On Politics Live Brexit  [22Nov2019], Party MEP Ben Habib,  put in an appearance, waving the Brexit “contract”, the Brexit Party alternative to a manifesto.  The Faragists insist that manifestos are untrustworthy and not a set of serious and binding commitments – unlike, apparently,  the Brexit Party “Contract”.

For a contract to have real significance in this context, it would have to have potential legal rather than simply electoral repercussions,  and there was no evidence of this being part of its conception, so I don’t suppose the document is really any different than the other party manifestos, which is to say: a set of aspirations which, should the party in question become our government,  are quite likely to be pushed to one side or otherwise modified in response to the day to day realities of running the country. And of course if you have no serious expectation of governing the country, then your contract/manifesto can gravitate more towards  the wish-list end of the commitment spectrum.  

The Brexit Party “Contract” is a strikingly small document, and indeed Jo Coburn, Chair of Politics Live for the day,  was rather rude about its size and lack of content. Ben Habib is not easily ruffled however and shrugged this off with, I thought, good humour, but then went on to ignore  its contents, and instead, to make attacks on the Manifesto of the Labour Party.  

As he is in property, he felt able to say that Labour plans to build at an  “annual rate of at least 150,000 council and social homes,” are not realistic. Property is indeed his area of expertise.   His Wikipedia entry informs us that “He has discussed in interviews how uncertainty around Brexit could be an opportunity for profit for his business.”  

One cannot doubt that the Labour Party’s house building plans are ambitious.  Ben Habib’s expertise however is evidently in making money out of property, and less  obviously in solving the housing crisis which faces our country. And of course, any programme which focuses on building a large number of affordable houses, will have the probable outcome of stabilising the market and reducing the pickings for property speculators such as Mr Habib. So perhaps he is not the most impartial judge of this particular  policy. 

Ben Habib however went on to take another swipe at the Labour Party Manifesto, arguing that despite “3 years of constitutional crisis in Parliament….there is not a single policy from either of them [Tory or Labour] for constitutional reform.”  

So far as the Labour Party is concerned, this is a serious misrepresentation which I regret to say went unchallenged by Holly Rigby of Momentum, who was also on the panel.  

Actually the Labour Party’s proposals are significant: in summary their plan is that “The renewal of our Parliament will be subject to recommendations made by a UK-wide Constitutional Convention, led by a citizens’ assembly.”  

I am, to declare an interest, a long time member of the Labour Campaign for Electoral Reform, and therefore a strong critic of the Labour Party on this particular matter, where the self interest of sitting Labour politicians, in collusion with a similar set of interests on the Conservative side of Parliament, have continued to prop-up  our deeply flawed First Past the Post Electoral System.  

A Citizens Assembly is no guarantee of the particular reforms which I personally might seek, but would seem to me a fresh way of approaching the reform of our Constitution in a manner which will not just seem like an establishment stitch-up. It is a bold proposal. Had Ben Habib read the Labour Party Manifesto, he might even agree.