Ed Miliband’s Labour has to move beyond New Labour and commit to changes in policy and organisation as profound as those introduced by Tony Blair in 1994.
I would like to see 50p tax rate remain for those earning more than £150,000 – I would like to see it permanent, especially in this age of austerity, as a way of creating greater equality in Britain. When I met Ed Miliband for the first time in his primary school at Haverstock Hill, I had a photograph taken with him. During this smile, I said to him, “Did you know that in Tony Blair’s “The Journey”, the words inequality and poverty don’t appear once in the index?” He continued smiling, in a way that reminded me of my first ever supervisor at Cambridge, Prof Simon Baron-Cohen, and grinned, “No, really!” Labour has to be much stronger on issues of inequality and poverty, to regain the moral ground. It needs to win the hearts of England, let alone Middle England, and the legacy of an increasing inequality gap in Britain is one which I am deeply ashamed of as a English Labour member. The people who are described as the ‘wealth creators’ are also the people making money out of speculating on money inter alia, creating nothing of any artistic or scientific merit for this country, and to a large extent created the mess that the poor are now paying for. This is truly obscene. Actually, it was at this point I decided that I would vote for Ed Miliband as leader of my Party.
A policy review will be conducted including commissioned work by independent thinktanks and studies by each shadow cabinet member on the issues in their field. Ed Miliband is starting with new policies, but the same values. This is brilliant news – as it to some extent obviates the inefficient and ineffective policy formation groups of the antiquated Labour machinery. As a member of the Fabian Society, Progress and Compass, I warmly embrace this challenge, as we build our new policies addressing people’s aspirations, but recognizing that their expectations and hopes are threatened by insecurities. These insecurities are across a diverse areas of society issues, including housing, immigration, of course, the public services, the bedrock of Britain, what makes Britain special, and the heart of Britain’s infrastructure.
The changes proposed by Ed Miliband will indeed be substantial as the world itself has changed massively, and Labour did not change massively. I believe strongly it needs to have a clear idea as to whether it agrees with the commodification and marketisation of British life at all. David Cameron despite enormous backing patently did not win the last general election because he didn’t undertake the profound change he needed. What he has performed is a hatchet salvage operation, which does nothing to paper over the cracks surrounding Europe, for one. I am not even convinced that New Labour was in the right place at the right time even then, apart from being an antedote to Margaret Thatcher. Labour has indeed embarked on an intellectual and practical journey, but every long journey has to start with its smallest initial steps.
Ed Miliband furthermore says he does not want union levy payers disenfranchised from the Labour party elections, but is happy to look at how the relationship could be reformed. He once said publicly in a meeting which I attended that he didn’t want the Union to be seen as Labour’s evil uncle that we needed to lock in the attack whenever visited. The reasoning for this is clear – you don’t have to be a member of Labour to be a member of a Union, Labour was born out of the Unions and we have a proud history together, and the Unions represent the part of the business and industry that is interested in ethical action, not necessarily shareholder profit at all costs.
I will be supporting him all the way. Ed Miliband is full of surprises, and there’s a remarkable combination of focus and unpredictability in him I very much respect.
Dr Shibley Rahman Queen’s Scholar BA MA MB BChir MRCP(UK) PhD FRSA LLB(Hons)
