The Rebels

The historian contemplating the Blair decade may seize upon three expressions which—some might say—define the former Prime Minister's contribution to British political life: ‘New Labour’, ‘control freakery’ and ‘Iraq’—analysed, conveniently, by the three books under review. In his account of British policy on Iraq, Kettell draws attention to the ‘all-pervasive strictures of party discipline’. Since most MPs are reliant on currying favour with their party for career advancement, ‘the result is to create mass ranks of MPs who are little more than docile lobby-fodder’ in the hands of the leadership' (Kettell: 17). Cowley expands a little: the Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP) is full of ‘tame, compliant career politicians’, ‘gutless and feeble ... terrified to follow their own consciences ... led by the nose to vote for almost everything put before them ... a flock of tame sheep’ (p. 1). Such, he notes, is the received wisdom, trotted-out regularly by commentators, accepted without demur throughout most of the media. As a description of Labour backbenchers, it suffers from a single fault: it is entirely false. Cowley has a story that he is determined to tell—and he tells it with panache and in a fluent and exuberant style: the belief that Labour MPs are a spineless butch of toadies bullied, cajoled and bribed into submission is an entirely without foundation. And he has marshalled the evidence to substantiate his case

Ideology · Political science · Politics · Prime minister · Sociology · Law · Political and Economic history of UK and US