So now who do we vote for?
by Molly Webb
Neal Lawson chaired a debate on the election and Labour party with David Aaronovitch and John Harris at Demos earlier this week.
Neal says...
Its been a dull election campaign so far. It's if the runners for the London marathon on hearing the gun just turned and walked back the other way. But on a sunny spring evening 70 people packed the Demos meeting space to hear John Harris author of So now how do we vote? and David Aaronovitch columnists with the Guardian and Observer debate whether New Labour's glass is half empty or half full. It was at the very least a brief moment when people talked about politics openly, honestly - as if it did really matter.
John kicked off with his encounters with voters in the North West while making a recent BBC programme. They were sullen and detached and concerned about the governments sense of drift. He went on to describe the key concern in his book - the commercialisation of the health service. David was robust as ever - cleverly listing his worries about what New Labour had failed to do before stridently taking on Johns anti choice position. Lots of questions and points came from the audience - reflecting pretty much equally the views of the two speakers. It could have gone on for another hour and just as we were about to finish of course the war cropped up and the debate sprang fiercely back into life. There are still two weeks to go of the official campaign - the end can't come too soon so that we can get back to real politic debate like this again.