Interview with John O'Farrell

John O'Farrell

John O'Farrell is the author of the No.1 bestseller Things Can Only Get Better; Eighteen Miserable Years in the Life of a Labour Supporter.

A successful novelist and writer John has also written other well known titles such as The Best a Man Can Get, I Blame the Scapegoats and Global Village Idiot

He has also written for such productions as Spitting Image, Have I Got News For You and on the film Chicken Run.

John is also a regular on the BBC 2 series Grumpy Old Men and writes a Weekly column in the Guardian.

He lives in Clapham with his wife and two children, where he is also the Chair of Governors at Lambeth Academy. As an active member of his local Party, John agreed to give this exclusive interview to LambethLabour.com.

In the 1980's you fought your own political battles as a Labour Party activist in Tory Battersea. What lessons from that time would you like to pass on to Labour Party members in Lambeth today?

The lesson which I hope readers of Things Can Only Get Better will take away with them is the absolute futility of opposition. Labour Councillors in Lambeth must now feel that, to see things done so badly and incompetently and yet to be powerless, is a galling way of spending your time.

The Liberal and Tory gains in the last election shocked all of us who expected us to be in power at a time of a Labour Government which could help Lambeth improve and instead we got an incompetent Liberal Council that doesn’t really get the blame for things that go wrong in Lambeth. I don’t think people realise that they’ve got a Liberal Council.

The trouble with local elections is that people vote on the popularity of the national Government of the day. So they treat it like a popularity test for Tony Blair or Michael Howard.

So the lesson I’d take away is that there is no point in being politics if you’re not going to get in power. So however much the Government sometimes drives me mad its still a thousand times better than if Michael Howard or Margaret Thatcher were in power. So we should never return to the posturing days of the eighties and let the larger goal slip from our view.

Liberal Democrats often present themselves as the cuddly, fluffy, non-ideological alternative to the other main parties. How would you assess the current image of the Liberal Democrats?

Well they try to be all things to all people and end up standing for not very much indeed. In fact many of the Councillors they put up around the country are people who are active in their community and ask them to stand for the Lib Dems. So these people aren’t coming from any ideological or political point of view. They don’t have any sort of guiding star to drive what they do. The result of it is that you tend to get widely divergent opinions within one party. Quite a lot of are maverick councillors who have no theory or set of core values driving them.

The other problem which I’ve always found with Liberals is that, much as I may dislike what the Tories stand for, at least they are capable of a clean election fight. My experience of fighting liberals is that they are the ones that play the dirtiest, particularly with bogus leaflets and false claims.

You once described local government as "Not what the guys in the marketing department would call 'sexy'" Given that few people would argue with this assessment, why should people still bother to vote in local elections?

Because it really does matter who’s running social services, who’s running the schools, who’s running local transport. The problem with local democracy is that people have too little democracy and not too much. If you can really feel and see the difference that that their involvement made then they would be less apathetic.

Just to give you an example, I was once a school governor at a primary school in Wandsworth, and that primary school has been closed down by a Tory council. I’ve been a Labour activist in Lambeth and we’ve got the green light for a £25 million newly built secondary school from a Labour Council and a Labour Government.. Only by being involved have I seen the difference that politics can make. We would never have got a new school under Thatcher, in fact there was a campaign back in the eighties for a school in Clapham which failed.

The same basic values apply in all the really important issues which effect our society. Health, education transport, all these are areas where we have a democratic voice with and the choice to have the right values running them. Now if you have people who send their kid to private school running state schools, if you have people who take taxis in charge of buses, if you have people who only go to Harley street running the NHS they will not have any idea of the experience of the people who need the services.

It seems to me to be blindingly obvious that the only way to improve these services Is to get people who know what they’re talking about and people with basic humility and decency that you are more likely to find on the left than on the right. Those are the people who should be in charge.

What does it mean to you to be the Chair of Governors at Lambeth Academy?

The City Academy Programme is very different to my previous experience in local Government and education. I was a labour political appointee to a chair of governors in Wandsworth, back then we elected our chair of governors, whilst I’ve been appointed. Now I didn’t take that lightly. I discussed this with the current chair of the campaign and the chair before that they both felt that I should take it because it was better to have a parent who had been involved in the campaign than somebody imposed from outside.

I sought guarantees that future Chairs will be elected, which they will be. And I also sought guarantees that the local governing body will be as representative as we can make it.

So all that said, to be involved at the centre of the birth of a new school which local parents have campaigned for is probably the most exciting and worthwhile thing I’ve ever done in politics. But that’s not saying very much because I’ve helped Labour lose elections at every level.

Here is something where involvement can really make a difference. Because I have a certain profile, I hope this has helped other people to feel confident about the school. Its an enormous leap of faith to go to a school that doesn’t exist. We all have to hold hands and jump together. My child has just started and its very exciting see the school developing. We’ve had a few teething problems with the school being completed so very close to the school’s opening date. But the enthusiasm and the hard work of the staff has helped overcome that.

So my involvement is partly to do with reassuring parents that have worries about sending their kids to a school that has no track record and might have teething problems with the catering etc. But these are very minor worries. Most parents and most kids come back really thrilled about having such a radical new curriculum and such a wonderful star as a head teacher. So I’m really enjoying it although its taking up about a day or two a week at the moment, but I plan to start managing my time more efficiently and I’m looking forward to my next three years which is my length of term as chair of Governors.

I gather there are state of the art facilities… is that right?

It‘s completely state of the art. There are about three or four computers per child. You can’t sit on a toilet without a laptop lowering in front of you. There are electronic whiteboards in every classroom, there are cash free tills at which the kids pay with electronic smart cards.

The kids don’t have to carry loads of books home, so they work on the computer at home. If they don’t have a computer at home they can just go to the homework club and do their work there. And yet it’s a really friendly and exciting and positive. Its not one these schools where the kids are having to do three hours of homework every night.

There is homework every night, but it doesn’t seem to be killing the kids, who’ve got enough to take on at the moment, a lot to get used to. Yeah, I think we are the first city academy with a brand new intake in the country, and that puts us right at the cutting edge of this educational programme which is perhaps why the Queen has been chosen to open it. So on October 26th I’ll be shaking hands with the Queen. So I hope I won’t be introduced as that man who used to write all those sketches on Spitting Image.

What is the best thing about living in Clapham?

I love living in Clapham because I love all the green spaces, I love it that my kids can walk to school. Its got fantastic primary schools and fantastic secondary schools (did I mention that!) its got a cinema you can walk to its got places you can go and eat. Its got a fantastic café at the end of my road, its got good transport links

The only downside is that its got one Tory Councillor and two Liberals!

But it has got a good MP. Kate Hoey has always been very supportive and I’ve always found her very easy to work with. I think she’s great.

Now that you’re officially a grumpy old man, what is the worst thing about living in Clapham?

The worst thing about Grumpy Old Men is that I didn’t agree to repeat fees! They’ve shown it about ten times now and I haven’t had any money for it! That proves I’m grumpy doesn’t it?

The worst thing about Clapham is the planes that go overhead. The captains going overhead often announce to passengers: “Hello this is you captain speaking. I’m afraid were are going to have to fly over John O’Farrell’s House just one more time.”

The other thing I don’t like is the social divide, the enormous gap in wealth between people who live in houses which cost a million pounds and a few hundred yards away are people who can’t afford a car. I was shocked when Councillor Ruth Ling told me that over half of the households in her ward do not have access to a car. Now I don’t know anybody who doesn’t have a car, unless they’ve made that decision on political grounds rather than economic, which is a shocking thing to admit. But most of the people living in that ward live in a house that doesn’t have a car.

Any yet right next door to them is a house with two big 4X4’s parked outside, where they don’t use the local schools, don’t walk on the common, don’t spend their weekends here and I think that’s very sad. Those people have opted out of the community.

What projects are you currently working on and are any of them inspired by your experiences in Lambeth?

Its funny you should say that because I’m just finishing a novel called “May Contain Nuts” and that is about nutty parents who drive their children to too many after school clubs… ballet…. Piano… all that sort of stuff. The non-stop pressurising of children. Now that comes from my experiences in Clapham, but I’m sure you find these people all over the world. There are also two made up schools in this book, one private, one state.

I usually like to set my books in South London. There’s a very strict demarcation between novelists in London. Nick Hornby has North London, Tim Lott stays up West London, but any characters south of the river, they’re controlled by me. In my first novel, “The Best A Man Can Get” I went North of the River accidentally and some heavies of Nick Hornby’s came round and said, “I hear you have been using metaphors and imagery on my Manor. Wouldn’t one of your characters to die in one of my Novels now would we!”

Did you find it easy to go from writing from your own experiences [In “Things Can Only Get Better] to writing fiction?

No not particularly. Each book I’ve written its been harder. I never planned to be a book writer. I was a writer for TV and Radio. I had one idea for a book, which I eventually wrote. It was such a pleasurable experience, such a delight to be the focus of attention. I had always been used to other people saying the lines and getting the credit! So I thought, well I’ll have a go at a novel when my publisher said “ would you like to have a two book deal?”

“The Best a Man Can Get” became the best selling debut novel of the year, which was very gratifying. I’ve now signed another two book deal, of which “May Contain Nuts” will be the first.

I suppose having already written one memoir I wasn’t in much of a position to write another one. I did think about writing a book about re-visiting my past when I returned to Maidenhead to stand at the General Election. Knocking on old teachers doors, that kind of thing. I might have squeezed a book out of it if I was Boris Johnson. Instead, I produced a documentary called “Losing my Maidenhead”, which was a title the BBC agreed to before polling day. They must have known something more than me.

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