Labour have been in power for 100 days.
The reason why we fixate on the first 100 days is because of Napoleon; 100 days was how long it took for him to escape from Elba, return to France, seize the country, become Emperor (again), invade Belgium and lose the battle of Waterloo.
Having come to power with a promise of competence the last few months have seen a row over cuts to Winter Fuel Payments for pensioners, and a very silly scandal over Taylor Swift tickets and donations.
The row over Taylor Swift tickets is confected nonsense from people who want to muddy the waters before the truth comes out about their own dodgy dealings, but the outcry over the WFP is real, and hard to ignore. The new Government has failed to convince voters that the chaos of the last 14 years is over and the grown ups are back in charge.
But from the Government perspective things don’t necessarily look that bad.
The economy is growing. Inflation is falling, and soon interest rates will fall too. The UK is forecast to be among the fast growing major economies in the world. This is as much luck as judgement, but it is a big change from the last few years. People will forgive Governments a lot if they have a few more quid in their pocket. The £62bn announced so far in investment is mostly deals agreed a while ago, but is still impressive.
The King’s Speech contained the most ambitious legislative programme I can remember. When I read it I wasn’t even sure there were enough committee rooms to manage so many new bills, never mind Parliamentary time. So far the Government has presented bills on:
Workers Rights
Water industry special measures
Great British energy
Terrorism
Renters Rights
Lords (representation)
Lords (abolition of hereditary peers)
Bank recapitalisation
Rail public ownership
Crown estates investment
Commonwealth parliament and Red Cross
Digital Asssets
Budget responsibility
Arbitration
Apprenticeships
Product regulation and measurements
Departmental spending
In addition there are 15 more Private Members bills coming from Labour backbenchers. Many of these look like Government bills through the back door: assisted dying, ticket touting, Water Industry nationalisation. This is the same tactic Wilson used in the late 60s – present a controversial measure as a Private Members bill and then let Government Whips push it through. Without primary legislation clampdowns on high interest buy no pay later providers is on it’s way.
This is more new legislation in 100 days than Cameron managed in his first year as PM, more even than Blair in 1997.
I suspect that Number 10 is happy having a row about Taylor Swift tickets rather than Winter Fuel Payments, and will be over joyed that it has managed to push through loads of legislation without comment or scrutiny. The effective absence of the Leader of the Oppostion has helped a lot, with Rishi Sunak clearly not arsed any more.
Those on the Conservative side complaining about Labour ministers taking freebies may want to remember that any tightening of the rules on MPs conduct will affect them too. Some on the Labour side may feel that they are setting a trap for the Tories.
We have had 14 years of Government run on favours and patronage. A network of privileged politicians, newspaper owners and journalists, rich authoritarian oligarchs all lubricated with foreign money, mostly from Russia. The current scandals about gifts and freebies is tiny compared to the vast networks of influence peddling that used to run the country. New rules will hit hard.
Whoever wins the Conservative Party leadership election may have to contend with a series of difficult by-elections if the remaining Tory MPs find the new rules on outside earnings and gifts too onerous. And the MP with the most to lose financially by tighter rules is Nigel Farage.
But I wouldn’t be so cheerful if I was in number 10.
It is clear that things are a mess behind the scenes. Sue Gray was always an odd choice for a senior role given her involvement in the defenestration of Boris Johnson. Few will miss her.
But she did have a crucial role to play. Fourteen years of weak Conservative Ministers and haphazard spending cuts have left the machinery of Government in a mess. Simon Case is the most hopeless Cabinet Secretary ever, and lots of Permanent Secretaries are just as bad. Too many chums and yes men appointed, too much talent shown the door. Key departments like HMRC and DWP are as broken as the Child Support Agency was a decade or more ago.
When Conservative policies failed they used to blame “the blob”; an imaginary conspiracy of leftie civil servants who would thwart their ideas. The reality was that Ministers spent billions on daft policies with no chance of success to chase headlines in the Daily Mail.
What Labour face is “the flab” a group of senior public sector leaders hand picked by Conservative Ministers, over promoted, under talented. Government Departments struggling with the legacy of 14 years of badly thought out policies costing billions. And some of the flab are leaking to their own chums on the Conservative press.
Starmer has his own problems. He has no empathy, and too often fails to understand that ordinary people care about things beyond policy and legislation. He lives in his comfort zone of bland legalism, believing that just because taking the Taylor Swift tickets was within the rules that was enough. It isn’t. You can’t make difficult decisions about cutting payments to pensioners one minute and take freebies the next, no matter what the rules say.
That is starting to become a problem. It is OK telling people we have to go through hard times to fix problems, particularly when inflation and interest rates are falling and the economy is starting to grow again. But telling people they have to dig in and take one for the team when he shows no recognition of their sacrifice, or any compassion at all is only going to last for so long. Reeves is just as bad. Cooper not much better.
There are people in his team who have a bit more of a human touch and he needs to put them more in the spotlight, otherwise people are going to start and see him as Spock not Kirk.
It is early days for Labour and most people are happy to wait and see how they get on. Those outraged on social media where never going to vote for a progressive party anway.
But the big task of making Government fit for purpose hasn’t started yet, and I don’t really know whose in charge of fixing that. If that doesn’t change it will be 5 years of chaos not 100 days.