Andrew Rawnsley has this line in his column in The Observer this morning:
“Reform is not great for Labour, but it is an existential threat to the Tories,” remarks one Labour strategist, noting that last week's YouGov poll reported that one in five of Tory voters in 2024 said they would now back Reform.
This made me groan out loud when I read it. That's because substitute the word Brexit for Reform in that sentence, and that was what I was told by a senior Labour strategist in March 2016. Brexit, they said, was a 'blue on blue' issue that could only go well for Labour, I was assured. They were wrong. It has not gone well for Labour, or anyone else, come to that. The same will be true for Reform.
As Rawnsely added later in the piece:
If Labour is to beat back Reform, the job won't be done simply by coming up with some sharper attack lines. Mr Farage is thriving now, just as he did in the years running up to the Brexit referendum, because he is tapping into high levels of voter discontent about the quality of their lives in a country with a stagnant economy and dilapidated public services. Immigration is one of the factors, but so is the cost of living and the condition of the health service. Sorting that is critical to seeing him off. It is not enough to say that Reform has bad ideas. Labour must demonstrate that it can deliver good results.
That is correct. It is hard to argue with any of it.
But, as I have noted in this morning's video, Labour is basing its whole economic policy on what are quite literally fantastic ideas - in the sense that they are works of fantasy that are very unlikely to yield results.
The required delivery, which is bums on seats in front of doctors, pounds in the pockets of people in need rather than those who would exploit them, and secure housing for those who live in fear of having to perpetually move on, are nowhere near Labour's headline agenda. We have to presume they are not on the agenda at all in that case, driven off by the obsession with book balancing, which is destroying Labour as surely as it destroyed the Tories.
Labour could deliver, but it has to abandon Reeves and all she says she stands for to do so.
Labour could deliver, but to do so, it would have to deliver from the left, and Morgan McSweeney apparently hates that, in which case, so does Starmer.
Labour could get out of the mess it is in by becoming a Labour Party, but those who knew how to deliver on that idea have all been expelled from it.
So, the door is open for Farage and something very much worse. Labour could prevent that. The Tories can't. But Labour has no desire to take the necessary steps to deliver what this country wants and needs - any more than Farage would if he were to get into office.
If Labour will not stop Farage then it - and the country - are consigned to history for the rest of my life. Of course, I am angry with Labvour about that, and I have every reason to be so. Choosing to fail in the face of a far-right threat is not what politicians of any party should do. Those pretending to be on the left who facilitate the far-right are hard to forgive. And that is where Labour is heading. It really is last chance saloon time for it.
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Reform like the Observer/Guardian has no answers because of their monetary system illiteracy. The article by the monetarily illiterate Rawnsley is simply treading water!
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2025/feb/07/what-do-trumps-tariffs-mean-for-us-china-trade
“That historic agreement included a decision to allow the dollar to depreciate against other major currencies, in an attempt to narrow the US current account deficit – a measure that includes borrowing from foreign creditors, as well as the trade balance. While it is less visible, the US imbalance with China includes Beijing’s vast holdings of US treasuries – effectively, loans to the US government – which were worth $770bn at the end of 2024, second only to Japan, a geopolitical ally of Washington.”
And who exactly is creating the US treasuries when it doesn’t need to or could use the purchase money to reduce taxation on US manufacturers?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hiCs_YHlKSI
The problem is expressed perfectly in this Guardian article, although of course the obvious solution eludes them.
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2025/feb/09/cash-strapped-schools-plan-to-lay-off-teachers-in-blow-to-labours-promise
Having promised to RECRUIT 6,500 teachers, LINO are upset that headteachers are in fact sacking teachers because they are under pressure not to go into deficit.
What could possibly be the missing ingredient in those school budgets, and who has the power and duty to provide it?
Apparently the answer is beyond Rachel Reeves, Keir Starmer and Bridget Phillipson.
Surely it couldn’t be anything as simple as government
-created money?
Apparently we have to wait till somehow, one day, in a way no one can explain, some money will find its way into school budgets from the private sector, one day, maybe, after that 3rd runway gets built (not) and “growth” provides us with trickledown…
Did any government ever determine to commit electoral suicide quite so early in its term, as Starmer’s?
With hands and legs tied Scottish government is trying to do the best they can for schools. 13.2 pupils per teacher…. Rest of UK???
Now that schools are supposed to pay teachers more, without any extra funding, by generating money through “efficiencies”, the latest wizard wheeze at the Department for Education is that they will put a load of effort into creating a kind of uSwitch for schools where they can get a better energy deal and move their current accounts to a higher-interest bank and that this will magically pay for another teacher or whatever
Aside from the obvious inefficiencies, is generating the money through bank interest substantially different from or any less inflationary than just giving schools money? Why are we obliged to funnel everything through scams and wheezes?
Labour has no actual answers to these problems beyond the same neoliberalism that got us into this mess in the first place. They can’t imagine anything else, let alone sell a vision to others.
Out of interest, Richard, is there anyone in sight who could replace Reeves and, in your opinion, deliver?
Not that we know of – but no one is taking the risk of talking right now
I was thinking of Darren Jones replacing Reeves but that would only be a sick joke as it is not April 1st yet.
Look, these avatar politicians right – politics is about THEM, their careers, their futures and if they have been good, OK, their political careers might end but they will be looked after by the system anyway won’t they? So, delivering what we think is nothing is something to those people these avatars like Starmer and Reeves work for – it does what Thomas Hobbes says is the key constituent of human existence – it helps the current system to survive and that is it – self preservation.
The voter will not give Starmer and Co self preservation but the party donation machine will, and the political system with its grace and favours will mollycoddle the used husks of Starmer and Reeves. How else can one explain the wealth of people like Blair and Mandelson? The old set of avatars will be discarded, and capital will find new ones in Reform. That’s how it works these days.
No way though is this democracy. No way. So then we move onto how it can be changed, which becomes even more piquant when you consider the increasing authoritarianism we are sliding toward.
Starmer and co may probably prefer to go down with all hands rather than uturn on theirr economics. I have seen this before – Hitler – and personally.
This is history repeating itself in my book. The New Labour “third way” opened the door for Brexit.
Starmer quite literally now opens door for Farage with another vacuous political strategy (growth).
The interesting thing is nothing sticks to Farage. The failure of Brexit is not an impediment for him. Quite likely because Starmer and his crap team are scared to take on that debate. An easy let off for Farage.
Maybe this is history repeating itself on a larger scale as well? Perhaps Reform are inevitable? Using books like End Times by Peter Turchin, or the Great Leveller by Walter Scheidel as reference, I think it likely we are seeing a collapse of the current political order as theorised in those books. We have increasingly worsening political talent as elites compete their way to the bottom, rising inequality, and an increase in political violence, albeit for now, just rhetorical. It won’t take much to spill over into actual violence. Labour are just another party trying to properly up a collapsing status quo, and Reform, unknowingly, are part of that inevitable collapse. They see themselves as agents of change, but are really just another nail in the coffin. Perhaps we have to go through a disaster like Reform would be to get to change at the other side.
Labour, read starmer, are too scared of upsetting money markets, anyone w real power & far too wedded to reeves’s non policies to make any headway in any meaningful way that impacts people’s lives. Their timidity will not save us (or them) but more us. If reform are predicted to take seats off the tories, maybe the greens & the libdems can from labour, that might help…but not by much. We need a progressive alliance w vision. Yeah i know, not likely…
ed – I think what we need isn’t a progressive alliance …which is unlikely for so many reasons. What we need is another party. Now. One that represents what Labour ought to represent.
If Farage can achieve success with this tactic on the right, why can’t another party do it on the left? Corbyn, or somebody with his values (and maybe a bit more welly) could start another UK party. I’m sure there would be lots of defectors from current Labour, along with independents …and lots and lots and lots of voters, who, at the moment, have nobody to vote for …to support it.
Stop hoping Labour is going to change from within. Change it from without? Makes sense to me. Most everything else HAS been tried …yet here we are.
We need to recognise the commonality of the diseconomic approach of the Tories, Reform and Labour.
They each offer more of the same neo-liberalism (supercharged in the case of Reform), all dressed up with subterfuge, obfuscation and distractions.
That is what we should attack – tar them all with the same brush! The Torela party.
In England, the Greens and the LibDems (no doubt fence-sitting on neo-liberal capitalism) should gain. In Scotland, a less confused SNP would benefit if only they understood money.
Here in Cymru, we have Plaid Cymru and Propel to lead us towards independence and a restoration of Keynesianism and democratic left-of-centre governance. Obviously a terrifying prospect.
Labour will deliver nothing with Starmer in charge. The longer he stays the worse it will get. Unless he is deposed by a leadership prepared to implement the kind of policy that will address the needs of the majority of British citizens we are looking at the next government being a Reform/Conservative coalition who will only dig us into an even deeper hole.
The rich ultimately want Farage in power to reduce their taxes. They are more than happy that racist anti-immigration cultural wars are waged by Farage for the voter muppets to achieve this. The Starmer government shilling for the rich is also part of this same process or drive.
Yes – perhaps. However.
The one I would be worried about (Farage = yesterday’s man) is Yaxley-Lennon. I would not be surprised if he is sitting in jail, garnering acolytes and writing “My Struggle”. Sure, Mr Toad may try to cuddle up to Y-L but he is getting on, has done nothing (Brexit is “done”) and is marmite to many. He offers nothing.
By contrast, as some might see it Y-L has stuck to his (erm..) “beliefs” and gone to jail for them. Mad-Musk supports him (probably the Mango-Mussolini – oh hang on – do I detect a pattern?). I think we are looking at the wrong threat.
Richard, is it time to accept that the current version of the Labour Party is not a left-wing party? Rather it is a centrist party following the (¿failed?) ideas of the Conservatives.
And to create and implement the policies/solutions that would address the key issues, as you outline them, do we need a new party of the left?
It is a right wing party
Not only is it capitulating to Trump and farage but Labour isnt doing what has to be done to save the planet
Patrick Dunleavy sets out with great clarity how our coup will happen
https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/politics/democracy/69225/a-british-trump-tribute-act-could-snatch-power-in-the-uk?t=h_rV0C0bLCIDOFtQhxWcvg
I’ve had long discussions with a couple of friends recently, both very anti immigration, so tending towards Farage. However if you question them as to ‘why’ they are not ‘anti immigration’ in principle but because they have been convinced immigration is the cause of the deterioration in public services. We need prominent politicians to make the case that more people paying taxes and providing labour for public services is a good thing. I failed with my friends, they are both still convinced if they elect a party who will ‘stop the boats’ this will somehow magically mean Dr’s appointments and NHS Dentists available for the rest of us.
The doctor and dentist they see is more likely to be an immigrant than a problem.
But there is a thought trail to deal with that- the dots don’t join up even though the facts may all be true in isolation… but it works for Reform UK.
The dentist is an immigrant
My son could have been a dentist.
University is too expensive.
My city is full of students.
More and more of them are foreign.
All the new flats are for students and they are very expensive.
Foreigners are filling the unis and filling the student flats and filling the buses
My son can’t afford the accomodation in the uni.
My son can’t find anywhere affordable to live as a student or a non-student.
I can’t find a dentist.
SO…
Stop the boats.
Control immigration.
Stop the student visas.
Stop building flats for foreign students.
Only Fa***e is listening.
Vote Reform.
Now of course that logic trail doesn’t make any sense – but the actual grievances are harder to dismiss, and “but if…” arguments don’t work on the omnibus round here.
What WOULD work is tackling the real grievances, so there is no need for immigrants as scapegoats. But it’s too late now – Labour have blown it.
Proper finance for dental training.
Proper finance for dental health care.
Affordable publicly financed housing.
Then “immigrants” are no longer relevant to the dental health problem.
But currently, the Government refuses to do anything about the grievances. Because they won’t invest in a decent society.
So they will lose to Reform.
And immigrants will suffer horribly.
And we STILL won’t have decent dental care because Fa***e doesn’t care one whit about your teeth (but maybe he will make gold fillings fashionable again – he can sell you the gold along with some dental insurance).
Agreed
@Richard Banner
“they are both still convinced if they elect a party who will ‘stop the boats’ this will somehow magically mean Dr’s appointments and NHS Dentists available for the rest of us.”
They also believe their children or grandchildren will be able to get a “place” at the school of their choice, housing costs will fall and rubbish will be correctly collected. Of course these people do not understand that “Boat People” are not really affecting public services. Lack of funding is the major cause of diminished public services.
What amazes me is NOT that my neighbours believe Reform UK. After all, millions of ££ (and covert $$) have been spent on convincing them via very well planned digital lies.
What amazes me, is that Labour/STP/LINO think the path to victory runs to the RIGHT of Reform, rather than to the left – by addressing the very real grievances of left-behind communities. After all, its the politicians who have the privileged education, the access to the data, and the history, and the time (years in opposition) to THINK about it all, and to cap it all, they even 5 years in government, with a stonking majority they didn’t earn, handed to them on a plate with a wilted lettuce leaf, an empty wine bottle or twenty, and some dodgy PPE on a tartan pallet, by a melted down Tory party, to get started on the recovery.
We have to stop blaming the voters and start listening to them. Really listening.
Rawnsley, Toynbee, Crerar, Freedland, Viner, YOU helped us into this mess, and believe it or not, you COULD help get us out of it, but it would take the sort of guts shown every day by journalists in Gaza & the West Bank. You would have to start telling us the truth. For example, tell us the truth about money. But no, you won’t, because you are FRIT (to borrow a phrase from an Iron Lady).
So, do nothing, and watch everything collapse around your ears. For a preview, watch Trump.
Won’t Starmer be far more worried about upsetting Trump and Musk to consider steering Labour back to its traditional values and to start effectively addressing social issues? As it stands, Trump has expressed some favour for Starmer by all accounts. I imagine this is because Starmer has simply taken up where Sunak left off but won’t that change if ever Starmer steers Left, surely Trump will then start to threaten?
Much talk about Musk investing in Reform UK if not Farage himself – I suspect Musk’s preference would be to have a Tommy Robinson led Reform UK, but my concern is how much influence will Trump and Musk bring to bear in the run up to the next UK General Election, and I guess much of that depends on how good folk in the US adapt and organise against the growing Trump/Musk autocracy?
Thinking about it
What about The Patriotic Millionaires?
Secondly if I was Rich which I am not I may not like Taxation but I can live with it, its a known risk, chaos on the other hand could reduce my wealth to nothing and a pitchfork could send me somewhere I could not take my wealth.
The Petit Bourgeoise on the other hand may not share my insight
Most of the issues that are driving people towards Reform are not things Reform intends to ‘put right’, perhaps with the exception of immigration. Do people really believe that Farage is interested in impriving the quality of lives, improving public services, making us all a little more wealthy?
Bizarrely, yes, they seem to do so
My thinking is that by attacking the status quo, as bad as it is, it gives people the impression you will do something about it. If not, why mention it? Reform’s style of politics simply couldn’t exist in an economy where people are doing well, or getting by comfortably. Why Labour don’t see this I don’t know. Of course, once in power, Reform won’t care any of the issues people face. They will either blame the Left for constraining them, or just outright change the whole system.
Rawnsley and the Guardian/Observer were instrumental in taking down Corbyn and the Labour left in favour of Starmer and the Labour right. Now some of them have buyer’s remorse although not all (eg Polly Toynbee).
So let’s not let them off the hook – they are part and parcel of the Starmer ‘project’.
You are of course right that a vacuum on the left enables the right. As the song goes, Labour is making plans for Nigel.
We complain about the political parties but their deep rooted problem is that they are malnourished of political thought. Why does Rachel Reeves have fantastical economic policies? At a guess, probably because every economics department in the country is stuffed full of people who think the same thing (including the dangerous idea that economics is a science) and taught countless future politicians to think the same way.
Economists who counter the narrative are outnumbered and many more, like Gary Stevenson, see no point in being part of the profession because most economists pump out right wing funded bilge.
For those who hold left wing views who seek an economics education, they either get left feeling like failures because they don’t accept what they are taught (which is taught as fact rather than theory, judging by the volume of mini-Kwartengs on LinkedIn who know the what and not the why) or they get sucked into the vortex of nonsense economics and become another Rachel Reeves.
If we want to break Labour open to new ideas, first the left needs to reestablish itself in economics departments and then it needs to make connections to the party intelligentsia.
And how do the right “tap in” to the discontent?
Well, they do control much of the media, money talks, but they are also wiping the floor with the left on social media.
Here is a video, UK specific, that should be an eye-opener for anyone on the progressive left.
I think anyone on the left who is actively involved on YouTube should watch this.
You Won’t Believe the Right-Wing Media Reach Today
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAJNx1KwPak
That’s only news though. The Left pretty much dominate culture; film, books, TV, music. Don’t underestimate the reach of ideas.
Democracy in its current form or even a fairer form in proportional representation has not & will not address the problems we are all concerned about, Economy, Environment, Existence.
I have been reading the Sortition Foundation’s plan for a Sortition based representative parliament / government. They have a compelling case, can’t link here, but a search for the sortition foundation will display them.
Imagine a govt of people, not parties, no agenda, no ideology, no whips, no lies, just honest folk, like you and me, actually addressing the issues we all care about. Selected at random, suitable, sane candidates, just like jury service, are conscripted to serve a limited term, w no follow up or reselection. We trust juries, why not this? Thoughts
This is raised here regularly.
This is not democracy.
And vitally, who sets the questions these people answer?
And who decides if they get it right?
And what happens to the person who cannot afford to serve, or who suffers from doing so.
I think sortition solves nothing and undermines democracy.
I don’t believe anyone can manage the brakes of this crash! Certainly not the Labour party we have. They had 14 years to cushion the blow and they completely blew it!
At least once a week I’m questioning people’s perceptions of immigration and right wing views and it’s pretty tiring. Labour should be working on that perception.
Healthcare, housing and education are the bone of contention for many. Labour should be doing something about that.
All I can see is a pessimistic government hoping for something and not adding any value, in any sense.
Sadly, in a way I understand the bitterness. My Syrian neighbours, to one side have 4 children and are in social housing and don’t work. It’s all too easy to blame them, than a governments inaction. Sadly those problems imo started with Tony Blair and joining the EU. He could have quite easily prevented the influx we had that disrupted healthcare, housing and education.
Instead we centralised healthcare and tried to keep everything as normal, whilst not building affordable homes
I view Reform supporters/voters, and to some extent, Brexiteers, as behaving like the rioters of both Tottenham and LA. That they trashed and destroyed their own neighbourhood. The basic theory being that the worse it gets, the worse we act. A self-reinforcing negative feedback loop resulting from total disenfranchisement and the will to self preserve.
As usual some very interesting comments and opinions.
The one issue that hits all communities within every corner of our countries is housing. The Govt target to build 300K/yr during this Parliament is a fantasy and unachievable for a myriad of reasons.
A quick search and data is easily found, revealing that nearly 1 million homes that could be available to rent or sell, but are not!
Source: https://www.actiononemptyhomes.org/news/empty-homes-have-risen-again-in-2024
Long term empty home: 270,000.
Exempted empty homes; 210,000.
Not yet ‘Long-term’ empties; 210,000.
Second Homes; 270,000
Holiday Lets; 90,000.
Legislating to make most of these properties available, through Emergency Legislation, would begin the journey of humility this Govt needs to go on; couple this with capping public AND private rents using the same Emergency legislation that would avoid parliamentary debate.
Prices set for all areas of the country including London, capping 2 bed properties at £400/mth, 3 at £500, 4 bed and over at £600/month. Landlords would complain…..so what!!!
The beneficiaries of these reductions would spend their extra cash in the economy, top-ups from the welfare system would be significantly reduced, families could financially de-pressurise, family units would flourish and society could briefly draw breath and re-boot.
As a Govt policy this would be radical and beautiful.
I think those rents might cause problems
We need solutions, but they need t9 be workable, and those would create mayhem.
Thanks for your response Richard. Clearly thresholds would be decided by those qualified, but the principle of capping would improve the situation for millions. Thanks.
Capping is worthwhile
Market collapse is not
All transitions have to be managed.
Until v recently, the BTL market was a hugely leveraged one ie: based on borrowed money.
You could start with enough for a deposit, get a BTL mortgage with interest allowable against tax, and rent covered by what was then called housing benefit. It was possible to make enough profit to get a deposit on another property and repeat the exercise. People became BTL property millionaires on the back of housing benefit and tax relief, while banks pocketed their share in interest payments.The profitability (and hence the BTL market, and hence the rental market, and as a spin off, the main housing market) was controlled by what happened in finance (interest rates, tax rules). Actual housing needs of real people in need of homes, was a very unimportant part of that and still is
Then tax reliefs, housing benefit rates and interest rates all went “the wrong way” (for the leveraged landlords who then wanted to sell). Some of those changes were necessary, some were BoE vandalism to the economy, some were just austerity in action, but none were part of a co-ordinated, socially responsible housing policy from a caring government using its powers for the social good.
Now we have a market in a mess, a homelessness problem, and a hands-off government relaxing planning rules and regulations, in the hope that the private sector will build more houses that ordinary people can’t afford.
Because of course government can’t interfere in the “free” market…
RobertJ: Thanks for explaining the detail superbly.
Very much appreciated.
Every word of this Richard, I feel your blazing passion. That’s it!
Thanks
Looking at the rise of Reform, it appears many voters believe a different political party adopting the same ideology will somehow yield better results. It’s like switching drivers but keeping the same faulty car.
Maybe the question we need to ask is why do people keep expecting different results from political parties that serve the same financial interests.