Zac Goldsmith - Still on the campaign trail
Zac Goldsmith may have won an election, but he’s still hard on the “campaign” trail. Caitlin Mackesy Davies spoke with the Richmond Park and Kingston North MP about the transition from outside agitator to political insider.
When Zac Goldsmith tells you that there is little difference between his goals outside of government as those in it, it’s easy to believe him. Portrayed as a sort of playboy of the political world in some quarters (a quick online search finds him featured recently in both the Financial Times and Hello!), in person Goldsmith’s energy is palpable – he paces the room for several minutes before forcing himself into an office chair for our chat – as is the genuine sense that he’s in Parliament more to make waves than to turn Party heads.
Moving into his role as an MP, he tells me, “is not a total transformation, because in my old life I was campaigning on a wide range of issues. That could have meant supporting charities, trying to set up charities, and taking part in some active campaigns that work in the public interest.”
For any campaigner, “it’s about opening doors and making things happen,” he continues. “As an MP it’s more or less the same thing. My job is to try and use my position to make change a bit easier.” Being there in Westminster as an MP, he says, lets him apply that extra bit of pressure when its needed: “I’m able to table Early Day Motions, to table questions, to initiate debates and to ask questions… and that is something that I couldn’t do before. So it just really creates a platform where you can be a more active campaigner.”
Of course, he admits, you don’t have to work so hard if you don’t want to: “There are no rules. You could go off to the Canary Islands for five years and smoke dope. It’s a five-year pass, basically. But if you are getting involved in politics because you want things to happen, that necessarily means you are a campaigner.”
Even as I write these words, Goldsmith is making headlines on the national stage voicing some very loud objections to Government proposals to reform the planning system. In this he’s backing voluntary sector organisations such as The National Trust, which by making its own concerns loud and clear, and asking its millions of members to lobby MPs about the issue, has faced accusations of running a “politically motivated campaign”. It has even faced questions from some quarters about whether the action threatens its charitable status.
It’s an obvious issue for Goldsmith to tackle, as someone with a track record of weighing in on the issues that affect our environment in virtually any way. And it’s also something that is a constant concern, Goldsmith says, for his local constituency. “Of the seventy or so emails I’ll receive while I’m talking to you today,” he tells me, “thirty will relate to planning issues, and over time I’ll probably end up with 500 or 600 emails on that issue.”
Goldsmith believes the The National Trust is right to ask its members to include writing to MPs in its lobbying strategy. These communications will form an invaluable tool, and he’s keen to encourage people to use the route to reach Government: “There’s an old cliché about writing to your MP, but it really does work. I can take that wodge of letters and say ‘this is how much it matters to my constituents’, and it empowers me as an MP.”
It’s also cause that sets him squarely up against his Party, a position which he both seems to relish, but also acknowledges as a potential weakness when it comes to pushing local constituent concerns: “There are some [Government] departments that I get on very well with, and others that I don’t get on well with. There are some people with whom I am more or less in agreement on the big issues and other Ministers with whom I am in disagreement on every issue.”
It also prompts me to ask whether he is able to respond as forcefully on constituent concerns or charity campaigns about which he has less enthusiasm. Is his approach different?
“There are huge calls on an MP’s time, and you can’t get involved in every campaign that comes your way, so that means making decisions,” he admits. “Prioritising one campaign over another usually means focusing on those campaigns that are of more personal interest than others. I think the thing to do is to be clear about where you stand.
“There are loads of charities that ask me to get involved, either in fundraising or organising, and I simply can’t do it all – it’s impossible. But every now and then something raises its head, which clearly needs support, and it is clear that I as an MP can add something different.” That something different will often mean raising concerns with the relevant Ministers, he says, and facilitating a direct dialogue on an issue or concern. Sometimes “simply having those letters after [my] name” allows him to cut through the bureaucracy, he says, “and that is hugely gratifying”.
Expect to hear more from Goldsmith in future, this time resurrecting the issue of Parliamentary reform. He’s not fighting shy of attacking the institution he’s so recently joined. “The system we have is absolutely absurd on so many levels and there are some reforms that can and should be brought in which would make Parliament much more relevant, and in turn would ensure that the Executive is held to account in a much more effective manner, and people will be much better represented than they are at the moment.” He’s been meeting with people from all the main parties, he says, and “working out how to initiate a reinvigorated campaign.”
While Goldsmith believes this next big campaign “is going to be of zero interest to people outside of Parliament.” Nonetheless, he says, it is almost the most important thing. “Because if you don’t get the decision-making process right, decisions are always going to be wrong.”
