Fear of the S Word
Photo by Annie SprattThis month brought the most recent humiliation in a long run of disappointing results that Labour have suffered since the 2019 General Election. Although the loss of further seats may come as a surprise to some, you don’t need to be Nostradamus to see that a move away from socialist ideology to a centrally positioned leadership of the party was bound to isolate the progressive voters that saw Labour membership boom under Corbyn’s tenure. We have already seen membership decline since Mr Corbyn’s departure, perhaps a sign that the former party leader brought a cult of personality with him – or perhaps a sign that the modern Labour voter aligns themselves with a particular vision of what the party stands for that they do not see Keir Starmer fulfilling.
Of course, the central and Blairite elements of the party who are now having their day in the sun after 4 years on the backbenches will claim that the reason for another dismal showing is that Labour are still suffering an ‘image crisis’ from Corbyn’s time as leader of the opposition. What this does not explain, however, is why Labour gained council seats in areas such as Salford and Eccles, now up to 53 councillors from candidates openly promoting themselves as socialists.
Of course the Centrist response would probably be a rowdy chorus of proclamations that Miss Long-Bailey’s constituency is about as safe as they get when it comes to a reliable turnout from the left of the party. Bear in mind then that the imposing ‘Red Wall’ of the North, which has been crumbling over the last 2 years, took another tumbling blow with the transition of Hartlepool from red to blue. Losing the by-election by over 7,000 votes, this is not brick by brick but an utter collapse brought on by the party’s inability to consolidate power in a region that held a slim Labour in 2015 under openly socialist leadership. The already disappointing turnout in 2015 where the majority of votes were lost to the now largely irrelevant UKIP could have served as a warning that working class areas were losing faith in Labour’s Brexit stance, but will now serve as a missed opportunity and a reminder that the party will need to rely on more than just classic voting intentions to regain key areas.
Other big wins for the socialist elements of the party were of course Mark Drakeford’s re-election as First Minister of Wales and Joanne Anderson being elected as the new Mayor of Liverpool. It does not seem at all surprising to me that the areas in which Labour have held onto or improved their position are areas where a strong, alternative message has been offered to contrast the meandering at best Tory leadership and the lack of any distinct plan imposed by Mr. Starmer.
When Keir Starmer was selected overwhelmingly to break away from the path that Jeremy Corbyn had been carving it seemed that his main qualifying points were his electability and political stance that would bridge the gap between the left wing and centrist factions in the party. It is ironic then that the man brought in to stop the rot that many inside and out of the Labour movement felt Corbyn had instigated has instead carried on in the same manner. In fact, he has seen himself become less electable than a Conservative leader who has presided over the deaths of 128,000 people while being marred by accusations that he accepted a private loan from party donors to renovate his Downing Street flat. Not only has Johnson increased his popularity in this window, but he has opened up a new 18 point lead over Starmer – the lowest rating since the new leader took the reins in 2020.
All of this is not to say that I am a staunch Corbynite. It may be oversimplifying the case to claim that Labour’s convincing defeat in 2019 was entirely a question of Brexit stand points, but I do believe that Corbyn chose his obvious dislike of the European Union as his hill to die on. Of course the hatchet job that was performed on the former Labour leader by everyone from tabloid newspapers to central-leaning elements of his own party took its toll. However, in an election that overwhelmingly revolved around the question of the UK’s EU membership, Corbyn muddied the waters around his stance on the issue and instead fought his campaign on free broadband to a bewildered electorate who thought that they could champion him as the Remain candidate. Whatever the state of play for the Labour party going forward, it is impossible to ignore Corbyn’s dismal 2019 election campaign as a contributing factor to the chaotic shambles that we witnessed this past week.
Over the coming months there will be inquests into how this continued drubbing could have possibly happened. New Labour will lay the blame with Corbyn and the left of the party will point their fingers back at Starmer. It is therefore important to remember that until the party stands unified behind competent leadership there is no justification for Labour to be referred to as ‘the opposition’. The bulk of Britain’s electorate look at Boris Johnson and see an eccentric goof who has the interests of the working class at heart, and to continue to blame this mirage on the working man instead of looking in the mirror and seeing that it is Labour’s lack of a real alternative to Johnson’s pragmatic populism that has led to this wide gap in the opinion polls, there will be no need for Tory donors to fret over the riskiness of their Downing Street apartment investments. It is important to remember that this is not 1997, Keir Starmer is not Tony Blair and the modern electorate are not afraid of the S word – they are encouraged and empowered by it.