Deconstructing 'We have to vote Labour to get the Tories out'

 'We have to vote Labour to get the Tories out.'

This is something I've heard over and over again. Truthfully, I'm sick of hearing it. Not only is it a really rigid line that leaves no room for discussion or dialogue, but it's something that Keir Starmer and the Labour Party are relying on. In fact, it's the only thing they're relying on; as a Government-in-waiting, they are offering nothing but the fact that people want the Tories out as their appeal.

As I've mentioned elsewhere on this blog, I'm involved with OCISA, a group that aims to create a socialist alliance through the election of independent socialists in the 2024 General Election. Most prominently, OCISA is supporting the South African socialist Andrew Feinstein to attempt to unseat Keir Starmer, the leader of the Labour Party. This is also happening in various other constituencies around the country, and my partner Owen is crowdfunding to stand against David TC Davies in the new constituency of Monmouthshire. Personally I think this is a really exciting turn of events, something that if loads of people get behind could really quite radically improve political discourse in our society.

But unfortunately, it seems that this idea that 'We have to vote Labour to get the Tories out' is a really dominant feature within our political understanding, so I thought I should give some reasons to explain why that isn't the case.

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The Tories and Labour are currently almost identical

There is nothing the current incarnation of Labour is offering that is discernibly different from what the Tory Government is doing. I will repeat that: nothing. The Tory Government is opposed to climate justice, and so is Labour. The Tory Government is opposed to viewing trans rights as human rights, and so is Labour. The Tory Government supports continuing to arm Israel in its genocide against the Palestinian people, and so does Labour.

To be fair, the actual manifestos haven't been released yet, so it could be that Labour will offer a few things that the Tories aren't doing - perhaps a few that have some appeal to them. But even if they do, do you trust them to actually honour these pledges? I don't. Pretty much all of Keir Starmer's ten pledges that he made during his 2020 leadership campaign, from social justice to climate justice to strengthening trade unions, have been scrapped. If Labour can do brazenly ignore its own pledges before it even gets elected to power, how on earth can it be relied upon to be telling the truth about anything it's promising in its manifesto?

The slightly optimistic view I've heard from some people is that maybe Labour is just pretending to be right-wing to get the mainstream media on side, and then they'll be proper socialists once they get elected. I very much doubt that this is true - I am not aware of any Government ever that has turned out to be more a party for the people upon being elected than it appeared to be before. But even in the hypothetical scenario that it did turn out to be true, I still wouldn't approve of this as an electoral strategy. It damages one's own credibility, and significantly harms innocent people in the meantime. Even if that were their plan, they do not deserve to win.

There is one, and only one, thing that the Labour Party has done to make it look like more of a suitable Government than the Tories, and that is make its leader Keir Starmer have a professional shine to him and look like a grown-up. However, this one thing would only appeal if Boris Johnson had still been the leader - I think Labour was hoping for a showdown between Johnson and Starmer. But Johnson is long gone, we've had two Prime Ministers since him and I don't believe that will work anymore.

What will be the excuse in 2029?

We don't even know yet when the 2024 election will be, and already I'm thinking ahead to the following one.

If you don't like Labour but plan to vote for them just to get rid of the Tories, what do you think will happen next time? If they're in Government under Keir Starmer for five years, continue to preside over the most harmful policies that the Tories did, presumably at the next election you'll 'just want to get rid of Labour' in the same way you just want to get rid of the Tories now? So who will you vote for then? The Tories?

I actually believe that Labour winning the next election with a majority would be more harmful than the Tories getting back in. As a socialist I can't actually believe I'm saying that, but there is method to my madness, I promise. If the Tories get back in, they'll surely continue being awful, but at least Labour will have to accept that its current strategy simply isn't working. It will force Labour to do something to improve. But if Labour gets in with a big majority, all that will do is re-affirm that nonsensical neoliberal right-wing posturing is what wins elections, irrespective of what harm it causes elsewhere. The Tories, meanwhile, will have the opportunity to take five years without being held accountable for anything that goes wrong, regroup and get back in one or two elections down the line.

Labour already acts as if the only election results that count were its losses in 1983 and 2019, and its win in 1997. It cherry-picks these three elections specifically because they back up the political point it's trying to make, and completely ignores the fact that since the 1980s there have been seven other elections whose outcomes undermine that point. Labour is trying to create the circumstances in the next election to back up this point even more. It's not true, and has never been true.

The first-past-the-post system

I've heard quite a lot of people say that the problem is with the first-past-the-post system, meaning that it's virtually impossible for anyone other than the major parties to win seats.

I agree with this. It's a crappy system that is designed for there to only be two options. You know who isn't going to change the system? Rishi Sunak. You know who else isn't going to change it? Keir Starmer. There has never been a Labour or Conservative leader who has backed a more democratic voting system (not even Jeremy Corbyn, one of the few things I disagreed with him on). That's because the system benefits these parties. It benefits the Tories most, because they're usually in power, and it benefits Labour on the odd occasion when the Tories are even more unpalatable than normal. If you don't like the first-past-the-post system, and most of us don't, voting Labour or Conservative is an absolute own goal.

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I don't have a particular opinion on what I want to happen nationwide at the next election. Neither of the two main parties deserve to win. I suppose the best we can hope for is that both parties lose significant numbers of seats, and that whoever has slightly more needs to rely on the support of more sensible people to get anything through Parliament.

However, I think we can hope for better results in individual constituencies, and that's why I'm so inspired by OCISA's work. Remember, you can't vote for who the Prime Minister is. That isn't how our system works in the UK. You can vote for your local MP, and you may have opportunities to get someone in who will hold whichever party ends up in Government to account. Even if you live in a so-called 'safe seat', remember that safe seats generally mean safe from either the Labour Party or the Conservative Party. They don't mean safe from concerted campaigns from citizens who aren't interested in the politics of either of the main parties.

I will just finish by saying that I really am not as convinced as everyone else is that Labour will shoot to victory in the next election. I'm not going to go out on a limb and say they won't, because they could do, but I don't think that's guaranteed by any means. I don't think the Tories being awful automatically means that Labour will do well. I recall a Labour win being predicted in 2015, but it didn't happen because Labour were so unappealing - and they're even less appealing now than they were then! Sure, the Tories have got worse as well - but do people normally win elections just because the alternative is dreadful? I don't think so. I think nearly everyone who has ever won an election, in this country at least, has appealed to hope on some level.

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