Race, class, and candidate selection - 29 comments

I do find the level of interest in our deputy leadership election a bit mystifying, but I read via TMP (with more at BBC News) that the contenders have been discussing the idea of all-BME ("black and minority ethnic") candidacy shortlists as a way of addressing the relatively low incidence of BME MPs (the small matter of the gap between becoming a candidate and becoming an MP was not discussed).

Apparently Hazel Blears, Jon Cruddas and Peter Hain all back the idea of shortlists, and according to TMP:

Hazel Blears MP, the Party Chair, [...] said she was going to call on Labour’s National Executive Committee "to draw up a code of conduct to move towards all BME shortlists". [...]

The party is in the process of taking legal advice on the issue. Lawyers predict that the race relations legislation will need to be amended to allow the introduction of the measure.

I'd like to hear one of the candidates explain how it is not racist to deny somebody the chance to stand as a Labour candidate on the basis of the racial category people have placed them in, and which no action on their part can ever change. The same, of course, goes for all-women shortlists. What you give to one group via "positive" discrimination you take from another, and when you discriminate on the basis of race, you become a practitioner of racism. Perhaps you mean well - in which case you're merely foolish. No doubt the BNP (and worse) would fancy rewriting the Race Relations Acts if they ever acquired the power to do so. This is a sign - that candidates ought to mark well - that the Acts are doing their job.

It would be a much better use of Hazel, Jon, and Peter's time to explain to all Labour supporters why they should consider standing as a candidate: what the point of being an MP is, what can be achieved, what can be expected, and why other careers just can't cut it in comparison, rather than assuming that racial discrimination is the best explanation for the relatively low proportion of BME MPs. I believe we should go to a considerable amount of trouble to identify what the reasons are, because I believe that a healthier society is one in which racial (and other) differences count for nothing, people are freed from discrimination to make their own decisions, and it's apparent to all citizens that people they identify with are represented in all levels of public life. If, say, we were able to prove that the relatively low proportion of BME MPs was largely due to the fact that BME citizens generally preferred to pursue their own careers, or believed that becoming an MP was a waste of time - which must be pretty likely, however misguided a belief that would be... - our course of action will be different, and we can avoid tinkering with the law, the possibility of Peter Law-style legal battles, and dividing the anti-racist movement.

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One division among potential candidates that few people seem to cite is our old friend, socio-economic class. Here's a run-down of candidates for the seat of Croydon Central. This is described as being a "strong line-up". Well it is, but that uses a definition of "strong" I'm not politically comfortable with.

I don't see why we should be any more pleased that a barrister, a policy adviser, or an existing councillor is on the list than an electrician, a bus driver, a nurse, or an unemployed former bank clerk. Of course candidates must be selected on merit, and perhaps only a small proportion of club bouncers would be capable of serving their constituents as effectively they deserve (I've no evidence in either direction), but we're not even talking about shortlists here - these people are all untested.

So, the lack of ordinary people and, for that matter, the low proportion of candidates from private sector employment - where, after all, approximately 80% of the labour force work - is a big concern. The more our elected members appear to come from a similar background - whether in terms of race, religion, age, gender, education, or employment - the narrower the Labour movement must appear to the population. I'd like our candidates to prove their strength to the electorate, and especially in government, not just demonstrate a CV with impressive-sounding credentials.

Hard-working families - 4 comments

The Times brings us the news that "Thousands of buy-to-let families face tax shock".

The article's feeble and shamelessly partisan rhetoric has already been cut to pieces, but what is tragic is to see the same "boo" and "warm" words traded by all mainstream political parties. How demeaning it is to contemporary politics that people out for themselves can still be held up for pity in front of a less well-off electorate, and the stupid and greedy protected on the grounds that they have a home, a spouse, and perhaps dependants.

It continues to stink.

Apples - 1 comment

What strikes me so often about BBC "health" articles is that they're generally so confused and illogical as to be incomprehensible. On that basis the sane strategy has to be to ignore them completely, and to take your news on developments in nutrition from authoritative sources.

Take Apple juice 'may prevent asthma':

Children who drink plenty of apple juice may be less likely to develop asthma symptoms, say scientists.

Actually, that's "might", but let's proceed gingerly.

Children who drank apple juice at least once a day were half as likely to suffer from wheezing as those drinking it less than once a month, it found.

Eating fresh apples themselves gave no apparent benefits, the study concluded.

And yet, fast-forwarding to the end...

Dr Mike Thomas, an Asthma UK researcher at the University of Aberdeen, said that the study was further evidence of the protective effect of apples.

Continuing...

He said: "There is some evidence that a healthy diet rich in anti-oxidants and vitamins is good for asthma.

Was it these that were being tested? Surely a logical leap.

It is yet another reason why we should be encouraging a healthy diet."

And another. If apples play, as I'm sure they do, a tiny positive role as a contributor to (though also a consequence of) a healthy diet, why the need to defend them on the basis of incredible asthma-related benefits? Moreover, if the benefits of apple-products are primarily asthma-related, why muddy the waters by talking about what foods are good for general health? And since when has concentrated apple juice (rather than the fruits themselves) been identified a mainstay of a healthy diet?

No doubt there are scientists who can answer these questions, but reading these silly articles will get you no closer to hearing what they have to say.

Back? - 1 comment

Well my 6 weeks of work training is over, so I'll be returning to more normal hours. Unfortunately you should be suspicious whenever you read statements like "I might make a full return to blogging this week...", recognising a symptom of blog-tiredness when you see one.

Not tiredness with Bloggers4Labour itself, or necessarily with what the most interesting bloggers are writing about politics, it's just that I can't bring myself to blog about it at the moment. Not national politics anyway, and certainly not via the regular route of pouncing on something stupid (and quite possibly misrepresented, misinterpreted, or only 'floated' in the first place for the benefit of the Sunday papers) at the BBC or Comment Is Free.

Perhaps I need a holiday - I can't remember the last time I had one. Alternatively, I could look for the practical benefits of political policies rather than fall into the trap of becoming the kind of hack content to write solely off the top of their head, or on the basis of what someone told them over dinner.

Update: Sorry, I will be trying to answer emails, but I still have 22 drafts to work through. The general rule is that I'm not ignoring you, and not trying to snub you, I just can't think what to say/what the answer is, at present.

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I wonder if a lot of time and intellectual effort wouldn't be saved by devising a kind of "automatic Fisking device" that could be deployed by bloggers against potentially offending articles, emitting a factual/logical demolition of the article within seconds. Perhaps the device/program could also be trained by experts with a dictionary of offending terms and phrases that mark the author and article as a potential offender (e.g. "Turbo-consumerism", "... the language of the BNP", "political legacy", "a time of change" - I'm sure you can improve on this list). Perhaps this way the "village idiots" (the Lawsons, Buntings, Clarks, Murrays, and Galloways of this world) can be dealt with swiftly, but not gratuitously, so we can be the more confident that serial critics really do have positive points of their own to make.

Another blogging witch-hunt - 1 comment

That the Mail on Sunday is happy to smear and victimise an individual (blogger) on the basis of their perceived political stance shouldn't surprise; what is depressing is to see other bloggers wading in to score the same political points.

It's not so much the Conservative-Labour aspect that bothers me - after all, I'm not at all sure that Owen Barder, the victim here, is indeed a Labour supporter - no, it's the crassness of the attack, the lack of thought for the individual concerned, for the reputation of bloggers, for the possibility of meaningful civil-servant blogging, as well as the resemblance of the perpetrator to something that shoots out from under a rarely-moved rug during a spring-clean.

Tim Worstall and Ministry of Truth have also posted about this.

Perhaps an alternative to the blogging "code of conduct" is some kind of "blacklist", that moves the burden of proof from the majority of bloggers who - for want of a better criterion - treat other bloggers as they would be treated, to the tiny majority who we only encounter when they sink their fangs into us, or someone we know. It shouldn't be too difficult to convince an independent panel of this, surely. How they could operate such a blacklist, once sentence has been passed, I leave as an exercise to readers. Just a thought.

I might make a full return to blogging this week...

Update: "Simon Walters is a Lying Scumbag" - the Mail on Sunday journalist, that is. I know, there's more going on in the world than this.

Education vouchers II - no comments

I hadn't really intended the last post on vouchers to hog the top spot for almost a week, but it was worthwhile, and some interesting comments have been left. There are even more (currently 28) at Stumbling and Mumbling's response to the article. I should have more time to blog (and, perhaps, think) by the end of next week.

Incidentally I've set up a poll on vouchers that is open to everyone with a B4L login. As usual, you have a full 100 votes to allocate between the various options, according to your preference and your level of interest. If you're quick (i.e. second) you can see how I voted.

Education vouchers - 9 comments

I'm sure this won't endear me to fellow Labour bloggers, but the Economist (actually, it's now last week's edition - sorry) has an interesting evidence of successful experiments involving school vouchers:

[...] Harry Patrinos, an education economist at the World Bank, cites a Colombian programme to broaden access to secondary schooling, known as PACES, a 1990s initiative that provided over 125,000 poor children with vouchers worth around half the cost of private secondary school. Crucially, there were more applicants than vouchers. The programme, which selected children by lottery, provided researchers with an almost perfect experiment, akin to the “pill-placebo” studies used to judge the efficacy of new medicines. The subsequent results show that the children who received vouchers were 15-20% more likely to finish secondary education, five percentage points less likely to repeat a grade, scored a bit better on scholastic tests and were much more likely to take college entrance exams.

Voucher programmes in several American states have been run along similar lines. Greg Forster, a statistician at the Friedman Foundation, a charity advocating universal vouchers, says there have been eight similar studies in America: seven showed statistically significant positive results for the lucky voucher winners; the eighth also showed positive results but was not designed well enough to count.

The voucher pupils did better even though the state spent less than it would have done had the children been educated in normal state schools. American voucher schemes typically offer private schools around half of what the state would spend if the pupils stayed in public schools. The Colombian programme did not even set out to offer better schooling than was available in the state sector; the aim was simply to raise enrolment rates as quickly and cheaply as possible.

These results are important because they strip out other influences. Home, neighbourhood and natural ability all affect results more than which school a child attends. If the pupils who received vouchers differ from those who don't—perhaps simply by coming from the sort of go-getting family that elbows its way to the front of every queue—any effect might simply be the result of any number of other factors. But assigning the vouchers randomly guarded against this risk. [...]

More evidence that choice can raise standards for all comes from Caroline Hoxby, an economist at Harvard University, who has shown that when American public schools must compete for their students with schools that accept vouchers, their performance improves. Swedish researchers say the same. It seems that those who work in state schools are just like everybody else: they do better when confronted by a bit of competition."

There must be a chance of such a scheme being introduced, whatever Labour activists hope. Why? Because voters are (evidently) riled; because private education is - say the figures - becoming a socially acceptable rather than an exceptional choice for parents; and because there'll come a point when schools have the resources they need, the buildings, the staff, the uniforms, the energised, performance-paid Heads, the rooms full of flat-screen monitors, but with limited success in equipping children for the world of work, training, and higher education.

Clearly the introduction of vouchers shouldn't be intended as a substitute for other education policies, but if it happens to work - as it appears to in Sweden - perhaps it can replace other policies that don't work? Perhaps, also, our current resistance stems from unfamiliarity or national peculiarity, rather than an internationally-consistent ideological position? Why not pick a council and try an experiment? If it appears to work, add another council; if not, scrap it and try something else. I can't see a quicker or cheaper way to find out the truth, once and for all.

The Commentariat, again - 2 comments

This is good, from the Ministry of Truth:

For all the professional commentariat complain bitterly of their rather 'robust' and ungentle handling by some bloggers and a few anonymous blog-trolls, it should be noted that there is nothing that pisses them off quite so much as those occasions on which their standard charge of amateurism contrives to explode in their face.

This latest spate of sniping from the hallowed ranks of the professional commentariat has, I will freely admit. prompted me to contemplate a pivotal question.

Just what, exactly, is it that journalists - or rather columnists, as there is little by way of real friction between most bloggers and other subspecies of the genus 'Journalista' - possess that bloggers do not, such that these columnists routinely operate from a presumption of their own professional and intellectual superiority?

The only answer that seems to fit, having pondered the subject, is that with payment for one’s opinions comes the hubristic belief that one’s ability to string together words in a more or less grammatically correct and pleasing manner automatically confers on oneself the status of being an ecumenical authority on any and all subjects to which one turns ones attention.

My last take on this topic.

Nick Robinson - on board 'Project Cameron'? - 1 comment

Paulie has the full story:

[...] After all, because Robinson has a Tory background (though he doesn’t mention his mid-'80s role as Chairman of the Young Conservatives in the biography that he publishes on his blog), he must already be a suspect clandestine member of 'Project Cameron.'

His idiotic sensationalism certainly makes him sound like one most of the time.

Supporters of public service broadcasting can only hope that Nick Robinson isn’t tipping Guido off though, and I expect that phone records could be examined to clear up any doubt. I would suggest that his superiors at the BBC should think about holding an internal enquiry into this – and publishing the results by way of reassurance.

Housekeeping / former Councillors - 2 comments

One of the least pleasant tasks here at B4L is taking deceased blogs from the list. Generally each loss is made up shortly, but the recent Council Elections will have caused a few blogging councillors to become blogging ex-councillors.

I can't track all of these cases down myself, which is where you come in. If you blog but lost your seat, please let me know so I can update the records. Likewise, drop me a line if you've spotted a blogging councillor, AM, or MSP announcing their defeat.

It's also possible some blogging candidates succeeded in their quest, so, again, please help me track them down.

French electoral geography - 2 comments

I wasn't expecting to post about this, but a comparison of the 2007 département map, and one from 1974, when Mitterand trailed in second to Giscard d'Estaing, is interesting:

2007:


1974:


OK, the gap in 1974 was 1.62 points, rather than 6.12 in 2007, so we'd expect more pink on the second map, but what's interesting is the geographical shift in support.

Take the North: apart from Pas de Calais, which Royal took by just over 4 points, the Socialists have disappeared. Isn't that supposed to be the industrial heartland? [this thought, via]

The Socialists have also disappeared from the South-east. Gard and Bouches-du-Rhône were won convincingly in 1974, but went to Sarkozy with majorities of 12 and 16 points respectively in 2007. The centre, too, isn't looking too strong (Centre and Bourgogne).

Pyrénées-Atlantiques (far South-west) shows a definite shift to the left, but generally Socialist support seems to have shifted decisively towards Brittany on the western tip.

I'm curious to know what this all means. Though I could probably whip up the relevant maps to prove my point, I suspect that a UK electoral map from the 2005 General Election would probably not differ much from an October 1974 one, if held at arm's length - at least from a red/blue point of view.

Update (08/05): See also: "French electorate splits into two tribes of young and old", via.

Results 2007 - 5 comments

It would be a bit odd if I didn't have anything to say about the Council elections, so here we go. Even if Labour avoided "meltdown" (how's that for ambition?), losing close to 500 councillors in England, and power in both Scotland and Wales, is a pretty lousy result.

Let's face it, Labour doesn't have any divine right to form a government, and governments are put in place to do a job, grudgingly (so the turnout figures say), by the public. Neither the Labour Party nor the Labour government should expect thanks, or even appreciation from the public, however many good things have been done, and are yet to be done. Nonetheless they must carry on governing roughly in accordance with the will of, and in the interests of the public. Just as individuals remember their own achievements, conveniently forgetting or dismissing their far more numerous failures, the majority of the public, who see themselves in opposition to (perhaps, subject to) governments in general, will tend to forget or dismiss governments' achievements, harking back to well-publicised failures or embarrassments.

What doesn't help is that seemingly doomed administrations are not marked by failure of policy, but by a hostile, bored media, hungry for intrigue and scandal. It's this poisonous cloud that is so dangerous for governments, for parties, and so unappealing to the electorate. Can it be dispersed - perhaps with the help of this blogosphere of ours?

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Back to the results, we had a particularly bad result here in Brighton & Hove, with Labour losing 10 of its 23 seats to the Greens, and to the Conservatives, who are now by far the largest party.

In the Brunswick and Adelaide ward (my side of the road) - once (intriguingly) the SNP's power base in England - Labour collapsed from second to fourth, their vote halving with the reduced turnout.

2003: LD 2325 (48.3%), Lab 1164 (24.2%), Green 680 (14.1%), Con 535 (11.1%), Others 110
2007: LD 1671 (41.1%), Green 913 (22.5%), Con 725 (17.8%), Lab 547 (13.5%), Others 208

The result was only marginally less bad in Central Hove (the other side of my road):

2003: Con 2154 (38.7%), LD 1731 (31.1%), Lab 1057 (19.0%), Green 618 (11.1%)
2007: Con 1865 (45.9%), LD 1359 (33.4%), Green 753 (18.5%), Lab 621 (15.3%), Others 109

Our only substantial share of the vote was the 41.2% achieved in East Brighton. Overall the score was: Con 36.6%, Lab 26.3%, Green 21.7%, LD 10.2%, Others 5.3%.

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Chris Dillow has more on the disappointing turnout, while Skuds covers compulsory voting. I wouldn't mind seeing a pilot project at a future election, though I agree that punishing people who decide not to vote is not a solution to the lack of interest in local politics. Furthermore, the democratic process is supposed to put the population in control, and introducing compulsion reverses this.

That is, of course, also an argument in favour of first past the post, against voting systems that use party lists and where the formation of governments is a matter of negotiation among politicians, where policies and principles can be put aside in order to make a large enough coalition. It's perhaps with this in mind that the Scottish Liberal Democrats, winners of a mere 16 out of 129 seats, seem to believe they're free to pick and choose coalition partners to give themselves a say in the running of Scotland:

"The Scottish Liberal Democrats will work constructively to promote our positive policies in the new Parliament."

The last eight years of the Scottish Parliament have seen Scotland run by a Labour-led coalition with the Liberal Democrats.

Earlier, Tavish Scott, who ran the Lib Dems' election campaign, said his party would not share power with Labour.

Sadly, the SNP won that election - in terms of both votes and seats - so it falls to them to govern Scotland. The Liberal Democrats, who came fourth, should go off into a little corner and keep their noses out.

Update (09/05): See also this on PR, from Shuggy.

Sarkozy - 3 comments

The Wikipedia has full results from the French presidential election, and links to this rather nice map that breaks down the second round results by département.

Dave Osler posts about the possibility of "resistance" to the new president from the left. It's hard to take that seriously. No fewer than 18,983,408 people voted for Sarkozy, nearly 2.2 million more than voted for Royal, which is a pretty clear democratic mandate. The feeling of resignation, and the lack of enthusiasm for Royal that I've felt from French socialist supporters, tells me this is a result that people will - as they should - accept, whatever they individually feel about the policies that will emerge.

Attempts to thwart the democratic mandate will just make the French left look ridiculous, irrelevant, and stiffen the resolve of those in government who want to take on the bastions of left-wing power. I imagine statements like Marie-George Buffet's:

It is necessary to assemble to block the politics that the right is going to set in motion. I make an urgent call for the mobilisation of all the forces of the left to organise a ripost.

Are just rhetoric intended to give disappointed supporters a lift. Incidentally, her 1.93% first round result was the lowest result ever for a Communist presidential candidate in France.

Vote Labour Today - 4 comments

Good luck to all Labour candidates today!

The Benn decade - 6 comments

Surely one of the silliest articles ever posted at Comment Is Free, Neil Clark - or, most likely, a child making their first, tentative foray into political writing - fantasises about the possibility of a three-term Labour government headed by, of all people, Tony Benn.

Tom H says what needs to be said, but the piece is so inane I hope he didn't spend too long on the critique.

In a similar vein, here's an interesting site that tries to judge the Labour government's adherence - in 2007 - to the "statements and conference decisions of 1992-4". Interesting it may be, but if the plan is to show how Labour has "sold out" (how else do people's minds change?) since the last "democratic/legitimate" setting-out of aims, then it's a ridiculous one. We're not talking about fundamental moral principles, but about - often - specific economic policies. I know economic understanding isn't evenly distributed, but surely 15 years is a long time in that business?

The appropriate baseline for future policy is today, not 1997, and not 1992. We should be asking the peddlers of policies past to justify their contemporary relevance - which is not necessarily difficult - rather than resorting to absent-minded dreams of Utopia.