Ongoing scandal is blighting the start of Labour’s conference in Liverpool, and the historical examples of embattled Labour ministers crowing about the Tories are coming thick and fast. The scandal is also running one of Labour’s major policy ideas into the rocks…
New York tourist Angela Rayner’s main campaign in the run up to the General Election was that a new Labour administration would overhaul the standards system. She said in a speech to the Institute for Government in November 2021:
“Under the next Labour government the rules will be strengthened. Enforcement will be toughened up, independent of political control. Labour’s new Independent Ethics & Integrity Commission will oversee and enforce standards in Government, ending the current situation in which the Prime Minister is the judge and jury on every case of ministerial misconduct. We will create a new, genuinely independent Ethics and Integrity Commission.”
Labour has made little progress on the Commission since it was elected. In an update to the Commons in July, Pat McFadden said:
“It is important to restore confidence in Government and public life, and to ensure the best possible standards. This was an important manifesto commitment. We will establish a new independent ethics and integrity commission, with its own independent chair, to ensure the highest possible standards. Work has begun on that, and I will keep the House up to date as it develops.”
Civil service insiders are now wondering how Labour can dismantle the current standards system and replace it with a new Commission, given the current heat. A number of sources looking at the proposals tell Guido that it will be near impossible to take forward given the current situation. Looks like Rayner will not get her political court after all…
Speaking to Sky News off the back of Rachel Reeves’ Air Passenger Duty hike, Ryanair chief executive Michael O’Leary said:
“Labour is dependent on those Red Wall seats, and yet every move she makes poisons economic growth and damages the UK’s recovery… it’s the Chancellor who stumbles from policy misstep to policy misstep… I think her policy decisions are incredibly stupid.”