Hill+Knowlton Strategies

Queen’s Speech
18 November 2009

Black Rod’s hammering on the doors of the House of Commons today was tantamount to the starting pistol firing in the General Election campaign. As MPs made their way to the House of Lords, one had the feeling that the jostling, bickering and hostility was a prelude to how the fifth parliamentary session of this tired third term Labour Government might play out over the remaining 70 or so working days.

The sheer scale of Labour’s ambitions for this last parliamentary term is astounding. Thirteen Bills (three carried over) and two draft bills were announced, two more than last year when the Government had a full session to play with! The choice of Bills introduced over the next six to eight weeks will tell us a lot about the Government’s priorities for what it would like to see on the statute books before the end of its term in office. The Equality Bill is a good case in point which contains some incredibly controversial measures such as requiring companies to report gender differences on pay and requiring public bodies to drive equality in the private sector through procurement.

Heavily trailed Bills to provide social care for the elderly, educational rights for children and parents, and protection for the poorest energy customers played to Labour’s heartlands whilst still having middle class appeal. It is foreseeable that these Bills will be amongst the first to be introduced. If this is the case then the Conservatives will have to choose their battles very carefully if, as touted, Tory peers decide to delay the progress of Bills in the Lords. This is a classic Gordon Brown dividing line, a clearly set trap that David Cameron will have to be careful to avoid if he is to protect his party’s social justice credentials.

Like last year, this year’s speech was set within the context of the economic situation with the fostering of growth and employment firmly at its core. Surprisingly, the issue which has coloured and dogged parliamentary proceedings since the summer, MPs’ expenses, was passed over with little more than a nod to “building trust in democratic institutions” in the speech’s preamble. Given the extent of the electorate’s disgust with MPs’ behaviour, it seems a risky strategy to seek to avoid the subject, particularly in the run-up to the election campaign. 

The Government apparently drew back from more radical measures like electoral reform for fear it would become blocked in the Lords. Considering the declaration of opposition from Tory peers they might now wish they had gone ahead with it, if for nothing more than to draw another clear dividing line.

The Conservatives and Liberal Democrats slammed today’s speech as little more than talk and blatant politicking. It is interesting to note, however, that in the dying days of the Major Government a similar number of Bills were shepherded through with a smaller majority in a comparable amount of time. Some may interpret this as Brown inadvertently conceding that he is not going to get another opportunity to introduce these Bills.

The Pre-Budget Report, due on 9th December, is more critical than ever. High ambitions often come at a cost, and the country’s coffers have rarely been as bare. As flesh – and figures – get put on the bones of today’s Bills, we will have a better understanding of how many Bills have a chance of surviving, something that will no doubt correlate with Labour’s slim chances of forming the next Government.

Clare Coffey on behalf of the H&K public affairs team.

Queen’s Speech PDF

Last week saw the 20^th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall and a flood of media interest in the celebrations. This came as no surprise as the fall of the Wall and the flood of joyous East Germans pouring into West Berlin on 9 November 1989 became one of the most iconic images of the 20^th Century.  Though just twelve years old at the time I remember the night well watching Brian Hanrahan reporting on the BBC nine o’clock news on the wall-mounted television in my local chippy as I queued for fish and chips (see here).  Twenty years on how much really did change?

Well, I suppose the starting point is to assess the impact that the fall of the Wall made on the populations that it effectively ‘locked away’, and by this I refer to Poles, Czechs, Estonians and Hungarians (and others) as well as East Germans. By this I mean that the Wall was a more powerful barrier psychologically than it ever was physically. Having spent much of the past fifteen years in and around Central and Eastern Europe with considerable stints in Warsaw, Krakow, Tallinn and Prague, it was clear to me that the most of the populations of Central and Eastern Europe felt a collective sigh of relief that the long years of Soviet domination had passed and that much of the past 20 years have been all about returning to ‘normalcy’. Indeed, one of my Polish relatives divides his life into two parts – pre-1989 and post-1989 – because from late 1989 onwards he had the freedom to travel to Western Europe.  His first trip, like the one made by so many Poles,  was to Rome.

From the Western European side, the fall of the Communist regimes opened up new contact with ‘Eastern Europeans’ who Western Europeans had seen mostly on grainy news reports from the ‘Eastern bloc’.  The post-1989 world also opened up new markets and engendered a familiarity and fascination with Central and Eastern Europe that has endured to this day – in no doubt bolstered by cheap flights and stag parties to ‘exotic’ destinations such as Riga, Vilnius and Bratislava.  Maybe this analysis is too simplistic? 

Yet this fascination is nowhere better exemplified than in the British press which reports extensively on the major deals, new companies and brands originating from the region.  For example, the FT regularly focuses on Russia’s corporate governance and transformation into a market economy recognising the impact that country will make as an energy supplier to the UK / Europe for many years to come.  Ditto the Evening Standard, which is owned by a Russian. 

Hill & Knowlton’s recent work with clients such as MTS (Russia), Interpipe (Ukraine) and Antena 1 (Romania) has illustrated that clients from Central and Eastern Europe come to London seeking both corporate and financial counsel and recognise the importance of the London market to communicate more broadly.  But putting media interest in the region aside, the general impression is that Western Europe still doesn’t fully understand the other half of the continent to any great extent.  Maybe you’d disagree but I get the impression that a better level of understanding will be achieved only with the familiarity that major sporting events bring.  Indeed, Poland and Ukraine are due to host the Euro 2012 football championships and Sochi in Russia will be the location of the 2014 Winter Olympics.  Visiting the Sochi Olympic site this summer there’s much work still to be done.

So looking back over the past twenty years, an enormous amount has changed – in business, society and politics.  And as far as Western European perceptions are concerned Central and Eastern Europe seems less far away and indeed more ‘normal’ than before the fall of the Wall.  What are your views?