Who represents business?

Dethroned guru: some reports suggest that he has lost the beard.

Dave Cameron's government tended to have an over cosy relationship with big business. When Theresa May came into office, it was apparent that she wanted to distance herself from big business as part of her appeal to the just about managing, although many suspect it was eminence grise Nick Timothy who was really behind this stance.

In any event the May Government's relationship with business has subsequently blown hot and cold. Business (by and large) wasn't happy about Brexit in the first place, but has been even less unhappy since then about the uncertainty that has been created (secret deals for Japanese car manufacturers aside).

The CBI has had an up and down relationship with governments. It was at the peak of its persuasive power in the tripartite structures used by both Conservative and Labour governments in the 1970s. Mrs Thatcher regarded them as corporatism incarnate and preferred to talk to the more ideologically sound Institute of Directors. They were rehabilitated under John Major and were seen as on message by Tony Blair who wanted to make New Labour 'the natural party of business'.

Now it has kicked off again. It started when Downing Street tried to get companies to voice their support for the Government's exit strategy which they were understandably reluctant to do. The stance taken on immigration has upset some companies.

Further offence has been caused by the failure to invite leading business lobby groups to a meeting at Chevening, the country residence available to Brexiteer ministers. The CBI, the Institute of Directors and the Association of British Chambers of Commerce have all been excluded. Senior business people are expected to attend, but there is some suspicion in business circles that it is a public relations exercise to show that Government is 'listening' to business.

I think there is a possible alternative explanation. When I was involved in the Organization of Business Interests project in the 1980s, the German leadership (Wolfgang Streeck) were preoccupied with the German associative state model which they saw as the norm. I had an uphill struggle to persuade them that in the US and the UK, a company state model tended to prevail with direct interactions between big companies and government being the norm. I also pointed out that big companies were forming government relations divisions to make their operations more sophisticated.

One interpretation of what is going on is that the Government is simply adhering to the British company state model and dealing direct with companies.

BTW, the FT had a very interesting article on the role of Vereine in producing a particular political culture in Germany recently: Clubby Germans

The day before yesterday

Yesterday the BBC Parliament channel re-ran the coverage of the 1997 general election campaign. I am not enough of an anorak to watch all of it, which would have been a marathon. However, I watched a considerable amount and the cat got some extra lap time.

There was such great hope and so many comparisons to 1945. Although the positive achievements of New Labour are often under estimated, and always overshadowed by the Iraq war, most analysts would argue that the 1945 Labour Government made more of a difference. Having said that, Chipping Norton historians like Dominic Sandbrook argue that we underestimate the extent to which the foundations of the welfare state were laid in the inter-war period.

I think that a very perceptive comment was made by David Dimbleby on the lines of it's one thing to win an election, another to govern. The civil service would have to be bludgeoned into submission and Tony Blair always complained of his difficulties with them, although in part that was an alibi. However, as Dimbleby noted, there is a world of difference between deciding what to say and deciding what to do.

It took a long time for results to come through, but local election votes had to be counted as well. Conservative spokesmen (they were all men) were stonewalling, no doubt under instructions from Central Office on a line to take, saying that exit polls had a bad record and only the real votes counted. Nevertheless, Paxo asked Michael Portillo 'Are you ready to drink hemlock yet?'

In many ways, it was the quirky events that caught my attention. I do remember how acerbic the declaration at Putney was. There were a number of fringe candidates, one of whom got seven votes, while the 'Sportsman Alliance. Anyone But Mellor' got into double figures.

Unsubstantiated allegations had been made that Mellor had performed the rites of Venus with a young lady while wearing a Chelsea shirt. However, both the successful Labour candidate and Sir 'Jams' Goldsmith were on their third marriages. Moreover, all the three leading candidates were millionaires.

'Jams', who didn't do any better than Referendum candidates elsewhere, interrupted Mellor's speech with hand clapping and shouts of 'Out! Out! Out!' Mellor responded in his television interview by urging Jams to return to Mexico at the earliest opportunity and said 'Up your hacienda, Jimmy.'

The event of the night was the defeat of Michael Denzil Xavier Portillo which arguably changed the future of the Conservative Party and British politics. Portillo was grinning broadly in his post defeat interview, no doubt contemplating the British railway journeys which would transform him from a right-wing Mr Nasty into a national treasure. However, he soon got into a spat with Paxman.

It was interesting to hear Kensington & Chelsea described as 'the safest Conservative seat in the country' but with a majority of only 9,000.

Barbara Follett was then a key Labour figure with a great future supposedly in front of her. Perhaps it was a sign that her and her husband could not open the champagne, de rigeur for champagne socialists, on election night. She held minor government posts and then got caught up in the election expenses scandal.

Ben Bradshaw, standing in Exeter, was rather oddly described (by the standards of twenty years later) as the first 'openly homosexual candidate'. He defeated his Conservative opponent who stood on a strident anti-gay and family values platform.

The backcloth to the declaration at Torbay was declared to be like a scene from South Pacific by Dimbleby, but before the Liberal Democrat win by 12 votes could be announced we switched to Harrogate. A grim faced Norman Lamont had been defeated after parachuting into the constituency by the Liberal Democrat leader of the local council. I met someone once who was a nurse in the hospital in Lerwick where his father was consultant and she said that he was a 'nasty little boy'.

Then Martin Bell won in his white suit in Hatton, a reluctant victor. His daughter Melissa, a Warwick politics student, was in the background. The subsequent career of Neil Hamilton shows there can be life after political death. He is now a member of the Welsh National Assembly for UKIP. Many of the victors that night have disappeared into obscurity.

Finally, a word about the varying style of the returning officers. One result was read out by the High Sheriff who would not give the party labels. Some insisted on repeating the numbers in the style of 'Miss Moneypenny, Transvestite Party, ninety four, 94.' The really threatening one was a fierce looking but relatively young bearded returning office in Galloway. There was some noise in the hall, mild by the standards of Putney, and he asked an aide 'to attend to' the offender.

Shift in electorate not good news for Labour

We are all familiar with arguments that the old left-right divide is being replaced by one between those in favour of/benefitting from globalisation and those who have lost out from it. It is reflected in tensions within the Labour Party between the metropolitan faction from Remain voting constituencies and those MPs from the north representing Brexit voting areas.

A paper in the British Journal of Political Science by Will Jennings and others using data from the British Social Attitudes Survey from 1985 to 2012 found that British young people are more right-wing and authoritarian in their views than previous generations. Although they are more socially liberal on matters of equality and women's rights, they are also more consumerist and individualistic on issues such as the welfare state.

The generation that grew up in the period of Conservative rule starting with Margaret Thatcher hold more right-wing views than their predecessors. But 'Blair's babes', who came of age while Tony Blair and New Labour were in power, are even further to the right of the political spectrum. New Labour essentially reinforced Thatcherite policy values, reproducing them and making them more embedded.

There has been a clear rise in negative attitudes towards the benefits system, the unemployed, benefit recipients and the welfare system. Younger people also take a harder line on previous generations, despite crime levels having fallen.

Is Labour making an impact?

The latest YouGov poll puts the Conservatives on 42 per cent, Labour on 40 per cent and the Lib Dems on 8 per cent. I would agree that polls at this stage of a Parliament are largely irrelevant, but one might think that Labour would be making a greater impact.

I have not been impressed by Ed Miliband at Prime Minister's Question Time. He does land the occasional punch, but it is often stilted or over prepared. David Cameron is usually able to out point him, often with a spontaneous put down like the Basil Brush comment on Wednesday (after Ed had tried to claim that the PM was 'air brushed').

It looks like in its haste to get away from New Labour (which did win three elections in a row) the Labour Party has reverted to its old principle: never compromise with the electorate.

Of course, it's possible that the Government will be overwhelmed by a tidal wave of revulsion against the effect of the cuts. No doubt that is what the Labour Party hopes. But they have to have a credible alternative economic plan and as yet they don't. Admittedly, they do have time to fill in the famous blank sheet of paper, but they can't take too long.

Meanwhile, David Cameron has followed Nick Clegg in getting in some populist shots at bankers' bonuses. They are an easy target and they haven't showed much political skill. Whether it's good policy is another matter.

Red Ed? Come off it!

That was Ed Miliband's message as he gave a heartfelt (and apart from the odd stumble) polished performance to the Labour Party conference this afternoon. Sometimes it did feel as if the Revd. Blair had been replaced as vicar by his curate who combined youthfulness, earnestness and a commitment to optimism, the theme on which he ended.

Ed Miliband tried to differentiate himself from Old and New Labour, while acknowledging the latter's achievements, by presenting himself as part of a new generation which wanted a new politics. How many times have we heard politicians say before that they want to change politics?

He presented his back story quite well, with a self-deprecatory remark about his father, Ralph (Adolph) Miliband. There were also references to the future in terms of his 16 month old son.

One of the clear themes came through to me was that he was not going to vacate the centre ground of politics, although he also argued that the centre ground can be re-shaped. He endorsed the central premise of the New Labour argument: one can deliver both economic efficiency and social justice. He also tried to make a strong ethical appeal, emphasising that 'my values are my anchor'.

He also made clear that the party 'wouldn't always like what I have to say ... but lead I will.' Militant trade unionists got a slap on the wrist with a reference to 'overblown rhetoric about waves of irresponsible strikes'.

On the deficit, he said that the need to reduce it would have meant painful cuts under Labour. Even if Labour regained office, it would not be possible to reverse all the cuts. Fiscal credibility had been hard won by New Labour and it must be won back. What this all came down to at the end, however, was a rather lame endorsement of the approach of halving the deficit.

One of the most potentially important statements was the announcement that he would vote in favour of AV in referendum, a move away from the opportunistic opposition Labour had been pursuing. It should increase the chances of the measure passing.

So a good start, but the real tests lie ahead. How will he match up against David Cameron at question time?