Neil Kinnock’s speech in Bridgend, Glamorgan, on 7 June 1983, rates as one of the finest speeches ever made in British politics.
It was two days before the General Election. He scribbled the notes from which he delivered the speech in the car on the way to the rally, and his voice was hoarse from campaigning. He was elected leader of the Labour Party at the party conference in October 1983, after Labour’s resounding defeat. He went on to transform the party to make it fit for government.
Here is the full text of what he said.
If Margaret Thatcher is re-elected as prime minister on Thursday, I warn you.
I warn you that you will have pain–when healing and relief depend upon payment.
I warn you that you will have ignorance–when talents are untended and wits are wasted, when learning is a privilege and not a right.
I warn you that you will have poverty–when pensions slip and benefits are whittled away by a government that won’t pay in an economy that can’t pay.
I warn you that you will be cold–when fuel charges are used as a tax system that the rich don’t notice and the poor can’t afford.
I warn you that you must not expect work–when many cannot spend, more will not be able to earn. When they don’t earn, they don’t spend. When they don’t spend, work dies.
I warn you not to go into the streets alone after dark or into the streets in large crowds of protest in the light.
I warn you that you will be quiet–when the curfew of fear and the gibbet of unemployment make you obedient.
I warn you that you will have defence of a sort–with a risk and at a price that passes all understanding.
I warn you that you will be home-bound–when fares and transport bills kill leisure and lock you up.
I warn you that you will borrow less–when credit, loans, mortgages and easy payments are refused to people on your melting income.
If Margaret Thatcher wins on Thursday–
- I warn you not to be ordinary
- I warn you not to be young
- I warn you not to fall ill
- I warn you not to get old.
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Quite a contrast with his Nuremberg moment in 1992.
Ah. You refer to the Sheffield Rally on 1 April 1992 (a date pregnant with resonance), in which Neil Kinnock punched the air and shouted “we are all right” to 10,000 supporters in the Sheffield Arena. At the time, it had no impact on the polls, and reporters who were there said it was a great success, but it has subsequently passed into political folklore that it had appeared too triumphalist and diminished Neil Kinnock’s image as a serious statesman.
Neil Kinnock said afterwards on the Frost programme:
Well, twenty years have passed so we’re now in a position to judge the accuracy of Kinnock’s rhetoric.
It seems a bit, err, hyperbolic, no?
Owen replies: err, no. The only bit that does not look prescient to me is the stuff about not being able to borrow.
Err, 1983? Around the beginning of the Lawson boom?
Tim
The benefits of Lawson boom, to its peak in 1989, were not widely shared within the country. They were focused on London and the South East.
J K Galbraith referred to private affluence and public squalor. With growing inequality, poverty within deprived communities outside London, the erosion of public services – I think Neil Kinnock was prescient in his vision of what would happen to British society.
Owen
What’s scary is that under the current administration many of these things are happening :
“ignorance” – the State education system is a disaster
“poverty–when pensions slip” – and companies abandon final salary schemes as fast as they can
“you will be cold–when fuel charges are used as a tax system” – no comment.
“not to go into the streets alone after dark” – a lot of old people on our estates obey this principle.
“I warn you not to fall ill, I warn you not to get old.” – for the Govenment will send a representative into a courtroom to argue for the State’s right to starve a hospital patient to death, if the doctors consider it to be “in the patients best interests”
http://www.ukcommentators.blogspot.com/2005_05_15_ukcommentators_archive.html#111648749042038601
PS I didn’t notice unemployment jumping and people taking less holidays after 1983 – nor do I now.
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Hi,I’m a 36 year old ,comitted Labour voter in southern England.As a teenager,raised by working-class grandparents,I saw Neil Kinnock as a ‘ modern-day Aneurin Bevan’-his conference speeches,whilst long-winded,were warm,fulll of humanity.It is the longest regret of my adult life that Neil Kinnock was not elected Prime Minister in 1992-he was decent,courageous,and throroughly deserved to take the ultimate prize-good on you,Neil!
Some years ago when Neil Kinnock was leader of the opposition I accompanied him on a number of calls and meetings with various Commonwealth leaders, and spent a good deal of time with him in the car on the way to and from these calls and back at the office between them, over three or four days. I can testify from this experience to his remarkable command of the key facts and figures relating to a host of political issues and a rare capacity for switching rapidly in conversation between them; to his sound, humane and liberal judgement on all of these issues; to the speed with which he would absorb points made to him (for someone with a well-known tendency to long-windedness unless checked by Glenys, he’s a remarkably good listener, a rare quality among senior politicians); to his wicked sense of humour; to his courageous self-knowledge; and to his charm. He was terrific company.
My respect and admiration for him as a socialist, a politician and a person were reinforced by a number of social contacts with him in subsequent years. He is now widely and in my view unfairly underrated. I believe that he would have made an excellent prime minister, perhaps even a great one. If only….
PS: You can still see and hear a clip with scenes from the controversial Sheffield Labour Party rally of 1992 here. I agree with Kinnock’s (and Owen’s) view that while aspects of it were misjudged (he had not wished for or intended the embarrassing triumphalism of the opening minutes), it had no effect on the result of the election, for which Kinnock was in no way to blame.
Brian
http://www.barder.com/ephems/
That is one of the most amazing, powerful and poignant speeches I have ever heard.
I wish I understood all your fancy words Owen when you repond to more fancy words. I am just a working class mother of 3, not very educated but I really like that speech. It appeals to ordinary people. Unlike the wordy words of academics. Le sigh…
It’s 21st October 2010 – the day after the coalition spending review and those words seem more relevant than ever.
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I was actually there that night – it was totally electric, as in your skin pricking with the adrenalin. Sadly, the speech could be delivered today with as much relevance – were there anyone in the Labour Party able to summon half as much oratorical skill.
Neil, I always supported you and feel we miss the voices of the ‘Old Hands’ now.
It was powerful, it was timely but it was utterly of its time. The very saddest thing is its redolence now, almost 30 years later! We, the electorate, the supposedely empowered, have been buffered and lied to for at least 2 generations! There need have been no “New Labour”, who were after all just tories with a different coloured tie, which Mr Kinnock ushered in, we should have NEVER sold off social housing, totally divisive, we should have BLOODY IINSISTED ON BEING ORDINARY! Bloody insisted that some are weaker than others and bloody insisted that that was not their fault, the stronger are here to protect them! PLEASE! The TUC did a wonderful thing in March, the Nurses did a wonderful thing today (voted no confidence in Andrew Lansley and his bill). WAKE UP, WE NEED YOU! See Coalition of Resistance site and PLEASE HELP!
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