Gray: why we must end poison politics in Scotland

Text of a speech to Scottish Labour Special Conference, 29 October 2011, from Iain Gray, Leader of Labour in the Scottish Parliament and Labour MSP for East Lothian. Check against delivery.

I am always on the lookout for useful quotes from politicians past and present. 

Last May I probably should have remembered one from a politician I know well, Alistair Darling: ‘expect the worst and you won't be disappointed’.

Disappointing doesn’t come near to how bad we felt.  I take responsibility for that, and that is why the day after the election I said I would stand down as your leader. 

I wanted to send a signal to Scotland that we recognised the scale of the defeat.  But I did not stand down immediately because I wanted to send a signal to you that anyone in our party who thought that simply replacing me with a new leader and changing nothing else would be change enough would simply be fooling themselves.

I wanted the Party to take the time to reflect and to reform before reacting.

The quote I really had in mind was a favourite of mine – not a politician but Hemingway – ‘the world breaks everyone and afterwards many are strong in the broken places’.

Traditionally these leaders speeches are about speaking above the head of the party to the public.  But today I want to speak directly to you, my colleagues, my friends.  Because I saw the work and the determination and the hope that you had put in over the months leading up to May and how it was dashed that night.

President Obama’s former chief of staff, Rahm Emmanuel famously said, ‘never waste a crisis’. 

Well we have not wasted this crisis. Sarah Boyack and Jim Murphy have led a review which has laid bare our failure to modernise our party in line with the way in which we modernised our country – our failure to recognise that the centre of gravity in Scottish politics shifted to Holyrood when we made that happen in 1999. 

They have made far reaching recommendations which will change that, and take Scottish Labour forward. 

These recommendations do not come from Sarah and Jim, they are informed by the participation of thousands of party members, hundreds of submissions they made, and dozens of meetings they attended.

They are marked by the honesty forced on us by the searing experience of May 2011.  And they are driven by our undiminished determination to make our party strong again and make our country better through our values, our principles and the force of our will.

We have confronted the reality of what happened, and we should.  But we should not let others rewrite the story of the election.  It was bad enough.

I have heard it said that our vote collapsed.  But it did not. 

Yes we lost Labour voters to other parties, of course we did.  But we gained some too and in many parts of Scotland our vote and our share of the vote went up, But it was not enough.

I have heard it said that we were beaten by a better campaign.  And you judge campaigns by their outcome, so that must be true.  But we were not outworked on the ground.  We did twice as much work on the ground in 2011 than in 2010, knocked on twice as many doors, delivered twice as many leaflets and spoke to twice as many people.  But it was not enough.

I have heard it said that our message was a negative one.  And I accept that we allowed that view to persist.  But our core message was that even in these difficult times the Scottish government’s aspiration should be no less than the eradication of youth unemployment and the creation of 250,000 jobs. 

That was a positive vision - an optimistic belief in every Scot’s capacity to work to contribute and to build this country’s future. But it was not enough.

It was a privilege to be the first ever Scottish Labour leader elected by the whole party – MPs, MSPs, MEPs, affiliates and party members.  But that wasn’t enough.

My successor will be the first Scottish leader of the party – leader of the whole party, a modern Scottish Labour Party devolved to match the devolution we created and believe in, devolved to match the politics of the Scotland we live in and devolved to create the unity, discipline and drive to take this Party forward.
 
Since May we have faced up to our situation. But today is a turning point. We have spent long enough on how bad we were in May.  It is now time to show how good we can be in the future.

Some of the commentators demand of us a clause 4 moment. So let us have one, let us look at clause 4 on our Party card.

It says there that we are Scottish Labour.  That we are a democratic socialist party.  And it says that we are stronger together, and weaker apart.  That we can achieve more by our common endeavour than we can alone.

There, right there is our way forward. 

At a time when we have governments in Holyrood and Westminster who glory in division.  At a time when 200,000 Scots are denied the opportunity to make their own way through their own labour – when one in four of our young men are workless. 

At a time when fatcat salaries are soaring and family salaries are cut.

Now more than ever we need a party defined by the right to work and the power of common endeavour, and driven by the moral imperative of equality– Scotland needs a Scottish Labour Party – now more than ever.

It is not just Scotland’s future that the SNP threaten.  They are trying to rewrite our past too. 

Listen to Alex Salmond try to place himself in a direct line from Tom Johnston through Donald Dewar to himself. 

Watch the SNP use the 40th anniversary of the UCS work in to imply, infer and insinuate that they were somehow there with the workers. 

Read Alex Salmond’s favourite book – a revisionist history of the past fifty years in which events like the miners’ strike are somehow reinvented as symbolic moments when Scotland stood up for itself rather than what they were –real actions taken by real working men and women standing up for each other and for the right to work – struggles of the politics of solidarity not of national identity.
 
In parliament recently Mike Russell even seemed to lay some claim to John Maclean, a socialist without self-interest – two concepts alien to Mike Russell - Maclean broken in the cruel incarceration of Calton jail in Edinburgh. 

The irony seemed to escape Mr Russell that as he made this curious claim his boss Alex Salmond was measuring up the Calton Jail governors’ house for his first ministerial curtains.

Just as the SNP have tried to reinvent their present as social democrats, they have tried to reinvent our past as a nationalist one.

I have seen this political creed before “who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past”. That was not written by a Scot - but on a Scottish island – by Orwell when he wrote 1984.
 
As for our present. 

The Scotland I believe in is not one where, when riots break out in British cities and Scots are lifting the phone to call their family and friends and workmates in London and Manchester and Liverpool to ask if they are safe and well and secure, the First Minister of Scotland chooses to lift the phone to the director general of the BBC and insist that the riots are described as English on TV strap lines.

I would want a leader of my country, who when he sees communities under siege and families being burned out of their homes to feel solidarity first and schadenfraude last or better still not at all.

The story was that Alex Salmond was driven by concern for the Scottish tourist industry.  I don’t believe that.  Do you believe that?  Does anyone believe that?  Everyone knows what he was driven by and it is an ugly thing indeed.

Ugly too the response we have come to expect from Alex Salmond and his party to those who disagree with him. 

Courts and judges who deliver justice which does not suit him are denounced in the crudest terms and their independence and even their budgets threatened. 

Economists and anti-sectarian campaigners who cross him are publicly denounced and their integrity questioned.  Bodies like the CBI when their message does not suit are told not to blunder into politics. 

And Scottish MPs, representing Scottish constituencies and elected by Scottish voters are told they have no right to speak on the constitution unless they carry an SNP party card.

This week an academic who dared to dissent had a letter of confession and recant drafted for him and his signature on it demanded.

Yes, the SNP won the election but nobody expected the Scottish Inquisition. 

It is not funny.  It is not democratic and it is not acceptable.

That is not the Scotland I know, the Scotland I love, the Scotland I want.  That is why a year ago in Oban I said “I love my country too much to be a nationalist”.

I still do.

The Scotland I want can only be built by a party which is about coming together and through our collective endeavour shaping the future we want for our children and grandchildren. That is what we have always been.

Labour is a party founded by a Scot Keir Hardie, representing an English constituency but believing in a home rule which recognised that what divides is as nothing to what binds us together. 

Served by transformational leaders, who combined intellect and pragmatism in a way which delivered.

Leaders like Tom Johnston who fashioned the rhetoric of “power from the glens” but then marshalled the labour of thousands to literally move mountains and deliver better living standards for the people of Scotland.

Labour leaders like Donald Dewar who delivered a Scottish Parliament in defiance of Alex Salmond who sneered that we could not even deliver a pizza. I guess that was before Salmond reinvented himself as the Norman Vincent Peale of positive politics.

It is that parliament, delivered by Labour which has achieved so much.  The best incapacity legislation in Europe. 

The best homelessness legislation in the world.  The end of one thousand years of feudalism.  The abolition of tuition fees in universities.  Free personal care. The smoking ban. 

A Scotland which punched above its weight in academic papers, research funding, new industries like life sciences and marine power.

I agree with Alex Salmond that Scotland’s future has no limits.  The difference between us is that I want to see us begin that future right now today – it doesn’t have to wait for a referendum or a secession or for Alex to take his seat in the UN.

It is not our parliament or our constitution which imposes limits on what we can be. 

It is 200,000 Scots without work, it is one in five of our young people, one in four of our young men, on the scrapheap. 

It is one in five children living in poverty. 770,000 households living in fuel poverty.

It is 9% fewer applications to university and thousands of college places being cut. 

It is an educational divide where a poor child’s chance of success might be a twentieth of the richer kid a few streets away. 

It is the remaining stains of sectarianism and racism and homophobia in too many corners of our country still. 

It is not the lack of our own army which might stop my grandchildren and yours making it to the 22nd century. It is the postcode lottery of life expectancy and the fact that we drink 25% more than our neighbours down south - and that is nothing to do with the price of the drink – or the lack of a border – its something to do with too many of us feeling alone in midst of a crowd, poor in the midst of prosperity, and passed over in the midst of progress.

Our parliament had begun to turn these things around in its first eight years. But what is it doing now?  25,000 fewer public sector jobs, 4000 fewer teachers, 2000 fewer nurses, cuts to our colleges, cuts to fuel poverty budgets, increases in care charges and cuts to the housing budget.

Our parliament has the power to do better than that and Scotland deserves better.

We cannot say it often enough - Labour created the Scottish parliament and we created it to be a powerful instrument of social progress – an expression of the pride, passion and unlimited potential of the people of my country. 

It was never meant to be an arena for constant constitutional grievance and its focus should be that social progress we crave.

But the people have decided that it should now debate the future of Scotland and whether it lies within the United Kingdom or not. 

We have to engage that debate now and we must win it. 

Because I believe with all my heart that Scotland is big enough, smart enough and rich enough in talent to stand with our comrades, friends, neighbours, workmates and family all across these islands.

I do not believe that a strong fair and equal Scotland in a strong fair and equal Britain is the only possible future for Scotland – but I am sure that it is the best possible future for Scotland.

We must engage in that debate now not to save the Union but to save devolution.  Because it is not the union of 1707 the SNP wish to destroy.  That is long gone.  It is devolution they wish to dismantle. 
 
A strong Scottish Parliament sharing risk, responsibility and opportunity across the United Kingdom.  Reaching out, not looking in, not looking on when we see injustice elsewhere in this or any country, standing shoulder to shoulder with those who struggle and suffer, not standing by because it is not us.
Last weekend I spoke at the hardest hit rally in Edinburgh.  With disabled people facing hardship and poverty imposed by benefit cuts.  The First Minister sent a message – to his credit.

But his message was this – everything will be fine with benefits in a separate Scotland. 

Scottish Labour’s message is – these cuts are wrong in Edinburgh they are wrong in Cardiff, they are wrong in Belfast and they are wrong in London too. 

And those Scottish Labour MPs Alex Salmond says have no right to speak for Scotland spoke for Scotland when they spoke against the welfare reform bill, and voted against the welfare reform bill, and their SNP
MP colleagues were virtually nowhere to be seen.  I am proud of Scottish Labour MPs and the stand they take for Scotland every single day.

So. A shared history.  A common bond. A stronger future.

A modern 21st century constitution, proud to be Scottish, at ease with being British and glad to be global.

That is what Scotland wants.  That is why we cannot have a straight question from Alex Salmond.

The SNP have had 77 conferences.  Alex Salmond has had 24 years as MP and MSP.  They have formed two Scottish governments.  They have published so many white papers, consultations and roads to independence that I can't count them. 

They’ll even give you a bendy wristband.

But they still won’t give you a straight question. 

The truth is Alex Salmond knows he can’t get his first question past the Scottish people.  And he knows he can’t get the second one past the SNP.

When we asked Alex Salmond if he would accept the answer to a referendum for at least a generation we didn’t realise he was going to take the whole generation to come up with the question.

We know you can’t trust the SNP on the NHS. We know you can’t trust the SNP on schools.  But it looks as if you can’t even trust them on their own referendum. 

He’ll say anything, do anything, write anything to avoid the straight question.

And conference let me say this about devo max and fiscal autonomy. 

We are the party of devolution and it is absolutely right that we should debate what powers should be devolved. 
 
Keir Hardie did that. Jimmy Maxton did that. Donald Dewar did that. Those debates are legitimate, important and inevitable. Those questions belong to us as the party of devolution. That is why we should not allow them to be used to cloud the fundamental once-and-for-all decision that the people of Scotland have to make between devolution and separation. The SNP have a mandate for a referendum and we accept that.  But they have an obligation to do that with clarity and we hold them to that.

Conference it has been an honour to lead this party for the past three years.  I want to thank the Scottish Labour movement for its support throughout that time.  May’s result was not because of your lack of work or lack of passion or lack of dedication to our values and ideals.

I want especially to thank all my colleagues past and present at Holyrood for the support they have given me – MSPs and staff too.  The leaders team - Michael Marra, Simon Pia, Sarah Metcalfe and Adele Black.  East Lothian CLP and Pat Gordon. 

Colin Smyth and the John Smith house staff for their incredible efforts. Jim Murphy, Ann McKechin and Margaret Curran for their support as secretary of state and shadow secretary.

I do not have the words to thank Gil and my family for all they have given and all they have given up to help me through the past three years.  Just thank you.

This afternoon we begin the process proper of electing a new Scottish leader for a new devolved Scottish Labour party.

I say to the candidates.  Don’t kid yourself.

You will be attacked.  You will be smeared.  You will be lied about.  You will be threatened. 

The cybernats and the bedsit bloggers will call you traitor, quisling, lapdog and worse.  They will question your appearance, your integrity and your sexuality.  They will drag your family and your faith into the lies and the vitriol.  If you are a woman it will be worse. 

It is no consolation to know that any journalist or commentator who gives you a fair hearing will suffer the same. 

This is the poison some have brought into our politics and it is vile. 

It is time we started talking openly about it and it is time the SNP did something about it. 

They know who some of these people are.

This is not how you build a better Scotland and Scotland deserves better.

But those who bring light suffer burning.  You will stand up to it and you should be proud to do so.

You will be proud, proud to lead this movement.  Newly empowered by the devolution of our party to match the devolution of our country.

You will have the platform and the Labour team in Holyrood in Westminster, in council chambers and on the streets of every community to make the case for our Scottish Parliament and all that it can do for our Scotland and all it can be – no limits, no limits to a vision of Scotland shaped by Labour values of fairness, solidarity and equality.

We do not believe that the capacity, intellect and potential of every Scot young or old, man or woman, is limited by the constitution. 

Rather it is limited by inequality, injustice, poverty, ill health and unemployment.

The Scottish Parliament we created is the place where we can plan for jobs, protect the NHS, make Scotland more equal and reach out to every community and family in Scotland. 

The Scottish Labour party we renew today is the place where we come together to argue that case, win that struggle, deliver that progress.

Its time to rediscover our self-confidence but reject self satisfaction of any kind.

Its time to rediscover our patriotism but redouble our struggle against parochialism

Its time to rediscover our solidarity with each other the better to defend devolution and defeat separatism.

I love Scotland too much to be a nationalist.  And I love this party too much to be a pessimist.

Its time for Scottish Labour to pick itself up again, look outward again and go forward again.

What are we waiting for? Let’s go pick a leader.  And let’s get back to work.