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Beyond the market, below the radar Barry Winter reports on a Catalyst conference that raised more questions than it answered Billed
by Catalyst as a ‘major pre-election conference’ on renewing the public
services, this event – ‘Beyond the Market: Public services in the
twenty-first century’ – aimed to create ‘a positive agenda and a new
progressive alliance’ on the left. It sought to draw together a broad range of
people and organisations concerned about the future of the public services under
a third-term Labour government. At
one level, the conference successfully attracted a wide range of people but not
in significant numbers. In spite of an impressive array of speakers and the
backing of 30 campaigns and organisations, including six trade unions, only
about 150 people were present. This failure to woo a bigger audience is not
meant as a criticism of its efforts or the deliberations. It merely recognises
the relatively weak condition today of what might be called the progressive
left. There
is, of course, the alternative attraction, the new Labour Representation
Committee (LRC). Here, judging by its recent publicity leaflet, ‘Winning
London Back for the Left’, little seems to have changed in this left’s
agenda: upfront with its shopping list of slogans. Top of its demands is the
call to withdraw troops from Iraq. I wish I could find politics so simple. If
for no other reason, the existence of the LRC enhances the importance and
relevance of events like the Catalyst conference. For here was a genuine and
open attempt at dialogue and at forging alliances to meet the challenges and
threats posed to the public services by the ‘next’ Labour government. Here
too was an emphasis on devising alternative policies and practices, on opening
debates rather than closing them. The
breadth of the concerns about the public sector can be seen in the variety of
workshops held: on the civil service; the health service; education from primary
to higher; social housing; on empowering users; the role of the public service
workforce; the role of mutuals in the public services; the new localism;
campaigning for public services; and the public services and globalisation. Opening
session Opening
the event the director of Catalyst, Martin McIvor, called for an alternative
vision for the public services. Instead of being based on markets, they should
rest upon notions of citizenship, equality and public service ethics, where
people can meet as co-producers. In
his keynote address, Colin Leys the academic (and author of Market-Driven
Policies), tackled the arguments of those he described as the ‘enemies of the
public services’. They have become adept, he argued, at using public language
to distort the debate, utilising phrases like ‘the nanny state’ and ‘tax
and spend’. For capitalists, the public sector offers a huge market with low
risks. His main criticism was of claims made by the Blair leadership that what
matters about the public services, particularly for the public itself, ‘is
what works’. This is simply a code for privatisation, he argued. Leys
said that privatisation changes the focus from what the service is for to what
it costs. Even before the service is sold, it has to be priced, broken down into
standardised units, and based on the cheapest labour for the least skilled. The
result of privatisation of hospital cleaning, which is based on low pay, has
been a sharp rise in infections. Exposed to the market, public service
television changed from programmes that include education and debate to
entertainment. In the process, informed democracy is undermined. In the shift
from meeting needs to making profits, we see declining standards and experience
a loss of control. At
stake is the future of the whole idea of the ‘public’ interest, with active
citizenship and social cohesion. These are being threatened by claims about the
apparent supremacy of individual consumers in the global market place. For
these reasons, defending public services is crucial to a progressive vision and,
central to this vision, is reinventing democracy. Without an effective
democratic culture there is nothing to oppose the forces of the market. Only if
we reassert an active, democratic culture can we defend the public sector. But
this also means that it must be reformed; it cannot continue to have closed,
hierarchical structures. While, to some, this may sound utopian, we need a
radical change of direction, Leys argued. To be clear, confident and
constructive about the future, we have to put the public services at the centre
of our political concerns. Reflecting
on Leys’ statement, which is close to the ILP’s perspective on democracy, I
have only one doubt. Instead of simply opposing the claim that ‘what matters
is what works’, as he seems to be arguing, we could accept the phrase but take
it in another direction. Sure, what matters is what works but that is tied up
with how it works, how well it works and for whom it works. Here democratic
accountability provides a more sound foundation for long-term success than
markets. In other words, instead of simply repudiating the Blairite slogan, we
might be better off engaging on the terrain that it establishes and shifting it
in a more radical, democratic direction. The
third term The
panel of speakers in the first plenary came from a broad political spectrum:
Douglas Alexander MP, the minister for trade, closely associated with Gordon
Brown; a speaker from the National Consumer Council; the general secretary of
the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS), Mark Serwotka, who is also
active in LRC; Frank Dobson, MP and former health minister; and Neil Lawson,
chair of the pressure group, Compass. Douglas
Alexander chose to address the future of the health service. A former chair of
the Public Service Forum, he argued that the public service ethos, with its
emphasis on non-material values, really matters. It defines the kind of society
we have, indicating that we are members of one community based on the ideas of
both reciprocity and service. The health service must continue to uphold the
idea of health for all. He
identified three responsibilities for politicians. First, to speak up for this
kind of society with its emphasis on public service which, he said, is a
precious inheritance. Secondly, to find ways to engage people and communities in
the public services. This means recognising that we live in a changing society
that values greater autonomy, that people want to be heard and expect greater
choice. Thirdly, we have to find a way to use the expertise and the knowledge of
the people who work in the public services, based on the idea of ‘worthwhile
work’. These responsibilities mean that the users and the workers should be
empowered. We need structures to make this possible and to sustain these
non-material values. Mark
Serwotka (a last-minute replacement for Kevin Curran of the GMB) made a lucid
and robust attack on the government’s plan to cut the civil service workforce.
He reminded the audience that we are talking about some of the lowest paid
workers in the country, mostly women. Commercialisation From
Compass, Neil Lawson described his own political journey as moving from
Mandelson to Marxism. He asked why the commercialisation of the public services
was taking place, arguing that it was a product of the culture of Labourism and
the lack of a distinctive left political economy. Frankly, the old structures
for the public sector are not good enough for today. Commercialisation was
therefore pushing at an open door. Old Labour treated the electorate in a
paternalistic manner, as passive and as incapable of being trusted. It was born
at the time of Leninism with its notion of the vanguard party leading the
masses. Social
democracy lost sight of its mission to link social justice and the economy, with
the principle of making society dominate the market. Today, we are told by party
leaders that the globalised economy is too strong to change. Instead we have to
accommodate ourselves to it and seek to be among the winners. Instead of
democracy, it is interested in efficiency. Whereas, the neo-liberals never
recognised an active role for the state, new Labour wants to use it, but it is
destroying the special character of the public services. Today,
we need to define what a new collectivism means in a new era, involving
empowerment, democracy and accountability. We need a new political economy the
space for the new collectivism. We have to shift from the argument that favours
‘freedom from’ to one that upholds our ‘freedom to’. The language of
freedom has to be appropriated by the left, as the means for people to control
their lives. Democracy today is not only about means but ends, but in a less
deferential society. Frank
Dobson argued that the health service is the citadel of socialist achievement.
He said that there is a great deal of user satisfaction with it, as there is
with our schools. He went on to criticise privatisation, citing the example of
private residential care for the elderly. The private owners of such companies
have realised that they can make greater profits from selling their properties
than for caring for old people. Residential homes are closing as a result. Practical
agenda Chairing
the closing plenary session, Michael Meacher MP and vice-chair of Catalyst,
spoke of the need to develop a specific, practical agenda. Co-founder
of New Wave Labour, Angela Eagle MP (author of Deepening Democracy, reviewed in
Democratic Socialist, Winter 2004) argued for deepening democracy in response to
both market fundamentalism and the ‘third way’. Not only does market
fundamentalism fail in practice but it is has great destructive power. The
Clinton version of the third way left a light and easy-to-remove political
footprint. The question is whether it is possible to leave a deeper imprint on
society? This
raises the question of how can we lock our values and vision into society so
that it is a more just one. Central to this is remaking our democracy because
people do not feel that they influence governments. We need to look at our
models of democracy in terms of what it means for people to have a say in their
lives – as workers and in their communities. This involves much more than
considering issues like proportional representation. Why should people
participate in rigged political processes? How do we counter top-down
dehumanising systems? Democracy
has to be made real within the Labour Party in contrast to the present
‘command party’ structure. Some gains have been made here, such as the
minority reports from the policy committees. These were even carried at last
year’s conference but then ignored. Active
citizenship is what is wanted. Examples of what could be developed are the New
Deal projects in the UK. We need to remake social democracy for the 21st
century. The third way does not allow you to do that. Democratic
services Billy
Hayes, general secretary of the Communications Workers Union (CWU), argued for
the importance of the public having its say in the future of the Royal Mail
which has been starved of investment. Hilary Wainwright (editor of Red Pepper,
whose book Reclaim the State was reviewed in Democratic Socialist, Winter 2004)
asked how we can build a movement for democratic public services. We want modern
services but this does not have to mean marketised services. Even
as someone sceptical about new Labour, she thought it would show more commitment
to democratic influences than to market ones. She was deeply disillusioned by
the contents of Best Value policies which are not allowed to fight privatisation.
Community participation in New Deal projects is allowed providing they do not
hinder the private sector. The failure to persuade the electorate in the north
about regional devolution shows the extent of the public’s alienation from
politics. The
rhetoric of new Labour is ambiguous, she said. It uses the language of
decentralisation to soften up the political process. To build alternative public
services we need a strong tradition to draw upon with a deep commitment to the
idea of ‘public good’. This provides the rock of commitment to better
health, education and other services. We
have to open up new ways of working together, to fight systematic attempts to
privatise the public sector. This means developing policies, programmes and
alternative strategies from below, based on an alternative vision of the public
sector, whether you are inside or outside the Labour Party. We
need a social movement for the public sector and to recognise that public
workers are not a cost but a source of experience. We have ‘patches of a
movemen’', such as the struggles to retain council housing, against jobs cuts
in the public sector, and the fight for the Royal Mail. Like a patchwork quilt,
these actions start from different corners and connect up. The task is to turn
the common sense support for the public good into a movement for the public
sector. The
national secretary for local government in Unison, Heather Wakefield, argued
that trade unions in the public sector are in a unique position as both workers
and as users of the public services. Unions, such as hers, have the potential to
influence events through their members. Seventy per cent of employees in the
public sector are women. Like
the morning session, the discussions that followed lacked a clear focus, except
in one respect. There was a brief exchange of views which focused on the need to
be inside or outside the Labour Party. On the defensive, Hilary Wainwright (who
is a leading member of Catalyst but not a member of the Labour Party and a
long-term advocate for a new left party) argued that the Labour Party should not
be the big issue in this kind of discussion. We can become too tied up with that
debate. Instead, the concern should be what we can build together, on a
democratic public sector, on non-market models. Billy
Hayes said that if we were not concerned with a third-term Labour government
then everything that people have been saying at the conference ‘is so much hot
air’. Angela Eagle said that important progress has been made in the policy
forums and that Labour has to be returned to power to prevent the situation
further deteriorating. Questions Not
surprisingly, this conference, with its diffuse range of speakers and political
perspectives, raised more questions than it resolved. In that sense, it reflects
the broad centre-left politics of the group that organised it. It
did allow for differences to be debated but often they were not. For example,
the government minister did not cross swords with critical trade unionists over
job cuts. No clear sense of purpose emerged from the meeting – nor could it.
It did show, however, that beneath the political radar there are activities
taking place and ideas being discussed that could challenge a future Labour
government. At best, judging from this conference, we are still at the early
stages of that important process. I
agreed with Hilary Wainwright on the need to establish a movement in support of
the public sector, starting with the campaigns that are already up and running.
If this is to happen, however, it may have to come from other organisations and
campaigns. Catalyst does not seem to be particularly equipped for this purpose.
It has the authority to bring people together but it needs others with a more
defined sense of purpose to take any initiatives forward. One
of the organisations present that appears to recognise this more clearly is
Compass. Whatever its origins, its recent political material suggests that it
may be developing in a far more radical direction. It declares: ‘progressive
forces in the Labour Party and beyond must reach out to new social forces and
voices of dissent’. It is committed to democratic left politics, to
encouraging ideas and activities that re-politicise debate within the Labour
Party, and to building a wide alliance for social change. I think we should
consider its politics more carefully. It may have more potential than Catalyst
to develop this critically important role. ‘Beyond
the Market: Public services in the twenty-first century’ was held on 27
November 2004 at City University, London Beyond
the Market conference: participating organisations Association
for Public Service Excellence Centre
for Public Services Compass
(www.compassonline.org.uk) Communication
Workers Union (CWU) Defend
Council Housing (www.defendcouncilhousing.org.uk) Democratic
Health Network GMB Local
Government Information Unit London
Health Emergency National
Association of Schoolmasters/Union of Women Teachers National
Consumer Council NHS
Consultants Association NHS
Support Federation New
Wave Labour (www.newwavelabour.co.uk) National
Union of Teachers Office
for Public Management Opinion
Leader Research Public
and Commercial Services Union Prospect Public
Services International Public
World Socialist
Educational Association TELCO
(The East London Community Organisation) Transport
and General Workers Union Unison War
on Want Work
Foundation World
Development Movement |