It's typical, you wait ages for a decent (sic) political memoir to come along and what do you know? Two turn up at the same time. I would like to say 'just like buses, but round here they stopped turning up at all two years ago, so I will leave that comparison to you lucky city dwellers who actually have public transport. It may be bad but don't knock it. Some of us have to manage entirely without.
The first is a revealing little volume by Nick Clegg, according to one poll the most unpopular British party leader in the history of that poll. He fell spectacularly from grace after the 2010 election when he hitched his horse to the Tories cart and discovered exactly how ruthless and conniving they really are. One lesson we can learn I think is that no matter what they the Tories are only in it for themselves. One Nation Conservatism is a myth and has been proved to be a myth. Not 'we are all in this together' but 'you are all in this together' When push comes to shove, and in Westminster that is about every other day then any principles, both real and imagined go out of the window as backs are watched and pockets lined. Into this bear-pit wanders a startlingly naive Nick Clegg, if he is to be believed. And he totally blows it.
However this is not really about Nick Clegg. I wanted to talk about his memoir because of something he said about Cameron and Osborne in it. He claims that they didn't want to build council houses because that would have 'created Labour voters'.
Let's just stop and ponder this for a second. Savour the moment. Let us assume that it has some basis in truth, and by that I mean that Cameron and Osborne did actually think that building council houses would create Labour voters. If this is the case then we need absolutely no further evidence to prove that these two were the most inept and out of touch politicians since at least Margaret Thatcher, and she, as we all know lived on a totally different planet in a completely different trouser-leg of time.
Let us examine this idea as a biologist might dissect a hapless white mouse. Firstly there is the idea that somewhere there are groups of aimless people wandering our urban wastelands waiting to be turned in to Labour voters. Who are these people, these poor rudderless individuals needing only a council house in which they can pupate and hatch out as beautiful fully grown Labour voters? They don't exist, or at least they didn't then. Two things may have awoken them now, but they have nothing to do with council houses.
The first is the referendum on EU membership which actually engaged large parts of the population who hitherto had been fairly apathetic, and introduced then to the idea that their vote might actually make a difference. And the second is of course the election of Jeremy Corbyn as leader of the Labour Party which proved, if nothing else, that not all politicians are the same.
Who did they imagine was going to live in these putative council houses which they refused to build? Let us think. Oh. The poor and needy, those condemned to live in sub-standard privately rented accommodation. These people are already disaffected, and while they generally do not vote at all they are likely to blame the government of the day for their situation, especially if that government is opposed to taking steps which might improve their lot. Imagine how they might react if that government suddenly had a change of heart and not only announced a plan to construct social housing on a massive scale but also went ahead and did it. Many of those condemned to struggle on in privately owned, extortionately priced rented accommodation could be rehoused in new, clean, energy efficient homes with affordable rents. And who would they have to thank for this? Why, the Tory Government. Why then would they feel the need to become Labour voters when the Tories were the source of their good fortune? Far more likely that they would vote for those who gave them a better deal.
The fact that Cameron and Osborne failed to grasp such a simple concept is staggering and if true, shows how far removed from the realities of life they really are. We are well shot of them. We just need to get shot of Mrs May and the rest of them and we shall be getting somewhere.
The other ex MP with time on his his hands is Twinkletoes himself, Edward Balls, erstwhile member for Morley and Outwood, currently spending more time with his family. I understand he is a celebrity contestant in this year's Strictly Come Bakeoff, but as I would rather poke myself in the eye with a rusty screwdriver than watch it, I cannot be sure. He too has produced a memoir, blessedly not about ballroom dancing, which is also full of pearls of wisdom, as these memoirs frequently are.
I cannot claim to have read it, and despite Andrew Marr's obvious enthusiasm for it on this morning's eponymous show on BBC1 I doubt very much if I ever will. The one priceless gem from it which I wish to share with you however concerns the labour leadership elections and the way in which Ed Miliband changed the rules, not to keep out the Blair supporters but to keep out the left and curb the influence of the unions. Clearly this strategy didn't work quite as well as they would have liked, but what struck me was Mr Balls's reaction to what happened and the fact that the new system allowed left wingers into the party. Now excuse me, but if left wingers don't join the Labour party who do they join? To openly bemoan the fact that voters with left wing views might join a party of the left gives a cold demonstration of what has been so wrong with politics in this country for so long. I know the Labour Party is a broad church, but is there room in it for people who do not want left wingers to join?
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