An Unexpected MP

by Jerry Hayes

  What some people don’t seem to understand is that all governments are coalitions of one sort or another. Just look at the ‘dries’ and the ‘wets’ under Thatcher and the Brown–Blair empire massacres when whoever won a skirmish ran the country for the day. Compromises have to be made or else governments grind to a halt. Interestingly, Thatcher avoided compromise unless she was forced to, and Brown’s obstinacy and almost psychotic greed to have the keys to No. 10 led civil servants and ministers to despair. In the land of the policy-blind, the one-eyed man ended up as king.

  What has confused so many Tories is that they have to make compromises with the Lib Dems.

  The remarkable thing about this coalition is not that it works but that it works so well. Policies are thrashed out with proper debate. The top table have grown-up discussions and compromise. And to be fair, the Lib Dems, who at grassroots level are the most dirty and dishonest of campaigners, have been a force for moderation. The Tories have been a brake on the woolly-headed left and the Lib Dems have kettled the howling full-mooners of the right.

  In many ways, this has been the problem. Backbench Tories find it very difficult to work with those who have personally trashed them in their constituencies, while the Lib Dems feel uncomfortable working with those who they feel are in a different political solar system.

  A good example of sensible cooperation was the Lansley NHS reforms. Only Andrew and a few civil servants understood them, so what hope was there of selling the policy to the voters? The brakes were put on and a more patient-friendly spin emerged.

  This is where Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt has been surprisingly masterly. He doesn’t bang on about ‘outcomes’ and other impenetrable jargon; instead, the new health speak is about compassion, care and professionalism. For once we have a Health Secretary who appears to be on the side of patients.

  To be fair, he was lucky with the Francis Report, which grimly detailed the horrors at Mid Staffs. Even more fortunate for him is that it all happened on Labour’s watch and in particular when Andy Burnham, his opposite number at Health, was in charge. For once, in the eyes of the public, the Tories have the moral high ground on the emotive issue of the NHS.

  Whether it will translate into votes is another matter. Hunt is a man to be watched. He has rescued Cameron twice, first as a human shield over the Murdoch difficulties and now in humanising the Lansley reforms. Hunt will now start acquiring enemies.

  Despite the collective moans from the usual Tory claque, YouGov polling data regularly shows that 57 per cent of Lib Dems and 67 per cent of Tory supporters think that the coalition is a good thing. Yet this is not represented in Parliament, as a significant minority of Tory backbenchers genuinely despise Cameron with a passion that borders on the bipolar. They keep hearing voices telling them to do unspeakable things. And it is always her voice.

  But Tory armed insurrection is a mere skirmish compared to the civil war that Ed Miliband has unleashed on Labour. All things Blair have been airbrushed out of history and there is a genocidal war against his supporters. This should be a gift for the Tories. Miliband was put there by the unions and in particular Len McCluskey’s Unite, who are manipulating the candidates lists to elbow in their own creatures. More horror stories will emerge from the scandal of Falkirk, Grangemouth and cronyism in the Cooperative movement.

  Worse, he is saddled with Ed Balls as shadow Chancellor, whom he never wanted nor even likes. The two Eds still live in the dark and sinister shadow of Gordon Brown and the Labour sky is becoming black with Brownian chickens coming home to roost. And as for Balls, if there was a Dangerous Politicians Act he would have been put to sleep long ago for belonging to a dangerous breed.

  Those who know him well tell me that Miliband is a really nice guy. I am sure that they are right. But he, Balls and Mad Dog McBride were Brown’s attack dogs, smearing and destroying anyone who stood in his path. Their devotion was not to party or country but to Gordon Brown. It was a deeply unpleasant and poisonous time in Labour’s history, particularly as they weren’t the slightest bit interested in attacking the Tories, just their own. Maybe Miliband wasn’t personally involved, but he must have known what was going on. Alastair Campbell didn’t dub him the emissary from Planet Fuck for nothing.

  And what about UKIP? What a deeply unpleasant ragamuffin army of racists, homophobes and the seriously flawed. You always have a sneaking suspicion that they are the sort of people who would watch Roots backwards so there is a happy ending. They are the flotsam and jetsam of the dispossessed and unelectable. The trouble is some of them do get elected, usually to waste-of-space jobs in the European Parliament. Apart from a sort of vague nod to Euro-democracy, being an MEP isn’t worth a bucket of warm spit. Except financially. It is a licence to print money.

  I remember a meeting with Thatcher when we first introduced elected MEPs; she just gave me the scary stare and growled, ‘It’s a gravy train.’ Too right.

  UKIP’s difficulty is that they are a one-man party. And Farage, since his plane accident, is not a well man. What happens when he goes? Who will fill his boots? Will the party fall apart? They tried it once by replacing him with Lord Pearson, who did for policy presentation what King Herod did for babysitting. And then my old friend Robert Kilroy-Silk (a former Labour MP and daytime chat-show host) tried to civilise them. He failed.

  UKIP’s attraction (how those words stick in my throat) is that they are just the spittoon for the electorate’s angst. Dog-and-duck politics; but only in the saloon bar and the golf club. Not so much a party of policy as of a deep and unpleasant snarl. They are the last refuge for the politically dispossessed. The snigger in the woodpile. It appears that the Conservative Party line is to be more cuddly towards them so as not to upset our grass roots. This is a mistake. They should be Febrezed out of British politics and the grass roots should be warned that a vote for them gives us Miliband by stealth. The trouble is that recent YouGov polling suggests that many UKIP supporters don’t care too much about the consequences of their vote. This is a serious dilemma for the Tories. I don’t pretend to know the answer except to expose UKIP for the ghastly bunch that they are.

  Yet it is immigration rather than the EU that exercises their supporters most. The trouble for UKIP is that by the time the election comes both foxes will have been shot and hung outside the gamekeeper’s lodge.

  Theresa May has been a remarkably effective Home Secretary. Through sheer tenacity and force of will she has managed to get to grips with her dysfunctional and disloyal department. She is as tough as old boots and does more than just make guttural grunts; she takes action – which strikes a chord with the voters.

  YouGov polling indicates that most people support the idea of the educated and skilled coming over to work but are totally opposed to those who come over just for the benefits. Intriguingly, 77 per cent support the right of the Romanians and the Bulgarians to come over here to work. The most interesting polling data shows that the public don’t trust any party on immigration. Neither fact is particularly surprising.

  The last fox to be shot is Europe. The latest YouGov material indicates that there is a very fine balance between those who think that the UK will benefit from leaving the EU and those who think it won’t. The interesting statistic is that if Cameron does renegotiate our position with Brussels, 57 per cent would vote to stay in. It is too early to make any judgements, but this suggests that Cameron may have found a voice. There is also the startling statistic that 81 per cent are critical of the government for not speaking about the benefits of being a member of the EU. The trouble is that the Euronutters want Cameron to publish the list of his ‘demands’ for renegotiation. That is a trap that he would be unwise to fall into because they would want to highlight the failures rather than the successes.

  The EU can be a perverse organisation. The Commission and their support staff don’t live in ivory towers; rather, they hover on fluffy white clouds suspended way above us mere mortals. They are the Euro Volturi, utterly committed to e
nforcing the doctrine of political unity. There is the beginning of a groundswell among the northern nations suggesting that there will have to be revision of this thought process, as a lot has changed since the Treaty of Rome, particularly with mass migration from the poorer countries. The challenge for change is not just for Britain but for all member states. So let’s have more openness, transparency and democracy. But this doesn’t go anywhere near solving the awful truth that none of us want to publicly admit: the Commission’s doctrine of political unity has a point. The reason the euro has been a catastrophic failure is because there is not a central fiscal policy, as the only way that that can be achieved is through some form of political unity. Member states have been able to get away with lying about their level of debt and the inevitable has happened. There is a respectable argument that Greece should leave the euro and go back to the drachma. There is only one question: who picks up the bill? Sadly, the European way of dealing with these crises is to brush them under the carpet and hope that they go away. This one won’t. And if the Greeks, the Spanish, the Portuguese and particularly the Italians revert to their old ways, our perilous recovery will hit the skids.

  But back home, politics is as poisonous as ever and politicians have never been more distrusted by the public. Historically, the Tory Party only seem to have three gears: complacency, panic and self-destruct. We’ve had the first two and have been teetering on the brink of the latter. I was genuinely shocked when backbenchers in the early part of 2013 were almost queuing up to tell me how much they wanted to get rid of Cameron at any price. Even if it meant annihilation at the election. Amazingly, before the economy began to pick up there was a genuine prospect of an Adam Afriyie (a wealthy Tory backbencher from Windsor) challenge and serious promises of a forced vote. At the moment this has been whittled down to a hard core of about fourteen. But the situation is still remarkably fragile. And Afriyie is still courting the disaffected. One minister, sacked in the most recent reshuffle, told me that he had been offered a place in an Afriyie Cabinet. This may be in the territory of Walter Mitty but there still remains a seething discontent. Quite what Cameron is meant to do to quell this, apart from agreeing to stop breathing, is a mystery. He has tried every weapon in the prime ministerial arsenal. Knighthoods are being showered like confetti, and backbenchers and their wives and partners are invited in for cosy chats, drinks and even lunches at Chequers. But rather than lap it up, many tell me they rather resent it. ‘He’s just patronising us,’ they squeal. Leading the Conservative Party is a thankless, joyless grind.

  What should encourage the party is that Labour has had only a consistent lead of about six points, which at this stage of the game borders on the disastrous for them. Cameron has a healthy lead personally on who would make the best Prime Minister, most able to take tough decisions and run the economy. Where he will be in danger is if there is another hung parliament. Backbenchers want more of a say in any negotiations, and if press reports are true (discuss) he has presented Graham Brady, the chairman of the 1922 Committee and a well-known Cameron hater, with a big red button with ‘NO’ engraved on it. But the irresistible temptation to press it would not only explode any prospect of another coalition but would detonate the explosive jacket that Cameron appears to have voluntarily donned.

  And the consequence of this mutually assured destruction? Why, governing in partnership with the DUP and any other minority mad hatter’s tea party, with the prospect of St Boris descending to earth to save us all.

  To normal, sentient people who actually care about growth, employment and improving the standard of living for everyone, this borders on the criminally insane. But it provides more than just a greater frequency of night emissions for the Tory right; it gives them hope. Hope that Cameron will be sent packing and hope that the Lib Dems will be driven into the arms of Labour. But not as much hope as it gives to the man who sends shivers down the spines of Ed Miliband, Ed Balls and the Young Pretender, Chuka Umunna: Tristram Hunt. He is dismissed as just too good-looking, just too bright, just too inexperienced and just too good to be true. Maybe. I’ve seen the future and it has perfect white teeth. The question is: ‘When?’

  In 2013 I appeared on Question Time with Tristram. He had just been appointed as a spokesman on higher education. After the show we had a chat over a glass of wine.

  ‘So, what are your policies?’ I politely enquired, expecting the usual gushing, starry-eyed five-point plan delivering universal happiness that tends to be beloved of the newly appointed. Instead he just paused, scratched his head, smiled and said, ‘I haven’t got a fucking clue.’ I tell that story in his favour as I found it rather refreshing.

  I just wonder whether the country has had enough of the old party system. They are all dying on their feet, with a dwindling band of ancient retainers shuffling round their constituencies knocking on doors and raising money before their final death rattle, which usually means the end of another branch. And who funds them? The Tories seem to receive their cash from betting empires, cheap loan companies and wealthy eccentrics. Labour is funded by the Jurassic Park of the unions, while the poor Lib Dems accept anything from anyone willing to slip them a few bob.

  This addiction to donors disfigures British democracy. That a party that loses a general election faces bankruptcy and is often driven into the financial arms of those it would not normally cuddle up to is clearly troubling. And forget about the public paying for their political games. It is a non-runner.

  There are the beginnings of a solution. At the moment, the amount spent in each constituency at election time is strictly capped, with serious consequences if there is an overspend. Yet the amount spent by the parties nationally knows no bounds; ‘Who Spends Wins’ is not a bad rule of thumb. Why not have a ceiling on all election spending? This will be resisted by all the main parties, particularly those who are attracting the most money. But with 24-hour news, do we need glitzy party broadcasts? Apart from political anoraks and the press, who actually watches them? And is anyone really swayed by them? And what is the point of spending a small fortune on buying up poster sites before an election? Does it really make a difference? I very much doubt it.

  One day someone is going to wrestle with the simple question of whether the public have outgrown two-party politics. Both main parties are hopelessly split. What do the Tory modernisers have in common with the hard right? Nothing except for a large umbrella with the word Conservative written on it. And what do the Milibanders have in common with the Blairites? Nothing except for a large umbrella with the word Labour written on it. They have even excised the word New. And within the Lib Dems, what do the orange bookers have in common with the wild and woolly left? Nothing at all, not even an umbrella.

  So, what binds all the main parties together apart from fear of the unknown and habit?

  But there is the potential for a realignment based on reason, pragmatism and basic decency. At that I can hear the collective groan from political correspondents that I have finally taken leave of my senses. Yet Conservative modernisers, the Blairites, and the orange bookers could be a formidable force for good in British politics if they joined forces. They have more to unite than to divide them. David Cameron has far more in common with Alan Milburn and John Reid than with John Redwood and Iain Duncan Smith. And what does Nick Clegg have in common with Vince Cable and Tim Farron apart from mutual loathing?

  When the next election campaign finally descends into a poisonous, vicious brawl, rough-and-tumbling into personal abuse and making the seventh circle of hell seem like a quiet night at the Rovers Return, the time might be right for a new politics. Oh dear, I can hear another groan from the political correspondents. Whether there would be enough good men and women with the courage to break free from a system that is hopelessly out of sync with the electorate and is on the cusp of moral questionability is probably an ask too far. I suspect that the resolution will be typically British. We will just muddle through. How mind-numbingly depressing.

  EPILOG
UE

  This may just be me slipping into my anecdotage, but politics is not as dull as many people make it out to be. It is just different. There is still the same naked ambition, treachery, bitterness among MPs. And of course the same deluded flotsam and jetsam bobbing along in a sea of self-induced fantasy that one day they will lead their party. But, by and large, they are in the anguished minority. The majority of MPs don’t spend every hour plotting and scheming, desperate to be invited to shine on a heavyweight radio or television show. They are hardworking, underpaid, stressed and spend their days working in the best interests of their constituents. They have to deal with a 24-hour instant-reaction media, Twitter, Facebook and flotillas of emails from constituents who want an immediate response, not just about personal problems but about policy. So the workload has increased. This can be a problem because policies can be a bit transient. Remember the wonderful vote-catching policy of selling off the forests? There would have been a CCHQ brief with a line to take and probably a draft letter to write or ping. So poor old Tory backbenchers would have had to send off another line to take while the smell of burning rubber was still searing their nostrils. All horribly embarrassing. And worse for Labour, whose idea of policy is a moveable feast. The humble pie is not a popular dish with MPs.

  But social media is a serious nightmare. If MPs think that they have so many followers because of their personal popularity, they are in need of a prefrontal lobotomy. Journalists, opponents and all-round loons are just hoping for them to say something really daft. My heart went out to dear old Jack Dromey, whose computer went haywire and put down as a favourite ‘Big Black Cock’, not a website he would have even heard of. The biggest dangers to MPs are irony and sitting in front of their terminals after a stressful, frustrating day. And if they have been victims of a good dinner or a refreshing reception they can land themselves in serious trouble.