When it comes to face-to-face debates in election campaigns, Britain’s party leaders have never really shared No?l Coward’s belief that “television is for appearing on, not for looking at”. TV appearances by prime ministerial candidates have been confined to solo interviews, or to scripted soundbites and staged photo opportunities. Why? Because the candidate ahead in the polls calculates that he or she has little to gain by submitting to such gladiatorial combat. Meanwhile, the underdog, reckoning that he has nothing to lose, often nags for such a debate and gets kicked by the front-runner for his troubles.
Yet it now seems possible that this undemocratic stalemate will end; and not just because today’s front-runner, David Cameron, is the one pressing Gordon Brown for a primetime debate. It should end because voters can no longer understand why, when the presidential candidates even of Afghanistan are ready to have a debate on TV, our own leaders are not.
Why has this breakthrough taken so long? Tony Blair always dismissed the idea of a TV debate on the ground that in Britain voters elected a constituency MP rather than a president — always a curious stance given how Mr Blair was not only the politician most likely to come across well on TV, but also because he was the most presidential Prime Minister Britain has had. What’s more, Mr Blair argued, Prime Minister’s Questions gave voters ample opportunity to see and hear him argue policy with his opponent.
Another possible brake on progress has been a suspicion that parading political leaders like prize fighters demeans both them and politics. It does not. Far from cheapening politics, it elevates it. Does it favour the relaxed and the eloquent over the nervous and the tongue-tied? Maybe. But we live in a media age. Why should voters not pick someone who can communicate eloquently both at home and when representing Britain’s interests abroad? Did Mr Blair not project this country more punchily for being able to articulate Britain’s interests fluently? A politician, let alone a prime minister, needs a cocktail of qualities and talents, from intellectual rigour to ratlike cunning. Good looks and charm did not do John Kennedy any harm, either. If brains were all that were needed for the job we’d only ever elect people like Isaiah Berlin to Downing Street.
And while TV-debate folklore brims with tales of Richard Nixon’s election-losing five o’clock shadow, a smooth tongue and smoother looks do not guarantee victory on TV: while Barack Obama’s grace and oratorical eloquence undoubtedly helped to steer him to the White House, it is worth recalling that George W. Bush won two presedential elections, after going into battle in front of the TV cameras with Al Gore and John Kerry, both of them seasoned debaters (it is worth recalling, too, that Nixon also landed the presidency on a subsequent attempt).
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There is time enough to settle squabbles about the precise format of the debate. The Liberal Democrats should have a seat. There may have to be some accommodation for the Scottish Nationalists. For now all parties must accept the principle of a TV debate before Britain next goes to the polls. Britain’s voters are grown up enough to be trusted with hearing their politicians unedited and drawing their own conclusions. The world has moved on. British politics must, too.