David Milliband, the British Foreign Secretary, has raised a lot of eyebrows in both the Guardian and the Times with an unexpected article about his vision for Labour to beat the odds for a fourth term in government. His detailed statement suggesting that the Party needs a 'radical new phase' has been interpreted both as a challenge to Gordon Brown's leadership and an implied criticism of it. I would say that anyone who does not mention his current leader even once in his article, who does not praise him in any way and studiously sets out his own vision and stall regarding the country, is touting for leadership. David Milliband might not openly wish to draw attention as a future Prime Minister, but he is certainly making it known that he is considering it. Most important, that he would also be suitable for it and already has the ideas in place to effect it.
According to Milliband, "When people hear exaggerated claims either about failure or success, then they switch off." I would suggest that people began switching off a long time ago. It has little to do with any 'exaggerated claims' and much more to do with the first reason:
Reason 1: That people naturally switch off when a government has been too long in power.
Voters are very fickle. In any democracy people like change. No matter how great a political party, after three terms, they have simply had enough, especially when things are not going too well. It has always been difficult historically for any government to get beyond three terms. That seems to be the tolerance threshold for the average voter. They want something to motivate them into the ballot box and it certainly isn't more of the same.
We hear this plaintive cry all the time from fading governments, that the people need to know about the achievements with less emphasis on the failures. However, governments and voters are like married couples. When they are dating (just voted in or being courted in an election), the only thing that matters are those successes and visions. Everything is rosy in the garden and people genuinely listen to what is going on and reinforce the Party's actions and aspirations. They will accept the posturing, the promises and the policies. Once the policies begin to hurt and the relationship appears to be dragging on, the failures loom into view to obscure all past glories. It doesn't matter how great those successes were, and how tiny the failures, once the relationship begins to hit the rocks, everything goes with it. Worst still, as in any impending divorce, those failures are likely to be magnified to justify the split!
Milliband also believes that Labour needs to find "a way to win the argument about our record, our vision for the future and how we achieve it". But the second reason scuppers that idea too.
Reason 2: One cannot win arguments in a fading relationship because at least one party would have stopped listening.
In this case, it would be the voters. The people have already experienced that record and the effects of that vision. That's why they would like to try something new. In politics, one doesn't get lots of chances to prove the same thing over and over, especially coming from the same mindsets. Like any political party with set principles, there is a limit to how that basic 'vision' can be reworked without straying from those original ethics and beliefs. Sooner or later, it will just feel like going around in the same tight circle of dogma. Thus the voters may give two, or three, chances, if they are broadly happy and feeling generous, but British Governments do not get a fourth, primarily for the third reason - the effects of personal perception.
Reason 3: Voters have this Utopian perception that governments are in charge of what happens in their lives.
It might be far from the reality but precisely because governments are seen to have such power over individual progress and quality of life is why they are readily voted in. It follows logically that when voters perceive their lives to be worsened under a government in power, they will blame that government for it. One always needs a scapegoat. Labour is presiding over an unpopular war it allowed Britain to be dragged into, a worrying recession, fears about personal security through terrorism and escalating knife crimes, the negative effects of conflicting cultures on the community, and a Prime Minister who is being constantly compared to what went before him and is obviously found wanting. Put all those together with the general change sweeping the rest of the world and the fact that the Government is at the end of three terms already, and that's a powder keg designed to propel the incumbents from office.
Quite simply, it does not take much reading of the crystal ball or tea leaves to see that, as night follows day, Labour will lose the next election, no matter who is going to lead them. As charismatic as Milliband is, he is no Obama. He is pretty lightweight compared to America's 'Messiah'. It would be more prudent for him to wait another few years then weigh in because Labour has had their time for now. They've had their chips and their moment. The people already have a negative perception of them based on their record . No new vision will change the status quo because Labour is hampered by its own history and principles.
The real tragedy here is that the Tories will be no better at solving the country's ills. A party whose Shadow Cabinet is almost entirely White males, the sum representation of a diverse society, does not exactly fill one with confidence, fairness and proactive inclusion. If anything, Britain could be radically pushed to the Right in a pretty reactionary way if the Tories are voted back in. But the people desire change, and change they will have, just like the change sweeping America. The Tories are the only genuine alternative the people perceive and there is very little that Labour can do about that perception now, short of something miraculous and entirely unexpected from Gordon Brown in the next few months!
