A rant about Labour’s electoral strategy
Keir Starmer has not yet been leader of the Labour party for a year, but frankly from where I am sitting, it does not appear to be going well. The most recent poll has Labour performing barely a point higher than its catastrophic 2019 general election result. In the detail, there are few Tory-to-Labour switchers, with most of those switching to the Labour party Lib Dem voters in the South. The price of this? Selling out on the rights of refugees, human rights, the rule of law, immigration, opposition to Great Replacement Theory, and supporting teachers’ unions in their attempt to protect their employees’ health. Once again, “grown-up politics’” Faustian bargain that if only we were prepared to be gratuitously chauvinistic towards the people we claim to represent, we could win power, appears to have failed to deliver. If this project continues to fail, no doubt the Blairite vultures will once again circle around the carcass of the party, as they did in 2015, protesting like medieval witch doctors that our ailment could be cured more effectively if only we applied their cure more vociferously, calling for a more craven capitulation to rich, white racists.
Who knows? They may turn out to be right. Starmer’s problems might indeed turn out to be due to the lingering toxicity of the Corbyn years, though it is unclear what he could do to more effectively distance himself from them. They might be due to the tendency of the public to rally around the government during a crisis, and now that the vaccine is causing coronavirus to recede in its severity, the next year will see a tide of Conservative “red wall” voters switch their allegiances. If this happens, I may have been proven wrong in my scepticism of third way triangulation. In this case, I think there is a genuine question about whether the strategy is worth it. How often am I prepared to stand back while the government says and does racist things about Syrians fleeing war and oppression if it means we can win power and give essential workers a pay rise? It’s not clear that the answer to this question is “never”. Politics is compromise, and many leftists made exactly this difficult call in 2019 when they traipsed to the polls to support a party they believed was institutionally anti-Semitic but which might protect the NHS from being wholesale auctioned to the US insurance industry. (By the way, the Labour party is still institutionally anti-Semitic. If you think you can deal with such a problem only by removing the leader, you don’t understand institutional racism.) It is worth saying too that Starmer is somewhat economically to the left of Miliband and Brown. Opposition to outsourcing and austerity is welcome. To be clear, I would probably hold my nose and vote Labour in a general election. I am not (yet) going to argue that there is no difference between them and the Tories.
I don’t think I am wrong though (who does?). What I want to argue here is that Labour’s whole electoral strategy is flawed. Pure triangulation, in this instance, will not work. Instead, I want to argue that there is a viable route to power which, coincidentally, does not involve quite as much selling out of liberal-left principles.
How did we get here?
Any reasonable diagnosis of the Labour party’s woes has to begin with the stylized fact that social democracy is in crisis more or less across the world, and especially in Europe. This is a stylized phenomenon which has been exacerbated post-GFC. There is a reason for this: social democracy emerged as a majority (or near-majority) position in Europe because there was a strong coalition of voters who could coalesce around expansion of the welfare state. The industrial working class had a strong material interest in state benefits which could cushion the shocks of the labour market; the expanding middle class had a strong material interest in protecting and expanding the employment of managers of that welfare state. This was a positive sum game which saw rising living standards and enhanced employment protection for a large voter base.
After the “golden age” of welfare state expansion, social democracy still had some relevance as it had something interesting to say about how cuts in the welfare state should be apportioned. Social democrats championed active labour market policy and full employment as means of handling the dual crises of slowing growth and ageing populations which afflicted welfare states. The GFC put an end to this, though. If, as social democrats are, one is committed to operating within the framework of free capital flows and their enforcers, the IMF, EU and US, then the last ten years have relegated governments to administrators of the post-GFC settlement: the sugar high of QE to keep asset owners happy, while a squeeze on public sector resources underpins slow wage growth and stagnating living standards for most others.
This is not necessarily a criticism of social democratic policy. Making the decision to break with the international order, risking economic terrorism in response, is a potentially unreasonable risk. Given this, it is simply not credible to claim that this does not throw a bleak backdrop to any political project, and that there are not “tough decisions” as a result. However, Social democrats administer welfare state retrenchment more fairly and humanely. They can shift the burden to higher earners; they can raise limited taxes on wealth and capital. I have no doubt that a Corbyn-led Labour government would have been better for most working-class people than our current government. What it means, crucially, is that social democracy is a hard sell these days.
Further, this context further weakens the case for social democracy through economic and social change. Firstly, the stagnation of living standards takes the form of a morphing of the labour market into one which is less amenable to traditional social democracy. The erosion of the public sector mechanically reduces the number of public sector workers (who have a material interest in social democracy) and the increase in precarious work and self-employed workers who are not unionised and fall outside the traditional purview of the welfare state. Again, without radical redesign of the welfare state, this weakens the material interest that they have in traditional social democracy. Secondly, in an environment of growing wealth inequality and an increasingly zero-sum world, the cultural right sees an opportunity to inject its poison into the political bloodstream, a move which moves social democrats onto less favourable political terrain.
This weakness is compounded in the UK by two factors. Firstly, in a first-past-the-post electoral system, the divergent material interests of older and younger generations which result from growing wealth inequality express themselves in an electoral geography which is highly adverse for social democrats. Younger, working people amass in cities, where the Labour party piles up useless votes, while more numerous rural constituencies are disproportionately made up of homeowners or otherwise asset-rich voters. It is not at all helpful that these tend to be socially conservative as well. Secondly, old questions about the constitutional settlement of the United Kingdom are beginning to reassert themselves, with a growing independence movement in Wales, and a totally dominant independence movement in Scotland. This issue splits Labour’s coalition down the middle, making it difficult to take any substantive position without alienating some of its voters.
In short, trying to patch together the traditional social democrat coalition is simply not going to work. The various versions of this which involve soft-peddling social liberalism in the hope that half of Labour’s coalition will forgive this and the other half will forget about it are similarly doomed, because, as I will now argue, they fundamentally mis-diagnose the problem.
The route to power does not run through the “red wall”
Red wall seats are disproportionately old mining towns. They have voted Labour for years. They are historically working class and on average lower income than most of the country. The fact that they tended to lead towards Brexit is therefore evidence of a fracturing of the working-class coalition in support of Labour. This was demonstrated in 2019 when many of them voted Conservative for the first time in decades. It represents a sharp division in Labour’s electoral coalition. In order to win them back, Labour must triangulate on the cultural issues that have alienated these voters.
So goes the narrative of the Starmer leadership. The problem is that it is based on an ecological fallacy, inference about individuals from groups that those individuals belong to. Working class people within Red Wall seats vote Labour. Working class people voted remain. Within Red Wall seats, homeowners and asset owners voted Brexit, and voted for the Conservatives in 2019. These people might have previously voted Labour, but they are not by any reasonable measure working class. The problem is that the electoral geography described above works against Labour in these seats. This is why they have steadily slipped away from the party over two decades, as young working class people have left to work in cities, leaving their parents to bask in the exponentially rising value of their houses.
It is my claim that Labour cannot win the red wall back to any significant extent. On a good electoral night, some of them might swing back, but the days of weighing Labour votes in Bolsover are gone. The material interests of Red Wall voters simply cut against it. They need the value of their assets (mostly house prices) to keep going up. Any half-serious attempt to reduce wealth inequality is a threat to this.
More specifically, there are three types of Tory voter in the red wall. Firstly, there are working class Tories. There always have been; there always will be. Some people just disagree with the left about the way to make their lives better. Many of them are also more socially conservative. Some of them are persuadable, and that is hard, hard work. It must be done. However, my case is that there are not especially many of them in red wall seats. I repeat, most people in working class jobs in the Red Wall voted Labour. Secondly, there are older retirees or near retirees who are desperately worried about Brexit, really uncomfortable about the rising tide of racism in the UK, but you see, Labour are just too much of a threat to “the economy”. This is a euphemism. Nobody who has watched the Conservatives preside over the slowest recovery from recession in recorded history and amongst the worst economic impact in the world from the coronavirus pandemic really votes Conservative because they care about the economy. (Okay, some people do, but if they have not been persuaded yet, I don’t see how they can be.) No, this is a euphemism for asset prices. Time after time, when offered the chance to risk their material wellbeing in the service of a more equal, less racist, less poor society, their courage fails them. It does not appear to me that any Labour programme worth electing can help these people to take that leap. Furthermore, triangulating on social issues will not help them. I fear they are lost. Thirdly, there are those who are materially well off, and in addition experience cultural insecurity. Somewhere in their bones, they just feel that it is right that those who have been here many generations should come before those whose parents, or grandparents, came to this country as refugees or economic migrants. There is a name for this: white supremacy. Some will say this is name-calling. I can only say in my defence that it is accurate. Look, some of my best friends are white supremacists. I just don’t ever expect to be able to win them over to a political programme I support. Aping the Tories on social issues will not cut it, because the original is better than the cover. And as I have said, many of these people have no material interest in voting Labour.
The solution: a hegemonic electoral pact
So far, so pessimistic. The fact remains, though, that there is a solid, unmovable, anti-Tory majority in the UK. The Conservatives have not won over 50% of the vote since the 1960s. Looking at the smaller parties of the UK, with the possible exception of the Liberal Democrats (which I would guess break slightly for Labour) most of their voters’ preferences would be for the Labour party over the Conservatives. In a proportional electoral system, the Conservatives would rarely have been in power.
The obvious solution is a formal electoral pact, for one election only, as a steppingstone to the implementation of a proportional electoral system. Labour should propose a generous agreement to the Lib Dems, Greens, SNP, and Plaid, which would involve all parties standing down candidates where there is a sitting MP of one party, and otherwise standing down candidates based on whoever achieved the highest share of the vote in the 2019 general election. They should propose it now, in order to give all parties the time to plan a well-resourced 2024 election campaign. In return, all parties would be able to run on their own platforms, outside the following areas:
- Electoral reform: a single transferable vote system to be brought in immediately for all future parliamentary elections. The coalition would be able to argue that they have a mandate for this without a referendum if they secure over 50% of the popular vote. Should the Lib Dems accept, this will be the main attraction to them. Should they reject, it should be very easy to then peel off tactical Lib Dem voters with this promise.
- Devo-max for Scotland, with powers over substantively all domestic policy and a veto on defence and trade policy given to the Scottish parliament, and a second independence referendum for Scotland. The SNP would find it difficult to explain turning this down to their electorate. People will argue that the Tories will then use a fear of Scottish independence as a wedge issue. The problem is, they do that anyway.
- A similar generous constitutional settlement for Wales.
- Immediate emergency relief for hungry children and a wage rise for essential workers.
- A comprehensive Green New Deal (one would hope this would be difficult for the Green party to reject).
Some explanation for the last two points is necessary. These are concessions to the necessity of these policies. I do not believe that most Lib Dem or SNP voters are particularly bothered about poverty alleviation or climate change, but these policies must be implemented as a matter of urgency. The planet is on fire, and a generation of children are starving. Our nurses and teachers are burning out. Furthermore, Labour needs to get internal buy-in for this pact, too.
In terms of other policy, Labour must scale back its radicalism in order to keep this coalition intact. This means, sadly, that broadband communism and the four-day working week will have to wait until the second term of a Labour government. Two policies I believe Labour must maintain are its support for the abolition of tuition fees and due process for migrants and asylum seekers. This is because it will still need its army of motivated, creative volunteers to win the ground war in any election. They disproportionately value education and racial equality, and they will fight for it. Labour must give them (us) this opportunity.
Finally, I believe Labour should adopt a policy of devolution of immigration policy to the regions. This is left-field and controversial, so let me explain. Central government would still set the broad envelope of immigration policy, something which would look like a heavily watered down version of the government’s points-based system, but individual regions would have leeway to decide which skills should attract which points for visas offered for jobs in that region, and some control of numbers. This is a good idea for four reasons. Firstly, there is value in democratic control over immigration. Until we live in a world without borders, immigration is a policy, and it is a policy which certain parts of the country will want to use to shape their society differently to others. The principle of subsidiarity dictates that it is good that they have this opportunity. Some regions will pursue more conservative immigration policy than I would pick. That is their right, and it is the responsibility of liberal-minded people in those regions to have that fight, and potentially lose the argument. Secondly, I believe that this will lead to more liberal immigration policy in the UK as a whole than if policy is centralised. The alternative is that inevitably, Labour will shy away from making any changes to the Conservatives' dumb points-based system, which will leave us having to deal with the economics and social ramifications of less immigration. This would allow Labour in the South East, Scotland, Wales and potentially the North West to push for liberalisation of immigration at a local level. Thirdly, this allows Labour to outflank the Conservatives on Brexit in a progressive direction. I have said above that I think Labour cannot win back the Red Wall. However, there are now many marginal Labour-held seats in the red wall that the Conservatives will be greedily eying. Offering them control over immigration that the Conservatives will not be able to match because of their fear of its implications for immigration elsewhere in the UK might just stymie this. Finally, local Blue Labour politicians in red wall areas will be able to use this opportunity to show us out-of-touch lefties how electorally popular racism with a red rosette is with former Labour voters. I think they will fall flat on their faces; and if they do, it will be quite funny.
Conclusion
I think this can work. At least, I think it has a better chance of working than Starmer’s strategy. The implications of it for the future of the UK are profound, and worth thinking about. These would leave the UK with a federal constitution and proportional representation in parliament. In my opinion, these are no bad things, but there are important knock-on effects to consider. For example, it is unlikely that such a constitutional disturbance would not also affect Northern Ireland. Labour must be ready, in a second term, to make a similar bold offer to the people of Northern Ireland, and be prepared to facilitate a peaceful reunification of the Island of Ireland if it is rejected. The party in my view is uniquely placed to help roadmap a future for the Ulster counties, combining as it does strong republican and unionist traditions. This would no doubt be painful, but it is also only a hastening of a process which is already in motion, and if nothing changes, likely to be ham-fistedly overseen by incompetents and zealots.
Secondly, I suspect this uneasy coalition would not last long, and after implementation of its core programme in the first one or two years, Labour would dissolve parliament and the UK would have its first election under PR. Scotland and Wales, at this point possibly independent, possibly de facto separate states, would have their first meaningful policy debates in decades, with the national question finally resolved. Such an election would be the first chapter in an exciting new future for progressive politics in the nations that currently constitute the UK. Freed from its centralisation, and its retrograde electoral geography, the progressive majority would be free to express itself, and to shape policy. Wales and Scotland would become crucibles for the testing of enlightened approaches to social policy. Under a proportional system, the Labour party would be free to splinter, and its left flank, brimming with policy ideas, would be free to argue for these, safe in the knowledge that it is not imperilling the success of progressive politics by upsetting moderates.
All this is possible. We just have to take it.