May 11 became Gordon Brown's day to unveil, what he would do as Blair's successor, just a day after Tony Blair had finally announced June 27th as the date he will step down as British Prime Minister. Of course, who becomes the next leader of the Labour party and British Prime Minister is pending a Labour party leadership race, but most analysts predict Prime Minister Brown is a forgone conclusion.
Gordon Brown's speech was as much about the re-branding of a pop star as it was an attempt to claw back support for a damaged Labour party. Almost every major policy proposal was aimed towards increasing Labour votes, in areas where Brown obviously felt Blair's policies had cost them. By showing the public that he shares their negative feelings over where Blair went wrong, and that his leadership will be very different — in most cases the opposite of Blair's — throughout his speech, Brown sought to regain support for the Labour party and build support for himself.
The biggest example of this was Brown's attempting to capitalize on the public's deep running anger and in some cases hatred for Blair's overruling of most of the Labour party and British public to send U.K. forces into Iraq. In that move, as Brown rightly pointed out, Blair cost Labour the trust of the British public, but not only in the Labour party, in the entire British political system of supposed democracy. Attempting to counteract this Brown said:
"One of my first acts as Prime Minister would be to restore power to parliament in order to build the trust of the British people in our democracy.
Government must be more open and more accountable to Parliament - for example in decisions about peace and war, in public appointments and in a new ministerial code of conduct.
Over the coming months, I want to build a shared national consensus for a programme of constitutional reform that strengthens the accountability of all who hold power; that is clear about the rights and responsibilities of being a citizen in Britain today; that defends the union and is vigilant about ensuring that the hard won liberties of the individual, for which Britain has for centuries been renowned round the world, are at all times upheld without relenting in our attack on terrorism."
So, Brown was not only telling the British public that he will make sure that neither he, nor anyone else can deploy the British military at will, but he was attacking the move, while attempting to reassure Britain's growing ethnic minorities who have been worried by Blair's ever-tightening laws to deal with terrorism.
Article comments
1 - Dave Nalle
Sounds like you wish Brown was a happy, proud Stalinist.
Personally, I have more faith in the good sense of the British people. One would think that with their growing muslim population and prominent instances of domestic terrorism they'd see how positive Blair's policies were.
Dave
2 - Graham McKnight
You still appear to disregard the fact that, out of 412 Labour MPs, only 149 of them voted against the proposed invasion in 2003, which means that 263 (a large majority of Blair's party) actually supported the military deployment.
Basically, it would be wrong to write that 'the political system' was against the war, but it would be correct to write that a significant proportion of the public were against it.
If in doubt, employ cautious language.
3 - Liam Bailey
Graham,
In your comment on my last article: you got me. Whatever way you slice it Blair did not overrule the entire British policital hierarchy. I got it wrong on that score.
However the vote you linked to from comments on my last article reffered to the vote held in the entire House of Commons, not just the Labour Party -- as you suggest in your latest comment.
There are 646 MP's in the House of Commons, meaning if the vote passed by 412 to 149 then there were 85 abstentions, probably meaning 85 members against the war but too afraid to speak up -- suggesting that they were Labour M.P's.
In the current composition there are 352 Labour members in the House. So if 234 members were against the war, then Blair overruled most of the Labour party in going into the war. As I said in my article.
The cautious language you suggest is inusable, because the public was never given the chance to vote before the war, meaning to say went against public opinion would be speculation.
4 - Graham McKnight
It would be correct to argue that the majority of MPs in the Commons today think of the invasion and occupation of Iraq as a mistake. Many publicly voice their discontents and public inquries have been conducted. These facts do not, however, excuse all those who voted in favour of invasion in 2003 from blame.
I agree with your sentiments very much.
5 - Dave Nalle
Based on what I've seen, the members of the commons are a bunch of worthless, hypocritical panderers - much like our congress, but even more venal. They blow whichever way the wind blows. What was a pleasant surprise about Blair was his willingness not to just blow with the wind of mob opinion.
That said...
These facts do not, however, excuse all those who voted in favour of invasion in 2003 from blame.
Why should there be blame? they made a reasonable vote based on the data available at the time, and if they've since changed their mind out of cowardice or from having reassessed the situation or from pure fickleness, isn't that their right? Can't they hold one opinion in 2003 and a different one in 2007? Why is that a crime that needs to 'excused'?
Dave
6 - STM
"Based on what I've seen, the members of the commons are a bunch of worthless, hypocritical panderers - much like our congress, but even more venal"
How much more venal could they be than US politicians, Dave? Seriously ... it's hard to go past a litany of public lies to support an untenable position on almost anything and a bloke occupying the highest position not just in the land but the world and who thought a blow job here and there didn't really pass for sex.
Pots and kettles, all of which are covered in charcoal, I say.
7 - Graham McKnight
Dave,
They are to blame for voting in favour of breaking the sovereignty of a foreign nation without the explicit consent of UN member states, Kangaroo court style.
The malevolent consequences of such action are plentiful.
8 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Liam,
The two articles on Blair leaving and Brown's apparent ascendancy to his position, and the article on Scottish nationalism show where your real strengths are - being a perceptive writer on the politics in the United Kingdom.
My opinions on these issues are somewhat irrelevant. The "English" contingent on BC can debate you on this better than I. But you are on firm ground in your writing on this topic, whatever your slant, and it shows. Kol hakavód - all honour to you.
9 - Dave Nalle
They are to blame for voting in favour of breaking the sovereignty of a foreign nation without the explicit consent of UN member states, Kangaroo court style.
Sorry, doesn't wash, Graham. Nations which have committed the crimes Saddam's regime had done no longer have any right to claim any protection of 'sovereignty'. They're outlaw states and should be free pickings for those willing to do the dirty work for the rest of the world and bring them down. To suggest otherwise is to condone the open practice of brutality, inhumanity and genocide. The UN failed its responsibility to take more decisive action against Saddam years ago, and they are largely to blame for the current situation.
We shouldn't be pointing accusatory fingers at Bush for invading Iraq, we should be pointing fingers at those who tacitly condoned Saddam's behavior and did nothing not only prior to the invasion, but more inexcusably after the invasion was already a done deal. To stay out before the invasion can be explained away as mere caution. To not do everything possible to help out once Saddam was defeated is the real crime here which the politically correct won't talk about.
The major nations which did not insist on a role in peacekeeping by offering their militaries and their money and their personnel as soon as possible after the invasion began are directly responsible for the mess which the overextended US and coalition forces have had to preside over.
Dave
10 - Christopher Rose
Doesn't it strike you as at all odd that this great drive to improve the world has started and finished with Afghanistan and Iraq? There are far worse regimes in the world than those two and nothing is being done there at all.
It's also rather naive to attack the UN for failing to take on the role of the world's policeman when the USA has been one of the principle countries inhibiting and undermining it...
11 - Graham McKnight
Dave you say that 'The UN failed its responsibility to take more decisive action against Saddam years ago... we should be pointing fingers at those who tacitly condoned Saddam's behavior'
The US condoned Saddam 'years ago'. Do not think of me as some conspiracy theorist; the evidence that proves American colaboration with the Iraqi regime is plentiful. The US knew of Saddam's slaughtering of the Kurdish population North of Bhagdad in 1988, yet chose not to act then.
Take a good look at articles such as this one. ...and concede that morals and ethics were not the primary motive for the US invasion in 2003. How could they have been when such blatant disregard for the Kurds' sovereign right to life was and is systematically at best ignored and at worst condoned by successive US Administrations?
12 - Dave Nalle
Doesn't it strike you as at all odd that this great drive to improve the world has started and finished with Afghanistan and Iraq? There are far worse regimes in the world than those two and nothing is being done there at all.
Christopher, you might want to try that theory out on the troops fighting terrorists with US support in Sudan and Somalia. Clearly Iraq and Afghanistan are far from the limits of the struggle.
Dave
13 - Christopher Rose
Dave, you might want to try following what somebody is saying, not going off on largely irrelevant tangents as you repeatedly do. Otherwise a chap might think you were trying to sabotage conversation rather than in engage in it...
14 - Dave Nalle
The US condoned Saddam 'years ago'. Do not think of me as some conspiracy theorist; the evidence that proves American colaboration with the Iraqi regime is plentiful. The US knew of Saddam's slaughtering of the Kurdish population North of Bhagdad in 1988, yet chose not to act then.
Quite right. No question about it. And that was wrong. But does doing something wrong once mean that we should heap wrong after wrong on top of it for decades? The US did change that policy and quite a few years before Bush took office. Yet after we took the right course with Iraq, countries like Russia and France continued covert trade, contrary to UN sanctions with Saddam's regime.
Take a good look at articles such as this one. ...and concede that morals and ethics were not the primary motive for the US invasion in 2003. How could they have been when such blatant disregard for the Kurds' sovereign right to life was and is systematically at best ignored and at worst condoned by successive US Administrations?
Moral failures from 20 years ago - and it has indeed been almost that long since the US condoned anything Saddam was doing - hardly play into what's going on today or the reasoning behind the invasion. If anything it could be argued that removing Saddam from power was the least we could do to make up for what we allowed to happen. And keep in mind that the one group in Iraq which is unreservedly pro-US is the Kurds. I'm thinking they have a more realistic perspective on this situation than you do.
Dave
15 - SCFMH
The vote in the Commmons on going to war was IRRELEVANT, and held only for PR purposes, as war is part of the Royal Prerogative (the Crown decides and we get no say). It (the vote) was therefore not what took us into Iraq; that had been decided between Bush and Blair long before (probably at Crawford about Easter '02, if Robin Cook's memoirs are correct).
16 - STM
When you say the Crown decides, you are misleading. In the case you describe, the Crown is the government of the UK. The Queen is a member of the executive branch, much like a US president with virtually no power, and effectively takes her advice only from the Prime Minister and Parliament.
There is no way "the Crown", as you've described it, would be sending people off to war unless the Government - not the Queen - decided that was the way to go. It would be imperative in modern Britain for any such decision to be backed by a vote of Parliament. It's no PR stunt.
17 - Graham McKnight
The Royal Prerogative is nothing but an archaic rubber stamp, an irrelevant layer of bureaucracy.
18 - STM
Yes, and as such it had no role in Britain's decision to go to war in Iraq possibly apart from the Queen symbolically lifting her arm and rubber-stamping the decision at the behest of Blair and parliament.
19 - SCFMH
I didn't say the Queen, I said the Crown; there is a big difference. The powers of the Royal Prerogative are anything but irrelevant, and are de facto exercised by the Prime Minister of the Day.
I repeat: under the Constitution, such as it is, matters of war and peace are not decided by Parliament but by the Crown. We get no say.
20 - STM
That is simply not true. There is no war that Britain will go to a real war in the modern age without parliament agreeing to it. You are right, but only on a technicality - which is what we've been trying to say.
21 - Graham
Parliament may very well pass legislature within our life times that transforms the UK into a UR; a United Republic.
The Crown is dependent on favourable Parliamentary desicion making. Should the issue of Monarchy become a popular public focal point the main three political parties will oblige themselves to include within their manifestos what they intend to do about the Crown should they win an election.
Reform in the House of Lords is taking place today, why not abolition of the Crown tomorrow?
22 - Dr Dreadful
Parliament may very well pass legislature within our life times that transforms the UK into a UR; a United Republic.
Can't see it happening: no politician wants to light the fuse on that particular stick of constitutional dynamite.
Also, what would the tabloids have to write about? :-)
23 - Graham McKnight
The key words in my last post were 'popular public focal point', i.e.- if the majority wish to see the Crown disolved, they will be more willing to vote for the Party that promises to enact such a desire.