Below is an extract from Gerry Hassan about the hollowing out of Scottish Labour and the false sense of hope the UK Coalition Government has given it, the full article is worth a read, but seems as much of its applies in Wales to the Labour Party, I thought I would share it.
He writes ‘Modern politics have a faint whiff of the aristocratic court; the politics of nepotism, of the Miliband brothers and now the Eagle sisters (Angela and Maria), of everything being about how you know and working the channels of access and power.
In Scotland the situation is actually much worse. Without the new nursery grounds of the new political elite, Scottish Labour is left drawing on threadbare resources to produce dull, risk averse semi-competent politicians who rose to the starry heights of MPs' researchers and organisers. The last UK election saw a significant diminution of Scottish Labour’s ranks; out went John McFall and John Reid, and in came the likes of Gemma Doyle, MP for West Dunbartonshire, and another young, bland, identikit politician who is unlikely to ruffle feathers or challenge the system.
Scottish Labour cannot pass off these changes as being the result of the establishment of the Scottish Parliament. The talent hasn’t gone elsewhere, it has just gone.
Look at the potential packed into Donald Dewar’s first Cabinet in Labour ministers: McConnell, McCabe, Alexander, Deacon, and then look at Iain Gray’s prospective team which could be the Cabinet next May. It is a spine-chilling prospect with Gray’s team having a quality which would not look out of place running a small to medium ranking council. Not Glasgow or Edinburgh mind you, but maybe a Dundee or Stirling.
The sole modus operandi of the whole enterprise is now shaped by partisan point scoring and tribal detestation of the SNP. No thought is given to the wider, noble cause of speaking for Scotland or a wider national interest.
The Scottish Labour leadership feels the exact opposite. It believes it has the wind in its sails, buoyed by the May UK election result north of the border, and what the opinion polls are saying about the likely result of next May’s Scottish elections.
Yet, the hollowing out of Scottish Labour is a much more deep and complex story, than about one or even two election results.
Once upon a time Scottish Labour saw itself as the crucial bridge building coalition between Scotland and Westminster. The party stood up for Scotland at Westminster, and sold the benefits of Britain in Scotland. This politics was done adeptly by Tom Johnston and Willie Ross, often using the Nationalist threat to extract more money out of Westminster, while having little interest in democratic politics, being more motivated by results and getting things done. It is no longer a viable politics.
Now Scottish Labour no longer counts to the same degree at Westminster, and it is going to have to chart its own course north of the border: unreformed, unapologetic for decades of Labour arrogance and misrule, and bereft of new ideas.
It sets out on this feeling rather good about itself, smug and self-satisfied that it is again the people’s party. This is the traditional Labour feeling of self-righteousness and sentimentality which New Labour set out to destroy and failed to do.
Normal service has been resumed for some. ‘We have got our party back’ crowed the complacent twice loser Neil Kinnock. Scottish Labour is heading for the victory it thinks is rightfully its entitlement, and as things stands, steaming straight into stormy waters and the rocks.’
There are of course differences between Welsh and Scottish Labour, Welsh Labour never had the quality or quantity of Ministers around the UK Cabinet table to start with and despite remaining the largest party the decline of Welsh Labour has been even more spectacular than that of their Scottish cousins.
One final thought I often wonder why there is no equivalent to Gerry Hassan in Wales to cast a critical eye over the future of Labour in Wales especially as they remain the dominant force driving Welsh politics, despite what I and many others think about them.Any source
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