Labour must do better and Tories must think different

Local elections are a funny old business. The results, however the chips have fallen, tend to be viewed by almost everyone as proof that things aren’t that bad. Indeed, it always makes a nonsense of the journalistic proclivity to translate local results to general elections, even if said elections are 4 years away.
This year was no different. Jeremy Corbyn appeared telling everyone that his party had defied predictions and “hung on,” clearly delighted that Labour’s (and more specifically his leadership’s) doomsday moment had not come. Meanwhile, despite the currently frosty relationship with his party’s membership, David Cameron was relaxed and upbeat in Peterborough as he addressed party activists. So what’s the truth? Let’s look at the 2 main parties, and pick up the others on the way.

Labour: A bar set much too low.
If Jeremy Corbyn follows the commentary of pundits, it’s little surprise that he is now feeling pretty pleased with himself. Labour’s collapse in England simply didn’t materialise. Let’s not forget, of course, that it’s a Labour politician who stole all the headlines: Sadiq Khan, the new mayor, who this blog graciously congratulates on his victory. The people who look at swings say that in a general election Labour may even have picked up a couple of seats based on these results.
That, however, was offset by a disastrous night in Scotland, where the party’s collapse has now been so spectacular that it has been pushed in to third place behind a resurgent Conservative party. In the New Labour era, it used to be joked that should the West Lothian question ever be resolved, most of the cabinet wouldn’t be able to vote on their own policies, so this is particularly humiliating. The truth is, in Scotland, the dividing lines in politics are related to the constitution. Even if there isn’t to be a second referendum any time soon, the choice to back a pro or anti -union party reflects the desired degree of closeness with England. It might be a symbolic choice, but symbolism is powerful in politics. That’s where Labour has failed. Scottish Labour undoubtedly has a rising star in the charming, articulate Kezia Dugdale. But her inexperience, and Labour’s continued bemusement at its collapse in Scotland, showed in the complete failure to address constitutional questions and give voice to those tired of the opportunistic SNP.
IT wasn’t much better in Wales either, where Labour lost out to UKIP and was thus denied an overall majority, scooping 29 of the 60 seats up for grabs. It remains the dominant force in Welsh politics, that is true, but how did UKIP come to erode that dominance? Here is where UKIP’s detractors fail to spot the danger they present, especially under an electoral system that is proportional. To contemptuously disregard it as at best a voice for disgruntled right-of-centre Tories and at worst a bunch of racist extremists, is to fail to understand its true heart: populism. It is neither a right-wing or left-wing party in any meaningful sense of the term, but rather combines elements of all perspectives: a Euroscepticism that emphasises patriotic pride, and an economic narrative critical of what it considers to be punishing austerity. The new Secretary of State for Work and Pensions Stephen Crabb, used his 2015 Conservative Party Conference speech to argue that a change is beginning in Wales. Labour, he argued, has taken its position for granted in Wales and people have had enough. That might be true, but it’s UKIP, which has done a much better job of highlighting the inadequacies of Labour’s administration, that has been handsomely rewarded. And boy does UKIP need handsomely rewarding. Since last year’s election, which saw only a single MP returned to Parliament, elements within it have turned viciously on each other. The latest to be knifed in the back is Suzanne Evans, the former Deputy Chair and undoubtedly the most able of Nigel Farage’s potential successors. It’s clear as mud as to exactly what she’s done wrong and why she was suspended. Their most impressive achievement, for which they rightly praise themselves, has been applying the necessary pressure to force a reluctant Conservative Party in to an EU referendum. But even now, Nigel Farage and his brand are so toxic that they had to pair with the amateurish movements of Leave.eu and Grassroots Out. The stars of the show have come from Vote Leave – the big beasts of Brexit are Tories like Michael Gove and Boris Johnson. UKIP has been very deliberately frozen out. If the party is to survive, it has to offer something beyond grievances with the EU, or come June it will almost certainly be in terminal decline. Wales is its big chance.
So this is all bad news for Labour. But you won’t hear Jeremy Corbyn acknowledge this. Instead, we heard him triumphantly celebrating the fact that “we hung on.” Yes, it was better than expected for Labour, but less bad news doesn’t make the bad stuff any less bad. Furthermore, when a party is collapsing in its heartlands, floundering around whilst its enemies answer the key questions on either side of the major fault lines of those heartlands’ politics, you are still so very far from power. The simple truth is that for Corbyn and his allies, as I have argued before on this blog, ideological purity matters far more than success. Accordingly, they are pleased with themselves because, if there was an imminent coup (claims of which I’ve always viewed with deep scepticism), it has now been averted. A bar that is set no higher than hanging on and not falling further is, quite simply, a bar set far too low.

The Conservative Party: A sharp contrast north and south.


It was undoubtedly true that the Tories weren’t in the spotlight on Thursday, and that following long-standing criticism of Corbyn and a week of awful headlines, all eyes would be fixed on Labour. But throughout yesterday and continuing today, talk isn’t about what Sadiq Khan did in order to win, but how Zac Goldsmith lost it. Accusations of racism and islamophobia are, quite simply, just what the party does not need. Goldsmith is a genuinely nice, principled person who wants to do the right thing. His background was always going to hamper him: however good his intentions, he would always be portrayed as the posh boy removed from reality by Daddy’s millions. The spiteful politics of envy is alive and well. The Tories captured London by putting up a rich, Eton-educated maverick and tried to replicate that with another rich, Eton-educated maverick. But they forgot one thing: there is simply no-one quite like Boris Johnson – undoubtedly an extraordinary political phenomenon, whether you love him, loathe him, or like me do one or the other at various points. Boris was charming: he put a smile on people’s faces and he seemed unpretentious. He might have been as far removed from ordinary people as Zac Goldsmith, but he didn’t seem that way.
They also forgot that Goldsmith not only lacks Boris’s star quality, but that he is distinctly uncharismatic, painfully shy and just looked ill at ease. Throw in some Lynton Crosby magic and it was always going to be a recipe for defeat. Negative campaigning has carried the Tories so far, but it was never enough for London. Labour saw attacks on Khan for his past associations with some deeply unpleasant characters coming a mile off, and was more than ready to brand them islamophobic. Perception matters far more than accuracy in politics. The Tories fell spectacularly in to Labour’s trap. They went further though, racially profiling Londoners and targeting voters with Sikh-sounding names, whipping up fear against Sadiq Khan. My understanding of naming conventions is that it isn’t too hard to identify Sikhs, and there has always been a logic to targeting them. They were and remain a highly aspirational group, to whom Tories offer a lot more than Labour, especially after it lurched leftwards. A lot of them have nothing other than history to explain their continued support for Labour, and if Tories can somehow convince them to make that break, it’s win win for them. But if you’re going to target groups of voters like this, you have to be subtle about it. Of course campaigning requires dealing with generalisations that are generally true, but it can’t be done in a crude way that shows no regard for the fact that social categories are made up of individuals and that there can be diversity within as well as between. Mailshots are crude, crass and patronising. Even more embarrassing was Goldsmith’s cringeworthy attempts at the vital goal of wooing the Asian vote, insisting he loved everything Bollywood but not being able to name a single song or movie. By the way, if he wants recommendations from a friendly fellow Tory, my favourite song is Rock N Roll Soniye, by Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy, Shankar Mahadevan, Shaan and Mahalakshmi Iyer. The casual platitudes reflected the overall sloppy, lazy nature of the campaign. Beyond ‘fear and smear,’ Goldsmith offered policies that lacked detail and substance. Worse, his decision to back Brexit undoubtedly played a key part in the party’s dismally lukewarm support. Volunteers trooped the streets, delivered leaflets and made calls as they always do – they are the unsung heroes that form the backbone of every success story for the party. But the campaign lacked energy from the start. I saw one tweet attacking Sadiq Khan recycled several times throughout the campaign. I received an email one day asking me to sign up to a telephone canvassing team, with no details about how it would work, where I would go or who I should contact with any questions. And the best bit: it was starting the next day. Of course, with so little time to make arrangements, I had to ignore it.
Contrast Goldsmith’s disastrous campaign with that of Ruth Davidson’s, also fighting for the party in what has traditionally been even more of a Labour heartland than London. Davidson did not snipe, attack and discredit. Instead, she understood that no-one who doesn’t reach out beyond their voting core can gain anything. She didn’t try and convert everyone to committed Tories, but placed herself and her party squarely in to the vacuum of Scottish politics. She is bright, bold and fearless. She established herself as a trustworthy pair of hands who, whatever one’s misgivings might be about her party, could be relied upon to hold the SNP to account. Cementing Labour’s collapse, she has forced the SNP in to the unenviable position of heading a minority government and presumably needing to look to Labour where it needs support. That means that, not only has she benefited from Labour’s ambivalence about independence, but she has ensured that it is a tactically sound line of attack for the foreseeable. Davidson knows exactly who her enemies are. She knows their weaknesses, her strengths, and how to seamlessly combine the two to pull off the success of the night for the party.
Yes, Scottish politics is different from English politics, but that doesn’t mean we can’t learn from her. One thing we have to do is build bridges, whereas Goldsmith’s ill-advised campaign blew them up in London. We have to build a much broader coalition of support. It’s a year today since our astonishing general election victory and in that time we have continued to establish our reputation for economic competence. Freed from the constraints of coalition, we have created initial momentum for a real focus on social justice. Once the EU referendum is out of the way, we have to unite and build on that. Maverick Boris aside, Tory politics has remained good-natured in spite of deep divisions over Europe, and I firmly believe that it will continue to do so afterwards. We undoubtedly have a great deal to be proud of in the way we conduct ourselves, and the way we have governed. Local elections tend to see the governing party lose out, as people tend to vote much more with their hearts at these elections. That has not happened this year. A year in, we should congratulate Cameron and his team and as party members be very proud indeed.
But there are signs of trouble. With largely free reign, Osborne was allowed to put forward a hubristic budget with policies that, it would now appear, rode roughshod over the wishes of backbenchers despite a slim majority allowing no room for rebellions of any significance. Climb-down after climb-down has followed. The latest was the hopelessly ill-conceived plan to forcibly convert all schools to these dreadful academies, trumpeted by the hapless Nicky Morgan. They have also backtracked on child refugees, changes to disability benefits and tax credits to name a few. It doesn’t matter whether you welcome these climb-downs or not: it looks bad. If Osborne (undoubtedly the brains of the operation) is cowed by public opinion or beaten in to submission by opposition from amongst his own, backtracking at the drop of a hat over billions of pounds of expenditure looks weak and incompetent. Poor Nicky was wheeled out yesterday to spin the line that the climb-down demonstrates that the government is listening. It in fact shows the opposite, for if it had sufficiently united the party behind an agenda, it would know what the limits were in the first place. It wouldn’t push them and hastily retreat in the face of very public criticism. And here’s the thing: one day, its enemies will get their act together. Eventually, a credible opposition will form. And all this, whilst the party can get away with it for now, will be held against it.
So the Tories in England had a good night, but both they and Labour have some serious questions to ask. Labour has to up its game, aim higher and demand better from Jeremy Corbyn. Sadiq Khan has a big job on his hands in London. The Conservatives, meanwhile, have a toxic campaign to deal with and need more imagination and better strategies to maintain the success they are currently enjoying.