Refounding Labour in Northern Ireland (2): Have we been conned?

I am unashamedly parochial about the Refounding Labour organisational review process. I can’t afford to be anything else. Labour Party members in Britain may be getting exercised about various aspects of the final report, to go to Conference next week, or indeed about the ‘one document one vote’ approach, as amendments will not be taken.

Labour in Northern Ireland just wants the opportunity to do what political parties are meant to do - stand in elections.

Accordingly, the submission from the Northern Ireland CLP was based around this one point, as set out in my previous post. The question now is: after Refounding Labour, is our aim more likely to be achieved?

The starting point was unpropitious, as the consultation document didn’t mention Northern Ireland at all. Even allowing for the fact that Labour doesn’t really get devolution as yet, that was tough. However, it probably helped to produce the thorough and considered response, as nobody likes to be ignored. The draft was the subject of a long and lovely discussion at a members’ meeting, after which some changes to the response were actually made – in other words, a real democratic process and a tribute to all who were involved.

So, after all the lobbying and NEC discussions, what’s in the final report? On page 17, we have:

‘The growth of party membership in Northern Ireland is very welcome and we note a few submissions have been received, including a submission from our NI CLP, that have requested the party agree to stand candidates for election in Northern Ireland.

Recommendation: The party will continue discussions with our NI CLP, and enter into discussions with our sister parties the SDLP and Irish Labour Party’.

Some may say: is that it? Exactly how much better off are you now?

I disagree. Just suppose the report had recommended standing for election. What would have been the first thing we would have had to do? We would have had to ‘enter into discussions with our sister parties the SDLP and Irish Labour Party’. With the SDLP because it does contain Labour-minded individuals, and we would have had to see if we could find any common ground, or, if not, perhaps to persuade some to join us. The SDLP is, in any case, currently at a crossroads with its very interesting leadership campaign. The outcome will be very important for the direction of democratic socialist politics in Northern Ireland. We cannot and should not ignore the SDLP’s membership of the Socialist International, but there might be a question about how long that membership will continue.

And discussions with Irish Labour would be needed because our entry into electoral politics would change the dynamics of Labour representation on this island. We would want to have a close and mutually supportive relationship, and align policy as much as possible. In my personal opinion I’d like to try persuade Irish Labour to change their minds about putting up their own candidates North of the border and run a joint campaign on a common manifesto.

So I see no harm in strengthening the case by having these discussions before a final decision is made. Of course, either or both the other parties may refuse to talk, saying they are happy with the status quo, in which case we know where we stand.

Labour members will discuss the situation in mid-October and of course there will be different opinions. The other side of the argument is that we’ve been conned. As Andy Burnham said during the last leadership campaign, the decision to stand in elections should be for Labour members in Northern Ireland. Talks can go on for years – as they already have. But given that the next elections we’d want to contest are in 2015, or possibly 2014 for the European Parliament, I think it’s worth a thorough and comradely exploration of how to get it right.

After all, the reason for standing in elections is to give the Labour movement a voice, in the interests of working people, in order to try to improve their lives (or, sadly, to mitigate damage) at a very difficult time. We need to find the most appropriate way of doing so in a changing but still divided society.

Refounding Labour in Northern Ireland (1): The Argument

The Refounding Labour organisational review will be debated and voted upon at the UK Labour Party Conference next week. Here is a summary of the Northern Ireland CLP’s submission.

The full version is available here and is worth reading if you are interested in the details of the argument – in particular, I would urge those who think the Party is anti-SDLP to read pages 3 -4 .

A real Shared Future: why the Labour Party should stand for elections in Northern Ireland

Submission to the Refounding Labour organisational review by the Northern Ireland CLP

Our submission is the response of the Northern Ireland Constituency Labour Party to the Labour Party’s organisational review, Refounding Labour, and argues that the Labour Party should stand for elections in Northern Ireland.

The argument has three strands.

1.    It is the final stage in achieving a fully functioning Labour movement in Northern Ireland. As has been said many times by senior Labour figures, there should be no ‘no go’ areas for the Labour Party.  In a democracy, a prospective Party of Government should seek a mandate across the UK, including Northern Ireland.

• Northern Ireland has a vibrant Labour moment including 350 paid-up Labour Party members, almost 260,000 trade union members, mostly in affiliated unions, and 32,000 trade union members contracting in to pay the political levy. Northern Ireland has the highest density of trade union membership of the four UK jurisdictions – and no other party in Northern Ireland has a structural link with the trade unions
• Party members participate in an active Constituency Labour Party, assist in British and Irish Labour election campaigns, attend Conference and are active in the National Policy Forum. Standing for election is the last piece in the jigsaw.
• Members also participate in their trade unions, socialist societies, the Co-operative Party, the Fabian Society, Labour Students and the Party of European Socialists activists’ network.
• Northern Ireland’s Labour Party members are involved in a wide range of civil society organisations which seek to influence policy both at regional and UK level through lobbying.
• It has been argued that Labour cannot usurp the SDLP’s position as the only Northern Ireland member of the Socialist International. However, fifteen countries have two SI parties as members, and one has three.
• Although Labour members would have respect for the historical role of the SDLP and for many individual SDLP members, the SDLP is currently unsuitable to represent the Labour movement because (i) it has no structural connection with the trade unions, and (ii) its ‘nationalist’ community designation in the Northern Ireland Assembly prevents it from developing truly cross-community, anti-sectarian politics based on economic and social issues rather than on territorial position.

2.    The Labour Party can fill the political vacuum caused by the lack of a cross-community, anti-sectarian democratic socialist political party.  Labour in Northern Ireland provides a voice that is un-mediated by community divisions, a voice that can develop policies that will encourage sharing in a divided society and build a future without the fear of sectarian tensions.

• Political identity and electoral behaviour in Northern Ireland is often erroneously presented as a simple territorial cleavage between unionism and nationalism. However, this disregards opinions on social and economic issues, and other aspects of political identity such as class and gender.
• A review of the statistical evidence has revealed a political vacuum that could be filled by Labour. For example:
• 43% of the population consider themselves to be neither unionist nor nationalist; and
• in 2005, around 70 percent of people who didn’t vote said they had sympathy with the statement that ‘I would have voted if there was a strong non-sectarian party’.
• Under the circumstances it is not surprising that turnout at elections is declining, and public confidence in the governance of the region is low. In such a climate of dissatisfaction and frustrated aspirations, Labour has to act.
• Labour Party politics can offer a home to those disillusioned voters and to many more voters who simply put up with current parties because there is no viable, non-sectarian alternative. We believe that the best ‘cross community’ decision-making takes place within parties rather than between them.

3.    We have the capacity to build our case around the Labour values of social justice, equality of opportunity, strength of community and rights matched with responsibilities. The Labour Party in Northern Ireland accepts the duty to stand for Labour values, to use those values to promote prosperity and a shared future, and to represent the wider Labour Movement politically.

• The Labour Party in Northern Ireland seeks to uphold Labour values in the context of a society trying to move beyond sectarian division and find a common ground based on values, rights and responsibilities we all share. We seek a new political paradigm that is not dependent on territorial politics and thus contributes to healing the divisions of the past.
• The people of Northern Ireland want politics based on everyday issues such as crime, education, health and the economy – especially at the present time of economic uncertainty and constraint.
• We can use our solid base of 350 members, plus substantial support in the wider Labour movement, to build electoral support through standing good, local candidates and seeking votes from all sections of the community.

The next stage of Northern Ireland’s ‘peace process’ is to work towards a genuinely shared society which acknowledges the importance of history but refuses to be held back by it. Only Labour can fulfil the role of a non-sectarian democratic socialist party in which all voters can have confidence.

The red-faced Orange

Over the years I have shocked many friends and acquaintances with my forthright opposition to the Orange Order and the scorn I have poured on Orangefest and the like. I think it’s sometimes been perceived as a failing on my part rather than a reflection on the organisation itself. But I have continued to insist that the Order as currently constituted cannot function as a non-sectarian organisation, taking part in jolly cross-community events funded by the taxpayer.

As Dominic Bryan says in his book ‘Orange Parades’ (2000):

There are a series of laws governing the relationship an Orangeman should have with members of the Roman Catholic Church. Marriage to a Roman Catholic and attendance at a Roman Catholic service can both lead to a member being expelled. In practice the use of these rules tends to vary among lodges. On more than one occasion, debate has taken place...over a member who has attended the funeral of a Catholic (p.106).

Bryan gives the example of a previous case which caused criticism, when David Trimble attended the funeral of Catholic victims of the Omagh bomb in 1998.

And now, the St Simon’s Church Total Abstinence LOL 821 from Sandy Row has caused red faces (nearly) all round by its utterly disgusting complaint about the conduct of two Orange Order members, also senior members of the Ulster Unionist Party, for attending the funeral of Constable Ronan Kerr, who was assassinated by dissident republicans last April. Initial coverage implied that particular offence had been taken because the men had attended the funeral mass, and some comments on web sites and the radio distinguished between the two, saying that it was fine to pay respects at a funeral but not to attend the mass. When you are in a hole, it’s really best to stop digging, and think about what you are doing looks like from outside the hole.

It is important to remember that the complaint has come from only one Lodge out of 1,200. It may, of course, be prompted by an ulterior motive connected with party politics within unionism. It is becoming increasingly clear that the complaint is not supported by many Orange members and Lodges. However, the situation was able to arise because the organisation’s membership qualifications are not limited to supporting Protestantism, which I think can be justified, but include the denigration of another religion, which cannot.

Hopefully, the incident will prompt debate about how that might change in future. Until then, the Orange Order has nothing to contribute to the new Northern Ireland.

Sexism at 40

Like many people here, the Europa Hotel holds special memories for me. I visited Belfast for the first time (as an adult) in 1995, to attend a conference in the city centre - including a fair amount of time spent in the Europa's first floor bar. The trip set in train a series of events that led finally to a permanent move from London to Belfast.

Like others, again, I can name all the other Hastings Hotels, have visited some of them (with variable results, I must say), and feel it’s important to support a local business in a highly competitive industry. Or rather, I did until today, when my Belfast Telegraph Facebook page presented me with some unwelcome news.

A documentary has been made about the history of the Europa. Two launch screenings were held yesterday, and someone had to think of a promotional gimmick. Because of course no-one would be interested in the fascinating history of the hotel in its own right.

I can understand the line of reasoning. The Europa is 40 years old. So let’s cast our minds back to, er, 1971. What was life like then? Well, people were murdering each other outside the hotel’s front door, but we won’t dwell on that. Homosexuality was illegal, but perhaps rather poor taste to mention it. The year’s pop charts were topped by, amongst others, Rod Stewart, T.Rex, and Slade. Not another seventies pop star lookalike event, please.

So what else has changed? Oh yes, the position of women. In 1971, something called women’s liberation was just getting going. Women were starting to protest against being treated as sex objects. Didn’t they burn their bras? Well, we can't have any of that sort of thing. Hang on a minute, wasn’t there a Penthouse nightclub in the Europa itself? Maybe we can run with this.... and it gets us some lovely girls....

As the Belfast Telegraph – no stranger itself to lovely girls – put it:

Scantily clad models donned the traditional ‘Playboy Bunny’ inspired outfits to welcome the hundreds of guests with a 1970s-themed evening.

But what’s this? Apparently:

The afternoon screening was introduced by Enterprise Minister Arlene Foster with the evening show launched by the city’s Lord Mayor, Niall O'Donnghaile.

That’s one of our best female politicians, a role model for younger women; and Belfast’s first citizen, member of a party that will no doubt have something to say about women’s rights at its Ard Fheis this weekend. Shame on you both, and shame on Hastings Hotels for failing to understand that there are some aspects of the 1970s that are better left in the past.

Burn the black suit

Autumn is here, and that means a wardrobe clearout, a huge bag of castoffs to the charity shop, and a panic about not having anything to wear. As inevitable as the leaves falling off the trees.

But this year has been different. One of the rejects was a suit. My only suit.

I’m lucky that I don’t have to dress very formally for my job. Neat and tidy, yes – contrary to the stereotype of the dishevelled and absent-minded academic. But when the suit started to look a bit dated, I realised I’d only been wearing it two or three times a year and could well do without it. A couple of jackets would cover the odd formal meeting, conference or graduation, and nowadays I might even be able to get away with a cardigan.

And when else, outside work, would I wear a suit? Funerals and job interviews. Even the funeral dress code is getting more casual, so that no longer applies. I don’t intend to move jobs again before I retire but if needs must then I wouldn’t want one which rejected me for not wearing a suit to the interview.

It’s quite a culture shock, though. I haven’t been without at least one suit since the mid 1990s, when I got my first full-time job in local government and thought I’d better smarten up. Until this year it would have been unthinkable to ditch them. I clung to my formal clothing even after I’d left local government and become a PhD student and then a postdoc, when there was very little need to look smart. On the basis that you never know.

Something has changed over the past couple of years. It may be the economic times we live in, or perhaps just fashion, but dress codes have become more relaxed, especially for women. It’s become acceptable at work to replace your dark, ill-fitting and drab suit with colourful jackets and cardigans, scarves and jewellery, and still to be taken seriously. That’s a welcome development for those of us who don’t see why we should have to dress like men in order to get equality and respect at work. But equal pay to go with my red cardigan would be nice.

A town like Maidenhead

I enjoyed the recent BBC series Town, presented by Nicholas Crane and including Ludlow, Perth, Scarborough and Totnes. You can catch the final two episodes on iPlayer if you’re quick. Crane made a persuasive case for the quality of life in towns and gave some great examples of their resilience in the face of economic and social change.

There was one quite understandable flaw, however. His four town were all, in some way, a success. They were places you’d think seriously about living in – even a city girl like I. But what about towns that are struggling? I can see why no local council or chamber of commerce would allow access on the basis of being Loser Town. However, a wander around my home town of Maidenhead last week provided the missing link.

Maidenhead is a Berkshire town with a population of 78,000, located between Slough and Reading. It has suffered from the shopping and other facilities available in those two towns, from out of town supermarkets, and from the niche shopping and amenities offered in surrounding affluent villages such as Cookham, Taplow and Bray.

What’s left is dire. Looking around, it was clear that most people were there due to lack of choice - because they either couldn’t afford a car (young people, including mothers) or didn’t want to drive long distances (old people). There were lots of empty shops, along with a poor range of goods and very little middle market choice. Atrocious service in Boots, where I was told to go to John Lewis for a brand they didn’t stock. Now, that’s fair enough if there had been a branch around the corner, but the nearest is in Reading.

There are two initiatives that could help to drag the town out of its stagnation. Kings Triangle is a proposed mixed use development which continues to shift the town’s centre of gravity towards the station, in my view correctly in order to encourage use of public transport. But although including office and residential space, as well as a public square, it follows the conventional path of trying to encourage more consumption. It may work, because it will provide a mix of large and small retail units which may diversify the retail offer and persuade more time-poor people to return to local shopping, but it very much depends on attracting the major chain stores to the town. The plans ignore the dreadful local bus services, which need to be vastly improved – and subsidised – in order to get people out of their cars.

Maidenhead also has a Transition Town group. The web site includes an interesting series of events, and hopefully the people involved can help to promote a more sustainable approach to development. However, the problem with these kind of groups is that they tend to remain small and without real influence.

But the real issue is the bigger picture: are we seeing the beginning of changes that could be very beneficial for towns like Maidenhead? Higher fuel costs and decreasing consumption due to the economic situation could lead to the end of shopping as a leisure activity. If people  returned to local retailers for essentials and followed the ‘buy less, buy well’ rule for the rest, then towns could benefit. And if more time is spent in a town, it becomes easier for it to develop a better community focus, reflecting the diversity of its citizens’ interests, and a stronger identity. All this helps with the area becoming a stronger economic hub as well.

Nicholas Crane gave us fascinating accounts of four towns that are further forward in this process, but others can follow.

Just askin'

Much consternation across the world about the English riots – mistakenly described in the media as UK riots, incidentally. But I can’t improve on Nick’s brilliant post about that subject, so I am turning my attention to the new financial crisis that’s bubbling away under the surface.

My understanding of the current situation is that US debt has been downgraded by one credit ratings agency; interest rates in the US will remain low for the next two years, presumably to try to encourage growth (which didn’t work in 2008); there are continuing problems in several eurozone countries; and the UK Chancellor is to address Parliament tomorrow, presumably to emphasise that further cuts remain necessary. Even Sammy Wilson has got in on the act. On top of this, consumer spending remains weak due to job losses and general loss of confidence in the future.

So, to summarise: nations have debt problems because they bailed out the banks which got into trouble due to poor lending practices compounded by lack of regulation. Nations cut public services due to debt problems. Public spending falls, firms go out of business, tax income falls. Credit agencies label nations as bad credit risks. Banks that hold loans to said nations get nervous and start to restrict lending again. Liquidity decreases. Shares fall. Interest rates fall. There is talk of further bank bailouts.

But with what? Are nations expected to get further into debt to keep capitalism in business? Or, if they can’t or won’t, what is the alternative? In 2007-08, in what we may soon be referring to as ‘the last credit crunch’, it was possible for nations to justify putting huge amount of money into bank bailouts of some kind – because debt was within reasonable limits. Also, people were still spending because, even though there were job losses, public sector cuts had not taken hold. Businesses could rely on the spending power of public sector workers and also – perhaps crucially – public sector contracts to keep them going.

This time around it’s different. The economic base of Western capitalism is contracting and at the same time becoming more, not less, debt-based. So what will happen next?

Too much, too young

Amy Winehouse died on Saturday 23rd July and will be buried today. The cause of her death remains uncertain but to many it wasn’t a surprise. She joins the uncanny number of musicians who died at 27, including Robert Johnson, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix and Kurt Cobain.
 Artists such as Winehouse are under two severe pressures: first, that of being so well known that you have no personal privacy; and second, the unrelenting scrutiny of your work (or comment on the lack of it), whether recorded or live performances. A further, usually disregarded, element of their lives is that maintaining your initial success is hard work. It’s not surprising that some people can’t cope - and once you are well known, handing in your notice on a Friday afternoon and slinking off to the pub isn’t an option.
 But the more interesting question is: what about those who have survived? What is the secret of the old timers like, say, Keith Richards, Patti Smith, Lou Reed, Iggy Pop?

Recently I read Patti Smith’s autobiography, Just Kids. It’s a fascinating tale of a young woman coming to New York City, living rough, hooking up with Robert Mappelthorpe, working in bookshops, living in the Chelsea Hotel and finally being able to make a living as a poet and rock musician.
 But there’s something of steel in it too. She always thought of herself as an artist. She worked hard. In some way, it seemed to me, she held herself back – not from the excesses of the day, but from letting those excesses get to her. She had a very strong relationship with her family, but then so did Winehouse. This isn’t about what other people can give you but about your own capacity to withstand stress. Smith’s book (and film, Dream of Life) made clear that artistic expression through poetry and music was the driving force in her life. That would give you a pretty strong survival instinct.

Unlike many, I don’t think Amy Winehouse was an outstandingly great singer or songwriter. I suspect that she may be remembered more for inspiring other young women with good voices to take up careers as solo performers. But the real tragedy is that, with discipline, she could have become great later in life.