Today's news about more plots against Gordon Brown by Geoff Hoon and Patricia Hewitt is only the latest reminder that Brown himself had spent years plotting to remove and replace Tony Blair.
A slightly more subtle reminder was the extraordinary speech he made in November 'supporting' Blair's candidacy for the presidency of the European Council. 'Supporting' is in inverted commas because his 'support' was preceded by no fewer than sevenpre-delicate hitches in quick succession.
Regular readers will know that pre-delicate hitches are things like 'uhs', 'ums' and false starts that often come just before a speaker says something that he/she thinks is rather delicate - e.g. when Brown was defending former Home Secretary Jacqui Smith, or when Hillary Clinton was threatening North Korea with consequences.
In this case, the question is: what was so delicate about it his support for Blair that he prefaced it with so many hitches?
Was it that he was finding it difficult to 'support' the very person he'd been plotting and briefing against for years?
Or was it that he that, given his well-known hostility towards Blair, he knew that no one would believe him - however 'clearly' he said it?
BROWN: Uh- let-let me say very very clearly that we uh-the British uh-government uh-believe that uh- Tony Blair would be an excellent uh-candidate and an excellent person to hold the job of president of the Council …
Regular readers will know that I have serious reservations about the way speeches have steadily given way to broadcast interviews as the main form of political communication in Britain (a selection of posts on which can be found at the bottom of this page).
So if you think that I might be dreading the thought of having to put up with the boredom, tedium and repetitive evasiveness that's awaiting us between now and the general election, you'd be dead right.
Masochists wanting to prepare themselves for the ordeal need look no further than Andrew Marr’s interview with Gordon Brown yesterday morning (see above or HERE for full transcript).
The big story was latched on to by quite a few commentators, including the BBC’s political editor Nick Robinson, who noted in his blog that:
“.. the interview was memorable … for a slip - on election timing…”
This reminded me of a question that first occurred to me after the 1987 general election, namely:
Has any broadcast interview ever generated any good news for a politician?
If you can think of an example of this happening, I’d love to hear from you.
Meanwhile, here’s a summary of the conclusions John Heritage and I reached in a paper we presented at a conference at Essex University after the 1987 election. Unfortunately I'm having to rely on fading memory, as Heritage migrated to UCLA shortly afterwards, which meant that we never got round to writing it up for publication. I do, however, clearly remember the title of the paper:
‘A SNAKES & LADDERS THEORY OF POLITICAL COMMUNICATION'
Ladders
Our general argument was that speeches work like 'ladders' that can move you up towards a winning position on the board, whereas interviews work like 'snakes' that can only move you downwards.
The advantage of speeches is that politicians (and/or their speechwriters) have total control over both what they say and how they say it. Skillful deployment of rhetoric and imagery can produce punchy lines that get noticed and selected as sound bites for evening news programmes and as headlines for the next morning’s newspapers.
An added bonus is that an audience of millions gets to see and hear the cheers, applause and enthusiasm coming from the local audience of a few hundreds or thousands.
Snakes
But being interviewed is like walking a tight rope. Success means getting to to the end of it without falling off - for which your reward is little or nothing in the way of positive news about what you actually said. Its only chance of becoming newsworthy is if you slip up, as Mr Brown did on Sunday, when he more or less revealed the date of the election. And slips hardly ever generate news that puts you in a good light.
In other words, our argument was that interviews are only capable of generating negative news for the politician.
Three notable examples of the Q-A format leading to negative stories about political leaders stood out during the 1987 general election.
1.Thatcher says she'll go on and on - and on
In an interview with Mrs Thatcher, Robin Day asked her if this, the third election in which she'd led the Conservative party, would be her last election – to which she replied “No, Mr Day. I intend to go on and on”.
Her two-part list was promptly extended to “on and on and on” both by headline writers and by Labour party leader Neil Kinnock in a speech a few days later, in which he used it as the second part of a powerful contrast:
“A leader who has let unemployment go up and up and up and up should not be allowed to go on and on and on”- a line that was singled out and replayed on most prime-time news bulletins (i.e. it took him, albeit temporarily, up a 'ladder' on the Snakes & Ladders board).
2.Kinnock says we’ll take to the mountains to fight the Russians
Meanwhile, unilateral nuclear disarmament was still at the heart of Labour’s defence policy in 1987.
When pressed on this in an interview, Neil Kinnock said that people would take to the hills and fight, thereby rendering any Soviet occupation of the UK “totally untenable” – lines that generated a huge amount of damaging publicity for him and his party (taking him down a 'snake' on the board).
3.The two Davids and Ask the Alliance Rallies
The SDP and Liberal Party fought the 1987 election as the Alliance under two leaders, David Steel (Lib) and David Owen (SDP). Until close to the end of the campaign, neither of them made any set- piece speeches at all, as they’d decided to run events called ‘Ask the Alliance’ rallies (probably because Steel was a better public speaker and Owen didn't want to be outshone by him).
The ‘rallies’ involved members of the public reading out prepared questions to the leaders, who then ad-libbed their answers. I don’t remember a single positive quotation from either of them that made the headlines. But I do remember saying that they came across like Gardeners’ Question Time on a bad day.
What little media interest they did generate mainly concentrated on the question of how well or badly the format was working, but reported little of what either of them had actually said.
Will 2010 be the first general election with no speeches, no rallies and no excitement?
Given the benefits that can come from making speeches to enthusiastic crowds (look no further than the success of Barack Obama's journey from nowhere), I remain completely baffled by the logic of our politicians’ apparent preference for doing endless interviews rather than letting us judge what they want to say and how they want to say it to audience at lively rallies.
After all, if you're going to play Snakes and Ladders, why on earth would you chose to spend all your time landing on Snakes and avoid the Ladders altogether?
The answer, I fear, is that our politicians have fallen into a bigger trap set for them by a mass media that's more obsessed with increasing their control and decreasing their costs than they are with what audiences find boring or interesting about politics and politicians. Otherwise, how could anyone get so excited about the dreary prospect of lengthy televised election 'debates' between party leaders?
But accountants at the BBC, ITV and Sky News, of course, have every reason to get excited by the hustings being transferred to television studios. The fewer reporters and camera crews they have to send to film speeches at rallies around the country, the lower their costs will be - the net result of which looks like being the most tedious and boring election on record.
Fewer snakes and more ladders, please!
If I were still active in advising a political leader, I'd be urging him to ignore the new rules set by a misguided media and to get back on the road. And I don't mean just walking around a few schools, hospitals and shopping centres. I mean holding proper rallies, making inspiring speeches, creating some excitement and building some momentum.
The media would have no choice but to cover them, and the wider public would surely find them a bit more lively than more and more interviews in which we have to wait longer and longer, on the off-chance that someone will slip up and make it interesting enough to become news.
For authors, there's nothing more encouraging than favorable reviews that recommend others to read something you've written. Without such unsolicited comments, you really don't have much idea of how closely you got to hitting the mark you were aiming for.
An unexpected and very welcome boost to my morale for the new year arrived the other day in the form of an email from LinkedIn pointing me to an Amazon reading list I hadn't come across before - that features reviews of my book Lend Me Your Ears.
Reproducing a selection of them here is hardly the most modest way to start another year of blogging.
But my defence goes back to one of my reasons for starting the blog in the first place, which was that I thought it might help to sell a few books. More than 400 posts later, this is the first and only and only one (i.e. less than 0.25% of the total) in which my subtle marketing strategy has ventured so explicitly 'above the line'.
The comment that gave me most pause for thought was the eighth one, as it reminded me of something that worried me when I originally started work on the book, namely that I might be writing myself out of my day job. But it was only a short pause that lasted long enough for me to realise that a significant proportion of the paid work I do these days is commissioned by people who've already read the book - and liked it well enough to pay considerably more than the disturbingly low price of £7.11 on the Amazon (UK) website.
"Fantastic book with a great framework for making memorable presentations"
"Excellent resource for the public speaker, with lots of tips for making presentations more effective. Should be required reading for anyone planning to make a public presentation."
"I found this book a very easy book to read and rather than being yet another tools & technique book, without a foundation, this one is quite special. The first part of the book investigates the concept of language and the various situations in which we 'talk'. It really gave me an insight into why we do some of the things we do when it comes to communicating through voice. Having built up this clear understanding it then provides some very useful techniques and insights into writing key note speeches, etc. A definite read for anyone interested in improving their presentation or public speaking skills."
"Professor Atkinson's book is a must read for new presenters and those who think they've got it all. Strong on attitude, structure and projection. The practical ideas build confidence, challenge complacency and reinforce competence."
"Read this if you want to hone your skills on succesful persuasion and general public speaking. Tons of useful tips that will make you an instant hit with your audiences."
"Max Atkinson has helped me develop with regards to communicating in a one to many setting. I believe this book will be valuable for most people wanting to improve their skills in front of an audience."
"A very well constructed book with each chapter covering different aspects and a useful summary/exercise section after each chapter. The author uses real world examples to illustrate his points which makes this even more relevant. I've not had the bottle to stand up and present yet but it's enabled me to produce better communications packs and have great conversations with my manager about the style and content of his presentations. It's useful to put yourself on the receiving end of presentations rather than see it as the speaker all the time."
"Save your money and don't do a presentation course. This gives you all you need to know..."
