April 30, 2021 - 3:00pm
It is often said that it was sleaze that did it for the John Major government of 1992-97. But did it really? Scandals such as ‘cash-for-questions’ and ‘back to basics’ unquestionably inflicted damage on the Tory brand during those years. But, in truth, sleaze was only part of the story. The ignominy of Black Wednesday, which saw interest rates ramped up to 15% and helped to destroy the Conservative party’s reputation for economic competence, surely did far more to repel the average voter than revelations about the financial or sexual indiscretions of individual Tory MPs.
That is why Sir Keir Starmer and the Labour party need to be careful. Assuming that media furores such as the current one surrounding the refurbishment of the prime minister’s flat will automatically translate into a shift in their favour in the polls is risky. In the long run — and even accounting for the fact that this particular affair involves the PM himself — these brouhahas tend not to be electorally significant.
Of course it is right that scrutiny be exercised and questions asked where alleged wrongdoing has occurred. But as any sort of strategy for setting Labour back on a path to power, attacking ‘Tory sleaze’ is a dead end. While voters would certainly expect the guilty to be held to account if rules have been broken, they are ultimately more preoccupied with the issues affecting their everyday lives — jobs, wages, housing, the cost of living, the safety of the streets — and they expect their politicians to be so, too.
It is no surprise, therefore, that a YouGov poll published today shows that the scandal over the flat refurbishment has not cut through to the electorate. In fact, the Tory lead over Labour has increased by one percentage point in the past week. These figures demonstrate the truth that if voters perceive the government to be getting the fundamentals right most of the time, they are willing to cut considerable slack on what they see as the trivial stuff.
Elections are won and lost on the bread-and-butter issues that matter most to people. Any party aspiring to government must focus on these and be careful about investing too much time and energy on Westminster scuttlebutt.
The electorate isn’t stupid. It knows that, in the final analysis, no party is naturally sleazy and none inherently virtuous. Labour, of course, was dogged by its own scandals when in power — Bernie Ecclestone, ‘cash-for-honours’, Peter Mandelson’s two resignations, and even its own pickle over wallpaper — but, individually and cumulatively, these did not ultimately make a major difference to the party’s performance at the ballot box.
Iraq, by contrast, did far more to undermine public trust in the Labour party than any episode of so-called ‘sleaze’ during its period in government.
When it comes to any new political scandal, the feverish excitement that often grips the SW1 bubble tends to be in inverse proportion to the importance attached to it by the voters. The media would do well to bear that in mind. And so would the Labour party.
Paul Embery is a firefighter, trade union activist, pro-Brexit campaigner and ‘Blue Labour’ thinker
PaulEmbery
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SubscribeIt’s very difficult to see that Sir Keir banging on about wallpaper will lead anyone to switch their allegiance from Tory to Labour. As many have pointed out, it’s hardly news to the electorate that Boris might perhaps not always tell the truth, the whole truth and so on. It’s factored in.
Given that it’s factored in, what can Sir Keir do to improve the attractiveness of Labour? Well taking the knee for BLM, signing up to the LGBT+ Labour Pledges (which amongst other things, insist that trans women are women), and being “disappointed” in the Sewell report because it fails to acknowledge systemic racism strike me as being exactly the wrong way to go.
I don’t believe that the Labour brand will in any way be made more attractive by Sir Keir – the man who presided over a CPS that failed to prosecute Jimmy Saville and who called for a second referendum rather than accepting the outcome of the first – coming over all woke. Is it a case of go woke, continue to be electorally broke?
Richard. Keir was not responsible for failing to prosecute Jimmy Savile as he was not the reviewing lawyer at the time. Also what about the DPS before Starmer they also did not prosecute him. In fact the reforms introduced by Starmer during his time as DPS helped victims come foreward, including a right for victims to challenge any CPS decisions. The Savile case was missed by many including Margaret Thatcher who was great friends with him and Jimmy Savile supported the Tory Party.
https://fullfact.org/online/keir-starmer-prosecute-jimmy-savile/
Bob. My post was worded to reflect the Full Fact piece. I agree that Starmer was not directly responsible given that he was not the reviewing lawyer. But, as DPP, was he not formally responsible for the failings of the organization of which he was head?
Sceptics might say that, given that Savile was such a high-profile public figure, it’s inconceivable that the decision over whether to prosecute him was not discussed by those senior to the reviewing lawyer.
Could it be that disreputable behaviour is “priced in” by the electorate?
18 months ago I had to choose between 3 narcissists offering themselves as PM: the amoral one, the one with perverted morals, and the one with a spacetime-warping reality distortion field (and probably a case of nominative determinism).
So I held my nose and voted for the amoral narcissist’s party because he has a history of changing his mind to please the electorate, and delegating to competent underlings – whereas the main competitor had a history of _never_ changing his mind.
Labour’s support will soon be limited to its true heartlands of QuIslington and Woke Newington.
Following the Joe Anderson affair in Liverpool, and overspending in councils of all persuasions across the country, people are probably not suprised at a bit of corruption in government. Sir Kier has not yet pointed out a major contract that has been misplaced as a result of the “sleaze”.
That may be true, but the Good Law Project have certainly pointed out quite a few, including one for $25m or so to a company that appears to be insolvent and to have no employees. The sad thing is not only are taxpayers overpaying Boris’ mates for, say, PPE – but too often they are not even getting what they overpaid for!
See https://goodlawproject.org/case/procurement-case/ for a summary of some of the worst examples.
Starmer might get a temporary small bump over this issue – but when the next election comes around and he is accused of being “more interested in wallpaper than the huge challenges etc etc ….” it will backfire on him.
I would have chosen somewhere more down- market than John Lewis to make his point, as most people would consider it also an expensive shop.
It’s interesting that you consider helping the poorest in our society to be fundamentally incompatible with reducing long term damage to the environment. Why do you think it’s not possible to solve more than one problem at once?
crude misrepresentation.
He did say that following green ideology (presumably by this he does mean reducing long term damage to the environment) would [necessarily] bring real financial hardship to the least well off in society.
I suggest you can help both the environment and the least well off.
You seem to adopt the Cathy Newman approach to interpreting other people’s comments. “So what you are really saying is”
No Paul, he really said what he really said. You used the same tactic on me recently.
So if green ideology does not mean reducing long term damage to the environment, what on earth does it mean, according to either you or WS or TH?
Making already rich people even richer.
The green racket will cripple the poorest in society. Everyone knows that.
The poorest in society are already being crippled, or hadn’t you noticed?
Whether we deal with that problem has nothing to do with whether we deal sensibly with the environmental problems we face. We can of course continue to make only token attempts to address both problems.
It will also, if B Gates is encouraged, in his messianic hubris, to spray sun-reflective particles into the stratosphere, lead to who knows what actual anthropogenic climate nemesis.
Science must be restored to its true form of open, honest debate. It is not settled, nor is it “The” “Science”, and silencing all dissent is not the way to seek truth.
“Look before you leap” appears to be an abandoned principle in the headlong rush amongst the shortsighted to profit from dodgy yet lucrative trends.
Paul, I think the climate issue is a “long term” one – and one we are being coerced to fix, now! The radical green lobby makes their demands for immediate action without allowing time to put in place upstream checks and balances. The ‘developed’ world will solve its climate poisoning problems off of the backs of the DRC Cobalt children, and the Xikrin Nickel children in Brazil, and millions of others around the globe, because of the speed of the demands from the radical green lobby. It is the speed that is fundamentally incompatible with reducing long and short term damage to the environment.
Should we stop pumping s**t into our atmosphere – of course, we should. However, we need to do it at a speed that allows us, and the producing countries, to protect the rest of the world, too.
All the best.
It’s always the economy. Miss that and you miss out.
Who advised Sir Keir to engage in this stunt, so poorly judged and executed. He is the only man I know who looks more uncomfortable with his tie off.
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Unfortunately, James,
have now been put into proper perspective by the breathtaking sleaze of the Blair era, so there are no votes in this for Labour.
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Nothing to add except well said, Paul.
As others have stated, people remember the Iraq war, and I suspect many in the modern Labour party may not know anyone who went there; there are plenty of those from proud “working class” ex industrial towns who did, as do I. Once Blair has admitted his crass actions in taking the UK into a war that wasn’t required, then I think they are at high risk of constantly on a hiding to nothing.
Sleaze has always happened, and I suspect it always will. It’s in every single country in some form or another. People accept it; they themselves know they aren’t perfect. As Robin Williams once put it “I don’t care if you sleep with a chicken, just get the economy going…”
Paul Embrey always seems to succinctly express the appropriate words, I’ve seen him in a few videos on YouTube, and I can’t help but think that the Labour Party are missing a trick not getting him on board and pushing him ahead. It would be good for them, good for parliament and good for the UK. I sit on the opposite side of the fence politically but I also care about proper and appropriate government.
Every politician is corruptible. Power corrupts. Labour and the Tories have been interchangeable on this forever. For most people we understand this, the line for us is ‘at what point does this materially affect US’. I don’t really care if Carrie Symonds likes gold wallpaper, I only care if taxpayers are paying for it. The apparently haven’t – so I don’t care. Tory donors could be said to be currying favour simply by being a donor. If they donate to the gold wallpaper what’s the difference?