The rapier ambition of ham-fisted Hattie
Harriet Harman was yin to Gordon Brown’s yang. The privately schooled feminist
with aristocratic connections was supposed to temper the gruffness of the
state-educated Scot and make him more electable in the south. But now
Labour’s deputy leader has developed a yen to take over Brown’s job, which
looks tenuous after a 20-point gap in the polls.
At least, that was the scenario painted by Harman’s critics last week in a
series of attacks that accused her of a “stealth campaign” to position
herself as leader-in-waiting.
Was Harman “Britain’s most deluded woman?” asked The Daily Telegraph,
reporting her “ham-fisted” efforts at self-promotion. The Daily Mail went
one better. Under the headline “Treachery in high heels”, the writer Leo
McKinstry, Harman’s former parliamentary aide, evoked her “frenzy of
disloyal activity” and portrayed her as an ambitious hypocrite. “Possessed
of shallow competence and intelligence, she could barely run her office, far
less the country,” he added. Oof!
It fell to The Guardian to call for fair play and suggest that, judging by the
tone of the attacks, Harman was being criticised so loudly because she was a
woman. Yet it was The Guardian that had set the hare running earlier in the
week by suggesting Brown was being touted by Angela Merkel, the German
chancellor, for a new job as a global financial watchdog. This was a story
planted by Harman to destabilise Brown, claimed his acolytes.
In the wooden, cautious style that has characterised the 58-year-old
politician’s tenure as one of Labour’s most enduring figures, Harman
deflected this blast. No, there was not a “shred of truth” in reports that
she wanted the prime minister’s job. And yes, she was “proud” to be Brown’s
“loyal deputy”.
Caricatured as “Hattie Harperson”, she has aroused love and hatred in equal
measure ever since entering the Commons in 1982, seven months pregnant and
one of only 10 women Labour MPs, to ask Margaret Thatcher why there were no
after-school clubs in the school holidays. Her colleague, the late Gwyneth
Dunwoody, described her as “one of those women who were of the opinion that
they had a God-given right to be among the chosen”.
No one doubts her ambition. “Her absolutely unflinching self-belief is her
biggest strength and her biggest weakness,” said a lobby correspondent. “She
has no doubt that she could be a female prime minister. But she takes a hell
of a lot of shit in the Commons from people writing her off as thick and
stupid. In fact she is a really hard worker who hasn’t been afraid to stick
her neck out.
“She can be charming, but on the negative side she can freeze out people who
have been loyal to her. She’s also slightly bonkers, in the sense that she
makes up policies on the hoof to get a cheap headline.”
Her workaholic routine seems to leave little time for her listed hobbies of
music, cooking, gardening and shopping. She once boasted that she never
spent more than £50 on a handbag after Hazel Blears, a Blairite foe, had
questioned Harman’s criticism of people who spend £10,000 on such an item
(Blears revealed that her own bag, an Orla Kiely number, cost about £250).
Many of the brickbats have landed close to home - not least the Fathers 4
Justice protesters who straddled the roof of Harman’s house last June. She
created a furore when she sent her three children to selective schools,
offering the disingenuous defence that since Britain had a policy of free
education, “parents make their own choices, whether they are politicians or
not”.
Her husband, Jack Dromey, deputy general secretary of the Transport and
General Workers’ Union, has given her useful credentials with the labour
movement. Married in 1982, they live in Herne Hill, southeast London, in her
Camberwell and Peckham constituency.
Then there was the “donorgate” scandal in 2007, when it emerged that Harman
had accepted a £5,000 donation to her deputy leadership campaign from David
Abrahams, Labour’s secret donor, through an intermediary, Janet Kidd. “I was
confident that I hadn’t done anything wrong,” Harman insisted. Brown’s
endorsement was less than fulsome.
Her sister Sarah, a lawyer and part-time judge, resigned in 2004 after being
caught passing confidential papers to Harman, then solicitor-general. Found
guilty of contempt and “conduct unbefitting a solicitor”, she was ordered to
pay £25,000 costs and stepped down as a judge.
The evidence of Harman’s “plotting” amounts mostly to accusations of
grandstanding. According to this indictment, she plans to seize the
limelight at London’s G20 summit in April by holding her own meetings with
businesswomen in an effort to get a commitment to safeguard women’s jobs
during the recession. She was also accused of hijacking an announcement on
social mobility by Liam Byrne, the Cabinet Office minister. Her caustic
remarks about City bonuses were said to have upset Blairites in the cabinet.
“There is a sense that she is out of control and no one can stop her,” one
detractor was quoted. “She thinks she can do what she likes because she has
a mandate from the party.”
Harman probably would not disagree with the last bit. She considers that she
is “in a different situation” to other cabinet members. Equality has always
been her particular passion and since she is secretary of state for women
and equality, she has the perfect excuse for drumming up support among
women’s groups, MPs, trade unions and MEPs.
To her critics, there is a fine line between promoting her Equality Bill and
promoting herself. Brown may have denied Harman the post of deputy prime
minister and the keys to Dorneywood, but she has the consolation of wearing
other hats, including chair of the party, leader of the Commons and privy
seal.
What rattles Harman’s enemies is that she was written off as “a bleating,
hectoring, finger-wagging vote loser”, in much the same way as now, before
winning the deputy leadership election in a remarkable comeback. The bruises
still hurt, though: “I wouldn’t wish that on anybody.” She began that
campaign six months before anyone else left the starting blocks - much as
now, it is feared.
Despite Harman’s insistence that she was not Brown’s anointed candidate, many
Brownites assumed she was. Her backers included Brown’s closest adviser, Ed
Balls, and his wife, Yvette Cooper, who had both worked under Harman when
she was chief secretary of the Treasury, and Alistair Darling, then trade
and industry secretary.
“Harman was probably Brown’s choice for the deputy leadership,” said one
political commentator. “He calculated that she would add to the gaiety of
the party, without posing a threat to him. Instead, she’s turned out to be a
thorn in his side.”
She was born on July 30, 1950, to Anna, a solicitor, and John, a Harley Street
physician whose sister was Elizabeth, Countess of Longford, the historical
biographer. Educated at the independent St Paul’s girls’ school and at York
University, where she gained a BA in politics, she trained as a solicitor.
In 1978 she became legal officer for the National Council for Civil
Liberties, now Liberty, where she forged a formidable alliance with Patricia
Hewitt, who is godmother to one of her children. After the whistleblower
Cathy Massiter revealed in 1984 that MI5 held personal files on Harman and
Hewitt, they successfully argued at the European Court of Human Rights that
their rights had been infringed.
By then Harman had been an MP for two years, thriving in a series of shadow
posts. After Labour’s 1997 victory, she was recognised as a part of the new
Labour brand - young, televisual and posh. Tony Blair appointed her
secretary of state for social security and gave her the huge task of reforming
the welfare state. She lasted barely 15 months.
Blair sacked Harman after her public rows with Frank Field, her
better-qualified deputy, and her unpopular moves to cut benefits for single
parents. She described her three subsequent years on the back benches as
among the worst in her life. One good thing came out of it: she taught
herself to cook: “All my family has eaten better after I got sacked.”
She did not do a Clare Short by turning on Blair and her loyalty was rewarded
with her return as solicitor-general in 2001. Four years later she was
minister for constitutional affairs, only to relinquish her responsibilities
for reform of the House of Lords, citing a conflict of interest after her
husband announced an investigation into the “loans for peerages” affair.
Should Harman reach the top, it would most likely be as opposition leader,
judging by current trends. “No one is talking about a leadership election
this side of a general election,” said a Westminster reporter. “A battered
and bruised Labour party that wanted to retreat into its comfort zone might
choose her as a Michael Foot figure.”
Last year she was named one of Westminster’s more dowdy politicians. “I
thought in that case I’m going to become really frumpy,” she said. “I’m not
going to wash my hair and I won’t spend any money on nice clothes.”
Foot would be proud of her.
