Tuesday 10 July 2012

Strategy

I want to start off with a history lesson.

In 2003, Labour, under Jack McConnell, was returned with a plurality in the Scottish Parliament. The same had happened under a different leader four years before. And, four years before there had been a faction, myself included, that had argued that we should have formed a minority administration and built a majority on a bill by bill basis.

But then, big Donald, steeped in Westminster experience, had decreed that a Government required a guaranteed overall majority in the chamber on all important matters. So, when, in 1999, the newly elected Labour MPs washed up in Edinburgh for the first time they were ushered into a receiving room past Donald and Henry, who each shook their hand in a manner that, Frank McAveety later recalled, reminded you of the bride and groom at a gay wedding. Donald then addressed the assembled rank and file to advise them that he had decided that a coalition with the Liberal Democrats was the only way forward. And no one demurred.

So, in the 2003 aftermath, such a renewed coalition appeared the obvious way forward. And Jack, by then our leader, was sent off to seal the deal.

To be honest, I can't remember what the Libs "wanted" in 1999. But I do know what it was in 2003: PR for local government. So when Jack came back to the Labour Group to advise that, unfortunately and despite his best argument, he had conceded that to them, who were the Labour Group to argue?

All very straightforward, Except that, actually, Jack was in favour of PR for Local Government. He'd written a Scottish Labour Action pamphlet making that very argument long before he'd ever thought he might be First Minister. To have to concede that "demand" as the price of coalition was, in reality, no concession at all. It was a way of by-passing an argument that he could not win, internally, within the Labour Party

So what's the point of this modern history lesson?

Alex Salmond was in exactly the same position in the run up to 2007. Like Donald, he saw the attraction of a majority administration. And, like Donald, he saw the Libs as his only conceivable partners. And like Jack he realised that they would want a concession. And like Jack he realised that this might be a concession that would deliver the policy he actually favoured. So if the Libs had demanded a second question within any Independence Referendum called  in the aftermath of  2007 as the price of coalition, this was a demand he would have "reluctantly" conceded. But the Libs wouldn't play.

All subsequent Scottish politics has to be understood against that background.

Now here I must pay Eck some credit. He doesn't really want a second question. Indeed, in an ideal world he doesn't even want a referendum, and not in the cynical version of that omission I have advanced.

Ideally, Eck would like to fight a Scottish Parliamentary election on the basis that an SNP victory would be a mandate to directly negotiate the dissolution of the United Kingdom. But he knows he could not win on that basis, hence the original compromise that at the best (or worst), such a victory would mean simply a referendum.  But he also knows that he couldn't win such a referendum. Everybody secretly knows that, even the wilder cybernats who maintain that the opinion polls themselves are part of a Unionist conspiracy.

Eck also knows however that his Party rank and file really believe that the Party's non negotiable objective must be to achieve independence. It was that which caused them to drive out John McCormick in favour, even, of Nazi apologisers in the 1940s and which later saw the triumph of the fundies in the early 1980s.

But Eck also believes that any step towards greater devolution is a welcome step forward, unlike many of his rank and file who would decry it as a compromise or, worse, a betrayal. So, just like Jack, who could never have found a way to persuade the vested interests in the Labour Party to embrace PR, Eck thought that the Libs would give him a way out. Only, as I say, they wouldn't.

His mistake (he might think otherwise) was to stick to the strategy of forced compromise when it was unclear, to say the least, as to who was forcing it upon him. There is not a single political Party in Scotland which publicly supports anything other than a yes/no vote. Not the pro-independence SNP, Greens or SSP; nor the anti-independence Labour, Tories or Libs. Even the various rag, tag and bobtails who do support a second question do so in the belief that a defined option will emerge and concede that there is no prospect of that happening.

Now, not a  soul believes for a minute that the "consultation analysis" will credibly throw up an overwhelming demand for something different from a direct choice. But as Uncle Joe famously observed, it's not who votes that count, it's who counts the votes. We are told this "analysis" will report in the Autumn but, for what it is worth,  I can confidently predict that "the Autumn" will prove to be some date after 21st October, when the SNP Conference ends. That buys more time.

In the end however you can't run away for ever. Eck, at some point will either have to adopt either the model of the Grand Old Duke of York or that of Lord Cardigan, in command of the Charge of the Light Brigade.

For legal reasons I have already outlined at length http://ianssmart.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/succulent-mince.html there will then either be a resignation to a direct yes/no vote or an attempt to keep the second question alive in the knowledge that this will mean no vote at all.


My money's still with the Grand Old Duke.




6 comments:

  1. This is exactly why the No campaigners are where they are , in opposition. The failure to listen to what the people were telling them led to the election of a majority SNP government in 2011 (with a voting system designed to prevent such an outcome)and they still have not learned the lessons of that overwhelming rejection. The LabLibCons. are doing the same thing again. They are refusing to listen to the polls which show that a majority of the people,not the politicians,the majority of the people are demanding something better / more than what they have now. Any failure to even listen will carry the same risk of a backlash when the time comes to decide.... Status quo or Independence? If that is all that is offered, as Mr salmond said 'woe betide a party that refuses to listen to what the people are telling them' or words to that effect.

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    1. yes I agree absolutely and it is frustrating to sense that the third question is very much out there but lacks a champion.

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  2. Yes indeed. A lovely and entertaining little intellectual analysis. Only, what about the people who want Devo-Max - some 60% of the electorate? What about them?

    If the SNP can't offer it, and Labour, LibDems, Tories, Greens, etc, won't offer it, where does that leave the majority of voters who want it? It leaves them once again let down by politicians for whom political manoeuvring is more important than representing their voters. And then we wonder why the the turnout at elections continues to plummet.

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  3. "But he also knows that he couldn't win such a referendum. Everybody secretly knows that, even the wilder cybernats who maintain that the opinion polls themselves are part of a Unionist conspiracy."

    No Ian, everybody does not know that. Voters are unsatisfied with the current arrangement and want Holyrood to have significantly more power than it currently has. Presented with the choice of no change (well, the UK government might throw us a bone at some unspecified point in the future) or an option which goes further than they'd ideally like, but includes everything that they DO want, people will go for the second option. In 1979, a majority voted in favour of a Scottish Assembly. In 1998, people voted in favour of a Scottish Parliament. Why then, in 2014, will this trend of moving power to Edinburgh suddenly go into reverse?

    "There is not a single political Party in Scotland which publicly supports anything other than a yes/no vote."

    About 40% of the public do, though. But then we all know how little importance unionists place on the will of the people.

    "But Eck also believes that any step towards greater devolution is a welcome step forward, unlike many of his rank and file who would decry it as a compromise or, worse, a betrayal."

    No Ian, most nationalists would welcome greater devolution, because we recognise that it brings independence a step closer. Any measure that takes powers out of the hands of neo-liberal nutters in Westminster is a welcome one. It just feels a bit pointless when we all know fine where this leads to, so we might as well just get there now instead of hanging about for another 25 years, during which Westminster will continue destroying society for the benefit of the few.

    "there will then either be a resignation to a direct yes/no vote or an attempt to keep the second question alive in the knowledge that this will mean no vote at all."

    What happened to "there will definitely be no referendum, no way sir, not ever, he's bluffing, you can take that to the bank, bet your house on there being no referendum, if there is a referendum I will eat my hat" etc? Suddenly you sound a bit less confident...

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  4. Labour, possibly more than any other party, needs to understand what the electorate have been saying. It's true that people who voted for the SNP were not necessarily voting for independence, but they were certainly saying that they were unsatisfied with how the other parties treated Holyrood. They voted for the SNP because the SNP take it seriously, and are prepared to butt heads with Westminster to protect Scottish interests. Labour and the Lib Dems spent 8 years being deferential to Westminster, with the smoking ban being about the only notable achievement in that entire time.

    One of the first things the SNP did in 2007 was change the name from Scottish Executive to Scottish Government. It may have been purely symbolic, but as a statement of intent it proved to be extremely prescient. Four years later, people decided they really liked having a party that took Holyrood seriously, rather than the ones who treated it as a nursing home for ageing MPs, a training ground for future MPs, and a consolation prize for failed MPs.

    Within those four years, the unionist parties tried to convince the public that they understood that folk wanted more powers for Holyrood. But the end result was utterly pathetic, and merely highlighted to people that, left in unionist hands, the devolution process would never give them what they want. People want a say in what powers Holyrood exercises on Scotland's behalf. They don't want to sit back and wait for politicians to decide "yeah okay, maybe you're grown up enough now to earn your own money instead of living off pocket money". WE'LL decide that, thank you very much.

    Better Together want to retain devolution as a politician's process. They say "vote no, and we'll maybe decide at some point to give you a few more powers". It's not good enough. People want MORE and they want it NOW. That is why people want to be given the opportunity to vote on what powers Scotland gets. If you present them with a binary choice, they'll pick the one that delivers those powers.

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  5. My best guess is that Eck's get out of jail card will be to turn it into a two stage referendum. 2014 on the principle, asking for a 'mandate' to negotiate terms with England, Wales & NI, but with promise of a second stage vote on the Treaty itself - which would presumably not happen until after General Elections in both Holyrood & Westminster, i.e. sometime in 2017 ...

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