The Labour Party is at a crucial stage in its recovery from the election defeat, but there are some important questions members need to ask. The first concerns a car-crash of a government that we’re all having to suffer.
Nothing better illustrates the incompetence and corruption inherent in Toryism than what is laughably called its ‘strategy’ to deal with the coronavirus pandemic. In every single aspect of its policy it has failed. At no time has it been led by the ‘Science’, as Johnson claims, but always by political expediency and what is best for friendly business interests. Instead of honest information, the daily pandemic briefings were always an exercise in blagging, exaggeration and lies.
The government introduced the lockdown in late March at least two weeks too late, so as not to antagonize the Tories’ business friends. It emptied hospital intensive care wards of their elderly Covid patients and dumped them into care homes, spreading the virus among the most vulnerable. Its testing regime has never been anything like as good as it is in other countries in Europe, much less like those South Korea, Singapore or China. Even today, there is no plan for the coherent and systematic testing of key sections of the workforce or the population as whole.
Lorry-loads of money thrown at private sector
The government’s provision of PPE for key workers was criminally inadequate and this has led directly to infection and deaths among workers in the NHS, social care and other in other key sectors. Its much-vaunted ‘track and trace’ app has been a shambolic failure. Throughout the whole exercise, the main priority of the government has been the provision of contracts to the private sector, without any competitive tendering, and these by now amount to over a billion pounds. In almost every case, the outsourced services could have been provided far cheaper and more effectively by local authorities or the NHS itself. Not that it matters one jot if the services contracted out are a failure, or how poorly paid their workers might be, so long as lorry-loads of public money is thrown at the private sector.
The net result of this omnishambles is the highest Covid mortality of any G7 country, when measured against the size of the population. According to the Office of National Statistics, comparing death rates over this period of time with the average of the previous five years shows an increase of over 65,000 deaths in the UK, far higher than the level trotted out day-in and day-out by the mainstream press. That is the real cost of Tory policy.
Meanwhile, all those workers in “key” sectors of the economy feel angry and embittered at the attitude of a government, willing to give them handclaps, pats on the back, medals and even a Spitfire fly-past, but on no account are they offered a decent wage for their work. Rishi Sunak’s mini-budget is a case in point – more promises of cash hand-outs to ‘persuade’ employers (the so-called ‘job creators’) to actually create jobs, while NHS workers and other key workers have to struggle on with pitiful wages and, now, increased car parking fees. What an insult to NHS staff, for a hospital parking space to make more money an hour than an essential worker!
Three quarters want a fully public NHS
It is hardly surprising that according to polls (see here) as many as 76 per cent of the public are in favour of an end to privatisation and the reinstatement of a “fully public service” against only 15 per cent in favour of private sector involvement. There is an understandable anger among working people, and particularly those in ‘key’ sectors, that they have been neglected for too long and look like being ignored again.
The first question to Labour members, therefore, and particularly for those who supported the election of Keir Starmer as leader, is why isn’t the Labour Party 20 points ahead in the polls? That would be a question asked by the BBC and all the mainstream media if Corbyn was still leader. Why doesn’t the anger and hatred of the Tories find an outlet in support for Starmer, who is struggling to get a single point or two ahead of the worst Prime Minister this century?
Starmer’s supporters may point to his demolition of Johnson in Prime Minister’s Questions, contrasting his ‘forensic’ attacks to Johnson’s blustering and lies. All well and good. But nurses aren’t dodging away from the wards to get a glimpse of PMQs on the television. Wetherspoon’s minimum-wage, zero-hours workers aren’t rushing home to turn on the TV parliament channel to see the goings on in the House of Commons. The fact is that outside of parliament, Starmer is the Invisible Man; with no presence, with no feeling for or resonance with the anger against this government that is all around.
Labour leaders on the wrong side of history
It is not a matter of personalities. It is a matter of politics and on that score, the Labour leader is on the wrong side of history. Unfortunately, Keir Starmer cannot support the 76 per cent of the population who want a fully-public NHS, because he belongs to that wing of the party – ‘new’ New Labour – that believes in the private sector. It was under Tony Blair that so many hospitals were built with PFI scams, that the ‘internal market’ was promoted in the NHS, and important sections of the NHS were privatised.
It remains to seen whether or not Keir Starmer will endorse the radical policies outlined in the Labour manifesto of 2019 – which were and are still are popular in the party and the country at large – or whether he swims against the tide of opinion and cosies up to business interests.
But another key question that has to be asked, this time directed towards the left of the party, is how seriously are you prepared to fight to reclaim the party for radical socialist ideas? The leadership of the party has made it clear, by the make-up of the shadow cabinet and the sacking of the last remaining ‘Corbynite’ that the very popular swing of the party towards the left will be thrown into reverse. How seriously will the left defend the gains and the policies of the last five years?
This is an important question, because many members on the left of the party are dispirited by Starmer, to say the least. Some are leaving, tired and disappointed after five years of struggles and campaigns to bring the party around to a view of policy explicitly in the interests of working-class people, ‘For the Many not the Few’. Out of the 135,000 who voted for Rebecca Long-Bailey as leader and of the 90,000 who voted for Richard Burgon as deputy, only a small fraction have left, but it is still too many and it gives the right-wing the control they want in some localities and perhaps on the NEC.
Campaign Group need to…campaign
What would have stemmed the haemorrhage of members would have been the sight of a significant part of the left – even if it was still a minority, but one with some standing in the movement – launching a serious and determined campaign to win the party back. That would have been motivation enough for many ‘leavers’ to stay and fight. Unfortunately, although there have been countless online meetings with individual left MPs and trade union leaders speaking, there has no been no concerted attempt, for example by the Campaign Group of MPs, to make a declaration of intent.
The right wing had no compunction about putting their case as soon as Corbyn was elected in 2015. Within days, they were putting down motions, making speeches and declaring their intentions to undermine a leader elected by the membership. What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. A not-so-friendly chat with the Labour leader, such as took place after Long-Bailey’s sacking is nowhere near good enough. The Campaign Group of MPs should declare their intentions openly and boldly to fight to defend the manifesto of 2019 and radical policies.
Unlike with the right-wing’s attacks on Corbyn, they do not need to make a personal attack on the leader. But they should openly declare support for a rule change to re-establish Open Selection; they should organise on-line meetings in all regions of the country and be seen to be building a campaign to defend the 2019 manifesto. If the leaders of the NEU can hold a meeting of over 20,000 union members in one sitting, the Campaign Group can hold regional mass rallies of left party members to issue a call to action. What goes for the left MPs, goes also for left trade union leaders, particularly the leaders of the larger unions. They should make it clear that their union sponsorship of MPs and candidates and their support for NEC and regional executive members, will only apply where those representatives, MPs and delegates support union policy and the 2019 manifesto.
We can’t wait out the next four years
This government is a government that has forfeited any moral right to rule, but that does not mean that it cannot stagger on for another four years. Supporters of Keir Starmer have suggested that the Labour Party should be a ‘party of government’ not a party of ‘protest’ as if the two were somehow mutually exclusive. It looks, unfortunately, like the Labour leadership are going to sit contentedly waiting out the next four years because they are not a party of ‘protest’. That is a price too high to pay. If necessary, therefoe, it is to the left of the party, that we need to look for a mass campaign to dislodge Johnson from Downing Street. But the first part of such a campaign has to be opening up a front within the party itself, to defend the gains of the last five years and to win it back from those who want to push us back to a ‘pinker’ version of Tory policy.
July 8, 2020
