On the second day of Labour's annual conference in Brighton, The Spectator's Fraser Nelson, James Forsyth and Isabel Hardman discuss Ed Balls' and Chuka Umunna's speeches on the economy and business. We also spoke to shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury Rachel Reeves about what she thought of Ed Balls' speech.
So far the tensions in the Labour party over Ed Miliband's plan to reform the link with the trade unions have stayed below the surface at this conference. The closest it came was, unsurprisingly, when Len McCluskey took to the stage. The Unite leader made another plea for the unions to 'set our vision of how we will build our country in government', and told the leadership (Ed Miliband had strangely disappeared from the stage at this point) that 'if OUR party is to have a future it must speak for ordinary workers and it must represent the voice of organised labour'. He also made his customary attack on the Blairite 'Them' that he likes to talk about whenever he defends the role of trade unions, saying: 'Zero hours in another age.
Much of this morning has been taken up with Labour figures trying to get across they aren't actively considering the story on the front of today's Times — that Labour is planning to deny child benefit to mothers who refuse to give their children the MMR jab. I have just chaired a fringe meeting on the Big Society and asked him afterwards if the story was true. He told me that the idea was originally floated by ‘Kevin Rudd in Australia’ and was ‘never part of the Labour policy review’. Cruddas also suggested the One Nation vaccination idea was 'an interesting idea' but just one of ‘loads of ideas put to me’. This story falls into the trap of journalese lingo. Was Cruddas considering it?
I will admit to a grudging admiration for Ed Balls. He’s wrong about most things, dangerously so. But his speeches are always well-considered, full of substance and usually part of a strategy that he keeps up for months if not years. For that reason, his speeches are always worth reading. This was a good speech, full of substance and forceful expositions of classic leftist errors. Aside from his bizarre towel joke, here’s what jumped out at me from his speech here at the Labour conference in Brighton:- 1. Back to the 1970s! Balls pledges to reverse reform and return to the pre-Blair Labour. Ed Balls was always against the Blair-era reforms of health and education, and now describes them as Tory ideas which he would abolish.
Below is the text and full audio of Ed Balls' conference speech given today in Brighton, as released by Labour's press office. But there's one section missing.
As Ed Balls knows, people tend only to remember one thing about a speech. A word if you’re lucky, a sentence if you’re really lucky. Or an image. Perhaps he was relyijg on HS2 to grab the headlines because the image he conjured up for us today was David Cameron getting changed in the beach with a Micky Mouse towel: not a fat Prime Minister, you understand. Balls tells us that his wife, Yvette Cooper, was impressed at how “for a 46-year-old man, David Cameron looked rather slim. Slim? What on earth she mean? And here’s the Jim Davidson-style punchline: “I just thought for a Prime Minister, it was a surprisingly small towel.
Ed Balls is currently addressing the Labour conference, and we'll post full analysis of his speech once he's done. But as he continues, it's worth highlighting that the Shadow Chancellor has just given his strongest indication yet that Labour will drop its support for HS2. He said: 'David Cameron and George Osborne have made clear they will go full steam ahead with this project – no matter how much the costs spiral up and up. They seem willing to put their own pride and vanity above best value for money for the taxpayer. 'Labour will not take this irresponsible approach. So let me be clear, in tough times – when there is less money around and a big deficit to get down – there will be no blank cheque from me as a Labour Chancellor for this project or for any project.
listen to ‘Len McCluskey: 'If our party is to have a future it must speak for working people and organised labour'’ on Audioboo.
Eddie Izzard’s alleged mayoral ambitions have been well documented, although he’s coy of going on the record about any plans. But mayor of where, exactly? There’s been lots of noise about London; but Izzard has been surprising people at parties recently by speaking with a Scottish accent. Tongues have been wagging. Is the funny man who believes in ‘equal clothing rights’, the political activist who enthusiastically endorsed the Euro, Gordon Brown, Yes2AV and Ken Livingstone, seeking a political career north of the border? It seems not. Izzard explained, with a Caledonian drawl, to my mole that he ‘was in character’ while preparing to play a Scotsman in a BBC drama.
When Ed Miliband dropped his support for the government's motion on military intervention in Syria, it was seen as a convenient way of the Labour leader avoiding the thorny question of what his party really thinks about the principle of intervention. He and his team were astonished when David Cameron said 'I get that' and took the option off the table entirely, but privately they admitted that it wasn't the most inconvenient thing that could happen. But today, Miliband's Shadow Defence Secretary Jim Murphy delivered another one of his measured, impressive speeches on the party's defence policy in which he reminded party activists that in spite of the ghosts of Iraq, Labour does still support intervention.
listen to ‘Ed Balls on Today: 'This recovery is not working for working families'’ on Audioboo.
Every morning throughout party conference season, we’ll be providing our pick of the fringe events on Coffee House. It's the second day of Labour's annual conference in Brighton. The morning session starts at 09:30am today, but don't think that means you can lie in. Fringe events with prominent party figures, shadow cabinet members and trade unionists kick off bright and early at 07:00: Title Key speaker(s) Time Location Running club and breakfast with Alastair Campbell Alastair Campbell 07:00 Gresham, Old Ship Hotel Business is Good for Britain: How can we encourage private investment and exports?
Congratulations to Jon Cruddas, Labour's policy review chief, for managing to produce a front page headline. Cruddas is famed for holding lengthy fringe events and interviews where he manages either to say nothing of interest or else says something that needs translating several times before it makes sense - one special adviser recently told me that he'd found, on the sixth time of reading, that a speech by this guru on 'statecraft' actually contained some very good ideas - and so the Times front page story that he wants parents to lose their child benefit if they refuse to give their child the MMR vaccine is unusual. Monday's Times front page - "Labour 'will stop benefits if parents refuse MMR'" #tomorrowspaperstoday #lab13 pic.twitter.
The cost of living may well appear to be a rich seam for the Labour party to mine, but it isn't entirely risk-free. As shadow ministers talk about Expensive Things in their speeches and fringe discussions this week in Brighton, they will be aware that voters might sympathise with their theme without fully trusting that their party can fix the problem. The polls still show that voters believe the Tories are the most competent on the economy, and an easy riposte from government ministers could be 'you stuck by us when we fixed the economy, now let us fix living standards'. The risk is that Labour appears to jump the question of the economy and go straight to living standards without gaining voters' trust on the former. Why should they therefore trust them to fix the latter?
Like his colleagues in the Labour party, Stephen Twigg used his speech this afternoon to focus on the cost of living. He pledged that Labour would force schools to open earlier and close later to provide 'wrap-around' childcare: 'Spiralling childcare costs are adding huge pressures to family budgets. Last year, nursery costs rose six times faster than wages, making work unaffordable for many parents…that is why I am announcing that the next Labour government will legislate to deliver a Primary Childcare Guarantee. Before and after school childcare for all primary pupils. ‘For parents of primary school children the certainty that they can access childcare from 8am-6pm through their school.
What’s Ed Miliband about? In a word: socialism. You can think this a good or a bad thing, but there ought to be no doubt about where he stands. At a Q&A in the Labour conference last night, he was challenged by an activist: When will you bring back socialism?' 'That’s what we are doing, sir' Miliband replied, quick as a flash. 'That's what we are doing. It says on our party card: democratic socialism'. It was being filmed, and your baristas at Coffee House have tracked down the clip as an exclusive. This little exchange will perhaps tell you more about Ed Miliband and his agenda than much of the over-wrought character-spinning stunts you can expect to see this week. It was no slip of the tongue.
The Scottish speech is normally a neglected part of the Labour Party conference but has more potency now that there's less than a year to go to the referendum. Johann Lamont, leader of Scottish Labour, is an important actor in the battle to save the union. The Tory vote in Scotland has been reduced to staff members and blood relatives so much depends on whether Labour is able to pack a punch. And Ms Lamont certainly is. She rather cleverly mocked the way that Salmond is in full hyperbole mode, declaring every second day an 'historic' day — to create the idea that we're building up to some Braveheart-style Independence Day.
In the words of Andrew Marr, that was an extraordinary interview. Ed Miliband kicked off Labour's conference today with an interview one can only assume was meant to show his personal side. Instead, I imagine it will reinforce the perception he is a tad weird.
If you want to know just how much anger Damian McBride’s book has created in the Labour party—and particularly its Blairite wing, just watch Alastair Campbell’s interview with Andrew Neil on The Sunday Politics. Campbell doesn’t scream or shout but the anger in his voice as he discusses McBride’s antics is palpable. He did not sound like a man inclined to forgive and forget. This whole row is, obviously, a massive conference distraction. Those close to Ed Miliband had hoped that this year, the Labour leader would get a free run at conference now that his brother has quite politics. But as one of his colleagues said to me late last week, ‘it used to be all about David, now it’ll be all about Damian.
Ed Miliband’s interview on the Andrew Marr show neatly summed up the Labour leader’s problems in cutting through. Marr started with a series of questions about Miliband’s plans to change Labour’s relationship with the unions. This might be an important issue but it is hardly one of paramount interest to the electorate and every minute Miliband is speaking about this, he can’t be speaking about other things. The next distraction is the whole Damian McBride business. Indeed, Miliband telling Marr that he’d told Brown to sack McBride is the BBC News headline on the interview. Miliband also had to fend off a whole host of questions about why his poll ratings are so bad. Miliband did, though, try to keep bringing the interview back to the cost of living.