Wednesday 23 January 2024 – Living the Dream
“It’s the economy, stupid!” This was the answer of one of Bill Clinton’s political advisers in the 1992 presidential election campaign to the question, what is the most important issue to the electorate? He was right and Clinton defeated the incumbent Republican, George Bush Snr. Other politicians have gone on to win general elections by focussing their political campaigns on the state of the economy. Republican nominee, Ronald Reagan, asked the electorate in 1980, “Are you better off now than you were four years ago?” President Jimmy Carter’s answer was a resounding “no” and in the final, crucial days of the campaign, his polling numbers tanked.
Margaret Thatcher told the UK in 1979 that “labour isn’t working” in reference to the high unemployment rate under James Callaghan’s Labour Government.
In 1957, painting a rosy picture of the UK economy, Conservative Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan, informed us that we “have never had it so good.”
Conservative Party campaign poster
in the 1979 General Election focusses on the economy and is thought to have
been pivotal to them winning the election.
There have been exceptions where general
elections have been won on issues other than the economy, but they have been strange
times. Clem Attlee’s Labour Party surprisingly
defeated Winston Churchill in the 1945 election on a post-war wave of socialism:
that the country should be more equal and its working classes and soldiers
returning home who had suffered, fought and defeated fascism, deserved social
security, universal healthcare and decent housing. It didn’t last long and the Tories won a
re-election in 1951 but only after promising to retain the principles of Attlee,
William Beveridge and Nye Bevan. Boris
Johnson won a landslide victory in 2019 with the slogan “Get Brexit Done” helped
by the underlying racism not being challenged by political commentators (see Spectemur
Agendo).
Johnson didn’t necessarily win because he was popular. According to pre-election polling data, his approval rating was deeply in the negative and he was perceived as a racist with published comments such as “Islam is the problem”, compared women wearing burkas to “letterboxes” and described Africans as “pickanninies”. He had a reputation as an untrustworthy, upper-class buffoon demonstrated with aplomb when he started to recite Kipling’s Road to Mandalay about the glory of British imperialism inside the Buddhist Shwedong Pagoda in Yangon, Myanmar. Still he won the election probably because his main opponent, Jeremy Corbyn, unlike Bill Clinton before him, focussed his campaign not on the economy but on greater equality. The electorate thought this was crazy talk and he was duly ousted by the Labour Party as a crank.
Theresa May put a similar focus on Brexit rather than the economy in 2017 (elections were coming thick and fast in those days) which was considered disastrous, losing her a large Parliamentary majority. But this may have been exacerbated by her campaign slogan of “Brexit Means Brexit” which, ironically, no-one knew what it meant. In reality, she appeared to be pursuing a policy of a sensible exit from Europe; an oxymoron that fell between two stools and appealed to neither the fanatics nor Remoaners.
These have all been national elections and the Government can do a great deal to affect the economy with its fiscal, monetary and regulatory levers. The electorate very much see economic hardship as the responsibility of Central Government. However, I don’t think they see local government as a driver of their economic fortunes. Instead, voters see the role of councils as to deliver services. Council tax raised from residents is largely spent on delivering expensive services to a small minority. Adult and children’s social care account for about 70% of a London borough’s budget. Adult social care statutory spend requirements are forecast to rise steeply in 2024/25 with inflation, an aging population and reduced provision in the NHS for geriatric care. Social housing is still an expensive service but with shrinking stocks as populations rise. Only a small number of schools in H&F are still under council control. These services do not affect most households who nonetheless pay for it but, to not fund it would be unthinkable (and illegal). Universal services such as bins collection, highway maintenance and parks are of political importance to voters. But economic development? Isn’t this the job of Central Government? Is the health of the economy anything a council can affect? Do geographical areas as small as Hammersmith & Fulham have their own economies? I sense that residents do not hold the council responsible for this and most probably don’t know their council even tries to develop the economy. What would they even do?
The council’s new Corporate Plan was published on 15 December (see The Little Things). Part of it focusses on economic development which pertains to what my service’s plan is, and will be, and one wonders if these ambitions are a rarefied thing; more obsessions of the small number of cabinet members building an empire in one of the richest corners of the planet rather than of any concern of residents, whether he or she both lives and works in the borough (unlikely other than for those who are employed by the council itself) or is affected by poverty and excluded long-term from the jobs market.
The Plan jumps around and repeats itself but
if I may collate some excerpts into a coherent order:
1. “…around £5bn [has been] invested [in the borough] since 2017,
2. “Our challenge is not only ensuring this growth
continues, but that all our residents can benefit from the opportunities it
brings.
3. “Our ambition is to continue to improve H&F’s
position as a global economic hotspot…
4. “…we will take our Industrial Strategy to its
next phase to reflect the evolving needs of businesses and residents…”
I’m not sure how we know how much money global business has invested within the arbitrary borders that make up the London Borough of Hammersmith & Fulham as distinct from the rest of London and it’s also unclear from this “Plan” why the council thinks it had anything to do with it. It certainly doesn’t go on to say, or what we plan to do to effect “our ambition” to “continue to improve H&F’s position as a global economic hotspot”, but I suspect that having the good fortune to be located in Zone 2 of one of the three richest global cities on the planet along with New York and Tokyo (and possibly Los Angeles, Paris, Frankfurt and Beijing) and being in a historical corridor of tech industry, has more to do with it than anything our Leader thought a council could have influenced, and our team delivered. What message is the council giving to our residents that their council tax is used for? These four points summarising the plan can themselves be summarised as:
1. Businesses invest in Central London (and we’ve made up a round number that sounds plausible without any reference to where we are pretending we got it from),
2. From this, we’ve identified a challenge that
has seemingly nothing to do with local government or anything it can affect, at
least not that is explained here…
3. …and we have taken on this challenge…
4. …and our plan to achieve this challenge is to
come up with a plan.
Brilliant! And to illustrate this, here is a councillor standing atop luxury flats being built for foreign investors on what was council land:
H&F
Cabinet member for Education (in the forefront) atop luxury flats being built
on an old school site, EdCity.
Assuming that residents care and that this is
nothing to do with how smug this councillor unfortunately looks in the
picture overseeing her prosperous empire, other than hand over schools land to
developers, what can a local authority do to improve the area as an economic
hotspot and promote inward investment?
What is the Assistant Director for Economic Development and his sidekick
Head of [Industrial] Strategy up to that is so lightly breezed over in the new Corporate
Plan?
In a “thought paper” sent round yesterday, the Head of Strategy breaks down his plan into two parts: an offer to businesses to promote inward investment and asking for planning contributions from developers (S106). His plan “is set against a backdrop of continued development in the borough with the anticipated expansion of White City and the re-development of Earls Court, Olympia and the Civic Campus, creating more opportunities for future growth.”
An
aerial photo of White City in the Corporate Plan, and the ongoing development
of buildings.
He explains that “the key to building
successful, long-term relationships with major corporate businesses” such as
those that might move into the commercial buildings being constructed in White
City, Earls Court and Olympia (the council is moving into the Civic Campus
when it is done so I’m not sure why this is on his list), “is to understand
their wants and needs and to provide tailored solutions based on these needs. This forms the foundations for reciprocal relationships
where each party can influence and benefit each other in different ways. It is therefore important that our offer
provides both “asks” and “gives” to help trust and create opportunities for greater
future collaboration. This paper
therefore provides a broad menu of options to appeal to the different interests
and priorities of corporate businesses. Initial
research and one-to-one discussions with individual businesses will determine
what options to focus on.”
As an economic strategy, this all seems a bit nebulous and strongly reliant on the expectation of pally, and frankly cultish, mason-like relationships between council Economic Development officers and captains of industry. It’s a far cry from the levers held by Central Government of fiscal spend, taxation, interest rates and regulation.
Hmmm, what do developers and businesses want from the council…? They mostly want under-priced land owned by the council to develop with little or no planning obligations to contribute to the local infrastructure such as training and jobs for local residents. A new school and nursery are being built on EdCity in White City as part of the agreement to give them the land but with 132 new flats on top in three towers between five and eight storeys tall.
The Corporate Plan wants “local residents to be included” in the economic development of the borough and gain “good quality jobs being created” in the tech sector “in STEM” (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics). Let’s ignore for a minute that most development to which our Economic Development S106 policy has and will relate is residential and, otherwise, most commercial development is offices, White City, including the old BBC Studios site, is being transformed into a tech centre with Imperial College London building a new campus in it. One may presume STEM jobs will be created here. But the Head of Strategy (HoS) gives little thought to developers and businesses offering training and jobs in his thought paper. Instead, he goes on with his “menu of options” starting with “gives” to developers. He proposes a Business Relationship Manager (BRM) post in the council:
“Effective business engagement is often hampered from the outset by the difficulties businesses face in navigating the right contact… within the Council [ranging] from business rates queries to planning permission requests, road closure requests through to late night licencing requests.”
So the first “give” is a single-point-of-contact BRM. Why the BRM should have any more luck navigating how crap the council is administratively, he doesn’t say. The second reciprocal “give” and “ask” on the menu is focussed on schools and colleges:
“Creating clear career pathways from nursery to adult education is at the forefront of our thinking. Apprenticeships, internships, work experience placements and integrating business influence into the classroom all have a role to play in creating a borough where everyone has the chance to succeed. Businesses can play a meaningful role in working with schools and adult education providers to plug future skills gaps and can also use local recruitment resources to further enhance the diversity of their workforce.”
So, careers education? We already do that. It’s already a thing. Specifically, it is already a required S106 contribution in the council’s planning policy that he is rewriting here, albeit determining and directing the career trajectories of toddlers in nursery is an Orwellian addition. Employers working with adult skills providers is also already a well-established thing with accredited training centres, Further Education colleges, universities and Jobcentre Plus leading on this, and already strategic partners of the council, and it is already an obligation in our S106 policy. Central and regional government has also experimented in the last decade with vocational skills academies replacing GCSEs for some pupils and T-Levels [the “T” standing for “Technical”] replacing A-Levels and BTECs for some, with little success to compare to a more traditional academic education, but the HoS doesn’t explain why he is proposing to duplicate these existing vocational education pathways.
For young people with a learning disability, the HoS mixes existing S106 policy with Victorian attitudes by categorising all “disabled people” as having a learning difficulty. He proposes a supported internship model where job descriptions are carved out to meet the specific abilities of learners who are then supported in the workplace by a teacher. Again, this is already a thing and already an “ask” in our S106 policy for employers to host learners. That, uniquely, our council doesn’t have a supported internship model is more a reflection of the capability of officers in the Special Educational Needs (SEN) Team (see How Rather Than Why) rather than of any economic insight by the HoS, and further evidence that the BRM is a doomed role.
The thought paper continues by listing contributions to greener construction and business practices, “Equity” (I think he means “Equality”), Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) training, and philanthropic contributions to community, health, environmental and council initiatives (note: it’s not philanthropy if you are being made to make a contribution), all “asks” already specified in either the council’s planning and social value policies to the point where he has duplicated the council’s thematic approach to the existing menu. He also adds that culture infrastructure as a major economic contributor should be considered.
But the main focus of the Industrial Strategy and the main aim of the Leader and his Cabinet is inward investment: he wants more businesses doing their business in Hammersmith & Fulham so residents of Hammersmith & Fulham can have jobs and careers in Hammersmith & Fulham and, like Nick Hornby, live the dream. The HoS’s strategic inward investment “give” is a “…hand-holding service [which] can include supporting them with logistical arrangements such as deliveries to buildings [and] road closure permits to get equipment into buildings.” Other than we couldn’t support the logistics of a brewery by making arrangements such as a piss-up, is this really enough “to continue to improve H&F’s position as a global economic hotspot”? Developers building commercial buildings are already at the top of their game in inward investment. In Earls Court Development Company’s planning and social value presentation in September to which only I and their assigned Planning Officer attended, they spoke of the offices, universities, creative and culture centres, and housing they are building and that they are already talking to Microsoft about basing their European Headquarters there from 2029 rather than Dublin, Berlin or Paris. If not, I don’t think Bill Gates would have been otherwise swayed by an offer to help them move the furniture in, which we will undoubtedly botch. And this thought paper was prepared in advance of his meeting with the Strategic Planning Team today to discuss updating the council’s Economic Development S106 policy in time to inform the contributions required in the planning application for Earls Court.
“What I need to understand”, the AD said gesticulating animatedly with his hands in that bumptious way he has about him as if he was about to say something profound and strategic, “is, what is the timeline for when we need to start considering S106 asks for Earls Court?”
The Head of Strategic Planning paused. He now looked worried. “S106 negotiations started in September. They have our current economic development policy but have been asked to wait for the new policy before they add their proposed contributions to the planning application. The application is due to be submitted in June.”
It was now the AD’s turn to pause and look worried. How could he not know this?! “We have been having cuddly meetings with the ECDC directors”, he eventually said. And that is the scope of both his strategy and his ability in economic development: he can shake hands with business leaders in a special and specific way that says, “We’re not going to try to govern you but please reciprocate by looking like you might give us something no matter how small.”
By this method, developers may get a warm, “cuddly” feeling but Earls Court Development Company has already presented (to me and Strategic Planning at least) plans for jobs, skills training, environmental standards, cultural centres, education, business incubators and support, and attracting large tech companies to the borough, and these good intentions led by Transport for London, who owns the land and imposing the Mayor of London’s economic development objectives on them, will happen no matter how feeble the council’s Industrial Strategy, Economic Development planning policy or the AD for Economic Development.
At the opposite end of the “Good Intentions” scale, the new Development Director for White City was not employed because of her knowledge of planning, development, economic development or STEM or because she is cuddly, but because she is a cold, hard-nosed negotiator (see Selecting Our Leaders) and, unlike ECDC’s social approach to development, she will be in no mood for reciprocating the above “gives” and, instead, will tear strips off the clueless AD and his HoS.
Olympia, with its cultural offer of a new exhibition centre and state-of-the-art theatre, is well under way and due for completion in September, before the council will have got out of the blocks with a strategy. And the tenants of the Civic Campus is the council and I’m not sure how we can glad-hand ourselves.
The Institute for Fiscal Studies hasn’t yet provided any conclusions on these “thoughts” and strategy but I don’t think they’re losing any sleep over the potential impact to the central London economy. After reading the Corporate Plan, and with Laurel and Hardy in charge of implementing the Leader's personal dream of a Republic of Hammersmith & Fulham, I’m still unclear on what the council is doing to attract the next “£5bn” of investment.
The
Guard (2011): Authorities such as Agent Wendell Everett of the FBI struggle
to explain where they get their economic valuations from:
Agent Everett: “Now the DA believes they have somewhere in the vicinity of five hundred million dollars worth of cocaine onboard…
Inspector Stanton: “Er, that’s half a billion, lads. Half a billion.”
E: “Er… thankyou Inspector Stanton, yes, that’s half… half a billion.”
Sgt. Boyle: “Street value.”
E: “Excuse me!?”
B: “Street value! You lads are always announcing a seizure of drugs worth a street value of ten million dollars or twenty million dollars or half a billion dollars. I was always wondering what street it is you’re buying your cocaine on because it’s not the same street as I’m buying my cocaine on.”
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