LS interviews Paddy Ashdown
Former Liberal Democrats leader, Paddy Ashdown, was in town to promote the recent release of his autobiography, “A Fortunate Life’. LS Extra caught up with him to talk “Education, education, education”-more on that later… Backtrack to a month or so ago and I was making an insomnia-fuelled coach journey back up north following a brief excursion to a landlocked fishing village down south that goes by the name of Sheffield. To stave away boredom, my friend and I decided to indulge in a little quiz. Nothing too taxing on our weary brain cells, just a few simple questions; “Name three different types of French cheese” being one that springs to mind.

Round one successfully executed, cue round two and my starter for ten: “Who is the current leader of the Liberal Democrat Party?” Ah, I knew this one. At least I thought I did, or maybe I’d confused actually knowing the answer with the fact that I should know it? It’s a fine line. Swallowing my pride, I asked for his initials and finally arrived at Nick Clegg. Oh, the shame.

Just imagine my bliss, then, when I discovered that Paddy Ashdown, the most well-known leader in the Party’s (albeit brief) history would be coming to Leeds to promote the recent release of his autobiography. After booking the interview, scenes from “Frost/Nixon’ conjured up in my mind as I anticipated a month’s intensive political study in advance of our scheduled showdown.

Given my earlier demonstration of political knowledge, was I scared? Oh yes, I was petrified.

Upon arriving at the city centre bookshop on an non-descript Wednesday afternoon, I was disappointed to discover that staff were already packing away the stall that had been set up for Ashdown’s signing with half an hour of the allotted time remaining. My star-o-meter began to wane. Then we met. Ashdown has this aura of wisdom about him-one of those people whose confidence simultaneously reassures you whilst making you feel extremely helpless at the same time. He orders a coffee (plus one celebrity point) and starts displaying somewhat of a Crackberry addiction by checking the beast on a regular basis (the true mark of a VIP, surely?). We’re back in business.

The autobiography, entitled “A Fortunate Life’, is more a tale of personal than political triumph. It documents Ashdown’s extraordinarily varied existence; from his Indian beginnings in 1941, his family’s migration to Ireland, his experiences in the Royal Marines, time spent serving as a Foreign Office representative, working as a factory employee and then as a Youth Worker…the list is endless – and all this before his political career kicked off, which is where our conversation begins.

“The key decision in my life was not about fate. It was also the most irresponsible decision. It was also potentially the worst decision. The thing I can’t resist is when someone says, “It’s impossible, it can’t be done’. Something I’ve learnt is that if you’re presented with two options, always take the more difficult one”, remarks Ashdown in relation to his decision to become a Lib Dem MP in 1976. He and his wife had set up home near Lake Geneva and were leading a comfortable and stable life as he worked for the Foreign Office in Switzerland. There seemed to be little good fortune about trading this in to take on an active yet unrewarding role at the heart of British liberal politics.

“I am a political animal. I only discovered that in my thirties. Once you’re a political animal, you’re always a political animal. My days of frontline politics are over, but I’m very happy to help from the backseat. It’s not all about power; it’s about something you believe in.”

After eleven years in charge, Ashdown now takes a backseat, representing the Liberal Democrats in the House of Lords. Given the Party’s anti-class stance, I wonder if he feels like he’s compromising personal and political values by occupying a seat there; “No, because my party leader asked me to go there, and I said to him: “I’m going there on one condition, so that I can vote to abolish it as soon as possible!”…I’ve never used my title…I’ve caught others using it to get me a better table at a restaurant”, he mischievously added.

Speaking from his backseat role, Ashdown talks highly of the current Lib Dem leadership, including the Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, Vince Cable; “He has this amazing ability to take a complex issue and phrase it in terms that people understand. He is an asset to the Party, an asset to the country as a whole.” Likewise, he holds Nick Clegg in high esteem, stating that the two of them are quite similar, both in terms of policy and character.

Like Ashdown, Clegg is pro-European and a “passionate internationalist”, yet he also possesses the same impatient streak that plagued Ashdown in his youth and “…must learn the habit of patience-it takes time to break through as leader”, Ashdown notes, with a heady self-awareness. It comes as a refreshing change to hear the two leaders phrased in similar terms since the media often portrays them as being at different ends of the political spectrum. This owes itself to Ashdown’s Labour-oriented past, rivalling Clegg’s Tory values. This is “…not accurate description, but one that is easily made”, Ashdown states.

Indeed, with the potential for a coalition in the next election, it’s a description that’s made with increasing frequency. On this note, I ask Ashdown who the Lib Dems should side with in such an eventuality, a question to which I’m damned if I get a straight answer; “My only advice is “don’t listen to old warhorses in the backseat’ (himself included). Every leader has a hand to play and only Nick will know what’s right for the Party at this time. I’m sure Nick will make the right decision.”

Surrendering to the fact that I wasn’t going to get a definitive response, we then turn to education, a topic I introduce jovially: “So, education, education, education”, I say. “…which I invented. Blair stole our idea”, Paddy remarks abruptly. I seem to have touched a nerve.

“It is the fundamental investment you have to make, especially in this post-industrial age. We will prosper as a nation on intellectual capital. That’s how we will survive. Labour have invested in education, yes, but I don’t think they’ve done it how I would have done it, and I don’t think it’s achieved the outcomes I would have liked to have seen.” I probe this further, asking what reforms Ashdown would have made to the system. He draws upon two main points.

Firstly, “I’d like to see a second chance education…I want an education system for the late developers”, he says.

Secondly, and rather more controversially, Ashdown states:

“Now, you’re not going to like this at Leeds…I think education systems are the centre of networks, but I think we’re too tied to the idea of them being building-based. To solve the conundrum of funding, we should not be so tied to buildings and should engage more in remote learning. We could educate much better, I think, if education wasn’t so tied to buildings. I think the building itself should be somewhere that’s visited maybe once a year. There’s a lot of interactive learning today that doesn’t have to take place in the classroom, or even in the presence of teachers. It would be better if we treated lecturers like we treated doctors and only went to them for the high value stuff that you really need personal contact for.”

“Look, it was a radical idea when I proposed it ten years ago. No doubt it’ll still be a radical idea now. Perhaps it’s not ideal, but it responds to the demands of our time. That’s what our economic competitors are doing in Japan, Korea…it provides a way of educating the masses on a large scale as the demand for tertiary education increases.”

This notion of online learning is not one which Ashdown restricts to solving the funding crisis in education. He argues that it has far wider implications, which he realised almost a decade ago:

“My solution to the millennium project was to create this database with all the information in the known world stored on it, sort of a modern day technological equivalent of the British Museum, in which we would have accumulated and stored all the information. We would have been information brokers, just like insurance brokers.”

Yes, but would it have been safe? “It would have been perfectly safe, because what you do then is open it up completely, so every British citizen has free, full-time access to that information. So you have new technologies serving not the government, but the citizen. And I still believe that if we’d have done that, it would have helped to generate the intellectual capital of this country in a way like no other.”

With time running out, I ask Ashdown if he had any wisdom to impart to the students of Leeds. The question prompts a bashful shrug of the shoulders and a “Well, I’m not sure about “wisdom’” response. “Okay”, I ease towards compromise, “what about some advice then?”

“I learnt far more after I left formal education”, Ashdown remarks. “It doesn’t matter if you don’t get into the career of your choice straight away. Take some time to experience life, explore what you want to do. I didn’t fall into my chosen path until late into my thirties. Never ever stop learning.”

As soon-to-be graduates of the recession, it comes as a great comfort to hear that we’ve still got a few years on our side.

If truth be told, I didn’t even get through half of the political material I’d prepared for this interview, but then again, Paddy the politician is only one of Ashdown’s many aliases. Try as I might to search for stardom, it just wasn’t forthcoming. A man influenced just as much by the humbling aspects of his life as those that have opened the door to a more privileged existence, Ashdown brings much more to the table than mere political spin. His ideas may strike some as outlandish or unrealistic, but there’s no doubt that the man himself is thoroughly grounded. Spending an hour in his company made for a truly enlightening experience indeed. If I lead a life even half as varied as his, there’s no doubt I’d consider myself fortunate too.

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