I have a lot of sympathy with this comment by Sunder Katwala, the general secretary of the Fabian Society, writing on the Labour Uncut blog:
Labour needs a compelling political narrative and project again. It won't get back to power by the alphabet soup of electoral segmentation. Finding the argument and strategy that can build a broad enough electoral coalition to provide a coherent governing project is not going to be easy.
Still, that is the price of political power.
The one thing that is a recipe for permanent opposition is yet another debate about which voters Labour would be better off without.
The Tories must be delighted by three things right now. The first is Labour factionalism. The second is that the factionalism seems entirely process (or means) focussed. The third is that the narrative reason for engaging in the debate is missing.
At the end of the day, as the SNP proved, narrative matters.
New Labour had one, for better or worse, and I think worse. It can't be revived (although an attempt is being made). The need is for a new narrative.
A narrative that says the state is a good thing.
That only the state can get us out of the mess we're in.
That if we have full employment we can repay debt, easily.
And what's more we can supply all the services our changing demography demands.
That's a narrative in a nutshell, and I know it can work.
Labour has to believe it until it is red in the face.
Then people will vote for it.
It's ends, not means, that matter in politics. And Labour's ends are all on the left.
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RM- You make the basic mistake as the Left often do, with equating the State as a benevolent utopian organization.
The state is the class/clique in charge. There is really not a lot of difference between State Control and Right Wing Oligopoly- only a difference in personnel.
There is really not a lot of difference between State Control and Right Wing Oligopoly- only a difference in personnel.
Even if we were to accept your caricature, to anyone not blinded by silly libertarianism this is plainly wrong.
Government is elected by the will of all the people in open and free elections.
Right Wing Oligopoly is by its very nature a closed shop from which 99.9% of the population is barred by virtue of not having enough money.
Government is preferable each and every time.
Which labour ?
The old, original, labour ?
The now-unelectable labour ?
The present labour party is as far removed from the original labour party as the conservative party is.
Discovering policies that people agree with is not going to be easy. We have a [pretend] left-of-centre conservative party in competition with a pretend right of left labour party.
In the real world, both are a waste of space. Just look at how all “elected members” were offended that the electorate found offensive their many offences in claiming expenses that [in private industry] would have led to dismissal and prosecution.
Their [labour, libdem and conservative] contempt for those who vote shone as a beacon from the pratlace of westminster.