I once spent a very strange afternoon at Twerton Park, watching Bath City against someone or other in the company of Ken Loach. I didn’t know him and he didn’t know me, but I knew who he was and I spent an affable hour or so with him talking occasionally about football, but mainly about politics. It took me approximately one second to work out that he despised the government which, at the time, was led by Tony Blair. I knew Loach was on the far left of politics, way to the left of the far left in the Labour Party, even, and I had heard everything he said before, usually from the likes of Tony Benn, albeit with knobs on.
I do not profess to be the fount of all political knowledge, but I do have a theory about where the Labour Party needs to be positioned in order to win elections. I was there in the late 1970s when Labour began to lose its way and, in 1979, was summarily dismissed by a Conservative Party that had found its way and what a way it was. Margaret Thatcher managed to find the G spot of both the working and middle classes. Whilst her philosophy was an illusion and most definitely did not benefit the working classes, her words if not her actions appealed to a large constituency, from those living in council houses, who could now aspire to own their own homes (yes, it was a bribe, a homes for votes bribe, but it worked) and to everyone else who wanted to get on. Labour, under control of the hard left like Tony Benn and, from 1983, a young ambition-free backbencher called Jeremy Corbyn, looked like they stood against aspiration. That was because they did.
Labour, throughout the late 1970s, all of the 1980s and much of the 1990s, carried on as before, speaking the politics of jealousy and with no interest in aspiration, which the Tories appeared to represent. The truth was that Thatcher represented aspiration for those who were already at the top.
Throughout this entire period, the Bennite left talked to themselves, making fiery speeches at packed rallies and protest marches. Ken Loach was usually in attendance. Loach did what he does best: he opposed. And he has opposed every single government since then, including the 13 years of Labour.
Anyway, my theory. My political philosophy is simple: I believe in a meritocracy, where everyone has the same chance to get on, no matter who they are, where they live, where they went to school. I believe I am a socialist because I support a National Health Service free at the point of delivery. The NHS is socialism in action. But I also support and passionately believe in people succeeding in life and being better off. I believe that everyone should be able to afford to drink Champagne. Labour needs to appeal to a wide range of the population, from the aspirational working classes to the already affluent middle classes. Not a message that says, “You are doing well, we’ll make you poorer”.
Tony Blair understood that people wanted to get on. They wanted better, well-paid jobs, they wanted to own their own homes. They wanted a nice car, a holiday abroad, they wanted their children to do better than they did. Nothing, especially not Champagne, should be too good for the working classes. The problem was that the Champagne only got as far as the very rich and the Champagne socialists. Like Ken Loach.
After many years of actively opposing Labour and campaigning against Labour, Loach now supports Jeremy Corbyn, unquestionably the worst Labour leader of my lifetime, someone who makes Ed Miliband look like Clement Attlee by comparison. No one in their right mind could possibly believe that someone as utterly useless as Corbyn will ever become prime minister. Even those on the centre left, even the mainstream left, will find it hard to vote for a party led by Corbyn. Barring his fan club, the three quidders along with the chattering classes of Islington and Hackney, everyone knows the Corbyn project is doomed. But they don’t care. They won’t suffer. It’s someone else’s problem.
Ken Loach won’t care. He’ll make a film about Daniel Blake, make his luvvie friends feel a bit better about themselves, trouser a shed load of money and quaff a few bottles of bubbly whilst the Tories he supposedly hates line his pockets. A Tory government is good for Ken Loach. Fact.
Labour can only win if it believes in people getting on, making people better off, not making them worse off. Embracing the better off, not squeezing them, playing fair, giving everyone a chance.
I Daniel Blake has done very well for Ken Loach. But if Labour stays where it is, there will be a lot more Daniel Blakes. And the only one who will do well then will be the Tories and Ken Loach. Another grammar schoolboy and Oxford educated student. Just like so many other Corbynites who think they know what’s best for the great unwashed.
