By Steve McKenzie, Erith and Thamesmead CLP member
It was absolutely clear to see, that the mainstream media campaign of outright lies and smears against Jeremy Corbyn, and the beginning of a socialist movement his leadership represented, reached a level of duplicity and distortion unrivalled in living memory. He was depicted as an IRA sympathiser, a Czech spy a threat to national security and so on and so forth.
One of the most ridiculous insinuations was that he was an anti-Semite and that the Labour party had become institutionally anti-Semitic since he was elected as the leader. This grotesque exaggeration of any genuine problem, relating to anti-Semitism in the Labour Party, was compounded by the ludicrous response of appeasement and apology adopted by Jeremy and those around him. Instead of confronting the problem straight away, and exposing it for what it was, new procedures were put in place and apologies were repeatedly made.
This gave the impression that there was a more serious problem that had to be dealt with. It gave confidence to those pursuing bogus allegations and their smear campaign started to take hold. To suggest that Jeremy Corbyn is in any way anti-Semitic is outrageous. To claim that the Labour party itself is institutionally anti-Semitic is fantasy almost beyond belief. Never, in recent times, has the name and reputation of such a decent man been so besmirched and vilified as that of Jeremy Corbyn. All genuine Labour leaders and prominent left wingers come in for the same sort of treatment, but none quite so intensely as Jeremy.
How could it be any other way with the billionaires printed press and their television channels. It is no better at the BBC, which has become little more than a state propaganda machine for the establishment. Corbyn, and the beginning of a socialist movement, posed a threat to the status quo and the very system that creates the inequality that their power, privilege and wealth rests on.
Brexit the biggest single issue
When examining the election defeat and the downfall of Jeremy Corbyn, we have to face facts. Brexit was without doubt, the biggest single issue that determined the outcome of the election. Fifty two of the fifty four seats lost in England were in leave-voting constituencies.
The Tories only increased their overall vote by one per cent, or around three hundred thousand votes. Labour lost around 2.7 million votes. The only real difference from our 2017 position was that of Brexit. Instead of saying that we were going to honour the outcome of the 2016 referendum, we had moved to a second referendum position.
The move in position came in stages. Initially, the position was that a Labour government was going to negotiate a leave deal with the EU, and that was going to be put to a vote.
Then the position was that an option to remain was going to be put on the ballot paper. The likes of Sir Keir Starmer, Emily Thornberry and even John McDonnell announced that they were going to campaign for remain and this contempt for the electorate was resoundingly answered at the ballot box. The People’s Vote/Second Referendum Campaign was never going to achieve its main objective. However, it brought about Labour’s defeat in the general election and the downfall of Jeremy Corbyn.
One-side civil war in the party
While the position on Brexit was clearly the main reason, it wasn’t the only one that led to the election defeat and the downfall of Corbyn. As already stated, the vilification and smearing of Jeremy by the establishment and the media was unparalleled in recent times. It clearly had an effect. However adding weight to this was the smear campaign against Corbyn and everything he stood for that was conducted from within the Labour movement. It lasted for over four years and was conducted from day one of his leadership until his downfall.
The campaign to undermine him and everything that he represented and stood for took the form of a one-sided civil war. The instigators and perpetrators were a majority of the Parliamentary Labour Party, a very significant number of full time officials employed by and paid by the Labour party, and unelected and barely-elected right wing trade union bureaucrats. They consistently attacked the man who was twice overwhelmingly elected by the membership. They constantly briefed and colluded with the right wing media, leaking information that was subsequently used to besmirch Corbyn and the left wing leadership.
They manufactured one of the most treacherous but inept coups in British political history.
Anti-Semitism smear campaign
The favourite weapon of choice for those waging the one-sided civil war increasingly became the anti-Semitism smear. It was used to devastating effect. It conflates legitimate opposition to the apartheid Israeli state’s treatment of the Palestinian people with anti-Semitism. The generalised and grotesque exaggeration of any anti-Semitism problem in the Labour party was supplemented with false allegations and accusations against individuals.
The problem was, that instead of confronting these disingenuous smears from the start, Jeremy and those around him adopted a disastrous approach of appeasement and apology.
Naively attempting to placate the right in a vain pursuit of ‘unity’, the soft left played into the hands of those who were ruthlessly trying to undermine and topple Corbyn. Instead of trying to expose the bogus nature of the anti-Semitism smear campaign, new procedures were adopted and repeated apologies were made. Decent people were being suspended and expelled following spurious allegations.
This whole approach facilitated the impression that there really was a serious problem of anti-Semitism in the Labour party and that this problem had proliferated since Jeremy Corbyn was elected as the leader in 2015. To suggest that Jeremy Corbyn is an anti-Semite is beyond belief. In November, a letter to Jeremy Corbyn from a Director of the UK Rabbinical Executive Board, on behalf of the United European Jews organisation (UEJ) completely exonerated Corbyn of anti-Semitism saying that the UEJ “reject and condemn in no uncertain terms” the recent comments in the media claiming that the “majority of British Jews are gripped by anxiety” at the prospect of a Labour government. Even Israeli commentators in the Israeli media have criticised the smear campaign against Jeremy. But none of these favourable comments made it anywhere near the national press or the BBC.
To suggest that the Labour party is institutionally anti-Semitic, therefore, is a complete fabrication. I have been a member of the Labour party for nearly forty years and have never once witnessed an incident of anti-Semitism. I know friends and comrades who have been party members even longer who have never witnessed an anti-Semitic incident in the Labour party.
The figures produced by the General Secretary Jennie Formby last year, revealed that those individuals found guilty of anti-Semitic incidents by the party amounted to 0.08 per cent of the membership – hardly a widespread, institutional problem.
Weakness of apologies and appeasement
Just as our position on Brexit had portrayed Jeremy as weak and indecisive and the party as duplicitous and anti democratic, the constant appeasement and apology in the face of the anti-Semitism smear campaign had exactly the same effect. Constantly apologising in the face of clearly fabricated allegations, throwing anti-racist campaigners under a bus when false allegations were made against them, all gave the impression that there was something to apologise about. Always backing down in the face of ridiculous allegations that would not stand up to the most superficial examination is strategy a recipe for disaster.
As a result of this pitiful response, ever more outrageous fabrications and exaggerations were made. The consequence was that the most effective anti-racist campaigner the Labour party has ever had as leader was smeared as an anti-Semite. The Labour party was smeared as being, ‘an existential threat to Jews in Britain’. The instigators and perpetrators of the anti-Semitism smear campaign certainly played a part in ensuring that the Labour party was defeated at the general election and that the leadership of Jeremy Corbyn was brought to an end.
Another fundamental reason contributing to the election defeat and the downfall of Jeremy Corbyn was the very real failure to democratise the Labour party. Many unaccountable members of the Parliamentary Labour Party, most of who think that they have a job for life, were allowed to get away with the most atrocious behaviour for over four years. That behaviour was a major factor in dragging Jeremy’s name through the mud, portraying the Labour party as split and without doubt, it contributed to the election defeat.
The constant briefings against Corbyn to the Tory press. The attempted coup against Corbyn in 2016, when 172 members of the Parliamentary Labour Party registered a vote of no confidence in the elected leader. There was collusion in, and collaboration in the conducting of the anti-Semitism smear, one of the most vindictive incidents being when the Barking MP, Dame Margaret Hodge was alleged of accusing Jeremy Corbyn of being “a fucking anti-Semite”. In all of these things, right wing Labour MPs were allowed to get away unchallenged, primarily because they were a law unto themselves and not accountable to the membership. It therefore almost beggars belief that at the 2018 Labour Party conference, the soft left ie those around Corbyn and even allegedly Jeremy himself, organised to have open selection manipulated off of the agenda. Instead of open selection, which would have automatically made MPs accountable to the members, the party was lumbered with a new ‘improved’ trigger-ballot system.
The fight for Open Selection
Whilst in theory it was a great improvement, the fact that the NEC delayed its implementation by almost a year, and the almost total incapacity of the left to utilize the new system, meant that the selection process was kept under the control of those who were really running the party. This in turn meant that existing MPs automatically stood as Labour candidates in their constituencies. There were only a few attempts to use the new trigger ballot system to dislodge sitting MPs but they were unsuccessful.
In constituencies where MPs had stood down, the wheelers and dealers at a national level attempted to foist the favoured sons and daughters of the bureaucracy onto the members. In one or two areas their machinations backfired, but on the whole the members were not selecting the candidates of their choice. This had a demoralising and debilitating effect. It also left those MPs who had spent the last four years attacking the party still in position.
To ensure that socialism survives this setback and begins the long road back, it is vital that the lessons of this election defeat are learned. This requires a scrupulously honest approach when examining the reasons for it. There will be no effective steps, let alone practical organisational tasks undertaken to rebuild the movement on a sounder footing if this is not done.
It is crystal clear that the billionaire-controlled media and the BBC will always attack socialism and those that represent it. The more genuine and effective leaders are perceived to be, the more hysterical and rabid the propaganda against them will be. The ludicrous argument that therefore the Labour party should drop its radical policies and elect a ‘moderate’ leader, to appease the billionaire-owned media, in the hope of better press coverage is nonsense.
An New Labour mark II, when the centre ground in politics has collapsed, is a recipe for disaster. Look at who is who and who has done what before casting your vote in the leadership and deputy leadership elections. Those seeking to return to the days of austerity-lite and centralised control of the Labour Party, i.e those who helped to bring down Corbyn cannot be allowed to take back control and lead us to oblivion.
February 3, 2020
