‘I will not make age an issue in this campaign’
So said Ronald Reagan in a TV debate 1984 when he stood for a second term, when his opponent Walter Mondale was 56 and Reagan himself was 73.
And then Reagan continued, to much laughter: “I am not going to exploit my opponent’s youth and inexperience.”
If, as looks increasingly likely, Mitt Romney gets the Republican nomination, he’ll be 65 when he stands in the general election this November.
And Republicans like elderly candidates.
Indeed, in the eight presidential elections since 1980, the only candidate who wasn’t at in least his mid to late 60s at the time of the election, was George W Bush. The details are as follows -
That’s an average age of 66. And there doesn’t seem to be much correlation between age and electoral success. While the septuagenarians Dole and McCain both lost, Reagan was hugely successful.
Yet these days British political parties try to steer well clear of elderly leaders – the only exceptions in recent times being Michael Howard and Ming Campbell.
Since Neil Kinnock replaced Michael Foot as Labour leader in 1983, the fashion has been for Britsih parties to pick someone in their 40s, often very early 40s (or occasionally younger). Indeed, one of my rules for British leadership elections is that the youngest candidate generally wins.
So why are the US Republicans different?
Perhaps it’s because American revere and respect elderly people a lot more than we do, but that hasn’t persuaded the Democrats to pick older candidates.
The oldest Democrat contenders since the war were Harry Truman, who was 64 in 1948, and John Kerry, who was 60 in 2004.
Another curiosity, pointed out by my friend Tom Fairbrother, is that all the candidates since Reagan – again except George W Bush – went for the Republican nomination in previous contests and failed. In contrast, Democrat candidates these days are more likely to be first-timers.
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Our current lot are not only young and inexperienced, they have done nothing outside politics.
Where are the old fashioned tory businessmen, labour union officials and lib dem protesters?
One of the shortcomings of democracy is that you only get to choose between the candidates the parties offer – and more and more they are looking unimpressive.
That’s why I’m increasingly against the idea of an elected House of Lords. The thought that the cross benchers who just voted against the government’s welfare reform will be replaced by more people looking like the current crop of MPs is scary.
Somehow we have to ensure that there are some people in Westminster who have knowledge beyond politics and PR.
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At least the USA has a lower age-limit of 35 (plus a requirement to be born there, although some do question the status of the current incumbent in that aspect).
But Saltaire Sam is right that we have acquired, deliberately or otherwise, representatives with largely no experience of real-world working life. The risk of this continuing into an elected upper chamber is significant.
My own preference would be for the new elected upper chamber to have both a minimum age-limit, say 40, and a qualification that the candidate had not held any elected office at any point of the past 10 years. That would weed out the retiring MPs and all the loyal bag-carriers from local government. ‘Born in the UK’ would be another neat trick, if only to eliminate any EU Gauleiters from slipping in under the wire (although admittedly we do have a regrettable number of those home-born fifth-columnists).
It is disturbing to note that the advance work on the new Police Commissioners has quickly defaulted to a ‘party political’ stitch-up, thus creating yet more sinecures for the loyal party hacks, rather than dedicated independent people of mixed backgrounds.
If Saltaire Sam stands for the West Yorkshire Police Commissioner post, I’ll vote for him.
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From my own experience. Age-ism is much more of an issue in the UK. The older you get the less chance you have of finding an entry-level position or a position deemed ‘junior’. In the US this is less of an issue. It tends to be slightly more of a meritocracy. Having said that, one has to question whether Mr Reagan when he was in power was in his right mind, or if he even knew what his right mind was. I am all for younger politicians, and do worry about the older ones. Perhaps a more important measure is to try to steer them clear of investing time and money on PR and gloss which are useful for marketing companies, but less so for an organisation that is meant to increase the quality of life for all of us. But, I could be misguided.
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When Hugh Gaitskell was elected as Leader of the Labour Party in 1955, at the age of 49 and after 10 years’ membership of the House of Commons, it was regarded as a gamble to choose someone so young and inexperienced.
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