The Murphy/Dugdale era

It’s just been announced that Jim Murphy has been elected leader of Labour’s Scottish Branch Office with a vote share of 22.36% (MPs/MSPs) + 20.14% (party members) + 13.26% (affiliates), and Kezia Dugdale has been elected depute leader.

The Guardian has some interesting information from his victory speech:

1. he doesn’t intend to lose a single Labour seat to the SNP in next May’s general election
2. he’s not trying to convince yes voters that they were wrong
3. he will make clear where he intends to stand for Holyrood in the new year
4. Kezia Dugdale will take on first minister’s questions in the Scottish parliament in the interim

Let’s have a quick look at these four points:

Firstly, holding on to all of Labour’s Scottish seats sounds about as likely as the SNP losing all of theirs. It’s certainly possible the SNP won’t do nearly as well as predicted by current polls, and I would have thought a realistic goal for Labour would have been to remain Scotland’s largest party in terms of Westminster seats, but he seems to be setting himself up for failure here.

Secondly, if you don’t convince the (ex-)Labour Yes voters that they were wrong to vote in favour of independence, why on Earth would they vote Labour again? Surely voting Labour only makes sense if you swallow the Unionist bait hook, line and sinker? I’m not at all sure that a argument along the lines of “let’s just agree to disagree on independence, but you must admit Labour’s commitment to continued austerity, as well as our track record on conducting illegal wars, is admirable” will go down at all well with many Scottish voters.

Thirdly, it’s interesting Murphy only intends to comment on where he’ll stand for Holyrood, not when. Surely the most interesting question is whether he can convince somebody to vacate their seat soon (potentially costing them £58.000), or whether he’ll have to remain in Westminster for ages. It sounds like there’ll be a lot of arm-twisting going on around Labour’s Christmas tree this Yuletide. It will also be interesting to see whether he’ll stand for his Westminster seat in May if he doesn’t find a Holyrood seat in time, or whether he’ll state soon that his constituency party needs to find a new candidate now. Also, what will be his role in Westminster for now? Will he be leading the Scottish MPs, or will he basically be a general without an army?

Fourthly, it will be interesting to see how well Kezia Dugdale can present Jim Murphy’s policies at Holyrood. When Nicola Sturgeon did the same for Alex Salmond, at least he was already a household name with well-known views, but Murphy will somehow need to backpedal frantically away from his New Labour past in absentia, which will be fun to watch.

To conclude, it will be fascinating to observe whether the Scottish Branch Office will tread water or collapse during the Murphy/Dugdale era. Murphy is certainly a very capable politician, but also one of the least liked MPs in Scotland — many people here in East Renfrewshire seem to develop an acute rash whenever they see him. Perhaps he’ll manage to ditch all his former views and present himself in a way that will appeal to Scottish Labour voters. Perhaps he’ll present himself as the unifying figure for all right-of-centre Unionist voters, whether Labour, Tory or LibDem, but losing Labour’s traditional supporters in the process. Or perhaps he’ll simply be a failure, presiding over such a catastrophic loss in the next two elections that his leadership will be extremely short-lived. We live in interesting times.