Katy Balls Katy Balls

The message behind Labour’s latest party broadcast | 30 April 2019

As the Tories set expectations low for Thursday’s local elections, Labour is in campaign mode. The party has released its third and final party political broadcast ahead of this week’s votes. The theme of the short film is investment vs austerity attempting to lay out the reasoning behind the Labour slogan ‘for the many not the few’. In it, a host offers five members of the public money back that they lost as a result of Tory austerity. Meanwhile, a billionaire is given a £20,000 tax cut. The film goes on to suggest that only the ‘ordinary’ people put the money back in the community – while the billionaire barely notices it and moves it abroad.

The message behind the smooth broadcast is simple and typical of Labour – it reinforces the Jeremy Corbyn view that society is unequal and that those at the top don’t do their bit to share their wealth. But despite being on brand, it does reveal some of the thinking going on behind the scenes of how Labour plan to make gains in elections away from the issue of Brexit.

With the Tories expected to be punished for failing to deliver Brexit both in the local elections and the European elections, Labour also find the issue at times unhelpful on the doorstep. So far Jeremy Corbyn has managed a Brexit fudge that roughly keeps the party’s coalition of voters together. However, local Labour campaigners report voter apathy on the doors with people fed up, disillusioned and worn down by the Brexit process. That is a problem for the party as they tend to benefit from high turnout – low turnout can disproportionately affect Labour.

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