"All pigs are equal, but some pigs are more equal than others"This doodle of a spinning pig was supposedly drawn by shadow chancellor Ed Balls during a plot to purge New Labour of Tony Blair's premiership in favour of a government led by Comrade Brown. The rest, as they say, is history.
Or it would be had today's Telegraph newspaper not chosen to remind its readers of those dark days, and thereby create a remarkable spin amongst certain sections of the chattering classes, of a kind the Balls doodle might well symbolise.
So why should Telegraph readers be interested in this old story? The answer lies in a politically modified animal which I shall call the New Labour Conservative. This creature, it should be emphasised, is not Red Tory or Blue Labour, but represents an equally important political constituency in Middle England.
The New Labour Conservative is typically a household which identifies itself as professional, and where one partner works in the public sector. This aspirational social unit was championed during the "Christian democracy" of Tony Blair's government, but wasn't so sure about Gordon Brown, particularly when the economy went pear-shaped.
However, neither has the Coalition's deficit reduction programme and proposed changes to public services gone down well with the New Labour Conservative. Incidentally, this politically modified animal includes a good many Lib-Dem (and Tory) councillors who don't like the downsizing of their fiefdoms, anymore than Liverpool Trots liked Neil Kinnock calling the shots.
However, the fact remains that New Labour created a Britain - and an aspirational Middle England in its own image - with a non-viable model of political economy. As politicians of the left, right and centre know very well, only radical structural transformation can re-create a sustainable future. The important issues in this tectonic shift, I would suggest, are the environment and a re-ordering of social well-being, as I'm sure Dr Rowan Williams would agree.
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