The Scottish Labour Party: ‘The Old Firm‘ of Scottish Politics

Neil McGarvey Department of Government

University of Strathclyde Glasgow G1 1XQ

n.mcgarvey@strath.ac.uk

Workshop: Dominant Parties and Democracy ECPR Joint Sessions, Granada, 14-19 April 2005

Working Draft

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Introduction Scottish football is consistently ridiculed in England and across Europe due to the dominance of the two ‘Old Firm’ clubs – Celtic and Rangers.1 In Scottish politics the dominance of the Labour Party in recent decades has been even more consistent – the party has not ‘lost’ (in terms of seats won) a UK General Election in Scotland since 1959. Labour’s dominance, unlike one could argue the Old Firm, is not based on appeal to religious cleavages and identity. It has been based on a combination of appeals to class, the idea of social justice, projecting itself as the defenders of Scotland’s interests and the collapse of its main opposition party. Numerous analysts have noted Labour’s dominant position in Scottish politics. Donnachie et al refer to, ‘Labour’s hegemony nationally and locally in much of urban-industrial Scotland during the past fifty years’ (1989: 1). Hassan refers to the Scottish Labour Party as

one of the most important and defining institutions in the last 100 years plus of Scotland … an institutionalised party – blurring the boundaries between party and state (2004: 1-4).

Irvine similarly refers to it as, ‘Scotland’s establishment party’ (2004: 225), as do Saren and McCormick (2004: 100). For MacWhirter, ‘The Scottish political classes … remain … Labour dominated and shaped by the Labour state’ (2002: 35). The paper will utilise the Scottish Labour Party’s dominance of politics in Scotland as a case study of one-party dominance. It will seek to address four questions: • Does the Scottish Labour Party qualify as a ‘dominant party’ under the

criteria set out by the literature? • What impact has devolution had on the Scottish Labour Party? • What are the implications of its dominance for democracy in Scotland? • Is the party’s dominance likely to continue for the foreseeable future? The dominant party literature sets out some rather stringent criteria that few parties in advanced liberal democracies can match up to. However, given the Scottish Labour Party’s longitudinal electoral success, it will be argued that although not strictly meeting all the criteria the party’s position in Scotland is such that it does qualify as dominant. It will suggest an expansion of the criteria in order to capture the multi-faceted nature of Labour’s dominance. The historical and contemporary political context will be outlined in order that an

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appreciation of Scottish Labour’s position can be gained. At the end of the paper, some of the consequences of Labour’s dominance will be highlighted. It will be suggested that its dominance is likely decline due to a number of developments in Scottish politics. One Party Dominance The first thing to say is that one party dominance of the type enjoyed by the Scottish Labour Party is rare in advanced liberal democracies. There have been many attempts to define such systems – see Bogaards (2004) for a review. Ware suggests the category of predominant party systems ‘has always contained a small, and declining, number of exemplars’ (1996: 160). The Scottish Labour Party is quite exceptional in comparative terms for the duration of its electoral dominance. 2 Fluidity and party change is usually deemed to be the ‘normal’ mode of electoral and party political in advanced liberal democracies. As Pempel notes,

What makes long-term rule by a single political party among the industrialized democracies an enticing puzzle is not just that it is rare but that it is not supposed to happen (1990: 5).

One party dominance raises a serious of questions about the operation of democracy in the country in which it occurs. It tends to raise questions about party-bureaucratic and state-civil society relations. These questions become highly relevant in a small polity such as Scotland with an electorate of only 3.9 million. One of the first questions raised in comparative studies of dominance is how one should define or measure it. There have been various attempts to do this. Duverger suggests,

A party is dominant when it is identified with an epoch, when its doctrines, ideas, methods, its style, so to speak, coincide with those of the epoch … A dominant party is that which public opinion believes to be dominant (1963: 2-3)

Sartori refers to a ‘predominant party system’ (note the different terminology), this being when one party ‘outdistances all the others’ (Sartori 1976: 193). In predominant party systems the main party is faced by a divided opposition – even the second largest party has difficulty in expanding its support base to become a potential rival (Ware 1996: 159). A predominant party relies on identification with it as ‘the party of the nation’ (1996: 160). In Scotland the

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Labour Party has for the past 25 years been projecting itself as thus. During the Conservative years it was the defender of Scottish interests, and since 1997 it has been running government machinery in Scotland. This paper will utilise that outlined by Pempel (1990). He suggests ‘the dominant party must dominate the electorate, other political parties, the formation of governments, and the public policy agenda’ (1990: 4). For Pempel, the experience of long-term dominance is deemed to raise troubling questions about the ‘trueness’ of a nation’s democracy, as the ability of citizens to change their government is often cited as a hallmark of democracy (1990: 7). Moreover, if a party stays in power for a lengthy period it can have serious consequences as it,

can use the resources of the state to reshape society in its own image, to reward its adherents, and to deny such rewards to its opponents, it has the potential to make semi-permanent minorities out of certain portions of its citizenry (Pempel 1990: 7)

Pempel suggests that the literature of political parties and party systems has been dominated by a focus on party activities as electoral machines with little attention played to other key roles. The input side (party organisation, candidate selection, electioneering etc) has dominated research to the neglect of the outputs – political decisions and material policies (1990: 8-9). This paper will utilise Pempel’s (1990: 3-4) four dimensions of single party dominance:

• Dominant in number. It must gain a plurality of the seats available to it. • Dominant bargaining position. It must hold a strategic position whereby it is highly unlikely that any administration could be formed without its inclusion. • Dominant chronologically. It must be the core of a nations government for a period beyond a few years. The Labour Party has not ‘lost’ a Scottish election in terms of votes won since 1959. • Dominant governmentally. Its long-standing presence in government should mean its public policy programme shapes the national policy agenda.

Utilising these criteria it will be suggested that the Scottish Labour Party does not necessarily qualify as dominant. However, as Pempel himself acknowledges (1990: 2) it is important to treat parties as not simply electoral machines but as organisers of interests in wider civil society as well formulators of government

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and implementers of public policies (Pempel 1990: 2). As the extent of Labour’s dominance in Scotland is not captured by these first four criteria I have suggested two additions:

• Dominant at all levels of democracy. It must have significant presence at sub-nation/state levels of government

• Dominant in civic society. It must through patronage and presence exert significant influence on politically importance institutions beyond the state.

Prior to assessing the status of the Scottish Labour Party under each criteria the paper will proceed by clarifying Scotland’s governing relations in the UK and give a brief historical overview of the Scottish party and its status within the British Labour Party. Scotland and the UK: A Brief Political History Despite the union with England in 1707 Scotland has always retained certain elements of ‘nationhood’. Scotland’s distinct heritage, geography, civil society, distinctive legal and educational system, religion, sporting institutions, media have all contributed to Scottish consciousness of separate national identity. The historic nation of Scotland was not simply absorbed into the unitary UK State – it retained features of statehood. The Scottish Office, established in 1885, provided a powerful administrative apparatus that had a degree of decision-making and administrative autonomy in certain sectors until 1999. It was responsible for Scottish policy in areas such as education, housing, health, economic development, social services, planning, transport, agriculture, fisheries, law and order, prisons. It had a degree of discretion in the exercise of its responsibilities, as well as ability to develop and implement UK policy and policy guidance that matched the specific needs and requirements of all or part of Scotland. There is some debate over the extent of its governing autonomy. Some suggest it was limited and it generally took its lead from UK departments in Whitehall (Midwinter et al 1991). Others tend to emphasise the autonomous role political elites in Scotland enjoyed (Brown et al 1997: 93), in the ‘partial’ union (Paterson 2000: 2). McCrone argues,

Scotland’s professional classes – lawyers, doctors, teachers, churchmen – while socially conservative, embody the institutional survival of distinctive Scottish ‘civil society’, and can be considered as keepers of native institutions (1992: 143)

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No matter your view as regards the autonomy of the Scottish Office it is difficult to argue with the idea that its existence encouraged a conception of Scotland as a political, and not merely a cultural, entity (Mitchell 2004). Brown et al (1997) emphasize how the Scottish Office and its associated policy networks were very important in promoting Scottish distinctiveness and identity as well as allowing administrative and policy autonomy within the Union. Midwinter et al project a more bland, mundane picture of Scottish politics as a policy process dominated by administrative policymakers. From the 1970s onwards feeling of difference and identity in Scotland were accentuated. This became particularly evident during the 17 years of Conservative Party rule (1979-1997). The Thatcher administrations were notoriously unpopular in Scotland with Conservative Party support declining dramatically (see table 2 below). The Conservative Party was one that only achieved a minority of the vote in Scotland. Perceptions of a ‘democratic deficit’ grew with Scottish government being run by a party that was perceived to be alien to Scottish interests. This placed a strain on the UK. The 18 years of Conservative rule in Britain, the rise of the constitutional issue and declining support for the Conservative Party in Scotland served to reinforce that Scottish politics was becoming more distinct from the rest of Britain. Working in the Scottish Constitutional Convention, a multi-party/institutional body that brought together many interests in Scottish civil society, the Scottish Labour Party in opposition contributed to plans to establish a Scottish Parliament. After the party’s landslide victory at the 1997 UK General Election these proposals were subject to a referendum later that years and overwhelmingly endorsed. The first Scottish parliamentary elections were held in 1999 (see table 5 for an outline of the responsibilities of the new parliament). The Scottish and the British Labour Party Before assessing the Scottish Labour Party’s status as a dominant party it would be useful to clarify its relationship with the British Labour Party. The roots of the UK Labour Party actually lie in Scotland with Keir Hardie’s founding of the Scottish Labour Party in 1888. The Labour Party in Scotland had no formal status within the UK Party. The Scottish Labour Party’s online site explicitly states that the party ‘is an integral party of the British Labour Party’ (http://www.scottishlabour.org.uk). This has always been the case. For the most part of its history the party in Scotland has prioritised broader British social and economic questions above the constitutional one in Scotland. It first established itself as the leading party in Scotland in 1923 when it won 35.9% of the vote and 34 MPs in Scotland. James Ramsey MacDonald, a Scot,

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became Labour’s first UK Prime Minister in January 1924. It is difficult to disagree with Harvie’s (1989) point that Scottish Labour made a significant contribution to the nature of the British Labour Party in the early 20th century. Through figures such as Keir Hardie, Ramsey MacDonald and John Wheatley a clear mark was made in terms of Labour leadership, language and ideology. According to Finlay, the Scottish Parliamentary Labour Party’s activities in the 1920s reflected a ‘wives and weans’ rather than a theoretical socialism i.e. it was first and foremost committed to looking after the welfare of the working class and an ethical belief in social justice rather than grandiose plans of reshaping the state (Finlay 2004: 26). One could argue that this form of ‘socialism’ (heavily influenced by trade unions) has had a lasting and lingering effect on the Scottish Labour Party. The British Labour Party has a relatively centralised organised structure and constitution which does not pay any great attention to Britain’s sub-national boundaries. McKenzie (1964: 240) dismissed the role of regions (as Scotland has been) in the overall distribution of power within the Labour party – they exist to ‘manage’ the party in the region with no role in policy development. The Labour Party in Scotland has however produced its own election manifesto since 1959 (it also produced one in 1950) (Mitchell 2001). Traditionally the Scottish manifesto is a tartanised version of the British one i.e. broadly similar but with the Scottish dimension stressed. Like all of Scotland’s political parties, with the possible exception of the Conservatives until recently, it has increasingly adopted the language and symbols of Scotland. In the 1980s and 90s it increasingly portrayed itself as representing and defending Scotland’s interests in Westminster and Whitehall. Its policy stance on devolution was projected it as being responsive to Scottish public opinion. In the 1980s Scottish Labour provided ‘the ballast and stability when the party was on the rocks’ (Hassan 2004: 15). After Labour’s third election defeat in a row in 1987 a new internal pressure group called Scottish Labour Action (SLA) was established. This group campaigned for greater autonomy for the Scottish Labour Party. In 1989 the party joined others interests in Scottish politics at the first meeting of the Scottish Constitutional Convention. It produced its first report Towards Scotland’s Parliament in 1990, which was reflected in Labour’s 1992 manifesto commitment to devolution. The Scottish Labour Party over the period of UK Conservative rule (1979-1997) increasingly viewed devolution as a useful protection shield against the worst excesses of a right-wing UK Government imposing alien policies on a non-receptive Scottish electorate. Increasingly the argument emerged that the

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Scottish branch of the party had a ‘Scottish mandate’ as it was the majority party in Scotland. Scottish Labour’s participation in the cross-party Constitutional Convention was undoubtedly a watershed in their history. Scottish Westminster Labour MPs and a large majority of their local councillors are accustomed to a culture of one-party rule. The Labour party, until the 1980s, had a ‘detached attitude to cross-party organisations … a legacy of Labour’s traditional suspicion of inter-party collaboration’ (Keating 2005: 49). The Constitutional Convention met between 1989-95 led to ‘Labour’s acceptance of perestroika in the shape of proportional representation ending that semi-East European ‘leading role of the Party’ which had throttled Scots pluralism’ (Harvie 2004: 61). The Scottish Labour Party made a pragmatic choice in 1990 in accepting the principle of PR for the Scottish Parliament. Although it should be remembered the vote in favour of it was very close and won only by behind the scenes trade union vote fixing and an underlying recognition that failure to take the Constitutional Convention forward would be electorally unpopular. It should also be noted that the electoral system adopted, as once acknowledged by Jack McConnell (The Scottish Parliamentary Labour Leader and First Minister) in a radio broadcast, is one designed to ensure the SNP will struggle to gain anything close to a parliamentary majority. In the 1990s the process of tartanisation continued. In March 1994 the party dropped the official title of ‘Scottish Council of the Labour Party’ in favour of the ‘Scottish Labour Party’. There remains only one outstanding action point from Scottish Labour Action’s founding charter is autonomous control of party resources in Scotland. The requirement of Jack McConnell to go to England to be interviewed for the post of Scottish General Secretary highlighted its lack of autonomy (McLean 2004: 48). The First Minister’s official title today is ‘Leader of Labour in the Scottish Parliament’ not ‘Leader of the Scottish Labour Party’. In Scotland there exists a Scottish Executive Committee (SEC) made up of representatives from each section of the party – government, MSPs, MPs, MEPs, councillors, trade unions and CLPs. Members vote for their CLP representatives in a ballot each year. The SEC in theory sets the party’s objectives and oversees the running of the party in Scotland. It is only in recent years that there has been a notable expansion in the administrative staff within the party’s Scottish headquarters. As Lynch and Birrell note, in Scotland research staff were absent until the 1970s, and political communications staff only entered the scene in the 1990s. There was a notable expansion in party staff in the late 1990s. Today the staff at Labour’s Scottish

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HQ is 26 which as well as administrative staff includes 5 local organisers, five research and five media officers (Lynch and Birrell 2004: 179). This is because despite the change in the party name in 1994, finance, staff and membership all remained heavily centralised – post devolution this situation remains largely unchanged. The dependence of the Scottish Party on the British one is highlighted by the limited finance available to the party in Scotland. The Scottish Labour Party fought the 1999 Scottish Election on a budget of £1.5m - £1.32 million of which came direct from head office (Lynch and Birrell 2004: 179). The party, like the Scottish Parliament, remains heavily dependent on finance from London. Areas such as finance, staffing, membership, party rules and discipline are still controlled by British Labour centrally (Lynch and Birrell 2004: 187). Technically no one joints the Scottish Labour Party – you join the UK Party as a Scottish member. The Scottish party’s membership base in terms of both social background and opinion is very similar to the rest of the UK (Hassan 2004). Based on such memberships, post-1997 Scottish Labour Party membership has fallen dramatically. The Scottish branch of the party has no incentive to mount recruitment campaigns nor does it have the resources to do so (Lynch and Birrell 2004: 181). There is a widespread perception that the Scottish Labour party had lagged behind the national party in terms of ‘modernisation’. The Scottish Labour Party in the 1980s and 90s did not have to respond to defeat in the same way that the English party did. Hassan suggests that although Scottish Labour continued to win elections in the 1980s and 90s it did so ‘with a sense of complacency and, without the rethinking the party south of the border undertook’ (Hassan 2004: 14). It did not lose the skilled working class voting base to the Tories in the same way as the party south of the border. Indeed the internal party debates began to take on a different flavour north and south of the border. In England the debate was about economic policy, Clause IV and the appropriate way to reform public services whilst devolution and the constitutional issue increasingly dominated the party’s agenda north of the border. As Saren and McCormick argue, Scottish Labour has never had to face the stark electoral rejection that prompts fundamental reappraisal and questioning’ (2004: 94). Historically, the Scottish party is often perceived to be to the Left of the UK Party, but a lot of this is more to do with emotional symbolism than practical policies (Hassan and Warhurst 2002). Until fairly recently the influence of its contingent of Scottish MPs was fairly limited. Of the 29 MPs elected to the shadow cabinet between 1951-64 only one was a Scottish MP. Whereas of the 46 MPs elected to the shadow cabinet between 1979 and 1997, eight represented Scottish seats and in the first Blair Cabinet in 1997 there were 6 Scots MPs (Hassan 2002a: 33-4). The Scottish influence on the British party has

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undoubtedly increased in recent decades. At the moment the ‘big hitters’ of the Scottish Labour Party remain in Westminster. Gordon Brown, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, is often cited as the ‘godfather’ of Scottish Labour. Other Scottish UK Cabinet ministers include John Reid, Alistair Darling. Ian McCartney and Lord Falconer. Donald Dewar, Scotland’s first First Minister, was the only senior Labour politician to chose Holyrood after a career in Westminster. Only six Labour MPs stood down from the House of Commons to transfer to the Edinburgh Parliament. 3 To summarise, on a formal level the Scottish Labour Party was over the course of the 20th century, nationalised and incorporated into the British Labour Party – a highly centralised, formalised structure which allows for little differentiation. Prior to the 1980s the Scottish branch of the UK Labour Party was largely absorbed into centralised party structures and had no great distinctive identity. However, on a more informal level, the Scottish party has retained the discretion to invoke a distinctly Scottish agenda, symbols and language (Hassan 2002a: 29-30). Particularly over the course of the past 20 years this has came more to the forefront – it has developed a role as a relatively autonomous specific Scottish institution. Is the Scottish Labour Party dominant? Dominant in number. It must gain a plurality of the seats available to it. The Scottish Labour Party qualifies comfortably on the first of Pempel’s four criteria. It has dominated Scottish politics in terms of winning a plurality of seats in British and Scottish parliamentary elections. The Labour Party has undoubtedly been very successful in playing the game of electoral politics in Scotland. It has played the game very well by shaping and changing its policy platform over the decades and whilst in power pursing policies that reinforce its electoral superiority. Despite its undoubted dominance it should be noted that a majority of the Scottish electorate have never voted for the Labour Party at a UK General Election (unlike the Conservatives) – see table 4 below. Table 1 gives the figures for the two Scottish Parliamentary Elections held to date. The figures highlight that the party is not achieving the same level of support as it has done at recent UK General Elections. It appears to be less popular at Scottish than UK parliamentary elections (see table 4). It is still winning the vast majority of constituency seats but the mechanics of the new more proportional Additional Member System mean that it has been unable to gain sufficient parliamentarians to form a majority. It has become reliant on the Liberal Democrats to do this.

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Table 1: Scottish Election results: number of seats and % vote. Ist Vote 2nd Vote Total Labour % Seats % Seats 1999 38.8 53 (73%) 33.6 3 56 (43%) 2003 34.6 46 (63%) 29.6 4 50 (39%) SNP 1999 28.7 7 27.3 28 35 2003 23.8 9 21.6 18 27 Cons 1999 15.6 0 15.4 18 18 2003 16.6 3 15.5 15 18 Lib Dems 1999 14.2 12 12.4 5 17 2003 15.4 13 11.6 4 17 Greens 1999 0 0 3.6 1 1 2003 0 0 6.5 7 7 SSP 1999 1.0 0 2.0 1 1 2003 6.2 0 6.5 6 6 Other 1999 1.7 1 5.7 0 1 2003 3.4 2 8.7 2 4 These aggregate figures do mask the party’s dominance in particular areas of Scotland. For example, at the 1999 election in Glasgow, the Labour Party won all 10 of the constituency seats and yet in seven of the seats a majority of the voters had not voted Labour. The second vote compensates for the disproportional effect of the first-past-the-post system in the first ballot by ensuring that the total seats in a region equate as closely as possible with the percentage of the vote received in the second ballot. Consequently, the Labour Party failed to win any seats in Glasgow on the second ballot. Table 2: Party Identity in Scotland 1992-2001 1992 1997 1999 2001 None 6 7 8 14 Labour 37 47 42 44 Conservative 28 16 17 14 Liberal Democrat 8 12 13 9

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SNP 21 18 21 18 Source: Surridge 2004: 71 The dominance of the party electorally is reflected in the numbers defining themselves as supporters of Labour in a lasting sense. Table 2 outlining party identification figures from recent election studies. These figures highlight just how far ahead of its rivals the party is. These figures, taken at face value, suggest the party’s support is solid and stable (Surridge 2004: 71). Table 3: European Parliament Election Results in Scotland 4 Labour SNP Con LibDem Others % (seats) % (seats) % (seats) % (seats) 1979 33.0 (2) 19.4 (1) 33.7 (5) 13.9 (0) 0 1984 40.7 (5) 17.9 (1) 25.8 (2) 15.6 (0) 0 1989 41.9 (7) 25.6 (1) 20.9 (0) 4.3 (0) 7.3 1994 42.5 (6) 32.6 (2) 14.5 (0) 7.2 (0) 3.2 1999 26.7 (3) 27.2 (2) 19.8 (2) 9.8 (2) 13.1 2004 26.4 (2) 19.7 (2) 17.8 (2) 13.1 (1) 25.1 Overall the Scottish Labour Party remains a formidable electoral machine – at present 108 of Scotland’s 209 national representatives (MPs, MSPs, MEPs) come from the party. Table 4 above outlines how the party has fared in European Parliament elections. Although its vote share has been declining it remains comfortably Scotland’s largest party, recovering in 2004 from a 1999 ‘defeat’ to the SNP. There is little doubt that the Scottish Labour Party gains a plurality of the seats available to it. Dominant bargaining position. It must hold a strategic position whereby it is highly unlikely that any administration could be formed without its inclusion. Today the Scottish Labour Party is by far the largest one in the Scottish Parliament – it has a dominant bargaining position. It holds 50 seats in the 129 member Scottish Parliament. Its nearest challenger (the SNP) has barely over half that number – 27. The Scottish Labour Party is the largest party in the Scottish Parliament and through agreement with the Scottish Liberal Democrats has a working majority in the Chamber. The ‘first-past-the-post’ electoral system was and is useful of the Labour Party as its support has tended to be concentrated in the urban/suburban areas of central Scotland. It makes it all the more remarkable that the Scottish Labour Party was willing to agree to the AMS electoral system for the Scottish Parliamentary

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elections, given that it would, almost inevitably signal an end to their majoritarian dominance. However, the AMS system retains significant features of the single member plurality system with 73 of the Parliament’s 129 members recruited under this system. Given the electoral arithmetic it remains difficult to envisage a Scottish administration being formed after the next Scottish Parliamentary elections in 2007 without the Labour Party being at the centre of it. By that date the party will have governed Scotland for a decade. Dominant chronologically. It must be the core of a nations government for a period beyond a few years Despite this, strictly speaking the Scottish Labour Party does not pass Pempel’s ‘dominant chronologically’ test. The party in Scotland, like the rest of the UK, was for most of the century focused on the achievement of a majority in the House of Commons. It was only in response to the rise of the SNP that the Scottish dimension to the party became more apparent. For significant period of the party’s electoral dominance it has not been in control of the government machinery in Scotland, as the party did not win the election at UK level. Between 1959-64, 1970-74 and 1979-1997 the Prime Minister of the Conservative Party appointed the ministers to run the Scottish Office. It could be argued that the Labour Party in Scotland has benefited from the fact that, despite its electoral dominance, it has not always been in control of the apparatus of the state in Scotland. There was thus no need ‘to throw the rascals out’ as the election of Conservative Governments at UK level meant that they controlled the Scottish Office between 1970-74 and 1979-1997, during Labour’s dominance. In terms of chronological dominance, the party has only been in control of the Scottish Office/Executive) in Scotland since 1997. Table 4: General Election results: number of seats (%votes) won in Scotland 1906 – 2003 Elections Labour Cons Lib (Dems) SNP Total Seats % Seats % Seats % Seats % Seats 1906 2.3 2 38.2 10 56.4 58 - - 70 1910 (Jan) 5.1 2 39.6 9 54.2 58 - - 70 1910 (Dec) 3.6 3 42.6 9 53.6 58 - - 70 1918 22.9 6 32.8 30 34.1 33 - - 71 1922 32.2 29 25.1 13 39.2 27 - - 71 1923 35.9 34 31.6 14 28.4 22 - - 71 1924 41.1 26 40.7 36 16.6 8 - - 71 1929 42.3 36 35.9 20 18.1 13 0.2 0 71 1931 32.6 7 49.5 48 13.5 15 1.0 0 71

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1935 41.8 24 42.0 35 13.4 10 1.1 0 71 1945 49.4 37 41.1 27 5.0 0 1.2 0 71 1950 46.2 37 44.8 32 6.6 2 0.4 0 71 1951 47.9 35 48.6 35 2.7 1 0.3 0 71 1955 46.7 34 50.1 36 1.9 1 0.5 0 71 1959 46.7 38 47.2 31 4.1 1 0.8 0 71 1964 48.7 43 40.6 24 7.6 4 2.4 0 71 1966 49.9 46 37.7 20 6.8 5 5.1 0 71 1970 44.5 44 38.0 23 5.5 3 11.4 0 71 1974 (Feb) 36.6 40 32.9 21 8.0 3 21.9 7 71 1974 (Oct) 36.3 41 24.7 16 8.3 3 30.4 11 71 1979 41.5 44 31.4 22 9.0 3 17.3 2 71 1983 35.1 41 28.4 21 24.5 8 11.7 2 72 1987 42.4 50 24.0 10 19.2 9 14.0 3 72 1992 39.0 49 25.6 11 13.1 9 21.5 3 72 1997 45.6 56 17.5 0 13.0 10 22.1 6 72 2001 43.3 55 15.6 1 16.3 10 20.1 5 72 Source: Adapted from McCrone 2001: 105-6 Table 4 illustrates the lengthy dominance of the Scottish Labour Party in electoral politics in Scotland. In terms of seats gained it has not lost a UK General Election since 1959 (i.e. it has now won twelve in a row). Its dominance has been consistent – even in 1983 when a leading figure in the UK Labour Party described the party’s manifesto as ‘the longest suicide note in history’ the party still won 7% points more than its nearest challenger and a majority of the country’s seats. Prior to 1959 the party was effectively operating in a two-party system with the Unionist Party (as the Conservative Party in Scotland was then called) a formidable electoral opponent and was just as often the ‘winner’ in Scottish elections as its opponent. The party’s first ‘victory’ was in 1923 but this breakthrough did not mark a period of continued ascendancy in UK and Scottish government - in the 1930s, 40s and 50s the Unionist part was just as often the winner. The appointment of Thomas Johnston as Secretary of State for Scotland in 1941 was probably the precursor to the establishment of Labour’s dominance. His period in office is widely cited as a time when the Labour Party demonstrated how the union with England delivered benefits as he gained concessions from the UK Cabinet for Scotland (Finlay 2004: 29-30). New healthcare, housing and industrial policies demonstrated the benefits the Labour Party in Scotland were bringing.

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Finlay suggests the period, signalling as it did the arrival of administrative devolution, led Scottish politics into an issue more about administration than government. Policies, whose intellectual origins lay in London, were adapted and implemented in Scotland by civil servants in the Scottish Office – ‘Pragmatism and management became ingrained in Scottish Labour’s post-war outlook’ (Finlay 2004: 31). With the 1945-51 UK Labour Government demonstrating the utility of the UK State, the Scottish branch of the party’s previous commitment to home rule declined and was dropped as party policy in 1958. In the immediate post-war period there were more parallels between the Labour Party in Scotland and at UK level than probably at any other point in the party’s history. In the words of Bennie et al, ‘The Labour Party in Scotland had a strong Scottish accent but it spoke the same language as the party in England’ (1997: 46). The abandonment of the party policy on home rule in 1958 was entirely consistent with the leadership’s line of aligning Scotland closely with the rest of the UK (Donnachie et al 1989: 5). Keating (1989) outlines how the Scottish party in the 1950s became almost completely integrated into the UK organisation:

So much so that in the 1950s Scotland was something of a backwater in the Labour Party, her MPs generally home-bred and parochial in outlook (Donnachie et al 1989: 5).

That can be contrasted with the position in the 1980s and 90s when Scottish members of the party began to have significant influence at UK level and assume leadership positions. The irony is that in this period when Labour’s dominance became most notable – the 1980s – Labour’s overall share of the vote changed little, its party membership was falling and the Conservatives ran the Scottish Office for the whole decade. It benefited from the fact that its main competitor (the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party) was in seemingly terminal decline and the ‘opposition’ vote was split more evenly amongst its competitors. Overall, on one level the Scottish Labour Party has been dominated chronologically in Scotland. However, because Scotland only forms but one nation - and a relatively small one in comparison to England5 – this has not always been reflected in the composition of the ministerial team in charge of running the Scottish Office. It has been at the core of Scotland’s government for the past 8 years but this was after 18 years out of office. Dominant governmentally. Its long-standing presence in government should mean its public policy programme shapes the national policy agenda.

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The Scottish Labour Party has only begun to dominate governmentally so strictly speaking does not qualify as a dominant party using Pempel’s fourth criteria. However, even during the party’s long period out of office (1979-1997) one could argue it still had a significant influence on the public policy agenda. For example, in the early 1990s the Labour dominated Strathclyde Regional Council (which had a population of 2.2 million in a nation of 5 million) conducted an unofficial referendum on the privatisation of water as part of a campaign to keep the utility in public hands. The Scottish Office decided not to privatise water (unlike the position in England and Wales). Moreover, it was the Labour party who played a lead role in the Scottish Constitutional Convention (1989-1995) that placed the constitutional issue firmly at the top of the political agenda in Scotland. However, the party’s impact on the public policy agenda stretches far beyond that, In Hassan’s opinion, ‘Scottish Labour has sought intellectual and cultural hegemony over progressive Scotland’ (2004: 5). In Scotland the politics of social democracy are the parameters under which the agenda party politics are fought – there is actually rather little beyond the margins to separate all of the mainstream parties. As Keating notes, ‘there is a certain egalitarian ethos which has dominated public debate and framed political discussion’ (Keating 2005: 29). While the party does not have a long-standing presence in government, its public policy programme does shape the national policy agenda in Scotland. The devolution settlement itself and the divisions of power contained therein dictate that a public services agenda frames the mainstream party political debate in Scotland. Table 5 below outlines the demarcation of responsibilities post-devolution. The state in Scotland has not been an instrument of Labour Party control for a lengthy period. The party has, however, even whilst out of office played a role in shaping the public policy agenda of Scottish politics. Despite this, the party again does not strictly meet Pempel’s criteria.

Table 5: Responsibilities of the Scottish Parliament Reserved Areas (Not Devolved) Areas not reserved

(responsibilities of the Scottish parliament)

Common market for UK goods and services Agriculture, fisheries

and forestry

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Constitution of the United Kingdom Economic Development

Defence & national security Education Employment legislation Environment Fiscal, economic & monetary union Health Health (in some areas), Medicine Housing Media and culture Local Government Professional Regulation (in certain cases) Law/Home Affairs Protection of Borders Social Work Social Security Training Transport Safety & Regulation Transport

This means that adopting a strict interpretation of Pempel’s four criteria the party only meets two, and does not therefore ‘qualify’ as a dominant party. However, it is suggested here that Pempel’s criteria and an exclusive focus on them would lead to a neglecting of other dimensions of Labour’s dominance in Scotland – its dominance of local democracy and civil society. Dominant at all levels of democracy. It must have significant presence at sub-nation/state levels of government Over the course of the 1980s and 90s the party gained ever-increasing control of Scottish local government. Today Labour controls 15 (this compares to a high of 20 in 1995) Scottish councils and shares power in 4 others (out of 32 in total). Again it benefits from the first-past-the-post election system - in only three of the thirty-two council areas did it achieve over 50% of the vote at the last (2003) elections. It is most dominant in the City of Glasgow where 74 of the 79 wards returned a Labour councillor – a divided opposition means a 48% vote share returns the party 90% of the seats on the council. The Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (COSLA), the umbrella organisation representing 31 of Scotland’s 32 councils, has had a Labour majority for over two decades now. Table 7 below outlines the extent of the party’s presence in Scottish local councils. At present the party controls 15 councils – its competitors control only 2 between them all. Moreover, the councils the Labour Party controls tend to be those with the highest populations in the central belt of Scotland – in the rural areas of Scotland the party’s presence is less visible. However, its rivals do not benefit as the independent councillor tradition means that no political party tends to be very successful (19% of Scotland’s councillors are independents). Table 6: Local Election Results 1974-2003

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Year Labour SNP Con Lib Dem % vote (seats) % (seats) % (seats) % (seats) 2003 (Unitary) 33 (509) 24.0 (181) 15 (123) 15 (175) 1999 (Unitary) 36 (551) 29 (204) 14 (109) 13 (161) 1995 (Unitary) 44 (613) 26 (181) 12 (82) 10(121) 1992 (District) 34 24 23 10 1988 (District) 43 21 19 8 1984 (District) 46 12 21 13 1980 (District) 45 16 24 6 1977 (District) 32 24 27 4 1974 (District) 38 12 27 5 Dominant in civic society. It must through patronage and presence exert significant influence on politically importance institutions beyond the state. The party dominates many areas of public life in Scotland –Paterson suggests that today, ‘in some respects Scottish public life is now less pluralistic than when the Tories staffed the Scottish Office’ (2002: 59). He notes how,

Labour people (or, more accurately Labour sympathisers) are everywhere – in the voluntary organisations, in local government, in the civil service, in government, even in business (Paterson 2002: 59).

Whilst not in office between 1979 and 1997 the party played an ever increasing role in Scottish civic society. As Hassan argues,

Scottish Labour has become through its dominance of Scottish public life an institutionalised party – blurring the boundaries between party and state, particularly in the local state (Hassan 2004: 4)

This for Macwhirter results in a very exclusive, almost familial, type of politics with nepotism ‘a way of life in large parts of Labour Scotland’ (Macwhirter 2002: 33). He suggests, ‘You do not get anywhere in Labour politics unless you have a large constituency of political friends and clients’ (Macwhirter 2002: 31). This all leads to what Hassan describes as, the ‘limited pluralism and incestousness of civic Scotland’ (Hassan 2002b: 26). In a similar vein, Macwhirter refers to ‘The Labour State’, and argues what is termed ‘civil society’ in Scotland is ‘in fact a dense congregation of Labour politicians, their clients and apparatchiks’ (2002: 28). The party’s dominance is reflected in close connections

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in the print media, trade union movement, local government and Scotland’s quasi-autonomous government agencies. The party has been aided throughout its period of dominance by a largely compliant print media. It (unlike the position in England) has enjoyed the support of Scotland’s best selling tabloid newspaper the Daily Record 6. Up until the 1950s the press in Scotland had been almost universally hostile to Labour. However, in 1956 the Daily Record was sold to the Mirror Group, which transformed the editorial stance of the paper to a pro-Labour one. Since that date it has, almost without exception, supported Labour at election time. Another key institution dominated by Labour sympathisers is the Scottish Trade Union Congress. Irvine (2004: 228) notes how the STUC’s elections involving senior officers that are dominated by Labour party insiders - ‘The STUC is sometimes described, to its public denial and private delight, as the political wing of the Labour Party in Scotland’ (Irvine 2004: 219). He suggests the STUC has a ‘pro-Labour orthodoxy is stifling reminiscent of the inflated support once claimed for the Communist Party of the Soviet Union’ (Irvine 2004: 230). The party also controls Scotland’s local government umbrella organisation – the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (COSLA). Kerevan refers to ‘the incestous nature and lack of real accountability in Scottish local government’ (2002: 43). In his analysis of Labour’s recent losses of overall control in a number of councils the co-ordinator of the Labour Campaign for Electoral Reform suggests, ‘What we have seen is that voters are becoming increasingly weary of what are effectively one party states’ (Kerevan 2002: 43) It is not only in large swathes of local government that the party is dominant. Party patronage has resulted in quasi-autonomous government agencies having Labour sympathisers appointed to their boards. The Scottish Executive presides over nearly 100 quangos and national industries as well as health boards. These bodies are run by 3,500 appointees (Rosie 2002: 126-7). A 2002 survey showed that 32 out of 141 (23%) of health board members (an appointed, unelected post subject to the patronage of the Scottish Executive) are declared Labour activists, compared to 5 Liberal Democrats, 4 SNP and 1 Conservative (Hassan 2002b: 17). A look at other appointments to bodies such as local enterprise companies and social inclusion partnerships is likely to reveal similar proportions. The sheer scale of the Labour bias in Scottish civic society is largely hidden from public view although reforms such as compelling board members of such organisations to register interests is bringing it more into public view. The Impact of Devolution

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New Politics It is perhaps ironic that one of the implications of Labour’s dominance is that through it they have set in motion a chain of events that will in all probability hasten the unravelling of their hegemonic position. As noted previously, the experience of 18 years of Conservative rule and the imposition of a perceived alien policy agenda led to Scottish party towards a fundamental commitment to devolution. As co-signatories to the final Scottish Constitutional Convention (1995) Report, the party committed itself to the introduction of the Additional Member System (AMS) electoral system. This effectively meant that the party would struggle to achieve a working majority in the Scottish Parliament and would be compelled to either form a minority administration or work in coalition. The necessity of coalition government has meant that the party has been forced to allow the introduction of a more proportional electoral system for local government. Devolution also brought with it a new agenda revolving around the concept of ‘new politics’ and Scottish Labour leaders were rhetorically at least espousing the language of ‘new politics’. This emphasised a new era for Scottish democracy that was to be marked with pluralism, inclusiveness and co-operation. Equal opportunities was also high on the political agenda – it is one of the four ‘guiding principles’ of the Parliament. The Scottish Labour Party was once characterised as stereotypically masculine but now 42% of its members are female. A new equal opportunities agenda emerged in the party in the past 15 or so years. Party rules now dictate that of the seven key constituency posts (chair, secretary, treasurer, two vice chairs, women’s officer and youth officer – three must be women The majority of the Scottish Executive Committee, elected in March 2003 are women (18 of 31). Some 80% of Scottish Labour Party staff are women (MacKay 2004: 109). In the Scottish Parliamentary Group in Edinburgh 56% are women (it was 50% in 1999). These figures can be contrasted with the proportion of Scottish Labour women elected as MPs in the House of Commons (18%) and in local government the figure is 22% - a figure unchanged for three successive elections (MacKay 2004: 110). Since first working with other parties in the Constitutional Convention the Scottish Labour Party has become more receptive and open to cross party discussion and collaboration. This is not to say the actual reality of party political partisanship has disappeared, but the institutional architecture and rules of the Scottish Parliament almost compel the party to be less insular in its approach. More emphasis has been placed on cross-party working in the new parliament’s committees.

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Internal Party Democracy Post devolution the Scottish Labour Party has in theory increased autonomy through the ability to make policy through the Scottish Policy Forum and in electing the party’s leader in the Scottish Parliament. However, in practice this has proved to be limited. The three leadership elections highlighted the lack of opportunity for individual party members to elect their leader. Party rules allow for the leader to be elected via an Electoral College with elected politicians (MPs, MEPs etc), local party representatives and affiliated trade unions having one-third of the votes each. This was the case for the election of Donald Dewar in the late 1990s. However, for the election of McLeish (2001) and McConnell (2002) there were only 80 and 84 involved. These were the party’s MSPs and members of Scottish Executive Committee.

On both occasions, Labour and union leaderships feared the prospect of proper elections and debate, and used the excuse that running a full Electoral College of Labour affiliates and trade union members would be too difficult and costly. So out went democracy, its price too high! (Irvine 2004: 228)

In the lead up to the first Scottish Parliamentary elections in 1999 whilst, the party leadership were rhetorically espousing the benefits of more democracy the party’s own internal rules and operations were not necessarily reflective of ‘good democratic practice’. The nominating process for candidates to stand for the first Scottish parliamentary elections were a particularly illuminating process in understanding the dynamics of power within the Scottish and British parties. The party abandoned its traditional constituency based approach to candidate selection in favour of a self-nomination process. Individual party members were invited to stand without the prior approval of the local party. In addition, the party avoided the legal minefield of women only shortlists by adopting a ‘twinning’ system whereby constituencies were linked in pairs and a man and a women candidate selected. In a sense the Scottish Labour party can claim this process to be more open, transparent and participatory than the older one – it specifically being designed to encourage nominations from party members who otherwise would not come forward. In total 534 did so. However, it was not this stage of the selection process that caused controversy – it was the next one. That was gaining access to the approved list of candidates. It was only those candidates who could then compete in open competition with other approved candidates for constituency nominations. To gain approval status candidates had to pass several hurdles. Firstly, their applications were reviewed by a Selection Board consisting of 15

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party members (5 executive committee, 5 party members and 5 NEC representatives) and 5 ‘independent’ professional advisers (Bradbury et al 2000: 3). Over 200 candidates were rejected on the basis of their application forms at this first stage7. The second stage involved being interviewed by a selection board consisting of four individuals from the Selection Board – 159 applicants were rejected at this stage (Bradbury et al 2000: 3). The third stage for the successful 166 candidates was to gain a constituency nomination and/or a placing on a regional list. Although unlikely to lead to election the Regional List route to selection attracted the most controversy - because it was the most blatantly centralised (Bradbury et al 2000: 6).. The key decision-makers were 4 members of the Scottish Labour Party Executive, the general secretary, the Secretary of State and two members of the NEC. As Bradbury et al note,

In practice … procedural reform in the Labour party largely facilitated an increase in central party elite influence and was seen ultimately to frustrate desires for greater party democracy … The procedure was open to immediate objection from party members on the grounds of the total absence of any membership-based democracy other than a right to partial consultation (2000: 2 and 6).

Whilst talking the language of ‘new politics’ the Labour Party in Scotland has been engaging in some very old-style party fixing to effect centrally change. Devolution & The British/Scottish Tension Moreover, devolution of power to Scotland resulted in only a marginal adjustment to the UK Labour Party’s internal structures. As a political party within the UK, Labour still assumes it has a need to maintain fundamental core policy positions or at least following variations on a common theme. The devolved political system has placed the Labour party in the position of being defenders of the Scottish Parliament, but at the same time wary of any unwelcome policy initiatives from the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish Executive that could contradict policy developments at the UK level. The Scottish Labour Party has had to create a balance between adherence to UK policy platforms and ensuring a level of Scottish distinctiveness. Indeed, Mitchell describes the contradictory ‘need to appear more united and more disunited simultaneously’ (2000: 28). This need to maintain a distinctive Scottish dimension to the Scottish Labour party and ensure that the Labour parties in government in Westminster and Edinburgh do not develop in divergent directions necessitates the management of personnel and puts the premium on relatively predictable behaviour without imposing uniformity. In Edinburgh the

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party must maintain its ‘Scottish’ credentials to avert the accusations from Nationalists that the Scottish Executive is a puppet of the Westminster Government. Thus Hassan suggests that:

Scottish Labour is simultaneously both the party of radical change: of renegotiating and modernising the Union, while being the party of the internal status quo (1998: 25).

Under Blair the argument for centralised control has often come under guise of ‘branding’. The argument being that he and his cohorts had successfully re-branded the British party as ‘New Labour’ and the electoral rewards for this were being reaped. Viewed from Millbank significant divergence by the Scottish Labour party from the UK party’s agenda would undermine the credibility and coherence of British Labour as a whole. An example of this line of thinking is Matthew Taylor, a former assistant general secretary, and now director of New Labour friendly think-tank, the Institute for Public Policy Research. In a Guardian article he argued,

The British Labour Party has every reason to have a stake in the policies and practices of Scottish and Welsh Labour. It is a question of branding. The emergence of a Scottish Labour brand very different to that of Wales and England would undermine the credibility and coherence of British Labour as a whole … Some in Labour's Scottish ranks appear to feel that having been carried to power on the shoulders of the British party, they can now dispense with its services. Their argument threatens not just the integrity of the union but denies one hundred years of Labour history (Guardian 11.5.99) (cited in Dinwoodie, R The Herald 12.5.00).

Because of this line of thinking the British party has continued to try to present a ‘seamless image’ of the party across the UK (Keating 2005: 50). This is particularly in evidence during UK General Election campaigns. Post devolution the Scottish Labour Party has been keen to avoid unwelcome media tension on UK-Scotland tensions within the party. However, such tensions undoubtedly exist. In one notable episode the day after the 2001 UK General Election Henry McLeish, the then Scottish First Minister, was caught on tape denouncing John Reid, former Secretary of State for Scotland, as a ‘patronising bastard’ and Brian Wilson, former Scottish Office Minister of State, as a ‘liability’. The latter along with Scottish MPs such as Tam Dalyell form a part of the party that has always been sceptical of the need for devolution. British Labour cannot hope to be an entirely cohesive and homogenous entity the length and breadth of Britain. The opposition they face in England, Scotland

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and Wales present different challenges. In Scotland the Greens, Socialists, Nationalists and to a lesser extent the Liberal Democrats all challenge Labour’s left of centre credentials, In England it is only the latter party that does this. The party’s north and south of the border face different electoral challengers. The implications of the party’s dominant status Factionalism and Machine like politics In large tracts of Scotland the key arena were partisan politics is conducted is not between parties but within the Labour party. This is not uncommon in dominant party systems – as Key (1949: 387-8) notes in his analysis of American Deep South, the Democrats rather than being a cohesive party, became a framework for the settlement of factional contests. With little opposition there was no external pressure compelling the party to be united and disciplined. In council administrations such as Glasgow where the party is so dominant (it has 74 out of a total of 79 councillors) the potential opposition to the council leadership tends to come from other factions within the party. As Keating notes, ‘The Scottish Labour Party is notorious for infighting and division, but this nowadays tends to be about power and factionalism rather than competing visions of social democracy’ (Keating 2005: 47-8). Bennie et al refer to, ‘A myriad of factions and tendencies … evident within Labour’s fraternal ranks over the years’ (Bennie et al 1997: 55). As Findlay noted of the Scottish Labour Party in the 1920s (see above) it is strangely lacking in conventional ideologues. The party today is not dis-similar. Fraser’s description of the Left in Scotland as a ‘community’ rather than ‘ideological’ Left is relevant. The Left within the Labour Party’s radicalism is based on experience of living and working in deprived communities and they are less rigid and more pragmatic in their outlook that the traditional Left (Fraser 2004: 141). As Lynch and Birrel note,

Rather than issue or ideological factions, Scottish Labour’s internal politics have become influenced by local family/personality factions in the constituencies and by the loose network of Blair and Brown supporters among parliamentarians (2004: 187)

Nepotism, according to Macwhirter (2002: 33) is a way of life in large parts of ‘Labour Scotland. He suggests the old saying ‘It’s not what you know but who you know’ remains relevant in Labour dominated Scotland (Macwhirter 2002:

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31). The end product of this type of politics results in the politics of factionalism within the party. It also results in the party having what he refers to as ‘North Korean tendencies, which see democracy as an inconvenience to running Scotland’ (Macwhirter 2002: 34). Local alliances and patronage rather than issues or ideology tend to be the factors that cement this type of factional politics within the Labour party (Lynch and Birrell 2004: 188). In 2002 Henry McLeish, the former Scottish First Minister and leader of the parliamentary party in Scotland, was forced to resign after a corruption scandal. After his resignation he suggested his problem was that he did not belong to a faction within the party. He suggested that the reason he was forced to resign was not that he was corrupt but that he ‘wasn’t a Catholic, wasn’t a Protestant and hadn’t gone to Glasgow University and wasn’t a member of the Lanarkshire Mafia’ (The Sun 7.2.02 cited in Macwhirter 2002: 29) 8. Scottish Labour’s dominance of the political scene in Scotland has attracted much negative political commentary. Accusations of the party using its patronage have led to charges of nepotism, cronyism and even outright corruption. Macwhirter suggests,

As in Eastern Europe, politics in large areas of Scotland takes place within the party rather than between parties in competition for power. In Scotland, as in Poland or the old East Germany, membership of the party is a precondition for personal advancement in most aspects of public life – an essential career accessory. Factionalism, rather than democracy, becomes the organizing principle of politics (2002: 27)

Policymaking The lack of conventional ideological conviction is possibly an explanation for why the Scottish party has never been a particularly fertile source for policy initiative. The lack of innovation was acknowledged by one of the party’s leading MSPs in a leaked letter to a political rival:

perhaps one of the last times the Labour Movement in Scotland made a real intellectual contribution to the UK Labour Party was around the rapid growth of the ILP following the establishment of the Forward newspaper in 1906’ (Alexander, Wendy MSP cited in Mitchell 2002)

Hassan suggests that there has always been within Scottish Labour a traditional disdain for progressive opinion outside the party (Hassan 2004: 5). In the 1980s this insular attitude was exacerbated by its electoral success:

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The 1980s were a strangely reassuring one for Scottish Labour – because it was easy for it to define what it stood for by what it was against – the imposition of Thatcherism and its ‘alien’ politics. Unlike British Labour, the Scottish party did not go through any painful rethinking and redefining of itself (Hassan 1999: 119)

A combination of it weak membership base and the lack of electoral competition, ‘represents a distinctive blend of voter loyalty (even if among a relatively small share of the electorate), pragmatism, incumbency and limited organisational capacity’ (Saren and McCormick 2004: 100). This meant that the party had little incentive to innovate, leading it to adopt a rather conservative outlook. Although the Scottish Labour Party is often perceived to be to the Left of the British Party, a lot of this is more to do with the weakness of the Conservative Party in Scotland, a romantic reading of Scottish Labour history and higher public expenditure per capita than any actual reality of policies. Policy differences post-devolution have, to date, been negligible. Moreover, one could argue many of these are a direct consequence of the party having to work in coalition with the Scottish Liberal Democrats and the overall centre-left make up of the Scottish Parliament. One could suggest the two most significant policy innovations post devolution (student tuition fees and funding free personal care for the elderly) have more to do with parliamentary and electoral arithmetic than party policy innovation. Although the party in Scotland does host its own Annual Conference in Spring of each year it is not a significant policymaking forum. Indeed its status was highlighted this year when the UK Prime Minister used it as a backdrop to a set-piece speech outlining details of new reforms to English heath policy. The Scottish Labour Party delegates merely providing a compliant audience backdrop. Overall the Scottish Labour Party’s,

ability to engage proactively in setting the policy agenda between elections, to develop its own policymaking capacity and indeed to run election campaigns is significantly less than would be expected in other European countries’ (Saren and McCormick 2004: 100)

The End of Labour Dominance? The picture presented in this paper may appear to be of the Labour Party as an all-powerful institution in Scottish politics. However, even if that were the case there are several contemporary developments that have, or are likely to in the

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near future, impact on its dominance. The future does not look so straightforward for Labour in Scotland. Firstly, Labour’s dominance in Scotland can definitely not be attributed to a large staff in Scotland directing electoral victories. Labour’s internal organisation in Scotland has been weak since the party was first established. As McLean notes, the Scottish Labour Party ‘has lagged behind the levels of membership, fundraising and organisation achieved by the party in the regions of England, London and Wales’ (2004: 49). As Saren and McCormick note, Scottish Labour has a remarkably lean party infrastructure despite being one of the most successful election-winning parties in Europe (Saren and McCormick 2004: 100). The UK Labour Party membership is 214,952.9 Latest estimates put the Scottish party membership figure at around 20,000 – with activists barely accounting for a quarter of that (Macwhirter 2002: 34).10 When you consider around 800 of these will be elected politicians, party workers or trade union officials the weakness of the party’s base is apparent. The party has traditionally had a smaller membership base than branches in England (Hassan 2004: 4). This represents less than 0.5% of the population. In 2002 three safe Glasgow constituency Labour party (CLPs) branches had under 200 members (Bailleston, Shettleston and Springburn) (Lynch and Birrell 2004: 181). The number of Scottish constituencies sending delegates to UK Labour conferences has been in decline for a number of years (Saren and McCormick 2004: 102). The local party membership figures in Scotland are so small that Lynch and Birrell suggest constituency Labour parties are probably best understood as local machine power bases for MP/MSPs to cement their position (Lynch and Birrell 2004: 188). Katz and Mair (1994) conceptualise a party in three strands: party in public office, party on the ground and party in central office. Whilst the Labour Party in public office is undoubtedly healthy – as noted above it has MPs in Westminster, MSPs in Edinburgh, MEPs in Brussels and councillors throughout Scotland. The party on the ground is however nowhere near as strong – membership has been falling and the capabilities of local party organisations declining. Whilst the party headquarters in Scotland has been expanded it still does not have even the most basic powers over organisation and finance. The Scottish Labour Party office is best described as primarily an organisation associated with administration, because of this ‘power migrates from the party organisation and membership to the parliamentarians, minister and civil servants’ (Lynch and Birrell 2004: 189).

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Devolution has exacerbated this problem - the Scottish party has seen the migration of many of its key internal figures to positions of power in the Scottish Executive and Parliament 11 – leaving something of a political vacuum with a weak organisation and membership base (Lynch and Birrel 2004: 177). In Scotland left-of-centre party activists have to choice of switching to either the Scottish Socialist or Scottish National parties – a choice not available in England. Secondly, Scotland’s party system is changing. Scotland, like Britain was a classic model of a two party system until the 1970s. The party system in Scotland until the 1960s operated largely in parallel to the system in the United Kingdom. Up until the 1970s politics in Scotland essentially paralleled English politics – it too was all about social class. Other cleavages were only of minor importance. The UK national parties, the Conservatives (called Unionists in Scotland until 1965) and Labour were electorally dominant with the Liberals on the fringes and the SNP virtually non-existent. However, as in England, the two party system came under increasing strain with the support of the two major parties declining on both sides of the border. However, just as the golden age of capitalist post-war economic expansion was faltering in the 1970s so too were the parallels between English and Scottish politics. It was during this decade that the Scottish National Party began to make significant gains breaking the two-party duopoly in Scotland. An SNP by-election victory in the late 1960s was the first signal of this. As the SNP winning candidate commented,

The late Oliver Brown … put it well. He said that when I won Hamilton, you could feel a chill along the Labour back-benches, looking for a spine to run up (Winnie Ewing, quoted in Ross 2000)

However, the SNP breakthrough masked the beginning of Labour’s dominance. The SNP’s best showing came in October 1974 when Labour had already enjoyed 15 years of successive victories - a run that now stretches to 46 years. It should be noted that over the course of this period the party’s share of the vote has dropped significantly. It has benefited from both the decline of its main competitor (the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party) and the movement from a two to a four-party system with the emergence of the Scottish National Party and the SDP-Liberal Alliance (now called Scottish Liberal Democrats). As early as 1981 Miller was referring to The End of British Politics in a book of that title. Despite the devolution referendum, the election of Mrs Thatcher and the waning of the SNP he suggested that Scottish politics had been irrevocably changed due to the emergence of the constitutional agenda onto the political landscape. He was not wrong.

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Thatcherism accelerated the demise of the Conservative and Unionist Party in Scotland. Even at the UK Labour Party’s electoral low-point in 1983, the one where Kaufman described the manifesto as ‘the longest suicide note in history’ the party in Scotland was still able to ‘win’ the election. Thatcherite policies leading towards de-industrialisation, privatisation and a rolling back of the state were proving unpopular in Scotland.

In a country which had turned against the Conservatives as early as the mid-1950s, the attack on the state seemed as much an attack on Scotland itself (McCrone 2001: 27)

As Harvie argues up against the Conservatives in the 1980s a party ‘programmed for self-destruction, Labour did not really have to do very much’ (Harvie 2004: 61). Thatcher it could be, and has been, said did more than anyone to bring about devolution. At the 1997 UK General Election all of the Scottish Conservative MPs lost their seats and the party’s decline that had begun in 1959 appeared to be complete. At that election, the professional middle classes were more likely to vote Labour than Conservative. Harvie possibly best sums up the Scottish Tories when he refers to them as ‘an extreme case of necrophilia’ (Harvie cited in Ross 2000). The political party system in Scotland is now different from England, as are the parties themselves. As Brown et al argued in 1996,

party labels (north and south of the border) may be similar but their histories and agendas are quite different, and increasingly so … the political parties in Scotland cannot be taken as British Parties writ small (1996: 117)

Until the 1997 UK General Election it was felt that the Labour Party, in order to overcome the Conservative Party at UK level, would be reliant on their Scottish MPs to form a Westminster majority. However, the Blair landslides in 1997 and 2001 proved that not to be the case. Devolution and the new electoral system has resulted in an expended party system in Scotland with both the Scottish Socialist and the Scottish Green Party gaining significant representation (six and seven MSPs respectively) in the Parliament. There are now 17 MSPs from non-mainstream parties in the Scottish Parliament (Greens, Socialists, Pensioners, Independents).

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If current electoral trends continue the party may be reliant on a rainbow coalition if it is to retain office in the Scottish Executive after the 2007 elections. The 2003 Scottish election led to a loss of six seats for the Scottish Labour Party and an effective coalition majority reduced from 17 to 5. The party is beginning to face major challenges on the Left (in the form of the SSP and Greens) and continues to face the nationalists. The likelihood is that in the future the party will be faced with a choice between forming a minority administration or extending its coalition in 2007 or 2011. The party is now facing a wider variety of opposition within a changing party system. Thirdly, the Labour’s Party’s strength is drawn from geographically concentrated constituency-based support in urban and suburban Scotland. The average Scottish constituency has 55,000 voters, compared with around 70,000 in an English constituency. David Marshall, the Labour MP for Glasgow Shettleston, has an electorate of just 49,359. However, the UK Boundary Commission Report, taking into account the 1998 Scotland Act, is about to be published. It is expected the number of Westminster parliamentary constituencies in Scotland from 72 to 59. Fourthly, a single transferable vote method of election is to be used in the next (2007) local government elections12. The party’s share of the vote at local elections has declined from 43.8% in 1995 to 32.6% in 2003, if it does not recover the party is likely to lose its majority control of almost all its councils. If the party wishes to retain a degree of control it will be compelled to work with other parties. Fifthly, the Blairite modernisation of the party, if permanent, is likely to lead to increasing tensions between Scotland the UK. Moreover, there is evidence that it is eroding the party’s traditional support base. Surridge (2004) outlines some survey evidence that suggests that Scottish Labour’s image has declined more amongst the working class than any other social group – in 2001 only half the working class perceived Labour to be looking after their interest (2004: 76). Its status as the unofficial national party of Scotland may be under threat – Paterson reports the proportion believing that the party acts in Scotland’s interests had fallen from 68% to 40% between 1997 and 1999. Sixthly, the complacency that is commonly a feature of dominant parties, whilst evident on local councils has not been, until recently, so apparent at national level, possibly because of the party’s lengthy exclusion from central office between 1979 and 1997. However, the other commonly cited feature – the lack of clear demarcation between the party and the state is evident. At local level party has faced scandals in Glasgow, North Lanarkshire, Fife and Renfrewshire councils. At the Scottish national level the lack of demarcation between the party and state and civil society institutions has been exposed in recent years in a

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series of scandals – ‘Lobbygate’, ‘Officegate’ ‘Wishawgate’ and ‘Warkgate’ being the most recent. 13 Finally, another notable development post-devolution is that the Parliament and its intimacy (it only has 129 members) particularly in all-party committees has resulted in more connections between Labour parliamentarians and those of other parties. This is likely to happen in local councils post-2007. These new structures are compelling the party to work in coalition arrangements, something it has not had to do very often due to the vagaries of the first-past-the-post-electoral system and the electoral majorities it tends to produce. To conclude, it is likely we are actually witnessing the beginning of the end of Labour’s one party dominance – concessions to more proportional electoral methods and the gradual erosion of the party’s voter base and the emergence of new political parties is likely to put it under increasing pressure. A Guardian post-election editorial in 2003 referred to ‘The idea of Labour hegemony in Scotland has been blown to the winds … the old ways are weakening’ (Guardian 20.5.03 cited in Fraser 2004: 144). It is hard to disagree with this analysis. However, predicting the winner in Scottish elections remain even easier than predicting that in the Scottish Premier League championships – Labour always win by a convincing margin. They are the ‘Old Firm’ of Scottish politics. Celtic and Rangers dominate the Scottish football market both commercially and in a footballing sense, Labour dominate Scottish politics. Today the Scottish Labour Party remains today one of if not the, key institutions in Scottish politics. It is the party of government both at the UK and Scottish level, it is by far the largest party in terms of representation at both local and national level and it has been the largest party at almost all elections in Scotland for well over two decades. It dominates electorally, and for the past eight years governmentally. The party’s electoral success is self-evident, but its influence more broadly and the questions it raises about party-bureaucratic and state civil-society relations in Scotland is an under-explored area. The party’s sphere of influence penetrates deeply into Scottish civic society. To understand the extent of Labour’s dominance in Scotland it is necessary to extend the scope of discussion beyond elections and the formal institutions of the state. Labour not only dominates representative democracy in Scotland but also groups involved in pluralist democratic processes. It is only by extending Pempel’s four criteria of dominance can the scale of Labour’s penetration and dominance of Scottish politics be appreciated.

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In Scotland the Scottish Labour Party is the political establishment. It can be placed alongside other key institutions in Scotland such as the Scottish Office, the church, the Law Society, education interests and various other groups in civic society as playing an important role in Scotland retaining a distinctive position within the United Kingdom. The Scottish Labour Party has been a formidable electoral machine for nearly 50 years. The Scottish Labour Party has been the political establishment in Scotland. In the past eight years its conservatism has resulted in it being a diluter on the emergence of a truly devolved and autonomous polity in Scotland. Bibliography Bradbury, L. Denver, D., Mitchell, J. Bennie, L. (2000) ‘Candidate Selection,

Devolution and Modernisation: The Selection of Labour Party Candidates for the 1999 Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly Elections’ British Parties and Elections Yearbook 10: 151-72

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(London: Routledge) 1 Since the formation of football in Scotland these clubs have won the league title 89 times between them. In recent years their dominance has been even more consistent – not since 1985 has another club won the league title. The ‘Old Firm’ gained their name through their joint commercial exploitation of the religious basis of their support in the early years of the 20th century. Celtic are a club founded by the catholic community in Glasgow, Rangers are a club that operated a deliberate policy of excluding Roman Catholics from employment until as late as 1989. They are presently 25 points ahead of their nearest challengers in the Scottish Premier League. Celtic and Rangers with commercial turnovers of £68 million and £58 million respectively (2003/4), they are both in the top 20 richest clubs in Europe. No other Scottish club has a commercial turnover of even £10 million. See B. Murray (1984) The Old Firm: Sectarianism, Sport and Society in Scotland (Edinburgh: John Donald) for a history.

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2 The oft-cited examples of one party dominant political regimes are the Liberal Democratic Party in Japan (1955-89) and the Social Democrats in Sweden (1932-76), and the Labor Party in Israel pre-independence - 1977. 3 Dewar, McLeish, Galbraith, McAllion, Robertson and Chisholm. 4 It should be noted that the electoral system used to allocate seats changed in 1999 from the first-past-the-post to a more proportional system 5 Scotland’s population – 5 million – is about one-tenth that of England. 6 The Daily Record has a circulation of approximately 600,000 and is by some margin the best selling newspaper in Scotland. 7 They failed to match the ‘person specification’ which set out the abilities of would-be MPs such as creative skills, strategic thinking and action, advocacy skills, interpersonal skills, leadership and teamwork, communication and campaigning skills. 8 In this quote McLeish seems to be suggesting the ‘sectarian’ divisions of Scotland are not limited to its football – they are reflected in the factionalism within the Labour Party. ‘The Lanarkshire mafia’ is a phrase often used in the Scottish media and reflects the background of leading figures in the party such as John Reid, Helen Liddell, Jack McConnell and Tom McCabe. The ‘Glasgow University’ faction (if there is such a thing!) would include graduates such as former party leader, John Smith and the first Scottish First Minister, Donald Dewar. 9 The latest figure available, as at December 31, 2003 10 It should also be noted that the Labour Party still includes as members those whose payment subscription is 6 months overdue, thus exaggerating its true membership figures. 11 For example, Jack McConnell the present First Minister was general secretary of the party 1992-98. 12 This despite the fact that 72% of Labour local councillors are against the move towards a more proportional electoral system (Kerevan 2002: 39) 13 ‘Lobbygate’ refers to an undercover investigation by The Observer newspaper that highlighted the close interpersonal connections between parliamentary lobbyists and the Scottish party leadership. ‘Officegate’ led to the resignation of the second First Minister, Henry McLeish after not declaring sublets in his constituency office. ‘Wishawgate’ exposed some undeclared trade union funding of the local party in the constituency of the current First Minister Jack McConnell. ‘Warkgate’ highlighted the closeness of the relationship between the First Minister and one of the BBC’s leading presenters on politics, Kirsty Wark.