The weekend's far-right march in London appears to have been pivotal in waking opinion on the danger the far right poses in the UK, and the reality of what they are doing.
Let me offer this quotation first of all from Stephen Bush in the FT:
So please, let's have none of this Temu Marxist talk about how Saturday's 110,000-strong march was “really” about economic anxiety. I know the price of a pint in the various pubs around King's Cross and Euston that were thronged with protesters on their way home, and no one necking that many of them is experiencing economic distress. Elon Musk, who urged the marchers to turn to pre-emptive ethnic violence, is certainly not suffering from economic anxiety.
Racism in the UK remains the preserve of an extreme minority — but one that is emboldened and growing louder. What we are seeing is not about having a bad economy. It is the result of a year in which neither the government nor the opposition have been willing to draw red lines, to argue against the conflation of whiteness with Britishness or to condemn people who suggest either that violence is an appropriate way to resolve political disputes or an inevitable fact of rising ethnic diversity.
And note that he, as a black journalist, concluded:
Both [Labour and Conservative] leaders need to learn from the past: racism does not diminish through rising GDP but through the willingness of politicians to argue against it.
They also need to learn to identify their own self-interest. It should be obvious that a march whose organising principle is that the mere existence of Badenoch is a crisis and that Starmer needs to be overthrown can't be beaten by either politician equivocating on whether they are wrong or not. Both need to actually make an argument, too.
I admire his courage. I agree with his analysis. I am not arguing that people aren't aggrieved, but I am saying that Farage, Reform, the Tories and Saturday were and are all about racism, and pretty much racism alone, because they never talk about anything else.
Labour seems to have noticed. This was the Guardian's headlines last night:
Khan, Sweeting, and Starmer are all saying we are fighting racism and a far-right threat to freedom. They are right on this,
I trust Sadiq Khan on this.
I think Wes Streeting gets the threat to homosexuals and others.
But Keir Starmer, does he really get it? Who knows? However, it seems he has been shaken into a changed narrative, and changed narratives are what we need.
That fact is that unless we call out racism, we cannot beat it. I have been saying so for what seems like a long time. Of course, I have not been alone, but it has felt like a lonely place.
I am hoping Labour means it is changing its narrative. It is essential that it does so.
But let's be clear, it also has to deliver a politics of care, and that means narratives are not enough. Starmer should also be fighting for what will really change hearts and minds, and that is taking away the fear people have:
- Of not having a job
- Of not having security
- Of not having a home
- Of not having healthcare, education and a pension
- Of not having a future.
Those are the issues that matter. Tackle them and we will have a country that will live at ease with itself, which is what everyone should want. Those are the conditions for freedom from fear, for everyone, but right now Labour's fiscal rules deny any such possibility.
Acknowledging racism is one thing. Delivering freedom from fear is necessary as well. We need a new economics and a new economic narrative to do that, hence the quantum series.
Taking further action
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Sadly racism is on the rise, especially in the poorer parts of the UK outside the Westminster bubble. Kier Starmer most definitely doesn’t get it. He lives in a total bubble and has no idea what life is like for the average Brit. He is also tone deaf. The Labour party has a long history of not treating it’s own people of colour well. The treatment of Dianne Abbott continues to show us this and it is clear they are far less bothered by Islamaphobia than appearing anti Semitic.
As someone who grew up in London and always had non white friends, I am saddened to see what we are becoming. Both major parties are feeding racial hatred through their focus on stopping the boats,and other than Zack Polanski I’ve not seen much defending of the benefits of immigration and exposing of the lies around it. The current racist rhetoric is scapegoating and deflection and needs to be exposed for what it is. Those arriving on small boats are not bankrupting our country any more than too many public libraries caused the 2008 financial crash.
Much to agree with
Interesting take! It’s so true that just acknowledging racism isn’t enough. We need real action to make people feel secure and change things at the root. Hope Labour is really listening!
Its clear that the far right is threatening people both creating an atmosphere of threat and actual threats and disorder, for example against anyone trying to remove their flags.
So pray why are they not getting the same treatment as those who allegedly support Palestine Action?
Why isnt Musk & other US Right Wingers banned from the UK?
Agreed. To me the prime example of this pernicious racism could be seen in Elon Musk’s sinister address to the Tommy Robinson fans on Saturday. He cannot argue that he is economically challenged. Yet the crowd lapped it up. The same is true of Farage – a public boarding school educated former City trader who is not short of a bob or two. They are whipping up the mob for no other reason than pure racism. As I posted yesterday, Jimmy the Giant’s latest You Tube video on the lies surrounding immigration that are repeatedly told by the right, is a good place to start challenging their vile narrative.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BS_7kJtUJJE
I fear that we are seeing “reactive” rather than “conviction” politics from Labour, on the issue of racism.
It is Reform’s polling that upsets them more than Reform’s racism (except perhaps in Sadiq Khan’s case).
If Labour really cared about racism (and misogyny, and Islamophobia), they would treat their BME/Muslim/female MPs more like human beings and political colleagues, instead of like something the cat brought in, and they wouldn’t have been tacking to the right ever since the leadership coup.
Starmer appointed Epstein buddy Mandelson as US Ambassador, but he can’t bring himself to speak to Apsana Begum MP.
Starmer is good at sacking people – perhaps he could sack some of his racist right-wing-favouring advisors and announce policy changes that differentiate him from the Tories and Reform?
I will wait and see what actions follow the words. It will take a lot of actions to convince me that “island of strangers” politics has really been abandoned by the Labour Party.
I am afraid, much to agree with. Who did their empathy bypasses?
However, I think Stephen Bush evidences a fundamental confusion common in the political centre. The hundred thousand willing to go out and march with Robinson in London – many actually traveling from other countries to do so – of course are in the main hard-core racists, and their agenda is indeed not “really” about economic anxiety. But they are not the same s the millions that are flirting with Reform, or casually saying they are to opinion pollsters. For most of these, it “really” is more about economic anxiety. They know the status-quo is not working for them – and they know now Labour (which they still think is the left) is not going to change it. Where to turn ?
During the brexit referendum campaign, a friend of mine was sitting near a family in a local pub, and overheard this exchange:
“I really don’t know which way to vote, Dad.”
“Well, things are pretty bad. Vote for the change option.”
I get that paradox, and make it clear that I do, I hope.
But it needs to be said: those worried, decent people need to be out off by the racists.
And that is the reason for pointing out that those organising this are racist.
I would take issue with Bush’s dismissal of ‘economic distress’ on the grounds of some of the marchers necking multiple pints after the march. They themselves might well not be suffering from economic distress, but the list you give of people’s fears are surely based on their feelings of economic distress and contribute to them being stirred up by narrative that says the country is full, we can’t take any more people and that ‘illegal’ immigrants are getting preferential access to public services (which I know is incorrect, but it’s potent) which ‘natives’ can’t access easily.
I think that If their needs were being seen to be satisfied by this dreadful government there wouldn’t be such a rich pool of economically distressed people to be stirred up by Farage et al.
We need to recognise a duality here. Of course many people’s fears are real, and justified. But so too is the racism real, and utterly unjustified. We need to hold both ideas, simultaneously.
Some very victorian (?) schools of thought, suggest that workers will start soldiering If they are not afraid.
Subscription (and/or debt) economy tries to keep the hamsters spinning their wheel.
We are in an insecurity driven economy/society and fear generates -phobias, on the other hand DEI, solidarity etc is being commodified.
What are you concluding?
How typical of the FT to use a black voice to foment dissent in the opposition and distract us from looking too closely at their economic agenda. They’d clearly love us to fight about what’s more important — racism or the economy — than unite over both issues. Next they’ll publish an op-ed telling us the real racism is against whites.
One wonders if the right wing ever gets tired of using the same formula over and over again.
As for Labour, my optimism there is close to nonexistent, but your dogged persistence on the substantive issues is appreciated.
I have to say you’re wrong in this.
The FT does not tell its columnists what to write and I very much dount Stephen Bush is wrong.
And I also very much doubt the paper is racist. It has, for example, been good on Gaza, overall.
Agreed.
Stephen Bush is a staff writer on the FT, not a journalist chosen out of the blue, and he was previously a much admired staff writer on the Left weekly, The New Statesman.