However he is also astute enough to understand that the intelligence gathering, policy formulation phase will soon have to end and that both he and the party will need to outline a creative and compelling vision of what our school system will look like under a future Labour government. More importantly he will need to articulate how as a nation we will seek to meet the needs, ambitions and aspirations of the young people our schools and colleges are meant to serve.

The pragmatic Twigg realises that, rightly or wrongly, one of the most contentious areas for a future Labour government and a future Labour Education Secretary will be how we ensure that state funded schools are accountable to local people. When Labour wins the next election and, as I hope and expect, Stephen is appointed as Education Secretary he will come under significant pressure from various wings of the party to either keep his foot firmly down on the ‘structural reform’ pedal or to apply the handbrake, do a U-turn and find a way of bringing academies and Free Schools back under local authority control. What should he do?

First of all I think it is important that both in opposition and in government he articulates the difference as he sees it between ‘state control’ and ‘state accountability.’ Should local or national governments control and micro-manage what happens in our schools or should the emphasis be back on ‘standards not structures’ on the holding of professionals to account for outcomes not processes? The Left should be mindful that what the past fifty years of school reform shows us is that the road to securing better educational opportunities for all is paved with good intentions but the impact has been minimal. Almost all of the post-war restructuring of the secondary school system in England: grammar schools; city technology colleges; grant maintained schools and even specialist schools mainly benefited the middle classes and not the urban poor. Those on the Right of the party need to be honest and admit that all of this is primarily because the advantaged and educated have always known how to ensure that their children attend the establishments that will help them become advantaged too. In this context Twigg will need to make clear where he and the party stands in relation to academies and Free Schools. In recent years I have been arguing that Labour should seek to accelerate the sponsored academy programme for failing schools when it gets back into government.

I firmly believe – and have seen at first hand – that academies provide the best means by which education can truly make a difference to the life chances of young people regardless of their background. The last Labour government deserves huge credit for making the case for the setting up of so many of the first academies in areas of significant social and economic deprivation. The truth is that for numerous, often working class communities trapped in a cycle of educational failure and under-achievement Labour’s academy programme provided new energy, new purpose and new opportunities for thousands of young people who deserved better. Yet I know that many fellow party members and supporters feel differently and often their concerns relate to what they see as the lack of local ‘control’ or the lack of clarity as to ‘who’ these state funded academies are accountable to. In fairness they have a point; academies do not always succeed and some sponsors do not see why they should be accountable to anyone other than the Secretary of State.

In my view Labour needs to take these genuine concerns seriously and should consider strengthening – via legislation if needs be – the existing role of local authorities (LAs) as children’s’ champions. For example a future Labour government could do this by:

• Making clear that LAs have a crucial role in ensuring that all children have access to high quality educational provision;
• ‘Requiring’ all poorly performing schools in a LA, including academies and Free Schools to produce twice yearly reports for local children and young people scrutiny boards on the progress the school is making in terms of standards of attainment;
• The creation of ‘Independent Local Education Scrutineers’  (ILESs) in each LA who will be tasked with the role of challenging local providers to improve but only if their performance is a cause for concern – either in terms of standards, access or community cohesion. ILESs are likely to be former headteachers or principals and will be appointed by a panel of local elected members, headteachers and academy principals, parents, governors and students for a fixed term (possibly 4  years) and  accountable to local children and young people scrutiny boards. ILESs would be tasked to produce termly reports to the scrutiny board and have regular meetings with regional directors of Ofsted.

‘ILESs’ would be contracted for around 50 days per year and paid a flat daily rate of something in the region of £300 per day in line with other public service appointments. Central government would fund 50% of the costs with LAs funding the other 50% with the option of increasing the number of days if needed or required.

Accountability in all areas of public life is important and there is a real and in my view genuine concern about  the lack of transparency at a local level in relation to academy sponsors , their aims and values and exactly how they are helping to ensure that the young people they serve make rapid, systemic and sustainable improvements.

Stephen Twigg cannot afford to get bogged down in endless debates about school structures or governance arrangements in his first years as Education Secretary. He needs to make clear that what matters ultimately is the impact that state funded schools have on the life chances of the pupils they serve. By all means strengthen local accountability structures but in doing so let us also be clear about what it is we want to hold schools and academies to account for.

Related posts:

1. Free schools aren’t an extension of New Labour’s academies
2. ‘Free schools’ and the future of education
3. ‘Free schools’ and the future of education
4. Replacing schools of the future with ‘free schools’ – where’s the fairness in that?
5. It’s still a Tory schools policy, and it’s still wrong

“We have suspended the start of the selection process of the Falkirk parliamentary seat. Concerns have been raised about membership recruitment which need to be investigated. An officer of the party will carry out an investigation to ensure the integrity of the process.”

Earlier this week it was confirmed that the seat will be an AWS selection, as the local party seeks to find a replacement for Eric Joyce, who is no longer a member of the party, but remains as MP for the seat.

Related posts:

1. Labour Party selections shortened to 8 weeks
2. Labour’s selection process – a word of praise, a word of caution
3. Eric Joyce MP suspended from Labour Party
4. Quickfire selection process for Feltham and Heston revealed
5. The problems with our selection process

When the Labour Party was first founded it was more simple. Then the explicit  aim was to secure working class representation, and specifically organised labour, in Parliament. Inevitably it became more complicated as Labour progressed after 1918 and with the rapid growth of the Labour Party in Parliament. The Parliamentary Leadership rightly recognised that it needed workers by brain as much as hand and a PLP of all the talents to govern as well as represent. However, right up to the 1990s organised Labour maintained a presence in Parliament largely through the ability of Trade Unions to directly nominate delegates to relatively small General Committees.

Fast forward to the modern day and let’s see where we are now. It’s not just the General Secretaries of our biggest Trade Unions who are keen that the Parliamentary Labour Party looks more like its voters – candidates with a healthy mix of working backgrounds who understand the concerns of working class families because they have lived their lives.  A much broader group of members and voters  are concerned that Parliament seems to have become a private club with a fast track for those with parliamentary and family connections. No-one doubts the talent of those in the Shadow Cabinet but there is no-one with the roots and life experience of Alan Johnson anywhere near it.

Perhaps we need to recognise that success in selections has always been about connections as much as class. But what is evident is there is that the process of being selected as a Labour Parliamentary Candidate has become incredibly competitive and punishes talented candidates without those connections. It does seem bizarre that for a party dedicated to planning and social progress we allow a ruthless free market to operate in our selection process.

One of the unintended consequences of greater party democracy is that an increasingly middle class and professional Labour membership often select in their own image. I am currently involved in a parliamentary selection where a brilliant candidate is being criticised by a number of members because he hasn’t got a university degree. Even the formidable Sharon Hodgson only won her home town of Sunderland  by five votes over a external and professional opponent. All women shortlists, for all their merits, have overwhelmingly seen the selection of middle class and professional women.

So what can be done? We could spend a lot of energy discussing what we mean by ‘working class’ and sadly there are more ‘unorganised labour’ than there used to be. But as at the beginning of our Party so now- the trades unions are central to the question of continuing working class representation in Parliament.

Steve Hart of Unite spoke eloquently at a recent Progress Conference on how Unite have recruited an excellent group of members to its Parliamentary Panel including works convenors and factory workers in food processing plants. But the unions have a problem. A large number of professional and well connected members  are using them more like ‘flags of convenience’ in parliamentary contests when frankly they have all the connections they need already. In the old days you had to have been a time served craftsmen before you could apply for the Parliamentary Panel of the AEU. The unions may not want to return to those days but if they really want to get the works convenor and factory worker’ into Parliament they are going to have focus their time and energy onto them and leave the professional politicians to their own devices.

Labour has many issues to contend with to win the next election in 2015. It is perhaps understandably that it may wish to leave the issue of working class representation in Parliament in the pending tray. Just don’t expect to rebuild any trust with those disenfranchised working class communities in a hurry.

Paul Wheeler is the Founder of Political Skills Forum and writes on local politics.

Related posts:

1. There aren’t many working class people like Bob in politics these days
2. We need to avoid appealing to an imaginary radical working class vote
3. Working class candidates need genuine access to the political system – encouragement is not enough
4. We need more working class MPs to get more working class leaders
5. Labour’s working class problem

Even by the pretty shoddy standards of the yellows, this is a corker:

Update: Haringey Lib Dems might want to work on their bar charts  maths too (via Christine Quigley):

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1. A spectacularly dishonest Tory bar chart
2. Is this the most important chart in British politics?
3. Is this Britain’s worst bar chart?
4. Christine Quigley announced as latest London Assembly Labour candidate
5. Brown “absolutely not” accused of bullying; PR stunt “charity” in touch with Tories

That’s what Jon Cruddas – the man who will in all likelihood write Labour’s next manifesto – told the Guardian the party’s policy review is focused on. And it sounds so simple – doesn’t it? Critics will say it’s too simplistic a definition (and they’d be right – I’m cherry picking here), but it’s also a brilliant example of the distance between most politicians and the everyday lives of their constituents. People talk about work and home all of the time, but how often do politicians?

If you ask your friends, your colleagues, your parents, what they want from life – and what matters to them – a few trends are likely to emerge. People will say that they want to spend more time with their families and want somewhere affordable to live that they can call their own. They might say that they want to be paid better at a time when the cost of living is rising and wages are squeezed, or if they aren’t working, they might want help finding secure, permenant work – and if possible, a career not a McJob. They might talk about a safe environment for their children, or worry about why their adult children can’t find work. They might talk about the insecurity of life for older people on low pensions or in social care. Or they might ask why in one of the world’s richest economies, millions will have to wait until they’re 40 before they can buy their own home – if they can ever afford to at all. As Blur said – twenty years ago – modern life is rubbish. It’s still rubbish now, for all too many.

Your friends and colleagues are unlikely to cite either a referendum on Europe or public service reform as what they really desire in life – unless they’re a policy wonk or a complete and utter political anorak.

Work and home are the two places where every single person in Britain spend the vast majority of their lives, but remarkably little time is spent in the rarified atmosphere of Westminster talking about how the quality of those two experiences can be improved. Often politicians of all stripes have preferred to stay out of the workplace for fear of stifling business and out of the home for fear of being accused of nanny-statism. But that simply means that politics has left the battlefield, allowing globalisation, neoliberalism and the other trappings of modern life to trample home-life and work-life in their wake.

A Labour Party that returned to first principles – back to basics if you will – would focus on the reality of modern life. Insecure, exhausting and constrained. My generation, for example, those following in the wake of the baby boomers (and who will have to clean up after them) no longer have jobs for life or the guarantee of a home (social or private) to call our own. Instead, many of those I went to school with are stuck in call centres, or working zero hours contracts in supermarkets. They will struggle to ever have a home of their own. Where is the promise of a safe and secure home and work life for them. We are some way from work-life balance here…

Yet it’s not all doom and gloom. The early whispers from the policy review suggest that “work and home” isn’t just a phrase, it’s the grounding on which Labour’s policy is being built – fair pay through a living wage, a jobs guarantee, significant levels of home building and a refocusing on the role of the family in care.

But if Labour is to offer something to the public in 2015 that truly resonates, work and home will have to be absolutely at the heart of everything we do. No exceptions.

Related posts:

1. Norway’s Progress Party – A “modern conservative party” or the ideological home of Anders Breivik?
2. Blue Labour: Modern life is not rubbish
3. The biggest speech of his life – what does it need to do and can it work?
4. The biggest speech of his life – what does it need to do and can it work?
5. Adapting to the modern world of work

Here’s the Guardian’s take:

Shadow cabinet groups chaired by Ed Miliband

1 The economy: plans for a British investment bank; building a transparent banking system; a new pensions system; energy market reform.

2 Society: a commission on older women; women’s personal safety; empowering local communities; library reform; the housing market; services for young people; children, food and obesity.

Labour national policy forum

Eight policy commissions on:

1 Stability and prosperity; investment and tax avoidance.

2 Work and business policy.

3 Living standards; transport and wellbeing.

4 Stronger, safer communities; housing crisis, private rented sector.

5 Education and children, including childcare.

6 Health and care; delivering integration of health and social care.

7 Reform of the political system.

8 Britain’s global role.

There are separate independent reviews established by the shadow cabinet on industrial policy, infrastructure, long-termism in industry, police reform and apprenticeships.

The paper have also produced a handy precis of where the party is on a range of policy areas.

Related posts:

1. The Policy Review: reviving local government?
2. Jon Cruddas has already revealed Labour’s policy priorities (and the Policy Review timetable) – but no-one noticed
3. The movement IS the policy – why changing the way the party works is bigger than Clause IV
4. David Miliband to chair discussion as part of Labour’s policy review
5. Putting members at the heart of the policy process

UKIP’s rise is unprecedented. They are contesting seats with virtually no money and no resources other than the copious amount of airtime afforded to them by the BBC. Their message knows no class boundaries. They are as strong in the shires are as they are in the inner cities. By April 2015 Nigel Farage may well have a case for why he deserves more of a place in the Leader’s debates than Nick Clegg (so I suppose every cloud has a silver lining and all that!).

For Labour, questions are being raised as to how we beat them. A consensus seems to be emerging that Labour will only win the next General Election if over the course of the next year we present a plethora of policies to the electorate.

Of course fully costed policies are the lifeblood of any party with serious aspirations for Government, but they are not the foundations. Before anyone bothers to begin reading up on the minutia of our education, welfare or immigration policies, they want to know who we are standing up for and what our values are. I don’t think this can be underestimated on the doorstep.

As I see it, we are currently living in deeply political times. Despite disappointing turnout figures and the usual print press rhetoric, more people than ever are actively engaging in the political process. The rise of cyber democracy through direct routes such as epetitions and the growth in on-line political debate has resulted in more people than ever being made aware of the latest news from Westminster as it is downloaded straight to their iPhone App or splashed across twitter.

The key for Labour in the next few months is not necessarily the detailed formulation of all our policies for 2015, but more broadly, what we stand for and the way in which we communicate it to the electorate. The right wing bias inherent within our press means that we will never be given a fair crack of the whip in outlining policy ideas, but declining circulation figures present us with the opportunity to counter this tabloidisation using modern media techniques to present Labour values and ideas in much the same way that the Obama campaigns of 2008 and 2012 demonstrated.

Take the industry that I know well for instance; construction. White van drivers across this country have become increasingly disillusioned with the Labour Party. We’ve all heard the complaints a thousand times, “The problem is Steve, these immigrant workers are coming over here and nicking all our jobs. They are willing to work longer hours for less money so construction site bosses give them the work and I’m the one losing out. What you going to do about it”?

It’s a fair point. In my constituency of Walton, the construction sector is one of the biggest employers. Hence, due to the economic downturn, we are contending with a dole queue that is 5,124 people deep.

More often than not, I ask the laid off construction worker what he thinks the answer is. “Get rid of the immigrants so I can go back to work” he invariably replies.  Some believe we should pull up the draw bridge, leave the European Union and put every Eastern European migrant on the next flight back to Warsaw and Kiev.

Really? Are the immigrants the ones who are causing all of the problems? Well, Nigel et al would argue that they are. Immigrants, in an anti-immigrant Britain, are not the most powerful individuals. By extension they don’t have much in the way of an effective political voice. “Hard luck” you might say. Short sighted I’d say.

Ed Miliband is right to view this problem as top down rather than bottom up. Immigrants cannot be blamed for their own exploitation. If any construction worker honestly believes that if every Eastern European immigrant left the country tomorrow that they would go back to work, earning a good wage with holiday pay and sick pay, then I have one word for you…blacklisting.

Long before (to paraphrase); “the last Labour Government just opened the doors to the Poles and Lithuanians”, construction site bosses were blacklisting British workers for whistleblowing on health and safety issues. Simply by pointing out that someone could be killed on an unsafe scaffold may well have resulted in a person being blacklisted.

We have to listen to the concerns of British workers in the way that Farage does and then communicate our message in a manner which is accessible and understandable to ordinary people. Bur first we have to win the argument that we are the only party in British politics that can both identify the real problems they face and effectively solve it in the best interest of the disillusioned voters.

Once we do that we might have a chance to change the terms of the debate in a way that party’s ready for Government so often manage to do. We can expose the fact that UKIP will never be able to change the welfare system, because they will never control the department for work and pensions. UKIP will never be able to change our relationship with the European Union because they will never control the foreign office. And UKIP will never address climate change, because they don’t believe in it. Whatever off-the–shelf policies they eventually buy to plug the gaps in other key areas, they will never get the chance to implement them – and that is why they are so dangerous but also so beatable.

My advice to party members and activists is don’t be afraid on the doorstep. Be bullish, be frank and be honest. That doesn’t mean being permanently apologetic either, by the way.

In May 2010 the Labour Party didn’t stop being the party that believed in solidarity over selfishness. We didn’t stop being the party that puts the needs of the many ahead of the few. And we didn’t stop being the party of compassion and ambition. No Labour Party member or activist needs a policy document or Shadow Cabinet Minister to tell them that. Social justice is in our DNA.

The truth is, the party needs to be more frank and in doing so, we will galvanise our membership and earn the respect and the trust of the British people.

Let’s start with this; in the last thirty years, Britain has never elected a one term Government. It has become the norm in Britain to elect Governments for generations. That in part has been a result of the total collapse of the ousted Government post-election defeat. But it has also been a result of the British people giving parties the benefit of the doubt and a second chance to get things right.

So in essence, what Ed Miliband’s Labour Party is attempting to do is to condense an average of 15 years worth of work, into the space of just five. That’s tough. But it is a testament to Ed that in the space of just three years, the official Opposition is in the strongest position of any political party who has suffered at the ballot box in its first term out of Government.

So there is plenty of reason for Labour members to be optimistic. Yes we need to flesh out the meat on the bone and members are right to suggest that now is the time to do it. We know the issues that matter most so we need to organise in a way that we can spread Labour’s message about fairness, solidarity, compassion and ambition working as one.

If we stand up for the party then we will change the terms of the debate, convince the British people and be ready to govern again. If members have the stomach for the fight than we will inspire Britain again and just like historical flashes in the political pan like the SDP, UKIP will be gone forever.

Related posts:

1. UKIP’s Godfrey Bloom MEP “I share a glass of wine a few times a year with Marine le Pen”
2. A ray of hope in turbulent times
3. On Workers’ Memorial Day we remember the dead, but campaign to protect the living
4. The Sunday Times on the EU
5. It’s a good deal, but there’s more to do

“People will be shocked by the evidence that Google is going to extraordinary lengths to avoid paying their fair share of tax. It comes on top of other firms apparently engaging in similar practices. It is evidence of a culture of corporate irresponsibility among certain firms which is totally unacceptable. And of course we have now seen allegations about petrol fixing as well.”

“It comes at a time when ordinary families are seeing services cut, their taxes rising and so many businesses are struggling to make ends meet and are actually doing the right thing and paying their fair share of taxes. As so often under this Government, I think it is evidence of one rule for those at the top and another rule for everyone else. David Cameron says we have to just wait for international action. He is wrong.”

Incidentally, Google Chief Exec Eric Schmidt sits on Cameron’s “Business Advisory Group” – even though he has said that he’s “proud” of Google’s tax avoidance schemes…

Related posts:

1. Cameron “totally unable to cope with dissenting voices” says ex-adviser
2. Lib Dems are talking tough on tax avoidance – we’ve heard it all before
3. On tax avoidance, and morality…
4. Google should face UK inquiry over Street View data breaches
5. Ideas for electability: A hard-line on tax avoidance and evasion

The first is that the Tories are still hopelessly divided on Europe. Plus ça change.

The second is that Labour’s refusal to match the Tory referendum pledge leaves the party framed as the enemy of choice, refusing to give the public its say.

The third is that a week is a long time in politics and people will forget the messy parliamentary to and fro of the past few days but remember that the Tories are pledged to hold that referendum. And that Labour isn’t.

This is madness. Ed Miliband’s critique of managerial politics and its bureaucratic, top-down remoteness has always been spot on. Yet I can’t think of an issue where the governed and the governing are further apart than on Europe.

And it’s not just our membership of the EU. In voters’ minds, the reason we have so much immigration is because of the EU’s free movement of people. And any number of other grievances, real, exaggerated and imagined – are also attributed to Europe. It is a lightning rod for the malaise at the heart of British political life.

It’s no use railing against these misconceptions. The pro-European cause has failed mightily. It has always been an elite movement that has never managed to popularise – or even normalise – Britain’s membership of the EU. The referendum is a chance to draw that poison.

‘Ah’, goes the theory, ‘why invade on private grief? Keep well clear and let the Tories rip themselves to pieces’. Labour can sit back, look like a responsible party of government and toady up to all those business leaders who are horrified at the prospect of us inching towards the EU’s exit door. Ed will look like the statesman against Cameron’s desperate political hack.

This is wishful thinking. What will happen is that the Tories’ referendum pledge will reclaim ground lost to UKIP. Rather than looking prime ministerial, Ed will be left looking belligerent and elitist – every inch the product of our managerial political class. Europe and immigration will dominate next year’s European elections and possibly the 2015 general election as well. Labour will be flummoxed as its candidates try to explain why giving the public a say is such a bad idea.

And make no mistake, Cameron will get his renegotiation in due course. If EU leaders will bust a gut to save economically peripheral countries like Ireland, Portugal, Greece and Cyprus, then they will not countenance the UK – the second largest economy in the EU – walking away. Cameron will get enough concessions to sell to the electorate.

He can then plausibly head a ‘yes’ campaign on the terms of his successful renegotiation. All those business leaders who are today telling Ed Miliband what a dreadful mistake this referendum pledge is will in due course flock behind Cameron.

Labour will have taken the hit for denying the public a say – for the best of intentions in trying to preserve our EU membership – only for Cameron to sweep in and steal our thunder. The party’s current position makes no strategic sense either viewed as high principle or as low politics.

Will it really take a hammering in next year’s European elections for us to realise that?

Related posts:

1. Who are Labour for a Referendum?
2. Balls says Labour would be “pretty stupid” to rule out an EU referendum
3. This is Labour’s chance to offer a real referendum and kill off Euroscepticism
4. What’s Labour’s answer to the Tories’ likely election – renegotiate – referendum on the EU approach?
5. Labour Europhiles should support a referendum on the EU

“Instead of talking about the things that most people care about, we talked about what we cared about most. While parents worried about childcare, getting the kids to school, balancing work and family life – we were banging on about Europe.” - David Cameron, Conservative Party Conference, 1 October 2006

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1. Miliband attacks Cameron’s Europe speech
2. The words that will come back to haunt David Cameron
3. Cameron is wrong on Europe
4. Bland words from Cameron, King of Vague
5. More opprobrium for Cameron on Europe