Steve Richards: The family seems a populist issue, but it is one that politicians should ignore at all costs

On the whole elected politicians should do more rather than less. Unlike business leaders, the fashionable voluntary sector and powerful regulators they are accountable to voters and are scrutinised obsessively by the media. When they act we can follow closely what they are up to and kick them out if they fail.

This week ministers and their opponents have good cause to worry once more about Britain's railways after the train derailment in Cumbria. More widely, they should agonise always about public services, the state of the economy, housing and the rest.

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But increasingly, they tend to leave these practical matters to others. Trains are for the likes of Network Rail, run by a bunch of people who few have heard of. Its chief executive says his organisation is devastated by the derailment, but who will take ultimate responsibility? Elsewhere, the anonymous committee that decided Manchester must be the location of the first Super Casino is nowhere to be seen in spite of mounting criticism of the decision. In another policy area unelected charities become increasingly responsible for the poor. Meanwhile, political leaders deliver sermons on the virtues or otherwise of family life. Lacking power or too scared to exercise it they seek to moralise instead.

The theme acquired a high profile when, in the light of the recent gun crime, David Cameron made a speech and gave interviews bemoaning the breakdown in family life. Mr Cameron's solutions include changes in the tax system to help families and the politics of exhortation, making it culturally less acceptable for reckless fathers to disappear.

He deserves credit for being quick-footed. The Government held a meaningless "gun summit." Mr Cameron struck a populist chord. But both of his proposals were silly in a Monty Python type of way. There is no way some drunken, violent, errant father would phone up the mother and declare: "I hear they've improved the family tax allowance. I am on my way back." Even if he were to do so I doubt if a violent, neglectful drunk would be welcomed back as a stabilising presence on some run-down estate in south London. Nor can politicians change the cultural mood on such matters.

Yesterday in this space Bruce Anderson argued that drinking and driving had become culturally unacceptable over the past decade. I wonder. The toughening of laws is a more significant development. People do not drink and drive now partly through fear that they will go to jail. Without tough laws many would still take the risk.

Political leaders that fleetingly command the media, as Mr Cameron does at the moment, always overestimate the power of exhortation. Mr Blair made the same mistake when, in that distant era, he could set the media agenda and get at least a fair hearing. Too often in the early days of power New Labour mistook an array of supportive front pages for the successful implementation of policy.

Yet the Government's response to Mr Cameron's flimsy celebration of family life has been slow and confused. This is partly because in this long drawn-out transition the Government IS slow and confused. One ally of Gordon Brown tells me he despaired as he listened to the Today programme recently. He heard reports on the Work and Pensions Secretary John Hutton calling for cuts in benefits, Peter Hain arguing for an increase in benefits for the poor and a junior minister proposing flexible working hours for all employees as an alternative to benefits in some cases. A close and detailed examination would show that the scatter-gun approach was not necessarily contradictory, but no one could accuse the Government of having a coherent narrative, a clear story to tell.

Specifically, it did not respond quickly to Mr Cameron's banal proclamations about the family. There are several reasons for this. Evidently there is no co-ordinated strategy for challenging the Tory leader, leaving the field clear. Probably also Tony Blair has some sympathy with Mr Cameron's analysis. In his first interview as the Labour leader in July 1994 Mr Blair told Brian Walden on ITV that "single parents who have chosen to have children without forming a stable relationship are wrong."

According to John Rentoul's biography the interviewer pressed Mr Blair three times and got the answer: "Yes. I disagree with what they have done." Mr Walden's persistence should not obscure the fact that the new Labour leader had entered the studio with every intention of conveying such a message.

But the main reason for the confusion is that "the family" is too woolly a starting point for a debate. There are no obvious levers for politicians to pull. This week the Education Secretary, Alan Johnson, will argue that "family policy must be bias-free. Not all children from married couples fare well and other family structures are not irretrievably doomed to fail."

I agree with him, but even when Mr Blair was targeting the Daily Mail in his 1994 interview he would not have challenged Mr Johnson's thesis. Indeed both Mr Blair in 1994 and Mr Cameron more recently went out of their way to stress that they were not demonising single parents explicitly or by implication.

Mr Johnson is reported as challenging Mr Hutton, as he seeks to encourage more single parents into work by reducing some benefits. But Mr Hutton's proposals should be considered in a wider context rather than as part of a meaningless debate about whether or not they will deter people from becoming single parents. There is a more compelling and coherent argument for another attempt at welfare reform put forward recently by Mr Blair when he argued that Britain could not pay for pensions and public services in the future unless the proportion in work was higher. That is a good reason for a government to review welfare payments. Moral judgements are for others.

Politicians should leave the "family" well alone. The theme is enticing because it is popular. But it always rebounds on those that seek to embrace it. Where are those thoughtless Tory ministers who sought to demonise single parents in the 1980s? Remember the slow hand clapping when Tony Blair proclaimed family life to the Women's Institute shortly after the birth of his baby in the first term.

Political leaders are better placed focusing on areas of more obvious responsibility, from the provision of childcare to improved employment programmes. With the introduction of Sure Start, tax credits and the subtle targeting of resources in poorer areas the Government has made progress, although in terms of provision Britain lags behind other EU countries. Such policies may or may not result in stabilising some families. What they will do is enhance the quality of life for some whatever their family background. That matters more than sermons.

s.richards@independent.co.uk

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