Thus spake Rosie Duffield, in her resignation letter to Keir Starmer. Absent is the obsequiousness that usually marks the form. It has the anger, if not the ranting quality of a furious Facebook status update. Yet that makes Duffield's letter effective. She has let her shock hang out and loosened her rage at the ride Starmer has taken the Labour membership, his MPs, and the electorate for. Duffield has channelled the disappointment of the Starmerist base into an unparliamentary intervention, boiling over with the sentiments that that had simmered on the back benches.
Last year Labour had the opportunity to ditch Duffield. She was always going to be a thorn in Starmer's side because of her transphobic campaigning. No matter how many times Wes Streeting restricts trans health care, or the genuflections Bridget Phillipson has made to "genuine concerns" about gender identity in schools, it would not have been enough for Duffield. But that she has attacked the leadership's integrity, and used the sort of hard language never employed by the soft left, is a surprise. Who can deny the substance of her argument? It's true. Starmer and friends have an entitlement complex to the trappings of office, and how they see nothing wrong with it is a reflex of the Labour right's self-importance. This isn't helped by Starmer's foolish efforts to emulate Emmanuel Macron, who has deliberately cultivated himself as a figure above politics unbeholden to the petty concerns of the little people. Look where that's got France.
Everyone knows Duffield is right and that Starmer is duplicitous. Especially those closest to Team Starmer, who are now unionising to fight wage cuts. What a way to show gratitude to one's underlings. While the media have indulged freebiegate and left the bigger scandal well alone, the damage to the new government's standing is real. The defences of Starmer's troughing, from it "didn't cost the taxpayer a penny" to the Prime Minister needing a wardrobe allowance was arrogant and dismissive, and has gone down as you might expect. Note to the Labour leadership. The poll bounce after a conference speech is supposed to go the other way.
Because Duffield is a cause celebre for transphobic centrists, her resignation will feed the divisions in Starmer's base that were present well before he took office. And for those loyalists who lost no time trying to fob freebies off as unimportant, they are bound to discover how objectionable and appalling Duffield's "gender critical" politics are. You can anticipate the ministers on the politics shows saying she has been "unhappy" with the party for some time and this is sour grapes because she was passed over for a job (Duffield's letter is annoyed at the new no-marks who've been promoted over the time servers). None of this is going to rescue the situation. Starmer and co. are exposed as out of touch troughers while telling everyone else to tighten their belts, and what Duffield has done is opened up a division in the party that had been papered over. We're not even three months in yet.
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3 comments:
Everyone (or at least everyone here) knows that she's right about Starmer, but she seems to have a bit of an entitlement complex herself, or to be trying to speak for some that do. How dare other people be promoted instead of her, when she WON CANTURBURY? (Nothing at all to do with that "anti-Semitic" old Magic Grandpa, of course! Here, have a bone about Diane Abbott instead.) How dare seniority and time served not be the sole determinant of career progression? (A pitch to Keir's civil service base, perhaps...?)
Not really a flawless series of notes hit, is it? She's got a bit of alienation to offer to almost everyone; the "centrists", the Zionists, the careerists and social climbers, the socialists, the anti-genocidalists, the Class of '17, and the voters.
And given that she's only a household name for the transphobia, it's a wee bit tricky to pick a dog in this fight. Starmer has cause to be very grateful that she's such a divisive figure among both his friends and his enemies. Many of the latter won't want to be seen standing too close to her, and many of the former won't suffer any confusion over which side that their bread is buttered upon.
But...as Phil points out, what she says about the freebies resonates with many. Starmer has been troughing and appears to not see the problem. He is spectacularly out-of-touch with the public mood, which given the election was only 3 months ago should be concerning for his groupies.
Of course the response will focus on the individual and her flaws, but that is missing the point. Starmer's whole pitch has been that it will be a long, hard road, but if we ALL knuckle down and tough it out, things will get better. His entitled bleating about Arsenal boxes, fancy suits, smart specs, luxury apartments and Taylor Swift concerts sends a very different message: "You knuckle down, I'll keep rolling in it."
FFS! This makes Sunak look like a political genius! Meanwhile, the neoliberal machine continues to concentrate the wealth, extracting all the value, dehydrating public services and leaving a fragile husk
Politics and politicians are alienating most of the populace who have no trust in them or belief that they will do anything other than look after themselves. This is clear proof that "they are all as bad as each other". The decline in turnout, the drop in support for the big two, it all tells a tale of politics in crisis; an entirely self-made crisis. Rather than leading to a surge in Green votes, it seems more likely to boost the populist right.
I'm fairly sure that it is indeed concerning for his groupies, who are putting on a regular show of flailing in panic these days.
Like the Brexit dupes, they gambled on a desperate hope, and then had it spit in their faces just as everyone else had predicted.
But with 5 years in the bag, authoritarian control of the party, and an invincible majority, Starmer appears to have some time in which to indulge utter cynical complacency. And certainly is acting like he does (which we hardly needed poisonous terfshrooms to point out to us). The 70 million soul question is whether he has anything else to offer once the clock starts to run down... or whether this is really it. It's the dreadful latter possibility which is gnawing at more than a few minds. Does this political death spiral have an off ramp? Or are they all doomed to be systematically closed off by the fattened parasites, until we wind up in the abyss?
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