Vancouver Province
for June 7, 2001

Three weeks ago, BC’s version of the Socialist Party took a terrible drubbing. Today, its alter ego, the British Labour Party, will administer a similar drubbing to the Conservatives. The immediate reaction – indeed it was mine – is that the NDP could learn some lessons from Toby Blair and his crew.

The Labour Party, after 1979 – the "Winter of Discontent" - found itself is a shambles and by the time John Major and his Tories delivered in 1992, what appeared to be the coup de grace, pundits predicted that the left were finished. Yet five years later Labour was the natural governing party of Britain and the Conservatives were without a ship much less a skipper and a rudder. How did that happen?

It took a long time, starting with Hugh Gaitskell back in the fifties who saw that the Labour Party couldn’t survive just as the labour unions plus the Fabian Socialists – the sort my father called "parlour pinks". By Neil Kinnock’s time it was abundantly clear that a traditional fiction had to be faced – union members didn’t all vote Labour. In fact by a margin of 3/2 or higher they voted Tory. Divorce proceedings had to commence and they were. By the time Tony Blair took over – thanks especially to John Smith who took over the struggle from Kinnock and was killed by the effort – the Labour Party had democratised itself by taking away the huge blocks of votes that constitutionally belonged to Trade Unions. They also rid themselves of Clause 4 which parroted the socialist dogma, inherited form the discredited Karl Marx, calling for the state control of everything.

When Tony Blair slaughtered the Tories in 1997 it was quickly evident that this indeed was "New" Labour.

Doesn’t it make sense, then, for the NDP nationally and in British Columbia to ape the Labour Party and move to recapture the left center and even much of the center? Of course it makes sense. The trouble is, it isn’t going to happen. It won’t happen because it can’t.

When the Labour Party started its long overhaul they were in bad shape but nowhere near as sick as the NDP are. While the party still belonged to the trade unions, the traditional "non" labour element was alive and well and was able to make the case that huge, fundamental change had to happen. It helped too that "loony" lefties like National Union of Miners "President-for-life" Arthur Scargill were held in deep opprobrium by the public at large. And, weak or not, Labour still had a lot of MPs.

The federal and BC NDP are beyond redemption. The only friends they have left – and they’re none too friendly these days – are the union leaders and the money they control. It’s classic Catch-22 – the NDP needs to rid itself of the only support it has that keeps it alive.

But is the lesson really lost? I think not. I suggest that the person to think on this deeply is Gordon Campbell for it is he who can profit from the Labour Party’s experience.

As it stands, Campbell and the Liberals have everyone from the "not-quite-far-left" to the "not quite far right". He must know he can’t hang on to all that. Where, then, to position the party?

Given that he can position it virtually anywhere he wants, wouldn’t it be wise to try to keep his gains in the "center left". The working person, union or non union, will support any government that supports both economic activity and strong social policies. In a word they will support a party like the pre Vander Zalm Socreds.

To solidify this support, Gordon Campbell must be careful with his labour policy and must, like the Bennetts, senior and junior, keep his social policies up dated. (Just for openers he could go a long way down that path by making the Children’s and Families Ministry work.)

There is nothing for Mr Campbell to fear from the right. While he apparently lost the 1996 election because of it in reality he lost much of the middle-of-the-road vote to the NDP.

The "middle" - that’s where elections are won and lost all over the western world. If Gordon Campbell can make his party into one that the "left" can’t beat, he will be premier for a very long time to come.