I must begin by saying these are only my first ideas and impressions of the disastrous British General Election of 2019. This is a disaster for the British left and there is no way around that. There will need to be serious analysis of the reasons for the British General Election result; the reasons for why a man who openly expresses his contempt for the British working class could win the support of some of the working class will require an analysis in the transformation in allegiances from at least Margaret Thatcher forwards. We can draw some general conclusions, but in a complex situation trying to understand why large sections of the British working class voted to literally throw themselves under a bus requires serious analysis. The British working class is by no means a united group of people; there are clearly differences in their voting patterns which depend on where they live, their notion of what they believe would be the “solution” to their problems and whom they blamed for their situation and why are not simple.
The role of national chauvinism cannot be ignored; the destruction of what some members of the working class viewed as their place in Britain and the world and who was responsible for that is important. What they viewed as the potential answer to their issues in their lives, of course, differed; yet, the acceptance by large parts of the former industrial and manufacturing working class of the interpretation of some sections of the ruling class, that the answer was leaving the EU clearly was accepted. While for the right-wing of the ruling class it was the EU which threatened their ability to undermine workers’ conditions, the public sector and the welfare state, and forced them to adhere to regulations around production, protection of the environment (even minimal as they were) were a brake to their complete control over the economy, for the working class these regulations provided some minimal protection against the worst excesses of the capitalist system. This is not to deny that the EU is a “bosses club”, of course it is, but sections of the British ruling class resented the EU’s brake on their aspirations for the British economy. How did some sections of working class people come to see that the EU represented a threat to their “sovereignty,” as though they ever had sovereignty, is something that needs to be understood.
Some beginning thoughts on the election results
Are the interests of the ruling class coincident with that of the working class? In reality, this is certainly not the case. Yet, some members of the British working class seem to accept this. Understanding why is important and that will require serious analysis which I can only begin to ask questions to rather than provide answers. Can it be argued that the working class understands its own interests in this situation? I would say no, the self-identification of some of the British working class with the most right-wing of the British ruling class whose destruction of our public sector (and public services), workers’ incomes and working conditions and with attacks on the welfare state cannot even be explained by the view that British working class has sunk into gross individualism as on an individual level this affects them and their families deeply.
While people may not have the sense of community and society that existed previously to the ideological perspective defined in Margaret Thatcher’s view that “there is no such thing as society” being accepted; even the fantasies of aspirations cannot explain this phenomenon completely. It certainly has a role but it cannot explain completely why people voted and accepted the needs and desires of the most right-wing section of the British ruling class as somehow representative of their own.
Moreover, we need to understand what national chauvinism offers to some sections of the working class and why this was accepted while actually positive transformations offered in the Labour Party Manifesto which not only would improve their lives and those of their children and grandchildren were not accepted; an understanding of the politics of despair and how to combat it is needed. The role of the loss of privilege of sections of the white British working class and its identification with the loss of power and privilege of Britain on an international level is relevant here and must be further analysed; this was strongly fed by the arguments in support of Brexit by its advocates around the question of “sovereignty” and what Britain’s correct place in the world should be and would be if Brexit were undertaken.
Clear evidence of the solidification of right wing populism among some sections of the British working class were evident during and after the Brexit referendum; the reasons for this shift, of course are essential in understanding the vote in the General Election. Correctly worry about this vote and what is could portend abounded among the centre and left in Britain. It was a warning and it was taken seriously and not only due to the attacks on EU migrants and people of colour in Britain following the Brexit referendum. The 2017 general election led as we know to a hung Parliament in which the British Conservative and Unionist Party was essentially propped up by the Scottish Tories and the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP). The Labour Party offered a progressive manifesto which contrary to all expectations of the MSM increased the LP share. Theresa May’s inability to get her Brexit deal through and the massive political, economic and social divisions in Britain were only magnified in this period.
The issue of the Left not offering something to the working class was not the scenario this election. The shift away from Labour in its traditional heartlands since the triangulation of New Labour (and the feeling of abandonment this caused) which added to the misery of the workers of the former manufacturing and industrial sectors clearly played a role. But the Labour Party manifesto argued for a radical transformation in Britain towards a positive future for the vast majority rather than the few who have gained from both 3rd way triangulation of New Labour and the hard austerity of the Con-Dem and Conservative governments.
There however was no good way to deal with Brexit for the Labour Party, this was a problem imposed on the whole of Britain due to divisions among the British ruling class. Given the voting in the Brexit referendum, there was no obvious answer for the Labour Party. Whilst its members overwhelmingly supported remain, the reality was that large sections of the working class in England and Wales supported Brexit.
From the point of view of Scotland and the North of Ireland where Remain won in the Brexit referendum, the situation clearly differed. The North of Ireland’s representatives in Parliament (given that Sinn Féin doesn’t take its seats in the Westminster Parliament), were predominantly the DUP who propped up Theresa May’s minority government and then rejected both Theresa May (which had support in the North) and then Boris Johnson’s deals. This contradiction with the democratic vote in the North of Ireland has come back to punish them; the DUP lost two seats, one to Sinn Féin and one to the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP); (Sinn Féin lost the seat of Foyle to the SDLP which is why their overall seat numbers remain unchanged) and the Alliance Party took its first seat in the Westminster Parliament. In Scotland, the desire to remain in the EU was clear; yet as pointed out over and over again by politicians of the SNP the Scots were being dragged out of the EU against their will.
These differences amongst the British working class itself meant that trying to prevent a Brexit election was important; as once this became The Brexit election everything turned on trying to stop Brexit from being the dominant reason for how people voted. Preventing this from happening turned out not to be possible due to the actions of the Liberal Democrats and the Scottish National Party (SNP) who acceded to Boris Johnson’s demands for an election; this left Labour little choice but to follow suit.
The SNP saw the chance to consolidate their position given Ruth Davidson’s (the former leader of the Scottish Tories) retirement and Scotland’s general support for Remain. They were incredibly successful in reaching this goal; winning 45% of the vote share and now holding 48 of 59 Scottish seats in Westminster (so they won 13 more seats and improved their vote share by 8.1.) The Liberal Democrats led by Jo Swinson made several errors which can be explained by amateurishness, hubris and self-delusion; primary among them was the vote at the Lib Dem conference to call for revoking Article 50 (if they won) instead of staying with a second referendum, her ridiculous belief that she was running to be the leader of the country, and her refusal to support even an interim caretaker PM role for Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Party. Casually using both red-baiting and the slur of antisemitism against the LP and Jeremy Corbyn’s inability to deal with it (should we be grateful that she didn’t call him an antisemite?) made her positions appalling. For example, see at her statement to the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) meeting; why she felt the need to say this to the CBI would be a mystery normally, but I cannot help thinking that somehow she thinks that the CBI has large numbers of Jewish members and that this is a beautiful example of antisemitism in practice; she and her party cynically attacked Labour and they directly are responsible for the loss by the LP of two seats in London (in Chingford and Woodford Green and in Kensington) where they had a good chance of winning; whether their chances of winning in the Cities of Westminster and London were as good needs further discussion. Acceding to Boris Johnson’s demand for an election rather than getting an agreed second referendum through Parliament was stopped by her sectarianism and instead of stopping Brexit, we will now face a hard Brexit and 5 years under the rule of right-wing Tories at a time when austerity has crippled not only the economy (which has been stagnant for some time) but the lives of the majority in Britain (especially women, people of colour and the disabled).
Role of MSM and Vilification of Jeremy Corbyn
It was a rather interesting thing to observe the general election; the victor, The Conservative and Unionist Party and its leader Boris Johnson who is a man whose stock in trade is lies; this is the man who voters have put in office. We see a large amount of lies, misrepresentations and spin being used in the general election; the site First Draft news has compiled some of this information for the general election campaign on 9th of November and on the 22nd of November and it doesn’t make for nice reading. On the 6th of December, first draft discussed the online campaign of the Tories on facebook:
“With 12 days until polling day, the Conservative Party massively stepped up its ad campaign on Facebook, running almost 7,000 ads and spending more than £50,000 between November 27 and December 3, according to the latest figures from Facebook’s Ad Library.
First Draft accessed the Facebook Ad Library API to download all 6,749 ads from the Conservative Party between December 1 and December 4. Some 88% (5,952) of the most widely promoted ads featured claims about the NHS, income tax cuts, and the Labour Party which had already been labelled misleading by Full Fact.
Not every ad includes the misleading claim directly in its image or caption. At least 54% (3,646) of the total ads served link to a webpage carrying the misleading claims.”
The use of the lie, disinformation and misinformation on the part of political parties campaigning in the election was at times impressive. The use of the lie is pernicious and also dangerous as the ability to discern the truth becomes ever more complicated. As I said previously, the manner in which news is being reported for example, on the BBC in its version of “balanced reporting is that information in and of itself is rarely provided; instead people are brought on to represent different sides often from the so-called MSM and then someone is brought on from the far-right to defend the person or position being criticised. Rarely does someone from the left get an opportunity to comment on so-called mainstream discussions unless they were coming from the left itself. As a result, nothing from the Left is left uncontested while the Left rarely has the opportunity to comment directly on the right or centre.
Another thing that has also became apparent in the general election is the use of political insiders by journalists (specifically of the Tory party) to provide information without basic fact-checking. This is how false accusations provided by the Tories such as a LP activist attacked an aide of Matt Hancock after his visit to a hospital in Leeds (where a child suspected of suffering from pneumonia lay on the floor for hours) were then tweeted by Laura Kuenssberg and Robert Peston. The Tories were forced to row back on the claim; but it shifted the story away from Boris Johnson’s unwillingness to even look at a picture of the child and pocketing of the mobile phone of the Daily Mirror reporter. One of the advertisements that appear on the BBC for their Brexit and General Election podcasts state that it is the participants “inside knowledge and access to politicians in Brussels and Britain” that enable them to make good insights; but the issue is more important, one thing is access to inside knowledge and politicians, another is relying on the specific politicians of one party for this information and repeating this information. That moves you from a purveyor of fact to being complicit on the behalf of one party and that is anything but balanced reporting. This is one example of many and it is not a small issue.
It would be remiss of me to not discuss the issue of media balance but serious analysis of the role of the MSM and its vilification of Jeremy Corbyn is already being done by people with a far wider knowledge of the media than I have.
This election was labelled the “marmite election” by the MSM; they argued that the leaders of the various political parties were either loved or loathed. But there is more to that as always and we need to recognise the role of the MSM in the construction of these narratives themselves as they do not come out of thin air.
As Richard Seymour points out:
“It is absolute truth that ‘Corbyn’, qua media persona, was an issue for some voters on the doorstep. However, that simply pushes the question back. Why was ‘Corbyn’ more of an issue this time? What did people, who didn’t care about the IRA allegations and the ‘security risk’ trolling two years ago, and who had already voted for a left-wing manifesto, and who seem to be fine with most of the policies, object to? What had changed in the wider political context? What had changed about his leadership? Why did some of these voters suddenly have trouble deciding what Corbyn stood for? I predict there will be no convincing answer from those who want Labour to veer right. They will repeat the same shibboleths they’ve been uttering since 2015. They will learn nothing.”
Knowing that an election will be ugly and witnessing it are in some senses separate things; but this is often only because while you may be prepared for something it doesn’t mean that you will not be shocked when it actually happens. As Jonathan Cook has written:
“In this election, the BBC cast off its public-service skin to reveal the corporate Terminator-style automaton below. It was shocking to behold even for a veteran media critic like myself. This restyled BBC, carefully constructed over the past four decades, shows how the patrician British establishment of my youth – bad as it was – has gone.
Now the BBC is a mirror of what our hollowed-out society looks like. It is no longer there to hold together British society, to forge shared values, to find common ground between the business community and the trade unions, to create a sense – even if falsely – of mutual interest between the rich and the workers. No, it is there to ringfence turbo-charged neoliberal capitalism, it is there to cannibalise what’s left of British society, and ultimately, as we may soon find out, it is there to generate civil war.”
While never surprised by the actions of the mainstream press, I was honestly shocked. The casual expressions of red-baiting were impressive; just google Jeremy Corbyn and Communist and Jeremy Corbyn Marxist; this is not only the usual suspects of The Sun, The Express, The Daily Mail, let’s also not forget the Guardian, he was erroneously accused of being a Communist spy by both The Guardian and The Sun. If you need a laugh (a bitter one at that), read this article from the ”this is money website” where he is not only a Marxist but a self-hating member of the middle class. Heck, even former LP MP Chuka Umunna and then the TIGS (aka Change UK and finally settling in the Lib Dems) called him a Marxist, whilst Peter Mandelson called his politics that of quasi-Marxism. This criticism from not only expected newspapers, but some of the so-called centrist papers and politicians provides for unpleasant reading. Corbyn is a democratic socialist, not a revolutionary Marxist but that was irrelevant and many people today do not have the slightest notions of what a Marxist stands for.
The casual red-baiting of a politician that is simply saying that we do not have to continue the ruinous policies of austerity and neoliberalism and that we can create a more just and equal future for all of Britain is important as it seals in attitudes that there is nothing that can be done but to continue our march into misery for the majority. I grew up in the 1960s and 70s US, red-baiting was then and is still common currency; but even though I grew up in a country where red-baiting was part of the essential verbiage of politicians and political commentators, this was impressive.
However, as we have seen many of these accusations (Jeremy Corbyn supports the IRA, he was a communist spy, that he is a Marxist, he supports Hamas and Hizbollah, he is not a patriot, he is a traitor, he is a security risk, and he is an antisemite, etc) are old coin. What was different this time that some of these accusations actually stuck. I spoke with people on the street, working people at my home that had a bit of a water entry crisis during this period, and listened in on people going about their lives; many of them actually believed some of these accusations. When they said they didn’t like him, and I had the opportunity to query further, I asked why. Unfortunately the resurgence of my Meniere’s disease made it hard for me to talk to people on the doorstep as canvassing was problematic as an understatement; my information is limited and second-hand and I am more than reluctant to draw conclusions based on my limited experience and 2nd hand information. Seymour argues that the main difference between this election and 2017 was between a resurgent Tory party and a reanimated right who rebuilt its popular support on Brexit.
My neighbour (a recently retired London cabbie) suggested that Corbyn was lacking charisma; when I pushed further (we talk politics often, he is a good human being that believes in solidarity but has also spoken with many people in the course of his work) he spoke about antisemitism. He was surprised that I, a Jew, supported Corbyn. I was rather surprised as well, and I told him about the 1987 Islington Jewish cemetery story I discuss below, he knew nothing about it and was surprised to hear of it. So why is this the case? Two friends of mine campaigning for Labour in two different constituencies in London were called Nazis and antisemites; one of them is Jewish and when told he should not be campaigning in that area because Jews lived on the street, he stated that he was Jewish and was told that he would be the person turning the valves in gas chambers.
Perhaps for me, the accusation of antisemitism against Corbyn himself (as opposed to accusations of the “rampant” antisemitism in the LP), a man that stood beside Jews in Britain and fought against antisemitism was shocking. This is a man that has continuously stood against racism (which includes antisemitism) throughout his political life; it is an accusation that is grotesque and frightening. Answering charges of this nature are difficult; his actions throughout his political career of standing with Jewish people are ignored. One of the most important which is rarely discussed is his leadership in the campaign to save an historic Jewish cemetery under threat for redevelopment by Islington Council in 1987; these are not the actions of an antisemite.
In point of fact, antisemitism like all racism is something that exists in British society; the accusation that it is something that has to do with the left rather than the right is easily disputed. Part of the accusation has come about due to the redefinition of antisemitism by the IHRA and the examples utilised in the definition which relate to criticisms of political Zionism and Israel. The accusation of rampant antisemitism in Labour and its cynical utilisation by Rabbi Mirvis where he claimed that “Mr Corbyn has allowed the poison of antisemitism to take root in the Labour Party” was jumped on by the British MSM which ran with the story (endlessly repeated by the BBC and other news channels); now if Rabbi Mirvis has said that as a Tory he supported the Tory party, that would be fine. But he didn’t; instead he spoke as the Chief Rabbi (he is the Chief Rabbi of a specific sect of Modern Orthodox Jews called United Synagogues); he does not speak for the Haredi Jews, Reform Jews (although they share his scepticism of Corbyn) or Progressive and Liberal Jews (who had come out in support of Jeremy Corbyn) and he does not represent those self-identifying Jews that do not belong to synagogues. While claiming to speak for all British Jews, he actually doesn’t and his intervention in the election actually stokes the danger of antisemitism due to its enabling of the purveyors of white nationalism that are increasingly entering the so-called mainstream of political parties. Moreover, as Roland Rance states,
“The assertion that Zionism and support for Israel are an integral part of Jewish identity, which is at the heart of this argument, is in itself a deeply antisemitic position. It echoes the argument that Jews have a “dual loyalty”, that they are liable at the drop of a hat to betray the country in which they live. It ignores the large (and rapidly growing) number of Jews who reject the Israeli state and its pretensions to speak in the name of “the Jewish people”, and it obliges the much larger number who do not really have a position at all to identify as either “pro-Israel” (and thus proudly Jewish) or “anti-Israel” (and thus a treasonous self-hater).
In addition, this attempt to expand the meaning of the term antisemitism is already having the effect of discrediting the use of the term when appropriate, and of actually fostering racial antagonism towards Jews. After all, if someone watches a video of Israeli carnage in Gaza, of the destruction of entire areas and the slaughter of whole families, and is then told that any criticism of this is an attack on the Jewish people as a whole, they are likely to decide that, if this is what Judaism and Jewishness means, then maybe there really is a problem with “the Jews”.”
As an important aside, what is increasingly obvious in the rise of white nationalism is the support of many of these antisemites for the state of Israel. Donald Trump himself is an excellent example of an antisemite who strongly supports Israel (another obvious person is John Hagee of Christians United for Israel). Trump’s obvious antisemitism includes telling American Jews that Binyamin Netanyahu is “your” prime minister, his attacks against George Soros (the modern version of the Rothschild myth); his accusations of Jewish insufficient loyalty to Israel, his latest executive order declaring American Jews to be a nation (we are not a nation, we are citizens of the US, Britain, Argentina, etc) in the attempt to argue that support for BDS is antisemitic (so while antisemitic hate crimes have risen in the US, his own executive order furthers the antisemitic view that somehow Jews are separate, a nation apart from other Americans. If it was about religion and religious discrimination why does this not apply to all minority religions in the US? Importantly, the author of the IHRA definition of antisemitism Kenneth Stern has come out and criticised the weaponisation of the IHRA definition by right-wing Jews to limit freedom of speech on campuses noting that it is being misused by Trump’s executive order and right-wing Jews.
“The real purpose of the executive order isn’t to tip the scales in a few title VI cases, but rather the chilling effect. ZOA and other groups will hunt political speech with which they disagree, and threaten to bring legal cases. I’m worried administrators will now have a strong motivation to suppress, or at least condemn, political speech for fear of litigation. I’m worried that faculty, who can just as easily teach about Jewish life in 19th-century Poland or about modern Israel, will probably choose the former as safer. I’m worried that pro-Israel Jewish students and groups, who rightly complain when an occasional pro-Israel speaker is heckled, will get the reputation for using instruments of state to suppress their political opponents.”
Just in case, Trump’s antisemitism is not obvious, let’s not forget his comments to the Israel-American Council members on the 7th of December that they will vote for him to protect their money as though that is the concern of all American Jews and that their concern for their money overrides any other ideological considerations.
What is becoming Trump’s (and this is the case of many right-wing and far right politicians) favourite tool is the accusation of others for what they themselves are. Hence the accusations of racism against people of colour and anti-racism activists, accusations of antisemitism by antisemites, the Islamophobia, misogyny and racism so evident in comments by Boris Johnson is ignored while anti-racist campaigners are called racists and antisemites. This is part of a divide and conquer ideology that has proven to be particularly effective tool in the hands of the right and has not only enabled the normalisation of racism, misogyny and homophobia; it provides cover to those whose beliefs are racist, misogynist and homophobic.
What Next for the Left?
As Richard Seymour says, we lost and we lost badly and we need to own that.
We also need to recognise what a Johnson-led Tory victory means for the vast majority of people in this country. The Tory Party Manifesto was noticeably thin on policy beyond getting Brexit done; building a brighter future for Britain by unleashing Britain’s potential (obviously stymied by the evil EU), some investment in the NHS and Schools (both of which are devastated after more than a decade of austerity), a “cross-party consensus” on social care (already backtracked) and strengthening the Union (which given the results in Scotland and North Ireland already is in deep shite). The Tories are far too closely aligned with the oil and natural gas sectors; we must continue the struggle to hold them to accountability and there are many points where pressure can be applied in all forms of struggle. Kuba Shand-Baptiste writing in The Independent discusses in detail what this right-wing Tory government has pledged itself to do and we need to be prepared
Johnson has started off with a bang, already vowing to ban strikes on public transport. John Mann (the new “Anti-Semitism Tsar; really who cannot appreciate the irony in that job title) has already said that he will begin an investigation into left-wing media sites and their role on the rise of Jew hate in Britain. I am wondering if he will also investigate the assault on Rabbi Gluck visiting Britain for a wedding during the election. Oddly, only Jeremy Corbyn bothered to call the rabbi to see how he was doing. The worry that real antisemitic acts will not be taken seriously is not to be lightly dismissed.
As the struggles within the LP heat up and believe me they started the moment that the exit poll was released on election night, we need to discuss what we the left is going to do. The recriminations on Brexit and what we did wrong (should we have supported Brexit to win, should we have demanded remain, should a clear position been agreed earlier?), the left of the LP being a cult around Jeremy Corbyn, that the Manifesto went too far to the left, the demand to move the politics of the party to the centre (given how poorly the centre did in this election against a right-wing Tory party this will have limited legitimacy, but it will be argued by the right and centre of the LP).
What we need to do urgently and in further struggles:
- First, we must not allow the gains in the LP to be backtracked; there are several essential policies like the Green New Deal that we simply cannot not allow to be abandoned along with policies addressing Universal Credit and building a better Britain for the many that we must defend from being scrapped in the case of a shift to the centre in the hope of winning seats in the future. We cannot lose the gains of Corbynyism, they must be defended and we must defend the Labour left from any purges by the right of the LP. A drift towards the centre will not save the Labour Party; the centrists parties performed appallingly against a right-wing resurgence in Britain.
- Second, we must continue acting in solidarity with the victims of austerity which are the majority of Britains; if you think things are going to get better as the Tories have pledged some money to the NHS and education, I have some bad news for you. We must continue fighting for the rights of migrants, asylum seekers, the disabled, women, and those dependent on benefits and foodbanks just to survive. We must never stop fighting for our right to health care, decent housing and better conditions of life and in support of economic, political and social inequality. Our not being in government does not absolve us from our responsibility of solidarity to each other and it may just make the difference between deportation, homelessness and the usage of foodbanks by so many. Real solidarity is more than a word and we must practice it as much as we are able. The importance of groups like Unite Community and other organisations actively helping those in communities cannot be overstated.
- We must also help those young people that joined the struggle for a better Britain who may fall away from political work due to demoralisation. They are the future of our country and we need them in the struggle. We cannot cease our struggle against the climate catastrophe that we are living in and we need to support those fighting against governments and corporations who simply cannot be bothered to actually do more than say pretty words and put targets out that are too late to prevent the degeneration of our planet and its environment.
- We must continue the struggle to build both national and international trade unions to help workers continue their struggle against the further destruction of workers’ incomes and working conditions and we must stand together with those fighting against exploitation and oppression
- Finally, we must keep our movement international and stand in solidarity with workers in other countries facing attacks; the right-wing surge is international and we must stand together. If we cannot do so, then we will have failed not only ourselves but each other. We should know and expect the dangers and consequences of this international right-wing surge (of which Britain is only a part) and only by standing together across countries and borders will we be able to resist the current international rise of the far right.
What I’ve said sounds almost quaint … but there are principles that we can never abandon