Posts Tagged "Government"

Government reshuffle goes to the Right

François Fillon was renamed Prime Minister of France yesterday in time for today’s reshuffle.

Details will trickle in over the course of the day but the early announcements are showing that the government is taking a right turn.

What it all shows is that Sarkozy is trying to appeal to his base. He’s in a terribly weak position, and the last reshuffle before the presidentials (presumably) wasn’t really his.

The fact that Fillon is there instead of his rival demonstrates that the party barons wanted him to stay, Sarkozy wanted him to go. Look who won.

The other interesting fact is that Bernard Kouchner is out. He was the ex-Socialist who became Foreign Secretary. You could call this the end of the ‘ouverture’ – the French name for “government of all talents”.

The Interior Minister (most important job for Presidential hopefuls) hasn’t changed, and Christine Lagarde remains as Economy Minister.

I’m looking out for Estrosi, to confirm my analysis of the Roma disaster.

We can look to Europe for ideas to reform our democracy

I have been working for our French colleagues in the Parti Socialiste for 6 months now, and though I don’t know what a Jedward is, I have been able to experience ‘continental democracy’.

The debate about electoral reform in Britain has always been “PR or not to PR”, with the third way of AV or AV+ and other complicated overhauls creeping in to the lexicon. The conclusion is always a very British paradox; FTPT is unfair, unrepresentative and needs reforming…but that’s the way we like it.

As a reaction, rather than a solution, to the expenses scandal when it broke a few months ago, there was a whole package of changes designed to restore a democracy in crisis. Fixed Term Parliaments were suggested and then forgotten about; meanwhile the Tories are determined to self-harm by reducing the number of MPs in the Commons as part of their ghoulish quest for cuts.

I have been looking at various democratic innovations we could import from other European countries, particularly France.

Both nations are suffering from a declining turnout, but for opposite reasons. The French tend to experience election fatigue, as they are required to vote for their MEP, the Président, their MP, then Regional, General and Municipal councillors, as well as their Mayor (no matter how small the town).

Britain, conversely, experiences election atrophy, creating the attitude “We only see you at election time” every four years, and there are generally only three levels of representation; the MEPs, MPs and Local Councillors, then depending on where you live there may be Scottish, Welsh or Northern Irish Assembly members or the Mayor of London and the GLA.

Creating more levels of representation will not have any effect if it is impossible to justify introducing them. Regional Assemblies, for example, were piloted then abandoned, though there is still a vocal lobby for an English Parliament.

Instead, the main argument used against British First Past the Post is the fact we have ‘two horse races’ in a three party system, which leads to either tactical voting or ‘wasted’ votes.

To solve this, we could experiment with a two-round system. It’s quite simple to implement ‘two elections’; the French vote on a Sunday (weekend voting is something else we should consider) and the two candidates with the highest share of the vote go through to a second round the following week. Sometimes three candidates qualify, but it’s all in the detail.

The effect on Britain could be a great many more parties form, as well as more independent candidates standing (coalitions are very popular here) but voting for one of the weaker candidates wouldn’t necessarily exclude you from having a say in the final decision between the more successful candidates. In the local by-election we fought over the summer in Nice there were eleven different candidates, though predictably the PS and UMP (Labour and Conservative equivalents, broadly speaking) qualified. This also means that ‘the underdog’ can stage quite a miraculous recovery thanks to the ‘reserve votes’.

It could transform tactical voting and make safe seats less safe, but the downside is of course that it would make two-party constituencies even clearer. Currently, many constituencies are Labour/Conservative marginals with the Lib Dems trailing in third place, so Lib Dems have to choose whether to vote for their own party and ‘waste’ their vote or to vote for whichever party they see as the lesser of two evils. Under a two-round system, they would be free to show support for their party in the first instance but on the second round they could make a straight choice for whomever they prefer. Labour voters are in a similar situation in the south.

When the ‘left’ vote is split (this mainly depends on how you view the Lib Dems) the Tories get in. But voting twice will allow voters to keep to their principles and be realistic at the same time. This vote-splitting is prohibited and so safe seats become a lot less safe. It may even increase turnout because, in the second round at least, every vote will make a difference.

The time between first and second rounds could also be used effectively to sharpen and clarify dividing lines while having the advantage of making political events more practical. For the Leader’s debates, there is still the question of what to do with Nick Clegg. It seems silly to have him on between the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition, but unfair not to invite him as he is after all a party leader.

Similarly, during the London Mayoral election campaign in May 2008, Newsnight had to invite Brian Paddick along, despite the fact the campaign was so evidently a Johnson/Livingstone affair. Second preference votes are obviously weaker than First preference, but if even the most dedicated Lib Dem voters were posed a straight choice between Ken and Boris, Ken might have made it (or Boris may have had a bigger majority).

A key argument against PR and AV is that they are more confusing and complex than one vote, one winner elections. So when it comes to Electoral Reform, all I propose is that Britain looks beyond the same debate we have had for decades and starts to think about real changes we can make. To that end, it may be worth looking to Europe for ideas.

Frédéric Mitterrand fights for his future

French Culture Minister Frédéric Mitterrand was fighting to keep his job last night, having been ensnared by a scandal of his own making.

The row began with his defence of famous film director Roman Polanski, (arrested with charges of paedophilia) where he said that the affair was “absolutely horrifying” before launching an attack on the USA. It was suggested that Mitterrand spoke well out of turn but he claimed that he was perfectly justified to comment and that the issue was well within his culture portfolio as it is his duty “to protect great artists”.

His comments have since backfired substantially, since a passage in his autobiography that had hitherto gone unnoticed became strikingly relevant. The passage described his experiences in Thailand paying for sex with boys in brothels.

He was invited onto TF1 and given a very easy ride (TF1 is a TV channel owned by one of Sarkozy’s friends) and categorically stated that he had never committed or advocated sex with minors and condemned strongly sexual tourism.

Marine Le Pen, Jean-Marie Le Pen’s daughter, of the Front National was first to hammer Mitterrand and call for his resignation. Shortly afterwards, a few people from the Parti Socialiste came out to express their shock but stopped short of calling for his resignation.

Mitterrand responded by saying that it was an honour to encounter the wrath of the Nationalists, but it was shameful that the Socialists would disapprove. As Frédéric is the nephew of the late Socialist President François Mitterrand, it’s almost certain the Socialists are exacting their revenge because he serves in Nicolas Sarkozy’s right wing UMP government.

I think Mitterand is safe for now. He has been one of the government stars since his ‘surprise’ appointment and in his performance on TF1 he said that he had Sarkozy’s support, so it looks unlikely that he will be forced to resign. However, he has been severely damaged by the affair and his interview has not set the record straight, mainly due to his exceedingly airy and evasive (and annoying) style of speaking.

His defence was very confusing, but I think that Mitterrand will keep his job for now, but Sarkozy will be looking to get rid of him in the next reshuffle.

Below is the video where he “explains himself”, even if you can’t understand French, it’s worth looking at to see how he sounds, it’s also interesting if you skip to 11:50 he gets a bit rattled, asking the journalist “How can you ask me that question? Have you not been listening to what I’ve been saying for the last 5 minutes?”

Cutting down the Commons will cripple Cameron’s government

While covering up unfortunate remarks made by his colleagues, David Cameron told us again that he wants to reduce the number of MPs.

The logic is, on the face of it, that fewer MPs will claim fewer expenses. It true in absolute figures, less so in proportion. Members of Parliament are quite unpopular at the moment so it follows that we should have fewer of them.

It is yet another example that Cameron is nowhere near being prepared for government; leaping on top of a simple solution with a short term benefit with no regard for the long term decision.

No wonder they called him “Mr 10%”. See this interview in the FT.

Osborne, You're Fired!

Fewer Labour seats mean less Opposition

The real reason behind this measure is really just to cut the number of seats the Labour party has and thus make it easier for the Tories to win a majority by moving the goalposts, as my Bath counterparts have explained.

It’s not a bad strategy. By reducing the number of MPs, those remaining will have to take on more constituency casework. This will be particularly the case in Inner City areas (which generally happen to be the Labour seats) where there tends to be more casework generated than for the MPs in rural constituencies.

Fewer Labour MPs will therefore need to take on more casework, and if they’re busy in their constituency office all the time they won’t be able to be in Westminster preventing legislation. They won’t even be getting out and about in the community, scoring up those pesky Labour votes. This is where the phrase “chained to the desk” applies itself well.

It could be worth giving constituency casework to local Councillors, though they tend to like to maintain political independence and loyalty to their council group rather than the Constituency Party. Perhaps it could be an area of reform to give Local Government some teeth.

Fewer Cameroons, more Hannanas

When (if?) Cameron is asked to form a Government, and he enacts his proposal, not only will he have to say goodbye to a few of his chums (which I am sure he is ruthless enough to do) but he will also have to make new ones.
Consider the following quite from Yes Minister:

There are only 630 MPs and a party with just over 300 MPs forms a government and of these 300, 100 are too old and too silly to be ministers and 100 too young and too callow. Therefore there are about 100 MPs to fill 100 government posts.

There are about 646 MPs right now and there will be 650 (due to new constituencies) after 2010. So a party needs 325 for a majority. Cut that by 10% and we have 585 MPs, 292 of which can form a majority.

Now you see the significance of the YM quote, I hope.

The result is that it will completely cripple DC, depending on when/if he gets the legislation through. I sound as if it is a fait accompli though you can be sure Labour and Lib Dems won’t take kindly to it, and I doubt newly elected Tory MPs will be so quick to sacrifice themselves in the name of Conservative hegemony either.

DC will have fewer Tory MPs to choose from and so in terms of probability alone it means he will have to offer jobs to the very same Old Tories and Thatcherites he has been trying to get away from for years. You know what’s worse than a Cameron Government? A Cameron Government with Health Secretary Dan Hannan in it. He will be at the beck and call of not just his backbenchers, but his frontbenchers too.

So it will not only weaken his particular government, but any subsequent government’s prospect of longevity. Obviously, as more and more MPs go through the ministerial ranks, the harder it is to control parliament. As it was with Major it is with Brown. With fewer qualified MPs to start with, the half-life of a government decreases and the pendulum will swing faster between Labour and Conservative (not necessarily a bad thing, though).

Cameron has said that there isn’t enough talent to go around on the Labour benches, despite a 60ish majority, hence the appointment of Lord Mandelson as Dark Lord of the State.

But that’s another story…