Labour needs someone with the guts to tell the party what it must do to avoid disaster

12 July 2008

Fraser Nelson on the latest at Westminster

Gordon Brown is not used to being spoken back to in Cabinet, which made a recent session on tackling David Cameron all the more memor-able. The civil servants were sent away, as is the custom at political Cabinet meetings, and the Prime Minister laid forth the Gospel according to St Gordon. The Conservatives had not changed, he said, and the next election would be a choice between Tory cuts and Labour investment — the narrative of the 2001 and 2005 campaigns. When he finished, there was an embarrassed silence. Then, one by one, his colleagues told him why he was wrong.

This time last year, the Prime Minister could have told them that the moon (or Mr Cameron) was made of green cheese without fear of contradiction. Now his authority has all but perished and his Cabinet are un- afraid to speak out. During that meeting, Mr Brown was told that it is futile to pretend the Tories have not changed and that it is more important, in fact, to persuade the public that Labour has changed. What none of his Cabinet colleagues said is that, as long as the party is led by this Scots chap with his wearily familiar face, it will be impossible to convince the voters that the governing party is refreshed and fit for purpose.

How to change this face is now the dominant topic of conversation at Westminster. It is too late to use the formal mechanism of a leadership challenge, but there are many ways to skin a cat. The party is broadly split into three groups: the Insurgents urging immediate action to get it over with in the summer recess; the One-Last-Chancers who want to reserve judgment until Christmas; and the Micawberists who want to keep Mr Brown in Number 10 in the hope that something will turn up. It is worth exploring their arguments in some detail.

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Tina

July 10th, 2008 9:32pm Report this comment

Great piece.

Gautam Sen

July 11th, 2008 2:14pm Report this comment

And why does the usually innocuous Fraser Nelson have any interest in 'saving' Labour? These are people who have turned a serious economic setback into absolute calamity. No clue, but daily complacent arrogance from a front bench that mostly never experienced a day's productive employment, moving straight from the turgid inanities of student politics and the absurdity of the Labour Research dept to high political office. Please, let us suffer homelessness, long walks (since petrol is going out fashion and only a few can afford London's transport) and starvation rations (no 19 course G-8 feasts) but no more of Ball, the Miliband's, Kelly's and, god preserve us, the deputy leader of the Labour Party. As one coughs to death with a hospital-acquired infection please let us not have grievous insult added to injury.

M McGregor

July 11th, 2008 3:39pm Report this comment

So what is "best for the Party"? Obviously being less hopelessly incompetent would be a start, and it might be nice if Labour were not so corrupt, self-seeking, dishonest and cynical - but on that they are neck-and-neck with the Conservatives. Thanks to a carefully preserved system which ensures the domination of the two main parties, while they're both as bad as each other the electorate feels it has no choice but to select the lesser of two evils; whichever that might be at any particular moment, depending on who last let the mask slip badly.

We won't bring in ideology or morality; this is, after all, the modern British political scene. It's so common to see politicians of either 'side' calling for changes of policy (or pretended changes of policy) on the grounds of pure expediency, the public generally doesn't even register the hypocrisy. Their 'beliefs' are often so similar anyway, with even the Tory leader openly regarding himself as the heir to Tony Blair, and saying that he "likes" what has been done to Britain. Then again, many are so deeply involved with personal advancement that they are blind to how their behaviour reveals their priorities.

Labour's core support always came from the British working class, which still retains many old- fashioned virtues, including patriotism. While these voters were occupied by the benefits of an artificially high standard of living, the Party has been able to pursue its vicious programme of erradicating British traditional values, standards, and the very racial & cultural identity of the nation itself, largely unnoticed by anybody who cares except the BNP, which was easily stifled or sabotaged by means of the all-powerful media.

Now this is coming to an end. The bulk of the population which still has the misfortune to be White, law-abiding, and sexually normal is becoming aware that its financial security is about to disappear due to the policies of the same people who have been dismantling their country.
What would be best for Labour (and,indeed, the Conservatives)would be for its decent membership to expel the marxists, pseudo-liberals,
cranks, and parasites who presently infest it; but as this will never happen, it should 'shut up shop' and make way for a party that will actually care about its own people, and actually do what it promises.

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