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That was the year that was. It was to have been the year Labour came good, abandoning the handcuffs it had donned to show it was safe, pure and wholesome, and beginning to build the better society based on redistribution, growth and public spending "You know Labour Government works. Now let’s build on that base".
Instead it was a year of cock-ups, wars and distractions, devoted to treading water. The election decided nothing and gave no mandate for anything. Tony disappeared into the stratosphere. The Tories opted for slow suicide and the recession I’ve been predicting for months began.The year of disconnection.
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January-February
The phoney war. Nothing much to do because the slim line programme of Labour Lite has all been carried. Gordon’s big spending boost is still hypothetical, though its blessings have been counted many times over.We’re in the trenches waiting to go over the top kept too busy doing nothing to prepare for the hand to hand grapple with the people.
Never mind, they still quite like us, give us the benefit of every doubt and still hate the Tories who’ve not even been able to live down things they didn’t do. The undeclared election dominates everything as we feed on a specially prepared diet of wholesome party pap and get supplies of custard pies to throw at each other. God. And Tony, smile benignly down. I warn Tony not to tie his hands by a commitment not to increase income tax. As usual he listens carefully before ignoring me.
March-April
Fantasy Parliament on the sinking parliamentary raft pretending to find work to avoid going down to the constituencies to face real people who may not understand the full brilliance of what we’ve not done. Never has so little been done by so many announcing so much about it.
Meanwhile a small cloud no bigger than a cows backside is looming out in the countryside. Foot and Mouth. Is it the first indication that God may not be New Labour after all? Here’s something we can’t blame on the Tories.
As we hear the evidence in the Agriculture Committee it becomes clear that a small band of scientifically motivated men has executed Nick Brown, and handed the war against sick kith and kine to Tony as if the Prime Minister has nothing better to do than trek around the country looking up animal’s bums.
He hasn’t and predictions come in showing exponential cow frying unless we kill everything except pensioners for miles around an infected area.Decide to do so,so new cases will reach zero (presumably because all animals are dead) by early June. So it begins to dawn that there ain’t going to be a May election. Time to make the preparations I’ve ignored. Clearly the Labour Party isn’t going to do anything for me
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May-June
The most enjoyable election I’ve ever fought .I like it so much I must fight some more. A marvellous communion with Grimsby, fighting on a totally different platform to the rest of the party.
The leadership let me down, boring the people while I was interesting them; avoiding real people where I was embracing them; attacking the Tories when they were helping us so well. I ended up liking my opponents in Grimsby thought the Liberal got more and more worried every time I announced that I agreed totally with everything he was saying. Except on Europe where I agreed with the Tory .Only later did I find Labour was fighting on a policy of privatisation, which I never noticed.
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July-August
Instead of building the New Heaven the leadership takes on backbenchers by purging the select committees of everyone infected by independence. The contiguous cull even included little me, though no one seems to notice that as I creep back hiding under Gwyneth Dunwoody’s skirts. We’ll behave like sheep and obey every command if there’s a prospect of a job at the end of it but diminish that prospect because there’s no room for more promotions in our over large party then anger the P45ers and treat the rest of us like serfs and you get revolt because no self respecting serf likes being told he is one..
The impetus which should have been given us by the election has gone. The election is as though it has never been. Spend July treading water. Useful preparation for what’s to come in August in California, having left my email, fax and phone number in Downing Street with John Burt’s delivery unit. He may need an extra pair of forceps.
September-October
September 11 Doing holiday relief work at Talk Sport by hosting their morning phone-in so it was an exciting week.
But not one which won approval from Grimsby. On the morning Parliament re-assembled constituents quickly discerned that I was on the air listening to the people, not in Parliament listening to Tony.
Letters poured in to the Grimsby Telegraph, to me, the Labour Party and doubtless to Ms Filkin.telling me I should have been doing the nodding dog routine behind Tony.
What`s bad for me is good for the government. Tony seizes the initiative. Every problem is postponed, particularly the inevitable row over privatisation. We`re at one for war, though without being allowed to vote for it.
November-December
A nation at war. A Party at war too, though only against Paul Marsden. Reality has been accelerated. There`s already a growing war weariness in the tabloids which have rightly gauged that the people are getting bored with the turban count and aren`t particularly interested in helping poor, down-trodden Afghan women out of their Burkas. Except, of course, in Kabul strip clubswhere the lads cry "Show us your face".
American and British troops are killed only by each other so as to avert anti-Moslem prejudices. Pilger`s predictions turn out not to be true. There`s a growing feeling that it will all be over by Christmas. Indeed, it will have to be. The media can`t afford to keep their people there on expenses as circulations, audiences, and advertising revenues sink. If it goes on longer Tony will have to subsidise them like rural tourism. Sadly, Gordon is running out of dosh too.
January
Return to normal. Except that a few minor commitments have been added to Labour`s rolling manifesto, like bringing peace to the world, relieving the oppressed, combating evil everywhere and sorting out the Arab-Israeli problem. All behind education and the NHS where we’ve not suceeded either.. Tony has had a brilliant war. Yet this kind of thing gives Labour leaders a taste for international statesmanship and air miles. Indeed, there are already fears that having become Britain`s First President, a Labour George Washington, he`s destined to become President of Europe. Allowing the Tories to claim that every time a concession to that Greedy Monolith looks like Gi`us a Job will be damaging. Tell me it`s not true, Tony, before I persuade Gordon to beg you publicly to stay.
I can see that Tony might not want to dirty his hands with normal Party politics. He`s not had to since 1995. Yet he needn`t. We have two oppositions without a policy between them. The Tories are still fighting a Euro referendum that can`t happen until the overvaluation gap between Sterling and the Euro closes. The Liberals are fighting that on the other side and posing as the new Tribune Group where they`d be better going back to the centre ground as moderate Conservatives to displace them.
Nothing will change much unless the recession really hits. I`ve been predicting it for months and been consistently wrong. Gordon is rightly boosting spending to counter it. So we can go on buying imports, spending like crazy and building up a gaping trade deficit. You can guzzle seed corn for years. Now it’s party policy who am I to argue? No point in being a prophet of doom, a Euro-sceptic, an advocate of full employment or even more public spending or any of the other things I`ve built my long career of failure round.
So I`m off to New Zealand by kind permission of Tommy McAvoy. I bribed him with a copy of my new Yorkshire Joke book, specially translated into Scots. Am now trying to persuade feminist MPs to denounce it as sexist, Politically Incorrect and Mucky. A nice row would boost sales. In return for leave, Tommy wants his pound of flesh - a surprising demand from someone with his figure. Suppose I come back from Socialist New Zealand re-radicalised and keen to make 2002 the Year of Socialism, Democracy, Low Interest Rates, and Freedom. Happy New Year! |
