The Labour Party has been going through the usual ritual acts of self-reproach, bafflement and mourning since its general election defeat.
It was caught in a pincer movement between Scottish nationalism and Ukip. Its arch-rivals the Conservatives beat it by more than five per cent. So much for that dead heat.
Labour needs to get the details right as part of a push towards a much more vigorous savings culture across all income groupsThe various leadership candidates have suggested the party was too left, too anti-business, too right (in Scotland), too northern, too London, too Brownite and/or was led by the wrong Miliband brother.
But one of the most interesting interventions has come from the new shadow chancellor Chris Leslie, who has replaced that world-famous fan of advisers Ed Balls.
Now I wasn’t travelling much in northern parts prior to the election, but I did not meet one adviser from southern parts who had a shred of doubt about who they were voting for.
I suspect a massive majority of advisers voted blue, which isn’t a surprise. But what should worry Labour is just how adamant advisers were about the choices confronting them and their clients.
For advisers, Labour was toxic and I would also argue this is more of a change than you might think.
I do remember one poll commissioned by a trade paper back in the New Labour years, which gave the Tories only the slimmest of leads.
And it is surely true that it becomes really difficult to get elected if you have most business-minded people ardently supporting your opposition.
On this, Leslie is talking a lot of sense. People will not vote for you if they don’t trust you to look after their wallets, he says. A rent cap would have hurt a lot of small buy-to-let landlords, including the elderly who rely on rents from flats as retirement income.
He says Labour must re-engage with the Which? magazine-reading public. This is better than John Lewis shoppers, but it may cause the odd shudder from advisers. For example, it was a Which? survey of supposedly overcharging drawdown that was the excuse for plans for Ed Miliband’s clunky, clumsy drawdown price cap.
But shoot-from-the-hip consumerism is actually one place Labour – both New and old – risks going wrong with. I can remember a Stephen Byers speech at a Labour conference about ‘rip-off Britain’. It concentrated on mortgages. The one thing mortgages were not at the time was a rip off. I asked the press office for the examples that were so concerning Mr Byers. Unsurprisingly, no instances were forthcoming.
Back to modern times. Getting drawdown correct for the vast majority is not a matter of fixating on charges. As far as possible, it is making sure pension pots don’t run out, particularly in the case of a stockmarket crash, combined with implementing a well-thought-out withdrawal strategy. That is surely the most pressing issue. Charges may well be the next item on the agenda if they are being abused.
Labour needs to get the details right as part of a push towards a much more vigorous savings culture across all income groups. That means drawing on their own conclusions about where consumers’ interests lie.
It might mean conceding on the long stop or creating a simplified advice channel.
And that may mean making sure advisers, if not quite Labour’s friends, are at least not their enemies next time out.
John Lappin blogs on industry issues at www.mindfulmoney.co.uk
