Snap - who's got the power?

There isn’t going to be a general election, then. All the excitement was created either by inexperienced and aroused cabinet ministers who rapidly backtracked when the Conservatives unexpectedly surged in the polls, an act of woeful indecision and poor leadership skills by the new Prime Minister who rapidly backtracked, etc, or something whipped up by otherwise bored media hacks. It, as always, all depends on whose opinion you are most willing to trust.

The fact that the election isn’t going to happen after all is both a good and a bad thing. It’s bad because as it was looking pretty inevitable I had started mulling over three politically themed blogs. You’ll just have to wait for my musings on political ideology and for a character assassination of David Cameron and George Osborne. However, you’re just going to have to sit through this one. It is a good thing because snap elections rarely have the expected or even desirable outcome - especially for the people who actually do the voting. An election, any election, will bring out of the woodwork a vast number of political commentators scrambling for an appearance fee, all of whom will claim to have the best perspective on the predicted outcome. I’m not a political commentator. I don’t claim anything. Any opinion I give is likely to be woefully informed and bias to my own moral compass. Fortunately, this doesn’t seem to be stopping me forcing it upon you.

First up, there simply isn’t the need for an Autumn election. There’s a lot of talk about giving Brown a mandate from the people, but this is complete tosh. Brown already has a mandate - it’s called a working majority of sixty-six in the Commons. The British democratic system does not elect Prime Ministers. We vote in the party that we feel has the values and the policies that we, as individuals, most agree with. We then trust that the group of people we have given the power to run our lives have the ability to choose the most suitable amongst them to be leader.

Okay, so in recent years Blair may have been day-dreaming of a presidential-style government and we may have been sub-consciously associating Labour with those frequently displayed teeth, but in 2005 it was at least made plain to the electorate that he was unlikely to serve a full third term. (I’m sure that given the choice he would have loved to have stayed on indefinitely - but that’s another issue.) So anyone who thinks we should go to the ballot box to confirm Brown’s status as leader is wrong. We have chosen the party of government; they, albeit rather meekly, have chosen the man.

We are not, thank Christ, fully into a world of David Cameron’s Conservatives politics just yet (outside of Ealing) - where the person speaking is more important than what is actually being said.

Besides, there’s no precedence for it. It didn’t happen when Major took over from Thatcher in 1990; or when Callaghan succeeded Wilson in 1976; Douglas-Home from MacMillan in 1963; MacMillan himself from Eden in 1957. In fact the only time it has happened is when Eden took over from Churchill in 1955, but as this was late into the fourth year of a term it was hardly surprising.

Of course it could be argued that these successions of power were under drastically different circumstances to that of 2007. In the main they were forced by occasion rather than following a pre-ordained plan. They were much more akin to coup d’etats where for various reasons the previous leader needed to be disposed of. The problems range from disastrous ill-advised and probably illegal wars on foreign countries (Eden), scandal (MacMillan), megalomania (Thatcher) and levels of paranoia verging on downright bonkersness (Wilson). H’mm, actually all of these could be applied to Blair.

No matter the spin applied, make no mistake, Blair did not jump. He was pushed. Prime Ministers, unsurprisingly, once given power are rarely keen to relinquish it. They usually need to have it torn from their sweaty little mitts either by the voters marking an X in the box for the opposition or, more commonly, by a knife in the back from their colleagues.

The Churchill-Eden change-over may seem relatively calm, but Churchill, having suffered a hushed-up stroke, was clearly becoming too old and mad to govern - MacMillan apparently once went to his office to find him in bed, covered in papers with a budgie called Toby perched on his head. But Churchill had privately anointed Eden as heir apparent back in 1942. Thirteen years of waiting in the wings. Pretty much the same length of time Brown has waited. Of course, Churchill had a war to win and then spent five years in opposition.

Interestingly, although not unsurprisingly, only Menzies Campbell* seemed to not be looking forward to an election. I saw an interview with Campbell (on ITN, I think) where he dismissed the question of a suitable date suggesting that we should have a fixed term government of four years anyway which would mean that none of this silliness would ever happen. Nice one, Menzies. What happens when we have a hung parliament? It’s only been in the past twenty years that the size of your majority has been something to brag about. What would happen if the days of a majority of thirty (1970) were to return? Or even, five (1950), four (1960) or just three (1974 - second time around)? The country would spend four years in political paralysis, grinding ever slower to a complete standstill waiting for the term to expire and give someone, anyone, at least a chance of actually getting anything done.

It is in these occasions of unworkable majorities that early or snap elections are called. Two occasions stand out, however, where the results were not only unexpected, but they led to disaster beyond Westminster for a lot of voters.

Thatcher was expected to go for a full first term in office, but surprised many by calling an election early in 1983. Thanks largely to her popularity riding on a high due to a surge in misguided imperialistic pride after victory in Falklands the Tories swept into power with a majority of one hundred and forty-four. It was as though most of the electorate forgot what her policies actually were and were just mesmerised by the image of action woman in a tank. The result gave the country a further fourteen years of Tory government and whilst a small minority did very, very well out of the eighties, for the vast majority of people things were to get a hell of lot worse before they got better.

Similarly in 1970 Wilson went early hoping to wrong-foot the opposition. It didn’t work and Labour were back in opposition and in the Prime Minister’s office was Edward Heath. Under his premiership Britain became a Western first world country facing wholesale national strikes and the indignity of being forced into a three day week. Here we can see the beginnings of the political, economic and industrial joke that was Britain for the best part of two decades.
Incompetent or dangerous people get into power when the voting populace are surprised by a change in the normal pattern of a May election every four or five years. And there’s enough of those hovering in the wings at Westminster. Is it really worth the risk?

Of course following a battering at PMQ, grumblings from former Blair favourites consigned to the back benches, accusations of incompetence and unsuccessful attempts at positive spin and Brown is beginning to resemble John Major. Perhaps New Labour is going to tear itself apart (then what happens? Post-Labour? Nu-Labour?) which in itself is no bad thing. It’s good for us to change our rulers more frequently than every twenty years. After all, that’s the point of voting for them rather than there being a law of succession. It means we’re, supposedly, not stuck with them when they’ve become old, senile and prone for falling asleep during important meetings. It should also mean we don’t get saddled with over-excitable youngsters driven by their loins.

I just hope that by 2009 somebody, somewhere will be offering a viable alternative.

* This article was written on Sunday. Ming, as you will know, resigned on Monday. I thought about taking this part out - but I like the point about hung parliaments so it stayed. So, the Liberals are leaderless again. Bring back Good Time Charlie Kennedy - it’s always fun to watch people so befuddled by gigantic quantities of alcohol that they can’t understand their own policies.