Former foreign secretary says Britain returning to turbulent economic times of 1970s when governments were short-lived
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David Miliband recalled the Bay City Rollers, pictured in 1975, as he said that Britain is heading back to the 1970s. Photograph: Rex Features
Flares, long hair and a truly embarrassing band from Edinburgh are back in fashion.
Dominic Sandbrook's BBC programme on the 1970s was a great success a few months ago. And now David Miliband is saying that Britain is heading back to the decade of the winter of discontent.
In a speech on Tuesday night the former foreign secretary said Britain has not seen anything like the current economic crisis since the 1970s. This has created what he calls a political volatility which means the next election is "up for grabs".
Miliband offers his most enthusiastic endorsement of his brother as he declares that Labour "can" win the next election and his brother "can" make it to No 10. This is partly down to Ed Miliband's growing success but also the lessons of the 1970s – that a period of uncertainty can lead to a rapid change of governments.
Nick Robinson, the political editor of the BBC, was one of the first people in recent months to say that Britain may be heading back to the decade of the Bay City Rollers. During the BBC's marathon coverage of the local elections last month, Robinson said that Britain may be moving away from the 1980s, 1990s and the noughties, which experienced long periods of government by one party, to the 1970s when governments chopped and changed.
In his speech on Tuesday night – Ministers and Politics in a Time of Crisis – hosted by John Bercow in his official Westminster residence, Miliband expanded this argument as he says there are four lessons from the 1970s:
• Politics is more uncertain. Miliband said:
Younger listeners may not know this, but governments can actually lose elections before they win three in a row. In the 1970s there were four prime ministers and five governments in nine years. For me and my party, this is great news. In 2015 Labour can win the general election and Ed can be in Downing Street.
• Domestic economics and international politics are "interwoven". Miliband said:
The prime minister says that we are moving into a world of flexible networks not rigid blocs. He does not wish the EU ill, but he doesn't see it as central to the future of our country. I disagree. We live in a global village, but that village is made up of different neighbourhoods. And a country weak in its neighbourhood is going to be weak globally. That is the danger we face at the moment.
• Economic stress spills into social and industrial disorder when politics leaves a vacuum. Miliband said:
I don't say last year's riots were caused because not enough people were listening to Today in Parliament. I do say that a lesson of the 1970s is that people take power into their hands when they feel there is a political vacuum at the top. This is a point to which I will return.
• Crises can bring "radical ideas from the margins to the mainstream". Miliband said:
The two economic crises of the 20th century were the parents of dramatic changes in the political centre of gravity in western economies. The 1930s spawned welfare capitalism – a new social contract in which full employment paid for public services and welfare benefits.
And like it or loathe it, the mix of monetarism, deregulation, privatisation did emerge from the 1970s and define the 1980s. These were serious new ideas. By contrast the SDP split from Labour had profound political implications – but in terms of ideas it felt less like a break with the past than, in the late Ralf Dahrendorf's telling phrase, "a better yesterday". This it seems to me to be the danger for the Tory right today – dreaming of the things that Mrs Thatcher failed to do, when economy and society have moved on.
Miliband said he remembers the 1970s well. The parallel will be completed if the Bay City Rollers return:
I was brought up in Leeds in the 1970s and remember Bruce Forsyth dominating the Saturday night schedules. There was even a drought. All we need is a comeback tour by the Bay City Rollers and the circle will be complete.