Published: 17 November, 2011
by GERALD ISAAMAN

How do we get out of current mess the world is in?

Events may well have changed by the time you read this – Harold Macmillan was undoubtedly right with his declaration that Prime Ministers are inevitably thrown off course by the curse of circumstance  – but for the moment we need to be cold with anger.

That is the belief of Neil Kinnock, the Labour leader who almost made it to No 10 and now sits in the Lords, as well as at Ed Miliband’s elbow since he lives in Tufnell Park and today’s Labour leader in nearby Dartmouth Park.

“Our mindset must be cold anger – cold because we need to be calculating, but angry because it is justified and it catches the mood of so many who are profoundly but, so far, haplessly anxious, resentful and leaderless,” he told me.

“Following that course will obviously bring collision with most of the press but it is essential that we take them on and refuse to be diverted.

“They reflect the majority view less by the day. They will distort us but they mustn’t divert us. Happily, that’s Ed’s view too.”

And his plea comes in the wake of the death earlier this month of Philip Gould, Labour’s backroom guru on public opinion who probably did more to fashion New Labour and Tony Blair’s premiership than either Peter Mandelson or Alistair Campbell.

He was the unknown from sticks of south London who made it to a villa in Kentish Town, his finger on the political pulse of the nation by using focus groups to discover a way ahead for Labour to come out of the doldrums of defeat and finally overturn the already smitten Thatcher bandwagon.

The humble lad who failed his 11-plus and ended up in the House of Lords proved a master strategist. He was the architect of power whose faith in New Labour manifested a new regime, albeit born with the inherent fault line between Blair and Gordon Brown that eventually blew it apart.

But don’t blame Gould for that.

Or the current lack of trust in politics and politicians.

It’s the flawed personalities of the leaders that parties choose who bring about the ugly downfalls under the pressure of events, made complete by a malicious media that has lost its own sense of what is good for the nation as it delves mercilessly into personal lives in a desperate phone-hacking attempt to halt dwindling newspaper sales.

The Westminster circus is indeed just. What Gould achieved is demonstrable, as anyone can discover reading the newly revamped edition of his brilliant analysis of British life – The Unfinished Revolution – How New Labour Changed British Politics For Ever.

And he brought it up to date only months before he died of cancer, aged just 61, with a remarkable and thoughtful forward by Tony Blair.

Plus too a passionate final chapter about the future that ought to inspire a generation of newly politicised young people who, fearing they have nowhere to go, will forge new boundaries.

“Philip was unique because he combined real mastery of polling analysis with strong progressive convictions and instincts of common sense,” Neil Kinnock told me.

“The normality of his background – including 11-plus failure – gave him fine insights and unshakeable determination to advance justice for humanity.

“Those who say that he had too much influence on the Labour government are wrong. His values should have been given more weight, not less.”

Which is why Lord Kinnock, an advocate of the Italian political philosopher and politician Antonio Gramsci, believes there is a future worth fighting for.

“I believe that the lessons taught by the excesses, the vanities and the greed that have brought this slump – and the grotesque differences in outcomes for the opulent and the ordinary – provide people of our rational beliefs with a true opportunity to get a mandate for social democracy,” he declared.

“If we are bold and bright enough to seize it. This is one of those fulcrum periods and we must use that.

If we don’t, deep economic difficulties – especially for the young – will be prolonged and the results will be perilous, not just appallingly wasteful.

“Gramsci recommended ‘pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will’ as the essential mentality of realistic socialists. It’s a vital combination now.”

But you don’t forge a sustainable way ahead – and an expanding economy – by making the poor poorer, slashing the pensions of teachers made to work longer, privatising the NHS, diminishing union laws, hitting charities and closing down the social welfare groups that bring cohesion.

Solidarity isn’t a dirty word. You can’t force protesters off the streets with flailing police batons and remove passive but outraged objectors to bankers’ greed from their tents of testament in front of an inactive Church of England leadership.

What New Labour has learned from its demise in 2010 is that the centre is never static, the politics of purpose is always on the move and new landscapes are there to be conquered.

“If New Labour dies, so too Labour,” Gould writes. “If New Labour lives on, albeit in a different world and from a different perspective, so does Labour.

“Ed Miliband is naturally suited to this; he sees the forward landscape fluidly and can bring apparently competing ideas together. I hope he succeeds, and I believe he can…”

The flame of unfinished revolution may flicker faintly. Yet it never dies.

• The Unfinished Revolution – How New Labour Changed British Politics For Ever. By Philip Gould. Abacus, £16.99