John McDonnell’s speech was a chance to win over voters. But while his pitch went down well in the hall and was greeted by raptures of wild applause from (some of) the party faithful, there was little on offer to entice those on the fence to come over to Labour. If anything, this looked to be business as usual for a party that voters just don’t trust on the economy (the latest YouGov poll puts Labour nine points behind the Tories). McDonnell talked about sharing the burden, investing and ‘calling a halt to austerity’. He said:
‘We will rewrite the rules to the benefit of working people on taxes, investment and how our economic institutions work.’
So what does this rewriting of the rules actually mean? Given that there was little flesh on the bones in McDonnell’s speech, it’s hard to tell.
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