by James Curran
6. ‘Key findings’ in A. Park, C. Bryson, E. Clery, J. Curtice, and M. Phillips (eds.) British Social Attitudes: the 30th Report (London: NatCen Social Research, 2013), p. ix.
7. Ibid, p. x.
8. A. Park and R. Rhead, ‘Personal relationships: Changing attitudes towards sex, marriage and parenthood’ in A. Park, C. Bryson, E. Clery, J. Curtice, and M. Phillips (eds.) (2013), British Social Attitudes: the 30th Report (London: NatCen Social Research, 2013), p. 17. Available online at: www.bsa-30.natcen.ac.uk (accessed 4 December 2018).
9. Ibid.
10. See Chapter 7.
11. See Figure 5.1.
12. Daily Mail 2 November 1984.
13. Daily Telegraph 23 January 1985.
14. J. Scott and E. Clery, ‘Gender roles: An incomplete revolution?’ in Park et al. (eds.) British Social Attitudes: the 30th Report (London: NatCen Social Research, 2013), p. 119.
15. Ibid, p. 122.
16. Ibid, p. 125.
17. J. Olchawski, Sex Equality: State of the Nation 2016 (London: Fawcett Society, 2016), p. 10
18. Ibid, p. 12.
19. Ibid, pp. 8–9.
20. Ibid, p. 10.
21. S. Rowbotham, A Century of Women (New York, Viking, 1997).
22. Equality: Timeline of women’s rights 1866–2016 (London: Fawcett Society, 2016), p. 8. Available at https://www.fawcettsociety.org.uk/equality-its-about-time-timeline-of-womens-rights-1866-2016 (accessed 3 January 2018).
23. Scott and Clery, ‘Gender roles’, p. 126.
24. Ibid, p. 129.
25. D. Butler and G. Butler, Twentieth-Century British Political Facts 1900–2000 (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 2000), pp 256–267.
26. Ibid; ‘Election 2017: Record number of female MPs’, BBC News Online, 10 June 2017. Available at www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2017-40192060 (accessed 5 January 2018).
27. Equality, p. 8.
28. Sun, July 2002–May 2003 cited in Culture Wars, first edition, p. 230.
29. ‘Energy and climate change public attitudes tracker: wave 21’ (2014) Gov.uk. Available at https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/energy-and-climate-change-public-attitude-tracking-survey-wave-21 (accessed 16 December 2017).
30. See Chapter 2.
31. ‘Ethnic targets for public services’, BBC News Online, 28 July 1999. Available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/405716.stm (accessed 10 December 2017).
32. The Guardian, 7 January 2001.
33. The Guardian, 5 July 1999.
34. The Guardian, 20 May 2004.
35. The Guardian, 11 February 2004.
36. For example, Police Diversity (London: House of Commons Home Affairs Committee, HC 27, 2016).
37. C. Airey, ‘Social and moral values’ in R. Jowell and C. Airey (eds.) British Social Attitudes: The 1984 Report (Aldershot: Gower, 1984), p. 129.
38. Ibid, p. 123.
39. Ibid, p. 128.
40. N. Kelley, O. Khan and S. Sharrock, Racial Prejudice in Britain Today (London: NatCen/Runnymede Trust, September 2017), p. 10.
41. R. Ford, ‘Is racial prejudice declining in Britain?’ British Journal of Sociology, 59, 2008.
42. R. Ford and A. Heath, ‘Immigration: A nation divided?’ in A. Park, C. Bryson and J. Curtice (eds.) British Social Attitudes: the 31st Report (London: NatCen Social Research, 2014), available online at: www.bsa-31.natcen.ac.uk (accessed 12 December 2017), p. 81.
43. Kelley, Khan and Sharrock, Racial Prejudice, p. 6.
44. Ibid, p. 9.
45. K. Sian, I. Law and S. Sayid, ‘The Media and Muslims in the UK’ (Leeds, Centre for Ethnicity and Racism Studies, University of Leeds, 2012).
46. R. Ford, ‘The decline of racial prejudice in Britain’, Manchester Policy Blogs, August 21, 2014 available at: http://blog.policy.manchester.ac.uk/featured/2014/08/the-decline-of-racial-prejudice-in-britain/ (accessed on 10 December 2017).
47. Ford and Heath, ‘Immigration’, p. 79.
48. Extensive research on press representations of immigration since 2002 is summarised in J. Curran and J. Seaton, Power Without Responsibility, 8th edition (London: Routledge, 2018).
49. See Chapter 10.
50. Changing attitudes to other moral and social issues are summarised in R. Harding, ‘Key Findings – Personal freedom: the continued rise of social liberalism’ in Clery, Curtice and Harding (eds.) British Social Attitudes 34.
51. J. Curtice ‘The vote to leave the EU: Litmus test or lightning rod’ in Clery, Curtice and Harding (eds.) British Social Attitudes 34, p. 178.
52. Ibid, p. 163.
53. Ibid, p. 165.
54. Lord Ashcroft, ‘How the United Kingdom voted on Thursday … and why’, Lord Ashcroft Polls, 24 June 2016, p. 9. Available at: https://lordashcroftpolls.com/2016/06/how-the-united-kingdom-voted-and-why/ (accessed 10 December 2017).
55. Ford and Heath, ‘Immigration’, p. 81.
56. D. Goodhart, The Road to Somewhere (London: Hurst, 2017).
57. This is examined in an illuminating book: A. Barnett, The Lure of Greatness (London: Unbound, 2017).
58. ‘Let that lion roar: Johnson’s speech in full’, ConservativeHome, 3 October 2017. available at: https://www.conservativehome.com/parliament/2017/10/let-that-lion-roar-johnsons-speech-in-full.html (accessed 6 January 2017).
59. Curtice, ‘The vote’, p. 167.
60. Barnett, Lure of Greatness.
61. These stories are anatomised in two key sources: Euromyths: A-Z index of euromyths 1992 to 2016 (European Commission). Available at: http://blogs.ec.europa.eu/ECintheUK/euromyths-a-z-index/ (accessed on June 12 2017); and ‘Guide to the best euromyths’, BBC 23 March 2007. Available at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6481969.stm (accessed on June 11 2017). Those cited here are only a few examples from a very large number of fake news stories.
62. D. Levy, B. Aslan and D. Biron, ‘The press and referendum campaign’, Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, University of Oxford, 2016. Available at: www.referendumanalysis.eu/eu-referendum-analysis-2016/section-3-news/the-press-and-the-referendum-campaign/ (accessed 8 June 2017).
63. Ibid.
64. The evidence supporting this conclusion is presented in Curran and Seaton, Power Without Responsibility, (8th edition), chapter 9.
65. W. Jennings and G. Stoker, ‘For the UK public, politics is failing because of the flawed character of our political class’, Democratic Audit UK, 2 August 2013. Available at: www.democraticaudit.com/2013/08/02/for-the-uk-public-politics-is-failing-because-of-the-flawed-character-of-our-political-class/ (accessed 12 December 2017). In this context, it should be noted that John Curtice (’The Vote’, p. 168 ff.) argues that political disaffection was a weak influence on the referendum result. However, this is contradicted by other evidence. It may be that the broad measures that Curtice used – standardised political trust and efficacy questions deployed for years in comparative research – failed to capture the distinctive dynamic of resentment and fear in the British context.
66. K. Swales, ‘Introduction’ in British Social Attitudes 33 (London: NatCen, 2016) Available at www.bsa.natcen.ac.uk/latest-report/british-social-attitudes-33/introduction.aspx (accessed 10 December 2017).
67. R. Johnston, K. Jones and D. Manley, ‘Predicting the Brexit vote: getting the geography right (more or less)’, LSE British Politics and Policy. Available at: http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/the-brexit-vote-getting-the-geography-more-or-less-right/ (accessed 10 December 2017).
68. Lord Ashcroft, ‘How the United Kingdom voted’, p. 9.
69. Ibid, p. 10.
70. Curtice, ‘The vote’, p. 166.
71. Ashcroft, ‘How the UK voted’, p. 10.
13
WHAT GOES AROUND COMES AROUND
Ivor Gaber
This chapter seeks to put the relationship between Labour’s left and the media into the context of the major changes that have been taking place in Britain’s political and media landscape. What started as a revolt against the Labour esta
blishment by predominantly young, mainly urban and overwhelmingly left-wing party members, has virtually come full circle. The Labour leadership in the 1970s and 1980s saw as ‘impossibilist’ and electorally suicidal the demands of the ‘loony left’ which had gradually taken hold among Labour’s grassroots (particularly at local government level). Following Tony Benn’s failed attempt to win the deputy leadership of the Party in 1982, the left continued with their demands which were, for the most part, successfully repulsed by the party leadership. For the next ten years, arguably until the emergence of New Labour, this battle continued, although as we have indicated, some of the ‘loony left’ agenda – particularly with regard to equalities – was adopted by the leadership. But under New Labour, these ‘left’ policies were not given a prominent role in Labour’s election campaigns in 1997, 2001 and 2005 because the leadership believed that they would be electorally unpopular.
However, in 2010, after thirteen years in the political wilderness, David Cameron’s Conservative Party defeated Labour and in the process adopted some of the very policies identified with the left – including greater tolerance of differing sexualities – that had been regarded as outlandish and electorally damaging when they were promoted by Labour’s left. Cameron took up these policies in an effort to ‘disinfect’ the Tories of the ‘nasty party’ germ identified by Theresa May back in 2002, although not without earning the undying enmity of the right-wing press in the process, notably the Daily Mail. This enmity was exemplified by headlines such as ‘How Mr Cameron’s Obsession with Gay Marriage is Killing the Tory Party’1 or ‘The Evidence that Blows Apart Mr Cameron’s Claim that Gay Marriage Will Strengthen Families’.2
Under Ed Miliband’s leadership, Labour flirted with a little more of the ‘loony-left’ agenda but never with great conviction; it wasn’t until Jeremy Corbyn won the leadership in 2015 that Labour’s policy wheel finally came full circle, with much of the left’s agenda finding its way into the party’s election manifesto in 2017 – and with many of the key personnel from the 1970s and 1980s identified with the ‘loony left’, (including Dianne Abbot, John McDonnell and Corbyn himself) – in leadership roles in the party. What goes around, comes around.
In the 1980s, Labour’s hierarchy reacted to the press hostility engendered by the apparent (albeit short-lived) pre-eminence of left-wing policies, by offering some rebuttal of the criticisms of their policies in ways that, they hoped, would not amount to directly confronting the press, nor offending either of the party’s increasingly antagonistic wings. But, as recounted elsewhere in this volume, Kinnock and Blair (or at least those surrounding them) came to see the press attacks on the left as, to some extent, important allies in their own intra-party battles. This involved not just failing to offer a wholehearted defence of these left policies, and personnel, that were under attack but, in some circumstances, actively colluding in such initiatives, with the aim of isolating and ridiculing the left, its policies and personalities. In 1995, for example, Margaret Hodge who had undergone a transformation from ‘loony-left’ leader of Islington Council to enthusiastic Blairite, distanced herself from her previous incarnation by saying: ‘We thought we could change the world by passing resolutions’.3 The attacks on the left came to a head when former GLC Leader, Ken Livingstone, sought the party’s nomination as Mayor of London. As outlined in detail in Chapter 8, high profile Labour politicians launched a series of coordinated attacks on Livingstone and his policies. For example, former leader Neil Kinnock wrote: ‘While he [Livingstone] led the Greater London Council the stories of high rates, public money for stunts, control by soft-headed hard left groups poured out of the press almost every day’.4 As part of this offensive Blair and Brown, even though they were then Prime Minister and Chancellor of the Exchequer respectively, devoted time, energy and political capital to launching a series of vitriolic attacks against Livingstone. One marker of the closeness of the New Labour leadership to the right-wing press in this period was the fact that between 2000 and leaving office in 2007, Tony Blair had thirteen by-lined articles (mostly written by Alastair Campbell) published in the Sun.5
By the mid-1980s, the ‘modernising’ tendency within the Labour Party had gained the ascendancy at Westminster; it had secured acceptance – sometimes grudging – in the union and constituency wings of the labour movement. But it had failed to incorporate the social movement wing of the broad left – centred on questions of gender, ethnicity, sexuality, environmentalism and peace – that eventually coalesced around Corbyn. And it failed to develop policies that addressed the problems faced by a growing number of young people: soaring rents, precarious jobs and, in the case of former students, enormous debts. Large numbers of young people joined the Corbyn insurgency.6 There was also a grassroots revolt, fuelled in part by electoral despair caused by Labour’s losses in Scotland to the SNP and the advance of UKIP in northern Labour strongholds. It found expression in the desire to fight for what activists believed in, rather than in a focus-group orientated party which was seen to be failing.
Conservative press attacks and internal party division, in the context of a continuing neo-liberal political ascendancy, at first seemed likely to bury the Corbyn revolt. But the results of the 2016 referendum on whether the UK should stay in the European Union, and the 2017 snap election, exemplified that many of the old political structures were breaking down. A survey by the global PR firm Edelman in 2017 found that general levels of trust in all institutions in the UK were at all-time lows. The research revealed that trust in the government (in general rather than the current one) which was already low at 36% in 2016 had fallen to 26% the following year. Trust in the media fell even more sharply – down from 36% to 24%. Trust in businesses fell from 46% to 33% and charities from 50% to 32%.7 A European Broadcasting Union survey of trust in the media, reinforced these results. It found that in 2017, Britons’ mistrust of their press was, by a significant margin, the highest in a survey of thirty-three European countries.8
It also needs to be stressed that although many of the ideas once associated with the ‘loony left’ are now widely shared, they are by no means universally accepted; papers such as the Daily Mail continue to wage a continuous, and highly vocal, war against them. But because these ideas are no longer seen as being the property solely of the left, the ideological target is now, equally, ‘liberal opinion’ and the ‘metropolitan elite’, and the intended audience is clearly those who feel left behind by the forces of globalisation and urban modernity – in other words, many of those who voted for the UK to withdraw from the EU in the 2016 referendum. These campaigns found the judiciary a particularly tempting target, exemplified by headlines such as ‘Enemies of the People’,9 ‘The Judges Versus the People’10 and ‘End Human Rights Lunacy’.11 The very word ‘Brussels’ and the phrase ‘political correctness gone mad’ became familiar signifiers in the toxic, and profoundly illiberal, populist narrative which came to dominate the right-wing press. Thus, a battle once waged against the relatively easy target of the ‘loony left’ has now swelled into a much wider ideological crusade against a whole strand of contemporary thought and opinion.
In terms of the narrative about the relations between the Labour Party and the news media, there are vast changes in the media landscape between 1975 and 2018, that have to be taken into consideration. 1975 is as good a starting point as any – it is the year in which one of the first references to the ‘loony left’ can be found. It appeared in an article in The Times quoting the Labour MP Les Huckfield, ‘warning’ the Tribune Group of Labour MPs that its criticism of the then Prime Minister, Harold Wilson put them in danger of earning the title the ‘loony left’.12 Huckfield made this remark (mildly ironic since he himself went on to be seen as a key player in the ‘loony left’) at a time when national newspapers, the clear majority of which supported the Conservative Party, dominated the news media landscape. Once the Sun, which had grown out of the Labour-supporting Daily Herald, had switched its support to the Tories in the
1974 General Election, only the Daily Mirror was left as an unwavering supporter of Labour, with the Guardian, and then the Independent, as sometime friends – a situation that was to remain unchanged up until the time of writing in 2018. There was a period when Rupert Murdoch switched the Sun’s support from a flagging Conservative Party to Tony Blair’s New Labour, but it was always clear that this support was contingent – for the man not the party – because Murdoch judged the Conservatives to be quite simply unelectable whilst at the same time viewed Blair as someone who would not be hostile to his media empire. Indeed, Blair was not just commercially supportive but politically as well, as he demonstrated when the two both supported the US/UK invasion of Iraq in 2003. The transparency of Murdoch’s support for Blair, as opposed to Labour was made dramatically clear when Gordon Brown took over the Labour leadership in 2007 and the Sun simply switched back to its natural home as an enthusiastic, and largely uncritical, Conservative-supporting paper.
Apart from the right-wing dominated press, in 1975 there were just three TV channels available in the UK, with the more radical Channel Four still seven years away from its first transmission. There were commercial radio stations but, then as now, both radio and television news were dominated by the BBC. ITV did compete on the news front and more challenging current affairs programmes were produced by the commercial public service broadcasters, whilst the BBC’s (now defunct) Community Programmes Unit was always prepared to challenge dominant narratives. Nonetheless, compared with the current media landscape this now looks like sparse fare.
There is, more or less the same line-up of newspapers13 and political weeklies, but by 2018 the sources of news and current affairs (and of course entertainment, an important ingredient in creating and sustaining political norms) have mushroomed. There are hundreds of TV and radio channels plus countless digital sources of news, information and opinion (not all of it, by any means, trustworthy) available as websites, blogs and ubiquitous social media. We are comparing the horse-drawn buggy with the driverless car – there is no comparison.