Seven months after his landslide victory in May 1997, Tony Blair faced the prospect of a three-figure rebellion against his government’s welfare policies. Tomorrow, Keir Starmer could face a mutiny just as great. But despite his devotion to his New Labour predecessor, Starmer has handled his trial with far less dexterity and daring.
In Blair’s case, the issue was the Lone Parent Premium, an additional payment to single parents that had been introduced under the Callaghan government in 1977. In his budget, the Conservative chancellor Ken Clarke had announced that it would be abolished by 1998.
In opposition, Labour had decried the cut. Single parents, mostly mothers, would be £6 worse off per week. Shadow Social Security Secretary Harriet Harman denounced the policy in the Commons: “The way to get lone mothers out of poverty and cut spending on benefits for them is not by cutting the amount on which they have to live year by year and plunging them further into poverty.” Yet, after the 1997 election, Harman became the social security minister tasked with implementing the very cuts she had passionately opposed only one year earlier. Blair had vowed during the election campaign to commit to Conservative spending plans for two years — and that meant seeing through Clarke’s cut. The credibility of New Labour’s economic programme was at stake.
Blair anticipated that welfare reform would be one of the biggest fights of his premiership. Behind the scenes, bitter rows erupted among senior ministers, with the foreign secretary, Robin Cook, arguing that the policy went against Labour’s core values. The international development secretary, Clare Short, warned it might destroy trust in the government.
“Blair anticipated that welfare reform would be one of the biggest fights of his premiership.”
Labour MPs worried that their constituents had not voted Labour to cut benefits for single mums. Spin doctor Alastair Campbell wrote in his diary: “The trouble we were having was explaining it as something that fitted the kind of issues on which people elected us.” Blair disagreed. He didn’t simply want to frame the issue as a fiscal necessity; instead, he believed the cuts could be justified as an anti-poverty strategy. Women who stayed on benefits would never become more prosperous. They would eke out a meagre living, at the mercy of government beneficence from budget to budget. In work, women could earn more, develop new skills, and progress in their careers, ultimately raising the standard of living for their children.
Blair persuaded Clive Soley, chairman of the Parliamentary Labour Party, to defend the cuts on feminist and socialist grounds. Soley audaciously claimed they were “a genuine attempt to rebuild a new welfare state fit for an economy that recognises the importance of women. That has always been part of the socialist vision.”
In spite of a petition from 120 Labour MPs pleading him to abandon the policy, Blair would not back down. He told Campbell: “All we can get out of this is strength.” He said he wanted to send the signal that “the bloke is not for turning”.
The government was heading towards a showdown. Blair, backed by his chancellor Gordon Brown, would not make any concessions. He was convinced he didn’t need to. The education secretary, David Blunkett, recorded in his own diary: “Aggravation is rising; although, in the end people will no doubt capitulate.”
The Conservatives had offered their support to the policy, so there was no risk of a defeat for the Government. At stake was Blair’s leadership over his party. In this respect, William Hague hoped that the prospect of an inevitable victory would encourage more Labour MPs to rebel. He predicted that welfare reform would be “New Labour’s Vietnam”.
Yet Blair did not demand loyalty for loyalty’s sake. He defended the policy in terms of principle. He met with rebels, spoke to the media, and later even toured the country to defend the cuts. He wrote in The Sun: “We warned you that New Labour would be different… I said we would not flinch… These were not fancy phrases to please the crowds.” His lines were delivered with such vigour that it was plausible that he really believed what he was saying.
The same cannot be said for Harman. It was obvious that she didn’t believe what she was saying. She later admitted in her memoirs: “There was no argument in favour of it.” She blamed Brown for pressuring her to support the policy on pain of contributing to a run on the pound. “I didn’t feel able to second-guess him on what the money markets would do,” she wrote.
In one speech defending the cut, Harman’s performance was so unconvincing that a handful of Labour MPs who were planning to abstain, but were open to being persuaded to support the cuts, instead decided to vote against them. Backbench MP Chris Mullin called Harman “shameless”.
Yet many felt pressure to fall in line. While collecting signatures for a letter of protest to Blair, backbencher Jean Corston overheard another Labour MP describing the cut as wicked. When Corsten asked her colleague if she would put her name to the letter, her fellow MP made excuses and scarpered.
On 10 December 1997, the vast majority of Labour MPs marched through the “Aye” lobby to abolish the Lone Parent Payment. Some female MPs were reported to have been in tears. Even MPs on the party’s Right felt uncomfortable about their vote. Labour Right-winger Giles Radice wondered: “What have things come to when I find myself more in agreement with [left-winger] Audrey Wise and Ken Livingstone than I do with the government?”
In the end, Blair’s resolve paid off. He made no concessions to the rebels, yet only 47 voted against the proposals. A further 13 Labour MPs abstained. The whips decided not to take formal action against most of the rebels, though each one was sent a waspish ticking-off letter. Four, including Livingstone, were singled out for further punishment as they had made particularly critical comments. If they rebelled again, they were told, they would lose the whip.
This past fortnight, Starmer has demonstrated no such authority over his Party. The Prime Minister hopes that by reviving the New Labour model, he can reprise Blair’s electoral miracle. Last year, it seemed as if he had pulled it off. Starmer won 411 seats, just seven MPs shy of Blair’s record in 1997.
Yet his victory was superficial. The limits of this New Labour tribute act can be glimpsed in Blair’s and Starmer’s contrasting approaches to welfare reform. On the surface, Blair’s attempt to cut the Lone Parent Premium in 1997 bears a strong resemblance to Starmer’s attempt to cut the Personal Independence Payment (PIP). The policies are both deeply unpopular with the Labour Party’s rank and file; though they have more support in the wider electorate. They are both examples of fiscal prudence, often not considered a Labour attribute, achieved by attacking Labour-inclined groups. Politically, they show a government that is willing to make “hard choices” in the supposed “national interest”, against the wishes of idealistic Labour members.
Yet Blair and Starmer couldn’t have taken more different approaches. Blair faced down his MPs, made no concessions to them, and survived the rebellion unscathed. After the vote, Labour polled 55%, a 29-point lead over the Conservatives. In comparison, Starmer tried to face down his MPs, made some concessions to them, failed to placate many, and now faces genuine questions about the future of his leadership. Labour is currently polling at about 25%, about five points behind Reform. Although Tuesday’s vote won’t bring down his leadership, Starmer’s authority has perhaps been irrevocably shaken. Labour MPs now have a greater permission structure to challenge the leader going forward.
It goes to show that Blair was a far more astute politician: he was a fighter, but also a capable intellectual advocate of his policies. He invited the debate, and encouraged MPs to make their cases to him, only for him to come out on top.
By contrast, Starmer has failed to make a strong argument for his policies — perhaps because he lacks any real political vision. He is a manager, obsessed with rules and procedures. His political life has been a dizzying metamorphosis from soft-Left to Corbynite to Blairite. As a result, we don’t really know who he is.
Blair would never have claimed, as Starmer has recently done, that he doesn’t read all of his speeches before delivering them; or that he says things he doesn’t mean because his speechwriters tell him to do so.
It holds true that in politics, as in life, you are more likely to respect someone, even when you disagree with them, if you believe them to be motivated by genuine conviction. Blair had conviction and, even if his policy prescription was deeply flawed, his success was partly due to his ability to defend his political vision. It was clear what he thought Britain’s problems were, and how he meant to fix them.
That can hardly be said for our current Prime Minister. Starmer once said: “There is no such thing as Starmerism, and there never will be.” That has turned out to be a problem, not a point of pride.
