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2015newsmaker:Murphy'slawmeetthemanbehindCorbynomics|Business|TheGuardian

2015 newsmaker: Murphy's law meet the

man behind Corbynomics
Tax expert Richard Murphy, widely credited with inspiring Labours economic policy, explains why
hes not suited to being behind the scenes
Heather Stewart
Wednesday 30 December 2015 15.25GMT

t was amazing how quickly the cold shoulder came on. Richard Murphy, tax expert
and father of Corbynomics, has heard nothing lately from Labours shadow chancellor
and Jeremy Corbyns right-hand man, John McDonnell.

Back in the summer, when he was propelled into the political limelight by the Corbyn
leadership campaign, which was keen to show it had a coherent economic platform,
Murphy began to assume he would take a senior role in Labours shadow Treasury team.
He addressed raucous campaign rallies, telling the assembled crowds that it was time to
ditch what he calls the economic doctrine of Tina there is no alternative. They
basically withdrew from discussing economy policy: they let me do it, he says. One friend
inside Labour even began referring to him teasingly as Professor Lord Murphy, as though
Corbyn might ennoble his economic guru.
But once Corbyn clinched the leadership, he handed the key role of shadow chancellor to
McDonnell, who quickly drafted in a seven-member panel of heavyweight economic
advisers, including the American Nobel prize winner Joseph Stiglitz, and the French
superstar Thomas Piketty but not Murphy.
He says the idea of making him a special adviser was mooted, as Labour MPs gathered for
their conference in Brighton in September. But nothing materialised. There was no formal
offer, he says. What became fairly clear was that I would have been some form of special
adviser. Thats not a job for a 57-year-old. Am I temperamentally suited to being the
behind-the-scenes guy who isnt noticed in public? Probably not.
So as the year draws to a close, the author of The Joy of Tax has returned to doing what he
has done successfully for many years: campaigning for a fairer tax system, from his home
in Downham Market, Norfolk. He has got another book in the works and recently took up a
professorship at City University in London.
Asked to recall the heady days of last summer, when he suddenly became the impromptu
spokesman for a political movement that was sweeping the country or at least, the Labour
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2015newsmaker:Murphy'slawmeetthemanbehindCorbynomics|Business|TheGuardian

party he sounds wistful. If youre a creator of ideas, youre always delighted if someone
wants to pick them up and use them, he says.
One day in July, I got a phone call saying, would I come and speak at the launch of Jeremy
Corbyns economic policy. I said: Why me? You know Im not a member of the Labour
party. They said: Have you seen the document?
When he was sent a copy of The economy in 2020, the radical policy pamphlet that had
already been sent off for publication, I looked through it and I realised that 70% of it could
have been cut and pasted off my blog.
He was irritated and remains so about how his ideas were presented without nuance. He
spent a lot of time, for example, explaining that only a proportion of the 120bn tax gap,
between what companies owe the tax authorities and what they actually pay, would be
recoverable in practice, and doing so would necessitate considerable upfront investment in
Revenue & Customs. He says: I have always said there was no way you would be able to
get it all: that point didnt come over clearly.
Instead, the pamphlet describes the 120bn as enough to double the NHS budget; enough
to give every man, woman and child in this country 2,000.
Another of Murphys central ideas so-called peoples quantitative easing became one of
the most talked-about aspects of Corbyns leadership bid. Murphy now says this idea, of
funding public investment through electronically created money, could be kept on the
shelf for the next economic downturn.
Peoples QE was a distinctively Corbynite twist on the idea of green QE, which was
conceived by Murphy together with a group of economists and environmental
campaigners, the green new deal group, as a way of paying for the radical restructuring
required to tackle climate change.
But during the leadership campaign, the idea sometimes appeared to lay Corbyn open to
the charge that he would be reckless with the public purse-strings; and it has been barely
mentioned since.
Jeremys very keen on investment, and seemed to think this would help fund it. Would I
have put it in the document in the way it was in the summer? No, Murphy says. It needed
to be made clear that this was a policy that would work best when there is no market for UK
gilts [government bonds], and at the moment there is a very buoyant markets for UK gilts. I
would have written a more balanced policy document.
He stresses that he never became a fully paid-up member of Team Corbyn. I didnt join the
Labour party; I didnt even pay 3 to vote for Jeremy. I just talked about my ideas.
But he remains proud of his role in opening the political space for a different conversation
about austerity and its consequences: If I have done anything over the past few years, it is
to create this alternative narrative.
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2015newsmaker:Murphy'slawmeetthemanbehindCorbynomics|Business|TheGuardian

Since Labour gave him the cold shoulder, he has been talking to the Green party and the
Scottish National party. But he cant help lamenting the fact that Labour appears to have
gone quiet on economic policy, surrendering some of the ground he hoped had been won
over the summer.
Labour doesnt appear to be using Jeremy Corbyns election as the best chance to create a
real narrative of its own, Murphy says. I am concerned, yes, but I have seen nothing so
far says that what I was suggesting, and what they borrowed from me, is not their policy.
More features

Topics
Economics
Economic policy
Labour
John McDonnell
Jeremy Corbyn
Thomas Piketty

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