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- Observer.co.uk,
- Sunday June 10 2001
How would you define success for Labour's second term in office?
What is your greatest concern or fear, or a potential pitfall which the government needs to avoid?
What one new policy idea would you advocate that the government adopt?
Test of success: A big improvement in public services including transport, plus improvements in productivity and partnership working to bring the UK up to the best European standards.
Fear: My greatest concern is that there might be some economic shock which causes unemployment to rise and which puts the economic and social progress made to date at risk.
New policy: I would like to see the government adopt a policy which brings about entry into the single currency within a reasonable period of time. - John Monks, General Secretary, TUC
Test of success: For Labour finally to convince the mass of people in these islands that a stronger Europe is not just compatible with national self-interest but indispensable to it.
Fear: That a global economic down-turn may trip them up or slow them down unduly
New policy: I have to be self-interested. Britain's university sector is about as buoyant as the Tory party and, like it, requires massive new investment and intelligent change. - Linda Colley, historian
Success will be determined by the opinion of British citizens at least a dozen years hence, when asked whether the second Labour government truly helped usher Britain into the 21st century.
My fear is that Blair and co will follow Bill Clinton's blueprint for a second term, which included no major or bold initiative, but fell instead into a vast swamp of scandal.
New policy? Baby bonds are a good start, but they need to be significantly larger, monetarily, if they're to have the impact they deserve to have. - Robert Reich
Test of success: Labour will succeed if it combines the economic stability of its first term with greater courage on the euro and the environment.
Greatest fear. Increased public spending for three years , followed by recession driven cutbacks, with long term issues about education and health not addressed.
New policy: Be bold on the environment and transport : higher fuel duties reinstated and congestion charges introduced to fund better public transport and lower taxes on labour. - Adair Turner
Test of success: Less inequality, a revised stronger freedom of information act and Labour taking a leadership role on such global issues as third world poverty, AIDS, human rights abuses and the environment.
Pitfall: An over reliance/over-dependence on the private sector and the market without adequate checks being put in place to protect the public interest
New policy: Proportional representation - without it Britain now risks becoming a one party state. - Noreena Hertz, Judge Institute of Management Studies, University of Cambridge
Test of success: Sustaining economic competitiveness, while creating greater social justice - the two very tasks that define new Labour.
Pitfall: The government must succeed in regenerating the NHS, the main concern of so many of the public.
New policy: Jenkins-style PR should seriously be considered. - Anthony Giddens, Director, London School of Economics
Test of success: An increase in social mobility; for all the rhetoric about a 'classless' or 'meritocratic' society middle class, the chances of moving up the social scale are no better today than ten years ago. Half of those in the highest social class had equally high-status parents, compared to just one in ten whose parents were from the lower reaches of the class system
Fear: Having won a second term, the Government will worry excessively about the prospects of an unprecendented third term and govern more conservatively than the first time around.
New idea: A massive increase in the availability of paid paternity leave: only when men are taking significant chunks of time out of paid work to care for children can we hope for genuine equality at work or at home. By 2006, the phrase 'career man' or 'working father' should have ceased to sound silly. - Richard Reeves, Author of Happy Mondays: Putting the Pleasure back into work
Test of success: A significant reduction in both poverty and inequalities of class, gender and race would be the mark of a successful second term.
Fear: My fear is that the government will once again pander to the perceived prejudices of middle England in a bid for a third term, leading to ever more shameful treatment of asylum-seekers, further 'tough' action against benefit claimants and failure to make the case for tax-benefit redistribution.
New idea: The strengthening of democracy and citizenship through the development of robust structures and a participatory culture in response to demands from people in poverty for a say in decision-making that affects their lives at national as well as local level. - Ruth Lister, Professor of Social Policy, Loughborough University
Test of success: Widespread recognition that public services have improved substantially.
My greatest fear is that the government doesn't win the European argument and carries on making too many concessions to the political right.
New policy: A new Companies Act to entrench a juster conception of capitalism by giving enhanced rights to workers, to consumers and to non-executive directors as guardians of a wider interest. - Will Hutton
Test of success: Labour's rhetoric on human rights, cosmopolitanism, the 'ethical dimension',openness to citizens ideas and views in the first term was very important.In the second term, the rhetoric needs to be implemented in practise, in particular, through developing an independent European foreign policy.
Fear:I have two big concerns - one is that the government might succomb to pressure from the Bush administration and the other is that it might pander to the prejudices that lead to right-wing populism, for example, on asylum seekers.
New idea: I would like to see a new initiative on weapons of mass destruction. At present, we still think of weapons of mass destruction in terms of Cold War logic and, in particular, the framework of arms control. We need a new approach in which weapons of mass destruction are reconceptualised in terms of the logic and political framework of human rights instead. - Mary Kaldor, Professor of Global Governance, LSE
Test of success: The key test is rebuilding faith in collective solutions - both domestically and internationally. Modernising public services must go hand in hand with a principled case for Europe and multilateralism so that the public debate revolves around how to make Europe or the state deliver rather than whether we need them at all.
Greatest fear: That the Government doesn't realise what opportunity there is for change and the scope that still exists for political leadership. Public anger with the state of our public infrastructure has created the best chance for progressive politics for decades.
New policy: European leaders should agree to create a league table measuring the quality of public services across the EU. This would entrench a social democratic consensus by forcing British governments to explain why French hospitals and German schools are so much better than ours. - Mark Leonard, Director, The Foreign Policy Centre
"Second term success" will consist of improvements to the public services which ordinary members of the public can identify without having to be told. If at the end of four or five years, people look back at late trains, crowded classrooms and long hospital waits as half-forgotten features of the bad old days then Labour will have succeeded.
The biggest fear (apart from a war) is an as yet unforeseen global collapse that precipitates a national downturn and crisis that makes everybody realise, with shock, how extraordinarily lucky they have been for the last decade - and that the opportunity for valuable change has been sadly squandered. The existence of this danger ought to give Mr Blair a pressing incentive to get on with bringing about change before the party is over.
New policy: the Labour government needs to take one policy area - just one - and seek a transformation that everybody will acknowledge. It could be primary schools or it could be prisons - or some completely different national scandal. Whatever it is, it should be the focus of concentrated attention and exceptional resources, for the whole of five years. The aim would be to provide an unmistakable landmark achievement, like the NHS for the Attlee government or the Open University for the Wilson one, which everybody will always remember. - Ben Pimlott:, Warden, Goldsmiths College
Test of success: A reduction in the gap between the incomes of the top 10% of the population and the bottom 10%. I want to see poverty reduced, but I also want us to achieve a more equal - and therefore more cohesive - society.
Fear: That the use of the private sector in public services will see Labour effectively denigrating public sector institutions and therefore helping further diminish the idea and values of the public realm.
New policy: Support for a major solar power programme, both in this country and in the developing world, to begin to move us into the low-carbon age - and to create jobs and development opportunities at the same time. - Michael Jacobs, General Secretary, Fabian Society
Test of success: Reform of the public services without recourse to sticking plaster solutions involving the private sector. Holding a referendum on the single currency and securing a yes vote. Doing more for the poor, particularly children and pensioners.
Fear: That insecurity will prevent the government from addressing controversial issues, ranging from an imaginative financial restructuring of the NHS to more flexible working hours for parents. New policy: A humane, progressive, fair and unbureaucratic attitude to asylum-seekers. - Mary Riddell, Observer columnist
Test of success: I would define success on two criteria. First, can Labour find ways of reforming public services so that the British people are better satisfied with what the government delivers, and more willing to pay the taxes to fund those services. And second, can Blair reconcile the British people to the European Union: can he convince them that the EU is good for them, and that they would be better off in the euro?
My greatest concern is that the government may lack the courage of its convictions on Europe. Will it be willing to take on a largely hostile media and argue the case for positive engagement in Europe? Or will it prefer an easier life, forget the euro, and accept that Britain will become a semi-detached member of the EU? It is not only the euro which counts. There is a big debate going on in France, Germany and other countries about the kind of EU we want. There is a great opportunity for Britain to help to set the agenda. Blair showed he can do this, last autumn, with his Warsaw speech on the future of the EU. But will he once again try to set the intellectual agenda on how to reform the EU - or will he leave it to others?
New policy: With another EU treaty revision due in 2004, I would like the government to advocate the abolition of the EU's rotating presidency. This is the practice by which EU members take it in turns every six months to run the EU. It is a ridiculous system that weakens the EU's ability to run effective foreign policies. - Charles Grant, Director, Centre for European Reform
Test of success: Reduction in poverty and inequality, and an improvement in the NHS that is perceptible to both patients and staff
Fear: Raising expectations of public service improvements beyond what can practically be achieved, especially on the NHS. There is no doubt that something can (and will) be done to improve it, but care must be taken to ensure that expectations are not raised too high.
New idea: With apologies for the egotism, I would propose three, all of which are important and all of which I have been deeply involved with. Firstly, the introduction of a 'baby bond' which I orginally proposed; secondly, the extension of use of private contractors in parts of the NHS and education systems (to be recommended by the IPPR Commission on Public/Private Partnerships, of which I am a member) and, thirdly, a hypothecated or earmarked tax to fund the NHS (as proposed by the Fabian Commission on Taxation and Citizenship). - Julian Le Grand, Professor of Social Policy, LSE
Test of success: Steady economic and employment growth allowing continued investment in public services allied with a programme of reform which emphasises diversity and decentralisation while protecting principles of equity and comprehensiveness.
Labour would also have pushed the goals of environmental sustainability and civic renewal to the heart of political debate. The gap between the top and the bottom income decile would have diminished.
Fear: A failure to learn that managerial centralisation and political manipulation are dead ends would be disastrous. The other great danger is that the war for Blair's succession casts a shadow over his second term.
New idea: Building on Labour's 'baby bonds' pledge, I hope that in five years all parties accept the importance of asset based welfare as crucial to tackling poverty and inequality. - Matthew Taylor, Director, IPPR
Test of success: Redefining public service improvement to make active self-government the essential companion to better government, or delivery in the conventional sense. This means involving people directly in shaping the services and outcomes the government wants to achieve in health, learning, community safety and so on. The goal is to build systems of public provision which are capable of transforming themselves over time, rather than just responding to central requirements. Private sector input and efficiencies are only one part of this. The deeper challenge is to unleash a wave of civic entrepreneurship, build a new set of relationships with citizens, and shape a political agenda around the central concept of quality of life.
Fear: The danger is two-fold: first,. the political challenge of handling a Euro referendum could easily divert the government from developing a new story about British identity which can create legitimacy for a longer wave of change. Second, Labour should not assume that achieving bigger targeted improvements in the productivity of existing public services is enough to rebuild trust in politics and public institutions.
New idea: Announce an ambition to double spending on public education, while allowing parents, community groups and other entrepreneurs to found their own schools, with a measure of public funding tied to quality standards, as part of a massive diversification of educational provision. - Tom Bentley, Director, Demos
Success in Labour's second term would mean delivering on their promises (including the ones made last time), improving public services, keeping the economy strong and the country independent.
Pitfall: Labour need to avoid the temptation to regulate and micro-manage centrally, which could cripple our economic adaptability and vitality.
New policy: The Adam Smith Institute will propose next week a new structure to make the public services consumer-directed and with constantly improving quality and efficiency. - Madsen Pirie, President, Adam Smith Institute
