Welcome to my Blog

I am a semi-retired former Scottish trade union policy wonk, now working on a range of projects. This includes the Director of the Jimmy Reid Foundation. All views are my own, not any of the organisations I work with. You can also follow me on Twitter. Or on Threads @davewatson1683. I hope you find this blog interesting and I would welcome your comments.

Wednesday 20 February 2013

In praise of Anas Sarwar's speech - well sort of!


Scottish Labour’s Deputy Leader Anas Sarwar made a set piece speech earlier this week that has been attacked from the fringe left and the right. It is worth reading in full rather than relying on some of the commentary that doesn't do it justice.  

I am someone who is likely to consider his words with a critical eye. I didn’t support Anas as Deputy Leader largely because he was a Vice-Chair of Progress, although he has subsequently resigned that post. I am also not a great fan of professional politicians, although in fairness he did at least do a real world job. His strengths are presentational rather than ideological, so a policy speech focusing on political principles is interesting. 

So what did he say? The introduction covered some common Miliband themes of social justice and inequality, broken politics, attacking the banks, energy companies and tax dodging. While not new, these are themes even the right recognises are dangerous for them. Hence Cameron is at least talking tough on tax dodging and energy prices. 

His pitch for Scottish Labour’s principles of Community, Solidarity, Fairness, Equality
and Social Justice won’t find many opponents within the party, although many of us would add a few more. He wisely targeted the references to universal provision, learning lessons from the less well crafted Johann Lamont speech on the subject. As I commented at the time, the reaction from some quarters to that speech was hysterical as she no more condemned universal provision than the SNP have adopted it. The legal aid debacle has demonstrated that. However, while I understand the differentiation strategy over universalism, I still believe it does more damage than good.
 

But for me the most interesting part of the speech was when he, at least partially, tackled the issue Johann ignored – taxation. While his focus was on geographical redistribution he also pointed to a gap in Nicola Sturgeon’s speech, which he argued had, “No progressive argument in favour of those with the broadest shoulders sharing the biggest burden. How can you talk about social justice without talking about wealth redistribution?” 

So overall it wasn’t the speech that I would have written and of course it doesn’t go far enough. But it was none the less a significant move in the right, or left, direction. For a former Vice-Chair of Progress to even talk about wealth redistribution is real progress with a small ‘p’. It is a recognition that faced with the most reactionary government for a generation; this is the territory we need to be on. Anas Sarwar may not be a conviction politician, but he appears to at least recognise that Scottish Labour needs more than managerialism to motivate members and capture the support of Scottish voters. 

I won’t spend much time commenting on the predictable reaction to the speech from the fringe, exemplified by Robin McAlpine’s rant at the Reid Foundation. The key is in the last line of his post, “Or stay where you are”. This reflects the fringe left view that if Labour moved to the murky middle they can capture the left vote in Scotland. That isn’t going to happen and in real world politics you have to build broad alliances to achieve change.
 
In that context, if I can adapt Mark Antony’s words - I come to broadly praise Anas’s speech, not to bury him.    

4 comments:

  1. Was it because of a commitment to redistribution that the Labour Government blocked the introduction of Local Income Tax in Scotland - a system that would have shifted the burden of funding local services onto those most able to bear it.

    Sarwar's words were designed to be exactly what you deride him for - all presentation and no substance. They are woolly enough to soothe party loyalists into doing just as you have done and give him credit for appearing to move while remaining rooted to the spot.

    The task of aligning Scottish Labour with the values of London Labour continues, despite there supposedly being no electoral imperative in Scotland to do so.

    ReplyDelete
  2. The SNP have an absolute majority in the Scottish parliament - They could introduce local income tax any time they want. They aren't going to . Instead they are continuing a campaign of permanent council tax freeze - are as we used to call it rate capping - that is harming services and jobs and helping drive outsourcing and cuts. Just last week John Swinney reiterated his intention to cut Corporation Tax the task of aligning the SNP with Rupert Murdoch's priorities continues despite there supposedly being no electoral imperative in Scotland to do so .

    ReplyDelete
  3. A Local Income Tax would simply shift the burden of taxation onto workers. The rich avoid income tax, but it's not as easy to duck property taxes. Any sensible country has a basket of taxes, you don't dump it all on income.

    ReplyDelete

  4. Hello
    I started visiting your blog and found it really interesting.I was wondering if you would be interested in creating a profile on Glipho.Its a social publishing engine for bloggers/writers wherein you can promote your blog and also follow other writers/bloggers,We have a variety of categories like travel,society,fashion,lifestyle etc where you can promote your blog posts.

    If your blog is powered by Blogger,Wordpress or Tumblr,you can import posts to Glipho from your existing blog without affecting it at all.Further you can attach twitter,facebook,Google + accounts to your Glipho profile and promote your blog on a larger scale.You can also connect your Instagram,Flickr or picasa accounts to drag and drop your photos into content.
    I’d suggest having a look at the website www.glipho.com to see what it looks like :)
    I will be always happy to help if you have any questions and let me know if you want me to send you an invite to set up a profile on Glipho.
    Happy writing!
    Good Luck,
    Neha

    ReplyDelete