Dilettante at the Adam Smith Institute: It is secondary education that needs to 'get real', Mr Ebdon

In my latest contribution to the ASI blog, I update and reprise my earlier assault on Simon Hughes and try to explain how state educators are using their political power to try to keep their outcomes and achievements as far away from the rigours of 'the real world' as possible.

Rumours of Lords Reform: Three criticisms.

 I'm sorry, I really am. I'm a pro-Coalition Conservative. I used to be a Liberal Democrat, long ago, and I have many friends who remain of the yellow persuasion. I normally try to see the silver lining in whatever storm-cloud currently besets our government. But this is too much.

 I've heard it elsewhere, but one link will suffice: Liberal Vision report that, if the Liberal Democrats lose the AV referendum, David Cameron will have to throw them a serious bone. Worse still, rumour is that the bone in question could be a fully elected House of Lords. As support for AV "collapses" this scenario is looking ever more likely. It cannot happen. I'm not the biggest fan of much of what goes on on the Conservative back benches, but if David Cameron tries to push this through I may have to stain forever my reformist credentials and go to the trenches with them.

 There are three main problems that need to be addressed: first, what is an elected Lords actually for; second, David Cameron can't simply continue making concessions he has no mandate for on issues as serious as the constitution; third, the Liberal Democrats need to grow up and get used to losing.

  The House of Lords is a revising chamber. It doesn't have the power to initiate or veto legislation from the Commons. It is a mixture of appointed experts, party dinosaurs and fascinating constitutional relics who between them bring experience and specific expertise to legislation drafted by career politicians in the Commons, and then compile recommendations that the politicians with a mandate debate.

 Before you can insist that the House of Lords needs to be elected to have a democratic mandate, you need to work out what it actually needs that mandate for. It doesn't require an electoral mandate to carry out its current duties - indeed, elections would probably negate its current function. Making the Lords elected would grant it a mandate to challenge the Commons - do we want that?

 One thing I've not heard much (if at all, in my recollection) is why Britain needs a bicameral, American-style legislature. The logic simply seems to be:

 We have a House of Lords = It is unelected! = Let us fix that.

 That isn't good enough. If the House of Lords' role as a chamber of revision is unnecessary, that on its own is simply a case for its abolition. Supporters of Lords reform need to first articulate their case for an equally-weighted bicameral parliament, and then win the country round to the idea.  Until they do that, they have no right to enact it. 

 It certainly can't be delivered as part of a grubby ransom payment, which brings me to my second point. Quite simply, the constitution of the United Kingdom is more important than David Cameron's premiership. Labour screwed around with the constitution, instituting the Supreme Court in place of the Law Lords and assaulting the integrity of our kingdom with devolution, but at least they changed the constitution because they believed in change. 

 David Cameron has never given much (if any?) indication of being in favour of serious reform to the Lords. He's certainly never articulated clearly why we need a powerful second chamber. The manner in which he's going about this is a sorry reflection on him. He should not - and certainly should not be allowed to - play fast and loose with the constitution of our union to try to preserve his rule in Number 10. He bounced his backbenchers into supporting the AV referendum, and that is quite far enough. They didn't sign up to anything more, and he has no mandate for it.

 Really though, the final share of the blame must rest with the people putting Cameron in this position: the Liberal Democrats. As a Coalition supporter I'm very disappointed, but the Liberal Democrats are - to put it mildly - not performing particularly impressively in government, and their behaviour on this occasion is little short of disgraceful.

 They lost the General Election. They didn't win a majority for their arch-reformist ideals, even on total share of the vote. They're a protest party that hasn't propped up a government since the 1970s and hasn't participated in one since the Second World War. Yet their stars aligned, a hung parliament combined with a particularly daring Conservative leader and they have their chance in government. This is their opportunity to demonstrate that they are a serious party capable of governing the country.

 Their primary focus during this government should be accruing credibility, aiming for a payoff in 2015 when they can claim credit for helping steer our country through a dire economic crisis as part of a stable and effective coalition government. That would be a long-term view. Instead, they're constantly fretting over short-term popularity, and pandering to a party base completely unused to the discipline and realism required in a party of government.

 Both the Conservatives and Labour have been very unpopular in the past. Both have had their 1983's and their 1997's, periods in which their rivals were totally in the ascendant and serious soul-searching was required. That both these parties remain the big players in British politics is testament to a key lesson the LD's need to learn: if you're doing anything important or difficult, to govern is to be unpopular. Governing parties do haemorrhage council seats whenever they have to enact a tough, serious measure, or tell the electorate something they don't want to hear. Short-term unpopularity is less important in the long run than being perceived as a sensible, mature party in the long-term. I don't think many people can claim the Liberal Democrats are there yet.

 The other thing the Lib Dems need to learn to do is learn to lose with grace. They got a referendum on changing the voting system out of a Conservative party deeply opposed to the idea. They never got a guarantee of victory nor did they ever get promised some kind of insurance against defeat. If AV is defeated in May, the Liberal Democrats should stop, assess the campaign and try to work out why they lost. They should not turn to David Cameron and ask what serious constitutional form he's going to offer them without a referendum to keep then in government, to make up for the one they have failed to acquire from the electorate. That is not the way a mature coalition partner behaves, it is the thought process of a spoilt child.

 Despite the macho talk of Vince Cable's 'nuclear option', the Liberal Democrats have a lot more riding on the Coalition than the Conservatives. This is their chance to prove two things: first, that the Liberal Democrats are a serious party of government; second, that coalition governments are strong and stable enough to steer the country through even this most tempestuous of times. If they terminate the coalition mid-term, in some fit of petulance over not being given something they had no right to extort from their coalition partner, that will stick in the minds of the electorate long after the ever-fickle anti-cuts storm has faded away. It will not only tar the Liberal Democrats, but it will taint the perception of coalition government - the very thing they claim to champion - in the minds of the electorate. The LD's terminating the coalition will just demonstrate that, when times are tough, coalitions don't work.

 Lords reform is a terrible idea that hasn't been put before the public even as a debate, let alone a vote. David Cameron should not butcher our constitution to hold onto power. And the Liberal Democrats should learn that being in government involves disappointments, defeats and dirty tactics, before its too late.

 Update: Almost as if to prove my point, Liberal Democrat President Tim Farron writes in the Times (23/4/2011) that a House of Lords elected by PR would have more legitimacy than a First-Past-The-Post Commons. That's the best argument against PR for the Lords I can think of.

Does a Liberal Democrat 'Nuclear Option' Exist?

One of the many unfortunate things Vince Cable recently revealed to undercover journalists recently was that he actually boasts of what he called the 'nuclear option'. By this, he meant bringing down the Coalition. Its true that the prospect of the Liberal Democrats being pushed too far and walking out has always been in the minds of the coalition's architects and enemies alike. But now the tuition fees vote has happened, is that at all likely to occur?

For a start, the tuition fees vote has gone. There's unlikely to be another bill that splits the party as dramatically as the fees hike. If the AV referendum goes against them then discontent amongst social-democratic LDs might see a marked increase, but that alone isn't enough for them to safely use the 'nuclear option'. Without a big, dramatic justification for their action, the Liberal Democrats will come across as a party chronically incapable of government. Furthermore, without an emotive issue to act as a trigger I'm not entirely sure that the LD left could take the LD right out of coalition.

The critical factor being that if the Liberal Democrats were to withdraw and bring the government down, there would have to be a General Election. And who exactly would be voting for the Liberal Democrats in that scenario? Their left-of-centre support has largely evaporated and is unlikely to flit back to them the moment they leave office - the legacy of fees and being part of the 'ConDem' government will be too fresh. And their remaining (perhaps right-of-centre) support, consisting of those who approve of the job the LDs are doing in government and like how they're handling coalition, will probably follow the Conservatives. After all, if nice collegiate Mr Cameron is viewed as having treated the Liberal Democrats fairly and they still left, then it will sour the image of the party and coalition government in general in the eyes of a substantial proportion of their main supporters. In short, they'll be seen to have betrayed both halves of their pre-government support base, and their electoral strength could evaporate.

Furthermore, if as discussed above the social democrats try the 'nuclear option' without some compelling justification, there is a chance that some of their leaders might not follow them out. The likes of Nick Clegg, Danny Alexander and David Laws would have precious little incentive to follow their party out of the coalition in such circumstances, where they would be condemned to irrelevance-in-perpetuity within a permanently left-aligned party even if they didn't lose their seats outright. They could well see the logic in continuing in government, in coalition with the Conservatives.

From there, they could either do three things. They could become Conservatives, although this would probably lead to Danny Alexander not joining them and put Clegg's chances of holding Hallam in serious jeopardy. The second option would be to stand as independents with a non-compete deal with the Conservatives at the next election. The third would be to form a National Liberal style party/organisation that would remain distinct from the Conservative Party while continuing to be willing to ally with it whilst providing a home for other Orange Bookers and Liberals who might be uncomfortable in a solidly leftwing Liberal Democrat party.

Finally, one should not forget that Cable's stock has fallen hugely during the Coalition's time in office. Unlike 'Saint Vince' of those distant pre-coalition days, I personally doubt that Cable still has the personal pull to rip the Coalition apart and lead the Liberal Democrat left into the abyss I've outlined above.

If this happened, the Liberal Democrats would enter the subsequent General Election shorn of both credibility as a party and of any members who have earned any by distinguishing themselves in government. It would be a complete disaster. The left of the party is far better holding on for the full five years and trying to take credit for anything 'nice' the Coalition does, casting the Conservatives as the nasty lot. For these reasons, I think that Cable's talk of bringing down the coalition was egotistical bluster and not much more.

Woohoo!

Nothing new to add on my part, just officially registering my delight at the apparent defeat of the 'graduate contribution (tax)'. I wrote to parliament on the issue and published the letter on here back in July, so I'm happy to let all my legions of readers share in my sense of happy closure. ;)

"The Big Society" - as I understand it.

Over the past few months, I have read an awful lot about people not understanding what the Big Society is; and, to a certain extent, I'm with them. Therefore I thought that I'd try to clarify 1) what I think the Big Society is and 2) what has made it come across so muddled.

The Vision: In my view, the 'Big Society' (or 'strong society', as it might have been better labelled) is Cameron's attempt to invoke the spirit of the pre-war years - before the statist socialists of the post-war Labour governments (backed up by their post-war consensus Tory opposites) castrated the voluntary element of British life. Other people have studied this process (and if this were a researched piece, I'd have gone back and re-read them, but ho-hum)*; but suffice to say, there is a body of opinion that believes that the increase in state intervention that swept the masses off their feet in the mid-twentieth century is either unable or unwilling to set them back down again. In short, the Big Society is an attempt to inject some of the Victorian ethos of community, self-help, volunteering and charity that more than a half-century of statism has eroded.

The Problem: Can you seriously imagine David Cameron espousing 'Victorian Values'? After all the rebranding work he's done? It's so old-school Tory. Contrary to those on the right, I am of the opinion that Cameron is actually a Conservative but, much as it might please the likes of the Telegraph and the Mail, a strategy of 'Victorian Values' isn't viable for a Conservative of Cameron's ilk. It sounds scary and unreformed - the left can gleefully point out that the Victorian era was the age of chimney sweeps, workhouses**, poverty etc. Getting stuck in a pitched battle over which bits of the Victorian age he wanted isn't something Cameron would have wanted on the eve of an election. Instead, we got 'The Big Society'.

Even after the election, the problem with implementation persists. Because liberalism (and I consider small state/strong society to be liberalism, as long as 'society' doesn't trammel individualism) requires being... well, mean. People will only stand on their own two feet if the state stops carrying them. Encouraging volunteering requires slashing state provision; why would you volunteer otherwise? Granting freedom to people should also mean giving them responsibility - and thus the risk of negative consequences. In an era when state help is viewed as an entitlement by many, governments are simply too afraid to give people responsibility.

This is less of a problem for Labour, which values equality over freedom (more or less), but it presents a major problem for the Conservatives. They're all for giving people freedom (social-conservative dinosaurs excepted) - but giving people responsibility invariably elicits howls of "heartless Tories!". It's why Cameron continues the Labour habit of fetishising spending on 'our' NHS rather than results or seriously considering structural reform. Government 'goodness' is measured in the volume of money - other peoples' money - you pump into stuff.

Which is where the problem with the Big Society comes in. The self-help, mutual, community ethos of the Victorian era existed because people thought that if they wanted something done, then the responsibility was theirs to do it. Rich people gave to - and actively participated in - charities to help the disadvantaged. Poor communities banded together to do various things and bonded in doing so. The problem with trying to bring this sort of thing back is that the general view now is that these things are the job of the state. If there's a problem, big or small; or a community, however small that wants something, that is the job of the state - "What we pay our taxes for".

Before the Big Society could be properly implemented, Cameron would first have to tell the nation "No, this is not what you pay your taxes for anymore". He would have to radically redefine the role of the state, creating one with a much smaller purview and much lower tax and spend turnover. Then, having slashed taxes to match, he would have to persuade people that they were capable of helping themselves - and that they should. The leftist orthodoxy that if someone is without the state they are 'alone' would need to be confronted head on. How callous and Thatcherite and evil that could so easily be painted as being; not the image of modern 'compassionate Conservatives' that the Cameroons were aiming for.

These major issues aside, there's no denying that the Coalition has muddied the waters further. Much as I admire it, a coalition that contains Vince Cable and John Redwood is not one equipped to challenge nearly a century of government orthodoxy on such emotive territory at a time of national crisis. I'll admit that watching Vince Cable on Question Time defending things like the Free Schools policy is a treat, but the Conservative's partners need to be handled with caution and respect if the coalition is to work. If Cameron's lucky, he'll somehow manage to absorb the Orange Bookers, making it the third time the Liberal right has joined the Conservatives. But until another election delivers him a majority, he has to keep the SDP on board, and the big society doesn't have much of a hope.

In short, Cameron couldn't sell Victorian Values before the election and he cannot implement them after it. Don't feel too sorry for him - 'Big Society' is still a terrible name.

* Nick Cohen's book "What's Left?" spends some time examining the way that a new breed of 20th Century socialism eroded the culture of self-reliance and self-improvement that had been the working class's in the 19th Century. James Bartholomw's book "The Welfare State We're In" is a key book on this subject and a very engaging read. I've even linked you to the bookshop!

** I'm aware of the irony that towards the end of his reign Gordon Brown actually proposed bringing these back himself, in a shiny modern form.

Letter to a Tory

I have just finished writing this letter to one of my MPs:

"Dear X

I was dismayed to read on the Spectator's website today about Vince Cable's planned introduction of a graduate tax. This is a terrible university funding policy that harshly penalises those who work hard for good degrees in order to subsidise the mass-consumption of low-value HE certificates in the name of social engineering.

I understand that your hands, like those of Mr Cameron and the party as a whole, are tied by the coalition agreement and the necessities of the grim times in which we are living. Nonetheless, I would be very grateful if you could raise and keep in the minds of policy makers the concerns of those aspirational students who will already be emerging from university with their fair share of the debt burden without having the burden of others thrust upon them too.

Kind Regards,"

Euch. I can't quite put into words how angry the introduction of a Graduate Tax (and more broadly, the presence of Vince Cable in a Conservative-led government) makes me. The Graduate Tax is proof positive of Vince's 'I'd be in Labour if it wasn't for the Loony Left running London when I moved there' credentials. The idea that the more use you make of more degree, the more you should pay to support those who won't, is abhorrent to both conservative and liberal thinking. Fraser Nelson's idea is what I would have hoped to see: an admittance that not everyone needs a degree, and a re-calibration of HE in line with the radical recalibration of compulsory education being enacted by Michael Gove. Instead, the coalition brings in a disjointed policy of radical reform on the one hand, and punitive taxes to subsidise the status quo on the other.

Another reason to vote 'NO' in the PR referendum.