So what exactly went wrong for Jeremy Corbyn's Labour?

'Repeat a lie often enough and it becomes the truth'
Attributed to Joseph Goebbels

'Corbyn is unelectable'
Numerous

A little later than planned, here's my blog analysing exactly what caused Labour's major defeat on Thursday. Such analysis is very much necessary in order to learn from the problems, and I've spent the last several days reading thoughts from all sides of the political debate to further my own understanding.

The most common explanations that come up in the media over this are 'Because the public don't like Corbyn' or 'Because the public don't want another EU referendum'. Whilst I think there's an element of truth to both of these theories, they are incredibly simplistic and don't take into account the multitude of circumstances that caused this collossal defeat. Another thing that we frequently hear is that 'Labour has moved too far to the left', which would be laughable if it wasn't so horrifying. Labour's manifesto is highly popular when presented blindly without the party attached to it; it cost the Tories their majority in 2017 and has actually caused the Tories to be slightly less bad than they otherwise would have been - there are some things in the Conservative manifesto that are weak imitations of Labour's, which is quite significant given that in 2015 Ed Miliband's manifesto tried to bring a few things from David Cameron's. Things have shifted in politics, a long way, and I want to try to make sense of exactly what that is.

There are so many reasons it's difficult to know where to start, but given that everyone is expecting me to pull out excuses, I'll be fair and start with the things I'll admit Labour is at fault for. Given that Brexit is so frequently considered to be the big political topic of our time, let's start with that.

Brexit

Labour's Brexit pledge, despite what many in the media will have you believe, was fairly straighforward: negotiate the best deal possible within six months, then put it back to the electorate in a confirmatory referendum (and remaining as the other option), with the Prime Minister staying neutral as to which option should be chosen. This was the one major change from the 2017 election, which occurred shortly after Corbyn whipped his MPs into backing Article 50 (I was very angry about this at the time, and even wrote this open letter to Corbyn to object to it, but I want it on record that I no longer believe what I wrote, and I now feel that in the circumstances triggering Article 50 was the only choice to make). I think Labour probably messed up the Brexit pledge. I used to be a People's Vote campaigner, but I've changed my mind on this. This isn't because I think a second referendum would be anti-democratic (it wouldn't) but just because I think it would be harmful. David Cameron was incredibly keen on calling referendums on things that he didn't agree with personally (the EU referendum was his third in six years) and it's not a good way to answer complex political questions that the majority of people don't have in-depth knowledge of. The first referendum was utterly toxic; why would another one be any better?

I am still a Remainer, but I honestly can't envisage any outcome of that which would make things less divisive. My way of sorting out Brexit would be to bring the country back together and find some kind of compromise that everyone can live with, and that doesn't come from us all going back to the polls in another roll of the dice. (That said, I still think Labour's position was more mature than the other parties', because Labour did at least try to see both sides of it, but it didn't work, and wasn't going to work. Whichever we voted for, we're sick of talking about bloody Brexit, and want to get it over with.)

Unfortunately, a lot of people seem to interpret 'getting it over with' as 'leaving as quickly as possible'. That's not how it's going to work. The faster we leave, the more difficult it's going to be to make the proper arrangements to get by outside the EU. Even that is assuming the Government is actually going to try to make those arrangements in a way that will benefit ordinary people the most, which given that this is Boris Johnson I have no confidence in them doing. This won't be over for a long time.

Seemingly unfeasible policies

Note the word 'seemingly'. The policies in Labour's manifesto were not unfeasible or irresponsible; the Financial Times reported that 163 prominent ecomomists backed them. Labour's 2017 plans were fully costed, as were their 2019 ones.

However, in 2017, Labour's policies were concise, clear and most importantly had been seeded. Things like free broadband and cheaper rail fares are totally feasible, and are always going to be popular with the public - or at least, a public that believes you'll actually deliver it. Prior to the announcement of an election, when did you ever hear Labour talking about many of these issues? The way they were announced came across like a bunch of pie-in-the-sky promises, and the electorate were a bit too sceptical for their own good. The election may have been in December, but a manifesto is not a Christmas list. Tom Clark of Another Angry Voice notes that the majority of people don't really understand economics in detail; a country's budget is still commonly perceived as working like a household budget, without acknowledgement of the fact that in a country's budget, public spending doesn't just lose the money; it puts it back into the economy, creating a win-win situation. You cannot make a bunch of election promises that people don't expect you to keep, even if you are entirely capable and willing to keep them.

Electoral pacts

This is something I think other parties hold more fault for than Labour, which I'll discuss in more detail further down the blog, but I have to express my concerns with Labour's rigidity, and unwillingness to agree to electoral pacts with other parties, thus splitting the left-wing vote. I recall in 2017, they were quite heavily criticised for not standing down in Jeremy Hunt's constituency of South West Surrey, even though Louise Irvine of National Health Action was standing against Hunt for the benefit of the NHS. Labour tends to be quite archaic about things relating to electoral reform generally (something I disagree with them quite strongly on) and I'd really like to see them do a bit more progressive with ideologically similar parties such as the Green Party.

However, I also think there was a lot outside of Labour's control that seriously sabotaged the campaign, as follows:

A huge part of the issue for Labour, for me, lies with the behaviour of the Liberal Democrats. There was once a time when their forerunners, the Liberal Party, were the official opposition to the Conservatives, and around the time of New Labour had quite a strong opposition vibe. In 2003 under the late Charles Kennedy, the Liberal Democrats opposed Tony Blair over the Iraq War, whilst the Conservatives largely voted in favour. However, since Nick Clegg I feel the party has become very opportunistic and quite careerist, and Jo Swinson, who in Government was more loyal to the Conservative whip than Jeremy Hunt was, is the epitome of this. During this campaign and before it, Swinson was seen to be far more critical of Labour than she was of the Conservative Party, continuously saying that she'd refuse to work with Jeremy Corbyn under any circumstances - and avoiding the question about working with Boris Johnson. The Liberal Democrats' insistence on standing on the single issue of ignoring the 2016 referendum result (despite the fact that such a thing is neither liberal nor democratic) helped Boris Johnson immeasurably in keeping the election firmly about Brexit, and disregarding all of the very important austerity reversals that Labour was promoting. Ideologically, the Liberal Democrats are (supposedly) closer to traditional Labour than they are to the Conservatives - not on this evidence they aren't. When the Conservatives were dying and unable to get anything through Parliament, Jo Swinson enthusiastically and arrogantly backed an election, ignoring the fact that her brand of politics is nearly as unpalatable.

But it's worse than that. Ben Gelblum in the London Economic writes that through tactical strategies, the Liberal Democrats had a tendency to position themselves, not Labour, as the tactical voting choice in constituencies where Labour didn't stand a chance. This strategy caused some fantastic Labour MPs in marginal seats, such as Westminster's Emma Dent Coad, lost their seats to the Conservatives - because the Liberal Democrats had falsely led voters to believe that they'd be better off voting for them, which split the anti-Tory vote. This tactical approach extended to supporting other alternative parties, such as the Green Party and Plaid Cymru, but not Labour or the SNP. Before anyone comes back with this argument, I know Labour is a bit too rigid on election pacts - I've acknowledged that earlier in this very blog. But in the circumstances, that shouldn't matter. Last week, I canvassed in the Totnes constituency for Labour candidate Louise Webberley, standing against Tory-turned-Liberal Democrat Sarah Wollaston. I was appalled to hear the amount of pressure Louise had been under to stand down for the benefit of Wollaston, from everyone to the Green Party and even from Extinction Rebellion. Wollaston was a Tory in all but name! Being opposed to Brexit doesn't change the fact that you voted through all the ghastly, horrific things the party has done in the last nine years. I was particularly disappointed by the Green Party, who I have voted for in the past and who I generally support. This was the main reason that in my own constituency I chose to re-elect Labour's Thangam Debbonaire over the Green Party's Carla Denyer, despite knowing Carla personally and having far more faith in her than in Thangam. I felt that in the circumstances, I could not support a party that was making alliances like this, even if I liked the specific candidate.

I really hope that in the wake of this, with Jo Swinson having lost her seat along with all of the Labour and Conservative MPs who defected to the Liberal Democrats, this causes the Liberal Democrats to change their ways a bit and become more opposition material. I can't say who I would like to see lead them, but in my mind it must be someone who wasn't there from 2010-2015. I think the Liberal Democrats are still reparable (after all, Labour was hardly better than them under Miliband, but I think they have at least learned their lesson) but they have to acknowledge their past errors and move on if they have any realistic future.

However, I feel that the real culprit in this is the constant, disgusting smear campaign against Jeremy Corbyn. This was a problem in 2017 as well (if it hadn't been I think Labour would have won a thumping victory in that one) but in the last two years this has been ramped up significantly, including by the supposedly impartial BBC, which this time went as far as editing an interview with Boris Johnson to make it sound as if one of his statements was greeted by applause, rather than laughter. We hear so much - 'Jeremy Corbyn is friends with terrorists!' 'Jeremy Corbyn is anti-Zionist!' 'Jeremy Corbyn shared a platform with a Holocaust survivor who believes this!' 'Jeremy Corbyn will turn us into socialists!' (People who shout the last one tend not to be quite sure what socialism is.) And I'm afraid that this is something that has been caused on purpose, including by people who are supposedly left-wing. We have Polly Toynbee and Jonathan Freedland in the Guardian talking about his supposed 'lack of charisma' (a claim anyone who has ever heard him speak can refute). We have people claiming everything from misogyny to terrorism, from being too weak to being too heavy-handed; the general aim has been to throw as much mud as possible in the hope that something sticks, even if it completely contradicts itself. When it doesn't work, they just claim that Corbyn is 'unelectable' - despite his incarnation of Labour completely turning things around in 2017 and losing the Tories their majority.

I think all of the smears have collectively had an impact, but by far the most significant one is the supposed anti-Semitism claim. I think this probably originated from Corbyn's public support of Palestine (which incidentally is NOT anti-Semitic - I've been accused of anti-Semitism myself for this, ignoring the fact that anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitism and that huge numbers of Jews are also on this campaign). Shaun Lawson writes this wonderful article outlining how anti-Semitic the anti-Corbyn narrative itself is - I've heard non-Jewish people publicly referring to Jewish Corbyn supporters with the slur 'self-hating Jew', without being picked up on this. I have also heard people claim that to be anti-capitalist is to be anti-Semitic, which is incredibly anti-Semitic in itself because it relies on the age-old trope of Jews being associated with banks and financial industry. Let me be clear: I have no doubt that there have most likely been occasions on which anti-Semitism in the Labour Party hasn't been handled as well as it should. Mistakes have surely been made, and they shouldn't be overlooked. But that does not mean that Labour itself is inherently anti-Semitic, especially when its main rival openly brags about its 'hostile environments' and actually congratulates itself when being accused of Islamophobia. The truth is that Labour was accused of this constantly, and the narrative didn't even take into account all of the facts - for example, Andrew Neil's 'Just apologise!' interview neither specified precisely what Corbyn was meant to be accepting responsibility for, nor took into account Corbyn's continued campaigns against anti-Semitism. His Parliamentary history includes numerous condemnations of anti-Semitism, resistence to the National Front, demands to accept Jewish refugees from Yemen... how often do you hear this reported in the media? The worst thing about this cynicism is that it undermines genuine claims of anti-Semitism. It's The Boy Who Cried Wolf in action, because not every allegation is untrue.

I hope that Labour doesn't come away from this feeling that it has to radically change its positions on things, because there's nothing wrong with Labour's actual policies - as I said above, they are realistic, costed and it's not even as if the public don't agree with them. I don't believe that the people of Scotland actually hold markedly different values than the people of England and Wales, as pundits tend to claim - apart from possibly wanting independence, but can you blame them? I don't want Scotland to leave the union at all, but if it does I will shake its hand and wish it luck - if I were a Scot, I'd hate England and Westminster as well. But in the meantime, Labour must prove an effective opposition, as it didn't under Ed Miliband. I think in some ways Labour under Corbyn did win the arguments about some of its policies, because in 2017 the electorate took some hope and positivity from the campaign, and I sincerely wish this to continue under the next leader. We cannot return to the days of abstaining on workfare. If anything does change with Labour, I hope it will be in the form of supporting an alternative to First Past The Post. The Tories actually received only around 270,000 more votes than in 2017, but our archaic system meant that this time it equated to +48 seats.

Before I conclude (and I realise this has been a very long blog) I'd like to say something about social media. I was really sad to see Lily Allen delete her Twitter account the other day, because she's a great campaigner and it was always a pleasure to see what she had to say. Her argument was that social media is toxic, caused the election result and other things such as the election of Donald Trump in the US. Although I think she has a point, I would say that social media is neither good nor bad. I liken it to a hammer; something that can cause someone to be severely hurt or a beautiful structure to be built, but neither is done directly by the hammer, but by the person wielding it. More importantly, we've created a world in which social media is necessary. It has some very serious flaws, but it's the one part of the media where independent voices have a chance to be heard, where Rupert Murdoch's power is curtailed. We can, and must, use it.

The establishment said that Corbyn was unelectable; I don't believe he was at the time, but sadly they've made him so, and he will go down in history as the best Prime Minister we ever nearly had.



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