There’s been a lot of commentary about @zarahsultana’s speech, in which she talked of ‘40 years of Thatcherism’. Well, I remember Thatcherism and I was twice a @UKLabour candidate in the Blair era. The platform I stood on had no relationship to Thatcherism whatsoever. Thread 1/15
2/15 As we know, the Blair government invested in public services, expanded state childcare, introduced a minimum wage, enhanced employment rights and devolved power around the UK. All anathema to Thatcher. And I’m scratching the surface here.
3/15 I’ve commented before, however, that the rewriting of history is an essential element of the Corbyn project. If Blair’s countless achievements are recognised as part of an objective historical review, it means an admission that ‘centrism’ can actually succeed.
4/15 The Corbynistas know that Blair won three elections and the sage of the allotment lost two. That doesn’t look too good. So their minds start whirring. What are the lines of defence?
5/15 First, they claim that *anyone* could have won in 1997 against the incompetent Tory government that had been in power for years. Errr... but it was *so* much harder to win in 2019?
6/15 Second, they claim that Blair *lost* votes over a period of time. This is something called democracy which allows governments to change occasionally. The Tories should be in the same position now. But... err... they’re not.
7/15 Third, but... but... but... Iraq!
8/15 Even people who were opposed to the war in Iraq in 2003 can still recognise the many other achievements of Blair. So in desperation, they turn to their fourth and final line of defence...
9/15 Blair was actually a Thatcherite. A ‘neo-liberal’. A wolf in sheep’s clothing. And this is part of a wider @PeoplesMomentum storybook in which history is split into two periods: Before neo-liberalism (BNL) and After neo-liberalism (ANL).
10/15 BNL was 1945 to c1976. ANL is 1976 to errr.. socialism. Or barbarism.
11/15 ANL is a period in which the public sphere has been dismantled. Four decades of continuous attack by people who might *appear* to be competing with each other politically, but who are actually in league with one another and share the same agenda.
12/15 But when you look at the facts, public spending as a proportion of GDP rose noticeably under Blair and Brown. (To be honest, despite all her rhetoric, even Thatcher failed to reduce the size of the state in her period of office.)
13/15 I am always struck by how *unsuccessful* and incompetent these neo-liberal plotters have actually been. Because after FOUR DECADES of their supposed dominance, my family still gets treated in the NHS for free, my kids went to free state schools...
14/15 Even after ‘40 years of Thatcherism’, we redistribute a quarter of a trillion a year in welfare and pensions. Spending as a proportion of GDP has declined noticeably since 2010, but is broadly in line with the early years of Blair.
15/15 If the Jezuits don’t rewrite history, nothing about their narrative about the death of centrism makes any sense. It is calculated and it is relentless. And the challenge to people like @Keir_Starmer is whether they are brave enough to stand up to it.
