Labour's @RachelReevesMP has written an important strategic article in the @NewStatesman which I assume reflects frontbench thinking ... it has implications for the left that need to be decoded... newstatesman.com/politics/uk/20… 1/ Here goes... (thread)....
2/ The Tories haven't just borrowed some Corbynist policies, they too have moved back from the individual to "community" as the basis for politics - so this is Base One of Labour's strategy: begs the question of how communities are defined and imagined...
3/ Very important attempt to differentiate from the Tories, English (and Scottish) nationalism, and ethnonationalist politics. But Labour needs to be a lot harder attacking the rising xenophobia that makes this argument necessary...
4/ Beat the pandemic and then set a new agenda, forcing the Tories to remain on ground where they can't win the argument (because Sunak has committed them to austerity post-2023, and indeed from October 2021)... but underplays the struggle over values Labour waged in 1945....
5/ Absolutely clear critique of neoliberal globalisation: begs question - will Labour commit to end the neoliberal economic model tout court... they don't want to have this argument in those terms but it has to be had...
6/ Critique of Blair/Brown's attachment to neoliberalism, but again begs the question: what's the alternative and how does this translate into a retail offer to voters who like the idea of their towns getting free money with the promise of more...
7/ Neat summary of Labour's target demographic - but under-estimates how easily the elderly conservative working class vote will get turned against even these heroes/heroines, which is the Tory strategy...
8/ Telling a convincing and coherent national story about the future is what all Labour leaders have failed to do since Blair (I'm no supporter of Blair!). You have to ask why? For me it's because the answer has to be radical economic change, which voters (as Corbyn found) fear
9/ This is the opportunity for the left. To define what "profoundly different" means. Just the same as it was for Nye Bevan and Stafford Cripps... that means fighting technocratic, cheese paring, PR-firm designed policymaking from the grass roots...
10/ If Labour could stop producing vague, prolix memes and reduce the offer to: well paid jobs, thriving communities and zero net carbon through smart deindustrialisation, as this does, it would stand a chance of cutting through: Tories cannot match the offer on high-paid work
11/ I agree with this. Mathematically there is no way to power without reconnecting with low-paid, lower skilled workers in English/North Wales towns (and Scotland). It carries the risk of alienating Labour's new core voters, in the urban salariat, but has to be done.... but how?
12/ Labour's problem is that narratives and visions are conveyed by actions, reactions and concrete policies, which have to be hammered home in brief, emotive language by everybody at once...
13/ By alienating, sidelining and sacking the left, Starmer has created a perfect conveyor belt for negativity into places like Bristol, Brighton, Stroud... this has to end.
14/ As I argued here, the left's job is to mobilise people in struggle, fight for a focused policy offer that ends neoliberalism, achieves real redistribution and ends net carbon emissions sooner than the elite wants to do it... medium.com/@paulmasonnews…
15/ The @RachelReevesMP article is an admirably clear statement of political strategy, raising opportunities for the left, but leaving the question of policy, slogans and practical struggles open... that's where the opportunity lies. newstatesman.com/politics/uk/20…
Sorry autocorrect: REindustrialisation!
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
I'm a republican - but I can see a much more limited constitutional monarchy coming out of the Meghan/racism scandal. The Windsors/post-war Establishment chose this model; it's destroyed two talented, independent women who didn't fit; it needs to change 1/...
2/ For all the media intrusion, the British press never actually holds the Royal institution to account: sycophancy plus intrusion pass for accountability. That has to end. Parliament now has to redesign the monarchy...
3/ The tragedy is that only Harry and Meghan looked remotely close to the modern world. Now they're shut out, the institution - like the officers' messes, the Pall Mall clubs, the hedge funds and landed estates it's part of - reeks of prejudice and elitism...
The Budget: a rapid response thread 1/ Sunak broke with the Tory austerian decade to extend the short term stimulus. But he's promised £68bn of fiscal austerity between 2023-26, mainly tax rises...
2/ The aim is to trap Labour into a position where it cannot promise fiscal expansion during a Labour govt, and to tee up a snap election before April 2023....
3/ Labour was right to oppose up front CT increases, and would be right to support them form 2023 onwards, for reasons of redistribution, not "balancing the books"....
Ahead of the budget, what would the left do faced with OBR's likely fiscal projections: 1/ Don't stop borrowing. Signal major strategic fiscal expansion over the next 3 years and get the BoE into line for continued support... medium.com/mosquito-ridge…
2/ Impose a windfall tax on companies whose profits grew significantly through the lockdowns. medium.com/mosquito-ridge…
3/ Signal the rise of corporation tax to 25% over four years, back-loaded, but with serious upfront measures on avoidance medium.com/mosquito-ridge…
R is for Rosa, a project in collaboration with @rosalux_global is three short documentaries about the ideas of the German revolutionary Rosa Luxemburg... in Episode 1 she dives into the 1905 revolution, ends up in jail, and writes The Mass Strike...
Episode 2 finds Luxemburg teaching in the SPD party school with a bunch of old reformists ... check out the archive shots to see how happy that made her feel... she writes a major work on economics, and then the war breaks out...
Episode 3 begins with Rosa in jail in Breslau... writing her diatribe against Lenin over democracy... she rushes to Berlin as the war ends, forms the KPD and is murdered by the Freikorps...
Sunak signals austerity lite - time for Labour to wake up and start making an argument: for borrowing, spending, growth and monetary activism... 1/ link.medium.com/UwVlHTWReeb
2/ Sunak plans to plug £43bn "hole" though freezing income tax allowances, a phased-in corporation tax rise and cutting the aid budget - plus around £20bn of cuts or further tax rises not specified. Labour's job is to *oppose it all* - because it's austerity. But...
3/ What we need now is a comprehensive alternative vision, argument and policies. The remainder of Sunak's post-Covid stimulus is piss-poor: £20bn on offshore wind? Labour pledged £88bn. We need a Biden-scale 10% of GDP stimulus - and to stop worrying about bond yields...
Thread: 1/ Labour's @JohnHealey_MP just set out a pretty comprehensive defence overview that is a) clearly anti-tory both in policy and principle b) stands a chance of reconnecting with the voters Labour needs to win...
2/ The key points were - as under Corbyn - support for NATO, for Trident renewal, multilateralism and rule of law, and UK-focused defence procurement strategy...
3/ Healey pointed out that all wings of Labour supported NATO at foundation - IIRC there were only 6 votes against it in parliament - 2x communists and 4x pro-CP ex-Labour MPs.... Bevan/Lee etc supported it and of course the Labour right designed it...