In Thursday's local elections, Rejoiners trounced Brexiters. The two main Brexit supporting parties (Tories and Labour) had a total net loss, of seats, of 522, whereas the two main parties advocating a reentry into the EU (Liberal Democrats and Greens), had a total net gain, of seats, of 646. But, that grossly understates the real victory of Rejoiners over Brexiters, in the election.
The Liberals and Greens, are both small parties, massively disadvantaged by Britain's undemocratic first past the post electoral system. They also started off with many fewer councillors, and so the advance of 646, actually represents an increase, of seats, of 41%. The Greens went from 240 seats to 481, an increase of more than 100%, whereas the Liberals advanced by more than 30%.
But, the figure for the Brexiters is also an illusion. The reality is that it is only Starmer's Blue Parliamentary Party that has collapsed into reactionary Brexit nationalism, in a lying attempt to win over the votes of petty-bourgeois and lumpen bigots, in decayed urban areas, whereas the large majority of Labour members, and Labour's core voters, are more opposed to Brexit, today, than they were in 2016, 2017, and 2019. Given the continued devastating effects of Brexit, and the fact that a clear majority of all voters now recognise it, and want to rejoin the EU, that division between the reactionary leadership of the PLP, and the party members and voters, can only grow ever wider.
For the large majority of Labour members and voters, as against Starmer's reactionary nationalist leadership, the elections pose a dilemma. They are necessarily torn between voting for Labour, whose heart continues to beat with the internationalist rhythm of a youthful and vibrant internationalism and opposition to Brexit, as against voting for other openly anti-Brexit parties, rather than Starmer's Blue Labour, and its faltering, aged Brexit nationalism. That dilemma is clearly manifest in the fact that Starmer's reactionary Blue Labour did worst in those areas that voted most heavily for Leave.
In those areas, Labour will most heavily have tried to present the case for Brexit. As could have been predicted, and as I have many times predicted, that failed to win over the reactionary bigots to Labour, whilst turning away a large number of progressive Labour voters. The bigots, who mostly have never been core Labour voters, but are Tories, BNP supporters, or non-voters, were not convinced by Starmer's Blue Labour, whose Brexitism they see as just as much a lie as the rest of Starmer's positions, adopted since he became Leader, and so continued to vote for the real thing, or not at all.
In Stoke-on-Trent, for example, Labour took control of the City Council, but did so without the Tories losing a single seat. Labour took all of its additional 14 seats from the Independents. In some heavily Brexit supporting areas, the Tories actually made advances against Labour, as it failed to win over the votes of bigots, but lost some of its own core voters to Liberals and Greens, as seen in the stunning advances of those parties.
In those areas which voted against Brexit, Labour's opportunist and tailist strategy will have toned down its Brexitism, and, in those areas, it did far better, but it could not change the reality that its leadership is still formally committed to Brexit. It can talk about a Labour Brexit, in terms of seeking a closer relation to the EU, and so on, as much as it likes, but it doesn't change the fact that any such Labour Brexit, is not only still Brexit, but is just another example of cakeism, an attempt to have the impossible.
Britain, outside the EU, cannot have the same rights and privileges as an EU member, whatever Starmer and Co. might lyingly proclaim. Even to have membership of the Single Market requires acceptance of all its rules, free movement, jurisdiction of the ECJ, and so on. So, although Labour did better in those areas, it did not do as well, and never could do as well as the actual Rejoiner parties, like the Greens and Liberals.
Yet, the Liberals, as the main Rejoiner Party itself has adopted a timid and tailist approach. At the time of the 2019 General Election, it adopted the rational approach of saying that, if elected to Government, they would simply scrap Brexit, taking the vote for them as the mandate for doing so. That approach was seen as clear and rational, not only by Liberals, but also by Labour, and even large numbers of Tory voters, as against the wholly confused position put forward by Labour, of calling for a second referendum, without any clear indication of what position Labour would take in that referendum and so on. But, today, the Liberals have abandoned that clear strategy.
Today, the Liberals talk about some convoluted four-stage process of rejoining the EU, putting it off, thereby, for many years. No wonder they have lost ground, compared to the Greens, whose rejoin strategy talks only about getting Britain “Rejoin Ready”, so as to begin negotiations with the EU. Yes, of course, its necessary to press for an immediate return of free movement, and so on, but the reality is the Tories are not going to negotiate that, even though they have been forced, in practice, to accept all the other conditions of the EU, in relation to the Single Market, because, without doing so, Britain's trade with the EU would have collapsed even more disastrously.
The only government that is going to get Britain “Rejoin Ready”, is a government that actually and actively supports and commits to rejoining. That is still unlikely to be a Liberal or Green government, but the local elections show that Labour is not going to form a majority government either. The preferable option would be for Labour members to oust Starmer's reactionary, Blue Labour cabal, and commit Labour, at its conference, to a clear policy of rejoining the EU, as soon as possible, including a Labour Government opening re-entry negotiations, as soon as its elected. But, that is also unlikely to happen, because Starmer's reactionary Bonapartist regime has already expelled thousands of progressive Labour members, and bureaucratically shut down CLP's for daring to express an opinion.
As we go into an election, which could be this Autumn, therefore, Labour will continue to be dragged down by a reactionary, Brexit supporting parliamentary leadership, within which, however, there still exists a large number of Blairites committed to the conservative social-democratic (neoliberal) agenda embarked on by The Master, and to meeting the needs of the ruling class, which most certainly cannot be fulfilled whilst Brexit exists. Sooner or later, Starmer, and that Blue Labour cabal will have to be removed, and the sooner its seen as being counter to the needs even of winning an election, the sooner the ruling class and its Blairite agents will remove it.
Of course, that ruling class might see, a Minority Labour government as best suiting those requirements. In 2019, the idea that Jo Swinson was going to sit in Downing Street or determine who sat there, was a fantasy, as was the project of the Small Change Party. It was clear that it was only going to be either Labour or Tories that won the election, and the extent to which the Liberals and Small Changers spent their time attacking Corbyn, and splitting the anti-Brexit vote, ensured that it was Boris Johnson that won the prize. But things are different now.
The state of play, after an Autumn election that will still see the Tories lose, but gives them the best chance of salvaging something, is likely to be one in which Labour is the largest party, but can only form a Minority Government, with tacit support from the SNP, Plaid, Liberals and Greens. Labour has never formed a majority government without having won more than 40 seats in Scotland, and, despite the fortuitous meltdown of the SNP, that still seems highly unlikely.
Scottish voters, two-thirds of whom voted against Brexit, are not going to vote for a Labour Party committed to Brexit, less still those that supported the SNP, and saw Labour acting as an English Nationalist Party, playing second fiddle to the Tories in the Independence Referendum. They will either hold their nose and vote for the SNP, vote for the Greens or Liberals, or sit on their hands. A portion of the Scottish nationalists also supported Brexit, being former Tories. They are likely to go back to the Tories, not to Labour. If Labour manages to get its Scottish seats into double figures, it will be doing well, but nowhere near well enough to form a majority government in Westminster.
The local elections, but more clearly the three by-elections, in which Liberals went from third place, to overhaul Labour, and win Tory seats, shows the problem faced by Labour in England and Wales. The Tories are likely to lose seats in its Blue Wall, but the overwhelming beneficiary of that is going to be Liberals and Greens, not Labour. To have any chance in those areas, Labour would have to disavow its national position on Brexit, and emphasise its commitment to drawing closer to the EU, a position that is not only deceitful, and will be compared with its national policy, and position in more Brexity areas, but will also be seen to be meaningless. Drawing closer to the EU is simply code for accepting EU conditions to an even greater extent, or else it is simply cakeism. Either way, it is useless without actually committing to rejoining the EU.
If, on the back of these recent election results, the Liberals and Greens do the obvious thing of stepping up their anti-Brexit, rejoin agenda, especially were they to engage in some kind of electoral pact, their ability to take large numbers of seats in those Blue Wall constituencies is massively enhanced, and progressive Labour voters in those areas, who overwhelmingly support rejoining, about 80% of them being in that camp, would be mightily incentivised to ensure that the Tory candidates lost, by backing Liberal or Green candidates.
A Minority Labour Government that depends on the votes of the SNP, Plaid, Liberals and Greens, all of whom oppose Brexit, and seek to rejoin the EU, at the earliest opportunity (though defined in varyingly vague terms by each) would be under considerable pressure to itself begin that process. Starmer has been so compromised by his militant Brexitism and jingoism that it would be difficult for him to lead such a government. But, that would suit the ruling class fine, as it opens the door for them to replace him with a Blairite of their choosing, including David Miliband, if he were to be found a safe seat.
There was no way that Swinson and the Liberals could dictate to Corbyn's Labour Party, who its Leader would be, because Labour members that backed Corbyn in huge numbers, would never have tolerated it. But, Starmer is loathed by the majority of Labour members, even those left after he has purged the party. He has abandoned every pledge he made to continue with the social-democratic agenda established under Corbyn, including now on scrapping University Tuition Fees, but he has even abandoned the conservative social-democratic agenda of Blair. Where there was an ocean of difference between the progressive social-democratic agenda of Corbyn, and the conservative social-democratic agenda of the Blairites, no such gulf exists between Starmer and the Blairites. On the contrary, Starmer stands to the Right of the Blairites! Consequently, if the SNP, Liberals, Greens and Plaid insisted on removing Starmer, and putting in place Miliband, so as to begin honest negotiations with the EU to rejoin, then Labour members are hardly likely to oppose it, and the ruling class, and its media, control of financial markets and so on would actively encourage it.
But, if the Liberals and Greens, and those supporting Rejoin in the Labour Party, want to maximise their strength in the intervening period, they should drop all of the timid and tailist nonsense about a four stage process of rejoining. The reality is that Britain was forced de facto to continue to accept EU Single Market rules, other than for free movement. It has not introduced its own checks on goods coming into Britain from the EU and elsewhere. It has not been able to introduce its own “British” standards, and British industry overwhelmingly sees any such additional bureaucracy and red tape as costly and unnecessary. It has not been able to negotiate any new trade deals with third countries that gave it anything better than it had inside the EU. On the contrary, that with Australia is seen as giving it a far worse deal than it had as an EU member.
The EU would fast track Britain back into the EU, if a Labour Government was committed to it, just as the EU said it would do for an independent Scotland. Britain already/still complies with all of the requirements for EU membership, as against countries like Turkey, and other applicants in the Balkans etc. The only difference on rejoining would be that a weakened Britain, as a result of Brexit, would have to accept that the former privileges and opt-outs it had would be lost, and it would have to accept joining the Eurozone, and Schengen Agreement, but that would be a wholly progressive development, in itself, as the EU moves towards becoming a federal state.
Its time for the voices of progress to speak up clearly and loudly, and argue for an end to the Brexit nightmare, and for commitment to rejoining the EU as soon as the EU can process the application.
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