Cock Up and Conspiracy

There are few things that can be described as coincidence in politics, and especially in the Labour Party. A bit more than a week has passed since Jess Barnard, the chair of Young Labour received a notice of investigation. A haphazard and pathetic effort sent at one in the morning, this implied solidarity against transphobia is something that has no place in Keir Starmer's Labour Party. If one was feeling generous it could be put down to a "tired and confused" staffer gone rogue and in no way reflects on the professional and neutral complaints process the current leadership have pledged to set up.

Except it's happened again. Kate Osborne, Labour MP for Jarrow has written about the notice of investigation she received on Friday morning. Told that she should not show it to anyone but could give the Samaritans a bell if she found it distressing, she obtained legal advice and by tea time the notice had been rescinded. She didn't say what the warning found so objectionable, but according to Aaron Bastani it was a tweet from June 2020 where she expressed her solidarity with Rebecca Long-Bailey. You might recall RLB was forced to resign as shadow education secretary for tweeting an interview with Maxine Peake published in The Independent.

Kate wonders aloud about the members targeted in a similar way who aren't as prominent as her and don't have legal advice to draw on. The dragnet, it seems, is being cast wide. Sienna Rodgers reports how one such letter was wrongly sent to an address where she lives. And meanwhile Heather Mendick, a Jewish party member and supporter of Jewish Voice for Labour, is being forced to answer a series of substantial charges without leave to properly prepare. Amateur hour meets abuse of process, a fitting summation of Starmerist managerialism.

What are we to make of this shambles? This is the week, in case anyone need reminding, where Labour should be capitalising on the Tory tax hike and knocking lumps out of Boris Johnson's plan for mass Covid infections. Instead, there's no follow up, no consistent pressure on the Tories, and no discipline in their party organisation as the apparat enjoy free reign to sate their bloodlust. How is anyone in the Labour Party supposed to direct their fire at the Tories when the leadership and its allies, satraps, and running dogs are determined to pettifog, intimidate and expel?

Going back to the Jess Barnard farce, the apparat was caught off guard by the backlash and very quickly it was blamed on the temps the party has hired to clear the backlog ahead of the new complaints system. If it was genuine inexperience and/or the zeal of a temp looking to impress in the hope of a permanent position, it ain't half funny how these notices keep hitting leftwingers. Rightwingers from parliamentary down to constituency level are somehow evading the grip of the manners police, as if Islamophobia, transphobia, and anti-black racism have teflon-like properties. It is, in other words, deliberate.

Consider the context. Of all the pledges of Starmer's leadership run, the pretended concern for unity is the one he has trampled on the most. Promises made and promises disregarded, this alone should disqualify him as Labour leader, let alone Prime Minister. With his pathetic witchhunt now backed by retrospective offences, in contravention of the most elementary bourgeois jurisprudence, the push for purging from the centre is empowering every mid-level pen pusher, self-appointed guardian of CLP probity, and Facebook screen-shotter. The culture is ripe for a tendency to work towards the leader, opportunistic forms of behaviour to be found in all organisations once the line of march is clear. I doubt Starmer or David Evans picked up the phone and commanded a minion to rid them of this troublesome Jarrow MP, but they have purposely created a culture where perverse and false accusations become the norm, not the exception. They don't need closed WhatsApp groups or secret shindigs on Teams. They wound the machine up and are watching it go. Everything is working as it should.

What's in it for them? Certainly nothing to do with getting match fit ahead of an early election in 2023. With a supine press not about to splash their reckless stupidities across their pages, the twin demons of intimidation and absurdity will drive dozens of their targets out of the party. And with each of them, hundreds of others disgusted at their charade. This is not accident, but design. This ultimately will cost the party dear, and rob Starmer of his chance at the top job. He might be naive enough to believe he has to do this to get to Number 10, but the people he listens to are not. For them, what matters is neither winning elections nor a formidable party organisation, but the security of an easy life. And Starmer in all his gormless stupidity is, for the moment, the right tool for their scabby wrecking job.