I did enjoy my rant against la Toynbee last week.
This Tuesday's column provides more delight, so a quick fisking awaits.
In fairness to her, it's no worse than the who-knows-if-Gordon-moves-to-the-left-he-might-even-win nonsense
peddled by Mary Riddell in the Telegraph today (why that woman rights for the DT I will never know).
But one logic-defying column at a time. Polly's back to her old favourites with this one:
A deathbed conversion will do. It's now or never for PR
PR not being public relations but proportional representation i.e. electoral reform to gerrymander the House of Commons.
Gordon Brown today chaired a cabinet sub-committee debating whether to take the plunge on electoral reform. Its decision is about far more than giving voters a referendum on proportional representation: it tells us whether Labour has any will left to recapture the high ground from the depths into which it has sunk.
Well, they want to
flog the motorist further, so not all hope is lost, eh?
Today's Guardian/ICM poll warns Labour that no one is listening any more. Now only big ideas can hope to make voters reconsider. Only an authentic change in Labour itself would show that the party's old political ways are over. At the time of writing, this decision hangs in the balance.
A giant "gravy train" sets off today on a tour of marginal constituencies where MPs have abused their expenses, demanding a referendum on electoral reform. The Vote for a Change coalition for proportional representation makes the crucial link between the scandal and the need for a Westminster clearout: safe seats for life create a culture of complacency and corruption.
But Polly, the introduction of PR will ensure that you can't kick out your MP if they are towards the top of a party list. Take the great Daniel Hannan, Conservative MEP for SE England. He topped the party's list for the 2009 poll, which meant that it was effectively impossible for him to lose (the Conservative Party's share of the vote in the SE would have had to have fallen by around four-fifths - it was as safe a seat as you can get. Neil Hamilton's Tatton constituency, on the other hand, was I think the third safest Conservative seat in the country at the 1997 election. But he lost, while the Conservatives held on to riskier seats. Why? Because it's what people wanted at a local level.
Oh, and there's no suggestion that MEPs, elected under PR, have ever fiddled their expenses? Perish the thought.
Reform will look yet more urgent when the expenses scandal breaks out again next month: offending MPs will be told how much to pay back and some bills will be shockers. Labour needs to get out ahead by declaring the Westminster closed shop over. If the party fails to ride the tide of anger, its MPs will be swept away by it. Radical reform is the best challenge to David Cameron, whose only reform is to raise the price of MPs' rock cakes.
A cheap shot. Cameron's plans to "cut the cost of Westminster" isn't going to save a lot of cash, but it shows that he 'gets it': MPs should be holding the Government to account, not fattening their arses at my expense.
The auguries are not good. Yesterday's cabinet sub-committee discussed a paper on options drawn up by Jack Straw, an outspoken opponent of PR. His trump card is a claim that a referendum is technically impossible unless the enabling bill passes all its parliamentary stages by 25 February – the last possible date before the last possible election day. The Tories in the Lords could filibuster the bill past that day. However, the Electoral Reform Society reckons the Lords have an obligation to pass it since a referendum was mentioned in Labour's last three manifestos. What's more, the society reckons that, with enough crossbenchers in favour, the Lords might well pass the bill anyway. Labour should go for it and expose the depth of the Tories' refusal to make political change.
And Labour always keeps its promises apropos referenda, so nothing to worry about there then Polly. Ever heard of a city called Lisbon?
Campaigners want a referendum on PR held on the same day as the general election because it is the only way to ensure it happens. The ballot paper would put two propositions: keep the present first-past-the-post system, or change to the alternative vote (AV) plus a top-up list – a system drawn up by Roy Jenkins, who
was commissioned by Tony Blair. The system would allow voters to put their candidates in 1,2,3 order and then make additional choices from the extra list,
resulting in a fairer alignment between votes cast and seats won. Straw and other cabinet opponents say they would tolerate AV without the top-up, but since that gives even less of a proportional result, it's not worth the effort of a referendum.
Again, if you have a top-up list system, as in Scotland, it means that it becomes literally impossible for some people to lose (if you stand under AV and also come at the top of a top-up list). It's completely undemocratic for a number of MPs to have literally 'unloseable' seats. FPTP may lead to 'safe' seats, but as Crewe & Nantwich 2008, Winchester 1997, Tatton 1997, Christchurch 1993 et al have demonstrated, sometimes when the chips are down, safe seats just ain't so safe.
The Lib Dems have for years campaigned for PR, though Nick Clegg has downplayed it for fear of sounding self-interested. Paddy Ashdown used to say that PR was not self-interest but high principle, since it could lose the Lib Dems more seats than they gain: tactical voters obliged to vote Lib Dem to keep their worst option out could, under PR, safely put their favoured party first. We shall see on Wednesday what passion Clegg puts into the reform cause in his big speech in Bournemouth.
But he has thrown a spanner into the works by opposing a referendum on election day, wanting a law passed now to set some date after the election. His good reason is that anything Gordon Brown puts forward "will turn to dust". Indeed a death-bed conversion by Labour after all these wasted years doesn't look good. Labour could legislate for a referendum to be held on local election day in 2011, avoiding any contamination with general election issues. Fine in theory, but it would probably never happen as Prime Minister Cameron would just rescind it. So, even if the timing is less than perfect, it has to be now or never.
And PM DC should rescind it. The current Government, with an unelected PM whose solution to every crisis is to bring in more of his unelected pals (by way of their elevation to the Lords), has no mandate to make this change now. If PR was such a great idea, why did it not come in term 1? It's interesting that they hark back to the Jenkins Commission - this group carried out its review eleven years ago! Roy Jenkins is DEAD! Can you imagine if the Tories had tried to implement electoral reform in late 1996, citing a report written in, oh, 1985? Polly would have crucified them... because it would be a shameless attempt of a decomposing administration to somehow cling to power. And she would have been right. But when Labour do it? Oh, that's different. It's "progressive" or some other such nonsense.
The cabinet has more PR advocates than ever, alongside the usual phalanx of old guard tribalists. But there is a tranche of converts and waverers, mostly younger, keenly aware of how far the party has fallen into disrepute. Brown is said to be listening, but is much influenced by Scottish MPs warning him that PR let the SNP win: they are in denial that Labour lost because it was so unpopular on both sides of the border. But the mood is changing: the TUC last week voted to open the PR debate.
Only a Guardian columnist could care what the TUC think about anything. True to form for Polly.
Arguments against the referendum will look persuasive to cabinet faint-hearts. It will be said PR means never again strong decisive government. But "strong" unaccountable government is absolutely not what people clamour for. The country would have been saved the worst of both Thatcher and Blair had it been moderated
by coalition partners. People complain bitterly of "strong" law-making by whipped party majorities elected by a minority of voters.
Or instead we could have the system they have in Italy, where each government trundles on for a few months and then collapses, or the crazy anti-democratic horse-trading of Israeli politics. Hannan / Carswell's "The Plan" has much better ideas for reconnecting power and people.
Thatcher took more votes than Blair - in 1979, 1983 and 1987, the number of people voting Conservative actually went UP each time. Blair's wins (1997, 2001, 2005) were with a declining band of voters.
It looks like a kind of gerrymandering, the last gasp of a dying party, say cabinet opponents. Yes, it smacks of panic that Labour never reformed parliament when it could. But this is no gerrymander: it's up to voters to decide, and it doesn't take effect until the following election. Meanwhile, Cameron unilaterally promises to cut the number of MPs – all Labour – and that really is a gerrymander: he certainly wouldn't do it if Tory seats were in the firing line. PR is the way to cut radically the number of MPs, without defrauding any party.
Perhaps there are more Labour seats in the firing line than Conservative because a boundary review is LONG overdue, and we have the situation where the Conservatives actually won the popular vote in England in 2005 but still had c. 90 seats fewer than Labour. I don't remember Polly trying to cite Michael Howard as some kind of Al Gore lost-leader figure a la Florida 2000.
What if the cabinet splits over the referendum? Some fear it will look chaotic. Nonsense. It will look like grown-up politics, allowing the party to think and vote as free individuals, earning public respect for more openness and honesty. An Electoral Reform Society poll showed that 30% of wavering Labour voters and 30% of Lib Dem voters were more likely to vote Labour if the party espoused electoral reform. Labour has lost 1.1 million to the Lib Dems so far.
Cameron, on current polls, is set to win a good majority in the Commons on the smallest proportion of votes cast since the last war. What's more, today's Hansard Society poll finds only 53% certain to vote, so he may win on the fewest votes ever. Disgust with politics and politicians will destroy Labour – unless it becomes the voice for cleansing Westminster. Leave the Conservatives to tell voters why everything is always for the best in the best of all possible worlds.
"Disgust with politics and politicians will destroy Labour – unless it becomes the voice for cleansing Westminster" - fat chance of that Polly!
And "allowing the party to think and vote as free individuals, earning public respect for more openness and honesty" - what has she been smoking? Yea Gods!
