Anthony Painter

Throughout this election I have tried to be honest on this blog in my analysis and assessment. Sometimes (often) that has meant deviating from the party line. Some will see this as fickle and self-indulgent. I hope many more will consider that an element of self-challenge, or independent critique makes an ultimately more convincing final case. I’ll leave it to you to judge. I have given some thought to why I am voting Labour and I will come to that but before I do, let me contextualise my thoughts by considering where things are as we head into this election.

What has happened in election 2010 (so far!!!!)?

There are two predominant views on politics nicely outlined in two pieces this week. One is expressed powerfully and unapologetically by Gary Younge in The Guardian. He is working class. He hates Tories because they hate the working classes. Cameron looked on in the 1980s as the poor were oppressed- economically, legally, politically and sometimes even violently- and thought the Tories were for him which says a lot. Younge may loathe many (most) of the things that Labour has done but he hates the Tories more. They must be stopped at all costs. This is political tribalism.

The second view of politics is that you have your life and your lifestyle and you pick form numerous fluid options to match your priorities and needs at any given time. It was expressed by Mark Penn in The Times on Monday. Mark Penn has fantasised about politics becoming like retail for a considerable time- voters have a series of shifting micro-preferences and politics is about identifying these needs and innovating policy solutions tailored to you. The M&S £10 meal is designed to respond to a particular lifestyle. And the same is true of, for example, more maternity and paternity rights in the political world. It’s not about what is right necessarily. It’s about responding to footloose consumer demand more effectively than your competitors. This is politics as retail.

It is worth analysing the Liberal Democrat surge in this election to see how these two world views combine in building a party’s final support. On Saturday, I outlined how the liberal and labour strands of the left were separating to make a viable left of centre alternative to the Conservatives more difficult to achieve. That is a long term trend that has been brought into sharp focus by the surge of support for Nick Clegg’s Liberal Democrats. For their additional support-and the fact that there may be some signs that it is subsiding in the closing stages of this election tends to support this- has actually come from groups that you wouldn’t necessarily assume to be ‘liberal’ (C2/ DEs.) In this sense, Mark Penn is right. There is a retail political element to their support which combined with the long-term increase in their base has meant that they have been able to reach almost and beyond 30% support during the course of this election campaign. Interestingly, these voters are not particularly attracted by David Cameron and the Conservatives which explains their difficulties (they may end up with barely more support as a percentage from Michael Howard in 2005- that would be a desperate outcome.)

The fact that Liberal Demcrats have attracted consumerist voters to their (increasingly) tribal base and still only manage to get in the mid to high twenties, say, is a tragedy for the left in a first past the post system. Labour is likely to end up in the high 20s/ low thirties and this is despite the fact that it has lost a huge amount of footloose support since the last election. Its base is bigger. So now we have a Liberal Democratic party/ liberal tradition that is too weak and a Labour party/ labour tradition that is strong but failing to move much beyond its core. So under first past the post, we may be facing a situation where the Liberal Democrats are too weak and Labour is not strong enough.

That’s where we are. But, as a voter, I am neither a footloose and fancy free Pennite or an angry tribalist in the style of Younge (though I do have more sympathy with Younge than Penn!) And you may not be either…..

So why am I voting Labour?

Who you vote for is a mixture of conflicting emotions and rationalities: tradition, family, your personal circumstances, ideas and values, tribal attachment, fear of the alternative, affinity, instinct, and trust. These things cut across class, gender, faith, race and ethnicity, and sexuality. Trying to predict someone’s political allegiance in this modern world is a mug’s game.

My personal history of family, place, values, ideas and belief place me firmly in the labour tradition.

Freedom is nothing without power and capability. There is no freedom without an equality that means something more than the opportunity to fail. Only through collective action- the state or more preferably through community- can each achieve in accordance their endeavour and abilities. We should never give up on anyone; there is always hope through persistence. What someone receives they should put back in equal or greater measure. Each individual is precious and their rights should be respected as such. A human society that is equal, free, cooperative, empowered, and optimistic is also creative, fair, secure, and effervescent.

For me, these things place me in the labour tradition. There are clearly liberal elements within these and even some conservative elements. But as a whole, they more resemble a labour outlook- one that has historic roots in the labour and cooperative movement and Britain’s working class communities but now is cross-class and the dominant ideological alternative to conservatism in modern Britain. It is an instinct and outlook also and is shared by somewhere in the region of 30% of British people.

I don’t hate Tories a la Younge. I just don’t trust the way they think. Their primal instincts are different to mine. And that will ultimately mean that they will do less for people who need help and support than a Labour government of any description would ever do. And their inheritance tax policy sums them up- to prioritise only the wealthy while we face a national mission to get through rough economic waters reveals their instincts in garish technicolour.

I agree with much of the Liberal Democrat agenda- political reform, civil liberties (by not respecting rights, the cost actually falls on the most deprived and alienated rather than the criminals and suspected terrorists they are supposed to target), compassionate amnesty, green investment. My own personal philosophy and outlook owes much to the liberal tradition- where would we be without Smith, Mill, Russell, Hobhouse, Green, Keynes, or Beveridge? We are different traditions largely within the left. But it comes down to tradition, instinct, emotion, and trust. The ideal future is a plural left- as distinct from a ‘new left consensus’- and Labour and the Liberal Democrats will have much in common but distinct we remain.

And the Labour party in Government has been far from perfect. Failing to hold a leadership election in 2007 will be seen as a long-term error- not because Gordon Brown wouldn’t have won but because it would made him better. It has been too unquestioning of the motivations of others in the fields of foreign policy (the invasion of Iraq will forever be a scar) and civil liberties, and failing to properly reform politics will come to be seen as an error of historic proportions. We can always argue that it should have done more on poverty, equality, on improving education and health. As people who insist on justice and change it is in our nature to always demand more and this impatience is a virtue that can become a self-destructive vice if we are not careful.

Saying that more- even much more- should have been done is not the same thing as saying Labour has done nothing. It has achieved an incredible amount.

Would the Conservative party have introduced a minimum wage, transformed the standard of healthcare, massively improved educational achievement- for the poorest more than anyone else, legislated for civil partnerships and expanded equality across the board, given workers more rights to be treated decently, devolved power to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, created Sure Start, invested in families through tax credits and the child trust fund- thereby fighting inequalities in income and wealth, moved 100,000s of pensioners out of poverty, and massively expanded  higher education? And yes, you can point to flies in the ointment in all of this. But really, do you believe any of this would have happened under a Conservative government? Really? Have you looked at what happened from 1979-97?

And Labour has a vision for the future- political reform, investment in a more sustainable and productive economy, protection of health, schools, and policing and the expansion of user involvement in these public services. It’s not flashy but it’s sound.

Criticise away, but do so alongside an analysis of what the Conservatives would do. Neil Kinnock’s ‘Under the Conservatives, I warn you not to get old’ speech applies just as much now as in 1983.*

And in Methodist Central Hall on Sunday- the birthplace of the UN General Assembly- amongst people steeped in the labour tradition- Citizens UK- as Gordon Brown found his authentic voice, I remembered precisely why I was voting Labour. It is because there is a deep and abiding labour instinct in Britain- one that should have a voice and proper political representation. It is an instinct that created the party that became the greatest engine for social justice in our history. Its work is far from finished. Despite all of its many shortcomings, it is a force for good. I’m voting Labour because I am labour.

* It is worth reading Jonathan Freedland on this today.