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| The Guardian view on cross-party cooperation: backbench MPs hold the cards | The Guardian view on cross-party cooperation: backbench MPs hold the cards |
| (7 months later) | |
| Mon 10 Jul 2017 19.19 BST | |
| Last modified on Mon 27 Nov 2017 20.25 GMT | |
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| Political leaders open up their governments to alternative ideas and different traditions for a range of reasons. In some cases, they take a cross-party approach because they truly believe it’s a good way of governing. In others it’s because circumstances dictate that they have no alternative. A third group makes the move without enthusiasm, but because they think it is a good look. A fourth does it in order to lure opponents into a trap. | Political leaders open up their governments to alternative ideas and different traditions for a range of reasons. In some cases, they take a cross-party approach because they truly believe it’s a good way of governing. In others it’s because circumstances dictate that they have no alternative. A third group makes the move without enthusiasm, but because they think it is a good look. A fourth does it in order to lure opponents into a trap. |
| Modern UK politics provides examples of all these approaches from strong and weak governments of all kinds. If the advance briefing is correct, Theresa May will on Tuesday join their number. She is expected to say in a speech to mark a rollercoaster year as prime minister that MPs across the political spectrum should “come forward with your own views and ideas” on inequality and injustice in order to “tackle these challenges as a country”. This has been interpreted as a specific appeal to Labour for ideas, and even as a cry for help to Jeremy Corbyn. | Modern UK politics provides examples of all these approaches from strong and weak governments of all kinds. If the advance briefing is correct, Theresa May will on Tuesday join their number. She is expected to say in a speech to mark a rollercoaster year as prime minister that MPs across the political spectrum should “come forward with your own views and ideas” on inequality and injustice in order to “tackle these challenges as a country”. This has been interpreted as a specific appeal to Labour for ideas, and even as a cry for help to Jeremy Corbyn. |
| There is little evidence that Mrs May really believes cross-party working is a good way of governing. First as home secretary and now as prime minister, she has rarely been open to new ideas from within her own party, never mind from within others. Instinctively, she is the cat who walks by herself. No senior Tory minister in the 2010-15 coalition was less collegiate to the Liberal Democrats. Her approach is marked more by obduracy – on issues like overseas student numbers or the European court of justice – and a penchant for going it alone (think grammar schools or the Trump visit) than by an instinct for pluralism or pragmatism. A rare exception was her invitation to Tony Blair’s former adviser Matthew Taylor to chair the review of modern employment that is published on Tuesday. | There is little evidence that Mrs May really believes cross-party working is a good way of governing. First as home secretary and now as prime minister, she has rarely been open to new ideas from within her own party, never mind from within others. Instinctively, she is the cat who walks by herself. No senior Tory minister in the 2010-15 coalition was less collegiate to the Liberal Democrats. Her approach is marked more by obduracy – on issues like overseas student numbers or the European court of justice – and a penchant for going it alone (think grammar schools or the Trump visit) than by an instinct for pluralism or pragmatism. A rare exception was her invitation to Tony Blair’s former adviser Matthew Taylor to chair the review of modern employment that is published on Tuesday. |
| It is easier to see Mrs May as someone who has been forced by circumstances into opening up a bit more. Since 8 June she has become a weakened leader in a hung parliament, charged with carrying out Brexit, the most complex and divisive negotiation in recent British history. She also presides, with difficulty, over a country that is torn over how to pay for things like social care, one of many major issues on which there is a powerful case for a national consensus approach. Though she has a deal with the reactionary Democratic Unionists, which assures her government’s immediate survival, she needs centre-left allies if she is to legislate promised social reforms that might boost Tory ratings. | It is easier to see Mrs May as someone who has been forced by circumstances into opening up a bit more. Since 8 June she has become a weakened leader in a hung parliament, charged with carrying out Brexit, the most complex and divisive negotiation in recent British history. She also presides, with difficulty, over a country that is torn over how to pay for things like social care, one of many major issues on which there is a powerful case for a national consensus approach. Though she has a deal with the reactionary Democratic Unionists, which assures her government’s immediate survival, she needs centre-left allies if she is to legislate promised social reforms that might boost Tory ratings. |
| It is also possible to see Mrs May as one of those leaders who likes the look but not the substance of openness and compromise. Mrs May’s pitch to other parties is very vague. A more focused appeal, for instance, on a big national issue like social care, higher education funding or even aspects of Brexit, would be much more convincing than a generalised call for ideas. In the absence of that, there will inevitably be a suspicion that the initiative is largely tactical, an attempt to manoeuvre Labour into a position where Mr Corbyn can be portrayed as a doctrinaire opponent of reasonableness. Mrs May should make it clear if that is not her aim. | It is also possible to see Mrs May as one of those leaders who likes the look but not the substance of openness and compromise. Mrs May’s pitch to other parties is very vague. A more focused appeal, for instance, on a big national issue like social care, higher education funding or even aspects of Brexit, would be much more convincing than a generalised call for ideas. In the absence of that, there will inevitably be a suspicion that the initiative is largely tactical, an attempt to manoeuvre Labour into a position where Mr Corbyn can be portrayed as a doctrinaire opponent of reasonableness. Mrs May should make it clear if that is not her aim. |
| The British parliamentary system is an adversarial one. This form of politics can be very effective, particularly when a government is failing and an opposition succeeds in burnishing its credibility as an alternative. But such moments come and go. Most of the time, the public dislikes yah-boo politics. They like it when parties cooperate, especially if they think it is in the national interest. Soon after the June general election, support for a cross-party approach to Brexit soared, for example. Yet support for cooperation and coalition ebbs and flows too. Coalition was very popular in 2010, but had become the opposite by 2015. | The British parliamentary system is an adversarial one. This form of politics can be very effective, particularly when a government is failing and an opposition succeeds in burnishing its credibility as an alternative. But such moments come and go. Most of the time, the public dislikes yah-boo politics. They like it when parties cooperate, especially if they think it is in the national interest. Soon after the June general election, support for a cross-party approach to Brexit soared, for example. Yet support for cooperation and coalition ebbs and flows too. Coalition was very popular in 2010, but had become the opposite by 2015. |
| A hung parliament provides a lot of opportunities for issue-by-issue political cooperation. But cooperation across the parties may prove more realistic than formal cooperation between the parties. Mrs May is no more interested in cooperation that elevates Mr Corbyn’s standing than he is in cooperation that elevates hers. | A hung parliament provides a lot of opportunities for issue-by-issue political cooperation. But cooperation across the parties may prove more realistic than formal cooperation between the parties. Mrs May is no more interested in cooperation that elevates Mr Corbyn’s standing than he is in cooperation that elevates hers. |
| Backbenchers, on the other hand, are freer. Labour’s Stella Creasy won a big victory of this kind on free abortions for Northern Ireland women last month. This week, backbenchers have another opportunity, providing that they work together, to elect strong and independent-minded chairs of the Commons select committees. The biggest test of this kind, though, is Brexit. There is no majority among MPs for a hard Brexit. Nothing in this parliament matters more than that MPs of all parties should work together in any and every way to prevent that. | Backbenchers, on the other hand, are freer. Labour’s Stella Creasy won a big victory of this kind on free abortions for Northern Ireland women last month. This week, backbenchers have another opportunity, providing that they work together, to elect strong and independent-minded chairs of the Commons select committees. The biggest test of this kind, though, is Brexit. There is no majority among MPs for a hard Brexit. Nothing in this parliament matters more than that MPs of all parties should work together in any and every way to prevent that. |
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