Protestors on the anti-Brexit marches have sensed an eerie absence. ‘What is it?’ I thought back in March as I stood on a soapbox to address an audience so jammed by the weight of numbers on Park Lane that it could not escape. Then it hit me. ‘What the hell have they done with the left?’
There were no Socialist Workers Party placards or George Galloways. The people who hijacked every demonstration I could remember had vanished. I saw plenty of left-wingers. On the neighbouring soapbox, a succession of socialists spoke well on the need to protect migrants and workers’ rights in a reformed Europe. But they were leftists, not the left: the left of Jeremy Corbyn, Seumas Milne, Len McCluskey, the Communist Party of Britain and Stop the War; the left that thinks historians give Stalin a bum rap; the left that will excuse Saddam Hussein, Slobodan Milosevic, Nicolas Maduro, Iran, Russia, Hamas and Hezbollah; the anti-European and anti-Semitic left; the bully left; the crank left; the left that no amount of shame could kill. Until now.
What was obvious in London is obvious everywhere – especially so after the European Parliament election results. Brexit can destroy the left and Labour with it. Like vultures, the Liberal Democrats, Greens, Change UK and the Scottish and Welsh nationalists are swooping down to feast on, well, the remains. The Lib Dems, written off by the left as Tory collaborators, are enjoying the heartiest meal. A poll for last weekend’s Observer found that, within the space of four weeks, they had roared ahead of Labour to become the favoured party of Remain voters. They finished second in the Euro elections, and came first in London – even in Islington, they forced Labour into second place. To date, 37 per cent of Labour’s general election vote had defected to the Lib Dems and Greens.
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