The results last night were as I predicted. Copeland, whoever was leader and whoever was the candidate, would have been lost IMO, based on the Social Democrat decline everywhere and that majority having been eroded down more than Stoke over the last few years. What didn’t help in Copeland was the play on Corbyn and Nuclear (he is not against Nuclear power as an energy source to be phased out, as he has repeated; but that was spun the other way by the Tories). This and it being ‘up North’ with May in her honeymoon period and pushing for a ‘hard’ Brexit has played well up there. As did Jamie Reid the ex MP who resigned being VERY openly anti-Corbyn.
This overshadows the Stoke result, which given the current circumstances re they being the biggest leavers, with a direct UKIP threat, was a good result. The ground team have described it (and they did prior to polling day to be fair) as “Labour won Stoke, Reid lost Copeland”. Apparently Tony Blair’s deliberately timed intervention didn’t help in Copeland, either….
It would be a fool’s errand to replace Corbyn now; Labour would totally collapse as there are no replacements and it is a miracle that we have someone willing to sacrifice themselves who would put up with what he has to. If you noticed, the recent hoo-ha re how unpopular Corbyn is as a leader was matched on the same level by….Ed Miliband. My point is, unless Labour move towards the right significantly-like under Blair, the media would destroy whoever came next. They may not have the resolve of Corbyn. The irony being of course, that type of politics is failing everywhere and lost Labour the last two elections and those types the last two leadership elections.
Is Corbyn perfect-absolutely not. I am not in denial that Corbyn doesn’t appeal to some. But we also know his policies are majority-popular with the general electorate. And with the membership and MPs. So, if the policies are good, we need to work a way of being able to penetrate the public conscience in a way that is unprecedented. Of course this will be hard, but nothing worth fighting for is easy.
Let us say Corbyn went; what would you think would happen? I see no point in changing Corbyn, only for the next person to get the same treatment. We have to stick together, support him more openly in public, be better at promoting the policies as Labour policies and get him in front of the cameras as much as possible. There are things on the horizon that will make May’s job much harder soon-more cuts, poor wages still, Europe being ‘difficult’. UKIP will now probably decline. It looks as though it is the Tories who are Labour’s main ‘working class’ threat. Labour have not lost, recently, that many to UKIP. UKIPers tend to go Tory now, as we see from the results in both by-elections.
So, I would say don’t have any knee-jerk reactions, but also don’t pretend there is not work to be done. I most certainly would not advocate replacing the leader as the leader is not the issue. It is a loss of trust, a disconnect on the ‘left’ between the more liberal, affluent, university-educated and the more small ‘c’ conservative, more working class Labour lot. That is a gap any person would struggle to bridge.
Sometimes, like with football teams, it is not the manager that is the main issue. Of course Corbyn would share responsibility, but, as I say, there is no point changing manager when it is the players that are so out of sync with the fan base. Not that it will come, but a period of calm and regrouping is needed.
I absolutely still back Jeremy Corbyn. This is what the right have been waiting for; the left to turn on itself and destroy itself. This is what I said I feared in 2015: The left caving due to it not used to being in power (I mean leading a party that is the main opposition/government), those on the left having different ideas of how things should be done, and, very importantly, there not being the left infrastructure, media, think tanks and PR formula. If anything, Corbyn may well be ahead of his time. Whatever happens to Corbyn, I have absolutely no doubt at all that he was-and IS-very much needed by the left. Turning on him will only increase the strength of our opponents. As I have said before, I don’t want to look back from some nightmare right wing future and say “The left blew it by imploding at the time they needed to regroup, re-energise, re-think strategy to some extent etc”.
I thought Corbyn’s policies and Corbyn himself were my inspiration yesterday, and I still think it today. I won’t turn on the man who brought this movement together and gives us all hope. I won’t support a shift back to the Blair-like policies that lost trust, lost mass membership, lost Labour identity and lost Scotland. That would be a HUGE mistake. I encourage all those on the left to take a breath, take a step back, take time to think: Why are we here? Who brought us together? What would happen were he not here? Who do you trust? Be careful what you wish for. Corbyn is one of us, not against us. We need to support him and give him the tools to succeed. Not implode and have knee-jerk reactions.
Thank you Jeremy, thank you membership, thank you campaigners and those MPs fighting for us all. I’m still with you 100%, and I’m still very proud to stand shoulder to shoulder with you. In solidarity. #JC4PM
Adam Samuels
