All the results are not yet in, but the conclusion is clear. The Labour Right and their Tory backers claimed that 2019 was the worst result for Labour since the 1935 (not true), and yet this result for Starmer's New Labour is much, much worse. Seats that Labour won handsomely in 2017, under Corbyn, fell under the Tory juggernaut, whilst even those seats that Labour won, under Corbyn, in 2019, were swept up by Johnson's marauders. But, then, given that Starmer has spent the last year praising Johnson's actions, and following in his trail, picking up the scraps and waste he has left, whilst having nothing of his own to say as an alternative, no criticism of Johnson's reactionary populist regime, why would anyone expect any different?
The clear message of these elections is what I have been saying and predicting for the last two years or more, and which led to Labour's defeats in 2019, and again last Thursday. In 2017, under Jeremy Corbyn, Labour not only recruited hundreds of thousands of young, progressive members to its ranks, but it also won the votes of millions of people like them, people who previously had either not voted, or else who had voted for Greens and Liberals, because they had seen the positions of those parties as, at least superficially, more progressive than the conservative policies that Labour had pursued under Blair, Brown and Miliband, which were indistinguishable from those of the Tories. It gave Labour the biggest increase in its vote since 1945. But, Labour threw it away in 2019 chasing a reactionary fantasy.
In 2017, Labour won over all those progressive elements, because it had undertaken the 2016 Referendum on the progressive platform of Remain, whilst not endorsing the existing liberal nature of the EU, and also putting forward its own more radical, social-democratic agenda. In 2017, despite clouding the issue by tying itself to “respecting” the referendum result, its “Six Tests” were clearly designed to ensure that any possible deal arrived at would fail to meet them, so that Labour was effectively committed to scrapping Brexit. Certainly for any progressive Remain voters, the only chance of stopping Brexit, in 2017, was to vote Labour, because the Liberals were disgraced, having put in place Cameron's shameful government in the first place, and the Greens had no chance of forming a government. Not surprising then that Labour candidates, in some seats, like Kensington, won, because they were able to get the votes, of middle-class, former Tory, Remain voters, as well as Greens, Liberals etc.
But, in 2019, Corbyn, backed by his Stalinoid advisors, who had never abandoned the reactionary nationalism of “The British Road To Socialism”, and their hostility to the EU, could not mentally separate out the idea that a growth in progressive ideas, and of the Left, did not itself include increased support for this talisman of their own reactionary leftism. Corbyn was led to stiffen the message of “respecting” the referendum result, to being one of implementing it, albeit in the delusional form of a so called “Labour Brexit”, which was simply a continuation of the reactionary and delusional ideas put forward under the rubric of Lexit. These were, after all the same reactionaries that had previously supported the Stalinoid No2EU election campaign. For them, the argument of “respecting” the referendum result was mere cover for their actual reactionary, nationalist agenda of Lexit.
The result was inevitable. Those millions of progressive Labour voters from 2017, were not at all attracted to the reactionary and delusional ideas of the Lexiters that were now being inserted, in insidious fashion, by the Stalinists and their fellow travellers. As it was pushed forward relentlessly, with the support of Stalinoid elements within the trades union bureaucracy, such as McCluskey, at Labour Conference, those Labour activists began to get disillusioned. In the Spring 2019 elections, even 60% of Labour members voted for other Remain supporting parties, rather than back Corbyn's reactionary Brexitism. Labour's vote collapsed. The reason Labour lost in the 2019 General Election was that it then had to spend the Summer undoing the damage done by that Brexitism in the Spring. Instead of spending the time on doorsteps putting a progressive alternative message to Leave voters, it was put on the back foot, and eventually tried to undo the damage by ever more frantic attempts to bribe the voters with giveaways that were seen for what they were. Incidentally its a problem Johnson will also face. The current pork barrel politics of bribing voters, in a few constituencies, like Tees Valley, can work for a time, but you can't sustain that economically for large areas of the country, and the bribes have to get bigger and bigger to retain the votes bought.
In fact, despite the claims, 2019 was not Labour's worst performance since 1935. In terms of votes and vote share, Labour did worse in 1983, 1987 and 1992. In 2019, Labour still got more votes than in any election since 2001, apart from 2017. Labour's share of the vote at 32.1% was significantly above that of Miliband in 2015 (30.4%), or Brown in 2010 (29%). Labour's problem was that Corbyn had gone in search of that reactionary nationalist Brexit vote, which he was never going to get in any significant numbers, and in the process pissed off 90% of party members who back Remain, and around 80% of its 2017 voters, who also back Remain. It was a foolish strategy, but Starmer has pursued it to even more foolish depths.
The trouble is that the strategists and pundits, much as they do when they look at the abstract concept of “the nation”, do not look at the fact that these abstract concepts are made up of antagonistic elements. So, “the North”, and “Midlands” are seen as areas of Leave, as with the constituencies that comprise them. Yet, as I have set out in previous posts, at the time, this is a crazy way of looking at the situation. As Professor John Curtice and others have explained, even in those heavily Leave voting areas and constituencies, a look at who was doing the voting for each of these two tribes is important. The reality was that, even in those seats, a majority of 2015 Labour voters, voted to Remain. The proportion of its 2017 voters – that included all those progressive new voters that Labour won over – who did so, was even greater than the proportion of its 2015 voters, who backed Remain.
Even in heavily Leave voting seats, around 60-70% of 2017 Labour voters backed Remain. Turning away from them, in search of a small reactionary minority that backed Leave, and whose reactionary views on other issues, meant that a progressive Labour Party would never get their support, was an act of stupidity. These are literally the same voters who, in the 1980's, backed the scabs in the Miners Strike, who voted for Thatcher to be able to buy their council house on the cheap and so on. Of course, they will never say so. Nor did the scabs and supporters of the scabs in the 1980's either. And, of course, the Labour Right are quite happy with that too, because, at that time, they would have been lining up to “listen” to the views of the scabs, whilst taking every opportunity to appear on TV to attack Scargill and the strikers. As I wrote a while ago, I remember in 1984, Labour supporters being told not to raise the issue of the strike in Council elections for fear of losing the votes of scabs and other opponents of the strike. Listen to those voters today, and the same message can be heard “we want Boris's money”. As with the Tories of the 18th century, Boris is again buying votes, but its a strategy that is bound to lead to disaster for him too.
A look at the Hartlepool vote showed that the vote itself was down by 10,000 votes, or 25% compared to 2019. That is overwhelmingly a reduction in the number of Labour voters who bothered to turn out, as Labour's vote fell by 7,000. But, of course, the dichotomised world view of the media could only interpret this as a swing from Labour to Tory, despite the fact that, add together the Tory and Reform vote, and it also fell, compared to 2019. In this election, it came in at 16,000, compared to a combined vote of more than 22,000 in 2019. So, clearly, this is not a matter of 2019 Labour voters voting Tory, but of Labour voters from 2017/2019 simply sitting on their hands to a greater extent than did Tory/BP voters.
And, its not just a matter of progressive Labour voters sitting on their hands. A look at the Council election results in Sheffield illustrates the point. The Council went from being Labour to Hung, as a result of Labour losing seats to the Greens. Yet, this understates the dynamic. In a FTP electoral system, for every former Labour vote that goes to the Greens, and results in a Green candidate being elected, another ten former Labour votes goes to Greens who do not get elected. Yet, every Labour vote that goes to a Green, Liberal, Plaid or other such candidate, whether those candidates get elected or not, is still a lost Labour vote, and makes the chance of Tories winning in that seat so much greater. But, with Labour indistinguishable from the Tories, and with Starmer pursuing a reactionary nationalist agenda why would any ordinary, progressive voter give them their vote, rather than voting Green or for some other candidate that – rightly or wrongly – they see as offering a progressive alternative?
In 2019, Johnson calculated – or probably it was Cummings – that all he had to do was to consolidate the reactionary Brexit vote. Labour's confused “respect the referendum” message itself was not sharp enough to mobilise all of the anti-Brexit vote behind it. The SNP are using the same approach in Scotland, mobilising all of the separatist sentiment behind them, now assisted by Johnson's pursuance of a reactionary and damaging Brexit over their heads. The anti-independence parties are trying, ineffectively, to mobilise support behind them, via undeclared tactical voting, but, in 2014, it was Labour's alliance with the Tories, and its pursuance of English nationalism, that put the nail in its Scottish coffin, and allowed the Tories to emerge as the second party in Scotland, though the bureaucracy and corruption of Scottish Labour had been rotting it from the head for decades, a process now likely to continue under Sarwar. In 2019, Corbyn's return to Brexit nationalism meant it was impossible for Labour to consolidate all of the Remain vote behind it, and with that Remain vote – which overall constituted a clear majority - divided, the road was wide open for Johnson to march his battalions through it.
But, at least, in 2019, Corbyn and Labour had another message. It was still able to offer a progressive, social-democratic agenda, even though, in the context of Brexit, such an agenda becomes impossible to implement, and became even more fanciful the closer the election came, and frantic efforts to add to it were made. But Starmer, has not just collapsed entirely into Brexit nationalism, so cutting off the route to all those progressive Labour, Liberal, Green, and Plaid votes, but has gone full throttle into jingoism, and wrapping himself in the butcher's apron, as the symbol of former British colonial imperialism. At the same time, having been elected on the basis of continuing the policy platform of the 2017 and 2019 elections, he has said nothing to support those policies, let alone develop them, despite all evidence being of the electoral popularity of those positions. Instead, at each stage, Starmer has simply acted as Boris Johnson's bag carrier.
No wonder that its not just John McDonnell, and Len McCluskey that complain that they have no idea what Labour, under Starmer, stands for, but that the same is said by Andrew Adonis, and others on the Right of the party.
The assessment has been made that all that was required was to say nothing and allow Boris to destroy himself. What a pathetic strategy for any political party let alone a socialist or social-democratic one. The idea that Toryism could be brought low by avoiding politics, but running to the media with cheap tittle-tattle about where Johnson's girlfriend shops, or who paid for the curtains was particularly abysmal. On the one we don't care, on the other, we all know that bourgeois politics is corrupt, and if this were the worst of it, then we would have little to worry about. The assessment was also made that the progressive Labour voters would vote Labour, even as Starmer chased the reactionary nationalists and jingoes, and abandoned even the moderately progressive social-democratic agenda of Corbyn. The assessment was also made that these progressive Labour voters were only to be found in the cities and metropolitan areas.
But, the example of Hartlepool showed that those progressive voters can stay at home in their tens of thousands. The rest of the country showed that they can do that, or they can vote Green, Liberal, Plaid, or SNP, where those parties appear to provide a more progressive alternative to Starmer's reactionary nationalist agenda. And, as in 2019, they did so, but now in even larger numbers. A look at the first results from the London Mayoral elections is another indication of it. It was thought that Saddiq Khan would have an easy win. Yet, the early results showed a much tighter race. Results in from some Labour seats showed, the Tories getting the most votes. Again that is not a result of Labour voters switching to the Tories, but of Labour voters staying home, or else, it appears, voting for Greens. Every vote for Greens, Liberals and so on, rather than Labour, is effectively a vote for the Tories. Khan is suffering because of Labour's overall reactionary turn, but also, because he opposed Corbyn throughout his period as Leader. Given that the election is in two rounds, he will undoubtedly win in the second round, as Green second votes go to Labour, but the fact remains that Labour's strategy is leading to a loss of support, enabling the Tories to win.
The idea that progressive voters only reside in cities or metropolitan areas is, as I wrote some time ago, clearly nonsense. Its just that there is more of them in some areas than others. There are plenty of progressive younger voters in a place like Stoke, just proportionately fewer compared to the older, more reactionary voters. The progressive voters in Stoke are no less likely to reject a reactionary Labour message than they would be if they lived in Manchester or London. That reactionary message is not going to win over many of those reactionary voters in Stoke and other similar areas, but it will turn away enough of those progressive younger voters to ensure that Labour could never win, and that the Tories will. That is what happened in 2019, and looks like what happened in England last week.
The comparison in Wales, is notable, where the Corbynite Mark Drayford's Labour appears to have done well, as he has continued to present a more progressive message, and, unlike Starmer, has, at least, managed to be opposing Johnson's government.
Professor John Curtice set out this view that the Labour Right seem to have been pursuing as though it was the only possible course, of trying to attract those elderly, reactionary voters. Of course, he said, it was not. Instead, its possible to try to minimise the divisions over Brexit, and focus on an economic message that might attract Labour voters across the divide. In effect, that is what Corby tried, but it failed. Another option, he said, was to ignore the reactionary Brexit voters, and go full out Remain, to rally around all of those progressive voters wherever they live, and, at the same time put forward a progressive economic agenda to win over Labour voters, again irrespective of their views on Brexit. That is clearly the rational electoral option, especially as the reality of the disaster of Brexit increasingly manifests itself.
But, instead, the Labour Right seek to double down on their failed strategy. Starmer talks about ending division in the party, but its him that has created the division with his expulsion of Corbyn from the PLP, the continuation of the witch hunt against party members, the expulsion of party officials just for challenging Corbyn's expulsion and so on. He can only talk in vacuous terms about learning lessons and winning back voters, but challenged about what message he would use to do that, he had no answer. Questioned again and again to elaborate, he simply became more and more rattled and red faced, repeating the same mantra, the more he was struck with the question, the louder the empty vessel rang, but with no change in its tune.
And, this talk of “listening” is not just vacuous, it is actually reactionary in itself. The conservative nationalist, former Labour MP, Caroline Flint, repeated the same calls for listening she has been making for the last several years, which really means listening to the reactionary demands for Brexit, for immigration controls and so on that some of her constituents had been making, so as to collapse into them in the vain hope of her winning a seat, so as to implement those reactionary, anti-working class policies. The conservative, populist Labour MP, Peter Kyle, responded to the electoral disaster by arguing it meant a need to push Labour even further to the Right. He argued the need to wrap itself even more in the butcher's apron, to be proud of British history, and so on. In other words, it was a call for a full on, racist apologism for British colonial savagery and slavery, in search of winning the votes of those bigots and reactionaries that look back to the days of the British Empire so as to bathe in its reflected glory.
The other day, I was watching, of all things, a recent episode of Michael Portillo's “Great British Railway Journeys”, using a guide from the 1930's. In it, he interviewed some Jewish people who had come across on the Kinder transport of that time, as refugees, from Germany. They talked about the way they were abused, and treated with hostility by British people when they arrived, at a time, of course, when Britain, like much of Europe, was consumed by deep-seated anti-Semitism and hatred of Jews. The first immigration laws were introduced to stop Jews coming to Britain, as they faced pogroms in Eastern Europe. Churchill was a well known anti-Semite, as was the Hitler supporting Daily Mail. They recounted how the British people they encountered resented their coming to Britain from Nazi Germany, as refugees, how they spoke of them as not belonging, because they were, and looked, different, and so on. The reality was that very few children were brought to Britain, partly due to this opposition. Even fewer Jewish adults were allowed into Britain unless they were of significance to the British state.
If Labour, at that time, had listened to all of these British anti-Semites whose views were prevalent in Britain at that time, the consequence would have been to have aligned itself with Moseley and the other fascists, who also put forward their own “left-wing” economic programme of nationalisation and so on. The Mosely Memorandum, was a 1930's equivalent of the Alternative Economic Strategy, and supported by Nye Bevan and others, for example. It would have meant Labour aligning itself, on the basis of such listening to reactionary voters, to an anti-Semitism that was far worse than anything they have accused Jeremy Corbyn and his supporters of.
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