Tony Blair is still ruining Britain
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Tony Blair and Gordon Brown’s failures are still writ large on the public imagination – the Iraq War for example, or the racking up of astonishing national debt. But what is less well recognised is the last Labour government’s extraordinary success in using seemingly mundane pieces of legislation to profoundly – and, for conservatives, detrimentally – transform the culture of the United Kingdom.
In its 2005 manifesto, the Labour Party pledged to bring forward a new Equality Bill, to “modernise and simplify” equality laws. A bland aim perhaps, but the resulting Equality Act 2010 became a flagship piece of New Labour legislation that would embed leftist identity politics into our public institutions, paving the way for the ideological capture of our schools, civil service and NHS.
Like all good grenades, these Blairite laws did not explode until the thrower was safely out of range. In 2010, few conservatives understood the perniciousness of a Bill that established in statute nine “protected characteristics” including race, sex, religion and gender reassignment, laying the foundations for a culture that sees people not as equal individuals but as members of competing groups.
Neither was it foreseen that the Act’s Public Sector Equality Duty (PSED) would give rise to such strident critical social justice activism within our public bodies. This paper has exposed some of the most excessive examples of this, such as hard-pressed NHS staff attending a three day diversity training course at a time of record hospital waiting lists.
It is welcome news that Government ministers wish to tackle divisive and wastelful civil service activism. But in promoting woke causes, public bodies genuinely believe they are fulfilling legal duties under the PSED, which compels public organisations to “eliminate discrimination” and “advance equality”.
It is no longer enough for public sector bosses to ensure they do not discriminate against someone because of their sex or skin colour; they must actively pursue policies to eliminate all potential inequalities, giving rise to the kinds of ridiculous re-education programmes that frequently make the news. In seeking to subvert a British understanding of fairness, these programmes actually introduce discrimination, for example gender neutral policies that discriminate against women.
I am often asked, how has this happened under a Conservative government? It’s a fair question. But while some now argue that the incoming 2010 Cameron government should have repealed the Equality Act, this was a political impossibility in coalition with the Lib Dems.
And by the time of Conservative’s outright victory in 2015, Blairite equalities legislation had changed our culture so effectively that anyone who questioned the new creed of Equality, Diversity and Inclusion feared becoming a pariah. Even if Cameron had wanted to push back against these “advances”, he would not have had a majority in parliament to do so.
The architects of Blair’s revolution knew that politicians would not want to be seen to oppose his “progressive” agenda. But if we want to end this ideological capture – and the division, waste, confusion and cultural destruction it has caused – then either this Government or a future Conservative government must be prepared to undertake wholesale reform of our equalities and human rights legislation, including withdrawing from the ECHR. It will take time to make the case for this but we must.
And the case for reform is this: Britain was built not on diversity, but on an understanding that every person is equal under the law, having an inherent value as an individual and not as a member of a particular identity group competing with other identity groups for power. A determination not to discriminate – to show no favouritism – is a key part of this understanding. But assuming someone needs special treatment or holds particular views purely on the basis of their race, sexuality, or age is itself a form of prejudice and undermines the social cohesion that is so vital in building a nation that shares a common purpose.
We cannot end this destructive madness by playing whack-a-mole with each and every public sector activist group; we need to reform our legal framework. Even if this cannot be achieved in this Parliament, Conservatives need to start rolling the pitch now. Our next manifesto must contain a clear commitment to a new British Bill of Rights that establishes fundamental rights and freedoms that apply equally to all individual British citizens.
Miriam Cates is Conservative MP for Penistone and Stockbridge
