By John Pickard, Brentwood and Ongar CLP member
Almost as soon as the first election diary was posted we had the news that Tom Watson was standing down as deputy Labour leader. This seems to have come as a big shock to Labour’s right wing and its significance is commented on elsewhere.
Watson has said his decision is personal, but he has spent most of the last few years since his election undermining Corbyn. When the majority of the PLP passed a vote of no confidence in 2016, leading to a second leadership election, Watson was one of the party big-hitters urging Corbyn to stand down.
When Jeremy was elected with an even bigger majority than the first time, Watson ought to have had to the good grace to stand down himself, but instead used his office, financed by non-party sources, to undermine the leader. For most party members, it is good riddance and we look forward to the election a deputy leader more in keeping with the ideas and aspirations of the membership. So far, only Dawn Butler has officially declared her interest, but it is expected that Rebecca Long-Bailey and possibly Angela Raynor will also seek nomination.
Tories doctor video of Starmer interview
Meanwhile the Tories have been caught red-handed doctoring a TV interview with Keir Starmer. During the interview, Starmer was asked a question about Brexit, which he proceeded to answer at some length. The doctored video cut out the answer altogether and showed instead that Starmer appeared to be lost for words and unable to explain Labour’s position on Brexit. Even the interview, Piers Morgan, who is no friend of the Labour Party, said the editing of the film was “misleading and unfair”.
Since 2010, the total circulation of printed papers has fallen by half, which is a good thing, considering that most of these rags are owned by billionaires who support the Tory Party. However, their front pages still have some clout among older voters and in the on-line news services, two anti-Corbyn websites, the BBC and MailOnline, are still out in front, in terms of readers.
On social media, the message in this election must be to beware of stories here too. Facebook, for example, has said it is happy to carry adverts with video, even if the film (like the Tories’ Starmer interview) is doctored.
In contrast to the faked interview with a Shadow Minister, we have had real video footage of Boris Johnson flatly contradicting his Brexit minister. Johnson explained to business-types in Northern Ireland that exportation of goods to Britain from Northern Ireland would require “no form-filling” something that Steven Barclay says quite plainly that it would. Boris clearly doesn’t understand the Brexit deal he himself negotiated. Then again, like Trump, he is incapable of “doing detail”.
WhatsApp accounts play the race card
Social media in general needs to be watched very carefully this time around. The Labour Party has had a huge advantage on social media in recent years, mostly because of its much younger base of support. But the Tories and right-wing organisations are making up for their lack of support on the ground with paid adverts and professional services. According to the Guardian (November 7) “Boris Johnson’s government has hired a series of twenty-something advisers with intimate knowledge of right-wing blogs and experience of making messages go viral.”
Due to changes in Facebook’s algorithms, many right-wing and pro-Brexit groups have built up large audiences on Facebook. Government and wealthy right-wing sources overseas have used ‘bots’ (automated fake accounts, masquerading as real people) to make millions of posts on social media and despite allegedly tighter security, they will no doubt feature again in this election.
Recent anti-Labour WhatsApp messages have been blatantly playing the race card, by suggesting that the Labour is now “the mouthpiece of the Pakistani government” and suggesting that voters of Indian heritage who vote Labour “are traitors to their ancestral land, to their family and friends in India and their cultural heritage.”
Tories keep quiet about their dirty Russian money
The national press, always keen to demonstrate what a ‘security risk’ Jeremy Corbyn is, will be keeping shtum on the Tories’ financial links to Russian oligarchs, many of them great pals of Vladimir Putin. Likewise Labour renegade, John Woodcock, who urged voters to stop Corbyn getting his hands on the “levers of national security and defence.” Yet there has been an official report produced, into Russian influence in British political processes, and Johnson is suppressing it. The report, by the parliamentary intelligence and security committee, is thought to name names, including some of the wealthy donors to the Tory Party, including Lubov Chernukin, who has given nearly a million and a quarter pounds, and Alexander Temerkenko, another long-standing Tory donor. In an interview with Sky, Tory chairman of the parliamentary committee, said he had been effectively “gagged” by the government.
The Liberal-Democrats, like their pals in the Tory Party, have been caught out twice now using made-up polling data. In the first case, an election leaflet showed the Tories and Lib-Dems neck and neck on a bar chart, giving the clear impression it was an actual constituency poll, whereas the small print explained that it was a “what if…” scenario. Jo Swinson was unable to justify this in a TV interview. In the second case, a Lib-Dem election leaflet referred to a YouGov poll in his constituency, showing the Lib-Dems very favourably. In fact, the two main parties in that area are Tories and Labour and YouGov, when asked, confirmed that they had not done a poll in that constituency.
Greens embrace Lib-Dems…who support fracking
The election pact of the week is the three-way agreement between Plaid Cymru, the Green Party and the Lib-Dems, covering 60 constituents. The only common denominator between these three parties is their policy of Remain at all costs. Some of their pacts are even in seats where the Labour Party came second and is within distance of taking it. It is a pact that may help deliver Tory seats and a Johnson government.
Plaid and the Greens should be reminded that the UK was still in the EU when Swanson’s Lib-Dems were voting for the bedroom tax, to treble student fees, to cut child benefit, to cut welfare and disability payments as well as cutting taxes for the rich. In fact, every reactionary policy pursued by the Tories today was started – and enthusiastically supported – by Swinson in coalition with them. Not to mention the fact that the Lib-Dems voted for fracking and have been bank-rolled by a fracking company. This agreement finally puts paid to any claims that Plaid and the Green Party might have had to be ‘radical’ parties. It is not surprising that the ‘Green Left’ has condemned the three-way pact and called for a vote for Labour.
The Brexit Party, as many people predicted it would, has finally announced that Labour is its real enemy. Having previously announced it would stand over 600 candidates, Nigel (“ordinary millionaire-bloke”) Farage said his party will not stand candidates in the 317 seats won by the Conservatives at the 2017 general election. It will focus instead on trying to block Labour candidates. Farage is under pressure now to withdraw even from Labour seats that the Tories are targeting. It might turn out that in Labour heartlands that the Brexit Party may indeed take some votes from Labour, at least enough to divide an anti-Tory vote. We will see. We will also see if the rumours of a knighthood or a peerage for Farage are true.
Predictable procession of ex-Labour MPs
Another predictable development is the procession of former Labour MPs and ministers who are coming forward to rubbish Corbyn’s campaign, or even to urge Labour voters to vote Tory. Ian Austin, a Labour minister for about five minutes, was on the BBC Today programme, giving what was, in effect, a Tory Party political broadcast courtesy of the BBC News and Current Affairs Tory-team. David Blunkett, the former Labour Education minister – the man who gave us academies and the virtual abolition of local education authorities – chipped in.
Many of these saboteurs are still ‘officially’ members of the Party, but they clearly prefer a Boris Johnson government to having Jeremy Corbyn in Number Ten. Whatever the outcome of the election, Labour Party members will be demanding some kind of ‘reckoning’ with these people. In an atmosphere where the so-called ‘Compliance Unit’ is acting like a Spanish Inquisition, those who actively undermine the election campaign are the least deserving of keeping their party membership.
November 13th, 2019
