Dear wannabe leaders of Britain. What a lot of you there are! I’ve been writing about leadership and the craft of politics for 25 years and I’m sick of watching the same mistakes repeated. I’m keen to help. So listen up Nigel, Kemi, Zack, Ed, Ed, Andy, Angela and Wes – and you Keir, it’s never too late to learn.
1) TL;DR: If you have no time for impertinent journalists, here’s the executive summary. You need a plan, plus strategy and tactics to deliver it. You need a narrative to explain it to voters. You need the charisma and application to take your party, the civil service and the country with you. And you need to build a team to do the bits that you cannot accomplish alone.
2) You need a plan: Bromides about helping the less well-off or curbing migration are not a plan. Andy, ‘Manchesterism’ is a slogan and a vibe, not a plan. Angela, being working class and mouthy isn’t a plan. Wes, you’re a great communicator but what is your NHS plan? To all Labour pretenders: what would you actually do differently?
3) You need a story: Narrative is not some optional extra for politicians with projects and ‘isms’ – it is essential. Tell the country who you are, who and what you are for and who and what you are against. Give reasons. Labour could have restricted welfare spending if they had argued that reform was morally needed to save people from worklessness. Instead, they framed it as a cost-cutting measure, with predictable results.
You need a plan. Angela, being working class and mouthy is not a plan. Wes, what is your NHS plan?
4) Don’t blame the comms: Bad comms flow from bad policy or a lack of story. If you don’t know what you want, you can’t expect a spin doctor to save you. In short: you can’t polish a turd. Fewer turds, please.
5) Build a team: Even Abraham Lincoln led a team of rivals. Nigel and Andy in particular, you’ve always loved your loyal retainers but if you’re going to take the big job, you need a chief of staff and more people with expertise in policy, delivery, economics and foreign policy.
6) Your team reflects you: Zack, it’s no use turning a blind eye to the anti-Semites in your party, even if they help you drum up Muslim votes. You’ve learned a lot from Jeremy Corbyn’s social media-driven populism, but his approach to anti-Semitism contaminates your desire to save the poor and the planet. Nigel, you largely have drummed out the loonies, but can you honestly say there are more than half a dozen truly brilliant people around you?
7) Look to the future: Andy, stop asking thinktanks trapped in the 1990s for your ideas. It’s as if Thatcher had staffed her policy shop with people from Churchill’s government. Find the bright young thinkers on the left. Kemi, you have better talent on your backbenches than in the shadow cabinet. Promote them, as Michael Howard did when last the Tories were saved from oblivion.
8) X is not reality: Right-wingers used to look at the Corbynites and laugh at their online obsessions. Now they’re living in a bizarre right-wing ecosystem. Yes, most voters are online, but they’re reading celebrity gossip, not Groypers. Nigel, you have a chance to become the leader of a governing party, but Reform’s recent announcements seem designed to outflank Rupert Lowe on the right.
9) Ideology is cool: Particularly in a world of tribal warfare where getting out the base is key, but the real advantage is clear signal setting. If civil servants know what your world view is they won’t have to keep asking what you want.
10) The civil service is a force multiplier: Officials are not your enemies, they are a tool and a bad workman blames his tools. If you’re directionless, they will default to how things have always been. But give them direction, as Boris Johnson and Dominic Cummings did in the second half of 2019, and even officials who don’t like your direction will put their shoulder to the wheel.
11) Belief has to be tempered by reality: Zack, you might think the plight of Palestinians is more important than the people of Pontefract, but that’s not what the country thinks.
12) The markets matter: Sorry, Andy, Angela, Zack. It’s fine to regret the influence of the City, but if you want to borrow and print money, those who set the interest rates get a say. Don’t be Liz Truss.
13) Tax is for raising money: I get that you are repelled by billionaires, but tax rates should maximise returns for public services, not punish people you don’t like. The rich can and will leave.
14) Deliverism doesn’t work: Being ‘the grown-ups’ isn’t enough. Managing doesn’t work. You’ll be overwhelmed by events.
15) Insurgency doesn’t work either:
Campaigning is not the same as governing. Ask Boris Johnson.
16) Neither does moralism: Outcome is more important than intention. There is no morality in failure, Keir. LBJ was a bad man who did good things. Be like LBJ.
17) Freebies and donations: A special adviser used to tell his minister: ‘If you don’t think it would look good on the front page of the Daily Mail, don’t do it.’ Good advice.
18) Fix this: Anyone who has worked in No. 10 over the past decade will tell you
the same things. Parliament has ceded too much power to judges and quangos. Nothing can be done quickly with the current system of judicial review. The civil service is incentivised to arse-cover, not innovate. Defence spending is too low. Welfare spending is
too high. The pensions triple lock is unsustainable. Many say we can’t stop the boats under the current treaties. I don’t expect universal agreement about the last three, but it would help if you could all agree to sort out the others.
Conclusion: Great statesmen understand that politics is not a dirty word, it is the means by which anything of consequence gets done. You can dislike the political game: see John Major, Gordon Brown, Theresa May, Rishi Sunak and you, Keir – but you still have to play it. You don’t win the game by bemoaning its existence or by being crap at it and resenting that fact.
For all our sakes, be better – Tim.
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