Decline & Fall

by Chris Mullin

  John Prescott was on the tube. We travelled together to King’s Cross. He seems to have adjusted well to the loss of office. I asked if he missed it, but he says he doesn’t. I guess in a way he’s relieved that it’s all over.

  Monday, 17 November

  What a roller coaster British politics has become. One moment Gordon is lord of all he surveys, next he is plumbing depths never before visited by a British prime minister. Now, suddenly, he is back on top again. Once again it is Gordon über alles and Shadow Chancellor George Osborne’s turn to plumb the depths. The media are full of whispers that he is not up to it, too lightweight, that the City and Tory backbenchers have lost confidence in him etc. This about a man until recently portrayed as a master strategist, leading the Tories back to the sunlit uplands. No doubt the tide will turn again ‘ere long, but we should enjoy this new mood while it lasts.

  Margaret Beckett in her latest incarnation as housing minister addressed this evening’s meeting of the parliamentary party. One after another southern members rose to describe the housing catastrophe, rising repossessions, record waiting lists, a generation priced out of the market, a dwindling supply of social housing decimated by the right-to-buy. Tales of desperate local authorities forced to lease back – at many times the original rent – former council properties from tenants who had exercised their right to buy, sold up and disappeared to sunnier climes. Margaret left us in no doubt that, for the first time in a decade, it is again respectable to talk about building council houses. Another New Labour nostrum bites the dust.

  Tuesday, 18 November

  A scary talk with an economist-cum-tax specialist who works for the Trades Union Congress. He said that on 5 October, the day that Lehman Brothers went under, he went out and stocked up with enough tinned food to last six weeks. He had thought there was a strong possibility that all the banks would go down and that there would be no means of exchange, civil disorder, troops on the street. There was still a danger that some major corporations – several names were mentioned – would go under and have to be bailed out by the taxpayer as the banks have been. Also, that several countries – Hungary, Belarus, Ukraine, Moldova, even Italy – were either bankrupt or on the point of bankruptcy and there was a danger that desperate people would start to move west or, as someone present put it, ‘We could end up with a sort of Congo on the edge of Europe.’ He also thought that sooner or later pressure on our currency would force us into the euro.

  Dennis Skinner, just back from a meeting of the party’s National Executive Committee, remarked that the party is in better heart than it has been for a long time. ‘Something is happening. It’s just possible we could win. I can feel it.’

  Wednesday, 19 November

  The battle lines are becoming clearer. At PMQs Cameron, following on from his announcement yesterday that the Tories are abandoning the pretence that they would match Labour’s spending on public service investment, hammered Gordon for his alleged profligacy. To judge by the glum expressions behind him, he didn’t make much impact, but it is early days yet. The Tories are now free to go into the next election posing as the party of fiscal restraint – or ‘cuts’ as our side were shouting at him – while painting us as the party of tax increases. So far they haven’t had much luck in pinning the blame for the crisis on us, if only because (as Gordon pointed out on Monday) ‘even the Americans agree it started in America’. That could all change once the bills start to come in.

  Monday, 24 November

  To London for Alistair Darling’s pre-Budget statement. Actually, there was nothing ‘pre’ about it. It was a Budget. Bigger than any in living memory. Mega. Billions splashed about everywhere in a desperate attempt to kick-start our ailing economy. A 2.5 per cent cut in VAT which alone will cost more than £12 billion. Several billion on bringing forward capital projects, child benefit up, pensions up, tax cuts for basic rate payers. All the old rules torn up. No mention of prudence. Of course it will all have to be paid for, but not until well after the next election. In due course there will be increases in National Insurance for those earning over £40,000 and a 45 per cent tax rate for those on £150,000, but not nearly enough to pay for it all. The Tories went wild at the suggestion that the public finances wouldn’t be back to current levels until 2015, and only then if Alistair’s optimistic predictions about a return to growth come good. A huge gamble and, despite much cheering on our side, no one seems confident that it will work. For now we take comfort in the thought that all this is the work of finer minds than ours, but is it?

  Tuesday, 25 November

  Predictable headlines. ‘Middle Class Tax Bombshell’ (Telegraph), ‘The Day New Labour Died’ (Mail), ‘Middle Britain Bashed’ (Express). More ominously a restrained leader in the FT warning of much pain in years to come, questioning the impact of the cut in VAT, suggesting that Alistair’s sums don’t add up. For the Tories, George Osborne was on his feet demanding an emergency debate, which the Speaker, rightly, conceded. Extraordinary that our masters should think they could get away with spending on this scale without giving Parliament a say. Also, and scandalously, much of what has just been announced was leaked in advance.

  Wednesday, 26 November

  Suddenly politics has come alive. Talk about clear blue water. It couldn’t be bluer or deeper. A return to old politics. The Tories going on about a tax bombshell, to which we respond by labelling them the ‘do nothing’ party. How it will all end is anybody’s guess. Gordon saw the enemy off easily at PMQs today, shooting Sir Peter Tapsell, one of the grandest and most pompous, straight between the eyes.

  Thursday, 27 November

  To Sunderland on an early train, nose running like a tap. My annual cold and as usual it is going straight to my chest. I dragged myself over to the Stadium of Light to hand out awards to Sandhill View School leavers. To bed, shaking with fever. So much so that I could barely hold a cup of water.

  Friday, 28 November

  The bulletins are full of an attack by jihadi terrorists on the Taj hotel and several other prominent targets in Bombay. At least 100 dead, fires raging. It’s been going on for two days and no one seems to know where the jihadis have come from or what their cause is, only that they appear to be well armed and highly motivated. Pakistan, of course, is the number one suspect.

  Monday, 1 December

  Still congested, but just about functioning. This afternoon to Monk-wearmouth School, where I talked to a class of 14-year-olds. A mix of delightful, bright-faced, enthusiastic youngsters and indifferent, insolent youths. In keeping with this age of celebrity, much interest as to whether I had appeared on TV and how much I earn (Answer: ‘Less than your head teacher, but more than your form teacher’). One bright little blonde asked, ‘What was the most important decision you’ve ever taken?’, which left me floundering for a moment until it dawned on me that nothing I had ever been called upon to decide as a minister was as significant as, for example, voting against our involvement in Iraq or as useful as banning smoking in public buildings.

  Tuesday, 2 December

  To London on an evening train. The news is dominated by a huge row over a police raid on the office of Damian Green, the Tory immigration spokesman, who was the beneficiary of a string of leaks from a civil servant in the Home Secretary’s office. The Tories have spent the first few days trying mendaciously to present the incident as evidence of an authoritarian government seeking to suppress legitimate opposition, despite the insistence of the police that they acted off their own bat, without the knowledge of anyone in government. Now the finger is beginning to point at the Speaker.

  Wednesday, 3 December

  A third day of sub-zero temperatures. I walked in with a scarf wrapped round my face.

  The Queen’s Speech was overshadowed by the growing row over the arrest of Damian Green. The Speaker made a statement that only dug the pit deeper. It turns out that the police had no warrant and that Speaker Martin appears to have given the go-ahead without even taking legal advice. Omi
nously, and ungallantly, he appeared to be dumping on the Serjeant at Arms, Jill Pay, who was looking very miserable. Tory indignation knows no bounds. Led by Michael Howard, they were jumping up and down with points of order and endlessly intervening on the Prime Minister as he attempted to introduce the government’s programme. Several people on our side pointed out that there were one or two other principles at stake, besides the rights of Members: the impartiality of the civil service, for example; not to mention the operational independence of the police, something the Tories used to be very keen on, not least when the police were conducting their honours inquiry. But the bottom line is that Mr Speaker Martin has let us all down. If we’d had someone like George Young, this would never have happened.

  Harriet Harman quietly (actually, not all that quietly) suggested I try to persuade Jacqui Smith to forget about her latest foolish wheeze – elected police authorities. ‘There’s no support for it,’ she said. ‘No one is asking us for it. It can only get us into trouble.’ In that case why are we going ahead? ‘There’s some support in Cabinet.’ Like who? ‘Hazel Blears.’ Say no more.

  Thursday, 4 December

  M from Washington called in. Very upbeat. He says Obama is unlikely to pursue ‘Star Wars’ or to be pushing to get Ukraine and Georgia into NATO. He will also want to cool the confrontation with Iran, even at the risk of letting the Iranians get on with their nuclear programme. He won’t take on the Israelis, but he won’t allow them to mess with Iran. ‘All Obama wants,’ says M, ‘is calm so that he can get on with sorting out the economy.’ Pakistan, he says, is the big problem that no one knows what to do about. Also, Bill Clinton is a potential embarrassment, swanning about the globe, mixing with all sorts of undesirables. ‘Out of control,’ according to M.

  Sunday, 7 December

  Spent the afternoon reading Nigel Lawson’s sceptical look at global warming, An Appeal to Reason. Beautifully written, scrupulously footnoted. His thesis is that (a) the evidence is ambivalent; (b) if global warming is happening, there are beneficial as well as adverse impacts; (c) the proposed cure – drastic cuts in carbon emissions – is worse than the alleged disease and anyway impossible to implement since the biggest emitters will never co-operate; and (d) that adaptation rather than mitigation is the way forward. Much food for thought. Without doubt a case to be answered.

  Monday, 8 December

  This evening to Congress House for the Prison Reform Trust’s annual lecture, delivered by an extraordinarily eloquent black American law professor. Some shocking statistics: since 1972 the American prison population has risen from 200,000 to 2.3 million, including (incredibly) 73 children aged 13 and 14 serving life without parole. The Welfare Reform Act 1992, signed into law by Bill Clinton, no less, denies welfare to anyone with a drug-related conviction, resulting in widespread destitution. And no end in sight. Even if he lasts the full eight years, Barack Obama is unlikely to have a chance to appoint enough new Supreme Court judges to make a difference. His message: don’t go down the American road.

  Tuesday, 9 December

  To Buckingham Palace, where I watched in awe as the Right Honourable Keith Vaz managed, in a crowded field, to inveigle himself into The Presence. HM, radiant in lime green, worked the crowd, in a gallery lined with Rembrandts and Van Dycks, for an hour and a half, managing to look bright and interested throughout.

  A brief exchange with Sarah Hogg, who once worked for John Major. She confirmed that he had toyed with banning foreign ownership of our media, but said I wouldn’t find any paperwork. They knew it was dynamite and committed nothing to paper.

  A poll in today’s Times put us comfortably ahead on economic competence, though still four points behind on voting intentions.

  Wednesday, 10 December

  To the Almeida theatre in Islington for Pat Kavanagh’s memorial meeting. Strictly by invitation in order to exclude the Evening Standard and the dreadful Jeanette Winterson. Giles Radice and I were the only politicians. The rest were literary glitterati – Carmen Callil, Robert Harris, Ian McEwan and, of course, Pat’s husband, Julian Barnes. A minimalist ceremony, no introductions, no applause, no fuss; beautifully choreographed, just right for a woman of such poise, elegance and so few words. At the end someone read out a list of epigrams found in her notebooks. One said: ‘If you want to succeed in society, you need to let yourself be taught a lot of things you already know.’

  This evening to Number 10 for Christmas drinks. Just about every light in the Ministry of Defence still blazing when we emerged at 9.30 p.m. So much for all those military big-wigs ringing up the Daily Telegraph every five minutes, saying how starved of funds they are.

  Saturday, 13 December

  Every day the news grows worse. The pound is plunging against the euro. Woolworth’s has gone under. Nissan and Toyota on short time; nine-month sabbaticals at Vauxhall; meanwhile the US car giants are in meltdown. Today there are reports that Bernie Madoff, a Wall Street fund manager, is going bust to the tune of US$50 billion. Apparently it was all a scam.

  Sunday, 14 December

  Gordon has spent the weekend on a whistlestop visit to Kabul, Islamabad and Delhi. Unless I am mistaken, at all three stops he was still sporting the same purple tie that he was wearing when I chatted to him briefly at Number 10 last Wednesday.

  Monday, 15 December

  Keith Hill joined me at lunch. The Man, who he saw on Friday, is on good form, apparently. The Man’s analysis of the present situation is that we are in uncharted waters. Government and Opposition have adopted starkly different approaches to the economic crisis and no one knows who is right. And even if Gordon’s approach is right, it is far from clear that it will lead to a recovery in time for the inevitable election. ‘Scary,’ says Keith.

  Miliband the Younger addressed the parliamentary party this evening, saying that action on climate change represented a chance to win back some of the middle-class votes that we had lost over Iraq. Also a chance to reassert moral authority. I asked if he had read Nigel Lawson’s book. He hadn’t, but promised to.

  Tuesday, 16 December

  ‘How are we doing?’ I asked Dennis Skinner in the Tea Room this afternoon.

  ‘We’re on a knife edge,’ he replied. ‘At any moment we could slip and slice our balls off.’

  This evening I tapped out an email to the Labour Party General Secretary, Ray Collins, re all-women shortlists in the light of recent experience in Sunderland, asking whether we might have stretched the elastic as far as it will go. I know what the answer will be, but I ought to get something on the record.

  Saturday, 27 December

  The Israelis have attacked Gaza, in response to incessant rocket fire from Hamas. ‘This is only the beginning . . .’ said a spokesman ominously.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  2009

  Tuesday, 6 January

  The Israelis are laying waste to Gaza. A picture on the front of this morning’s Guardian shows a distraught father standing over the bodies of his three small children, looking for all the world as if they were asleep, killed by tank fire. They are killing on a ratio of 100 to one, dropping huge bombs into crowded housing, systematically demolishing what remains of Gaza’s ramshackle infrastructure, destroying mosques, all in the name of fighting Hamas. It is nothing new. They did the same in Lebanon 18 months ago. These are crimes and the people responsible are war criminals. Yet still no one of any consequence speaks out. From European governments, our own included, just a lot of mealie-mouthed calls for a ceasefire. From the US, which as everyone knows could put a stop to this overnight, blatant connivance. Even as the bodies pile up and death and destruction rain down, Bush speaks only of Hamas violence. Silence too from President-Elect Obama. Tonight it was reported that three schools have been hit, including one run by the UN, killing perhaps 40 people, many of them children. The UN school was clearly marked, the flag was flying, the co-ordinates had been sent to the Israelis, but still they bombed it. Within the hour an Israeli spokesman is justifying the
carnage on the grounds that someone in the school fired at them – clearly a lie. It is striking how articulate Israeli spokesmen are. How apparently reasonable. How calm. How utterly, utterly shameless. Nothing fazes them. Over and over they repeat that Israel does not target civilians. Of course they don’t. They are just completely careless. No point in getting angry with them; they just calmly repeat their mantras.

  The difficulty is, of course, that there are no heroes in the Middle East. Extremists abound on all sides and, for all the talk of roadmaps, there is no solution in sight. Even in the unlikely event of a settlement there is no shortage of lunatics waiting to destroy it. As my old friend Wilf Burchett* used to say, ‘Every morning I get up and thank God that he never made me an expert on the Middle East.’