By Jessica Frank-Keyes
They say to govern is to choose.
As – perhaps – the UK’s next Prime Minister, if elected, Sir Keir Starmer is going to find himself with a whole bucket load of choices to make over the next few years.
Some may be incidental – the hiring and firing of junior ministers – and some, like committing Britain to military action or declaring war, could determine future decades of global peace and security.
But making choices – and communicating them clearly to the public – has been somewhat of a sticking point for Labour over the past few years.
Voters’ predominant refrain has been to question what the man who wants to govern thinks; what decisions he will make for the country; and where those options will lead us.
Political strategists will understandably explain that, in opposition, presenting the incumbent and relatively unpopular government with a bunch of your best ideas to pick holes in – before you absolutely have to – is verging on electoral suicide.
The flip side, inevitably, is that you get a whole load of stick for appearing to not be able to make up your mind.
“I don’t know what he stands for,” one 2019 Conservative voter told Times’ Radio’s focus group last week – despite saying he was going to give the Labour Party his vote this year.
While another woman – also a prospective Labour voter – suggested he’s someone who “doesn’t have his own agenda”.
So, what would Labour’s Britain look like? It’s been the crucial question for some two years, and in just over two weeks, the party – if not the rest of us – will be a little closer to knowing the answer.
Starmer is understood to have set shadow cabinet ministers a February 8 deadline to submit policies for a draft election manifesto, which the Financial Times reports policy director Ravinder Athwal is penning, in a bid to be match fit should a May election be sprung on us.
The document, which will not be made public until an election is called, will put flesh on the bones of the party’s ‘five missions’ or “chapter headings”.
Broader themes – economic growth, green energy, the NHS, crime and education – will be amplified with a raft of measures handpicked from a wider pool of policies submitted to the National Policy Forum (NPF) back in last autumn, before the party’s annual conference.
A sprawling 116-pager, as per LabourList, it encompasses everything from the much-discussed £28bn green investment pledge, reforming corporate governance and unlocking pension capital, to improving police IT systems, devolution and breakfast clubs.
Input will also come in from MPs, the National Executive Committee (NEC), unions and affiliated membership groups – known as socialist societies – as the document is refined.
While organisations like BusinessLDN and the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) have been lobbying for policies ranging from restoring VAT-free shopping for tourists and business rates reform to green super-deductions and new bi-annual public-private investment forums.
Despite conference backing, some think it’s unlikely proportional representation will make the final cut. Other speculation includes early years childcare being a higher priority than tuition fee reform, but maintenance grants and interest caps – potentially – being on the table.
Surprises – or “rabbits out of hats” – are always a possibility, and in the past there have been late stage additions to the slate.
But in the end, those with the ultimate say are a “tight circle,” one Labour source told me, “of very, very trusted advisors”.
They will finalise the manifesto at a day-long Clause V meeting, alongside NPF officers, the NEC, senior members of the Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP) and the leader of the opposition’s office (LOTO), all wrangling over the contents.
YouGov’s polling tracker, as of yesterday, suggests the public thinks the most important issues facing the country right now are, in order: the economy, health, immigration and asylum, the environment, housing, and crime; indicating where the focus will be.
However, election campaigns, never mind how entrenched the polls seem, are unpredictable. Think Theresa May’s 2017 ‘dementia tax’ – or, as Morgan McSweeney would like the shadow cabinet to remember, thank you very much, Trump v. Hillary in 2016.
For every carefully crafted, agonised-over, choice, the public could very well turn around and decide they don’t like it – or you – after all.
Decision day is fast approaching – but for Starmer’s Labour the real test could still be a long way off.
