Theresa May’s Conservative government is less united and less powerful than it may seem. It has a small and vulnerable majority, remains divided on what kind of relationship it wants with the European Union, and disagrees on some key political issues like the role, if any, that grammar schools should play in secondary education.
Even the current urgent crisis on care for elderly and disabled adults is a source of argument. Should local councils, starved of resources after years of heavy cuts, be held to their statutory responsibilities, or is the crisis so extensive that only government responses will suffice – higher national taxes or an increase in national insurance contributions to meet the evident suffering of the old, the sick and the poor?
Proposing a precept of a few percent more on council taxes will lead to greater burdens on local businesses: some will be bankrupted, shops and offices will close, and more areas of our towns and cities will become derelict.
Yet the government has faced little effective opposition, not because of its majority but because the opposition parties fail to work together, even though on many issues there is no difference of principle or conviction between them, and there is a clear opposition to the Conservatives. On the survival of the NHS, the need to tackle care for the sick and elderly at a national level, the commitment to comprehensive education, greater fairness in taxation and on tackling poverty, there is little if any reason why cross-party opposition campaigns could not be forged.
The Brexit negotiations will involve a review of all the laws and rules the UK accepted as part of agreed European legislation. Once the negotiations begin in earnest, the best part of the European Union’s welfare and employment rights heritage will be at great risk. For parties of the centre and centre left, it is vital to fight to retain employment rights, such as provision for parental leave, rest time and holiday entitlement. If these are abolished, thousands of people will be worse off. But the opposition work required will demand time and effort from all the progressive parties, working together.
Sadly, despite the urgency, the opposition parties are not working together. Tribalism, not least in the Labour party, dominates, and provides the government with a green light for its more extreme policies. What we have to do is sit down, take each one of the issues on which we are broadly in agreement, and work out how best, in parliament and elsewhere, we can support a common policy. For instance, in the case of the NHS we could strongly argue for a continued immigration policy that allows men and women from other countries who are prepared to work in the health service to come to the UK. In the case of the council precept, we need to put together the outline of a national policy for care. And on civil liberties issues such as detention without trial, we could agree on the position that there should be a limit on how long anyone can be detained.
The parties of the centre and left are highly unlikely to merge or become one party. But they could surely forge progressive alliances on issues and surely agree to protect and defend the common ground based on values we already share, above all to protect the poor and those in need. The price of tribalism is conceding to the government so much that we value in our society.
The only way to beat the Tories is for opposition parties to work together | Shirley Williams
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