A fortnight ago the Guardian published an article which asked readers
to get in touch and let the paper know which
candidate they intended to vote for in the Labour leadership election. Over
2,500 people responded - all explaining their reasoning for backing any of the
four candidates. Some three-quarters indicated that they would vote for JeremyCorbyn. Of course, the paper did not claim that it was an unbiased sample when
analysing the responses. Nevertheless it was a very revealing exercise.
I went through a number of the responses and there
were common themes.
First on the Labour Party:
·
Labour has just decisively lost an
election trying to copy the Conservatives
·
Labour has become akin to desperate
sales people who will say anything to get elected. My advice is to stay true to
principles and believe in them.
·
What is the point of winning just to
implement Tory-light policies?
·
Labour is not facing up to the
reality that millions of lives have been blighted by Tory ideology and their agenda
·
Labour’s stance on the Welfare Bill revealed
a lot ...
·
What is the point of Labour if not to
stand up for ordinary working people as well as the young, sick, disabled or unemployed?
Then on Corbyn:-
·
He is the only one talking about
child poverty, homelessness, unaffordable housing, privatisation and
progressive taxation
·
They (the four candidates) are all
likely to lose the next election but at least Corbyn will do it with some
principles.
So I come back to a question I asked in a blog some
month or so ago. What indeed is the point of Labour today?
Shortly after the election Tristram Hunt, the
Shadow Education Secretary, argued that Labour’s defeat was due to more than just
policies. It was also down to how society has changed over time. He went on to list:
-
The steelworks and pits have gone …the
chapels have emptied.
-
There is a weakening of class-based
identity… the unions have disappeared in the private sector
-
The old political allegiances have
gone…and have been replaced by a more fluid political identity
-
Globalisation and new technology have
caused a new revolution.
Therefore he concluded that there is a bigger
challenge facing Labour than just finding ‘its beating heart’. That could very well
be true, but I am not sure that he is entirely grasping the enormity of the
changes that have taken place and the challenges that, in fact, confront all
centre-left parties.
Yes, it is true that times have changed compared to
the period after the Second World War to the 1980s. But it is not only the
times that are changing, but people also. The impact of new technologies has meant
that now in an instant we all can become considerably more aware of what is
going on in the wider world. As a consequence issues, scandals and the like
cannot be hidden from people any longer. We all have instant access to how the
establishment behaves, including the corruption and lies, abuse cover–ups that have
seemingly been going on since the 1970s as well as other matters of principles
in public life. So, in other words, the ‘age’ when people were easily ‘kept in the dark’, ‘duped’ and ‘misled’ - for
even centuries – came to an end at least ten years ago.
The problem is that the establishment and the
political classes have not woken up to the fact, or are deliberately not responding
to the major changes in people’s attitudes, values and expectations. We also know
that they have powerful allies with a range of vested interests within the
media, business, finance, multi-national corporations etc
The centre-left, or as I would much rather call it
the ‘progressives’ of the political spectrum, have to accept that there is a
core vote – probably in the region of
25% of the electorate - who will not ever
buy in to the implications of responding to these changes. Hence such a
situation has to be faced up to ... and the Tory agenda challenged.
The changes that are clearly evident in society manifest themselves through considerably more clamour for transparency; fairness;
justice; freedom; equality; human rights; wider understanding of international
development issues; apprehension over the environment and climate change; and
concerns over deepening world poverty etc. All is being ignored at the altar of
the Tory agenda along with a fear of being dubbed politically as far left, progressive
and, dare I say, radical. The problem emerging in British politics is that the
centre ground has shifted to the right.
We are still trapped in the old politics where
there is a general feeling that the Tories have a ‘moral’ right to govern. So,
at present, they govern as if they have a majority of a hundred seats. They claim
that they have a ‘mandate’ to be the government but that is only valid under
the definitions of the old two party political system. In reality, of course, they
have no such mandate and, put simply, they did not win the support of anything
like the majority of the people to have any such moral authority. 66% of the
electorate either did not vote or voted anti –Tory and yet Mr Cameron believes,
in his heart, that all is well with the world. Indeed only 24% of those
entitled to vote made him Prime Minister under our crumbling, archaic electoral
system.
So when Harriet Harman announced that she had been
round the country and had listened to the people’s voices – stating that ‘they
had given a clear message’- I am not sure that she had been speaking and
listening to the right people. True, some people did deliver some kind of
message, but they were far from being in the majority. Harriet Harman either
misunderstood the message or only spoke with Tory swing voters! The consequence
of this was the debacle of Labour’s response to the Welfare Bill and even abstaining
in the Commons vote. So, in an instant, that illustrates everything about the
current Labour leadership and the state of mind of three of its candidates to
be leader.
Back to my question - what is the point of Labour
today? Well the UK Union is fragmenting and so are its political allegiances along
with the party political system. The two party political system effectively
ceased at the General Election of 1983 and, since then, a clear plurality has
been emerging in our politics. Progressive politics is about much more than
economics, the debate over the national debt, the financial deficit, the size
of the public sector and the like. This is a fact the centre-left leaders have
to grasp ... and quickly. The Labour party in particular needs to understand
that All-party cooperation is now essential on a wide range of matters. The
traditional ‘macho’ Labour approach just will not wash anymore for any reform
to happen.
For me the old adage that ‘politics is the language
of priorities’ still holds true but importantly the ‘priorities’ are changing. Whatever the view - of
many in the Labour party and country – is of Jeremy Corbyn, there is little
doubt that he is capturing that mood just as Tim Farron is doing as the new
leader of the Liberal Democrats.