Budge up! We need to make room at the British political table for a new guest. Or, an old guest wearing a different hat which, in these days of UKIPs, Brexit parties, and Reform Uks (Reforms UK?), happens a lot.
It seems that former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn will return to leading a political party. We didn’t hear it directly from him of course, but from fellow left-wing MP Zarah Sultana who will be joining him in this new, yet unnamed, venture.
At the time, it seemed Sultana had jumped the gun and announced the move without Corbyn’s approval – perhaps he was present, whether he was involved remains unclear.
But why should liberals, capital letter or lower case, care about what’s going on behind the newest set of curtains in the dysfunctional cul-de-sac of UK politics?
Well, because we like balance and particularly balancing opportunities with obligations; and the new party of the hard-left, which some are already calling “Jezbollah”, presents us with both.
First, the opportunity.
Labour has had a rough year or so in government. The smooth, slick, optimistic Keir Starmer that won the General Election is no more. Even though the Tories were about as popular as the Ebola virus at the time, Labour’s victory was impressive and showed that a sensibly led Labour party can win.
But since then, it’s all gone a bit wrong.
There are some Labour folks who still cling to the idea that it is some grand plan by the leadership to dispose of the difficult stuff (cuts, winter fuel, immigration etc) in the beginning so that when the next election arrives, it’ll be all free puppies and rising GDP.
What they’ve got is plummeting popularity and inflation at 3.6 percent.
Labour is one major scandal away from asking the Ebola virus to share who does its PR and now the ghost of May Day past is haunting their feast. One set of polls even has Starmer’s Labour neck and brass neck with the People’s Front of Kneecap and Bob Vylan.
For Liberals, a chance presents. We can rally behind our shared values of individualism, freedom, and community to show disenfranchised soft-right Labour voters that there is a home for them with us. They do not have to choose between Sir Keir’s downbeat, depressing round table and Jeremy Corbyn’s wonky picnic table where you may well end up sat next to someone from Hamas.
There is an alternative with Liberal Democrats.
But with opportunity comes responsibility and it is our duty to remind people of the real nature of Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana’s politics.
It is the politics of envy. It believes that no private sector business, entrepreneurial endeavour, or industry is above being sacrificed for ever more bloated state services. It is critical of the common law tradition, constitutional monarchy, and institutions that have made Britain a free country.
It always manages to be on the side of global affairs that the United Kingdom, the United States, and our NATO and our western allies are not.
It makes excuses for, and is regularly pictured alongside, terrible people with only malevolence in their hearts.
However, the greatest danger of Copy and Paste Corbynism is that it, like socialist movements always do, will attempt to rewrite its own history. Mr Corbyn and his colleagues have previous in this.
In the immediate aftermath of the 2019 General Election, he claimed in the Guardian that his Labour leadership had “won the argument.”
This was, of course, false.
Had he won the argument, he would have been Prime Minister, John McDonnell would have been the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Diane Abbott would have been Home Secretary, in charge of the police and MI5.
This did not happen.
Which brings us to Jeremy Corbyn’s biggest and most lasting, perhaps even only tangible, achievement in over forty years as a politician, the monument to his efforts, his Ed Stone, his Corbyn carbuncle, if you will… Boris Johnson’s 2019 majority.
History has carved that in stone and Mr Corbyn and his supporters were both present for it and very much involved.
In our role in pointing out that we can see the emperor’s wedding tackle, liberals can take inspiration from what Neil Kinnock said at Labour’s 1985 conference and point out what happens with “impossible promises” and “outdated” and “irrelevant” “rigid dogma.”
In our recent history, the biggest Tory majority since 1987 is what happens. Do any of us want that again? That is the legacy of Corbynism and if all we do is remind wavering voters of that, we’ll have done our job.
* Alan is a writer and a regular columnist for the Scottish Daily Express. He also runs Alan Grant Communications, specialising in political communications and public affairs.
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25 Comments
I find it depressing that the political spectrum has moved so far to the right that a new political to the left of Keir Starmer’s Labour Party is automatically described as ‘hard-left’. The truth is that if you think of Keir Starmer policies and Margaret Thatcher’s, there is very little difference. She denationalised major state owned industries and Keir Starmer wants to keep them in the private sector. She passed major anti-trade union laws, and Keir Starmer wants to keep them. And Starmer was trying to cut benefits which, I’m sure, Thatcher would have supported if alive today.
So, what was regarded as right-wing or even hard right in the 1980s is now regarded as centre-left? Meanwhile Jeremy Corbyn, who would have just been regarded as quite a mainstream socialist politician is now suddenly more left wing than Stalin?
My point is not to defend Corbyn but to caution that the Liberal Democrats should be a centre-left or left of centre party today if it had not also drifted to the right over the last few decades. We should not be afraid to be proudly on the left of Keir Starmer – and that does not make us ‘hard-left’ by any sensible definition.
A very sensible comment from Brenda Will.
If Alan Grant thinks the 2017 and 2019 Labour manifestos under Jeremy Corbyn were “hard left” perhaps he’d like to say which particular policies he has in mind.
As far as I remember they didn’t make a call for “all power to the proletariat”! There was a call to renationalise some of the previously privatised industries. Lib Dems claim to support a mixed economy. You can’t have a mixed economy if everything is in the private sector.
Liking a hypothetical political party co-founded by a Muslim to terrorists, (without any apparent justification, if there could be any) is one of the worst and most blatant examples of islamophobia that I’ve seen in our party. As an allegedly liberal blog this is the last place something like this ought to have been published.
“show disenfranchised soft-right Labour voters that there is a home for them with us”
So our criticism of Labour should be that they aren’t doing blairism correctly? And there are people that will vote for us if we do that? No thanks!
Sickened to see an article again comparing people opposing war crimes with supporting Hama. Might be fine for the Scottish Daily Express but a real new low for Lib Dem voice.
The politics of Envy ? I don’t envy the billionaires destroying fellow humans and life on this planet.
“our shared values of individualism … and community” an oxymoron there surely!
And what sort of “community” is this? I assume liberals favour the sort of community where people help each other, rather than the one that enforces conformity to some sort of social norm. Blue Labour voters might prefer the second sort of community though.
@Caracatus: There is indeed a difference between opposing Israel’s war crimes and supporting Hamas. Unfortunately Jeremy Corbyn does not appear to recognise that difference, and often gives the impression that the only people who matter are the likes of Hamas. I don’t know much about Zarah Sultana (though she seems sensible) but I would want to avoid any political movement involving JC. As for the pro-Gaza Independents who might also become involved, I’d give them a very wide berth indeed for the reason I outlined in a comment on another post.
@Caracatus – I too was quite shocked that linking people opposing war crimes with supporting Hamas (sp?) was included in an article on Lib Dem Voice.
I’m pretty sure the mention of Hamas in the article is a reference to Corbyn having described Hamas as ‘friends’, along with his repeated equivocation over many years over whether Hamas were terrorists. (Although to be fair, Corbyn did later say he regretted his use of the word ‘friends’ and after the October 2023 massacre he did (finally) describe Hamas as ‘terrorists’.
Considering in any case Alan’s article is very obviously written in a somewhat tongue-n-cheek way (…asking the Ebola virus to share who does its PR…), I’d cut it some slack in terms of having stuff that is obviously not literally true before taking offence at it, or describing it as ‘a new low for Lib Dem voice’.
Disappointing that opposing the horrific war, suffering of 2m Palestinians & killing of over 60,000 in Gaza is equated with supporting Hamas. A cheap remark. There’s no place for naivety & attempts at satire on such an issue. Jeremy Corbyn is my local MP & we should understand he won as an independent with huge support in a long held Labour constituency, Islington, ((7k majority) where at one time the council was run by the Liberal Democrats, & we now trail the Greens without a single councillor.
” It (he politics of JC and ZS) is critical of the common law tradition, constitutional monarchy, and institutions that have made Britain a free country.”
Alan Grant might have a point on criticism of the wisdom of having an hereditary component of government but why does he think the tradition of common law is under attack? And why does he think we are all that free (free from what BTW?) when there are examples in the news all the time which show otherwise?
PS I’ve just noticed that Alan Grant ” is a writer and a regular columnist for the Scottish Daily Express”.
Does this have a different editorial slant than the Daily Express south of the border?
As well as sharing the concerns of other commenters on this article, I don’t think it’s correct that we should be looking to attract support from the “soft right” of 2024 Labour voters. We should be looking to attract support from the socially liberal ones. “Right” leaning 2024 Labour voters will either be happy with Starmer or flirting with Reform, and we should not contort ourselves to get in their way. A far bigger group are socially liberal and economically social-democratic, and that’s the group our party was literally founded to provide a home for. We need to prove to them that we are that home.
In reference to Corbyn and Hamas, what he said has been taken out of context and turned into something it never was. The use of the term ‘friend’ in that context was not an indication of agreement with their position. It was simply because he had engaged with them in a way that their terrorist designation makes so difficult now. The designation of both the military and civil wings of Hamas by the UK government was wrong as Hamas was indeed the legitimate government of Gaza having won an election in 2006. To proscribe every aspect of Hamas as terrorist was to condemn all those employed by Hamas – doctors, agriculturalists, civil servants, police, librarians etc, to death by Israel.
I find this whole anti-Corbyn terror to be counter-productive and ill-considered. Many accusations against him were fabricated or over blown.
Part of the problem Labour is having now is their desperation to distance themselves from him. Maybe we need to look carefully at what Corbyn actually said and study what his policies actually were before committing the same mistakes.
Let’s harness his support rather than alienating it.
@ Peter Martin “Alan Grant might have a point on criticism of the wisdom of having an hereditary component of government”.
The hereditary system is a lottery with no rational foundation, especially when it makes the Monarch Head of the Established Church. Just thank your lucky stars (equally irrational) that the Duke of York wasn’t born first.
@ Alan Grant “In our role in pointing out that we can see the emperor’s wedding tackle”.
Does Grant think that is some sort of literary flourish ? I’m afraid I don’t.
Good article. I think the Corbyn, Hamas link is fair comment given his history.
It is utterly naive to describe the Corbyn/Sultana position as anti-war or anti-war crime. Anybody actively opposing war crimes and atrocities will spend most of their time criticising Hamas (well maybe Sudan/RSF, Iran, Syria, new Syria, Putin, various groups in the Sahel, the Houthis, Myanmar, China, then Hamas.) What Corbyn and Sultana are doing is seeking to justify the ongoing conflict in Israel/Palestine by repeating all the propaganda coming from one of the belligerents. This is not how you achieve peace.
More broadly the analysis is correct. I have some sympathy with the Labour Party here. For all its faults, it’s mainstream is democratic, inclusive and patriotic, but they are forever cursed by the hard left haters and traitors.
“Which brings us to Jeremy Corbyn’s biggest and most lasting, perhaps even only tangible, achievement in over forty years as a politician, the monument to his efforts, his Ed Stone, his Corbyn carbuncle, if you will… Boris Johnson’s 2019 majority.””
I’d expand that to include his contribution to losing the Brexit referendum
@Meral Hussein-Ece: As per my earlier comment, it’s not opposing the war in Gaza, but Jeremy Corbyn’s position specifically, that’s a cause for concern. JC has a history of equivocation on Palestinian extremist groups such as Hamas, which is part of his pattern of knee-jerk anti-westernism in foreign policy (which also includes making a false equivalence between Russia and Ukraine). One can oppose Israel’s war in Gaza without supporting or appearing to support Palestinian terrorists, but JC fails that test.
“We should be looking to attract support from the socially liberal ones. “Right” leaning 2024 Labour voters will either be happy with Starmer or flirting with Reform”
We forget the power and attraction of free trade, free speech and sound money (classic liberal virtues) at our peril. Personally I think our natural collation is socially liberal plus economically liberal – shown since the enlightenment to have materially increased both person freedom and material prosperity in a way that born before (say) 1700 would find impossible to comprehend (though a coupe who might are Lucian of Samosata (dc185 CE) and Lucretius (d c 55BCE).
The available political space is anti-authoritarian/centre/centre right. Labour’s centre of gravity is puling soft left; and the Greens and Corbyn are shouting for the economically illiterate vote along with Reform.
@ Tristan,
I wondered how long it would be before someone turned the conversation back to Brexit! If Jo Swinson had been willing to at least talk to Jeremy Corbyn it’s quite possible that we could have had a more manageable type of Brexit. One that included staying in the Customs Union perhaps.
But both she and Ed voted against that.
In response to @Tristan Ward:
“The available political space is anti-authoritarian/centre/centre right.”
I agree with this sentiment. It doesn’t mean we can’t adopt a few policies that would be seen as “centre-left”, but on the whole, the space is there to be filled.
@ Jack Meredith 18th Jul ’25 – 11:52am
We are on the same page here. Making the socially liberal policies work in an economically liberal financial environment is key.
@ David,
I wasn’t intending to make a pro-monarchist argument. I was saying that Alan Grant is correct to point out that both JC and ZS do at least have serious doubts about the monarchy. As you also seem to – as a Lib Dem. So there is nothing ultra left about it.
Most of the rest of the world would agree on that point too.
My own view is that we’d be better off without it but we probably should leave the question alone until there is clear majority opposition.
@ Peter Martin 18th Jul ’25 – 11:46am
“I wondered how long it would be before someone turned the conversation back to Brexit! If Jo Swinson had been willing to at least talk to Jeremy Corbyn”
Yes just picking up on the comment about Johnson’s majority. And Jo Swinson might have talked to David Gauke as well. According to Tim Shipman’s books (I may have the detail wrong here) Gauke said there were a group of about a dozen Remainer MPs ready to declare independence from the Tory party in exchange for assurances we would not oppose them at a general election. That might have made a huge difference as well.
I’m nervous about using ‘the politics of envy’ as a jibe against redistributive taxation. Yes, it’s what the Mail and the Express say repeatedly. But inequality has widened sharply in the UK over the past 20 years; only the USA has a greater gap between rich and poor among developed democracies. It’s hard to maintain an open and democratic society when wealth is so unequally distributed – as we are seeing in the USA. Free market Liberals thin shrinking the state and letting entrepreneurs rip[ is more important p as the Chicago School showed in their support for the Chilean coup. Social Liberals put democracy and civil society first.