31st July 2023
The leader of the opposition is a former litigator, and many litigators have a certain strategy – or at least a set of tactics: a certain cautious approach.
This approach is to think backwards from what may happen at trial – indeed sometimes to think backwards from what may happen with any appeal.
This sort of litigator anticipates what can go wrong with a case and thereby acts to, as far as possible, close the potential problem(s) down.
Other litigators can be more gung-ho, trying to make the most of their case at each and every point, from aggressive letter before action to expansive claim forms. Such litigators often encounter set-backs.
The more cautious litigator looks at everything the other way round, focussing on the strengths of the other side and the weaknesses of their own.
The merit of this approach is that if and when one gets to trial one is less exposed to defeat.
And often not being defeated on key points is enough for a good result.
If both sides adopt this approach then the “winning” party will be the one who has made the fewer mistakes.
But.
Politics is not law, and a general election is not a trial.
Yes, there is a place for mitigating or even eliminating predictable lines of attack.
And that may be enough for a political party to at least avoid a heavy defeat.
It may not, however, be enough to mobilise sufficient support so as to make an outright victory more likely.
For that there needs to be a positive message: to have points that the other party instead needs to mitigate or eliminate.
This is not to say that closing down lines of attack is a bad thing, just that it is not a sufficient thing.
A cautious litigation turn of mind has its place, but campaigning is not litigation.
A political leader – even those who were once lawyers – also needs a political frame of mind.
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So true. Starmer needs to find some passion and what he truly believes in. The electorate like to know where they are being led.
This is fine, and very clear, but …
As a long-time Labour voter, I find it difficult to support them at the moment, because of the pusillanimous response to the Brexit problem, and because of the shamefully weak “two-child” benefit response.
So my vote will be for the Liberal-Democrat candidate – in a safe LD seat. If I were still living in Starmer’s constituency, then it would not be so clear.
I’d be tactical voting for labour anywhere they are the strongest challenger, except in Kiers seat.
I just don’t believe he’ll do anything real to make people’s lives better.
Absolutely spot on! Despite being resolutely anti-Tory, I have no enthusiasm whatsoever for Starmer’s Labour. Best wishes
I have friends who didn’t vote for Brexit, they just didn’t vote. A tactical mistake that has cost one of them their retirement home in France. I am not enamoured with Starmer’s stance on Brexit or the two child cap for benefits, but I will hold my nose and vote for the Labour candidate to put an end to this Tory administration.
Two things.
First, every lawyer reasons backward from adverse consequences. That’s where transactional lawyers add value.
Second, I generally agree with the post’s thesis. I would rephrase it with an American expression: you can’t beat something with nothing. But I’d make an exception for the English (sic) Tory Party. Right now, the Tories are less than nothing. It’s good enough for Labor if voters vote against the Tories. A beige Labour campaign is unsporting, and might mean a few more Lib Dem seats. But any risk hedge has some costs, and they don’t seem very big here.
“every lawyer reasons backward from adverse consequences”
One would like to think so, but I fear this ideal view would not survive seeing many letters before claim.
Perfectly put -I hope he takes heed.
Agreed though I’m not sure Starmer is able to loosen the hold he’s put on himself. It will be a relief for me to vote Labour again after the Corbyn years. I’m not wholly convinced by Starmer but wasn’t wholly convinced by Blair. I think it would be a mistake to focus on trying to get back into the EU much though it broke my heart to leave it and, objectively, thought Brexit could not work and indeed has not worked.
Thinking ahead, the result of the next election is disappointment, misery and penury. The difficulty for Starmer is to make sure it is he who gets the disappointment, misery and penury – for the populace – and £87k/year + expenses + boondoggles for his merry band.
Already becoming a tricky game of ‘have you stopped beating your wife?’. Steering a path between at least six impossible things to believe before breakfast, whilst Mr Sunak dreams up yet more impossible things. A game that will seem important for the next 18 months but will result in disappointment, misery and penury.
Everything you say is clear and true. I would have hoped an intelligent person who is asking the electorate to leave their homes, deal with the onerous identification rules surrounding voting booths and cast their vote for him to lead the nation might have considered by now that he is engaged in a different game than the one he has skills in.
Nothing so far indicates he realises this is the case.
If very many allies and supporters at the moment are considering NOT voting for him and his current ‘direction of travel’, as they are, this tells me he could well fail in his attempt to win office through his own efforts despite the awful competition he faces.
Humans are such contrary beings; it’s often not enough to tell us that ‘there is no alternative’ to further calamity because we’ll burn our hand on the top of the gas hob to test whether that’s true. Our countrymen have done exactly that at least twice in the last decade.
I fear this is an outstanding example of one of the oxymoronic theses of Isabel Hardman in her book, ‘Why We Get the Wrong Politicians’: to get elected, one has to be a good campaigner, but the skill set of a good campaigner is not that of a good law-maker.
Most of the examples we have seen recently in the UK (& US) are the opposite of Starmer—charismatic campaigners, but of little or no substance when it comes to writing and improving laws.
This is compounded by another problem Hardman describes, that of the lack of any induction or training for newly-appointed MPs in how the system works, and how to write good laws.
Finally, there is the factor so well defined in Ian Dunt’s ‘How Westminster Works and Why it Doesn’t’, namely there is now virtually no proper scrutiny of Bills other than the Lords and Select Committees, but their power is limited, as you have so often commented on here.
We are in serious need of parliamentary reform (again, as you have averred a number of times!). Will Starmer have the guts and public-spiritedness to do this (i.e. country before party)?
I hope he is being very canny—keeping his policy powder as bland and dry as possible, and then being unexpectedly proactive if/when he gets into power.
I fear he has read Hilaire Belloc’s “Cautionary Tale” about Charles Augustus Fortescue, but failed to detect any note of satire.