, tackle illegal arms dealing on an international basis as opposed to a local basis, or even a national basis. Just as it would actually be far more helpful to organise schooling on a local basis than an international basis, or indeed a national basis. (In fact the national basis is the unhappy medium in quite a lot of these sorts of examples…) Basically, it’s a question of the appropriate level for the problem you want to solve.
Mind you, that clearly shouldn’t necessarily commit us to “Europe” in the sense that it exists at the moment. I would also agree that the green issue is a borderline case, and it does largely depend on what you think should “happen” about the environment.
Charlotte Gore said...
17 Sep 09 at 12:29 pm
Alix,
Yes, I agree with you that certain international action is always essential – mutual free trade agreements being the obvious one.
It’s the Green thing – the solutions offered so far are economic planning. The idea of that being organised centrally on an international level is chilling, not least of which because if the result of such economic planning is economic disaster then the greater the number of countries under the control of the governing body, the worse things will be for everyone.
James Graham said...
17 Sep 09 at 12:54 pm
Clegg doesn’t talk about who he would or would not make pacts with in this pamphlet and the emphasis is on replacing Labour not working with them. But the subtext of placing the Conservatives as The Enemy and Labour mere rivals is inescapable. You can’t claim the mantle of “progressivism” while sitting pretty in Cabinet with David Cameron.
You only really need the introduction and the conclusion by the way. Most of the chapters merely restate policy.
Thomas Byrne said...
17 Sep 09 at 2:21 pm
I don’t know about you James, but our Schooling Policy, and International Aid Policy, sitting alongside the Lib Dems ‘fairness’ (Making cuts for the rich as well as the poor) and social liberalism sits pretty well with me.
Julian H said...
17 Sep 09 at 3:04 pm
“Clearly it’s more helpful to, for example, tackle illegal arms dealing on an international basis as opposed to a local basis”
I’d have thought that’s because national governments are the biggest buyers and sellers of arms by a country mile.
Overall I agree with your point, though – I’m happy with large, international institutions – or at least would be if they were constitutionally limited to stop remote politicians and bureaucrats imposing vested-interest-suiting rules over all of us.
Roger Thornhill said...
17 Sep 09 at 4:24 pm
Internationalism is fine as long as it is non-binding. Once that happens (q.v. EU, UN) then sovereignty leaks away into unaccountable cesspools.
But back to Clegg – the problem is the vague word “fair”. Fair to me is equal treatment under Rule of Law. Clegg says fine words, but the Authoritarian, nay, Totalitarian devil is in the detail. Is it fair to take from the productive to give to the unproductive without consent? How about if those who produce decide where it goes?
As for “social radicalism in schools” – how about “get your bad haircut out of my school”? A liberal who wants to interfere so much is basically an Authoritarian-Totalitarian who wants to be loved.
Andrew Hickey said...
17 Sep 09 at 4:26 pm
How are you defining ‘productive’, Roger? Because as far as I can tell many of the richest people are some of the *least* productive members of society…
Roger Thornhill said...
17 Sep 09 at 11:54 pm
Andrew, who is talking anout the rich? Pepple on minimum wage are taxed.
Even if I were, your stance Shows your blinkered prejudices and ignorance of how an economy functions.
Andrew Hickey said...
18 Sep 09 at 7:52 am
Which is precisely why I said it depends how you’re defining productive. Of course one of the things reiterated in this pamphlet is the desire to stop the poorest paying income tax altogether…
James said...
18 Sep 09 at 8:23 am
Meeting binding climate change targets won’t require some kind of democratic centralism or five year plans. There are plenty of ways to skin this cat (apologies to the laser kitties).
And, re the Flandersism query above, what would you actually do?
Jack Hughes said...
19 Sep 09 at 6:09 am
Re: “Something must be done”
This is so horribly vague and it’s also passive voice. Who ? What When ? Why ? How ?
Albert Einstein once said: “If I had an hour to save the world
I would spend 59 minutes defining the problem and one minute finding solutions”
Over to you guys to define the “problem” with the environment.