Deal or No Deal?

Liverpool City council have said the 'City Deal' that was on the table was the only deal to go for. Joe Anderson is putting a lot of effort into suggesting this deal to go direct to Mayoral election and bypassing a referendum was in the best interests of the city. He would say that, wouldn't he? But this leaves a lot of questions unanswered. Was it even a deal? What we're the other options?

Joe Anderson says the £130m City Deal could be worth £1billion. As far as I know he hasn't told us how yet. The City Deal was negotiated in private so all that is in public domain is the agreement in the form of a letter from Greg Clarke MP, Minister for Decentralisation and Cities. We don't know what other deals were on the table. For instance, we don't know what the City Deal for Liverpool would have been if the city would have chosen to take the referendum route.

It is worth noting that none of the other major cities that are constructing a City Deal felt that a direct election was in their best interest. Why is it that only Liverpool has chosen to go down the direction election route? Did the government construct the negotiations in such a way that they wanted to deny the people of Liverpool a choice? If so we should be told.

Or was it Liverpool City Council who constructed this arrangement? If the £130m deal was the best, what was the other deal? We can assume it was less, but how much less? £129m? £100m

Is there some conditionality to the City Deal that is not included in the agreement?  It is not clear if the new powers include the ability sign-off on large project or do they, as some are starting suggest, that sign-off will still be in the gift of various secretaries of state? Is this part of the deal?

A second issue that arises is just how much of the money and additional power is actually new?  The £75m in economic development appears to comprise all the money that was already available to the City, and certainly the powers are not new. Take the 'super fast broadband' money, this was already allocated to Liverpool under a deal from the Department for Culture, Media & Sport. A similar set up is true for the for the Housing element of the Mayoral Investment Board, which is simply a 'lease' type transfer of land assets from the Home & Community Agency, who will retain legal ownership of the assets and will continue to be the accountable body.

Two interesting omissions from the Mayor's powers will be education and health. Although the Mayor may have sufficient soft-power to bring people together, the increasing autonomy in the Education sector could mean that that integrating education into the economic development plan may be difficult. It is widely accepted that Liverpool has education attainment problems that contribute to the sluggishness of economic development. The Mayor will have some resources to build new schools, but even so half of these must be academies and therefore autonomous.

Health matters will also be dealt with by the new Health & Wellbeing Board. This will be run by local commissioning groups and representatives from the health sector. Its powers will be outside of the Mayor's remit. Again, the track record poor economic performance in Liverpool is related to health & wellbeing on both sides of the cause and symptom equation. Its within the Mayor's powers to work in partnership, but again this is significant area where the mayor has little influence.

There is also an area where there is potential source of conflict too. Although the Mayor will have economic development powers in Liverpool, it will be shared with the Local Economic Partnership, which is an arrangement that covers 6 boroughs. This is particularly important because some of the £130m is from retained business rates, but the mayor can only keep these if the LEP agrees. Its not clear what happens if the LEP doesn't agree.

There remains a lack of clarity over what the City Deal brings and what the alternatives were. Joe Anderson would do better by explaining how this deal was constructed and what were the alternatives. At the moment his triumphalism over the City Deal is looking a lot like the emperor's new clothes. I hope this is not the talking point for the election.

An interesting problem for Liam Fogarty

Liam Fogarty has an interesting problem. As the figurehead of the 'Mayor For Liverpool' campaign he was a natural candidate. Within hours of Liverpool City Council taking the historic decision to bypass the referendum and have a Mayoral election in May Fogarty announced his intention to stand as an independent.

The Mayor For Liverpool campaign group had a number of high profile supporters. Some of these supporters, including Prof John Ashton, Hilary Burrage and Alex Corina, are well known Labour Party activists. Ashton is seeking to stand as Labour's candidate for the new office of Policing Commissioner while Corina has stood for election as a councillor in the Cressington Ward in recent years. As far as I'm aware it is against Labour Party policy for a member to campaign for another candidate. It can lead to being expelled.

Clearly, supporting the the campaign for a Mayor is not the same as backing the campaign leader in standing for Mayor. We'll have to wait and see if they join Joe Anderson's campaign team. But its an interesting problem for Fogarty. Having to build an election campaign team without some of his previous allies is another disadvantage for him,

Jim'll Fix it for you.

Any candidate for the Mayor will need some cash for the campaign. While the deposit is £500, the maximum allowed expenditure for the campaign is about £22k - its based on £2k base and the about 4p per voter. Its not a lot.If it seems a low figure, you'd be right. David Bartlett over at the Liverpool Post speculates that its deliberately low to give Joe Anderson an advantage over any independents who must spend some of their money on setting up the 'campaign machine' while the established parties have everything in place.

Both the Liberal Democrats and Labour are bankrupt (in the financial sense) but can always find funds for a campaign and their various supporters will stump up enough dosh to manage a reasonable campaign. I imagine that both parties will be looking to deliver strong campaigns. Even though the LibDems are opposed to the Mayor, they are desperate to revive their fortunes in Liverpool.

The Conservative Party are yet to declare if they'll stand a candidate although President Tony Caldiera did recently suggest that he'd like to be Mayor. I've jokingly put elsewhere that the Tories might want to save the deposit, but if they do decide to put up a candidate you can be sure they will be fully supported with funds from Lord Ashcroft.

It has been rumoured that celebrity hairdresser Herbert Howe might run as a Tory candidate but I can't confirm if this is guess work if there's something more to it - his views are the typically social conservative with a large does free enterprise.. Whether he stands for the Conservatives or as an independent he is likely to be OK for funds. It suggested that he is properly minted although his flagship property on Hanover Street still remains empty bar the salon and that must have cost a bomb to build. Maybe it's Herbert's in name only and the deeds are owned by some Irish investors or a clearing house somewhere. He always looks a million dollars so I don't imagine he's going to struggle to meet the maxium.

I don't know about Liam Fogarty, he might struggle to get a decent pot together if he hasn't got a source of patronage or his own funds. Although his 'Mayor for Liverpool' campaign had a few well profiled supporters its not clear that it ever had much financial backing but then its not clear that it ever needed much! But then at £22k its not a huge sum to raise.

Phil Redmond has probably got a stash of his own after selling his stake in MerseyTV to All3TV in a £35m deal. Its rumoured that the late Jimmy Saville, a good friend since the Grange Hill days, left a decent wedge in his will for his mate Phil. So a Redmond campaign is unlikely to be short of a few bob. Maybe Jim has fixed it for Phil and that's why he being very relaxed about declaring!

Is Redmond testing the water or testing someone's resolve?

Phil Redmond penned an interesting article on the Guardian's Comment is Free site this evening. Its interesting that he's using The Guardian when he could use his column in the Post. Its also interesting that he's continuing to test the Mayor's role (see previous post re Job Description) - this time on how he'd address "the ability of the dominant political party to filibuster." And finally its interesting because he almost offers Joe Anderson the job as deputy Mayor!

The latter two points are related of course. Reading between the lines, my interpretation of his Guardian article is he believes he can win the election but he doesn't want to hand-tied by a constant fight with the councillors who will both control the cabinet and the full council. It seems he is looking for that assurance from Anderson that Labour, who must surely retain their sizeable majority after the local elections, will play nicely with the Mayor. He has good reason to worry about this, the relations with the cabinet could very difficult if a collective obdurate mentality sets in. 

On the other hand, he'll be Mayor and away from the Town Hall he will have a great deal of influence. Liam Fogarty, the former BBC man and independent candidate, tweeted earlier that Redmond understates the 'soft' power that the Mayor will have. 

P. Redmond on Liverpool mayor role: bit.ly/xZym4P I think he understates the "soft" power a popular mandate confers on the winner.
— Liam Fogarty (@LiamFog) February 13, 2012

'Soft power' defines he way influencers can can obtain buy-in through co-option and attraction. Its about creating a culture and establishing a value base for the Mayor's office. Fogarty has a point, the Mayor will have a symbolic power that people will want to work with. It just remains to be seen whether the councillors will fall into step with that or play politics. Anyone who witnessed the Mayoral debate will be in no doubt  Liverpool politicians from all sides like to play off of one and other.

Redmond's article referenced the Militant tendency in his open paragraph and then closed with "I'd invite the leader of the largest party to become deputy mayor." I was immediately reminded of the Hatton/Mulhearn combination: the savvy front-man with media presence and the back room boss cutting deals across the council. It kind of felt like he was saying, 'I'll shape the agenda, and my deputy will make it happen.' Anderson will have an important role in shaping the Mayor's duties in the coming weeks, and Redmond has been clear in using his Post column and this article to make demands of the role. Its like the very public salvoes that happen before closed negotiations happen - part agenda setting, part testing the resolve.

His final words in the article were "If I were running for Mayor." If? This horse is in the starting gate.

David Milliband suggests 'open primary' for Labour Mayoral candidates.

David Milliband has suggested Labour candidates for City Mayoral elections should be selected by an 'open primary'. At the moment it seems Liverpool will be the only city to go straight to an election on May 3rd 2012. The remaining 8 cities will hold a referendum first.  If Liverpool Labour chose the 'open primary' route it would be the first place to do so. I'd be surprised if this was the outcome.

An 'open primary' allows registered supporters of a party to take part in the selection of the party's candidate. Milliband suggests that non-members could register as supporters for a small fee of £1 and this would entitle them to participate in the selection process for the candidate. He suggests that it could be a good way for the party to re-engage with electorate.

Labour has not used the primary method before and its only been used once before in British politics. The Tories held an open primary prior to the 2009 general election to select the candidate for Totnes. Dr Sarah Woolaston won the primary, just over 16,000 voters took part, and she went on to win the subsequent election becoming the MP for the Devon constituency. The French Socialist Party recently used the method proposed by Milliband to select their candidate for the forthcoming presidential election. Nearly three million voters took part in selecting François Hollande paying 1 euro each for the privilege. That's a good amount of voter engagement but also a tidy sum for the campaign coffers!

Joe Anderson might feel this is a shot across his bow. The current Leader of the Council occupies a position of strength of within the local party and is expected to be the party's candidate should Labour use a member-only vote. However, if the party uses the primary model it could open the way for another candidate to stand who might be more popular with the potential Labour supporting electorate.

It has been suggested the Liverpool administration chose to avoid having a referendum because the question was set-out in a way that would reflect negatively on the current administration. The referendum ballot question was phrased to make the choice between "This is how the council is run now" or "This would be a change from how the council if run now." If the referendum result was for a Mayor it would be used by Labour's opponents to suggest the electorate didn't support the way the party ran the council had been run. There's certainly a lot on antipathy towards the council, but that's politics folks!

However, Anderson might take some comfort that practicalities are on his side, or at least time is. It might be difficult to arrange and conduct an open primary in the time-frame. The selection of the candidate must happen by April 4th when the formal nomination process closes. Anderson supporters might hope the local party hierarchy drag their feet on this matter. If Labour are to use this method they will need to get a move on.

Phil Redmond might run

As I speculated on Tuesday, Phil Redmond might run for the Mayor of Liverpool. In an article in the Liverpool Echo he has declared an interest. However, he'd like to see the 'job description' first. This is fair enough and is the first sensible thing I've read so far on the Mayor race. He was also on last night's BBC Question Time and Dimbleby asked if he would stand. Redmond replied he "didn't know."

Mr Redmond, who is the former head of Mersey TV and current chair of the National Museums and Galleries on Merseyside,  is no stranger to city politics. He was widely credited as 'the cavalry' by many insiders for his role in the Culture 2008 campaign, snatching victory from the jaws of defeat in aftermath of a series of high profile resignations. More recently he had a big falling out with Joe Anderson and the City Council over the withdrawal from 'Big Society Pilot' that the former Hollyoaks boss was spearheading.

I have wondered if Redmond could stand for the Tories - they're always very accommodating. I don't know if he has any political affiliations to any party but I'm informed that he is well connected to Cameron and other leading members of the government. If there is someone who could detoxify the Tory brand in Liverpool it would him. However, this is pure conjecture on my part, nothing more.

Mayoral Candidates

In my post yesterday I listed some of the potential candidates we're like to see on 3rd May. Joe Anderson's campaign got a boost today with a solid backing from Frank McKenna, head of the ever growing Downtown in Business network. McKenna, a former Labour politician in Lancashire, has a finger on the pulse of Liverpool's business community and is giving his backing to the current leader of the Labour-led council. I did wonder if McKenna would stand himself on the business ticket, but when I asked him last night he was forthright in saying he wouldn't.

Also yesterday I wondered if the Conservatives would even put forward a candidate. I expected they would save the deposit. However, David Bartlett over at the Post & Echo has just published a entry on his Dale Street Associates blog suggesting that Tony Caldiera, President of Liverpool's Tories could be lining up for punt himself. There is nothing solid in the quotes from Caldiera, who will follow the due process of the party, but has said it would be a great honour to lead the city as Mayor. What an optimist!

City Council votes yes to elected Mayor

In what is being billed as a historic moment for Liverpool, the city council voted overwhelming to have an elected Mayor. Currently the council has a leader who is elected by the councillors of the party with most seats. The directly elected Mayor will be elected directly by citizens. The vote will happen 86 days from on May 3rd 2012.

A deal between the current Labour administration and central government under the auspices of the 'city deal' meant the city could proceed directly to having a Mayor without having a referendum. The coalition government's policy is for the 8 major cities to have Mayors to provide a consistent figurehead to to city development. However, it is looking likely that the other cities will offer their citizens a choice.

At this time former BBC man Liam Fogerty and celebrity hairdresser Herbert Howe are both thought to have declared themselves as independent candidates. It is expected that Joe Anderson, the current council leader, is expected to put himself forward for the Labour ticket. It is thought that Richard Kemp is the leading contender from the LibDems. It is not known if the conservatives will field a candidate, but to be fair this would be throwing good money after bad. There's also been a strong rumour that Phil redmond may also enter the race as an independent but the former MerseyTV boss has neither confirmed or denied the suggestions. There'll no doubt be one or two curveball candidates as well. Nominations will open on March 27 and close a week later on April 4th.

The race has begin, watch this space!