The Crisis in Your Party

Considering the last fortnight, it takes something special to make Keir Starmer and Morgan McSweeney look like exemplars of competence. Just a quick reminder of where we are in the Your Party crisis. Zarah Sultana's faction, annoyed with the snail's pace of the project and the conference arrangements worked out seemingly behind her back, opened a membership drive. Only to have it disowned by Jeremy Corbyn and the four Gaza Independents. Sultana's reply complained about being frozen out, and another communique from the Corbyn camp said they had reported the affair to the Information Commissioner. Archie Woodrow has done the honours in supplying the time lines, and his superlative guide to the hidden differences behind the Your Party project is required reading. Things have settled down a bit today, with prominent supporters in Wales and a new grassroots initiative each fielding their takes. Sultana has endorsed the latter while Sky News reports on reconciliation efforts. Your Party might be in the toilet but no one's pulled the chain. Yet.

There's nothing much to add except for hundreds of thousands of would-be supporters, the outbreak of collective joy that occasioned this summer's announcement that a new party is but a memory. Recrimination, anxiety, and disappointment is now filling the vacuum left by this unseemly falling out. As Woodrow writes in his overview of Your Party's factional balances, there is an abundance of control-freakery and secrecy. It's tempting to locate this in the desire of a handful of people around Corbyn wanting to secure paid positions and influence in the new party, and plenty have made that inference. But this is secondary to the politics of our shadowy movers and shakers. And what are these politics? Fundamentally, it comes down to what they think the new party should be.

For the Corbyn wing and its (understandably) reluctant leader, the desire is obviously a mk II Labour Party. One with a touch more democracy and better politics, but ultimately Labourist in orientation and method. The "sexist boys' club" Sultana criticised has centred the formation of the new party on the honourable members - Corbyn and the so-called Gaza Independents. From the off, the MPs have had a privileged say over the party's direction, and are looking to preserve their autonomy and standing within it. This is hardly the grass roots democracy Corbyn promised over the summer, and is concerning when it's very clear that apart from Gaza, the politics of the independents are barely Labourist, let alone socialist. But that suits a Labour mk II fine, which thrives on a politics of the lowest common denominator.

Some have asked why Corbyn wants to co-habit with the independents in a new party. Is he not aware of their positions on landlordism, LGBTQ issues, and cousin marriage? Of course he is, but Corbyn's ethical socialism predisposes him to a politics of diplomacy. This is a politics of moral outrage at the evils of the world, and believes in the essential dignity and goodness of human beings. Capitalism is obviously damaging and cruel, and there is an ethical imperative to build something better - a position everyone can get behind, because everyone benefits. Socialist morality abstracted from a materialist appreciation of power and politics, in Corbyn's case, helps explain his decency and willingness to engage with people most wouldn't touch with a barge pole. Why can't we all get along is the principle by which he's lived his political life, and he reciprocates the friendship and loyalty shown him by others. Karie Murphy, for instance, is often criticised as a gatekeeper and an authoritarian, but she stayed in the trench with Corbyn until the end. Small wonder she's part of the inner circle, alongside Len McCluskey who did everything he could to get Corbyn readmitted as a Labour MP. Unlike Starmer, who bins off allies when they become an encumbrance, the fusion of the personal and political in Corbyn means he can never be as mercenary. Regardless of how damaging his allies might be for whatever project he's involved with. Where the Gaza Independents are concerned, while Labour "oppositionists" to Israel's genocide have been few and far between, they have been resolute and faced down Westminster and media hostility. On paper, who would not want to make common political cause with such courageous people?

Corbyn-as-figurehead is the glue that keeps this faction together. Unity where their common interests are concerned, and diplomatic silences over political differences. Which makes Corbyn ideal to leas a broad church that stretches from the far left to anti-LGBTQ "traditionalists", as long as no one talks about difference or, horror of horrors, politics. This is where his keen interest in community organising comes in. While laudable in and of itself as a means of implanting the new party into our communities, activists so engaged will build trust and solidarity through good works. Disagreements would simply wither away and not matter because action takes precedence.

Sultana's faction has a different objective. They are not looking for a Labour mk II, and want to establish a radical left party. Indeed, in her interview with Novara on the topic, she said her preferred name for the new party would be the Left Party or The Left. In other words, quite similar to several continental left-green parties and broadly congruent with Zack Polanski's trajectory. She has argued for putting "class issues" front and centre, while maintaining it should be a socially liberal party. I.e. Mirror the vast majority of the class it seeks to organise in the age of immaterial labour. Obviously, this party isn't a place for landlords or those whose politics seek to sow division, regardless of how good they might be on questions of war and peace. And she's impatient with the bureaucratic obstructionism and foot dragging given the state of political affairs. Whether you agree or disagree with her positions, at least Sultana has been open about her vision and what the new party should be like. Can you say the same for Corbyn?

These are the fundamental differences between the two broad camps, and the reason we've reached this impasse is because one side - Corbyn's - would rather not have a "divisive" debate about the party's character. The problem is when you stifle politics, they find other, more damaging ways of finding expression, and it ends up scarring those doing the repressing. The situation we're in means Corbyn is the only politician with sufficient social weight to bring together the left and refound it on a mass, as opposed to a sectarian basis. But the more he delays, the more his associates are given free reign to arrest this process, the more his standing will diminish to the point where the moment could be lost. But the situation can and must be retrieved. Open the membership, put the party on a firm financial and organisational setting, regularise the already-existing branches and fora, and let's have this founding conference where the purpose and politics of our party can get thrashed out.

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Keir Starmer Vs the Far Right

The other week, a long-time reader of this blog put a question to me. They asked what warranted the assumption that if Keir Starmer did this or that, Labour would be able to see off Nigel Farage and Reform. For example, had Starmer criticised the far right instead of rolling out the red carpet for them, what's to say his efforts wouldn't be ignored in the same way their appeasement and cultivation of anti-immigrant politics haven't stymied Reform's polling? Fair point.

What Starmer says and does with regard to the extreme right matters in two ways. Pandering to their politics in a doomed effort to out-Farage Farage has emboldened other establishment figures to ratchet up the rhetoric. Confirmed waste of space Robert Jenrick, the architect of housing refugees in hotels, would not have had the gall to join far right protests to boost his long coup against Kemi Badenoch. No mark Labour MPs might have kept their counsel. The net result of going down the "genuine concerns" path? An undermining of mainstream politics, and Labour in particular. Had Starmer stood against the tidal wave of filth breaking over British politics would likely have kept more of the Labour base on side. The divisions in Starmer's personal base, which remains the managerial layers of the state, local government, and public sector bureaucracies, would never have manifested and given Labour that little more ballast to face the political head winds. Coming out hard against racism, which the Prime Minister delegated to the King last year, and individual Labour MPs these last few days, could begin winning back the natural support he has so far alienated.

What Starmer does also matters. There has been some criticism of Zack Polanski in recent days for linking the growth of the far right to the consequences of austerity and a starved public realm. The implication being that there is a direct correspondence, and that if Labour weren't committed to broadly the same approach to statecraft as the Tories then none of this would be happening. For example, Richard Seymour has argued at length about the libidinal roots of far right politics, and the spasm of pleasure that is derived from punching down. Therefore a properly funded NHS or, to use the Starmerist lexicon, "delivery" would not see the extreme right off.

Yet there is a relationship. As argued many times here and in the book, the building of the Tory voter coalition in 2017 and 2019, and the failed efforts at reviving it since, was based on an understanding of who the core vote was, how they were structurally predisposed to a politics of fear, and using the levers of government and media propaganda to stoke those fires further. A blend of statecraft, governance, and faceless processes of individuation and atomisation have broken up senses of community, evacuated hope from anticipations of the future, and engendered a wide sense of fatalism, if not powerlessness. A politics that offers some people some certainty, while identifying targets that are symptoms of or causes of the malaise can affect a powerful attraction, especially when it involves performative spectacles of scapegoating or that old trick of saying the "unsayable". If Labour had a different political economy and Starmer was governing as if his leadership pledges mattered, Britain would be on the path to better wages, security at work, an obvious and visible movement of rebuilding public services, making state and politics more responsive, and so on. It's not that dealing seriously with the cost-of-living crisis negates the far right, but consequences of this programme would cultivate social conditions that are less conducive for those politics to thrive. Ontological insecurity is displaced by its opposite. By way of demonstrating its obvious truth, why are Reform next to nowhere with young people? Is it because they're all saintly and see through their drivel? Or does it have something to do with their social circumstances, that there is something about their social being that conditions their attitudes to the world at the conscious and unconscious levels?

Labour are in a position to do something about the rise of the far right, which they are doing. It's not just Starmer and McSweeney's pathetic Chamberlain cosplay that's making life easier for the Farages and Yaxley-Lennon's of this world, but it's the consequences their beggar-thy-neighbour politics, their "fiscal rules", and utter disinterest in addressing this country's long-term problems - because it goes against the interests of those whom they serve - that are doing real damage to our social fabric. This is their responsibility, and there is no doubt in my mind that they will carry on as they are. Until they are either removed, or Farage gets himself into Number 10.

Over for Ovenden

It was in my A-Level Law class over 30 years ago that I learned a valuable lesson for a life in politics. Never write anything down that might compromise you or give your opponents ammunition if they get their hands on it. If only Paul Ovenden, strategy director and late of Keir Starmer's office, had paid this most utterly basic precaution some mind while talking about Diane Abbott in the typically vile manner the Labour right specialise in. Thankfully, what actually was said isn't widely publicised but because of the huge leak of WhatsApp messages at the beginning of Starmer's leadership, we don't have to. It doesn't require much imagination if anyone's paid any attention.

In bis message circulated to journalists, MPs, and other interested hangers on, Ovenden said he was planning on leaving Number 10 anyway, that these texts were a distraction, and he decided to bring his departure forward. I almost cackled with schadenfreude after reading "Having your private messages from nearly a decade ago hacked and then published in an attempt to damage your career is chilling." Quite, but no such scruples were demonstrated by his dear friend Morgan McSweeney when he employed people to trawl through private groups for dirt from which factional ammunition could be manufactured - as admitted by the man himself.

Not wanting to afford Ovenden any credit, at the very least he did the decent thing instead of attempting to brazen it out. But not without some resistance from his friends. Such as the Starmer-friendly journalist Rachel Weirmouth. And this item from Patrick Maguire, in which a "senior government advisor" says "You can tell all you need to know about a leader from who and what they fight for. The prime minister should have taken one look at one of his most skilful and loyal aides and torn up the resignation." It's a mystery who briefed this attack, isn't that right Morgan?

And so, Starmer's "second phase" again lurches from one disaster to the next. Having created together with McSweeney a rigid, authoritarian, and politically narrow project - that has got even narrower following Angela Rayner's resignation and the targeted sackings that came in her wake. In the absence of political disagreements to write about the hacks are going to dig through the bins instead. And because the spads and bureaucrats have no hinterland or legitimacy apart from preferment to fall back on, they're especially vulnerable to exposes of this sort - as Tom Watson, no friend of above-board politics, rightly notes. Full-timers, back office types, and fixers who were featured in 2020's so-called Labour Files had better watch out. As today's Ovenden episode might suggest, the media have noticed this was a thing they accidentally on purpose overlooked then. But now, other racisms, sexisms, and out-of-turn remarks are recalled to memory, ready to embarrass and destabilise the brittle Starmer set up further.

Chamberlain Labour

Approximately 100,000 on a far right march in London. A grim new milestone in post-war political history, and one conventional politics has spent all summer cultivating. What, for instance, did the big brains in the Labour Party think was going to happen after tailing the extreme right on immigration, and saying the tiny band of fascist-led protests against asylum seekers - which were self-evident efforts at repeating the same kind of disorder we saw last year - "had a point"? This is the culmination of Keir Starmer's rancid approach to immigration, one that has, alongside blanket media coverage, legitimated and amplified Reform in the first instance, and now enabled mass far right street politics. Never mind the Peter Mandelson scandal, Labour MPs should be demanding his resignation for this catastrophe.

The government's response to racist violence on the streets of the capital this weekend is pathetic. Number 10's comms allowed tumbleweed to roll through the Saturday evening news schedules. And as the Sunday morning politics programmes swung around, there was a statement from our new Home Secretary, Shabana Mahmood, that condemned the violence and ... that was it. An almost apolitical law and order response, as if she was talking about car theft or shop lifting. Worse, Peter Kyle, considered by the leader's office as an able communicator, was invited to venture a political opinion about the far right march on Sky News with Trevor Phillips. He said it showed "free speech was alive and well" in this country. No rebuttal, no response to Elon Musk's call for the overthrow of parliament. Another roll-me-over-and-tickle-my-belly moment. Finally, on Sunday afternoon Starmer uttered something. He said will "never surrender" the flag to the far right. How can the Prime Minister's words be taken seriously with his track record of ceding them the political initiative?

We've been here before. Last summer, Starmer's approach to the riots was politically weak. Instead, he left it to the King of all people to make the rote remarks about cohesion and community. And this reluctance to afford fascism a political rebuttal does not start with Starmer. In the 1930s, as 2010 paper points out, party activists were instructed to avoid agitating and confronting the Mosleyites and that being quiet about the far right would freeze them out of politics. Though, to be fair to this feeble strategy, Labour's efforts at ignoring the British Union of Fascists did not mean adopting the overtly racist parts of their programme or suggesting its thugs were motivated by genuine concerns.

Starmer's timidity toward the far right reflects the politics of our under-fire friend, Morgan McSweeney. Caught in the same doom loop that helped do the Tories in. As a well heeled member of the ruling class, his politics coincide a great deal with Tory statecraft. I.e. Offer nothing that might raise political horizons or get people's hopes up, because that could lead to popular demands they cannot comfortably accommodate within the settlement they defend. And so draw deep on the old, anti-immigrant racist traditions and divert anger toward undesirable out-groups while demonstrating the government's efficacy by dealing decisively with them. It's an approach that smacks of patronising contempt of Labour's voters, while desperately - and against all evidence - hopes it will keep them on board in lieu of anything else. For McSweeney and his view of "working people", anything that might sound like criticism of the racist politics of Nigel Farage, Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, Elon Musk, and he rest of the horror show will put off the people they ignorantly assume might support Labour in the future. A strange strategy when the job of winning the next election is about keeping the voters the party has in the seats that they have, but who are we to dispute the genius that thought bringing Mandelson back would be a good idea?

This is the root of the Labour leadership's paralysis. If we stay quiet while drunk far right mobs scream racist abuse and say they want to assassinate the Prime Minister, perhaps they'll give us a look before the next election. A strategy that will prove a slam dunk for sure. In the real world of politics where the consequences of this are playing out, the results of Starmer/McSweeney's approach has been the loss of one parliamentary by-election, giving away dozens of seats to Reform in council by-elections, and a collapse in Labour's already low levels of support. They are legitimising the extreme right by letting them dictate the terms of politics, and in so doing are paving the way for them while hoping, somehow, its voracious appetite for division and hate will be gratified by Labour's offerings. This is appeasement pure and simple. It didn't stop fascism in the 1930s. And it will not work today.

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Laurent Garnier - Coloured City

By their Friends

You know Keir Starmer is on a sticky wicket when Kemi Badenoch made him squirm, disassemble, and throw out whataboutery like confetti at Wednesday's Prime Minister's Questions. The publication of Peter Mandelson's cringeworthy correspondence with the disgraced billionaire and sex trafficker, Jeffrey Epstein, shines an unwelcome light on a politician who revels in his dark reputation. It's a moment that highlights Starmer's double standards, considering how others have gone for far less.

In the letters, Mandelson calls Epstein his "best pal". On the occasion of the financier's birthday, he gushed "Once upon a time, an intelligent, sharp-witted man they call 'mysterious' parachuted into my life." Awkwardly, in 2010 Mandelson was able to leverage this chummy relationship after Epstein's conviction for child sex offenders to offload a UK state-owned bank on the cheap. And even worse, Mandelson apparently urged his "best pal" to fight for early release. When a leader says they have full confidence in an appointee, as Starmer has done, conventions suggests that the US ambassador's days are probably numbered.

Mandelson and scandal goes together like noughts with crosses. On the one hand, his personal conduct is less than above board. For instance, while he was busy scheming and plotting the removal of Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader "every day", he failed to declare interests and dishonestly badged his consultancy firm as a something that does not dispense political advice to avoid public oversight. He provides friendly counsel to union-busting firms, and happily cultivated the Tories while they were in office and provided jobs for former ministers. During the New Labour years, he famously took out a personal loan from Geoffrey Robinson - against the rules - to buy a desirable Notting Hill pad. When he returned to government it wasn't long before he was forced to resign again, this time for sorting out a passport for one of the Hinduja brothers after they donated a million pounds to the Millennium Dome project. They were facing allegations of their own around weapons and corruption at the time. After leaving office and finding his feet as an EU trade commissioner, he was noted for his friendship with Diego Della Yalle, an Italian fashion magnate who, entirely coincidentally, benefited from Mandelson's decision to slap tariffs on Chinese shoe imports. He was known for his links with Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska, an "entrepreneur" who made billions from plundering state owned assets in the chaos following the USSR's dissolution, and over whom Epstein-esque allegations currently hang.

Having read Mandelson's The Third Man, it's quite obvious that, like so many Labour figures before him, he used the party as a vehicle of social mobility. But perhaps none, save Tony Blair, have been as successful in getting wealthy off the relationships built between billionaires and businesses, and successive governments. Mandelson isn't unlucky in being a scandal magnet. Being a grasper, and filling his boots hanging around with financiers, tycoons, and self-styled entrepreneurs, means encountering moral vacuums is one of the occupational hazards. Anti-social psychopathy is a well known trait among billionaires, what with their senses of exalted importance and suicidal hubris. Mandelson, having not come from money, has used his skillset and contact book to insinuate himself into their lives and has become an indispensable retainer. So when Badenoch asked Starmer about whether he was aware of the extent of Mandelson's relationship to Epstein, the unspoken answer was "yes, of course". It was precisely because of his ability to schmooze and flatter plutocrats that the Prime Minister packed him off to Washington in the first place. Small wonder he still has full confidence in Mandelson being able to carry on with his role.

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Mulling Over Mainstream

Mainstream - the home for Labour's radical realists. This is how the newest faction on the block styles itself. Following Angela Rayner's exit, the clearing out of "Burnhamite" North Western MPs, the installation of the most politically narrow cabinet in Labour history, the deputy leadership election, and the gnashing of trade union teeth at the TUC's annual conference, its launch is blessed with fortuitous timing. And it's likely to annoy the Labour right, who think they have the monopoly on political wisdom and that the Blue Labour rubbish (minus its supposed fealty to left wing economics) is where most of Britain is at. Polling figures hovering around the 20% mark suggests not.

What does Mainstream stand for? Its statement of values talks about protecting workers, long-term investments, defending liberties, democracy, and international law, and touts an open conception of a national community in which everyone has a stake. Shades of old friend One Nation Labour from the Ed Miliband era. On how Mainstream as a faction will work, there are commitments to pluralism, an openness to ideas, a commitment to defeat Faragism (or, borrowing from Stuart Hall, 'authoritarian populism'), and work to enhance democracy in the Labour Party. Looking through the signatories we find a mix of Jeremy Corbyn-associated figures, soft left MPs, and - fittingly enough - some from the mainstream of the parliamentary party.

This initiative will strike a chord with many members. Despite Labour's best efforts to to lose troublesome members, or as one Starmerite insider memorably put it, to "shake off the fleas", the much reduced rump left are likely to find plenty that's attractive about Mainstream. Not just because it contrasts with the Prime Minister's monochromatic managerialism, but the fact it speaks to their grievances. All across the party, including in the Labour machine, there are people weary of Morgan McSweeney's grip and are rightly concerned that he and Starmer are leading Labour over the cliff with their continued boosting of Reform and extreme right wing politics. Because of this and thanks to the accident of timing, the new faction could play a role in determining the outcome of the deputy leadership.

As argued here before, In theory Labour could bring it back and see off Reform because the party has the levers of government to do things. And pivoting toward popular policies instead of getting into a racist bidding war with Farage could undercut the extreme right's support. Racism doesn't drop from a clear blue sky - it is embedded in how economics and politics works, exacerbated by the choices made by governments. Assuming Labour does poorly at next year's local elections and Starmer is removed, a new leader with a Mainstream and a mainstream policy platform might be able to turn it around. But it would be far from easy, what with an eco-populist alternative and the menaces of a new viable left party.

Unfortunately for those involved and Labour as a whole, Mainstream is probably a couple of years or so too late. Had this coalition formalised itself to prevent Starmer's backsliding on his leadership pledges, it could have been a bulwark against his leadership's capitulations and stupidities and the fragmentation of the party base. The actions Labour really needed to take to arrest Reform and prevent it becoming a threat to democratic politics have had their moments in the recent past. The task now is much harder. And so in the spirit of comradeship, while I wish those on the Labour left involved with Mainstream well it does smack of being too little, too late.

The Uses of Lucy Connolly

The Lucy Connolly interview at this weekend's Farage Fest, variously available on extreme right wing YouTube outlets, was interesting. Having served her time for inciting violence online as racist mobs went on the rampage last summer, Connolly has been variously used by Reform, by a further diminishing Tory party, and by the right wing press as a free speech martyr. But it seems she's quite happy to be so utilised, saying to the always-ridiculous Allison Pearon that she looks forward to "working with Reform". Don't be surprised if she ends up as a parliamentary by-election candidate before long.

What we got from her conversation was an exercise in right wing grievance politics. As a mother, and one who lost a child to apparent NHS negligence 12 years previously, her concern is that unchecked immigration is a threat to her daughter and other children. Surely anyone with an ounce of compassion can see the sudden trauma of the Southport murders might cause an otherwise powerless woman to lash out? That in fact her call to set fire to hotels full of refugees came from a place of love and care? Connolly then argued that the courts were handing down much tougher sentences following Keir Starmer's remarks about far right thuggery. An example was to be made of her and, therefore, she was a political prisoner. We learned that while she was inside, her entitlements to leave were abrogated, and that even photographs of her daughter wrapped in the Union jack - following her victories in junior Golf - were denied. Her treatment only improved after Richard Tice went and visited her, with the Reform audience guffawing at the imagined bowing and scraping these now frightened prison official emoted before their future master.

This blog has previously visited right wing victimhood and its propensity to moan and whinge about how unfair everything is. Understanding this begins with acknowledging how their politics are fundamentally dishonest, because Faragism, just like the conservatism he came out of, has to present the minority interest - that of the oligarchy of the City, finance, propert, etc. - as the universal interest. Farage is a cannier peddler of this moonshine than the best the Tories can currently offer, and he uses the old populist tricks to creat a "them" of establishment elites and do-gooders, versus an "us" oppressed by political correctness, race hate laws, and people that might answer back. To get a bit abstract about it, the received idea of citizenship grew out of the exclusion of gendered, racialised, and classed others, and what the extreme right here and everywhere want to retain is this power to (arbitrarily) exclude. The imaginary of losing the privilege to define is a powerful attractor for some who feel excluded from politics and society, and the promise of its restoration is a harbinger for the return of certainty, of feeling in control again. This abstraction reflects the concrete realities of class politics - of a ruling class worried about its reproduction, the decline of the West, the right's dependence on the old, and the, for want of a better phrase, petit-bourgeoisification of retired people. The politics of Leave, of Boris Johnson, and now of Nigel Farage is a politics of being under siege. And to lift any siege, sharp initiatives and decisive actions are necessities. But those "solutions" consume much less energy than the performance the right affects of being victimised. It is a contrivance.

Yet Connolly, despite her gushing thanks to Reform and Allison Pearson might prove something of an unreliable partisan. Toward the end of her interview, she talked about the unfairness of the criminal justice system, of how (she felt) she wasn't able to access proper legal advice shortly after her arrest because it was at the weekend, the injustice of waiting long periods on remand, how her experience of prison has made her passionate about reforming the system, and - echoing common feminist arguments, that most women inside shouldn't be. Remarks that earned a smattering of applause. Which indicates straight away the direction Reform are using and want to carry on using Connolly's "plight". She is a martyr, an emblem of a two-tier Britain where we've become, to use Starmer's phrase, an "island of strangers". But where she has actually drawn compassionate lessons from her own experience, they're not interested. We'll see in due course if the rewards of being a useful puppet for Reform will override her desire to do something about the shortcomings of the criminal justice system.

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After Angela Rayner

So much for my forecasts. The report of the government's standards' advisor found that Angela Rayner's failure to pay the correct stamp duty on her £850k Brighton pad was not motivated by avoidance, but she should have sought the appropriate specialist advice. As such, she broke the Ministerial Code. Under these circumstances, there was no way Rayner could brazen it out as many a Tory minister had under the ancien regime, and she quickly located a sword to fall on to. This left Keir Starmer with two headaches. Who to appoint Deputy Prime Minister, and the difficulties arising from the election of a new Deputy Leader for the Labour Party.

To be fair to Starmer, and true to his state bureacrat background he has moved swiftly to prevent festering speculation by carrying out a major cabinet reshuffle. David Lammy is Rayner's replacement, and adds Lord Chancellor and the justice brief to his portfolio. Yvette Cooper Has been shifted from the Home Office to Foreign Secretary. Whether that's because Starmer is dissatisfied with her performance in the doomed effort to stop the boats awaits commentary from helpful insiders. She's replaced by Shabana Mahmood, who has something of a reputation of taking on thankless tasks and, before Labour entered government, received little thanks in return. The recently promoted Darren Jones find his new job as cabinet enforcer (the absurdly-titled Chancellor of the Grand Duchy of Lancaster) subsuminng his new-old job as Chief Secretary to the PM. Pat McFadden is off to the DWP, while Liz Kendall carries the can for the welfare debacle and resurfaces as science minister. Also in is Wee Dougie as the Scotland minister, and out is Ian Murray - a permanently soggy tea towel long overdue a hanging-out to-dry. And gone is Lucy Powell, or Andy Burnham's representative in cabinet. With her and Rayner warming seats on the backbenches, no other Labour cabinet has had as many right wingers sitting around the table.

Stuffing your top team with think-alikes presents its own problem: the other trends and shades of opinion in the parliamentary party do not have representatives shaping "phase two" of Starmer's government. Appearing decisive and not shilly-shallying around with the appointments closes down speculation now, but could cause political problems later. And this is where the deputy leadership contest rears its ugly head.

With the cabinet a monochromatic grey of tired, obsolete managerialism, there is every danger the upcoming election might see an outbreak of politics. Of course, the gatekeepers will ensure that no one from the Campaign Group will get a look in. But there is unhappiness on the backbenches. Careerists impatient to begin climbing the career ladder, honourable members irked at McSweeney's arrogance and thuggery, worry warts concerned that the racism is inflaming, not dampening support for Reform, Starmer supporting the Palestinian genocide, and going out of their way to attack the most vulnerable. The moment is ripe for old hands and new faces to make a splash, and therefore the possibility of embarrassment. For Starmer, it would be preferable that the contest did not happen and that a single loyalist figure comes forward, but the pre-recess welfare rebellion makes such an enforced outcome difficult. McSweeney's threats didn't work then and caused a great deal of upset among the PLP. With the party firmly on the skids they probably won't cut the mustard now.

And whatever the outcome, though the appointment of the party's deputy leader as Deputy Prime Minister is a convention, the presence of another politician with their own mandate from the MPs, membership, and union affiliates acts as a pressure on Starmer. He might, horrors, have to accommodate mass opinion. Blocking a contest, nobbling the candidates, or later refusing to appoint the deputy is not without risks. Especially now a left alternative is coalescing. So Rayner is down and out for now, but the mess she leaves is fraught with beartraps for a clodhopping leadership.

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Unravelling McSweeney

A handful of points on Patrick Maguire and Gabriel Pogrund's Get In: The Inside Story of Labour under Starmer.

1. This story is really a commentary on the activities of Keir Starmer and, more importantly, Morgan McSweeney. In fact, given the conversations, insights, and reflections on who was thinking and saying what and when from "sources close to the leadership", McSweeney should have been given a writing credit.

2. Virtually all the dirty tricks the Labour right pulled during the Jeremy Corbyn years (including some not covered previously) are confessed to. The barefaced lying, the arm twisting, the diddling with delegates, and the breaking of electoral law, everything is included. According to Labour legend, when John Spellar read John Golding's vainglorious The Hammer of the Left, he was pissed off that the right's dirty tricks were out in the open for all to see. Reading this book must have made his face melt.

3. On their co-author McSweeney, there are two mentions of planning meetings taking place at his mansion. Which reminded me that McSweeney is actually from a bourgeois background, and helps explain his antipathy to anything smacking of working class politics. Helps, but does not account for all. The pen portrait of McSweeney that emerges is of a bureaucrat who is hungry to smash the left and win elections. What he actually stands for is thin on the ground. There is nothing about a commitment to improving the health service, helping the vulnerable, and making sure education delivers equality of opportunity - which are the values even the most vacuous, tank-grown backbench Starmerite would admit to. But McSweeney does appear to care about immigration and hammering those who, like he once did, want to make their fortunes on these shores. In any other context, McSweeney would fit right in to the contemporary Tory party or, for that matter, Reform.

4. This, its predecessor volume (Left Out), and Tim Shipman's Brexit/Tory collapse quartet (All Out War, Fall Out, No Way Out, and Out), all share the same methodology: of politics boiled down to personalities and the clashes between them. This is soap opera for boring people. The interplay of interest and individuals is a matter of coincidence. In Get In, for instance, there is some discussion of Trevor Chinn and Waheed Ali and what they have done for the Labour right. In the latter's case, there's some treatment of freebiegate and his having once had a Number 10 pass, and his apparent veto on measures that would curb wealth concentration. But his support for the party is presented as an individual foible, not an exercise of his - and by extension - common oligarchical interests. As such this, like Shipman's work, political comment generally, and mainstream politics' obsession with biographies evidences a distorted picture of politics that they all share.

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Rayner in Danger

Her future is now in the hands of the government's independent standards commissioner, but if Angela Rayner's account of how she "forgot" to pay £40k in stamp duty is found to be substantially true, it's unlikely she'll have to resign from cabinet. Nevertheless, buying an £850k des res while holding the policy brief for overcoming Britain's housing crisis was a bad look to start with, reinforcing the popular perception that politicians are on the make. And reckless too, what with the historic low levels of support this government had to start with that have only got worse since.

The problem Rayner has is her role in government is not only to bring an otherwise staid operation a touch of colour, it's to blast the Tories over their rank hypocrisies. Such as around dodging tax. Even if the standards process exonerates her, it's not likely she'll front any attacks on this any time soon. At Prime Minister's Questions today, Keir Starmer made a public show of backing his deputy and, in another absence of tactical nous, Kemi Badenoch largely left the issue alone. But from Starmer's standpoint, losing Rayner would be a calamity - despite his backroom boys having previously had fun attacking her base in the party.

Unlike Starmer's relationship to Rachel Reeves, there has long been tension between leader and deputy but more recently it has proven productive. The PM brings (or, rather, brought) the vibes of managerial competence and Mr Rules probity, while Rayner can convincingly appear authentic - more so than other cabinet continuity Blairites from similarly humble backgrounds. And when it comes to elections, Rayner's easy-going charisma is a boon for a government of empty suits and non-personalities. Without the cover she provides, it's difficult to see any other Labour figure filling her shoes and belting out the John-Prescott-in-a-skirt numbers. Without her, Labour in office appears even more alienating and divorced from the working people it it affects to represent.

The Tories, however, are cock-a-hoop. Their hostility to Rayner isn't simply snobbery. After all, until recently there were a few working class Conservatives that sat on their benches. Rather, despite her patchy politics that swing between the soft left and the stupidities of Blue Labour, what irks the Tories and the leader writers of the unhinged right wing press is what she represents: the presence of trade unions in political life. For these people, the very hint of working class collectivism, no matter how diluted, is something our hyper class conscious gatekeepers of permissible politics cannot stomach. For them, the prize of Rayner's departure is not so much getting rid of a key prop of Starmer's premiership but the sinking of the workers' rights agenda she has championed. How likely would that be taken up with any enthusiasm by a replacement?

Given the stale set of promises Labour were elected on, and how much this government is already subsumed by capital's interests, we're in the less than optimal situation where the watered down promises to improve workers' rights might rest on Rayner's beleaguered shoulders alone. And it's for this reason, and this reason only, why we should be careful about cheering on her departure.

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The Greens' Historic Opportunity

Congratulations to Zack Polanski for his emphatic victory in the Green Party leadership race. Carving out an 84% share of the votes shows a depth of support that can't simply be written off as refugees from Corbynism. Even under the outgoing leadership of Carla Denyer and Adrian Ramsay, the party's left wing turn had powered it to a record number of MPs, councillors, and London Assembly members. Armed with an unapologetic "eco-populism" unafraid of attacking concentrated wealth and using class-based arguments to criticise Labour's doomed efforts to out-barbarise Nigel Farage and Reform, Polanski has a clear strategy for appealing to the disaffected. But is it reasonable to suppose the Greens' upward trajectory will continue?

There's a yawning gap for the party to fill. While the Greens have traditionally been seen as a radical petit bourgeois party because, in all honesty, they were, its environmental and social justice messaging is resonating far beyond its narrow, traditional support base. There are events like the Palestinian genocide, the racist scapegoating of asylum seekers, the junking of environmental protections, and the experience of being at the sharp end of class inequality that are neglected by the mainstream but are nevertheless shaping politics, and are issues the Greens have ready answers for. And there is the wider shift in class relations as well, where the growing dominance of immaterial labour is reinforcing socially liberal values. The Greens' vibes resonate with ever wider layers of workers while its policy platform is largely consistent with their perception of their interests. For example among the cohorts most thoroughly socialised into the social competencies immaterial labour requires, the latest YouGov poll reports they are on 27% among 18-24 year olds, four points clear of Labour and 12 points ahead of the Tories and Reform combined.

As noted previously, there are a couple of obstacles in the Greens' way. Can Polanski keep hold of the small c conservatives that supported the party in Waveney Valley and North Herefordshire while going for the broadening progressive vote? And what about the new Corbyn/Sultana party? Indicative polling shows it could command up to a fifth of the electorate right out of the gate, and the silly numbers that have signed up to the mailing list casts a shadow that dwarves the aggregate size of the rest of Britain's political parties. The new left party will be fishing in similar waters, and then some. Polanski knows this, and welcomed its formation while holding out the possibility of cooperation. A putative alliance would apparently attract a third of all votes as a starting point.

You'll note that Labour isn't listed as an obstacle. Bullishly, Polanski has declared his ambition to replace it. After a summer of chasing Reform voters and reaping the reward of ever-declining polling, Labour are now congenitally incapable of fielding political arguments against the left. For example, this sponsored(!?) piece on LabourList tries building something out of Keir Starmer's "power, not protest" drivel. With a straight face, Robert Knowles-Leak, a self-styled specialist in combatting the Greens in (*checks notes*) Bristol, shamelessly accuses Polanski of pushing divisive politics and offering false hope. He says the Greens offer easy solutions and have broken promises in his home town by selling off council houses, without noting that Labour have done little to nothing to replace the 22,000 lost in the city since the early 1980s. An oversight, I'm sure. Summing up, he says serious parties listen to the electorate. But the Greens are listening to the electorate, it's Starmer, McSweeney and co. that have decided the people's priorities on the environment, on Gaza, on housing, and on the NHS are not worth bothering with. In other words, a weird little piece that reproduces every accusation-is-really-a-confession trope.

With nothing to offer progressive voters, Labour's defences against Polanski's eco-populism are so many chocolate fireguards. The Greens stand on the threshold of an historic opportunity, and every sign points towards their readiness to capitalise on it.

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How Not to Cover a Reshuffle

The new parliamentary term began today, and Keir Starmer led it off with a small reshuffle. Darren Jones has moved from the Treasury to 'Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister', a new position in charge of "delivery". Baronness Minouchie Shafik, having previously done stints at the IMF and Bank of England is now Starmer's chief economic advisor, and Tim Allan - former Blair lackey and founder of the Blairite comms firm, Portland, is confirmed as the sole head of Downing Street's PR machine. Gone is Liz Lloyd, another Blair era appointee, to make way for Jones. Politically, does it mean anything? Does it signify a fresh start? No. The government remains the same slow motion car crash it was yesterday.

That hasn't stopped some from trying to read significance into these mainly managerial moves. In some of the most tenedentious commentary I've read recently, for the Telegraph associate editor Gordon Rayner declares this was "a power grab" that shows Rachel Reeves is on borrowed time. The evidence? Moving Jones to Number 10 leaves the chancellor "publicly humiliated". Mindful that Prime Ministers who sack their next door neighbours aren't long for this political world, this is apparently an element of a low-key campaign to make her life impossible and force Reeves's resignation after her multiple misfires in office.

This, alas, is an exercise in right wing wishful thinking. A point underlined by the additional comment provided by John Redwood. For one, if the framing was true there would be "insiders" touting anonymous briefings. Maybe Rayner's contact list has a dearth of Labour numbers, so he couldn't find anyone to give him the inside track. But nowhere else is running the line that this is a constructive dismissal effort. Not even the gossip mongers at Guido, who prefer to dwell on how Jones's appointment takes some responsibilities off Pat McFadden. If displeasure underpins the reshuffle, one could make a more plausible case for it being at the expense of his brief, not Reeves's.

Since Reeves's appointment, there is some truth to the notion that she has blindsided Starmer, particularly with last summer's debacle over winter fuel payments. One might suggest Starmer had no choice but to stick by his chancellor so early in the new government, but her initiative was consistent with the Labour right's approach to social security. And it proved to be the jumping off points for further attacks, most of which have been blunted or abandoned. These cannot be layed solely at Reeves's door. The Prime Minister nodded every one on, and his unelected henchmen were greenlit to do their worst "persuading" opposition-minded MPs to back the line.

There is no truth in the view that Starmer and Reeves are in tension, let alone at splitting point. He has accepted her outlook, conditioned as it is by the Treasury/Bank of England/City nexus as the commonsense view on matters economic - reinforced by Shafik's appointment. This reshuffle is business-as-usual and more of the same. And Rayner's Telegraph piece? A case study of forcing the facts to fit a baseless conclusion. Which just about sums up the entirety of right wing politics in the moment of Conservatism's collapse.

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Five Most Popular Posts in August

I can't help it. With only six posts to boast about I am still rigidly committed to delivering a monthly overview of what happened on the blog, no matter how absurd the exercise. I'm stuck, incapable of breaking the habit. So here are the five.

1. Rachel Reeves's Pitiful Attack on Corbyn
2. Some Changes
3. Local Council By-Elections July 2025
4. Five Most Popular Posts in July
5. Local Council By-Elections August 2025

The aim for September? To crowd out by-election and monthly round ups with enough content folk will find worth reading.

As explained the other day, as Britain has baked under the glaring sun your scribe has been contending with burnout of their own. The good news is that I've had a bit of a break and found some renewed inspiration in the development of the new party. And returning to my old muckers Hardt and Negri to make sense of the intersection between class and political dynamics. Perhaps it will bear fruit in the not too distant where this place is concerned. Here's to the Autumn!

Spagna - Call Me

There is a post bubbling under. Honest, guv! But we're having a bit of a film night this evening so here's a cheesy placeholder for your delight/despair.

Local Council By-Elections August 2025

This month saw 34,125 votes cast in 15 local authority contests. All percentages are rounded to the nearest single decimal place. 10 council seats changed hands. For comparison with July's results, see here.

Party	Number of Candidates	Total Vote	%	+/- Jul	+/- Aug 24	Avge/ Contest	+/- Seats
Conservative	16	4,777	14.0%	-4.6	-6.9	299	-4
Labour	14	7,184	21.1%	+4.5	-8.2	513	-5
Lib Dem	13	5,248	15.4%	-2.7	+3.9	404	+2
Reform*	16	8,794	25.8%	-2.1	+19.2	550	+5
Green	12	2,948	8.6%	-0.4	-0.9	246	+2
SNP**	1	1,142	3.3%	+3.3	-6.4	1,142	0
PC***	2	1,128	3.3%	+1.5	+1.1	564	0
Ind****	10	2,218	6.5%	-1.3	-2.2	221	0
Other*****	9	686	2.0%	+1.7	+0.5	76	0

* Reform's comparison results are based on recomputing their tallies from last year's Others
** There was one by-elections in Scotland
*** There were three by-elections in Wales
**** There were two Independent clashes
***** Others in June consisted of Abolish Holyrood (27), Brixtowe Alliance (275), Gwlad (6), Pirate Party (11), Propel (327), TUSC (29, 1), UKIP (5), Workers' Party (15)

And the Tories come fourth with a truly terrible share of aggregate votes. Not quite the worst as the 13.1% recorded in April this year is their floor. So far. And so having spent the entire month sounding like the BNP to try and outdo Reform has paid obvious dividends on the council front. Another pitiful month for Labour too, though it does have the consolation of popping its head above the 20% barrier this month. Meanwhile, the Greens and Lib Dems will be pleased with their performances and, with weary predicability, Nigel Farage comes out on top. Albeit with a second month in vote share fall.

It's worth remembering that Reform's performance is not a reflection of growing support, but rather by-elections catching up with the opinion polling shift that has already taken place. And what that tells us is, bearing in mind that elderly voters disproportionately turn out for council by-elections, that the Tory goose is well and truly cooked. But given how far they've shifted to the right, are there any meaningful political differences between them and Reform? No. The only real difference is the latter is far more credible with right wing voters where delivering their hateful agenda is concerned. Meaning that the space for the Conservative is rapidly evaporating.

7 August
Cannock Chase, Hednesford Green Heath, Ref gain from Lab
Carmarthenshire, Llangennech, Ref gain from Lab
Durham, Easington & Shotton, Ref hold

14 August
Cardiff, Grangetown, Grn gain from Lab
Newcastle, South Jesmond, Grn gain from Lab

21 August
Doncaster, Bentley, Ref hold
East Hampshire, Alton Amery, LDem hold
East Renfrewshire, Barrhead, Liboside & Uplawmoor, Lab hold
Gwynedd, Abermaw, Ind hold
Hounslow, Cranford, Lab hold
Runnymede, Addlestone South, Ref gain from Con x2
Surrey, Addlestone, Ref gain from Con
Surrey, Hinchley Wood, Claygate & Oxshott, LDem gain from Con

28 August
Broxtowe, Nuthall East & Strelley, Con hold
Camden, West Hampstead, LDem gain from Lab