With the news that Ed Miliband paid a late night visit to comedian / author Russell Brand’s house to be interviewed by the author of Revolution, I couldn’t wait a moment longer before posting my analysis of this game-changing moment of the 2015 general election campaign.
So here it is:
That is all.
Ben Nolan, the Labour Party’s Head of Membership, is having a nervous 2015 general election campaign.
Whereas other Labour figures (or their MailChimp newsletter administrators) have been relentlessly upbeat in their messages – “GUESS where our JAWS are this morning, Samuel, after we saw our latest fundraising totals!” – Nolan seems to be paid to be pessimistic. And creepy.
As a political blogger, I make a point of staying on the mailing lists for all the main political parties. Normally they are completely unrevealing missives, simple straightforward requests for cash. Sometimes they direct you to a website where you are invited to enter your postcode to reveal a bespoke list of that party’s achievements in office or future spending bribes, customised for your local area.
But sometimes they look like the one that Ben Nolan sent today, fired out to “supporters” who he has decided are not trying hard enough to propel Ed Miliband into 10 Downing Street:
Samuel,
I know we’ve asked you — more than a few times — in the last couple of weeks for a donation to support the crucial work of our local organisers and volunteers.
It seems from our records that you aren’t yet among our generous group of online donors.*
I’m sure it’s for a good reason, Samuel, and I’d love to know what it is. Do you have one minute to tell me what’s stopped you donating?
Your feedback will help us to build a stronger and more inclusive campaign in these final days.
Thanks so much for taking the time.
Ben
Ben Nolan
Head of Membership, Labour Party
Note the undertone of menace in the words “I’m sure it’s for a good reason”.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_plGu_FpzJ8
What to do when the political party you support and spend every waking moment campaigning for adopts a stance which is not only breathtakingly arrogant, but which runs completely contrary to the fundamental principles of democracy and respecting the will of the people?
Well, if you’re the socialist website Left Foot Forward and the case in question is whether or not Britain should hold a referendum on leaving the European Union, you simply convince yourself that the public are dangerous idiots who can’t be trusted to know what’s best for themselves, thus justifying your benevolent left wing dictatorship.
The editors of Left Foot Forward, clearly feeling a little uneasy that their man Ed Miliband is actively campaigning on a platform of denying the British people a say on their future governance, decided to do some unofficial polling to make themselves feel better. And sure enough, it transpires that 63% of their readers are also opposed to letting the British people decide.
But the left need some reasons, however flimsy, to shore up their indefensible position, and Left Foot Forward staff writer Ruby Stockham comes armed with plenty of them:
EU-sceptic Conservatives say that the knife-edge balance of public opinion means it is undemocratic to block a referendum. There are several problems with this argument. The first is that it’s cherry picking: we do not hold referendums on most public issues. There has not been one, for example, on TTIP; there was not one on military intervention in Syria or Libya.
The reason for this is that most of the electorate do not have a deep understanding of the intricacies of these issues; to build up a full picture of the economic, social, or security benefits and disadvantages of both sides would be a full-time job. What the electorate are exposed to is the simplified bias of parties like UKIP or the Eurosceptic press, who present an easily digested one-sided argument. The government cannot decide whether or not something is democratic based on whether or not it suits their aims.
Actually, the reason that EU-sceptic conservatives want a referendum is nothing to do with the fact that the public opinion is on a “knife-edge”. It’s more to do with the fact that power has been continually given away from Westminster to Brussels, from democratic British institutions to their opaque and largely undemocratic EU counterparts, without the British people ever having granted their permission for this to happen.
The 1975 referendum doesn’t count – the British people voted to join what was then known as the European Economic Community because as its name suggested, it was presented as a matter of free trade. Since that time, “common” European policies have sprung up in all manner of areas which impact British life, and which are traditionally fall to the nation state to control. Therefore, to present the question of Britain’s continued membership of the EU as being the same as any run-of-the-mill government decision – like raising taxes or deploying the military – is an entirely misleading comparison.
Stockham then tries to suggest that the British people are too ill-informed to make an educated decision. But this would be the whole point of a referendum campaign – to educate the British people on the pros, cons and detailed implications before letting the people render their judgement. Of course it does not suit Stockham’s purpose for the British people to become more educated on the subject of Europe, because then they would realise the extent to which the common market is just a façade for the far more wide-reaching European political union which was always the end goal.
And it is certainly not the case that the public would be overtly swayed by the “simplified bias of parties like UKIP”, as Ruby Stockham so haughtily suggests. If anything, the simplified bias is all on the pro-EU side. The majority of big businesses (who are naturally risk averse) are for the status quo – funny how the opinion of big business matters to the left on the topic of Europe, but nowhere else – as are all of Britain’s political parties, besides UKIP. In terms of funding and finding suitable mouthpieces for their talking points, the pro-Europeans would have no problems whatsoever – but of course it suits Left Foot Forward’s aims to portray themselves as the underdog.
But Ruby Stockham saves her best argument against holding an EU referendum for last:
Fourthly, the European Union has over 500 million citizens. A UK exit would affect all of them. It is truly undemocratic to allow the UK minority to dictate the future for all EU citizens.
That’s right. According to Left Foot Forward, the British people are not entitled to determine their own future because to hold a referendum would infringe on the rights of people in Lisbon and Warsaw – nearly all of whom would be supremely indifferent in any case – to keep Britain tied up in an unwanted political union.
Truly, no argument is too desperate when it comes to the British political left trying to find excuses to override the will of the people.
To quote a much younger Tony Blair: Weak, weak, weak.
“A decent society looks after its people” is the moralising title of Labour’s latest celebrity election broadcast about the NHS, starring comedian Jo Brand.
That Jo Brand is a loyal supporter of the Labour Party hardly comes as a shock – the comedian was a supporter of the People’s Assembly anti-austerity coalition, and performed at the Stand Up Against Reality Austerity gig organised by that group last year. And credit where credit is due: she puts her time and money where her mouth is, supporting a cause she believes in. But unfortunately, in the case of Labour Party scaremongering about the NHS, that cause is a blatant falsehood.
Brand opens Labour’s latest celebrity ad with one of those “oh! fancy seeing you here” introductions, as though we were the last people she expected to encounter as she exercised on a lone cross-trainer slap bang in the middle of a brightly lit TV studio:
“There’s an election coming up. You might know that. And we all have our own personal axes to grind. Mine is what’s gonna happen to the NHS. Not because of my undeniable status as a national fitness icon, but because once upon a time I used to be a nurse.”
Establish credibility? Check.
When debating healthcare reform in Britain, nothing sweeps away logical debate and replaces it with hushed reverence more effectively than uttering the words “I’m a nurse”, or “I’m an NHS doctor”. Suddenly the speaker becomes an oracle, imbued with deep and mystical wisdom about national healthcare policy thanks to their selfless occupation on the front lines of clinical care.
If you are employed by the NHS, that huge organisation, the largest employer in Britain and fifth largest in the world (just behind McDonald’s), is there not the slightest possibility that working for such a vast branch of government – with a bureaucratic life of its own and a very strong survival instinct – and relying on it for your pay cheque just might skew your judgement when it comes to changing structures and working practices? Apparently not.
Regardless, Jo Brand then whips out the first of her many personal axes to grind:
“Work with us to keep the Tories out of government!”
“If we work together, we can lock Cameron out of Number 10.”
“We have a chance to kick David Cameron out of Downing Street. Don’t turn your back on it, people will never forgive you…”
To watch the leaders of Labour, Plaid Cymru, the SNP and the Green Party plead with the audience – and each other – at last night’s BBC Election “Challengers” Debate, you would think that Britain faced the awful prospect of some fascist or totalitarian party seizing power on 8 May this year, thus requiring all decent people to put aside their differences and band together in solidarity against a visceral, urgent threat to our way of life.
But the hideous spectre conjured by Ed Miliband, Leanne Wood, Nicola Sturgeon and Natalie Bennett is not a latter-day Adolf Hitler or Joseph Stalin – or even a contemporary African tin-pot dictator. No, we are asked to believe that the mortal threat to Britain and her people comes in the pale, patrician form of David Cameron – who has already held the top job for five years without successfully summoning the apocalypse – perhaps propped up by the equally unthreatening Nigel Farage (Nigel being just the type of fearsome name that strikes terror into the heart of even the bravest soul).
The British left is used to preaching to the choir and percolating in its own intellectual laziness, having long ago purged from the bubble anyone who doesn’t reflexively Hate the Tories and abhor right-wing ideas. But today we witnessed Britain’s four left wing party leaders construct and imprison themselves in a bubble of their own making, right on the stage at Westminster Central Hall.
From the BBC’s account of the debate:
Semi-Partisan Politics 