It was around 1892. My Gateshead grandma, a small child then, was off to the dressmaker’s on her own. Her mam was dead and her riveter dad was busy organising a union at his shipyard. “What colour shall I ask for?” she asked him. “Just tell her you’re a socialist,” he laughed. So she became a little girl in a red dress.
The Labour Party’s formation in 1900 was a dream come true.
As a frail pensioner on polling days, Grandma would accept a lift in the Tory Lord of the Manor’s Bentley to reach the polling station – where she unerringly voted Labour.
Those times are dust dead and gone. The family stories, the millions of people across generations, building a movement so powerful it could move mountains and change the world.
Labour was in our DNA and on our side.
And now?
But after the Reform UK advances at the local elections we have to ask – is the party that ran through our veins finished? Will we see Labour try to compete only with the rhetoric of the far right simply to win votes? A wannabe Reform UK in a red dress?
As we all (or at least many of us) gaze in horror on the local election results, we might ask what we can do to halt the rise of far right populism (aka fascism) and a Prime Minister Nigel Farage at the next General Election?
Reform UK won 677 council seats in the local elections, but this is from zero seats at the 2021 polls.
The surge in votes was enough for Reform to take power in ten councils, including County Durham. Reform also returned two mayors and a by-election MP in a safe Labour seat.
Labour lost nearly 200 council seats, and won only 99.
It could have been worse: many councils and mayoralties were not up for election this time.
Although comparatively small gains in the greater scheme of things, the abrupt rise of Reform UK represents a trend. For Labour it’s like the trend of falling to the ground after you’ve jumped off a cliff.
It was what we were dreading – a closer look at the General Election Labour “landslide” confirms it was anything but: just the implosion of the Tory vote, helped along by Reform, with Labour happily picking up the crumbs that returned them to power.
It could have been different
It could have been so different after last year’s General Election, with everyone sick of a Conservative government. Now was the time for a fresh start: humane, financially astute and honest. Most of all, for and by the people.
But we got more of the same. Like the “tough choices” that affected only the most vulnerable – cutting Winter Fuel Allowance for pensioners, cutting disability benefits – that were simply mean.
There were no tough choices for the rich who could afford them.
Then the cock-eyed view of pressing for growth while imposing austerity, which hampers spending, which limits growth.
Let’s not forget the drift of the grassroots away from the party, after purges of left wing MPs and activists, and protest resignations. I cut up my card over their policy on Gaza.
The party lost 37,000 members in 2023 alone. That’s people who would normally be out canvassing for their Labour candidates.
With the prospect of obliteration, cue much naval-gazing in the party. In an exclusive article in The Sun on Sunday – where else – the architect of Blue Labour Maurice Gasman set out his stall for electoral success.
Although he advocates restoring the Winter Fuel Allowance, he calls for a relaxing of Net Zero goals and a clampdown on immigration – the latter by withdrawing from the European Convention on Human Rights and scrapping the Human Rights Act.
There is an alternative, starting with increasing high- earner income tax, closing tax loopholes, clamping down on tax havens in British Territories, judicious nationalisation and reconnecting with the EU. And also restoring benefits to the disabled, poor families and pensioners.
There are plenty of local policies that could improve living standards without breaking the bank. In Community Wealth Building, councils form close relationships with local “anchor institutions” to develop the local economy, engaging townsfolk in economic democracy like forming workers cooperatives.
Created by the Democracy Collaborative in Cleveland Ohio, the blueprint has been copied throughout the developed world. The UK pioneers are Preston Council and their councillor Matthew Brown who wrote the book about it, “Paint Your Town Red”.
Labour town halls across the North have adopted elements of the Preston Model.
But the policy has become associated with the party’s left wing, and under Starmer it has been strategically forgotten.
Yet there’s nothing to prevent central government from supporting Community Wealth Building.
Take local authority pension funds for example. The £326bn Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) is the largest public sector pension scheme in the UK with more than five million members.
Like the rest of the financial community, the LGPS funds continue to invest in the US Stock Exchange despite the volatility created by President Trump.
With the Mansion House reforms, the various LGPS funds are joining together to benefit from economies of scale.
Teesside Pension Fund (managing four of the Tees Valley council pensions) and the LGPS for Tyne and Wear are planning a shared service for their pensions to launch this summer, with some £19bn of investments.
While the merging of funds is welcome news, there’s a risk that the LGPS managers could overlook local investment opportunities in a strategy known as Place Based Impact Investment (PBII).
For instance they could invest a fraction of their wealth in local social housing – with safe returns in the shape of stable rental income.
With that extra money, local councils could downsize overambitious plans for their dying High Streets and repurpose some commercial properties for housing, creating more footfall for the remaining shops.
Central government could allow tax-free investment in social housing from private investors. In 1994 Tory Prime Minister John Major launched the Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS) which allowed tax-free returns on selected investment projects.
Peabody Housing Association used EIS to finance the renewal of their London housing stock.
But this won’t happen while Blue Labour is in charge. There won’t be support at the top for any policy rethink before the next General Election – beyond Reform-lite posturing on immigration.
A disastrous General Election will usher in Reform UK.
As we watch democracy collapse, the only alternative might be to accept the end of the two-party hegemony, with LibDems, Greens, Plaid, SNP and parties around ex – Labour members, forming a coalition to counter the worst excesses of the far right.
Once upon a time, Labour was the party that won pensions, national insurance and free school meals, created the NHS, built council housing and founded the Open University.
Could it be that while Keir Hardy was the Labour Party’s first Leader, his namesake becomes its last, in everything that matters?
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