Jeremy Corbyn Credit : Leon Neal/Getty Images
So there we have it. It turns out that the British working-class was not, in the end, willing to throw its weight behind a London-centric, youth-obsessed, middle-class party that preached the gospels of liberal cosmopolitanism and class war. Who’d have thought it?
Well, me for a start. And plenty of others who had been loyal to the party over many years and desperately wanted to see a Labour government, only to be dismissed as ‘reactionaries’ who held a ‘nostalgic’ view of the working-class.
It barely needs saying that these election results are an utter catastrophe for Labour. For the party to have failed to dislodge the Tories after nearly a decade of austerity and three years of political chaos is bad enough. But for the so-called Red Wall to have crumbled so spectacularly underlines the sheer scale of the failure. Bolsover, Blyth Valley, Leigh, Redcar, Don Valley, Sedgefield, Burnley, Great Grimsby, Wrexham — just a few of the long-time Labour strongholds in traditional working-class areas which have fallen to the Tories.
Labour’s meltdown in these places will come as no surprise to anyone who was paying attention and wasn’t blinded by ideology or fanaticism. Some of us had long warned that working-class voters across post-industrial and small-town Britain were becoming increasingly alienated from the party. But we were banging our heads against a brick wall. When many in the party were bathing in the afterglow of the 2017 general election, we tried to remind them that not only had Labour, in fact, lost that election, there had been a swing to the Tories in many of the party’s heartland seats.
We sounded the alarm bells again earlier this year when, in the local and European elections, Labour haemorrhaged support in several working-class communities across the north and Midlands.
But the woke liberals and Toytown revolutionaries who now dominate the party didn’t listen to us. They truly thought that ‘one more heave’ would bring victory. They believed that constantly hammering on about economic inequality would be enough to get Labour over the line. In doing so, they made a major miscalculation: they failed to grasp that working-class voters desire something more than just economic security; they want cultural security too.
They want politicians to respect their way of life, and their sense of place and belonging; to elevate real-world concepts such as work, family and community over nebulous constructs like ‘diversity’, ‘equality’ and ‘inclusivity’. By immersing itself in the destructive creed of identity politics and championing policies such as open borders, Labour placed itself on a completely different wavelength to millions across provincial Britain without whose support it simply could not win power. In the end, Labour was losing a cultural war that it didn’t even realise it was fighting.
The easy response in the wake of this calamity would be to pin the blame on Corbyn. But that would be a mistake. It’s certainly true that Corbyn was unpopular on the doorstep, but Labour’s estrangement from its core vote predates his leadership. Long before Corbyn took over, the party had started to prioritise the agenda of the urban, liberal middle-class over that of its old working-class heartlands. As it did so, support from the latter began to ebb slowly away.
Brexit provided an opportunity for the party to reconnect with its traditional base, to show working-class voters that it understood their priorities and was on their side. But it flunked the test, choosing to indulge its own membership rather than appeal to those whose votes it needed. Its decision to support a second referendum spelled electoral suicide. There could be no greater signal to the disaffected millions in the party’s old heartlands that it did not represent them or respect their democratic wishes. From that moment, the writing was on the wall.
So where now? If Labour is to again be the party of the working-class — and there must now be serious doubts that it ever will — it must undergo radical surgery. It must somehow rediscover the spirit of the early Labour tradition that spoke to workers’ patriotic and communitarian instincts, and offered them a natural home. It must exploit that sweet spot in British politics that marries demands for economic justice with those for cultural stability. It must move heaven and earth to reconnect with voters in Britain’s hard-pressed post-industrial and coastal towns who looked on bewildered as their communities were subjected to intense economic and cultural change, and felt that Labour was indifferent to their plight. It must rekindle a politics of belonging built around shared values and common cultural bonds. And, crucially, it must be unremittingly post-liberal in perspective and policy development.
But, to achieve any of that, Labour must stop treating the traditional working-class as though they were some kind of embarrassing elderly relative. It must learn to respect those who, for example, voted for Brexit, oppose large-scale immigration, want to see a tough and effective justice system, feel proud to be British, support the reassertion of the role of the family at the centre of society, prefer a welfare system to be based around reciprocity – something for something – rather than universal entitlement, believe in the nation state, and do not obsess about multiculturalism or trans rights.
Such people were once welcomed by the Labour party and felt entirely comfortable voting for it; but now so many of the party’s activists look upon these voters as if they were a different species altogether. And the price has been paid in millions of lost votes.
There is a danger that some in the party will see the calamitous events of this election as some kind of mandate to return to Blairism. They could not be more wrong. It was the Blairite embrace of globalisation and liberal cosmopolitanism, with all their destructive consequences for working-class communities, that did so much to damage to the relationship between the party and its traditional base. And, as we saw with the abject failure of Change UK, very few in our country want a return to that kind of politics.
Cliché though it is, Labour stands today at a crossroads. Those whose strategy has led to the most ignominious defeat for the party since the 1930s can choose either to plough on in the delusional belief that working-class voters really would support their philosophy if only they could be shaken from their false consciousness, or instead engage in an honest and frank debate about why things went so disastrously wrong and what it might take to put them right.
We are witnessing the beginnings of a fundamental realignment in British politics. The old tribalisms are crashing down around us. How Labour responds to this will determine whether it remains a serious political force or is instead destined to become a party of permanent protest.
Paul Embery is a firefighter, trade union activist, pro-Brexit campaigner and ‘Blue Labour’ thinker
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SubscribeIt’ so ironic, it almost beggars belief, one could wail, gnash one’s teeth and stamp up and down with despair. The one thing that could have united this country, was the Empire. Instead of using it as a building block, to forge a new sense of community, a common heritage, it has been traduced and reviled and used to sow dissent and bitterness. Sure, the British Empire was far from perfect, it was no different from any other collective human endeavour, self serving, but for all of it’s contradictions, it did tie, people from all across the globe to a common purpose, for which not a few were prepared to sacrifice their lives. When immigration, became a thing, after the Second World War, many of those initial travellers came to the UK on the back of that shared connection, that forged identity ( My first father-in-law to name but one).
No countries history is perfect, every single one will contain episodes of murder, destruction, greed, exploitation, and Britain, or the British Empire, was no different in that regard, but like all emergent countries it then set about trying to forge a common unifying identity, and not entirely without success. I truly despair, that supposedly clever people, with their own agendas, cannot recognise this simple truth. They seek to unite by destroying the very ties that bind, the very reason that drew people, from all over the world, here in the first place.
And no, I will not apologise, for thinking that the British Empire was not an entirely bad thing (I enjoy Flashman, far to much for that).
The British Empire ended the legal institution of slavery, a reality that had existed since the dawn of human history. That people don’t know this when they start banging on about the evils of the UK’s imperial past borders upon obscenely stupid.
I am with you Mr Lewis. The British Empire was far more ‘good’ than ‘bad’ and yes we both know that the standards expected were not always upheld and there were some very bad episodes. But we have left elements of our parliamentary system, justice, administration, ‘rights’, protection of the weak etc for many countries to use as building blocks for their own development. The Commonwealth of Nations is a sort of testament to that.
Disparaging Empire is a silly academic diversionary cul-de-sac. It’s a part of our history which we should look back on as a time when we gave practical foundational help to what eventually became emergent nations and states. Yes, it was based on increasing our wealth and clout as a nation but so many administrators in the late eighteenth and ninenteenth centuries held high principles based on fairness and good will and that meant improving the lot of the native inhabitants where we settled. Sometimes the system failed but these were exceptional instances to what was a straight-forward determination to govern fairly and equably.
King George III wrote an instruction to his newly appointed Governor of New South Wales, Captain Arthur Philip, to ‘treat the natives fairly’ and to ensure that they were not unnecessarily troubled.The humanity was central to the thinking and that is, overall, what we should be proud of.
That you chose this particular straw to grasp shows a remarkable ignorance of how Aborigines have been treated. I suppose we did treat them fairly, until what they wanted confilcted with what we wanted. Then we started shooting them.
I used to believe in the importance of ‘values’ for the post-Christian west. Now, when every corporation and organisation spouts its monolithic ‘values’ to close dissenters down, I see them as a trojan horse for DIE (Diversity/Inclusion/Equity). DIE is a totalising ideology which, up to a couple of years ago, I would have called un-British.
You can still call them un-British, Judy. I know, I call many progressive memes un-American, such as the blatant disregard for our First Amendment that is involved in de-platforming.
I really liked the Manchester Commonwealth Games when ‘Land of hope and glory’ was used as the English anthem. The music is classy and inspiring; the words do recollect what Britain has always represented. I heard the OBON song – dumbed down like a Eurovision entry: nul points!
You are dissing the creative efforts of UK schoolchildren – sacrilege! Whatever next? You’ll be criticising the NHS soon at this rate!
May be some one could have suggested a theme, something along the lines of tomorrow belonging to them perhaps
That’s a thought – we boomers sold that pup to the millennials, it might work with the subsequent generations…
That was satire, correct – or are you unaware of a German song popular during the Third Reich about “tomorrow belongs to me”?
That’s the thing about satire, you never know
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDuHXTG3uyY
Also it was written by John Kander and Fred Ebb (2 of the chosen people) for the film Cabaret in 1972
I don’t understand why ‘Land of Hope and Glory’ can’t be used for this? It inspires hope, belonging and was written by a talented poet and not some random school children. Why are our standards so low? Maybe we should start with that.
Please see our new Relationships/PSHE/character education call it what you will programme for primary schools at http://www.alivetotheworld.com. (See comment below). I’ve always worked on the basis that’s it’s not enough to protest. One has to produce the good alternative and here it is. We even have an exercise getting children to colour in the Union Jack while understanding how it comes from the flags of Ss George, Andrew and Patrick – not forgetting our friends the Welsh whose colourful dragon all the children can colour in. Have a look at the website. So much more in there. Anything anyone can do to advertise it abroad greatly welcomed.
The website is so new I’ve given you the wrong name! It’s http://www.alivetotheworld.co.uk. That’s better.
Orwell was right about the British laughing at militaristic posturing, but he also saw the dangers of totalitarian newspeak and doublethink and wrote Nineteen Eighty Four to warn us. How ironic that plenty of young ‘educated’ Brits now act as if that novel is a guide to the conduct of public affairs.
“What British Values tended to mean, and this wasn’t exactly an accident, was liberal or progressive values, ideas that plenty of people of all backgrounds might feel completely alien to them. Beyond that the things they emphasise — tolerance and respect — are worthy, and something we’d like to teach our children, but they’re not particularly British.”
They’re not particularly Liberal or Progressive either. Wokeism is the latest iteration of Progress within Liberalism, and it’s the diametric opposite of tolerant and respectful.
The Swiss have an admirable level of civic nationalism, partly facilitated by having four official languages. They have one tune for their national hymn, but the lyrics in the different languages express different sentiments. The German lyrics are like advertising copy for the Swiss Tourist Board, whereas the French lyrics read like a version of our footy chant “. If you think you’re hard enough, come and take a chance . . .”. (My knowledge of Italian and Romansh are too limited for me to attempt translations.)
This demonstrates that, as long as the tune is the same, a country does not have to sing from the same hymn sheet.
Great idea. ‘God Save The Team’ does it for sport.
I have long thought that our national anthem should be updated to reflect what is mostly sung as our anthem, namely, “‘Ere We Go”.
For the benefit of non-British commenters the tune is “Stars And Stripes Forever”, and the anthem is very easy to remember, because it would have only four verses. In each verse the same word is repeated throughout, thus:
Optionally verses 2 and 3 could be left out.
It’s a winner.
Doesn’t work for Scotland unless you say Scot-ter-land but Wales is definitely short of syllables.
In fact, Wales has the best anthem by far but the words would be a problem for most people.
Those countries would drop verse 2.
On the matter of re-writing National Anthems, there is this version of the La Marseillaise:
We are the French, we run away
We live to surrender another day
That’s why all French military heroes
Are Women, or, have German Dads.
Not bad, but in the interests of scansion, how about amending the last three words to “are total zeros”? Just a thought.
It does scan better, but I think the line, as is, echoes both the American observation that due to D-Day, ‘Thousands of French women find out what it’s like to not only sleep with a winner, but one who doesn’t call her “Fraulein.” Sadly, widespread use of condoms by American forces forestalls any improvement in the French bloodline.’ and the English football chant of, “You’re S**t, but your birds are fit!”
I think you might have a sideline in writing for I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue.
Liberal democracy is just a reststop on the road from nationalism to nihilism.
Legutko again!
Which is curious since I am completely irreligious.
I thought the internationally recognised essential British value was fair play? Perhaps we should try and rescue it from the avalanche of BS in which it is drowning
The only society which can successfully make “values” the principle of unity is a totalitarian one – and it can only last for as long as subscription to the “values” is enforced. The moment that weakness kicks in, or fatigue, or doubt, the whole thing goes belly-up. Hence the fall of the Soviet Union. The US pretends it is constructed around a constitution, but that constitution is itself a manifestation of the real reason for US unity and identity, the WASP inheritance – now all but squandered – which means the US is heading for dissolution. National integrity relies on inherited culture which in turn depends on demographic stability. When the ties that bind are deeper than “values”, the bitterest rows are sustainable and deadly division kept at bay. After all, what are “values” at the end of the day but fancy, moralising propositions most likely at variance with real experience? And a proposition naturally excites its own opposition in any conscious mind. Any attempt to build a society on words is doomed, either to speedy collapse – “liberal”; or long, increasingly coercive and hysterical enforcement – Marxist / “Woke”.
Oh dear. The union flag held by the little girl in the picture is upside-down.
To be fair, it’s the person who stuck it on the stick who is to blame. Perhaps she knows hence she is scowling at it slightly
Three lions on a shirt
Plus another one on Scotland’s
Wales have got a DRAGON
And Northern Ireland’s is nice too
GB is a truly great country IMO with great people and great potential, and its not even the 1% that spoil it for everyone else its far less than that. There is no place in this country for that tiny %,. To carry on the 1% analogy they are the “filthy few” and include messrs Johnson, Corbin, Witty, Valance and Ferguson. Spain and Portugal are close in joint 2nd to GB in my exp.The best place for those who have no place here is probably somewhere where they have death squads and psychotic cartel bosses. That’ll learn them.
“One flesh, one bone, one true religion
One voice, one hope, one real decision
Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa
Give me one vision, yeah”
If you sing this in the style of Dennis Waterman in Little Britain, I could get on board with this…
If non-european rulers derived their legitimacy from their value as allies of Britain and the Raj, maybe our modern island story should emphasise our value as vassals of the American empire. Just as Jodhpur ruled herself and provided some of the finest (Indian officered) troops in our imperial armies, so to do we provide submarines equally as advanced as America’s efforts. They have sailed side by side against Russian SSKs and SSNs. No other nation can provide that assistance. Nor can any other nation provide the signals intelligence that America depends on. There is no closer alliance in the intelligence world than UKUSA (even within the already tightly knit Five Eyes).
Zareer Masani spoke of an imperial esprit de corps in the armies of the empire. Maybe we should embrace our role as part of the American empire and make clear how important we are to them.
Sounds about right. Only I do not think the US same view of our significance, not at all
Plenty of Brits disparaged the princes, with the exception of the military. The British Army was desperate for Indian and Nepalese manpower, and were incredibly grateful for what they got. The admiration of the US military (which is very very real) is all we need. Ignore the silly democrats- they are no different to the complacent liberal imperialists of the late 19th century. Ungrateful and increasingly irrelevant.
Was the reference to the JRSST deeply ironic, or a mistake? It has been funding anti British activities for,decades. ( You never know.A Times journalist recently called Glenn Greenwall a conservative journalist).
We’re all fu**ed!
It may still be too early to assess whether the British Empire was a good thing. Like the Ottoman, Roman and earlier empires, it is the imprint left once the centre of power and the history have faded that counts. If positive, this is likely to include some kind of partly real or imagined concept or project that leaves former subjects wealthier in spirit than before. On that basis, despite their predations and brutalities, the Roman and British empires may be thought tilted towards the good, if one overlooks arbitrary borders drawn on maps that are a source of endless trouble. Not so the Ottoman empire or attempts to create copycat empires by other European nations and Japan. Now, what of Britain’s last colony – itself?
This type of article keeps coming along. People in England see that the problem with unity begins in Scotland and Wales. In fact, the problem begins in England – in conversation people struggle with the idea of Britishness not being the same as Englishness.
For total unity, the idea of Englishness has to disappear first because England is dominant in the arrangement but can’t be openly seen to be dominant.
Excellent point. I’ve never been able to pin down what “Englishness” is, so always defined myself as “British”, or “Northern”, or “Yorkshire”. Those identities always triggered a feeling of belonging for me much more than “English” did.
What would you say was “British” and what “English”?
I have always assumed we English are diffident about our nationality as we have had the larger influence over the British Isles in language, driving, law etc. I’m 3rd generation white immigrant and half-English but feel pretty incorporated. The English identity is maybe humour (Carry On films), self-depreciation, nostalgia (Downton Abbey), inventiveness and Christian humanism (abolished slavery in the 12th century) [off the top of my head]!
And this is the problem because everyone else doesn’t get a say in things.
You mean deprecation.
Haha. Yes perhaps too much self-depreciation has led us to this dearth of values
Yes, George, but maybe a malapropism that works?
The slavery abolition was mostly the Normans.
I have lived in Wales for 45 years but was born in the north of England. Before moving to Wales I worked in Scotland. I have never seen myself as English!!!
The north of England is vastly different from the south and is, in fact, nearer in humour and character to Wales – self-deprecating, harsh, corner of the mouth rather than full on. To me Englishness means living within a 100 mile radius of London – it means Londonness. Here is the problem, of course. About half of the British population live in this area and they see Englishness and Britishness as the same thing. This makes the far-flung places feel left out of the party. Hence the arrival of independence movements.
Not sure that’s true. I see myself as English because seeing myself as British sort of implies that I must accept something in common with and vicariously share some aspects of Scottishness. As I see Scotland* as a handouts-dependent complete and utter waste of space and a millstone, I don’t agree that they make up any part of my nationality at all.
I have the same reservation about Northern Ireland, where they bizarrely have a “marching season” to insult each other by commemorating sectarian battles of 300 years ago, and a related one about Welshness. As far as I can see there is no Welsh identity at all. When you think of Scotland you at least think of Ally’s Tartan Army and Trainspotting, but when you think of Wales, does anyone think of anything? Anything at all?
*that of today, not the Scotland of the past – where, if you drew up one list of Scottish inventions and discoveries, and another list of British inventions and discoveries, they’d be almost the same list
This is a good answer but you are confirming what I am saying. Effectively, that Englishness doesn’t have room for anything else.
I’m more about suggesting that being British and English is like being north American and American. There cannot be many Americans who consider Mexicans, Panamanians and Canadians their compatriates.
Well no, those are separate countries from the US. But as yet Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man, and the Channels (did I miss anything?) all share the same country with England.
If you visit North Wales you will meet lovely people speaking an ancient language.one feels Wales.Its magical.
I am 100% behind Welsh independence but a language is no good for putting food on the table. This idea, that everything depends on a language is what is slowing us down. We need high-paid jobs:- battery producers, the tidal power unit in Swansea, something in the empty space of mid-Wales, technology instead of social science.
I worked in north Wales (well, it was a big chunk of my sales territory) as a graduate and I love the countryside. It is a fabulous place straight out of Tolkien. I am not sure that it adds up to an identity though.
Hi Chris, I was born within 100 miles of London and have never identified with it. I’ve been visiting the capital for 50 years and it progressively became less and less the capital of England and more like an international city of the kind you see in dystopian Sci-Fi films. The only things vaguely English are connected to the Monarchy. Now of course it’s become a political playground under the present Mayor.
I tried replying but for some reason it is ‘waiting for approval’. Time to withdraw from UnHerd, I think.
Howards End has an interesting debate about this. Little England it used to be called , disparagingly, in the days of the Empire. Belloc,and Chesterton portrayed it very well, as well as E.M. Forster. Germany went through a similar identity crisis during its unification under Bismarck.Highly influential writers wanted,Germany to be more like Switzerland. I must admit I find Englishness very easy to understand, based in its ethereally beautiful countryside, nostalgic anthems and bloody minded people.
No, that’s the problem, Englishness has been destroyed to make way for Britishness. The problem isn’t that Englishness is in the way, it’s that Englishness doesn’t exist. We are English, not British, and that is where our focus should be. Britain is a political union, that is all, and the English ties to Britain is what is weakening us because it’s us who are bearing the brunt of it. The Scottish or the Welsh don’t consider themselves British before their national identities so why do we?
You are just agreeing with me but using different words. The reason why Britishness does not work is that Englishness gets in the way. That’s what I said.
“We are Britain and we have one dream to unite all people in one Great Team”.
The road to Brexit was built and paved with such stuff…
Our diversity is our greatest strength … let’s embrace it!
I think the down ticks don’t appreciate irony. Another term I like is diversity and inclusion. Orwellian Newspeak.
Even better, let’s “celebrate” it!