Labour
by Richard Reeves
07/06/09
What Labour needs is direction. The single most important role of a leader is to provide a clear sense of the end destination. Labour is a crusade or it is nothing. But where is the crusade leading? Brown should step down. But the idea that his departure will magically transform Labour's fortunes is clearly nonsense. The last thing Labour needs now is a 'caretaker'. The whole movement needs to be rebuilt, with a commitment to radical political reform, a new approach to party activism and more plural approach to other political parties, including the greens and liberal democrats.
Jon Cruddas has written in the Sunday Mirror today, and his comments have been written up elsewhere as a statement that getting rid of Brown would be 'madness'. In fact, as you would expect from such a thoughtul figure, his message is much more nuanced than that. Here's part of what he wrote:
"In a way, it is a leadership question. But it is not about who leads us. It is about where they are leading us and why. The scandal over expenses means that reform is needed now...Everyone knows our Government is in trouble. Serious trouble. But to suggest that we’ll tackle those problems simply by chucking Gordon Brown overboard is madness."
Cruddas is right. The renewal of the progressive left will require a huge amount of time, thought and organisation. 'Simply' chucking out Brown will certainly not do the job. But whether Brown stays or goes, the renewal has to begin now.
D. McKean
Can you really call the Labour party the party of the 'progressive left'? Surely it would be more accurate to call it the party of the progressive centre-right (though perhaps the use of the word 'progressive' is misleading in itself), and possibly the Lib Dems or the Greens as the 'progressive' left.
The last time the Labour party behaved like a leftist party was pre-Blair. Since then i think we could argue that at best it has been staunchly on the right of centre. And given the options on the table for Brown's replacement, it would still be a stretch to consider their future as being a party for the left. More importantly still, is that whether or not Brown goes, and regardless of his replacement, it still won't dent the deep rooted collusion between the main parties to protect their interests. Don't expect to see Parliamentary reform any time soon, or any real changes to banking regulations, as a successful effort has been undertaken to see those debates taken off the table, or at least to skew the debate sufficiently so as to move it away from public scrutiny.
The renewal of the progressive left requires one thing, a new party. Whether this be the Greens or someone else is uncertain, however it certainly will not be New Labour.