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Brexit, the PV, class and northern Englishness... a thread 1/ Some Shadow Cabinet ppl claiming their opposition to PV is about class and "north v south" - as if the poor of London, Bristol, York, and Glasgow are not working class? It's a very dangerous argument...
2/ Are @MaryCreaghMP or @JamesFrith not "northern"? No comrades the difference is political: it's about recognising that hard Brexit is the project of racists, xenophobes and a posh elite - and if we can't get a soft Brexit we have to stop Brexit...
3/ Accepting the elite's cultural definition of class - white, male, industrial, low skill - has nothing to do with either social democracy or Marxism: a class forms itself in struggle around a project...
4/ At last year's Durham miners gala - the biggest labour movement gathering ever - the mood was anti-Brexit; ditto Glastonbury. That's because the working class has become educated, networked and culturally diverse and community-organised ...
5/ I understand why some Midlands and N England Labor MPs would not choose to fight PV - neither would I. I don't look forward to it. That's why we have to make May own the failure of Brexit...
6/ but let's be honest about the politics: Stalinist economic nationalism is a strong but small component of modern Labour. It was defeated and conference - it had its say on the podium - so now stick to the agreed position....
7/ because the conference we had represented working class people from all sectors and every town in Britain; 300 ppl sat in the compositing meeting - almost all TU members
8/ the solution is a version of Kyle-Wilson - get a soft Brexit deal thru Parliament and put it to the people in a second referendum and mobilise to defeat fascism and tell a better story than the xenophobes...
9/ I'm northern, white, male and English - but the black female cleaners and the degree educated nurses on my London bus this morning are an equal part of the class we are *building through our resistance*. Lose that, we lose everything.
