This morning the Labour Party launched The GPC Files. For those of you who aren't terminally online (who am I kidding, you’re reading this Substack), it is a website highlighting spending by government ministers and officials on what are known as Government Procurement Cards. The project and accompanying news headlines are supposed to highlight the shocking waste at the heart of government. However, the only thing that is shocking is what it reveals about the Labour Party’s priorities.
The GPC Files reveals things such as Rishi Sunak and his officials spending a lot of money staying in a five star hotel while at a G7 meeting, diplomats spending thousands of pounds on food and drink, and one department forking out on stationery. Essentially, that’s it. It’s ministers and officials spending money as part of their role. It really should be a non-story, but it does raise questions as to how Labour will govern if elected.
For example, will Sir Keir Starmer travel to international summits via Megabus, stay in youth hostels, and eat nothing but Pot Noodles? I certainly hope not. We should want our senior politicians and their advisers to travel on official business in the most time effective way as possible and we obviously need them to be in close proximity with other world leaders in order for discussions to take place and for security.
Or what about diplomacy under the next Labour government? Will the FCDO simply throw stale bread at visiting diplomats as though they are a feral goose, or will it simply ask that Ambassadors bring a packed lunch? We saw outrage from Labour when Liz Truss spent a few thousand pounds throwing a dinner for the US Trade Representative and her officials, as though it was appropriate to just take a representative of the most powerful nation on Earth to KFC or Wetherspoons. As an interesting aside we did once serve fish & chips to Australian officials in the Foreign Office but this was part of a more informal meeting and Truss had already established a very good working relationship with the Australian HIgh Commissioner.
What about the rest of the civil service? Will officials be expected to pay for their own stationery while undertaking work for the government. I did once write a post about abolishing the paperclip budget but as Alastair Fraser-Urquhart has pointed out, I was making a point not a policy proposal.
For the most part, I don’t even think for a moment that anything would change under a Labour government and nor should it. It does, however, mean that this miserable penny pinching will continue in the civil service. We’ve already seen civil servants attacked by politicians for working from home (despite the fact that in many departments there simply isn’t enough space for all of them). We see faux outrage in the tabloids about them having an occasional coffee at the taxpayers’ expense or subsidised sandwiches rather than gruel. This is demoralising for people doing important work and who continued to work hard for the good of the country during the pandemic. As I’ve written before, treating civil servants in this way and not increasing their pay will further demoralise and see many of the best people leave. If we want to continue enjoying the benefits of a Rolls Royce civil service then Labour needs to abandon this negative mindset.
It also fuels the idea that all politicians are out of touch with their snouts in the trough. While it is true that some politicians are like this, it obviously isn’t the case for the overwhelming majority of them who are just trying to do the best job they can for their constituency and country. Such stories engender mistrust and disillusionment in politics. Is this really what Labour wants to be doing as it prepares to start running the country?
Perhaps most seriously, it reveals a lack of seriousness in the Labour Party. It is no surprise that this project has been led by Emily Thornberry. I personally think that Thornberry is an excellent communicator and would no doubt be a great laugh down the pub. However, my opinion of her as a politician is that she is deeply unserious. She was the Shadow Trade Secretary when I was advising Truss and I saw her priorities through her use of Parliamentary Questions.
It is obviously right that the Opposition holds the government to account but the questions which Thornberry constantly asked showed that she had very little interest or understanding of trade policy. For example, pretty much every question asked was about Truss meeting think tanks and other groups such as the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA). Numerous questions would come in about who Truss met with, which officials were present, how much was spent on food etc. I could see why Thornberry was doing it as it was sure to stir up controversy in the Westminster Bubble and on Twitter but had nothing to do with the serious issues facing the country or the struggles of normal people. Rather than developing a trade policy which would benefit the UK or highlighting the issues with the government’s policies, Thornberry preferred to focus on trivial issues.
It is disappointing that this way of thinking seems to be permeating throughout the entire Labour Party. This country is facing a lot of problems which need to be urgently addressed through various policy reforms. This will require a lot of serious thinking in order to come up with a plan which is credible, workable, and can bring the electorate on board. Instead, Labour is focussed on headline grabbing froth.
I’ve been deeply encouraged by Sir Keir Starmer’s reforms to the Labour Party. He has got rid of the cranks and the anti-semites from the party and is a vast improvement on his predecessor who seemed to see it as a day wasted if he wasn’t siding with one of the UK’s enemies. Moreover, I’ve been impressed by Wes Streeting who seems to be reform minded. Labour needs to stop focussing on froth and get back to working on serious policy issues if it has any hope of solving the country’s problems.