The reactions to my post on Labour's problem with antisemitism yesterday were, in many cases, depressing. It's my belief that Labour can address this issue where it matters on the ground vastly more effectively than it has, and keep the Jewish community happy (many of whom should be natural Labour supporters) and be honest to its beliefs, simultaneously. It was clear many disagree. And if I was disheartened by some of the comments, I wonder what I would have felt like if I was Jewish? I am certain deep alienation would be the best description.
And yet what many seemed not to notice was that what I actually wrote about was the fact that Labour is, by letting internal divisions fester, failing to do the job it is meant to do on behalf of the people of this country. What I mean is, it is not opposing the most dangerous government we have had in decades at a time of massive political crisis. That is what I actually wrote about. You might never have noticed, such was the reaction.
I am not alone in holding this view. This is John Harris in the Guardian this morning:
[Anna Soubrey] well knows something too many Tories choose to ignore: that if these people increase their influence via one of their number becoming the prime minister, they will eventually kill traditional British Conservatism for two generations at least. But the left has to wake up, too. It is the reckless right, not “Blairites” and centrists, that is the real enemy. If we want an end to the fear and anxiety that currently define the national mood and a future worth living for, these are the saboteurs who will have to be crushed.
I know what the reaction of some will be. It will be that the Guardian can't be trusted and is, in any case, aligned against Labour or, at least the Left. It so happens I don't share the view. Just as I don't share the view of many of its columnists. But I also understand that both commercially as well as intellectually and politically it feels the need to represent a broad church of interests who are never intended to speak with a single voice, but from whom each interest can learn, even if only by working out why they disagree, and what they could do better.
And Labour could do better. I bothered to explain this weekend how it could take on the issue of failing councils and solve it by pursuing a policy that puts the vulnerable first. I have heard nothing from Labour on this.
Sometime in the next hour or so I also intend to finish a blog on the poverty of Labour's economic thinking, where it obviously still thinks it is in hock to banker's and has to deliver austerity as a result.
And on the biggest issue of the day, which is Brexit, it isn't even sure it will trust its membership to speak at its conference on the issue as yet as far as I know.
My point is that if Labour is to deliver it has to be radical. It has to be clear in whose interests it acts. It has to be coherent and consistent on their behalf. And it has to be willing to set its own agenda.
This does not mean accepting the Labour right's agenda. Far from it.
But what it does mean is actually having an agenda other than some tokens, like rail nationalisation (which really is the easy stuff, and which will not radically alter most people's lives), that can actually be used to show that a Labour Government would make a big difference to what it is like to live in Britain today.
I am far from alone in thinking that Labour is far away from achieving this.
I want a radical Opposition in this country that fights the far-right and the economic, political and social madness they promote with policies that will effect real change. I don't think that is too much to hope for.
But I am a very long way from getting it.
And I reserve my right to say so.
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“The biggest issue of the day”
… is not ‘Brexit’ but climate change and associated environmental issues.
I realised I should have said so after publishing
Agreed, Joe, but the most pressing, immediate, short-term issue is Brexit, which if it succeeds, in whatever form, may seriously compromise the UK’s ability to decarbonise and help towards dealing with anthropogenic climate change.
“It is the reckless right, not “Blairites” and centrists, that is the real enemy”
Perhaps the Blairites should stop doing/saying things that make them appear to be the enemy then. The direction of the party has been voted for twice in two years but they still keep on complaining. They cannot accept defeat and we all know why.
Are you saying free speech is not allowed?
Why?
I don’t agree with them. Not at all. But they have the right to their opinions?
Do you disagree?
If so what message does that send?
I agree whole-heartedly. It’s so frustrating knowing that as a nation we could be doing so much better. It’s misleading when the MSM continually refer to us as the 5th or 6th largest economy in the world, which maybe gives the general population a false sense of international status and that we’re doing OK. A more meaningful stat is GDP per capita – where we rank 26th (https://tradingeconomics.com/country-list/gdp-per-capita-ppp). If other comparative indicators – e.g. ‘ The top 10 best countries to raise children in 2018’, where we’re not even a contender, (https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/06/us-news-world-report-2018-top-10-best-countries-to-raise-children.html) – were publicly debated then perhaps there would be more upward pressure for change.
But, of course, without a strong major political party convincingly articulating how it’s possible to achieve a better quality of life for everyone and not just the asset-wealthy 30%, there’s little chance that anything will radically improve for the 70% (arbitrary percentages).
So the topic reverts back to the Labour Party and all your valid criticisms of its leadership in the earlier blog. The Conservative agenda has been pretty much the same since its inception, so they don’t need to explain anything. It does what it says on the tin and delivers the social inequality it always has. In that sense it has more integrity than the Labour Party.
With a poorly led, badly managed and economically illiterate Labour Party, coupled with the FPTP voting system, it’s difficult to see how to move the nation forward other than by waiting for the next crisis and capitalising on that for change. For some reason (cultural / historical?) the British public cannot understand that better performing countries, such as the Scandinavian social-democracies, didn’t achieve their higher qualities of life by accident. It was the result of more competent and imaginative leadership and generally from a much lower base-line than ours. (It’s little wonder that so many Scots want to unshackle themselves from Westminster and look to these countries as models. I hope they succeed).
To add to the bad news, the minority Neo-liberals, both in here in the UK and the US, are increasingly controlling the political agenda from outside via their very deep pockets, lobbyists, corporate client-base and successful manipulation of public opinion/behaviour, all of which further hinders the possibility of progressive change. Was it ever thus, but I really do think it’s worse now than at anytime in the past century.
The good news is that, while the ‘Right’ may be winning current battles there is no reason why the ‘Left’ cannot win the war. For starters, age is on our side. Both the Republican and Conservative parties are in decline numerically. Secondly, the gradually failing Global Capitalist economy will open up opportunities for change as it ceases to deliver improving living standards. Thirdly, new and better leadership will eventually emerge from within both the Democrats and the LP.
It’s going to be a long-game, Richard, necessitating relentless constructive criticism from all ‘Progressives’, making blogs such as yours critical to achieving the change we know is needed and which can be achieved … for the sake of future generations. But it’s going to be a daunting challenge and often dirty fight …. it already is.
And I haven’t even mentioned ‘Brexit’, climate change and immigration.
Barista,una tazza grande del tuo miglior caffè, per favore!
Thanks
Joe Burlington is quite correct. The existential subject today is climate change and other environmental topics. ‘Brexit’ is now serving as a useful tool to keep the plebs (‘as we used to call them at Eton’) from noticing the changes that are going to impact from now regarding their way of life and future.
I’ve been studying climate change from 1962. I know that the French were already noticing its effects on what we now call the Sahel in the 1930s. The tipping point passed in the 1980s, was recognised, but nothing was done to counteract the causes. We are now, I believe, unable to prevent an environmental disaster which will impact horribly on world agriculture.
As I said above, an existential threat.
Oh for a radical opposition. The antisemitism issue is a diversion, and I wish it could be solved, even by adopting now the IHRA definition (which the Party has done) and all the examples.
Tackling climate change as the priority and prism for dealing with all other issues, and adopting Contraction and Convergence as the only equitable basis which will be acceptable globally, the reality of the current situation is far darker than generally recognised.
The best analysis has just been published by Prof Jem Bendell “Deep Adaptation: A Map for Navigating Climate Tragedy” – http://www.lifeworth.com/deepadaptation.pdf
The implications of this are currently being discussed by a global thread of some 65 scientists, anthropologists, economists, unfortunately by e-mail. (Aubrey Meyer of http://www.gci.org.uk (who can he found on twitter as
@Aubreygci is acting as ad hoc moderator.)
Nevertheless, issues of population, energy and food production, are not fully meeting the deep realities which jem poses in his paper, which is essential reading.
Saved to read this evening
Thank you
Thank you Jeffrey – Jem’s paper is certainly worth reading though not if you are hoping to be cheered up.
He is observing that we are now seeing exponentially increasing rates of change, and the potential for or actual non-linear jumps in climate change and it’s disastrous consequences.
By accident I did some work on the maths of non-linearity and chaotic system decades ago at university. It planted the thought that many systems, and most human systems, are non-linear in nature. It’s just how we behave.
Unfortunately I’d observe that most people can grasp the idea of a linear relationship – if this happens then so does that. Temperature increases, ice melts. Some grasp exponential relationships – if this happens that happens but at in increasing rate – a bit of differential calculus. As temperatures increase, glaciers move faster and melt ever faster (experts please feel free to correct me)
However few grasp the idea of non-linearities or discontinuities – that a system can suddenly flip from one state to another. Massive ice sheets break off and melt causing sea level rise and flooded coastal cities. I’d argue most human behaviour is pretty non-linear.
Meteorologists and environmentalists have understood this for decades. Economists are perhaps the worst offenders with rare and honourable exceptions. Surprisingly perhaps, the Bank of England has started to recognise it though they have 100s of economists educated the old way.
Time to distribute lots of copies of Jerrod Diamond’s book Collapse
I was impressed by the paper
But it’s not cheering
And it was depressing but unsurprising it could find no academic home
I’m all for radical ideas and trying them out. This blog from welfare guru Prof Paul Spicker points to the problems trying new ideas and is worth a read (including the comment below Spickers blog):
http://blog.spicker.uk/terminating-a-basic-income-experiment-tells-us-something-too/
I’m not linking this to say that we should not try but to be aware of how we should perhaps try new things and try them in a committed way.
Whatever Labour say or do the press and media will not give it time except for anything negative against Labour. If you think that labour is not opposing watch social meadia.
I know what is happening
And I am documenting its failings
Which I deeply regret having to do
You seem to be blaming the Labour Party and not the press and media if you know what’s going on then you do not put it across well
Get real
If the Labour Party cannot manage the media then the problem is the Labour Party’s
It knows it has few friends there and has to work with that issue, and not fuel it
Of course it is Labour’s problem, and unless it solves it then it will fail people
You don’t have to be a centrist to see that, surely?
Richard you say, “If Labour cannot manage the media then the problem is the Labour Party’s”. If we remotely had a free MSM/BBC etc your comment would be valid, we don’t, and it isn’t. Caste your mind back to the last GE. There was virulent biased campaign of vilification orchestrated against Jeremy Corbyn. JC went over the heads of the MSM and talked directly to the voters. His sincere message won them over in the hundreds of thousands. IMO if it had not been for the Manchester bombing upsetting labour’s successful trajectory Labour would now be in government. Bad timing or what? We don’t need or expect the support of the MSM. JC knows how to deal with fake news peddlers.
So deal with it
That’s the reality
Don’t whine. Stop giving them the ammo
But right now Labour is seeking to combust of its own free will and is needing no help from the media to do so
IMO
John D, thanks for a superb post. It is pretty depressing. As you say, how can any reasonable person blame the Scots for wanting to be shot of rule by the Westminster Parliament, and model themselves on more successful countries.
Still, there is a bit of good news around. Wonga is in serious financial straits, due to tougher regulations introduced in 2013, and a high level of claims brought against it by ex-customers. Oh dear, what a shame.
And the delicious irony is this: “Claims management companies have targeted payday lenders as potential payouts from payment protection insurance start to dwindle. PPI customers have a year left to make complaints before the FCA’s deadline. Wonga received almost 1,000 more claims in the second half of 2017 than in the first half.”
One form of predatory finance sector capitalism falling victim to another! So, there is a bit to be cheerful about.
I believe Labour does have a coherent and radical agenda which will effect real change, and it is outlined in this piece;
http://www.renewal.org.uk/articles/the-institutional-turn-labours-new-political-economy
However, it doesn’t appear to do very well in communicating it.