POLITICS
It's time to put an end to the fibs and the pashes at St Tonian's
BRUCE ANDERSON
0 nly one author could do justice to the Blair/Brown/Mandelson saga and she, alas, is no longer with us. It would have taken Angela Brazil to chronicle the conflicting passions — or rather pashes — in the over- heated girls' school that the Blair govern- ment frequently resembles.
The feuds and infighting have always been there. Gordon Brown and Robin Cook have been on non-speaks for so long that their quarrel has become Labour's Schleswig-Holstein Question; no one can remember how it started. But it is at least thought to have had masculine origins — a dispute about power and influence in Scot- land, or some such — before it escalated into prima donna-ishness.
We are dealing with unstable characters. On many occasions, Mr Blair has urged Mr Mandelson to make it up with Mr Brown; why is it, the PM once exclaimed, that the two colleagues he most valued were so incapable of getting on? But his protests have been ignored. The Prime Minister may call for a ceasefire, and even think that he has negotiated one, but five minutes later, they are at it again. It is in the nature of the two men.
Gordon Brown seems to have an emo- tional need to bear grudges. He is never happier than when he is gnawing on some old bone of grievance, nursing his wrath to keep it warm. As for Mr Mandelson, he seems to have an emotional need to stir up trouble. Both men also demand exclusive loyalty from their own supporters, which can make life difficult for lobby journalists who are merely trying to cultivate as wide a range of sources as possible. But anyone deemed by the Brownites to be too close to Mr Mandelson — or vice versa — risks the withdrawal of favours. Hacks virtually have to choose whether they will be in the maths mistress's faction or the head girl's.
All this has endless amusement value, but there is a deeper significance. The whole business throws light on one of the great mysteries of current politics: the real nature of New Labour and what its princi- pals actually believe. For a start, it is instructive to compare Mr Brown's original attitude to Mr Mandelson, before they fell out over the Smith succession, with Mr Blair's. Gordon Brown and Peter Mandel- son used to be friends, though Mr Brown made little attempt to commend Mandy to his mentor John Smith. Mr Smith, who believed that, ultimately, politics was about truth, principles and morality, thought that Mr Mandelson was of limited usefulness. But the future Chancellor, from a different political generation, respected Peter Man- delson's skills as a media manipulator, though not as much as Tony Blair did.
Gordon Brown has considerable and jus- tified intellectual self-confidence; he never doubts his own ability to think problems through. His opinions have altered since the days when he read Marx, wrote an admiring biography of James Maxton, the Red Clydesider, and was full of socialist zeal. He retains a moral and intellectual force derived from his earlier convictions, even though his present position is much less coherent. But he would not admit that, and anyway he has never relied on Peter Mandelson to tell him what to think.
Unlike Mr Blair. Gordon thought that once he had worked out the message, Peter would be good at putting it across. To Tony, however, the medium was the mes- sage; everything was sublimated into pre- sentation. Tony Blair's beliefs were of the shallowest; ditto, his thinking. For five years, he has been making himself up as he goes along. This is a stressful business, which is why he is so emotionally depen- dent on his two closest advisers, Peter Man- delson and Alastair Campbell. On one trip to the Middle East, Mr Blair spent half his time gabbling anxiously to Mr Campbell, asking what he should say next — as if Alastair Campbell knows anything about the Middle East. This is a Prime Minister who fears that if he were ever cut off from his advisers, he would have only five min- utes' intellectual fuel in his tank.
But he is even more dependent on Mr Mandelson than he is on Mr Campbell. In the exchange of letters after Mr Mandel- son's first resignation, the PM wrote that, without Peter, New Labour would not have been possible, and he meant it. Mr Blair may not know much, but like Isaiah Berlin's fox, he knows one big thing: that he won power by winning the support of people who disliked everything which Labour used to stand for, and whom Labour used to dis- like. He also knows that this is an unstable relationship. Those voters will never become natural Labour voters, while many Labour MPs — and ministers — find it unnatural that they have to devote so much energy to appeasing them; they did not go into politics to suck up to the Daily Mail. Lots of Labour MPs still hope that at some stage the New Labour mask will be discard- ed. But as long as Tony Blair is in power, this will not happen; he is determined to hang on to his 1997 supporters. The mas- querade has taken over the project.
That is why Tony needs Peter so much. Even Alastair retains some old Labour instincts, albeit largely , corroded by cyni- cism. Only Peter is as committed as Tony is to the continued transformation of Labour into a suburban party. Only Peter shares the PM's electoral insecurity. Mr Blair, who never expected such a large majority, was astonished at how easily it all came, and since then has been oppressed by the thought of `easy come, easy go'. That explains why this Prime Minister, ostensibly so powerful, who spent three years on a honeymoon cruise with the voters when there was hardly a cloud of opposition in the sky, often seems so anxious. Peter understands these feelings in a way that none of the other pupils at St Tonian's do, which is why the headmistress takes no notice of the maths mistress's demands for detentions and expulsions.
But how will the voters react, if they get to hear about the goings-on in the girls' dorms? It is certainly no way to run a gov- ernment, and it also involves a great deal of fibbing. Mandy may yet be reminded that the cover-up often compounds the offence. As for Tony, he lies about little things, such as watching Jackie Milburn play football or trying to stow away on a plane from New- castle to the Bahamas. He lies about mid- dle-sized things, such as the Tory peers pre- venting a ban on fox-hunting. He also lies about big things, such as Bernie Eccle- stone's donation. He does all this not only because he has scant regard for the truth, but also because he has scant regard for the voters; he thinks that they are too thick to notice. If the Tories could get that point across, and depict this straightforward sort of guy as the B.liar he often is, the tantrums would start in earnest.
While all this unjolly hockey sticks is going on in Downing Street, William Hague has decided to take his message to the country; we are in for six months of soap-box politics. It remains to be seen whether the Tories will be able to attract much publicity for all this, but the contrast can only be helpful.
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