Easily done…
Despite Burnham promising to respond to Blair tomorrow he has spoken to the Observer on the campaign trail about the former PM’s criticisms:
- On inequality: “He doesn’t mention inequality once. If you don’t get how that’s driving politics now, if you are not rooting your analysis in the fact that people are unable to live and that things that were taken for granted are no longer affordable, then you are not understanding what’s going on.”
- On neoliberalism and the centre: Blair “criticises my phrase about 40 years of neoliberalism but the last 40 years has given us wide inequality – that’s what’s responsible for the abandonment of the centre. People don’t think the centre has delivered for them in terms of their lives, therefore they’ve gone further to the extremes.”
- On the private sector and public services: “Tony seems to argue that the private sector has all-encompassing reach into everything, and when it comes to essential services the evidence is pretty clear it isn’t the fix.”
- On the market as the answer: “Blairism sometimes saw the market as always the answer. That’s its problem.”
- On universities: “The prioritisation of universities is a significant part of the problem that has left out too many people and has impacted on the welfare system.”
Hotting up…
A key ally of Sue Gray is doing communications work for Team Burnham. Takeover…
After Ed Miliband seconded his SpAd Grace Pritchard to join the Burnham comms team, Guido can reveal that key Sue Gray ally Donjeta Miftari is also spinning for Andy. This comes after suspicions raised by Guido were confirmed that Gray has a role advising Burnham…
Miftari, who worked for Sue, was brought into No10 as a foreign policy SpAd, but left after three months – much like the doomed Chief of Staff. She took up a role at Hanbury Strategy, from which Guido hears she is now taking unpaid leave to spin for Burnham. This means staff from camps Miliband and Gray are running the Burnham operation. Gulp…
Junior doctors will strike again in June from the 15th to the 19th – their 16th round of industrial action – after the BMA rejected a pay deal following talks with new Health Secretary James Murray. The rejected offer would have left doctors 35% better off than four years ago, with the most senior juniors on a basic salary of £77,348 and average total earnings exceeding £100,000 once additional hours were included…
The government had also offered 4,000 new specialist training places, with the first 1,000 due in August at a cost of £18.5 million. Government officials say this expansion will now be scrapped because there isn’t enough time or money to deliver it…
Nigel Farage has written a public letter to the Charity Commission over allegations that political campaign group Hope Not Hate is canvassing for Labour in Makerfield. Farage claims the group is sending leaflets backing Andy Burnham across the constituency, with “a call to join the local fightback against Reform”. Guido has covered HnH’s deep ties to Labour for some time…
Farage argues the leaflet breaches “regulatory obligations indirectly by allowing charitable grants to be utilised by the associated private company for non-charitable purposes“. Read the full letter below…
“There are numerous reports of Hope Not Hate sending leaflets to addresses within the Makerfield constituency ahead of the Parliamentary by-election on 18 June.¹ The leaflet allegedly endorses Andy Burnham, Labour’s candidate, and attempts to influence voters’ decisions. The tone and content of the leaflet is clearly directed towards persuading the reader to vote for a particular candidate, and the text in the footer, “To join the local fightback against Reform, please scan the QR code”, is party political.
The letter states that it is promoted by Nick Lowles on behalf of HOPE Not Hate Limited (HnH Ltd.), a private company with links to HOPE Unlimited Charitable Trust (HUCT), a charitable company registered with the Charity Commission under Charity number: 1013880.² HnH Ltd. is a registered third party campaign organisation.³ The Charity Commission took regulatory action in January over connected activities between HUCT and HnH Ltd.⁴
In the Charity Commission guidance for Charities on Elections and Referendums, in the section entitled ‘Publicity’, it states:“In any publicity material generated (including via print, media interviews, social media and websites) a charity may promote its views on issues which relate to its purposes and activities. However, the charity must steer clear of explicitly comparing its views (favourably or otherwise) with those of the political parties or candidates taking part in the election.
(…) The charity must not encourage support for any particular parties or candidates.”In the Charity Commission’s guidance document ‘Campaigning and Political Activity Guidance for Charities’ (CC9), it states that: Continue reading “Farage Reports Hope Not Hate to Charity Watchdog Over ‘Pro-Labour Leaflets’”
Burnham passionately defended Blair’s government in an address to the Cambridge Union in 2015. Not making those noises any more, is he…
Tony Blair has smarted at Burnham’s recent declaration that the North has been blighted by “40 years of neoliberalism” and has made criticisms of Burnham’s current platform in his push for the Labour leadership. The soon-to-be-mayor was making different noises in 2015:
“Britain was a divided place where the authorities held all the power. The 1980s was a decade when working-class culture and communities – football supporters, trade unionists – were demonised by parts of the press and the Conservative Party. That was the Britain that New Labour inherited, and it was to change that Britain that I went into politics… It was a Britain where the single biggest influence on your treatment and your life chances was the postcode of the bed you were born in.
Because when Labour came to government in May 1997, public sector debt as a share of GDP was 42.5%, and when we got to 2007, before the crash, it was 36.2%… But think of the other things: the national minimum wage, the trebling of overseas aid, the first ever Climate Change Act. We did so many things to change this country for the better.
In conclusion, I’ve never argued we got everything right. I thought at times we didn’t do enough to make Britain more equal – that we didn’t speak enough about the 50% of young people who weren’t going to university. But the question before you tonight is not whether the Blair and Brown governments got everything right. It is whether they ruined Britain. And I will put it to you that the Britain of 2010 was a better place than the Britain of my youth: fairer, less divided, more open-minded. Or, in the words of David Cameron on the steps of 10 Downing Street in May 2010 – and I quote – ‘compared with a decade ago, this country is more open at home and more compassionate abroad.’
But the clinching piece of evidence is not in anything that I’ve said tonight. It’s not in anything that I’ve said. The clinching piece of evidence is here, in the Conservative Party manifesto of 2010 – that kept those increases to the overseas budget, that kept the national minimum wage, that kept the benefits that cut pensioner poverty, that kept the investment in the National Health Service. That is the manifesto that Cameron and Osborne stood on in 2010, because they accepted that New Labour had changed Britain for the better – that they couldn’t undo the good things that had been done. That is the evidence that you need to think about tonight, that shows everything you’ve heard from those seats opposite is empty rhetoric. New Labour changed Britain for the better, and this is the proof of it.”
Doesn’t sound much like the pernicious ‘neoliberalism’ described by Burnham now…
The Makerfield candidate says he will set out a response to Blair tomorrow as it should be a “considered” one. You would hope so…
Batting away critical points from Nick Robinson on the Today Programme, Tony Blair said:
“I always used to say the greatest source of election-losing advice was the Guardian.”
