Are the Labour Left losers?
Sometimes, when you’re tired, it’s nice to have someone do the legwork for you.
So instead of that long post about the history of class and gender inequality within the NHS, here’s Reuben over at The Third Estate making a quote out of an imagined statement ( I think):
‘Back in the 1980s the Labour party lurched to the left and made the party unelectable. Ultimately it was the hardline Labour left who were responsible for 18 grim years of Tory rule.’
Ever since Blair’s landslide victory in 1997 this has been the orthodoxy, both within the Labour party and amongst political commentators in general. It has been a stick with which to beat those who have demanded that Labour behave in a more principled and more genuinely progressive fashion while in office. It has been a means of frightening any waverers, and a powerful form of self-justification for the New Labour elite.
Labour’s impending defeat at the hands of the Tories will almost certainly create some kind of debate within the Labour Party about the way forward. As such it is time that some scrutiny was given to this still powerful, and influential narrative.
And here’s Luke, doing just what the person in the imagined statement said he might:
‘Insurgency from the left has afflicted Labour during every major period in opposition – the 1930s, the 1950s and the 1980s.
In every case it has been necessary to wage a long and bitter internal struggle to smash the left and purge entryists who are not democratic socialists in order to make the party electable again.’
And here’s me, with some facts about Labour insurgents:
‘While it’s not wholly reflective of the period, the general election results in Liverpool (the home of Militant) between 1974 and 1987 are revealing:
1974 (Oct): Labour 54.6% Tory 32.5%
1979: Labour 49% Tory 35.8%
1983: Labour 47.3% Tory 29.3%
1987: Labour 56.7% Tory 17.4%In a city not ‘traditionally’ Labour (in 1951 the Tories got 51% of the vote), the mid 1980s (Militant members were expelled in 1985) saw a huge swing to Labour. If the 10.7% swing between 1983 and 1987 had been repeated nationally, Labour would have won in 1987 with 325 seats.’
(Source for all data: Taafe P (pictured) and Mulhearn T (1988) Liverpool: A city that dared to fight (London: Fortress).
Militant had many faults, but in general electoral unpopularity was not one of them.’
As election fever hots up, Labour needs to remind itself: being leftwing can be a winner.
Yes what a triumph for Labour 1987 was! Stopped Margaret Thatcher dead in her tracks didn’t it? No more neglect of schools, hospitals or social services after that was there?
No point winning well in Liverpool when we’re losing badly in, for example, Gloucester and Croydon…
PS Louise Ellman (“One of the Blair government’s most loyal cheerleaders”) got 70.4% in Liverpool Riverside in 1997 and 71.4% in 2001…
Hi Paul,
I agree with the general argument (and have a post lined up about what focus groups were actually telling New Labour in the 1990s which supports this case), but the figures that you’ve got for Liverpool local elections show a 9.6% rise in support for Labour after Kinnock denounced the Militant and they were expelled – how does that support the case that the Militant were electorally popular?
My memories of Militant and Liverpool in the 1980s are pretty faint, but I don’t think that you can generalise from the Liverpool experience to the country as a whole. A large part of Militant’s appeal was their appeal to the ‘us vs. them’ mindset when the Tories were in power. Pretty shortly after Thatcher departed, the city council went NOC and in 1998 it went Lib Dem and has stayed so since (despite continuing to elect Labour MPs with resounding if falling majorities). Is this a pattern of electing councils that are from a party not in power at Westminster, or of electing councils that are to the left of the Westminster gov? Could technically be either, but the former seems more likely to me.
I’d also suspect that for every vote Militant won for Labour in Liverpool, several votes were lost in the marginal middle ground that Blair eventually captured in 1997 (this is the fault of the FPTP system, of course). But then perhaps I’m a victim of the popular narrative?
Generally I think electoral statistics are meaningless. They can be plausibly interpreted every which way, and without being inside the mind of every voter you just never know. There is no logical basis on which to prioritize the competing interpretations; were national issues having a big effect locally, for example? We just don’t know – and opinion polls are not reliable.
Much more accurate, from the point of view of the Left, is how we’re received on the ground when we go into workplaces to sell agitational newspapers, to support strikes and so on. Remember, we’re not aiming to represent the whole country – no party will ever do that. You can represent labour or capital, you can’t represent both. And you win, ultimately, by having your core supporters so united that capital is stymied and the middling sorts are buoyed towards our demands by a) the benefits it will bring and b) our unity and self confidence.
For which there are much better indicators than elections under a formal-democratic system as the extant one.
Brian @1: I’m not claiming the victory in Liverpool stopped Thatcher. What I am suggesting is that more leftwing approach has greater electoral appeal than is accorded in the New Labour narrative of the 1990s.
Dan @2: Yes, Dan, I purposely left that open last night. The popularity of Kinnock’s decision to expel Militant could, at first sight, explain the increase in the vote.
But I don’t think that stands up. Here’s the names of the 5 MPs who won in Liverpool in 1987: Eric Heffer,Eddie Loyden, Bob Parry, Bob Wareing, Terry Fields. all of these were members of the left who had, to varying degrees, supported Militant, and were recognised as leftwing.
I think all the detailed evidence points towards the 1987 vote being a vote of support for how the Left had fought in Liverpool against the Tories.
Rob @3: You’re right that Liverpool had some specfics that makes its hard to generalise from, and in fact (though I don’t have the figures to hand) I think you could argue that the Manchester Left is better evidence of how the Labour left was electorally successful, especially agaist the Tories and especially in council elections. I think I’m write in saying there is still no Tory councillor in Manchester.
Yes, what militant achieved was a very ‘us vs them’ victory in the 1980s, but I count that as a good thing, based on the success of Militant in getting a class-based message across.
I did say on the OP that Militant had faults, and I think this does account for their failure (or the Labour people who came after them) to cope with the rise of the LibDems, who were able to attack the very housing-focused ‘ultra-municipal socialism’ of Militant quite well, but I think the continued strength at parliamentary time (as evidenced by Brian @1) remains testament to Militant’s success ion more or less driving the Tories out from Liverpool (and Knowsley)
Dave @5: Yes, I agree, and I don’t spend my time hookd to electoral stats. The post was simply about rebutting the Labour right’s assertion that the Labour left is always a electoral liabilty – it’s prime (voiced) reason for wanting to marginalise us. It’s simply not true.