So this unholy trinity of manifestos is a timely venture into popular political publishing: with a cheap price and a uniform length of 100

So this unholy trinity of manifestos is a timely venture into popular political publishing: with a cheap price, and a uniform length of 100 pages, each title is written with accessible vigour. The idea was excellent; the results are somewhat disappointing, as they say. Tony Wright, perhaps the brightest and best of the new MPs, wrote well on the history of socialism in his academic days and as joint editor of Political Quarterly often editorialised for cooperation between Labour and the Liberal Democrats None of that appears here. He simply throws strong partisan punches at the Tories, with more right hooks to straight lefts on my card. "Between 1979 and 1993 the income of the poorest tenth declined by nearly 20%, while that of the richest tenth increased by 20%": a well-stated if familiar indictment of the Conservative record.

Income differences and disabling poverty grew dramatically worse. Industry ran down to the benefit of City speculation: hence increased unemployment and government borrowing. Wright explains well the paradox of the anti- statist party that enhanced the arbitrary powers of government.His punches are thrown, however, with padded gloves. Wright discusses "the renewal and transformation of the Labour Party. under Tony Blair - that has brought hope to all those who want a sensible and radical party of reform to vote for and who understand that being radical and sensible do not have to be alternatives." Don't pause to puzzle whether those two vital "ands" are conjunctive or distinctive. A chapter headed "New Labour, Old Values" beckons, but the values are left a wee bit vague.Only William Wallace, for the Lib-Dems, body-snatches those abandoned triplets "liberty, equality, fraternity" (which he calls "community"). Wright recklessly quotes Yeats to the effect that Labour is "changed, changed utterly", but stops short of saying that "a terrible beauty is born".

Too much of his pamphlet is on such a level of generality that truism wrestles with tautology. When it comes to policy, the vision becomes distinctly blaired.I struggled to find meaning in Wright's words on taxation policy - surely basic to the common good. Gordon Brown had not crossed the Rubicon when Wright wrote, but the latter must have seen the commitment to static tax levels coming and trimmed his sails. But Wright still flies a "stakeholding" colour, which seems meantime to have been lowered from the admiral's mast.He is strongly for constitutional reform, but now has to sail around the rocks of PR. So he raises the possibility of "a system that makes all votes count": Blairy code for the alternative vote, which is not PR. His calls for a "civic vision" and "a responsible society" are heartfelt and admirable. But how is the gross inequality that negates both to be tackled? By "training", it seems, and by the one-off cure-all windfall tax.Wright speaks well for all of us who would do almost anything to get this lot out.