THE APOTHEOSIS of Nimbyism appeared in our local paper in the autumn. Some residents of Primrose Hill in London objected to the building of a new Jewish community centre and synagogue on a patch of disused land by the side of the railway. Their objections failing, they deployed the ultimate argument. Pointing out that nuclear waste is occasionally transported by rail, the residents speculated that terrorists might find the momentary proximity of nukes to Jews irresistible, and that the entire area risked being destroyed by way of collateral damage.
They lost, but should I see their ingenious campaign as an expression of a vibrant local political culture and be disappointed that the council overrode their objections? After all, if this is to be the era of citizen power, when we must do all we can to encourage activism, we can hardly object if the activists are active in causes that we dislike. It is apparently the activity itself that matters.
This week both the Power Commission, chaired by Baroness Kennedy of The Shaws and funded by Rowntree, and the Chancellor (funded by the taxpayer) pointed out that the British people are far from being apathetic, and that “out there” millions of us are engaged in petition-writing, demonstrating, volunteering and campaigning. The commission’s interest was in how this activist virtue could be transformed into engagement in the political process itself, a process seen as facing “meltdown” because of falling turnout in elections and declining membership of political parties.
The Power report has, for me, a unique quality. Unique in the real sense, because I disagree with almost all the report’s premises, and yet agree with almost every single one of its recommendations. I’ll deal with the disagreement first, partly because it’s more fun.
Power explains the coming meltdown as being due to disenfranchised party members “who feel they have no say in policy-making and are increasingly disaffected”, to the main parties being seen as “too similar and lacking in principle”, to the first-past-the-post electoral system, and to catch-all manifestos at elections.
Well, I haven’t seen the evidence but I think most of this is nonsense. If you simply invert the propositions by asking whether turnout would improve dramatically if each of these conditions were altered, it is evident that the answer would be “no”. Ordinary party members, for example, exercise far more influence over who leads their parties than they did 30 years ago, when only MPs were deemed knowledgeable enough to have a vote. Rank-and-file Conservatives have never had more power, and there have never been fewer of them.
In the case of Labour it is demonstrably untrue that maximum internal debate and maximum ideological differentiation leads to greater voter support. The 1983 radical manifesto — as detailed as you could possibly get — was dubbed “the longest suicide note in history” and attracted Labour’s lowest post-First World War vote. Far from responding to political activists, voters are often slightly repelled by them.
On proportional representation, between the 1999 and 2003 elections for the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly — both elected with a substantial PR element — the turn-out fell by more than 8 per cent in both cases, whereas it rose slightly in the general election of 2005. And no government has said and done more than this one about issues to do with world poverty, Africa and trade justice, yet youth participation in elections — said to be function of engagement in such issues — has fallen.
Despite this I think most of the suggestions made by Power are good, and one or two are genuinely inventive. A cap on donations to political parties is obvious enough, but the notion of a box on the ballot paper allowing each voter to allocate three quid from the State to the party of his or her choice is brilliant. I love the idea of parties having to beg the electorate for dosh. Will they advertise?
I can also support a 70 per cent elected element in a new second chamber, though Power’s desire to restrict eligibility to people above 40 is both eccentric and inequitable. I am in favour of giving greater power and resources to select committees, in favour of allowing petitioning to the Commons, and in favour of a PR element for Westminster elections.
But you could do all this and it wouldn’t, of itself, raise turnout or increase party membership at all, although it might improve the quality of governance. Far from people being somehow cut off, as Power suggests, from information about how the world is run, part of the problem may be that people now have access to more knowledge than they know what to do with. They can also see that the world is a far more complex place than is suggested by the old solutions or the red/blue, I’m right/he’s wrong ideologies. The difficulty for them is deciding where and how to intervene.
It is in this context that all the political parties (who are nowhere near as clueless as Power seems to imagine) are involved in a discussion about civic culture and how to strengthen it. Even if there was not one extra party member recruited or one additional percentage point on the polls, politicians can see that nationalisation of political and social action makes no more sense than nationalisation of economic action does.
Power needs to be dispersed for things to be run well, and it also needs to be dispersed for people to behave like adults, and not just consumers.
Yesterday Gordon Brown was writing that he was aware of a “new kind of citizen” — active in the community — who was “demanding the right to set the agenda”. These social entrepreneurs included green companies, groups of parents and so on. These groups could be given local assets to run themselves, as is currently and controversially being suggested in the Government’s education proposals. And as is being resisted like anything by Labour’s residual ideologues.
Even though I agree with such devolution, I can see that there are a number of problems. One is the extreme defensiveness of institutions — schools, hospitals, public sector unions — in allowing parents, patients and other clients to have a say, rather than a purely passive volunteering role. A second is the reluctance on the part of some of these volunteers to immerse themselves in the tedious business of communication and negotiation that accompanies public responsibility.
The third problem is that people don’t always use virtuous processes for virtuous causes. It was interesting that the mellifluous Baroness Kennedy, quizzed on the Today programme, gave as an example of empowerment citizens petitioning against ID cards. She is against ID cards. But they may just as well petition against the prosecution of burglar-slayers, or for the deportation of asylum-seekers or in favour of ID cards. Some Muslims or some Christians may want to stop the teaching of Darwinism.
Or the building of a synagogue. Or, like the actor Tom Conti, who lives near me, may campaign ceaselessly and tediously against any restriction on him or his mates driving or parking their cars in any way or in any place that they want to drive or park.
Up until now, of course, I could rely on the council or the government to preserve me from Contis. Now it seems that it is better for me to have to do it myself.
David Aaronovitch’s weblog is at www.timesonline.co.uk/weblogs
