Gorgeous George and the St Tropez factor
Tribune, 4 June 2004

I suppose we ought to be grateful to Joan Collins. The Seventies' soft-porn star from St Tropez has at least enlivened the forthcoming Euro elections by hitching her absentee wagon to Robert Kilroy-Silk and the UK Independence Party. In the salons of Lower Holloway we now debate into the wee hours which of three Euro-egos we would least like to wake up next to on the morning after the election. The choice is between Collins, Kilroy or the outside left's own version of a celebrity candidate, "Gorgeous George" Galloway.

This ungallant political parlour game is justified on the basis that each of these characters, in their own inimitable fashion, thinks of him or herself as among the sexiest creatures in God's creation. And each of them, in their own way, shares the same vanity of believing that their supposed popular appeal in the groin department will translate into votes in the ballot box.

My prediction, for what it's worth, is that the UKIP will indeed mop up enough low-level prejudice against Europe, immigrants and the "go soft on crime brigade" (whoever they may be these days) to add to its existing representation at Strasbourg. This may be no bad thing from a Labour Party election strategist's point of view, since it will undermine both the BNP vote and any developing Tory revival without posing a serious threat to Labour beyond the Euro elections.

At the same time, a perceived three-pronged right-wing challenge from the UKIP, BNP and Conservatives will probably prove scary enough to keep sufficient Labour supporters on board to avoid any effective electoral challenge from the left. The unholy alliance of the Socialist Workers Party, the Muslim Association of Britain and George Galloway under the Respect banner seems unlikely to get any closer to an electoral breakthrough from the left than past endeavours along similar lines. It might even reduce the effectiveness of the left-of-Labour vote by splitting the support that would otherwise have gone to the Greens.

In short, I suspect that Labour will come out of these elections less damaged than it might have feared under the circumstances. The Liberal Democrats, no doubt, will make inroads here, there and everywhere in a scrappy, inconsistent sort of way. But they'll probably lose ground, as well as take it, as a result of the Conservative revival.

The Conservatives, for their part, may re-establish themselves as a competent opposition, and even retake a few more of those places in local government that you wonder how they ever lost. But they're unlikely to do any better than that; and a competent opposition does not a government-in-waiting make. Michael Howard, moreover, may discover that the Euro Curse that Margaret Thatcher bequeathed to his party will re-emerge to haunt him as it has his predecessors - except that this time it has Joan Collins's face on it.

As for the purported challenge from the left, well make me eat the unread copies of this column if I'm wrong, but it really doesn't feel as though Respect is on a roll to me. If George Galloway squeaks home on a low London turnout I'll be surprised. If any other Respect candidate gets to represent us in Europe, I'll be flabbergasted.

The English left's best big chance of busting open Labour's electoral monopoly came and went with Ken Livingstone. It was possible to imagine a Livingstone-led alliance of the left polling perhaps 10-15 per cent of the national vote in elections such as these, and doing a Scottish Socialist Party south of the border. Livingstone in London has displayed just the mix of populism, pragmatism and principle that can reach beyond the ghettoes of the outside left. But with him back in the Labour fold, no one else comes close to creating the same crossover appeal.

If this sounds as though I'm saying that personalities are more important than policies when it comes to getting elected, it's because to some extent I am. At any rate, it's important who you get to project the policies and how.

But in the longer term, serious electoral ambition requires serious electoral organisation. That's one reason why Ken Livingstone decided against remaining an outsider: even the biggest personalities find it almost impossible to go it alone.

It also requires commitment that goes beyond just one election. It remains to be seen whether the SWP will tire of its latest political adventure, or Respect's Muslim and other supporters look elsewhere, if this week's election results turn out to be disappointing for them. It's hard to see them being in it for the long haul of local election campaigning, though. Getting a councillor elected in Preston is a bit of a come-down when you've been pitching for the overthrow of the whole world order.

Whatever happens on Thursday, by the time of the general election, we'll be back to the same basic choice of Labour versus the Tories, with the Lib Dems chipping away at the edges. And Joan Collins sitting in out in St Tropez.