ABSTRACT
Law and order has been central to the New Labour project from the outset. Law and order first became a political issue in Britain during the early 1970s, and played a massive part in Margaret Thatcher's 1979 victory. Since then the Tories have almost always dominated as the party of law and order. This chapter argues that law and order is necessarily a liability for Labour, and this cannot be changed without dramatic and undesirable changes in policy. New Labour has pursued populist policies on law and order since 1992, embedding the discourse of toughness ever more deeply. New Labour's espousal of law and order was a Faustian pact to secure re-election, which now (together with its broader embrace of neoliberalism) threatens its destruction. But New Labour has connived in keeping secret that Labour had better policies to provide public protection, and that a social democratic attack on the deep causes of crime is ultimately the only basis for security.
