From my column in today’s MEN:
HERE’S a simple question for every ambitious MP: What is the one thing you never do if you want to be prime minister?
The answer? Make it clear you want the job.
I mention this because Harriet Harman – who won her post as Labour deputy leader with left-leaning dog whistles to the trade unions and party footsoldiers – is said to be at it again. Only this time, unnamed colleagues say, she is after the top job if and when Gordon Brown loses the next election.
The speed with which Ms Harman’s fierce criticism of City ‘greed’, made in Cabinet, was leaked to the public started the whispers. Now Yvette Cooper, it is claimed, has been sounded out as a possible ’stop Harriet’ alternative. Her husband, Ed Balls, would be another likely candidate should the post become vacant.
And Hazel Blears’ planned attack on ‘creeping’ political correctness – with the claim that the pendulum has swung too far in favour of not offending minorities – is being seen by most political commentators as the start of a possible rival leadership bid. At the very least, it will open up talk of a left-right divide in the Labour Party.
The irony is that all of this tells you more about the current state of Labour than it does about who will eventually replace Mr Brown. Politics, like today’s Stock Exchange, is a notoriously fickle business, and politicians’ value can go down as well as up. Just ask David Miliband. One minute, the heir apparent, who only had to plunge the knife in order to take the crown; the next, an also-ran in a contest that still hasn’t actually started.
And why? Because he was pictured at party conference in Manchester with a banana in his hand and a grin on his face. Suddenly the ‘next Tony Blair’ was being portrayed as a maniacal, fruit-wielding Judas.
Or look at the Conservatives. John Major was never really spoken of as a potential leader until a vacancy appeared. William Hague won because of who he wasn’t – Ken Clarke or John Redwood – as much as who he was. Even David Cameron was extremely careful not to speak about the Tories’ previous failings, and need for an internal revolution, before predecessor Michael Howard confirmed he was standing down. It would have been seen as disloyal.
No, campaigning for a non-existent post is a mug’s game. If there is one thing politicians hate more than a damaged leader, it is a colleague trying to capitalise on a damaged leader. Treachery is just not seen as a very prime ministerial quality. And it hurts the party, too. Indecision, policy misjudgements and general unpopularity – all these things are wounding. But division is fatal.
It hamstrung Labour in the years of Thatcher. It destroyed the Conservatives in her dog days. Politicians know this, and yet sometimes they can’t help themselves.
Labour is deeply divided over the prospects under Mr Brown going in to the next election. There are those – the believers – who note the plaudits he got in the early part of the economic crisis. They look at the Conservatives and they see a party who are not yet a credible alternative government, particularly in difficult times. They think the country will come to see this as things get worse. They want bold decisions to show up the differences between a party which is fit to be in power and one that is simply adept at capitalising on mistakes.
Then there are those – the sceptics – who accept all of this, but look at the polls and still see a 20-point gap. It simply doesn’t matter, they think; the game is up. And their ranks are growing.
The result is frustration, bitterness and fear. It is not just more than a decade of Labour government that is at stake. It is individual political careers, too. MPs, worried they will lose their seats, are looking inwards rather than outwards for someone to blame.
The corridors of Westminster are fertile ground for rumour. Briefing leads to counter-briefing. The press laps it up. The whole thing develops a momentum of its own.
No one knows exactly where it will end, but everyone knows this: It will not help Mr Brown, and it will not help the party he leads.
Here’s my prediction. If there is a Labour leadership contest after the next general election, it will be extraordinarily difficult to call. Why? Because Tony Blair and Gordon Brown have not just realigned the Labour Party over the past 10 years or so; they have realigned British politics. They have narrowed the gap between left and right and made it almost impossible for a party to win without appealing, first and foremost, to the consensus in the middle. They have changed the way politics is carried out, too: heightening the importance of the media, specifically television, and the importance of sound bites.
Independent voices and big characters have dropped out of the Cabinet, one by one. We are left with a shortlist of candidates for next Labour leader – James Purnell, Mr Miliband, Ms Cooper, Mr Balls – who, to those outside the party, look very similar indeed.
Ms Harman might privately believe she can achieve the leadership by appealing to the left wing. But could it achieve an election victory? No. The whole project is doomed to failure – and the party will know this when the time comes to make a choice. Labour will be in search of a distinctive, winning vision. The key question will not be ‘who?’; it will be ‘what?’. And the problem for Labour is that no one really knows what the answer might be.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 24th, 2009 at 10:17 am and is filed under Gordon Brown, Labour. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.