Some car manufacturers still supply a spare wheel with their models. This fifth wheel is not so robust as the other four – it is there ‘to get you home’ – without proceeding above 56 m.p.h. Policies pursued by the Labour government over this last 17 months remind me of a car, the progress of which is being hobbled by its running on its spare wheel. It’s all, ‘caution – and let’s get through the next six months’.
I am a paid-up Liberal Democrat, but voted tactically for Labour in July last year in order to rid my constituency of its Tory MP. Success! So, I did not set the bar high for the incoming Labour government but, even so, it has singularly failed to clear it. My vote has been rewarded with timidity and caution – and that’s not to forget Labour straying into some pretty illiberal territory (for example, its rhetoric on and treatment of asylum seekers, and of those seeking legitimately to protest about events in Gaza).
Labour has a large majority in the Commons and it should be using that to enact the radical change that this country needs. What sort of change would that be?
Reform comes at a price – but it’s one we could pay
The reforms I have in mind will cost money and so more tax revenue needs to be garnered. It was foolish and unnecessary of Labour to include a manifesto commitment not to raise income tax rates, VAT or national insurance contributions. Labour put itself in danger of boxing itself in by restricting its options.
However, help is at hand. In a Guardian article in April 2024, Richard Murphy, Professor of Taxation at Sheffield Business School, pointed out a whole series of tweaks to the current system that collectively might raise an additional £90 billion.
Even if only, say, £50bn of Murphy’s flow could be realised, this would give enough money for Labour to resurrect its ‘Green Investment Plan’ – disgracefully put to one side by Labour pusillanimity. That plan would not only help address climate change – the biggest challenge facing the world – but would create economic activity, and help kick-start our dormant economy. That might absorb close to £30bn of the original plan.
The remaining c.£20bn might be used to resurrect an active regional policy. According to a 2023 Harvard study on the UK’s regional economic inequality, the London region ranks as one of the wealthiest in Europe. All other regions of the UK sit amongst the poorest in Europe. Regional economic disparities in the UK are an indictment of 15 years of appalling economic mismanagement. Only a well-funded, well-designed and well-implemented regional policy will get us out of that mess.
Electoral reform and closer EU alignment
Two further radical changes that I believe should be pursued vigorously are fundamental electoral reform and getting far more closely interconnected with the EU in our trading relationship.
Taking the former, a priority is to reform the electoral system before the next general election. First Past The Post (FPTP) needs to be consigned to the dustbin and replaced by a proportional system, ideally, in my view, the Single Transferable Vote in multi-member constituencies. That would bring the UK into line with the other democracies of western Europe.
While some people would argue that such fundamental change would require, in advance, much earnest discussion in a Speaker’s Conference or Royal Commission, I would urge the Labour government to simply ‘get on with it’. The reform is urgent and necessary. Electoral reform has been Labour Party policy for some time. Perhaps there was no express manifesto commitment to make this change but, by the same token, there was no manifesto commitment to retain FPTP either.
Two advantages of the change would be that in future all votes would count. FPTP maximises the number of wasted votes. Secondly, electoral reform is the surest way of preventing Farage and Reform from forming a majority government on the basis of 27% support in the polls, which would be possible under FPTP.
The tide has incontrovertibly turned against Brexit – now seen for what it always was – a busted flush. Eating a bit of humble pie, and negotiating to align with the EU Single Market is another win-win for UK economic growth via enhanced international trade.
Most historians would consider Clement Attlee among the best prime ministers of the 20th century. His Labour government enacted wonderful radical change, such as establishing the NHS at a time, in 1945, when the country was in extreme difficulty – worse than we are today. Sir Keir Starmer needs to take a whole series of leaves from the Attlee book.
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