Local Council By-Elections August 2024

This month saw 15,880 votes cast in nine local authority contests. All percentages are rounded to the nearest single decimal place. Three council seats changed hands. For comparison with July's results, see here.

Party	Number of Candidates	Total Vote	%	+/- Jul	+/- Aug 23	Avge/ Contest	+/- Seats
Conservative	7	3,326	20.9%	+1.4	-1.9	475	0
Labour	9	4,655	29.3%	-11.5	+1.1	517	+1
Lib Dem	8	1,830	11.5%	-3.3	-14.3	229	-1
Green	7	1,511	9.5%	-4.1	-1.9	216	0
SNP*	2	1,547	9.7%	+9.4	+9.7	774	0
PC**	1	353	2.2%	+2.2	+1.0	353	0
Ind***	7	1,374	8.7%	+0.6	+5.1	196	0
Other****	4	1,284	8.1%	+5.2	+1.2	321	0

* There were two by-elections in Scotland
** There was one by-election in Wales
*** There were two Independent clashes
**** Others this month consisted of Independence for Scotland (236), and Reform (519, 352, 177)

A fairly quiet month as folks have departed for their holibobs, and with few contests there's not much that can be said about the results. Except for one thing. Seeing how Reform Ltd performed during the general election, August suggests a new found seriousness toward local authority by-elections. And, depressingly, their three candidates mustered just over a thousand votes between them. If this keeps up I might have to graduate them out of the 'other' category, depending on how many candidates are fielded over the coming months.

September is going to be very busy for by-elections. There are 36 contests, held mainly in Labour held seats after councillors have stepped down to become MPs. I would expect a strong showing - though it will be interesting to see if buyer's remorse over the direction Keir Starmer has taken in office, above all on Winter Fuel Allowance, impacts the outcomes.

15 August
Caerphilly, Aberbargoed and Bargoed, Lab hold
Islington, Hillrise, Lab hold
Stirling, Dunblane & Bridge of Allan, Lab hold

22 August
Northumberland, Cramlington Eastfield, Con hold
Three Rivers, Abbots Langley & Bedmond, Con gain from LDem
West Lothian, Armadale & Blackridge, Lab gain from Ind

29 August
Hertfordshire, Bedwell, Lab hold
Wychavon, Badsey & Aldington, Con hold
Wychavon, Harvington & Norton, Ind gain from Con

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The Two Souls of Labourism

This 40-year old edition of Panorama has dome the rounds on social media these last couple of days. Filmed during an abatement of the faction fighting in the early 1980s and before the purge of the Militant Tendency got properly underway, it's good for a potted history of Labourism and how it has always been a fusion of opposites. Starmerism, like Blairism, is not a break from these traditions but is rooted in and a culmination of strands that go back to the beginnings of Labourism as a political current and school of thought.

Perfecting the State

Having got heavily covered in the bank holiday weekend's press, Keir Starmer needn't have bothered with his speech about the "tough choices" he's "having" to make. Especially as there was nothing here that hadn't already been covered by Labour's election positioning and Rachel Reeves's summer mini-statement. Nothing new, so why bother writing about it?

Here Starmer confirmed (yet again) what his project is about: the renovation of the state. If in revolutionary politics the subject is the working class and the project is its self-liberation, and in Tory politics it is - wrapped in ideological swaddling - the bourgeoisie and defending the class relations that maintain them, for right wing Labour in its Fabian, "revisionist", Blairite, and Starmerite iterations the state is the only legitimate agent of politics and its perfection is their purpose.

Consider the two parts to the speech. Returning to the racist riots, Starmer said that these were unmistakably inspired by the far right (but no words on those who fanned the flames), but there was an element of opportunism at work - an opportunism born of the Tories' dereliction of duty. Those who rioted knew the criminal justice system was teetering on the brink and prison places were at a premium, and acted as though there wouldn't be any arrests, let alone jail terms. Thanks to Tory recklessness. And, to a degree, Starmer corrected his reluctant earlier response by condemning efforts at trying to burn down hotels full of human beings (a rare moment of humanising asylum seekers in British politics) and praising communities who came together in the riots' aftermath to rebuild. Note he didn't go as far as the King, but again thanked the police and first responders for their service. Starmer therefore condemns the riots as a failure of Tory statecraft, passes over the role of communities and anti-fascists in defending themselves, praises the spirit of resilience, and then returns to the agents of the state as the legitimate saviours of the situation.

The second part was focused on the state itself. Starmer talked a lot about the £22bn "black hole" in state finances which, in reality, only exists because of how the Chancellor has chosen to frame public spending. Hence the tough decision of scrapping the Winter Fuel Allowance for all pensioners not in receipt of pension credits. This is being taken away so the NHS can be fixed. Likewise, when challenged on above inflation pay rises for public sector workers and railway workers, Starmer's defence owed nothing to the injustices these deals partly correct and everything to economic efficiency, getting the health service working, and so on. It was the right decision not by the workers, but by the state.

This is how it will be. The state is presented as a neutral arbiter, and one that has been broken by the Tories. Fixing it means being "honest about the challenges we face" and ending the "politics of the easy answer". Therefore October's budget is going to be "painful" and, hinting at possible wealth taxes, those with the "broadest shoulders" will bear the most burden. But Starmer has promised nothing but "big asks" for the country but it's something we can get through "together".

Starmerism isn't concerned with "social justice". Improving life for the poorest is not a priority. If these happen, it's an incidental by-product of re-engineering and renewing the state. What matters is getting it functioning "properly" again and using the state as a reliable partner for capital accumulation, the maintenance of the wage relation, and ensuring that whatever changes Starmer's political project brings about, the fundamentals of class, wealth, and private ownership will remain unchanged. As a statement of intent, this came through loud and clear.

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Securing the Oligarchy

Here we go again. The Times reports that leading figures in the Labour Party are trying to strip members of their say over the party's leader. This, apparently, is to avoid the party succumbing to a "Liz Truss moment". Instead, who gets to be leader will be in the gift of Labour's MPs. Just like it was before 1983.

The Labour right are fans because it makes politics easier. With candidate selection more or less under their complete control, the exclusion of the membership from voting on the direction the party should guarantee the party carries on providing careers for the chosen few in perpetuity. The chance of a left wing upsurge depriving the party oligarchy of their right to seats, briefcases, and ministerial cars is sunk forever. And it will be another step along the road of making Labour a party that can always be relied on, as far as capital is concerned.

There is a feeble political justification for going backwards on party democracy, ably set out earlier by "Red Historian" Robert Saunders. The parliamentary party is elected and they represent constituents. Therefore, the MPs are best placed to select the leader. Party members, however, are self-selecting, represent nobody, and aren't accountable.

Let's assume this is an argument made in good faith. Parties are not made out of complete randoms. As Engels once put it, parties are more or less expressions of classes and class fractions. Or, if mainstream political science is more your jam, parties correspond to cleavage structures. I.e. Every society is divided in a variety of ways, and political parties are responses to those structures. In Britain, as the world's first capitalist state in which the relationship between church and state, centre and periphery, and city and country are settled (more or less), class is unresolved and that's the axis around which British parties revolve. Bearing this in mind, the Tory membership tend to be more propertied and petit bourgeois than the general population. Labour's membership is more proletarian, which encompasses wage and salary earners from the organised workers movement to professional and managerial layers. Other parties have their own mixes and class compositions, which tends to condition their outlook and policies.

Party members therefore are not isolated cells swimming in an undifferentiated political soup. By and large, they are drawn from the layers that look to that party. To politics they bring their lived experiences, their views, and their interpretation of what their interests are. There is a tendency toward correspondence between these and the principles and objectives of their party, and are what they bring to bear when they participate in leadership elections, candidate selections, internal elections, policy debates, and party activism. This isn't a formal accountability mechanism, but what's important here is the weight of tradition, family histories, relationships outside the party, community, and other ties. Contrary to aspersions cast on members, they have very strong claims to being representative because they are more typical of the public.

Much stronger than MPs, in fact. Members provide the personnel from which candidates are selected. But the process of becoming an MP creates a constitutional fiction that poorly masks the obvious truth: that being a representative makes one less representative. As an honourable member, in 2024 you begin parliamentary life on £91k. You have a status that makes you a VIP. You are courted by organisations and businesses in your constituency as someone who matters. You are in receipt of gifts, freebies, and access to other notables. You are taken seriously. Well known journalists might want to know you. And your working life is spent inside the rarefied world of the House of Commons. The only people in the rest of the country you now resemble are professional/managerial layers. Conditions of work, money, status differentiate the parliamentarian from the people they represent. But doesn't the function of an MP give them a better understanding of politics? After all, their office is in receipt of all kinds of correspondence. They have to deal with the issues placed before them by constituents, whether they voted for them or not. This overview should afford them a privileged perspective. MPs have the need to exercise their judgement on the basis of these facts of political life - facts those back in the constituency party or association only have a dim awareness of, and can't possibly be expected to have a say over.

These conceits spiral out more conceits. Such as the idea MPs sit above the party that got them elected. Because of the constituency function, plenty of MPs think they're in the Commons because of their record as campaigners and being known in their areas. Only a few can make this claim with any credibility. The overwhelming majority of MPs who were elected last month got in because of the party label that was next to their name. They were voted in because of their party's association with interests, policies, ideas, etc. MPs like to think they're special, but they're the beneficiaries of collective decision-making made around collective preferences.

That MPs are the only ones capable of determining who a party's leader is an ideological exercise in the truest sense. This fundamentally distorts the workings of the most basic of political processes. And by pure coincidence it reflects the attitudes and interests of those set to benefit the most.

Nevertheless, it's one thing to want this and another to get it through conference. Leaders of affiliated trade unions will have their concerns, because it means surrendering their powers of patronage. That is, unless something significant can be offered in exchange. Like a seat at a tripartite table that would determine economic strategy, industrial activism, and collective bargaining across sectors of industry. Something that Keir Starmer has toyed with in the recent past.

What is obvious is how it would accelerate the decomposition of the Labour Party itself. Allowing the parliamentary party to perpetuate itself as an unaccountable clique disincentivises membership, attenuates the the representative correspondence between the party leadership and the constituency of the party, and strengthens the (already strong) tendency of Labourism to work against the interests of those it's supposed to champion. It's a recipe for dissolution, and on the basis of its shallow victory, a gift to those on the left looking to win over Labour's discarded support. Wouldn't it be funny if Labour MPs' moves to insulate themselves from political pressures makes them more vulnerable to defeat?

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Wow! Signal Mystery Solved

A rare foray into matters scientific, and we're going with the news that the so-called Wow! signal - the best candidate yet seen for alien communication efforts - was very likely nothing of the sort. Don't tell the Posadaists.

Nigel Farage's "Special" Voters

It's now a couple of weeks since the far right's racist rampages abated, and the government's polling on handling the pogroms has improved. According to YouGov, approval of Keir Starmer's response to the riots has increased from 31% to 43%. Those who thought he was doing badly has tumbled from 49% to 40%. It might have been better had he taken a different tack, but Number 10 will be happy with the direction of travel. Respondents who thought the police handled the riots well has also gone up, from 52% to 63%, and approval of the legal system's handling of convictions has shot up to 57% from 27%.

On the sentences meted out, 45% believed the severity was about right versus 27% who thought they were too lenient and 16% saying saying too harsh. What's interesting are the findings by voter intention. Labour, Lib Dem, and Tory voters are all more or less the same on 'not harsh enough' (27%, 27%, and 28% respectively), though there is more sympathy among the last saying they were "too harsh" (5%, 7%, and 20% - reflecting the ambiguity among the Tories themselves). But customers of Nigel Farage's Reform Ltd stand out a mile. Only 15% thought the penalties were not harsh enough, 29% "about right" (compared to the other parties' 58%, 57%, and 48%), but more than half - 51% - said the sentences were too much. This tallies with YouGov's earlier findings that 84% of Reform voters supported the idea of anti-immigration/anti-Muslim "protests", and 21% the violent disorder. Which seems at odds with right wing voters who generally like law and order. What gives?

Reform took votes from the Tories and allowed a slew of Labour and Lib Dem candidates slip through in July, but the bedrock of its support base, like the Brexit Party and UKIP before it, is somewhat different. Sociologically, Reform's voters are more male, whiter, and aged (though not quite as aged as the Tories) than the typical voter. Reform's strong political attractor is its authoritarianism, and not the flat tax/scrap the NHS drivel that passes for the party's political economy. People vote for it because it offers a certain aesthetics of politics that fetishises state violence as a "solution" to intractable "problems".

The political science literature on populist right and extreme right parties in Western Europe have all found similar features. Their supporters are more likely to have low to no trust in the prevailing political order, low to no trust in parties, and be sceptical about the efficacy of other institutions of state. One reason why they are attracted to 'great leader' personalities is because they offer a direct imaginary connection between the charismatic political figure, certain positions that are "not allowed" in the mainstream, and the (apparent) circumvention of the (lying, liberal) media, corrupt parties, and the other trappings of democracy. And those who find this politics most congenial are the petit bourgeoisie. As is well known, their lived existence could be snuffed out by the vagaries of the market, and are threatened by "unreasonable" wage demands, employees who don't pull their weight, and the costs demanded of businesses by local and national government. This makes for a very volatile force. They are predisposed to an authoritarian politics because it promises order and stability, as well as attacks on perceived sources of unease and threat. Of course, not all the petit bourgeoisie support populists but at their core this constituency is overrepresented.

What makes Reform's voters "special" is that this group was cultivated and persuaded to turn out for the Tories in 2019, and ever since Rishi Sunak tried desperately to keep them on side. It didn't work because, despite the populist messaging and posturing, the Tories didn't follow through with the brutal "solutions" their policies required. Rwanda didn't see the light of day. Setting aside the ECHR to deport refugees never happened. On these issues, which the Tories have relentlessly talked up with the aid of its press, they lost all credibility. Farage, however, has proved his outsider status by being the catalyst responsible for Britain's exit from the EU. He tells it like it is and has the track record to back this up.

Like all populist politicians, Farage is using "the people" against "the elites" for his own selfish ends, but pointing this out won't cut the mustard. Nor will Labour by appealing to these same people with its hard-on-immigration lines and aversion to confronting the racist right politically. It is, to be honest, pointless trying to win this constituency over. What is not is containing them. This requires taking on their arguments, debunking their myths, condemning Tory efforts to fish from these waters, and shifting politics away from issues that feeds the populist right's affected sense of injury. The chance Labour won't do this, seeing as it thinks everything will be fine if it delivers on GDP and has an efficient refugee removals system. And that means, as always, that it falls to anti-fascists, the labour movement, and others to do the job the Labour Party is unable and unwilling to do.

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Nesrine Malik on the Racist Riots

It's almost a month since far right mobs went on the rampage attacking hotels hosting asylum seekers, mosques, and seeking confrontation with Muslims and anti-fascists. In this interview on Politics Theory Other, Nesrine Malik looks at the politics of the riots. She covers the changing racist discourses employed by the fascists themselves to the politically-muted response of Keir Starmer, and how the growth of social liberalism is employed by the press and right wing actors to portray a Britain under siege - with the effect of radicalising a racist minority.

As ever, you can support Alex and the podcast here
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Politics Theory Other · The UK's pogroms and resurgent Islamophobia w/ Nesrine Malik

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Playing Two-Dimensional Chess

Am I the only one experiencing a Rachel Reeves-shaped double dose of deja vu? On the one hand, there is her copying Gordon Brown's "prudent" management of public finances which, in the first two years of the New Labour government, saw him stick to Tory spending plans. And then there is Tuesday night's briefing to the Graun. We are warned that her Autumn statement will include tax rises and public sector cuts. Stuff that she has already said. I suppose plagiarising one's self is a step up from ripping off others.

What does the piece say? Despite the economy puttering along better than expected, state borrowing for July had doubled compared to this time last year. Because it's £3bn over target, "tough decisions" are called for. I thought economic growth was supposed to be our magical cure-all? There are four measures that are being trailed. Raising capital gains and inheritance tax, and keeping to the letter of no new taxes on "working people". Going for a 1% increase in public spending, while expecting some departments to find savings. The child benefit cap is staying in place because the point of hard choices is to look tough and uncaring. And finally, the Bank of England will be excluded from state debt figures.

The last is the most wonkish, but is politically interesting. As we know, taxes are paid into the consolidated fund, which is effectively the government's current account with the Bank. It suits Labour and the Tories to pretend its incomings and outgoings have to be balanced, and that borrowing money from other sources is super bad. However, the money lender of first resort is always the Bank. In 2022-23, the Bank owned 25% of government bonds (gilts), effectively meaning a quarter of the state's debt is owned by the state. According to the House of Commons public finance report published this Wednesday, redefining state debt so it excludes money the state owes itself would depress debt from 99.4% to 91.9% of GDP. An accounting trick that can be presented as Labour's achievement in getting the figures down when everyone's forgot the redefinition, and allows more borrowing from the Bank off the books (as it were).

To underline the point that this means absolutely no relief for the party's base, the FT splashed on Reeves's plans to raise social rents above the rate of inflation. This means "stability" apparently, because it's a 10-year settlement that will allow housing associations and councils to plan and use monies to invest in new builds. A way of diverting housing benefit for those who qualify into the sector, while hammering those who don't. But ultimately, efforts at trying to rebuild social rents by putting costs onto tenants is undermined by Labour's retention of Right to Buy. Why invest in new housing when tenants can buy them at a discount after three years of 'permanent tenancy' status? No wonder councils have put cash in build-to-rents via "private" local authority-owned landlords. They get a return without the asset being sold from under them. And in the mean time the housing crisis worsens.

One might say Reeves is moving pieces around a chess board. Except there are no clever-clever 11-dimensional moves here. The Chancellor is narrowing the range of public debate and purposely pretending her choices are "necessities". Therefore, Labour has "no option" but to throw public money at business, can't do anything about the financial crisis in public services, and demand those at the sharpest end cough up to cover the costs of refurbishing the state. She is presenting a false, dishonest politics, and it's up to the labour movement to expose it as such and push back.

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The Tory Party's "Centrist" Turn?

This Tory leadership contest is weird. The long timetable has seen urgency pack its bags and go on a long summer's holiday, and so candidates are almost reticent about setting out their stalls. With the whittling down to the last four not due until September, presently very few MPs have declared who they're backing. The latest update has the candidates on four to 10 declarations apiece, with the utterly awful Robert Jenrick setting the pace. But by no means a convincing lead. The polls however are a different story.

Party member polling by Techne finds James Cleverly is out in front with 26%. Priti Patel is second on 20%, Kemi Badenoch 14%, Tom Tugendhat 11%, Jenrick on 10%, and Mel Stride brings up the rear on 6%. Also encouraging for the shadow home secretary is that members found him preferable in head-to-heads wih all the other candidates. This differs from the last (unscientific) polling round taken by Conservative Home. Its leading candidates - Jenrick and Badenoch - would be beaten by Cleverly 49-28 and 51-28 respectively in Tecnhe's findings. These results are more or less in line with work done by Ipsos at the beginning of the month. They found Cleverly and Patel were ahead among the public on who would make a good Conservative leader. Unfortunately, 20% of those asked thought Cleverly would make a bad leader (giving him a net -2) and a whopping 44% felt the same about Patel. Only Tugendhat had a net positive rating (17% vs 11%). Meanwhile, a separate YouGov survey for The Times found that Tugendhat is the least disliked among the public, with an approval rating of -12. This stacks up favourably against Stride (-15), Jenrick (-19), Cleverly (-22), Badenoch (-22), and Patel (-52). At least among the weirdos paying the Tories any mind these days.

These figures might give those MPs thinking that a lurch to the right is what the Tories need some pause. It suggests the recent comments/positioning of Badenoch and Jenrick in light of the riots hasn't gone down well. Similarly, Badenoch's Mail on Sunday article saw her double down on these themes and rail against "Blairite" identity politics. If the membership are, contrary to expectations, not in the mood for more boring far right cosplay, why might this be?

There could be three intertwined explanations for this scenario. For the shrinking Tory membership, culture war rubbish might be fun but the Tories just lost an election on that prospectus. The returning of five Reform MPs suggests that Nigel Farage and co can't be out-competed on these terms and a heavy investment here would see meagre returns, so why bother? Tory members might have done that rare thing of actually learning something. Second, regardless of how enthusiastic or otherwise they are about this rubbish they've seen how the racist riots appropriated this politics. If there's anything the typical Tory abhors above all else, it's disorder and the unpredictable consequences that might entail. We saw how far right mobs graduated from fighting the police and bricking mosques to the destruction of property and the looting of businesses, and carrying on peddling these lines could stir up future trouble. And third, there's the meagre possibility of a comeback.

In his interview on Times Radio, Michael Gove acknowledged that the Tories had had a "terrible result", but because they scraped back into the Commons with 122 seats it doesn't appear as catastrophic as the more excitable MRP surveys forecast some might be tempted to think that it wasn't that bad. You might say that there are Tory members who've convinced themselves an evisceration is no worse than a grazed knee. But adding to this in the thinness of Labour's victory. Likewise, while they were hammered relentlessly by the Liberal Democrats the yellow party saw their vote share fall. Therefore, for the average Tory who hasn't a scooby about the hole their party is in could conclude that a poor performance from Keir Starmer might see Labour's wafer thin plurality splinter (especially with the rise of the Greens and Left Independents) and the Tories come back after one term. To be sure, no one with a political brain thinks this but it's a plausible enough for some. Which means those from the briefcase wing of the party might do better than expected because they stand a better chance of credibly leading a revival of fortunes than those on the right.

Let's be clear, the membership are not taking a centrist turn. Tugendhat is as rabid about leaving the ECHR as any right winger, and Cleverly has proven himself a loyal going-alonger with all the disgusting schemes hatched by the last three Prime Ministers. But because they have the vibes that suggest they could do a better job turning outwards than the unknown Stride and the other horrors, they find themselves better positioned than might otherwise be the case. Still, the contest to be the leader who'll take their party into the next general election defeat has a long way to go yet.

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Why Does Labour Hate Universities?

Employees of the higher education system have turned out and voted Labour in disproportionate numbers for years. This, despite the imposition of tuition fees, rampant marketisation and the resultant promiscuous bureaucratisation under New Labour. Having been attacked by the Tories for nakedly political reasons, the sector once again voted Labour in droves to see its tormentors vanquished and for a reset of the relationship with government. Back in the halcyon days of the first week, there were encouraging signs for the optimistic. It was all smiles as Bridget Phillipson sat down with the UCU's Jo Grady for a chat about the state of HE. The Tory Lord placeman James Wharton resigned as chair of the Office for Students, reasoning correctly his services would not be required for long. And late last month, Labour scrapped the "freedom of speech" laws, which would have entitled right wingers and grifters to play the victim and harass universities through the litigation the bill provided for.

The positive vibes didn't last long. Going back to the manifesto, on the vexed issue of HE funding there was, as per many other social problems, a lot of hand waving and waffle. And so this week, finally some answers about what we can expect. In her interview with C4 News on further education results day, Baroness Jacqui Smith said the government were prepared to let universities go bust (40% are due to make an operating loss this year, and half a dozen could be facing insolvency). Does that mean Labour will reverse the Tory policy that prevented overseas students from bringing their families/dependents with them, which has seen a 40% drop in international applications? After all, this costs the government nothing and the higher fees they pay helps offset stagnant or falling revenue streams elsewhere. The answer is no. Smith thinks saying nice things will help numbers recover without changing policy. Good to know we have an HE minister of outstanding quality.

On the face of it, this is nonsensical. Rachel Reeves has growth at all costs at the top of every agenda (Wes Streeting has referred to his Department of Health as an "economic growth department"). HE is a big exports earner and, unlike British business, British universities are acknowledged world leaders. And yet. Then there is the politics. As we have seen, this is a Labour-friendly constituency and should be relied on as core voters. And yet. Universities are key propagators of social liberalism and are helping solidify irreversible changes in the electorate that severely disadvantage the Tories. And yet. Then, lastly, there are all those institutional property interests that have massive investments tied up in student lets, and whose pressure the Tories were keen to support during the Covid crisis by forcing students back to university early. You'd think Labour would want this section of capital on side. And yet.

Labour's HE strategy is driven by two overlapping approaches. The first is the technocratic. I.e. The Tories have set up the policy environment, so let's see how universities fare under the "stability" of the status quo. Rather than listen to the joint lobbying of workers and vice chancellors, they want to see the unnecessary stress and pain for themselves. The second reflects an attitude within some sections of Starmer's state/managerial base. There are simply too many young people going to university. They see the limited quantity of graduate jobs, note the evaporation of the graduate premium, and observe how the huge debts students acquire are not balanced adequately by reward. Therefore instead of doing something radical, cutting provision is preferred.

On the politics, in the long lead up to the general election Keir Starmer has long returned Labour to the mean where this country's "debate" about immigration is concerned. He left it to the King of all people to praise those who opposed the far right on the streets, and cabinet members have not once uttered criticisms of far right politics - embraced by half of the Tory leadership contenders - that stirred the hate mobs. And famously Labour bottled the Clacton campaign against Nigel Farage because it didn't want to challenge the right's talking points on immigration. They don't want to be seen being soft on Tory media obsessions, and the party wants the luxury of having a scapegoat button to press when the politics requires it. University policy is subordinate to these strategies because, stupidly, Labour doesn't want to be associated with "wokeism" and therefore remind its new would-be allies/donors that the party is structurally unsound where bourgeois politics is concerned. Nor does it want to be seen increasing net migration inflows. In other words, Labour are trying to occupy a zone of non-punishment that doesn't irk the (declining) press or the coalition of elite interests Starmer is assembling.

The result is the sort of political flat footedness we've seen with the riots. Carrying on this way means the undermining of Labour's coalition that began when Starmer moved the party to the right will continue unabated. It's a good job the next general election is five years away, because Labour is intent on entering politically troubled territory. Today it's universities and HE workers and students. Whose turn among the party's base is it tomorrow?

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Rachel Reeves's PFI Enthusiasm

Having ripped off Wikipedia, is Rachel Reeves about to rip off the Treasury? According to Monday's FT, the Chancellor is mulling over a Private Finance Initiative-style scheme to build a new £9bn highway and tunnel linking Kent and Essex just east of Gravesend. This "reinvented" form of PFI differs from the predecessor pioneered by John Major and made New Labour's own during the Blair/Brown years in several respects. The state will underwrite the risky parts of the investment (i.e. the tunnel), with the rest coming from private capital. In return, investors would receive returns from the tolls levied. However, these would be capped and the operation of this son-of-PFI would come under the scrutiny of an independent regulator ("changed" Labour loves its quangos, as forecast).

Leaving aside whether such a project is "necessary" when we should be reducing road traffic, it is politically attractive to Reeves because like Gordon Brown before her, it would keep some of the costs off the government books, enabling her to claim fidelity to her self-imposed fiscal rules. It would score points with FT and Economist editorials, while signalling to overseas capital that returns are guaranteed thanks to Labour's industrial activism. But there are wider concerns impinging on Reeves's decision about the Thames crossing. What you might call the good reason and the real reasons.

There are close parallels between Keir Starmer's authoritarian modernisation project and the drum Will Hutton has spent the last 30 years banging. Starmer is appalled by and opposed to "sticking plaster politics", and wants to renovate the mindset of the state so it takes the longer view. Hutton back in his celebrated (but, pointedly, ignored by Blair) The State We're In railed against the short-termist culture of British capitalism, and argued building a competitive economy in the 21st century requires planning and interventionism. In this respect, the new PFI - rebrand incoming - can be seen as a government effort at tackling the short-termism, a habit picked up from the City, and therefore endemic amongst British capital and its hangers ons. Underwriting risk while capping returns forces investors to think longer-term. And if more similar schemes can be spun off (aspects of this are included in Great British Energy, for instance), Starmerism could affect the attitude change it wants to see. On paper, it could lead to a more stable economic environment, and one where investors are prudent with their stakes instead of chasing high risk, high reward fancies that have the periodic tendency of bringing stock markets crashing down.

As for the real reasons, the same applies here as it has always done with PFIs. Creating public-private partnerships brings business interests to the top of ministers' in-trays. It works as a pressure as office holders come and go, making sure they're treated as preferential clients as opposed to contractors engaged to provide a service. And, as everyone knows, if a minister is seen as "good for business", the rewards will be there when the political career is over: consultancies, board positions, chairs, retainers. All offering the promise of a comfortable retirement. We cannot forget the politics either. What motivates the Labour right more than anything else is their self-importance, and that is guaranteed by sustaining their careers as stewards of the state. PFI is a means of offering the fearless risk-taking animal spirits of British business guaranteed markets. Just as in the New Labour years a section of capital was annexed by Blairism, the aim is to repeat history - hopefully not as farce - and create a big bourgeois tent. If Labour are good for business, most sections of capital will support them. Which makes it harder for the Tories to come back and take their ministerial cars from them.

In other words, Reeves's preference for PFI-style schemes has nothing to do with "learning the wrong lessons", or "ideology", nor nostalgia for Blairism. It's about interests, which is what politics always is.

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The Defence of Douglas Murray

Fraser Nelson has penned a thin defence of Douglas Murray because he and The Spectator have received stick for publishing his articles. In the established tradition of right wing victimhood, editor Fraser Nelson goes for a defiant "the mob will never silence us!" defence, and says recent controversies about Murray have only increased the Speccie's circulation. A reminder that there's no such thing as bad publicity.

What has galvanised the digital denunciation of Murray and his corpus? Nelson does not say, apart from whingeing about remarks that have been "heated up" and "selectively edited to maliciously misrepresent him". Indeed, he goes out of his way to not talk about the material in question because "to repeat such smears is to spread them". Thankfully, we don't have to take Nelson's word for it, the recording is available. In one interview from last November, Murray accuses (then) Scottish First Minister Humza Yousaf of wanting to import extreme religious sectarianism to Scotland, which would be the inevitable consequence of providing a safe haven for Palestinians. He calls Yousaf the "First Minister for Gaza" and says he "infiltrated our system", implying something improper about his participation in Scottish politics. This piece resurfaced after his remarks about the far right's racist rioting got wide circulation. Then Murray said,

If the army will not be sent in then the public will have to sort this out themselves and it'll be very brutal. I don't want them to live here. I don't want them here. They came under false pretences.

Murray isn't saying that the army should be sent in to sort out the rioters. He's arguing that they be directed against the victims of the fascist mobs - the Muslims who came out to defend their community and, by extension, the asylum seekers that were firebombed in Tamworth and Rotherham. This cannot be interpreted as anything other than inciting racial hatred. And Nelson knows this, which why he hasn't repeated any of Murray's remarks.

As we know, Murray has a long history of marketing himself as a far right intellectual. Since the 7th October attack by Hamas, he has carved out a niche for being Israel's loudest cheerleader in their massacre of the Palestinians. There is no atrocity he won't "contextualise" and justify. Though the mask did slip back in November when, in the pages of the Jewish Chronicle no less, he asked his readers to spare a thought for the consciences of SS officers who directed the gunning down of Jews on the Eastern front. All to peddle his crank obsessive hatred against Muslims in general, and Palestinians in particular. By any reasonable definition, Murray is trash.

The Spectator's defence of their star columnist says a great deal about them. While it affects a broad church sensibility, and even occasionally publishes left wingers, hard right economics and hard right social conservatism is its comfort zone. Murray fits in commercially because "respectable" racism sells, and he fits the (doomed) class project of the most reactionary sections of British capital to turn back the tide of social liberalism. But defending Murray reveals a certain weakness on the right. He's been on the scene for nearly 20 years but, effectively, there is no one else. Yes, there are the gobshite columnists aplenty but he has the right's pesudo-intellectual space to himself. Good for getting writing and speaking gigs, but where their collective class project is concerned? Roger Scruton's departure to the hereafter hasn't brought forth a replacement, and so - effectively - Murray is the last "high functioning" right wing brain standing. And that's an immediate problem for the Speccie, because if Murray's racist drivel gets him exiled from polite society, where's the magazine going to get a new celebrity writer from? Matthew Goodwin doesn't cut the mustard because of his evident stupidity, and Rod Liddle is too wedded to old Labour economics to fit the hole. Murray is a protect-at-all-costs asset for the unhinged wing of the British right not because he's the best they've got, he's all they've got.