May I introduce you to the “new politics” of the Corbyn era. Some of you may remember Chuka Umunna who before the general election was shadow business secretary under Ed Miliband. He resigned from the shadow cabinet following Jeremy Corbyn’s election as Labour leader. He’s been victim of some interesting trolling lately because, obviously, in the eyes of many of Corbyn’s supporters – never Jeremy, oh no – Umunna is not of the hard left, he must be of the right. To experienced Labour watchers, this is par for the course, as is the abuse Umunna suffered today.
Allow me to quote tweets from one Steve J Stann, whose twitter persona is now deceased, but happily his comments were screen shot: “Chuka – you are a lying, deceitful stinking red Tory. It is YOU and your mates sponsored by the business funded “Progress” organisation who are the stinking trolls, attacking Corbyn at any opportunity. Get out of the Labour Party and get back to your natural home as an Uncle Tom in the Tory Party.” When someone tweets that this does not seem to be the “new kinder politics”, Mr Stann replies, “If you don’t like it go away and join the Tory Party.” Umunna, as well as well as many other Labour Party MPs and ordinary members, have had plenty more like this. In the words of the Carpenters, it’s yesterday once more.
Firstly, there is a stench of racism in this twitter exchange. The term Uncle Tom is not a compliment. My dictionary describes an Uncle Tom as “a black man considered by other blacks to be subservient to or to curry favour with whites.” Now I have no idea whether Mr Stann is black, nor do I have any interest, except that the comment is extremely offensive. Such an insult is rarely used against anyone who is not black so straight away we are in treacherous waters.
But here we go again: if you don’t like Labour’s direction – that is a narrow, far left sect led, if that is the right word, by a man who, it is becoming crystal clear, is a pacifist – then go away and join the Tory Party. A bungling, incompetent pacifist at that, who is surrounding himself with his comrades as they seek to gain control of the Labour Party’s machinery, in traditional Marxist style. Forget the “Labour Party is a broad church” which was, laughably, spouted by Corbyn’s mentor and architect of Labour’s 18 years of opposition from 1979, Tony Benn himself. Broad church? That’s the last thing the Corbynistas want. For theirs is the world of you are either for us or against us. If you don’t like it, you can leave and join the Tory Party which you have vigorously opposed all your life whilst the far left were holding protest meetings.
It is the certainty of the far left that is baffling, the certainty that all the public have been waiting for is a far left manifesto and the only reason Labour lost in May was because it wasn’t left wing enough. Lurking on the outer edges of politics are more of the comrades, just waiting to resume their places in Corbyn’s “straight talking, honest politics”, like Ken Loach’s misnamed “Left Unity” and the Socialist Party/Militant tendency front organisation, the Trade Union and Socialist Coalition. Imagine it. People wielding power in the Labour Party by 2020 might be Derek Hatton, George Galloway, Mark Serwotka, Ken Livingstone and former SWP committee member Lindsey German, with kindly old Jeremy at the top table, still talking blithely how, “we don’t advocate or condone personal attacks, we don’t accept personal abuse and we don’t let those who peddle slurs and half-truths set the agenda. Our approach is inclusive, positive and based around issues, not personalities.” Well, you don’t, Jeremy. It’s never you, it’s always someone else. And boy there are some seriously unpleasant people lining up behind Labour’s reluctant leader.
I somehow doubt that the politics of abuse being directed at those who do not toe the hard left political line will play out well among the electorate, but that is never a concern for the comrades whose idea of power is control of the party machine rather than actually running the country. Purity will always take priority over pragmatism, only one view – theirs – is the right one.
Just look at the names lining up behind Corbyn. Derek Hatton who arranged for a fleet of taxis to deliver redundancy notices to council workers, George Galloway who needs nor deserves an introduction to his unpleasant career, Mark Serwotka who has turned the PCS union into an intellectual and financial basket case, Ken Livingstone who twice lost the mayoral election to Boris Johnson, the second time in 2012 when the Tories were in a mess after George Osborne’s omnishambles budget and Lindsey German, a high up in the far left Stop The War Coalition, former prop. J Corbyn. Can you honestly imagine your average swing voter looking at that lot, thinking: “Hmm. They look a sensible bunch of people I could trust to run the economy and protect the country.” More likely, the thought would be that they could not be relied upon to run a whelk stall.
Corbyn may well believe, at least superficially, that he favours politics which are “inclusive (and) positive”, but few of his henchmen feel nor act that way. The worst thing is that so many of the comrades behind the throne are losers in their fields of inexpertise. That, at least, shows they are supporting the right man, at least from their point of view, but the wrong one for everyone else.
There are some people who just fancy a Labour government and many others who need one. The Corbynistas have in their number a good many people who believe in the former, but only if it fits with their brand of purity. For all I know, Labour’s leader may well be a nice man who does things differently from other politicians, but that cannot be said for many of his apparatchiks who are merely a throwback to the unkinder, more unpleasant Labour politics we all remember from the 1980s. The attacks on Chuka Umunna and others are just the warm-up act. You just watch. We have been here before.
