James Reed: Risk-averse campaign has failed to tackle the issues

They have reached the top spot by playing an expansive brand of rugby league based on fast running, slick passing and a willingness to take risks in situations where other teams would pursue more conservative options.

Pundits are regularly heard saying they hope the West Yorkshire team go on to win a trophy as their doing so would encourage more teams to pursue this attractive style of play and help market the sport to a wider audience.

I fear something similar, but far less welcome, could be about to happen in politics.

You don’t need me to tell you that this has not been an election campaign to set the pulse-racing.

The Conservatives set the tone two years ago with their ‘long term economic plan’ mantra but have taken their message discipline to a new level in this campaign to the extent that Today programme presenter Mishal Husain was forced to ask Boris Johnson to “stop talking” as the Foreign Secretary persistently tried to steer the interview in the direction he wanted.

They have been allowed to pursue this approach by the shortcomings of Labour’s campaign, and the result is more than likely to be a Conservative victory that makes speak-your-weight-machine politics the blueprint for elections to come.

In scope as well as style, this is a campaign that has left voters ill-informed on vast areas of policy that touch the lives of almost every family in the country.

Disagree?

Ask yourself what are the schools policies of the two major parties? If you can come up with an answer, I suspect it would be ‘grammar schools’ for the Conservatives and ‘spend more money’ for Labour.

In fact, on top of more selection, the Conservatives want to introduce new technical education T-levels, review admissions policy, force universities and private schools to sponsor academies or free schools, toughen primary school targets and make secondary schools more accountable for what happens between the ages of 11 and 14.

Labour, meanwhile, wants to establish a National Education Service, scrap free schools, simplify admissions, extend free meals to all primary school children, review primary school testing and extend school counselling.

On the one hand Labour is looking to end the bi-partisan consensus, established in the 1990s, that more localised management of schools – and diversity of state provision – is preferable while the Conservatives are looking to dramatically accelerate that agenda, even though Justine Greening, the Rotherham-born Education Secretary, has been a largely anonymous figure on the campaign trail.

And here’s a confession – I had to leaf through both manifestos to discover this for myself and I do this a for a living.

What about Brexit? The Prime Minister justified this election on the basis of the imminent start of the Brexit negotiations, but does any voter really have a clearer idea of what Britain’s relationship with Europe is likely to look like under either party than they did seven weeks ago?

This has been an election campaign too that has done little to acknowledge regional differences in England.

On English regional devolution, identified as a major priority by this newspaper, the Conservatives offer only a tinkering with the arrangements around elected mayors. As for Labour, it references future devolution deals but simultaneously advocates recreating regional government offices, extending the reach of Whitehall into the provinces.

For the last 20 years, sections of the left and right have claimed British elections would be more engaging if there was clearer water between Labour and the Conservatives. I doubt millions of centre-ground voters agree after the experience of the 2017 election campaign.

Tony Blair once said that when a traditional left-wing party and a traditional right-wing party compete in a British election it produces the “traditional result”.

In the coming hours we will find out if he was right – or whether this result does truly come from left wing.

AHEAD of tonight’s election results, a reminder that MPs are human beings too.

Yes, some of those who lose will deserve it for taking their seats for granted. But the majority across all parties will have, in their own way, worked hard for their communities and will have been defeated because of voter considerations that have little to do with local issues or their personal records.

These people are losing their jobs, their families are losing an income and their staff will be having to look for new work.

From the moment of victory, MPs know they are always on borrowed time.

But politics must be the only profession where people cheer as you are made redundant. Spare a sympathetic thought, please, for those who must endure that experience tonight.

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