John Denham’s speech to the Fabian Society 8th May 2008 

Given the highly publicised election results in Southampton last Thursday you might wonder where I get the cheek to speak about election fortunes in the south. One reason is that I have written and spoken about this over many years, in bad years, and in good. The other is that I, personally, have been here before.  I had to take my seat from third place in1983 to scrape in by 500 votes in 1992.  Before hitting a 14,000 majority in 1997. We don’t have that long. But the process must be the same.   

By engaging with the world as it is; not as we might want or imagine it to be. And we must. Not because as Labour people we want to be elected. But because it matters to Britain. 

I am in absolutely no doubt that there is not a constituency in the south of England where there is not a clear majority of people who are better off today than they were under the Tories.  And who are better off today than they would have been under the Tories.  Partly through the things we have done directly - the new deal, the minimum wage, sure start, investment in the NHS, family friendly working – all of which were opposed by the Tories. And partly through the things we have enabled people to achieve for themselves as new jobs were created, inflation and interest rates kept in low and sensible bounds. 

The reason we want to win again is not for us; but because we believe that people’s lives will be better; and that this country will be stronger. If we ever give the impression we have any other motive, then we are lost. So today, I want to look at what we need to do. 

We’ve said we will listen, so what should we be hearing? 

I will say why the South is so crucial. And I’ll say what we need to be doing, at least in the areas that are my responsibility. 

One important point. The South is a place. It’s where I’m from; where I live. But there are many places in Britain which share similar characteristics, similar economies, and similar politics.  So when I talk tonight about the South, I’m talking about both the geographical south and the political south. The South has the key marginal seats on which our majority depends.  That much is well known. But the South is much more important than that. The South should be at the heart of our election strategy. In the South, we only win with support from a wide spread of voters.  We only win if we get the core Labour votes, the new Labour votes and the “ ‘I’m not really Labour’ votes”. If we win those votes in the south, we’ll win the seats we need in other places too. 

But there is a second reason for making the South the centre of our strategy. It’s because the issues that come to dominate politics tend to happen first, happen faster, and happen harder in the south. And what happens here will happen elsewhere later. 

Of course, we are, on average, a relatively prosperous region.  And what the South enjoys today we, surely, want the rest of the country to enjoy tomorrow. The South shows us what success feels like in a globalised economy. More of our economy is ‘knowledge based’ – whether advanced manufacturing, finance or services. More of our jobs are filled by people with higher level qualification and skills. More of our economy depends on the world class research and innovation in which Labour has invested so much. 

But the South also tells us that success in the global economy brings its own problems. The raft of jobs which are not highly paid; which don’t offer prospects to get on. Wages may be higher but so are many of our costs. And if you are amongst the poorest in the South you feel even poorer when you look at the people around you.   When the housing market booms, first-time buyers and families wanting affordable rents feel it most sharply. But when the housing market stumbles, we feel the shivers because so much of our sense of wealth and security is tied up in the homes which, on average have higher mortgages. Because our jobs market has boomed, we experience the downsides as well as the upsides of migration changing our communities. We draw in people from all over the UK as well as outside. So we find it hardest to balance the demands of growth and prosperity with protection of the environment. 

Many people say that the challenge to Labour is the challenge of the South. But I put it differently. The political challenge of the South is the political challenge of the future. Because if Britain is successful in the future, more parts of Britain will be like the South. I don’t, of course, mean this will change the distinctive traditions, cultures and outlooks of other parts of Britain. But the type of economy, the type of jobs,  the type of pressures, the type of opportunities will be more like those we face in the south. If we want to be trusted to govern Britain in the future, in a Britain more like the South, we must want to win the South. 

This is what many of us argued in the early 1990s. Giles Radice’s Fabian pamphlet ‘Southern Discomfort’ set out the challenge. The handful of newly elected MPs (including Anne Campbell) made similar points in ‘Winning in the South’. But 2008 cannot be a re-run of the mid 1990s. Then Labour’s core vote, hammered by the Tories for 18 years, was committed. It was new votes – from the skilled, aspirational, white collar, middle income voters – that we set out to win. Today we have to earn support once more but from all parts of society. In 2008 we have to revive every part of the coalition.  From the life-long Labour voters who didn’t support us on Thursday to the young voters who have never voted for us but whose support we need.  

Nothing is more pointless than a debate about which group of voters we want. That’s a luxury for other parts of the country. But we must remember how we did it in the past. Not by taking the traditional voters for granted. But by talking about a society in which all could see their stake.   A society with clear values.  Fairness and opportunity; rights balanced by clear responsibilities; economic prosperity and social justice. And each illustrated by examples of what sort of country we wanted to build. Values that embodied what we went on to do in Government. 

I say we have been good for a majority of people in all southern constituencies.  I believe that for that majority we made it possible for people who were prepared to work hard to see steady if not spectacular improvements in the quality of their families’ lives.  At the same time they could use public services that, in the main, steadily improved. And that statement has been true, whether you started amongst the poorest pensioners, or were working on a low wage, or whether you were already successful. It’s what we promised ten years ago: not a message for the poor, or the middle class, but for everyone. It’s an achievement we should be proud of. 

But, of course, it’s not the whole picture. Not everyone who works hard – or who worked hard during their lives- feels that they have benefitted as they might have done.  And these people don’t think they’ve heard too much about their lives in the past ten years. Our communities have changed more rapidly than at anytime in our lives, through migration, new development and wider social change.  They are undoubtedly safer and less crime-ridden, but real fears persist. At the edges, some families struggle to cope, with an impact on all our lives.  We’ve put enormous effort into these problems, but it was pretty clear last Thursday – and in my view had been for some time - too many felt our description of their lives was not what they experience.  

Most of the time, this doesn’t matter too much. Rightly or wrongly the public assume that governments will have a rosy view of the real world whilst oppositions live in pathological gloom. But when things begin to go wrong – when you have a succession of international events – the credit crunch, food prices and petrol prices – then any gap between government and people becomes critical. Voters will usually forgive us for events beyond our control.  They will often generously forgive us for individual mistakes, provided they believe we are aiming for the right things. But they won’t forgive us for apparently not understanding what is happening in their lives. 

When voters feel less secure about their own prospects they are most likely to use to the expression known to every canvasser: ‘it isn’t fair’.  ‘It isn’t fair that I work so hard and find life tough.’  ‘It isn’t fair that I play by the rules but others seem to get more.’  In uncertain times, the trade off between the taxes people pay and the benefits they receive can seem less clear. In the short term we can and will act to tackle some of the immediate causes of concern. 

But this will only work if we also have a single compelling story that every voter can recognise.  The New Labour coalition is no less important today, but it did not start eroding last Thursday. I told the Fabians a year ago that we had lost over a million votes in the South East between 1997 and 2005. For several years, we have tailored different messages to different people, at the cost of a vision of society that unites voters from different backgrounds.   It has simply left too many confused about what we stand for.

There will always be what Harold Macmillan called ‘events’. What carries you through is public confidence that you know where you are going. Of course we do know, but we need to spell it out again. And it should still be the core Labour story of the 1990s.  A fair society in which hard work is rewarded. A society where individuals can prosper but we provide together the things – like health and education - we cannot provide for ourselves. A society that has a positive bias in favour of those who earn their way. And has a bias against those who are not prepared to; or who want to take more than their fair share. 

But the story needs re-telling for the 21^st century. To show we can bring these values to life in a competitive global economy; to show we can make them work when we have to tackle climate change; and where we can expect ever more international pressures of the sort we have seen on food and fuel. 

The story needs to make it clear where we stand on fairness.  That we understand that fairness is not just about the distribution of wealth, but about the distribution of rewards. It’s not just ‘how much do I get’; but do I get a fair return for what I put in.’ That our promise of fairness is rooted in our determination to create opportunities for those who want to take them, not over-protection for those who don’t.  And that while a Labour Government will always provide extra for those who cannot help themselves, including children, we will never think that this is enough. But because there will always be those who need extra help, we need to be clear what the deal is for those who normally won’t get direct personal financial help.    They too need to feel life gives them a fair deal. 

Look at what we are doing and you can see the basis of that deal if only we spell it out. The chance to work, after the years of mass unemployment.  But more important still, the chance to progress, to get on, to improve your working life. To have a good career and raise a family at the same time. It’s the job of Government to make sure these things are possible. 

Second, through our commitment to public services, a fair deal. In our action to improve schools and hospitals we are working to create the right, always, to be able to choose the school, but also never to have feel you have to choose. The right always to be able to choose your hospital, but the right, also never to feel you have to choose.  

It means your kids should have the right to go to university, or the chance to do an apprenticeship, whichever their aptitude and inclination determine. That’s an outcome only Government can deliver. 

And the promise that we will be the guardians of the taxpayer’s pound. That every pound works as hard for the taxpayer who earned it as it can.  That’s a responsibility of Government. 

Last year I stressed the importance of Labour’s housing plans to making it possible for southern families to get the homes they need. I also raised an issue of fairness we had not addressed.  Inheritance tax where in the South we knew of too many families of relatively modest incomes to whom it seems unfair. In Government we are tackling the unfairness of inheritance tax for the vast majority of ordinary, hard-working whose homes are the main thing to show for a life of work.  Taken together, we can and should make a powerful case for fairness that reflects effort; and for the role of a Labour Government in creating it. 

Throughout it all, we need to re-assert one more simple belief. That what government does, matters.  Not all of government is good government, even under Labour. But Government can make a difference.  And many things people want to achieve can only be done if Government opens the doors and makes it possible. 

In my own department, Innovation, Universities and Skills, I’ve being looking at how we reflect this approach in everything we do.  Because my Department is at the centre of the efforts to make Britain more competitive, more prosperous and fairer in the future.  To make more of Britain as prosperous as the South. We are at the heart of creating a fair deal for hard working families. Not just the chance of a job, but the chance to get on, to do better. And for your children to do better still. And it is now, when the economy has slowed, that we need to spell out this message.  

The Tories say we should have put money away for a rainy day. Gordon created the department with rising real budgets at a time of real spending because it is our investment in education and skills that is the real protection when the international economy shivers.   Investment in scientific research continues to grow, because without it we will damage our ability to compete in the future.  And the biggest single factor that will decide whether everyone can share in future prosperity will be whether people have the skills to get the better jobs. 

We want to make sure people have the chance to work and to progress, to get on.  More and more of the jobs of the future will go to graduates. Because of Labour more people have the chance to go to university than ever before. Our new university challenge will bring university centres to 20 more towns and cities, making sure more people can study flexibly and close to home and family. We are making sure that the colleges, employers and public investment work together to ensure that training delivers what the jobs of the future will need – in biotech, in advanced manufacturing, in services, hospitality and retail. 

It can be hard moving from a dead-end job to a better one. So our new Advancement and Careers Service will help guide people through skills, tax-credits, child care, housing and transport choices. It can be hardest for people in the worst jobs. I’m pleased Gordon wants to find a way forward on agency work because those who survive on casual, work are perhaps least likely to be able to get the skills they need to break out to something better. 

We want to open up opportunities for families. David Cameron derided our ambition to see half young people go to university. But over half of young people from every social class now want to go.  Our target simply expresses Labour’s commitment to meet the aspirations of the rising generation. Labour rescued apprenticeships in 1997. We’ve doubled the number of apprenticeships and nearly trebled the success rate. With Ed Balls, we’re aiming to give not one in fifteen young people the chance  to do one as we have to day; but, in the future one in five. 

We want the system to be fair for everyone. We saw that students from the poorest backgrounds might be put off if they thought they couldn’t survive at uni; so we’ve raised limit for the full grants from a £17,500 family income to £25,000.  But because we believe in fairness for all, we also saw the need to support the hard working families who are doing the right thing supporting their children at uni. So we raised the upper limit for grants to £60,000 a year. 

We are making it clear who will benefit as we widen participation to university. It’s not just the bright students from the poorest backgrounds, but millions of hard-working, tax paying home owning families with no past experience of higher education – the people who keep the country going.  

We want to reward those who make the effort. This isn’t about government telling people what they should have. More and more we are giving both individuals and employers the right to decide how public investment in skills should be spent, so that each is getting the training that is best for them supported by us. 

And we want to make every public pound work as hard as it can.  We’re investing £2bn in FE colleges, but I’ve made it clear I don’t just want nice buildings but specialist provision to train for the new jobs we are creating. I want every new project to provide training,  for the people who work on it; not just take the contractor with the lowest price. I want each built to the highest green standards. So that the pound that trains someone today, will also help protect our children and grandchildren.  

And we want to strengthen our communities too.  Give an adult better job prospects and their children be healthier and will aim higher. Concentrate ESOL on long-term residents and we bond communities together with a common language. The driver of migration is jobs that local people cannot fill.  No British worker should lose their job to a foreign worker because their skills are poorer – whether the job goes abroad or the foreign worker comes here. Improving skills is part of our response to the touchstone issue of migration. 

Every single one of these issues resonates in the geographical South and the political South.  Each lets us re-open our conversation with southern voters. 

Practical policies, shaped by Labour values, let us deliver prosperity and fairness. They enable us to reward effort and open up opportunity. They help us meet the challenges of the future. 

Every one is an issue where the difference between us and the Tories is clear. They lack the commitment to invest. They lack the ambition to make sure Britain can match up to a changing world and make the changes we have to make. And, they simply do not recognise that in all these areas, what government does actually matters and makes a difference. 

And because we know Government matters; Government makes a difference, we know we can, we must and we will win the next General Election.