I suppose I ought to write something about the upcoming general election…
I’ve been avoiding it really; avoiding thinking about it, avoiding talking about it, basically I’m trying to pretend it isn’t happening. Because it looks like this election is going to be an absolute disaster for the Labour party, and with the Conservatives set to romp to victory I’m feeling a bit glum about the next five years. Here’s why:
Local elections are just the beginning
Yes, I know that we should exercise caution when looking at local election data and using it to predict generals, but precedent tells us that when an opposition performs badly at a local election and when there’s a general in close succession, they usually get pummelled. So there should be no optimism here. Frankly, John McDonnell doing the post-election media round calling last week’s result a “solid base” to build from is both laughable and infuriating. A loss of seven councils and 380+ councillors is not a solid base, it’s a bloody nightmare.
The Tories now have almost 2,000 council seats and they took control of almost 30 councils, as well as being elected as new metro mayors in the West Midlands and Tees Valley. That means that when important decisions need to be taken at the local level, about our schools and hospitals, about bin collections, public spaces or care in the community, it won’t be the Labour party deciding what to do, and that means a worse deal for local people.
Brexit is going to bite
We all know why Theresa May called this election – to seize control of Westminster. But of course that’s not what the PM has been saying. She called this election, she says, to strengthen her negotiating hand ahead of the summer’s Brexit negotiations. I’ve no doubt that the general election will do just that, but the thing is I’m not sure that’s a good result for anyone.
The PM has repeatedly said that “no deal is better than a bad deal” and armed with a huge mandate from the electorate, and a Tory majority in Westminster there is every chance that she’ll walk away from the negotiations with absolutely nothing, and the rest of us will be stuck with it. This election is going to give her Ministers license to deliver a hard Brexit, one that is not in the best interests of this country. A Tory majority in June will only make David Davis, Liam Fox and Boris Johnson stronger; it will provide them with the public stamp of approval that they’ve been seeking and off they’ll go swinging their wrecking balls with our country’s permission.
Of course here is where I would like to say “if you want to see a sensible, measured approach to negotiations, where collaboration and friendship are priorities, then vote for Labour.” And yet, our party has let us down. Labour are so busy trying to talk about anything but Brexit that they’ve managed to position themselves as the only party irrelevant on this issue. The Lib Dems and the SNP are beside themselves trying to position their parties as the “real” opposition to a hard Brexit, and you might well believe them. Their parties have established positions, which no doubt will be reflected in their manifestos. I’m not saying I agree with them, but at least they’re articulating them to voters. At the moment you might vote for Labour because you trust them on the health service or you want to see the minimum wage rise to £10 an hour, but it’s very unlikely you’d vote for them solely because of their position on Europe and at this election, that is going to render us irrelevant in lots of households.
A shift to the right
We’ve already seen it; where UKIP has fallen, the Conservatives have stepped right in. That pressure to capture UKIP voters, and to satisfy the Brexiteers within her own party, has increasingly seen Mrs May shift her party to the right. Gone are the liberal social leanings of David Cameron, instead we’ve got the Tories fixated on immigration. We’ve got a Prime Minister accusing the EU of attempting to influence our election, we’ve got an education secretary set to bring back grammar schools, we’ve got further austerity cuts, no doubt we’ll see further cut backs to welfare spending for the young, disabled or less able to work. The next five years won’t just be more of the same, they’ll be worse. When Philip Hammond tried to raise NI contributions earlier this year, the Tory slimline majority meant that he’d rowed back in the space of hours. With a majority of 50+, there will be no rowing back for this Government. It’ll be full steam ahead, and they won’t care who they trample over.
The wilderness years, again
When Tony Blair first entered Number 10 in 1997, Labour had been in opposition for 18 years. Not only was it in opposition, it was pretty much rendered obsolete for much of that, and it was only after a complete overhaul of the party and the stewardship of strong leadership that the party was able to return to power. And yet, 20 years later we are about to enter the wilderness again.
The election of Jeremy Corbyn as leader of the Labour party was an absolute disaster. Since he took the reins, membership may have gone up, but vote share has gone down – dramatically. Labour’s poll ratings are the worst they’ve been in decades. When asked who would make a better PM – May, Corbyn or ‘don’t know’ – Corbyn came third. The general electorate do not see him as PM material. Ultimately that was considered to be one of the many failings of Ed Miliband’s leadership – people looked at him and just didn’t think he’d make a good PM. And yet now they’re presented with a man who has a history of failing to back his own party, who does not believe in Labour principles such as strong European collaboration through the EU, or the need for a strong defence, or the notion that we’re an internationalist party that seeks to promote and protect ideals around the world. Corbyn is a weak leader and at this juncture in our history, when the British public is told time and time again that we need strong leadership, people are going to go out and vote for the person they think the strongest – Theresa May.
If Labour get a kicking at this election, Corbyn must stand down. He has to go. And yet we’re hearing that he has no intention of going. In fact, depending on how many MPs lose their seats, and who they are, there’s every chance that paradoxically Corbyn’s strength within the PLP will grow. But what sort of a leader clings on to power when he’s overseen such a mess? I believe that if you’re leader of the Labour party you have a duty not just to MPs, not just to members, but to the general public to provide them with a voice of opposition, an alternative. Corbyn does nothing of the sort. If he stays on, we will become a party of total insignificance. We might grow our membership, we might win in seats like Islington North, but the people in the NE, in Wales, in Scotland, they’ll all be without an effective voice for their needs, and it will be the end of us as an electoral force.
Politics on the side 