Why I will always be a Stroppy Labour Rebel
01 Mar 2006
New LabourĀ is often splenetic about MPs who rebel. The preferred explanation is that we have some kind of personality disorder. The truth is that rebellion and dissent are in the Labour Party's DNA. The party was set up more than 100 years ago to challenge the established order. It continues to attract freethinkers. So, as Labour whips mobilise to crush dissent over the Government's Education Bill, they are fighting not just individuals but the party's history. Paradoxically, the tradition of dissent owes more to the Labour Party's Methodist inheritance with its emphasis on conscience, than to its Marxist antecedents with the emphasis on the "central committee" and toeing the party line. All the party's most revered and heroic figures are dissenters: Keir Hardie, John Maxton, Nye Bevan and Michael Foot. When I entered parliament in 1987 the archetypal Labour rebel was Dennis Skinner. What he lacked in oratory he made up for in deadly repartee (together with a northern comedian's sense of timing) and he was devoted to the art of parliamentary rebellion. It was Dennis who Neil Kinnock accompanied in a famous photograph from 1977 where they both sit alone in the Chamber of the House of Commons having rebelled by refusing to go and listen to the Queen's Speech. Dennis taught us young ones everything he knew. When, as new and timid MPs, we expressed concern at "voting with the Tories" he would say firmly: "The lobby belongs to everybody."
Some people enter parliament with a reputation as dissenters. Others are forced into dissent by government idiocy. Geraldine Smith, a mild-mannered Labour backbencher, surprised everyone by standing up to ministers over the death of 19 Chinese cockle pickers in her constituency - and thereby rose in everyone's esteem. And who would you rather spend an evening with - Bob Marshall-Andrews or a loyal New Labour sheep? In many ways, New Labour's problem with rebellion is one of its own making.
The less they have involved the party (let alone MPs) in policymaking, the less inclined backbenchers have felt to give each new initiative uncritical support. Furthermore, the Iraq war did not just damage Tony Blair's credibility with voters; it damaged him with his own MPs, who are now less likely to take him on trust. And the more draconian party managers are with dissenters the more they create a class of MPs with nothing left to lose. Threatening people that their career will be over if they ever vote against the Government works up to a point. But it becomes counterproductive once they have actually rebelled. What reason do they then have not to keep on rebelling?
Day by day, Labour MPs become more accustomed to examining each issue on its merits and voting accordingly. And this habit may prove to be more dangerous for the Government than any Leftwing conspiracy.
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