The Labour government is in complete disarray. Through the last month, a series of scandals have hit this government like an avalanche.
Editorial from Issue 59 of Socialist Alternative’s monthly newspaper. Get your copy today!
First came the scandal which saw the quick exit of Angela Rayner after it was revealed she had failed to pay £40,000 in stamp duty on the purchase of her £800,000 house in Brighton. As someone who was popular among the ‘soft left’ (or, more accurately, soft right) within the Parliamentary Labour Party, Rayner’s loyalty to Starmer had become an essential shield for him as Prime Minister. The removal of this leaves him ever more vulnerable, with the Deputy Leadership contest shining a spotlight on the brewing discontent on the Labour benches.
This discontent has been massively ratcheted up as new revelations about Peter Mandelson and the billionaire paedophile Jeffrey Epstein have hit the media.
Appointed British Ambassador to Trump’s US by Starmer, ‘The Prince of Darkness’ was famously quoted in 1999 giving a speech to US billionaires saying he was “intensely relaxed about people getting filthy rich”. It seems we weren’t aware of the full extent of just how comfortable he was not just with billionaires, but with an individual billionaire who used his wealth and power to abuse dozens of young girls.
One letter from Mandelson to Epstein while he was in prison read: “I think the world of you and I feel hopeless and furious about what has happened. I can still barely understand it. It just could not happen in Britain. Your friends stay with you and love you.” The fact Starmer knew about this connection, yet chose to appoint Mandelson anyway, gives a sickening taste of what the capitalist elite really think; their contempt for the victims of abuse, and their confidence that it is ‘one law for us and another for them’.
Labour’s polling figures currently put them on track for a historic defeat, with some polls placing the party on as little as 16%! Starmer’s popularity has tanked, with 71% viewing him unfavourably. This isn’t just because of particular scandals or policies. It is because this government has, from the very beginning, stood wholeheartedly on the side of the ultra-rich and against the working class.
Starmer has echoed the vicious racist rhetoric of Reform and Enoch Powell while punishing the poorest in the country via welfare cuts so the CEOs can further line their pockets. His government has carried out unprecedented repression against the anti-war movement with the proscription of Palestine Action, with its supporters charged under counter-terror laws. In one day alone, 857 people – mostly old-age pensioners – were arrested for the ‘crime’ of showing solidarity with the direct action group. All while Starmer rolled out the literal red carpet on Israeli President Isaac Herzog and Donald Trump.
Will Starmer last?
The knives are starting to come out on the Labour backbenches. It isn’t clear how long Starmer will last, but it is quite possible that he will be gone by Christmas. If Labour is smashed in next May’s local elections, which is extremely likely, he is very likely to be removed.
Murmurs circulate about Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham’s possible return to Westminster, which would mean a bid for power from Labour’s so-called ‘soft left’. The upcoming Deputy Leadership election has already begun to operate along these factional lines, with both candidates – Bridget Phillipson and Lucy Powell – acting as proxies.
A new grouping in Labour with Burnham’s support has been launched – ‘Mainstream’ – which claims to provide a home for “radical realists”, promising to “offer the country not just a programme, but a vision of hope: popular principles and practical left politics for meaningful change”. Reinventing themselves for the cameras, both Powell and Phillipson have sold themselves as opponents of the two-child benefit cap and the slaughter in Gaza. Yet both have been part of Starmer’s government and loyal to it in all parliamentary votes on these issues!
As Zarah Sultana correctly put it, “Labour is dead”.
Far right on the doorstep – no more missed opportunities!
Tommy Robinson’s 100,000-strong “Unite the Kingdom” march on 13 September gave an alarming indication of where British politics could head if the working class is unable to assert itself politically and push back the far right. Although several of the mass marches for Palestine have been significantly bigger than this (despite a virtual media blackout), it was still, by a long shot, the largest march called by the far right in British history.
The raising of flags in communities across the country and the uptick in racist violence, show the far right has become more emboldened, more organised and more determined. The assassination of Charlie Kirk in the US has only further emboldened these forces. Elon Musk’s speech at the rally gave a chilling indication of where these figures wish to take things: “Whether you choose violence or not, violence is coming to you. You either fight back, or you die”.
The need for Your Party to get its act together has never been clearer. Following the party’s launch in July, 800,000 signed up, showing the enormous enthusiasm and potential to mobilise hundreds of thousands – potentially millions – of workers and young people in the fight against austerity, war and oppression.
13 September was a missed opportunity to do just this. Had the 800,000 sign-ups been mobilised to take part in a counter-demo led by Your Party boldly opposing racism and linking this with the fight for decent jobs, homes and services, the far right could have been massively outnumbered. This would have been an ideal opportunity to launch Your Party on the streets, showing that it would not just be for elections, but would instead be based on class struggle and the fightback.
The People’s Alliance for Change and Equality in Kirklees, West Yorkshire, which Socialist Alternative members are playing a leading role in, is organising such a march on 18 October in Huddersfield to launch the new party in the North.
Over recent weeks, thousands of working-class people have had to fight to keep the show on the road, and ensure that the huge potential that exists to build a new party for working-class people is not squandered.
Time to draw lessons – get the party started!
Rather than structuring the party around a tiny group of MPs and self-appointed leaders, the founding conference must be democratically organised. In the driving seat must be the party’s members, organised into branches. This is why we have been widely publicising the Platform for a Democratic Party, signed by the film director Ken Loach and many other leading Your Party activists across the country.
The new party must adopt a clear set of socialist policies which can genuinely challenge Reform and Labour. We fight for every possible improvement that can be won for working-class people through struggle. But we go further. Socialist Alternative stands for the fundamental, revolutionary socialist change that’s really needed.
To end the endless crises of this system, we will be fighting inside Your Party for a policy of bringing energy, utilities, transport, banks and the 100 biggest corporations into democratic public ownership, allowing working-class people to plan the economy on a socialist basis.
