Britain’s biggest unions come out for Ken

The leaders of Britain’s biggest trade unions have come out in support of Ken Livingstone’s re-election as Mayor of London. In a statement Paul Kenny, Billy Hayes, Dave Prentice, Derek Simpson and Tony Woodley, general secretaries of the GMB, CWU, UNISON, Unite (Amicus section) and Unite (T&G section) say:

“We urge every Londoner to support the re-election of Ken Livingstone as Mayor of London in May 2008.”
“Under Ken Livingstone’s leadership London’s public services, particularly bus services and the transport system as a whole, have been radically improved and, after years of neglect he has begun a program of radical and progressive steps to improve the environment, and increase the supply of affordable housing – using his planning powers to force developers to make half of all new homes affordable.”

They praise Livingstone for his progressive policies which they say has been delivered by
“uprooting the Thatcherite dogma that everything should be left to the free market – and replacing it with massive investment in public services and support for organisations such as the trade union movement fighting to improve life for ordinary Londoners.”

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Black Socialist Society Special Conference – 24 November

The Black Socialist Society Special Conference 2007 will be held in Manchester College of Arts and Technology, Ashton Old Road, Manchester, M11 2WH on Saturday 24 November 2007. Conference attendees will gather to take part in Labour’s policy making process, receive training, hear from Government Ministers and much more.

The results of the Black Socialist Society name change ballot will also be announced at the Special Conference. The names under consideration are as follows:
1. Black and Asian Society
2. Black and Asian Socialist Society
3. Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic Society
4. Black, Asian, Arabs and Chinese Society
5. BAME Labour Society
6. BAME Labour

This is an important conference which will be the first since the re-established of the Black Socialist Society earlier this year. The organisation has over 4500 members, is an affiliate of the Labour Party and is the biggest organisation of its kind in British politics today. Its chair is the former Mayor of Brent, Ahmad Shahzad, and its representative on Labour’s National Executive Committee is the Chair of the Home Affairs Select Committee, Keith Vaz MP (above).

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Baroness Prosser adds to calls for for ‘representative actions’ to plug the persistent pay gaps

In response to last week’s Office of National Statistics pay figures, which show the full time gender pay gap remains a stubborn 17.2%, and the part-time pay gap 35.6%, Baroness Margaret Prosser, deputy Chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission (and TMP contributor) said,

“The pay gap between men and women is closing at snail’s pace. Even taking into account today’s tiny improvement, it will still take at least two decades to resolve this injustice. Women who work full time are cheated of around £330,000 over the course of their lifetime. This is blatant unfairness.

This is not just about an extra pair of shoes for a night out. Nationwide, women are less able to save for a pension, leaving them poverty stricken in old age. The low wages of many single mums leaves them struggling to pay the household bills.

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Dawn does us proud

In front of a packed House of Commons and TV cameras, Labour MP for Brent South and TMP fan, Dawn Butler, was given the honour of seconding the Queen’s Speech last week.

Dawn spoke about her pride in Brent and its many wonders including Dollis Hill House, the Swaminaryan Temple, Wembley Mosque, the house where Bob Marley used to live and Wembley Stadium.  Dawn said, “although I may have some of the poorest wards in the country, I can testify that my constituency is full of richness, full of ordinary people who achieve extraordinary things.”

As Vice Chair of the Labour Party for Youth, Dawn’s speech focused on the benefits for young people in the Government’s programme.  Under the Government’s proposals young people will stay in education or training until age 18, and they will be provided with new opportunities to undertake apprenticeships.

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Chuka and Polly – the conversation continues

In the second part of his interview with Guardian columnist Polly Toynbee, TMP editor Chuka Umunna puts to her the accusation that she contradicts herself, asks her to justify her claim that the Brown government has left social democracy for dead, discusses with her the electoral viability of the equality and fairness agenda she promotes, finds out what she thinks of all-black shortlists and invites her to speculate on which “young turk” will succeed the Prime Minister.

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CU: Some people say you are a bit all over the place and that you often contradict yourself. For example, on the one hand you claim that the Blair government was one of the best, on the other hand you were highly critical of Blair the man. How do you marry those two approaches?

PT: …..well both things are true. We haven’t had a lot of good governments since the war. I’ve done two books with David Walker [the Guardian’s social affairs editor] assessing Labour’s first and second terms, in which we added up everything that has been done in each department, and it is a pretty impressive record. The amount of money spent, the improvements, the way hospitals, schools and open spaces – everything – just looks so much better! We forget how utterly run down things were in 1997 and how bad it was.

Most of Labour’s ideas have been very good. Most of the things they have done have worked, though some have not and not enough has been spent on the public sector (the result of Swedish ambitions on close to American levels of taxation). I supported Blair, despite the fact of being passionately against the Iraq war right from the start of it. I supported him through the last election because I thought that dumping him and putting Brown in beforehand would have been the wrong thing to do and Blair would probably win – he did.

But after that I thought he ought to go very quickly – quit while he was ahead, having won three elections. The time he stayed was incredibly painful after the 2005 election, at which point I was turning very anti-Blair but I never moved to a position where I was saying “everything the government does is rubbish”. I simply said that Blair should go, the war is a calamity and he ought to realise he’s not in a position any more to be inspiring or to produce new policies.

CU: Were you ever inspired by Tony Blair in a big way?

PT: Erm…well I suppose by things he did, yes. And you couldn’t but catch the enthusiasm of ‘97. What they pulled off between ’94 and ’97 was pretty fantastic. It was pretty amazing what they’d created, it was a huge success and it went on to do a great many very good things.

But there were a lot of things I didn’t like about Blair’s approach. I didn’t like him not being able to speak about inequality and not caring about doing something about the rich. I didn’t like the whole choice agenda and the privatisations, but that was only a fairly small part of what his government did. We’ve had a very competent 10 year government – better than anything since Attlee.

I don’t think any of that is contradictory. It is possible to say how well the government has done, whilst highlighting the opportunities they have missed.

CU: What about Brown? What is your assessment of his performance so far? Two weeks ago you were bemoaning the fact that Labour’s leaders had left social democracy for dead.

PT: I think Brown has decided – and Blair had done so already – that he is not a social democrat (they had both stopped being socialists a long time ago). I think what you see now is a very decent, “centre” government.

CU: When do you think Brown decided to become a “centrist”?

PT: I think its been creeping up on him. Afterall, he has never called himself a social democrat. I think he has a very strong moral conscience and a very strong wish to do the right thing. He’s a thoroughly decent man but I think he’s made an accommodation with a sort of capitalist truism: he thinks there is nothing you can do about globalisation except educate people enough to be able to cope with it; that government doesn’t have power to interfere with the market much beyond a bit of regulation here and there. He thinks you should have very flexible labour markets and that all you can do is “swim with the tide”, hope for the best and keep people in work. He doesn‘t really think you can stand up and say “this [inequality] is too much, this is disgusting”.

CU: But what about his 2003 “best when we are boldest, best when we are Labour” speech or his 2004 address to the Compass national conference, pointing out the limits to the market? Both sounded social democratic…

PT: …but that was when he wasn’t in power….

CU: … he was the Chancellor of the Exchequer!?

PT: The impression that Gordon and his people consistently gave was that he would be, if he could, further to the left. A lot of people at the time said “don’t be deluded, New Labour is their joint project”. I think that has been the case. Although their styles are different, the emphasises different and the things they care most about are different, basically they have made the same pact – they think there is not much you can do about the market or capitalism, and you had better just bow down in front of the City.

I think Brown subscribes to this view point for economic reasons – I don’t think its just a case of political cowardice. I think he thinks you cannot disturb the market and if you try to change it, it’ll just fall apart in your hands and you will destroy everything. I think he genuinely believes what we have now is necessary. For example, Brown admires Alan Greenspan [the former head of the U.S Federal Reserve] and thinks Greenspan is correct in his thinking, but Greenspan is very far to the right by any social democratic standard – Greenspan thought it was okay for Bush to make those huge tax cuts for the rich which resulted in quite serious economic trouble for the U.S.

What makes Brown a centrist is that he thinks you can be entirely up for the capitalist project, absolutely not for taxing people more (particularly the rich who would otherwise flee) on the one hand, and on the other hand you can try to do your best to help the people that get left behind. Read more

Chuka in conversation with Polly

Polly Toynbee (left) is invariably referred to as one of the most influential commentators of the New Labour era, reviled and revered in equal measure. This doyenne of the Left was formerly BBC social affairs editor and an associate editor of the Independent before rejoining the Guardian in 1998, where she had spent many years earlier in her career and where she still resides.

In the first part of his in depth interview with Polly, Chuka Umunna, editor of TMP (right), talks to her about her career, her political activism in the 1980s, her views on her profession, her take on the Paxman/Humphrys approach to politicians and her opinions on the Great British press in general.  Enjoy.

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CU: One gets the impression that you have a lot of fire in your belly so why journalism and not activism or doing politics proper?

PT: Well, I was briefly a politician. I was in the Labour Party but left in the early 1980s when the choice between Michael foot and Margaret Thatcher didn’t seem a very sensible one, and the Labour Party looked as if it was bent on self-destruction (there was no way that Michael Foot’s Labour Party was electable!).So I joined the SDP, the Social Democratic Party, which formed an alliance with the then Liberal Party in 1981, with a load of other Labour Party people I knew. I was an admirer of Roy Jenkins – one of the “gang of four” who helped found the party – though I allied myself with David Owen (partly because Owen pushed forward lots of women) when the SDP split in 1988 between those voting to merge with the Liberal Party (to become the Liberal Democrats) and those, like Owen, who were against.

I was on the national executive committee of the party, stood as its candidate in Lewisham East in the 1983 election and was one of the main organisers of its 1987 general election campaign. After it all ended in [a proverbial] car crash, I joined the BBC in 1988 as social affairs editor, which gave me an elegant reason for leaving the party.

CU: So why, after 1987, didn’t you just stick it out and hop on board the New Labour bandwagon as a politician, when it came? Why did you return to journalism?

Well I’d always been a journalist and had carried on as a journalist [working at the Guardian] right the way through my involvement with the SDP – I had done politics in my spare time. And at that point in the late ‘80s I wasn’t going to rejoin Labour – I didn’t see any particular point. Labour was on its way after 1984 and I’d never had a burning desire to be a politician.

In any case, being at the BBC ruled out being involved in politics and I was there for 7 years, before leaving to join the Independent in 1995 for a while. Andrew Marr’s removal as editor of the Independent in 1998 prompted my return to the Guardian that year.

CU: Do you feel any guilt in perhaps prolonging Thatcher’s reign during the 1980s, by further splitting the progressive vote with your SDP colleagues?

PT: No, not at all, as we always knew we would either help bring the Labour Party to its senses or we would win. At the time a lot of people joined the SDP saying “either we win or Labour comes to its senses”. It took a lot longer than we thought. We got within two points of Labour in 1983. Even if we hadn’t got many seats, if we had overtaken Labour in the popular vote, I think we would have got to a sort of “New Labour” position a bit sooner than we did – I think we would have got Labour to a position where it would have won the 1992 election…but who knows.

CU: You get so very passionate and angry about things. Don’t you feel restrained by just putting your thoughts on to paper?

PT: Well in some ways it’s a hell of a lot less restrained than some poor old minister [she refers to one new, young, minister] who absolutely can’t say anything. The sad thing about Labour is that almost everyone one knows and meets feels passionately about things too, but the moment they get a post and become insiders, they have to zip their lip and not say anything.

CU: You’re supposedly influential and pop up in published lists of the influential. Do you feel influential?

PT: No not nearly enough [she says laughing loudly]. I wish they’d all do what I say!

CU: Do you ever see the results of your reported influence?

PT: I would like to think that the most constructive thing I ever did was to bang on about child care – the need for Children’s Centres and a Sure Start type programme, which I got on to very early and went on about in print and to Labour politicians every time I saw them. One of Gordon Brown’s inner circle was kind enough to say to me that he thought I had had an influence in that respect. I hope that by saying – “if you really want to invest in poverty, start at the very beginning, invest in kids before the age of 5 and you have some hope” – I had some effect, but I have no idea. I’m just one of many voices. Read more

Indian prosperity hinges on a peaceful neighbourhood

A report just published by Chatham House, in association with International Alert, states that India’s long-term prosperity depends on peace between South Asian nations and increased levels of economic integration in the region.

India recognizes that its political capital is dwindling fast among its neighbours, and trade agreements, whether bilateral or regional, do not seem to have had any positive influence in reducing conflict in South Asia the report argues.

To date, India’s economic growth has been crucial in shifting mindsets to viewing neighbouring countries as essential arteries for regional trade rather than as security threats. Yet despite some successes, India’s economic engagement with its neighbours continues to be crippled by deep-rooted political tensions.

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BBC Asian Network – Nihal

TMP’s editor, Chuka Umunna, will be appearing on Nihal’s show (left) on BBC’s Asian Network between from 11am-12pm today. He will be talking about TMP and the British political scene. The BBC Asian Network brings you the latest news, sport and issues from a British Asian perspective, with the sounds of current Bollywood hits and the best in British Asian music. You can listen to it live here or tune in to Freeview channel 709, Sky channel 0119 or Virgin Media channel 912. For more info on how to listen, click here.

Young, gifted and black

The Independent on Sunday has published a feature today celebrating the achievements of 60 “young, gifted and black” people in the fields of politics, arts and literature, performance arts, fashion and design (see fashion designer, Kesh, below), business and media and sport.

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8,000 voters could have handed power to the Conservatives on November 1st

Research from the Electoral Reform Society has revealed just how few votes were required to swing the general election from Labour had it taken place yesterday.

A combination of our winner takes all system and new parliamentary boundaries, mean that a mere 8000 votes could have delivered a new government in Britain according to the ERS. Dr Ken Ritchie, Chief Executive of the Electoral Reform Society said:

“Discussion today will focus on the Prime Minister’s loss of nerve, on an election that never was. But there was never a clear imperative to call an election and if these numbers show one thing it is that this country simply does not need another unreconstructed election.”
“Brown’s opponents may be claiming that a new government needs a mandate. Well a mandate delivered by 8000 people in the swing seats is no mandate at all.
“We call on the Prime Minister and to go back to his Route map to constitutional reform. Because at our next general election (whenever that may be), he should know that the voters of Britain deserve better.” Read more