A Journey_ My Political Life Part 34

Which brings me back to Afghanistan, though I would make the same point about Iraq. What is happening in Afghanistan is really very simple: our enemies think they can outlast us. Our enemies aren't alone in thinking that. Our friends do, too. Therefore the ordinary folk think: I should make my peace with those who are staying, not those who are going. Now it is of course sensible, as we are doing, to envisage a timetable for departure and for transferring responsibility into Afghan hands; but it should derive from a position of strength and from an Afghan capacity that is real.

And our people say, 'How long are you seriously saying we should hold out?' If, in the 1950s, when faced with the threat of revolutionary Communism, I had asked you how long you expected us to fight it, you would have answered: As long as the threat exists. If I had said it may be for decades, you would have raised an eyebrow, as if to say: Well, if the threat remains for decades, what choice have we? In other words, you would have seen this as a clearly defined threat to our security that left us no alternative but to take it on and beat it. Of course, there were those who said 'Better red than dead', but that was surely one of the least appealing slogans to the human spirit ever devised, and only a minority bought it. Most people realised the threat was real and had to be confronted, however long it took.

The difficulty with this present battle lies in defining what 'it' is. After September 11 the phrase 'the war on terror' was used. People distrusted this, partly for its directness, partly because it seemed too limited. So we dropped it. Yet if what we are fighting is not a war, what is it?

The threat is obvious enough: weapons of ma.s.s destruction in the hands of those who would wage ma.s.s destruction. If they could get a dirty nuclear device, they would use it. But the threat is more than this. The movement also has the capacity to destabilise governments and take over countries, some of which are immensely important to our security and strategic interests, not simply in a selfish sense but to those of the global community. That's why Iran matters. Iran with a nuclear bomb would mean others in the region acquiring the same capability; it would dramatically alter the balance of power in the region, but also within Islam. Then there is the actual war in Afghanistan.

However, the threat is more than that, too. Like revolutionary Communism, it is an extremist movement, not just a series of extreme acts. It doesn't begin on the battlefield, it begins in the school. It starts not with talk of military weapons, but with talk of religion. You have to take on the clerics who foment the extremism, not just the people who engage actively in terrorism; and empower those clerics who will stand up for what is right. The ideology is not born of a desire for military domination; it is born of a world view based on belief in G.o.d's will. Not only its narrative but also its ideology has to be systematically dismantled, just as it has been systematically constructed.

We need to link what happens as the latest car bomb detonates in Kabul or Baghdad to what is taught in the madrasas of Pakistan, or about the rights of women in Yemen. We need a religious counter-attack, not just a political or military one. Iraq is just one part of this picture, as is Afghanistan; and so are the deaths in the Philippines, Bombay, Kashmir, Chechnya and Karachi anywhere this ideology has a connection, however remote.

So the answer to the question 'How long should we hold out?' is: 'As long as is necessary to defeat the extremism.' Sometimes it will mean fighting. Sometimes it will mean preaching. Sometimes as with the Israel/Palestine question (not the cause of the extremism but a powerful tool in the hands of extremists) it will mean peacemaking. But at every level, in every respect, in each and every one of its locations, among different peoples and political contexts, it has to be confronted and beaten.

We need to mobilise and support the modernising forces within Islam, those who embrace peaceful coexistence. But most of all, they need us to be strong, to show determination, to show this is a fight in which we have our heart and soul. What they fear, much more than us being overbearing, is us being weak.

We need the suasion in argument of an Obama (or Clinton) and the simplicity in approach of a Bush (or Reagan). We need an intellectual case, brilliantly marshalled, combined with a hard-headed ability to confront. Now is the time to do it. From the years since September 11 we have learned we haven't beaten the threat, and we can't beat it fast. It still threatens us. The question is: have we learned that we have no choice but to beat it and so the only issue is how?

In doing this, we should renew confidence in our way of life and the values it represents. This is no more a simple issue about our national security than the battle against Communism or fascism was. In those battles, we knew what we were fighting for: not just our nations' freedom but the freedom of humanity, the idea that tyranny and extremism are the enemies of the human race, not of individual countries. In conducting those battles, we were inspired by more than a desire to win: but also by belief, by a pa.s.sion originating in the interests of progress, to consign the forces of darkness back into the darkness in which they belong.

We need some of that inspiration and pa.s.sion now. When we read of car bombs driven into crowded streets, in whatever part of the world, our response should not be one of resignation or despair, but of outrage, indignation and, above all, resolve.

In this, America and Europe should stand together. Together we should take it on; together we should reach out and persuade the new powers to join us. There is no challenge facing the world today that would be met more easily if the US and the European Union stood apart. Not the challenge of the economy, and certainly not the security threat. Of course the geopolitical power structure is changing. China, India, Brazil, Russia and, in time, Indonesia, Mexico and others demand, rightly, to be treated as equals and partners. But, to state the obvious, they do not all share the same interests or views. Alliances in each case will be different, but none of those alliances will work better with Europe and America at odds. None of the opportunities will be easier to grasp; none of the challenges easier to handle.

I find the insouciance towards the decline of the transatlantic relations.h.i.+p, on both sides of the water, a little shocking. There's a feeling that it belongs to an era that has pa.s.sed. This is to misunderstand the way the world is changing; or perhaps better put it is to look at the issue upside down.

It is said: new powers are emerging, therefore we should seek deeper relations.h.i.+ps with them and there is less need for the old relations.h.i.+p. Yet it is precisely because the relative power of Europe and America is changing as new powers come on the stage that it is sensible for the two to combine. Just as the European Union is necessary to increase the power of the individual nations, so the US and the European Union should work together.

Possibly we have not yet internalised the true significance of China's rise (or indeed that of India). I now travel to China frequently. There are many riddles to be solved about how it will be in the future, and even those most intimately connected with the decisions live in a state of uncertainty, but some things we do know: the country is opening up at an extraordinary rate. Its economic and political power, already vast, is only a fraction of what it will be. Its people are smart, determined and fiercely proud of their nation. The varieties of ethnic and racial groupings, the diversity in different parts of the country, the almost unimaginable scale of the challenge of development all of these things are understood, though their full consequences are still tricky to divine. But the will to overcome the challenges, the desire never again to let China slip into unfathomable obscurity, are sentiments that define the character of the country and its leaders.h.i.+p.

We need to offer China the partners.h.i.+p that it is in both our interests to have. And strong partners are always better than weak. A divided West, competing for favours with the new powers, is sensible for no one.

For Europe, the starkness of the choice and the challenge is greatest. After all the debate over the Lisbon Treaty, it now has to make some very straightforward decisions. These are not about more process, which Europe loves to debate endlessly. They are about policy direction. If Europe wants to be strong, capable of partnering the US, China and others, and also attractive as a partner, it has to focus on certain fundamental decisions.

First, it should make full use of the economic crisis to redefine its social model, coordinate fiscal and monetary policy, liberalise the single market and therefore get the benefits of European cohesion. It should match the budget to the priorities, not fit the priorities to the budget.

Second, it should create a genuine European defence policy which concentrates on combat capability. Europe needs to be able to field significant numbers of troops, plus logistical and technological backup, with the will, the desire and the ability to engage in fighting the new type of insurgency and terror campaigns. This requires not only organisation and cooperation, but also a debate within our societies about how we approach the military engagement, and in particular the casualties we will inevitably face if we engage. There is no place for this other than with the men and women prepared for the risks and willing to undertake them, who need to be rewarded accordingly.

Third, Europe would gain enormously, economically and in terms of leaders.h.i.+p, by adopting a common energy policy. A unified grid is not a physical impossibility, and the savings would be huge. The differences in policy over nuclear power, for example, can be overcome by accepting there will be such differences, but there will be many areas of cooperation. It would reduce costs to business and consumers dramatically.

Fourth, Europe has common borders and faces a common menace in illegal immigration and organised crime. This is not just about Schengen rules concerning asylum and immigration. It is about practical legislative and policing cooperation. Most of all, it is about an agreed approach: that we remain open societies free of racism but determined to impose rules and order on a system that otherwise, by its disorderly system for deciding and enforcing who comes in, fuels xenophobia.

Fifth, Europe has universities that used to be global leaders. The number of European universities in the top fifty or hundred today is an extraordinary rebuke to our capacity to modernise. Each nation will want to decide its own policy; but Europe could benefit greatly by agreeing certain key principles for reform, research and collaboration, at least among the elite group, and using such agreement to build the intellectual capital Europe needs to compete. Successful economies today depend on successful entrepreneurial inst.i.tutions of higher education. Go to California and you will see how and why Silicon Valley came into being.

These are just five policy directions, but think how much difference they would make to Europe, not just to its economy but to its standing, its self-belief, its confidence about the future. It needs to stop thinking like a small country and start acting like a big one. This is not a point about big and small European states actually, in today's Europe, all states are small compared to the emerging powers. That's why we need Europe to get bigger and stronger, and therefore more able to exert influence and shape events. This isn't an a.n.a.lysis born of a complex lesson of politics; it is a clear-cut, unvarnished lesson, self-evident since the first committee meeting of Neanderthals in a cave. Those with the power, count. Those without it, don't. But the stupidest thing is to have it but not know you do; or to be able to get it yet to be too timid to make the effort.

Where does the UK sit in all this? I don't want to repeat what I learned from 19972007. Let me concentrate on 200710. First, why did Labour lose the 2010 election?

The answer to that, I'm afraid, is obvious. Labour won when it was New Labour. It lost because it stopped being New Labour. This is not about Gordon Brown as an individual. It is true he is unsuited to the modern type of political scrutiny in which characters are minutely dissected. He was never comfortable as the 'normal bloke' sort of politician. As I say elsewhere, he didn't need to be. He had strengths: he was regarded as hard-working, with his heart in the right place, intelligent, and definitely committed to the country.

Had he pursued New Labour policy, the personal issue would still have made victory tough, but it wouldn't have been impossible. Departing from New Labour made it so. Just as the 2005 election was one we were never going to lose, 2010 was one we were never going to win once the fateful strategic decision was taken to abandon the New Labour position.

At this point, some will be scratching their heads. Did we abandon New Labour? Wasn't Gordon in the New Labour camp, especially after Peter Mandelson came back? The answers are yes and no. And here's why.

The economic crisis, strangely enough, was an opportunity. At first, we took it. It was here Gordon acted at his best, intellectually rigorous, totally driven, sure in his touch. The plan for the banks was right.

But then he decided that a paradigm s.h.i.+ft had occurred. He bought completely the so-called Keynesian 'state is back in fas.h.i.+on' thesis that appeared dominant. Alistair Darling was an excellent Chancellor but (I would hazard a guess) he was not given the chance to implement policy in the way he wanted. The top rate of tax was put up to 50 per cent; the 2009 Budget signalled a return to tax and spend; in 2010 the hike in National Insurance was the route taken to tackle the deficit; and the decision was made to fight on the grounds of cuts versus investment. Elsewhere the academies programme was watered down and the thrust of public service reform weakened. Crime and antisocial behaviour were downplayed until too late. ID cards actually the only answer to the immigration issue were scaled back.

What should we have done? As I suggested in my a.n.a.lysis of the economy earlier, in my view we should have taken a New Labour way out of the economic crisis: kept direct tax rates compet.i.tive, had a gradual rise in VAT and other indirect taxes to close the deficit, and used the crisis to push further and faster on reform.

I believe such a programme is economically right. Its politics are also crystal clear. What happened in 2010 was that we broke up our coalition. We had done enough over thirteen years to avoid a wipeout. In certain areas support solidified, but the core middle ground which brought us the seats in Hove, Hastings, Crawley and Dorset deserted. They weren't at all sure of the Tories, as a matter of fact, but they were sure of us: we had become the old Labour Party. Funnily enough, the commentariat didn't always see it like that (the media became obsessed with the debates on TV), and from the news coverage you might think tax and spending weren't huge issues. But underneath, with the public, they were definitive. The voters knew that whoever was elected was going to take tough measures. The taxpayers, the aspiring people, the ones who agree with Labour on social compa.s.sion, but who need us to be sensitive to their desire to spend their own money, thought the Tories would go easier on them.

Tellingly, we lost business. This was crucial. When the Tories brought out thirty or so chief executives who were against the National Insurance rise, I knew the game was up. Some commentators waited for Labour to reply with their own group. I phoned Peter and asked if we had any. 'No,' he said, 'they won't come out for us.' The important thing politically is this. Labour's case in 2010 was that the Tories would put the recovery at risk. If thirty chief executives, employing thousands of people in companies worth billions of pounds, say it's Labour that will put the economy at risk, who does the voter believe? Answer: the chief executives. Once you lose them, you lose more than a few votes. You lose your economic credibility. And a sprinkling of academic economists, however distinguished, won't make up the difference.

What the public ended up doing, in that remarkable way they have, is electing the government they wanted. They were unsure of the Tories, so they put a strong Lib Dem showing alongside and urged them to get together. They elected what they want to be a Tory version of a centrist government (whether they get that is another matter!). There's been lots of speculation about the possibility that there could have been a Labour-Lib Dem coalition. In my view, it was never on. The people would have revolted; the votes weren't there. The truth is that, on any objective basis, seven points adrift of the Tories, we were hammered. The fear of a meltdown, unrealised, made the heavy defeat seem a reprieve. But it only means we live to fight another day.

The danger for Labour now is that we drift off, or even move decisively off, to the left. If we do, we will lose even bigger next time. We have to buck the historical trend and face up to the reasons for defeat squarely and honestly.

Of course, you can point to the fatigue after thirteen years, the loss of trust over Iraq, the wear and tear that comes with power, but none of those things is determinative. We won in 2005 after Iraq, and the public were hardly likely to elect Labour under the prime minister who took the country into war, then wait five years to take it out on the person who didn't. The Tories' 1992 victory shows it is possible for a party to win again despite thirteen years in power. It could have been done. The 2010 election was our equivalent of 1992, not 1997.

If Labour wants to come back, it has to realise just how quickly defeat has altered the political landscape. It means the Tories get to clear up the economic deficit and define its nature, and can do so while pointing the finger of blame at the previous government.

If Labour simply defaults to a 'Tory cutters, Lib Dem collaborators' mantra, it may well benefit in the short term; however, it will lose any possibility of being chosen as an alternative government. Instead, it has to stand up for its record in the many areas it can do so, but also explain where the criticism of the thirteen years is valid. It should criticise the composition but not the thrust of the Tory deficit reductions. This is incredibly difficult. Of course, the key factor in our economy, as elsewhere, is the global economic crisis and all nations are having to cut back and adjust. However, we should also accept that from 2005 onwards Labour was insufficiently vigorous in limiting or eliminating the potential structural deficit. The failure to embrace the Fundamental Savings Review of 20056 was, in retrospect, a much bigger error than I ever thought at the time. An a.n.a.lysis of the pros and cons of putting so much into tax credits is essential. All of this only has to be stated to seem unconscionably hard. Yet unless we do this, we cannot get the correct a.n.a.lysis of what we did right, what we did wrong, and where we go now.

Attacking the nature of the Tory-Lib Dem changes to public spending requires greater intellectual depth and determination, and each detail has to be carefully considered. So, for example, if we attack as we should the cuts to school investment, we have to be prepared to say where we would also make more radical savings than the new government. But it is better than mounting a general attack on macro policy 'putting the recovery at risk' and ending up betting the shop that the recovery fails to materialise. It is correct that the withdrawal of the stimulus in each country's case is a delicate question of judgement, but if you study the figures for government projections in the UK, by the end of 2014 public spending will still be 42 per cent of GDP.

Such an approach is the reverse of what is easy for Oppositions, who get dragged almost unconsciously, almost unwillingly, into wholesale opposition. It's where the short-term market in votes is. It is where the party feels most comfortable. It's what gets the biggest cheer. The trouble is, it also chains the Opposition to positions that in the longer term look irresponsible, short-sighted or just plain wrong.

The real challenge for the coalition will be simple: the Tories and Lib Dems don't really agree. In many areas of domestic policy, the Tories will be at their best when they are allowed to get on with it as with reforms in education. They will be at their worst when policy represents an uneasy compromise between the Old Labour instincts of the Lib Dems and the hard decisions the Tories will instinctively want to take; or where, as with the Tory and Lib Dem insistence on being the 'civil liberties' proponents, they end up failing to meet genuine and legitimate public concerns about security.

On the other hand, they have a common interest in stability. The Lib Dems desperately desire the game-changer: electoral reform. And there are areas such as Europe where the Lib Dems will have a healthy effect on the Tories.

The Tories are the only party with options: they can work with the Lib Dems, in which case, fine; or they can cut them loose and seek a mandate on the basis that they are governing OK but could do better without the ball and chain. The Lib Dems have to cling on, or the coalition will be seen as a historic mistake.

Labour has no option but to be credible in its own right. That means, as I say, having a coherent position on the deficit. It means remaining flexible enough to attack the government from left and from right. It means being ready at any time to a.s.sume the mantle of government. It has to be permanently in contention.

Where the Tories will be vulnerable is where they always are vulnerable: their policies will be skewed towards those at the top, fas.h.i.+oned too much by the preoccupations of the elite (which is why they despised action on antisocial behaviour) and too conservative, particularly in foreign policy.

Labour should also focus attention on renewing the party, and it has to do this in a genuinely radical and modern way. I wish I had had the time to devote to this when prime minister, but the prime minister never does. We should use this period of Opposition to restructure members.h.i.+p, methods of selection, and policymaking. We should resist any notion of letting the now heavily amalgamated and concentrated trade unions get back any dominance in policy. We should link up with other modernising progressives across Europe and beyond, where at present our representation in government is pretty limited.

From this it can be seen that I still favour the third-way progressive politics, still believe it represents the best chance, not just for the centre left but for the country; and indeed not just for the UK but for others too.

Many people on the progressive wing of politics, however, will read the a.n.a.lysis of the financial crisis and the security threat and say: But there are those on the right who can agree with that, so what's progressive about it?

The answer to that question is vital, decisive even of the fate of progressive politics. First, what makes you a progressive? I would say: belief in social justice, i.e. using the power of society as a whole to bring opportunity, prosperity and hope to those without it; to do so not just within our national boundaries but outside of them; to judge our societies by the condition of the weak as much as the strong; to stand up at all times for the principle that all human beings are of equal worth, irrespective of race, religion, gender (I would add of s.e.xuality) or ability; and never to forget and always to strive for those at the bottom, the poorest, the most disadvantaged, the ones others forget.

Notice these are all values, not policies. They may beget policies. Hence the trebling of aid to Africa and the cancellation of debt during my time as prime minister (an example of great cooperation between myself and Gordon, rightly celebrated for his part in it). Or the investment in health, education and inner cities. Or better maternity rights. Or civil partners.h.i.+ps. Or the minimum wage. Or the winter allowance for pensioners. But we are defined by values that are static, immoveable, not subject to the ravages of time; rather than by policies which necessarily are ravaged and altered.

Second, it is true there are people on the right who might share some or all of these values and some of the policies. Today's Tories are committed to aid and development, and as a party, not simply as individual ministers. George Bush doubled the HIV/Aids programme of the US. It is also true that some programmes cross left and right. The Obama administration continues the Bush commitment to charter schools; David Cameron's government continues my commitment to academies. Sarkozy has socialist ministers in a UMP government. In other words, the policy s.p.a.ce is now as much shared as in single occupation.

The point is: that's the way it is! And it's not a bad thing in fact it's rather good, and the public, by the way, understood this ages ago. Defining where you stand by reference to the opposite of where the other person stands is not just childish, it is completely out of touch with where politics is today. Progressives should not fret about or feel threatened by such cohabitation. They should be entirely comfortable with it because, in being at ease, they have more chance to lead it.

In fact, the real risk right or left is that at the very moment when the public has lost its enthusiasm for traditional political divisions, the parties and their activists become more obsessed with them. The result will be a dangerous incongruence between 'normal' people and 'abnormal' political militants, which will only increase public disaffection with politics.

The differences of course between Tories and Labour or Republicans and Democrats may be great, and actually the financial crisis has, to an extent, brought them back in vogue (though I suspect the fas.h.i.+on is more dominant among politicians than people). The point is that these differences aren't necessary for progressive politics to remain progressive. And even where policies are in the same s.p.a.ce, progressives will often slant them towards the poorest, whereas conservatives will not. You don't lose your ident.i.ty as a progressive simply because you share s.p.a.ce with conservatives. It is the new world, and we should get used to it.

The genius of Barack Obama was precisely that he reached out and over the partisan divisions. He did so explicitly. The desire of some of his present-day critics to drag him back from the centre is absurd. The espousal of centrist politics is not a betrayal. It was what he promised.

Third, there is a new divide in politics which transcends traditional left and right. It is what I call 'open vs closed'. Some right-wingers are free-traders, others aren't. Likewise with the left. On both sides, some are pro-immigration, others anti-. Some favour an interventionist foreign policy; others don't. Some see globalisation and the emergence of China, India and others as a threat; some as an opportunity. There is a common link to the free trade, pro-immigration (controlled, of course), interventionist and pro-globalisation political positions, but it is 'open vs closed', not 'left vs right'. I believe progressives should be the champions of the open position, which is not only correct but also a winning position, as Bill Clinton showed conclusively. However, it is a huge and important dividing line in modern politics.

Fourth and tactically hardest of all for the centre left progressives have to be proud of policies that lead to efficiency as much as those that lead to justice. Why? Because the lesson learned since 1945 is that driving value for money through public services is not a question of being efficient rather than just it is is just. Spend less on bureaucracy and you spend more on front-line care. To me, reform of health care, education, welfare and pensions was based on both efficiency and justice. Better services were also fairer. Likewise I was as keen on Bank of England independence as on a minimum wage; on encouraging business as on giving people the right to be union members; on growth as much as on tackling poverty. Now it is true some of those policies and even sentiments are sometimes more a.s.sociated with the right; but that's our fault and our bane, actually. just. Spend less on bureaucracy and you spend more on front-line care. To me, reform of health care, education, welfare and pensions was based on both efficiency and justice. Better services were also fairer. Likewise I was as keen on Bank of England independence as on a minimum wage; on encouraging business as on giving people the right to be union members; on growth as much as on tackling poverty. Now it is true some of those policies and even sentiments are sometimes more a.s.sociated with the right; but that's our fault and our bane, actually.

This will focus especially around the role of the state, which is why it is so important not to misread the political consequences of the financial crisis. Big-state politics today will fail. In fact if you offer 'small state vs big state', small will win. Even now, after the crisis. Progressives have to transcend that choice, and offer a concept of the state that actively empowers people to make their own choices and does not try to do it for them. So the state will be smaller, more strategic but also active not a necessary evil, as some on the right would have it, but redesigned for today's world. In that world, the choices technology offers have undergone a revolution. Any political position that doesn't a.s.similate this is doomed.

So what is crucial is not to leave the people with a dilemma: a right-wing solution that at its worst is nationalistic, socially regressive and economically indifferent to the plight of the disadvantaged; or a left solution that unfortunately, whatever its good intentions, is a different form of regression, where we confuse the state with the interests of the people. Face people with that dilemma and there is a real risk they move right. Third-way politics is the only way out of it, for progressives.

There is also the issue of a general malaise about politics which is a real problem in Britain and elsewhere. This has crystallised around the supposed corruption of our representatives, but the MPs' expenses 'scandal' is a metaphor for all that is wrong with the way the current debate about politics is conducted.

Back in the 1980s, there was a perfectly sensible solution to MPs' pay, put forward by an independent commission, the Review Body on Top Salaries, which proposed that rather than MPs voting on their own pay, it should be linked to that of a senior civil servant grade, and expenses would be strictly limited. Parliament should have pa.s.sed this solution but it baulked at a time of pay restraint in the public sector. Instead, an unspoken pact arose: pay would not rise in line with such a link, but a regime bordering on total self-a.s.sessment was allowed on expenses. The abuses were clear and indefensible yet also entirely explicable. But the savaging of MPs as basically a bunch of wasters and fraudsters was unjust and deeply damaging. As ever with such an outpouring of outrage, the innocent or mildly stupid have been executed along with those who really did cross the line. It is a real shame that no one stuck up for the MPs. Instead, everyone competed in condemnation of them.

It is damaging because it also completely misses the point. The problem with the modern generation of MPs has nothing whatsoever to do with their character. On the whole, in my experience, of whatever party, they are a pretty public-spirited lot. The problem is lack of experience of real life, a huge narrowing of the talent pool for political representatives, and the obsessive nature of the activity required to get on the greasy pole of politics today. The very thing that people think is the issue the absence of full-time dedication to the job of being an MP is the opposite of the case. The problem is precisely that most MPs now come into politics from university, become researchers or work for political parties, get selected, get into Parliament and, no matter how able, have absolutely no experience of non-political life. As I described earlier, my seven years as a full-time barrister in industrial and commercial law were invaluable. They taught me how real people, real businesses and real life work.

There are exceptions, people who in later life turn their attention to politics and enter Parliament, but they are just that: exceptions. This, in turn, has another consequence: the best ministers are often now those in the House of Lords. The gene pool for ministers and MPs is now worryingly restricted. If this continues, it will not be long before we look at whether ministers really have to be drawn from the stock of MPs or lords. People are woefully underprepared for what running a vast department entails, and it shows. You end up with people who are great at the politics and lousy at the management.

Which brings me to another issue: it is probably less likely to be fatal to a political career to be bad at management than to be bad at politics. That is also a problem. A good politician can survive being a lousy manager, but a good manager will find it hard to survive being a lousy politician.

Each time I tried to bring, for example, a person from the private sector into government, I found that a part of the media would immediately try to find some angle to show they were suspect in some way. People who were prepared to forgo a large salary to devote time to public service ended up being done over as trying to get their feet on the ladder of corruption.

The role of the media in modern democracy is an issue every senior politician I know believes is ripe for debate. Yet it is virtually undebated, because the media on the whole resent the debate and inflict harm on those who attempt to engage in it, and the politicians are scared of the consequences of challenging powerful media interests. In an era of 24/7 media saturation, the absence of a debate about the media's impact, and how its interaction with politics affects the quality of the public discourse about political affairs, is objectively astonis.h.i.+ng even if subjectively easily explained.

Every walk of life involving power is now subject to strong rules of disclosure, scrutiny and accountability, except one: the media. Just in the past few years, politicians have seen rules on fund-raising, earning, expenses and information revolutionised. Yet the average member of the public knows little or nothing about those who exercise far greater control over what happens in Britain than the average Cabinet minister, let alone the average MP.

Anyway I've made the point before. I dare say I'll make it again! It is actually part of a far bigger question which is this (and as I write, it seems a slightly curious way to put it, and I am not sure even now I fully see its implications).

Three years out of office have given me time to reflect on our system of government and to study other systems. I have no doubt democracy is the best system. And India remains the s.h.i.+ning example of a large nation, still developing, that manages to be genuinely democratic. But I think there is a tendency for those of us in democracies to become smug about the fact that we are democratic, as if universal suffrage and no more were enough to give us good government.

The truth is that in order to function well, democracies need to be more than simply places where universal suffrage decides who governs. They also need to have the capacity, inst.i.tutions, culture and rules to make it work effectively. Sometimes this will take time, which is why a nation like China, unlike India, will only be ready for simple democracy at a certain point in development. At present what it needs is well-intentioned leaders.h.i.+p taking the decisions necessary for it to develop faster. Four hundred million people lifted out of poverty in twenty years is pretty impressive.

But the same also applies to countries that are developed and democratic but whose political systems are not delivering effective government. In other words, democracy itself needs to mature; it needs to adapt and reform as circ.u.mstances change. I would say that the way we run Westminster or Whitehall today is just not effective in a twenty-first-century world. Many might say the same about Congress and the US. The Civil Service requires a totally different skill set today from thirty years ago, far more akin to that of the private sector. I have already discussed the position and training of MPs.

Yet the debate, though it acknowledges that the public are disillusioned and disquieted, focuses exclusively on the issues of honesty, transparency and accountability as if it were a character problem. It isn't. It's an efficiency problem.

Provided we see the problem as one not of people but of systems, we cease also to be so worried about it. Yet if we lack the people, we really should be fearful. Systems can be changed.

I end on a note of optimism. My new life takes me round the world. There is a common theme to what I do. My theory of the world today is that globalisation, enabled by technology and scientific advance, is creating an interdependent global community, in which, like it or not, people have to live and work together, and share the world's challenges and opportunities. The drivers behind this are not governments, but people, and it is an unstoppable force. Its consequences, however, are a matter of choice. We can choose, in the face of this force, to co-exist peacefully, to be tolerant and respectful toward each other, to rejoice in the opportunities now available to us, and try to share them; or we can see globalisation as a threat, as displacing our traditional way of life and culture, as undermining our ident.i.ty. The first leads to a world at peace; the second to conflict. Both choices are on offer.

For us to choose peaceful coexistence, certain things need to happen and some of these I work on: peace between Israelis and Palestinians; respect between the four billion people of different faiths; progress in Africa; and protection of our physical environment. A global community requires values to match, values that are shared. Above all, it requires a world in which justice for the many, not the few, is the guiding light of global government.

In each area I am putting into practice something I learned and reflected upon when prime minister, but which only now I have the time to try to implement. In each case I have an unconventional view, based on my experience.

I do not believe we will see a peace agreement between Israelis and Palestinians based simply on a standard political negotiation. Don't misunderstand me such a negotiation is necessary; but the real problem is a 'reality' problem, not one resolvable merely by negotiation. The Israeli reality is security. The Palestinian reality is occupation. They are linked. Only when and if the Israelis are sure that a Palestinian state will be securely and properly governed will they agree to it, whatever its borders. Only when the Palestinians are sure that if they take measures to ensure proper governance and security, Israel will leave their territory, will they believe any a.s.surances of statehood are credible. We need to build a Palestinian state not just through a process of negotiation but through building the inst.i.tutions, capacity and economy consistent with a state not one only suitable for an agreement made and then left on the shelf, but one taking shape and root in reality; one achieved bottom up as much as top down.

I have always been more interested in religion than politics, but in the work my Faith Foundation does, the two overlap. To create peaceful coexistence in an era of globalisation, people of different faiths have to learn to understand and respect each other. The Foundation is highly practical. We have a programme that uses new technology to join up schools of different faiths so that from a young age children can learn about each other's culture and faith based on the truth, not on often deeply misguided perceptions. It operates now in twelve countries, and children of Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Buddhist, Hindu and Sikh faiths can take part.

We have a university programme, begun at Yale but now in eight other universities, to teach a course on the issues of faith and globalisation.

We have an action programme, which is to encourage those of different faiths to work together to implement the UN Millennium Development goals, and we have begun with the fight against malaria in Africa.

Africa is, naturally, another major area of work. Here the proposition is that, yes, aid is important; but what Africa really needs is help on capacity and governance. The money may be there for health care or agriculture support, but if the government doesn't have the capacity to deliver, then nothing happens. So we work alongside the presidents for the moment in three countries, Rwanda, Sierra Leone and Liberia to help them build basic effective levers of delivery. We hire teams of highly qualified young people (aged 2535) it may be from governments, the World Bank, McKinsey or private banks who work on the ground alongside the president's team and build capacity, so that in time the locals can do it. They also focus on getting in quality private sector investment, which is essential. I work closely with the presidents and political leaders so that what we propose is not only technically sensible but politically doable.

Finally I work on business solutions to climate change, and with the Climate Group have produced reports aimed at practical and business-friendly ways of achieving a low-carbon economy. My idea here is that the only way to achieve political buy-in to reducing emissions is to make business the partner of change, not its victim.

So that's my new life. What makes me optimistic? People. Since leaving office, I have learned one thing above all: the people are the hope.

It is sometimes said that young people have lost their pa.s.sion to do good; they're all just obsessed with getting on and the latest gadget. My experience is the opposite. The young people working for me in Africa are absolutely committed. All could earn better outside. All do it out of a drive to help bring about change. There are hordes of volunteers who work with my Faith Foundation, incredibly well motivated, fantastic, interesting dynamic young people, whose religious commitment is totally without prejudice against those of a different faith.

In Palestine, even when the politics are dark, what lights the situation up is the realisation that young Israelis and Palestinians are not inhabitants of a different world, polarised irredeemably by culture, religion and politics; they are striving for the same fulfilment and chance to do well, and are held back by a situation they would love to change.

In other words, for every bad event, malign conjunction of circ.u.mstances or individual act of hate, there are changes for the better, benign possibilities and above all people of good faith, good intentions and worthy actions.

My conclusion, strangely, is not that the power of politics is needed to liberate the people; but that the power of people is needed to liberate the politics. An odd thing for a politician to say; but then, as you will gather from this memoir, it has never been entirely clear whether the journey I have taken is one of triumph of the person over the politics, or of the politics over the person.

PICTURE INSERTS.

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i) Me and Mum, with Dad holding my older brother Bill in the mid-1950s

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ii) My dad on his way to work. Fostered by a rigger in the Govan s.h.i.+pyards, he went on to become an academic, a barrister and a Conservative [image]

iii) Always happy in the sun. We lived in Australia till I was five

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