Read more: Labour's plan for business
Today’s Labour Party conference saw speeches from Deputy Leader Tom Watson and London Mayor Sadiq Khan: two Labour heavyweights who have voiced criticism of Corbyn and who, importantly, have their own mandates. Unsurprisingly, Watson praised Khan as a “champion.” It is significant that both, while accepting the result of the leadership election and offering support to Jeremy Corbyn, made some implicit criticisms of Corbyn and his backers. And in both their speeches there are elements that point to the shape of the Labour Party platform they would like to see.
Before Khan had even delivered his speech, journalists had already counted the number of times he was going to use the word “power” (38 in the final version). The principal message of his speech was a simple one: Labour must aim to take power at the national level as soon as possible; it is only in power that Labour can make the changes needed to help those who “need it most.” This was an argument, ultimately, for compromise on ideological principle in favour of pragmatic achievement. And in heaping praise on the party’s MPs, MSPs, AMs, and councillors as the people who “walk the streets and knock on doors come rain or shine, who deliver Labour leaflets and who listen to the voters,” Khan insisted that the party’s MPs, in particular, be recognised as some of Labour’s most dedicated activists, and given credit for their achievements. As Corbyn has appeared in recent days to give his supporters in Momentum leeway to consider campaigning for the deselection of some MPs, this is an important message. By slipping in “listen to the voters,” Khan hinted that the party needs to take very seriously opinion polls and evidence from canvassers who often report that Corbyn is not popular among many sometime Labour voters.
Watson, striking a parallel note, critiqued the tendency of some Corbyn supporters to denigrate the achievements of the New Labour years. Watson emphasised that the party’s history—including its recent history—must not be criticized as a catalogue of failures, calling the labour movement “the greatest movement for social change our great country has ever known.” Similarly, the values Khan put forward as “real Labour values”—“equality, social justice and opportunities for all”—while they might seem relatively uncontentious, represent a restatement of the values that soft left modernizers in the 1980s insisted Labour must place at the heart of the party’s project. Labour’s core values have never been fixed: any political party evolves and reconfigures the core elements of its ideological platform over time. Equality has probably been the most consistently central plank of Labour’s ideology. But how “equality”’ is understood, and the other values placed alongside it, are important. Khan talked about race and gender as well as material inequality, stressing the importance of identity politics as well as the politics of distribution. In emphasising “opportunities for all” alongside equality, he insisted that the British people don’t want equality to mean a shift towards sameness; rather, equality must be a springboard to allow people to choose and take opportunities.
Khan and Watson were both positive about business; Khan talked about Labour supporting businesses to grow as well as about rights at work, and Watson made a defence of “capitalism” central to his speech: “businesses are where people work. The private sector’s what generates the money to pay for our schools and hospitals.” This represents a repudiation of statements from Corbyn, John McDonnell and others which have been construed as “anti-business.” (Not least the great train fiasco of August, where Corbyn took on Virgin trains and didn’t appear to win.) Although, importantly, they were in tune with key parts of John McDonnell’s conference speech on Monday which emphasised that Labour would seek to support business, innovation and entrepreneurs.
Watson developed this agenda, emphasising that the nature of work and the economy is changing, and that Labour needs to analyse these changes dispassionately and come up with new solutions to meet these new challenges. At the heart of his speech was a focus on the “fourth industrial revolution”—technology and automation—and what it is doing to work. He outlined the independent commission on the future of work, chaired by Helen Mountfield QC, that he is setting up, and suggested that both old policies (like Wages Boards) and new ones will be needed to meet the coming challenges.
The policy areas Khan chose to illustrate the ways in which Labour in power can achieve—and is achieving—real change reflect the remit of his job as Mayor of London: cleaner air, tackling the housing crisis, social integration and reducing barriers of discrimination. But these arenas also represent a vision for the Labour Party which is much broader than a simple focus on material outcomes, taking in gender, race, and the environment as well. New policies to reflect evolving demands in these areas, too, will form a central part of a renewed Labour Party programme.
Both speakers emphasised the good things Labour is doing and can do in local government—this is one of the key success stories Labour can tell at the moment. Watson also suggested that local government successes and innovations might provide a route for Labour to return to power at a national level. It is certainly true that Labour councillors provide a backbone, alongside the trade unions, for the Party. And there are precedents for a strategy of renewal through local government: in its early decades, the Labour Party won credibility partly through its demonstration that it could deliver positive change at the local level. But it is also the case that Labour has never won major victories at national level without having a national story to tell: about the problems facing the nation as a whole, the interests that cut across class or sectional interests, and the transformative policies for national renewal that Labour offers. This was the case in 1945, 1966 and 1997, and the party should not forget it.
There were messages aimed at Corbyn and his supporters in both these speeches: both insisted that winning power at a national level is important, implicitly suggesting that compromise with purity of principle might be necessary, and that the “mainstream media” (which so often invokes the ire of Corbynite supporters) might have to be wooed in some way. But more than this, these speeches also contain important suggestions about what a renewed Labour party platform, updated for the contemporary world, might be built on.
Florence Sutcliffe-Braithwaite is a lecturer in twentieth century British history at UCL and co-editor of Renewal: A Journal of Social Democracy
Today’s Labour Party conference saw speeches from Deputy Leader Tom Watson and London Mayor Sadiq Khan: two Labour heavyweights who have voiced criticism of Corbyn and who, importantly, have their own mandates. Unsurprisingly, Watson praised Khan as a “champion.” It is significant that both, while accepting the result of the leadership election and offering support to Jeremy Corbyn, made some implicit criticisms of Corbyn and his backers. And in both their speeches there are elements that point to the shape of the Labour Party platform they would like to see.
Before Khan had even delivered his speech, journalists had already counted the number of times he was going to use the word “power” (38 in the final version). The principal message of his speech was a simple one: Labour must aim to take power at the national level as soon as possible; it is only in power that Labour can make the changes needed to help those who “need it most.” This was an argument, ultimately, for compromise on ideological principle in favour of pragmatic achievement. And in heaping praise on the party’s MPs, MSPs, AMs, and councillors as the people who “walk the streets and knock on doors come rain or shine, who deliver Labour leaflets and who listen to the voters,” Khan insisted that the party’s MPs, in particular, be recognised as some of Labour’s most dedicated activists, and given credit for their achievements. As Corbyn has appeared in recent days to give his supporters in Momentum leeway to consider campaigning for the deselection of some MPs, this is an important message. By slipping in “listen to the voters,” Khan hinted that the party needs to take very seriously opinion polls and evidence from canvassers who often report that Corbyn is not popular among many sometime Labour voters.
Watson, striking a parallel note, critiqued the tendency of some Corbyn supporters to denigrate the achievements of the New Labour years. Watson emphasised that the party’s history—including its recent history—must not be criticized as a catalogue of failures, calling the labour movement “the greatest movement for social change our great country has ever known.” Similarly, the values Khan put forward as “real Labour values”—“equality, social justice and opportunities for all”—while they might seem relatively uncontentious, represent a restatement of the values that soft left modernizers in the 1980s insisted Labour must place at the heart of the party’s project. Labour’s core values have never been fixed: any political party evolves and reconfigures the core elements of its ideological platform over time. Equality has probably been the most consistently central plank of Labour’s ideology. But how “equality”’ is understood, and the other values placed alongside it, are important. Khan talked about race and gender as well as material inequality, stressing the importance of identity politics as well as the politics of distribution. In emphasising “opportunities for all” alongside equality, he insisted that the British people don’t want equality to mean a shift towards sameness; rather, equality must be a springboard to allow people to choose and take opportunities.
Khan and Watson were both positive about business; Khan talked about Labour supporting businesses to grow as well as about rights at work, and Watson made a defence of “capitalism” central to his speech: “businesses are where people work. The private sector’s what generates the money to pay for our schools and hospitals.” This represents a repudiation of statements from Corbyn, John McDonnell and others which have been construed as “anti-business.” (Not least the great train fiasco of August, where Corbyn took on Virgin trains and didn’t appear to win.) Although, importantly, they were in tune with key parts of John McDonnell’s conference speech on Monday which emphasised that Labour would seek to support business, innovation and entrepreneurs.
Watson developed this agenda, emphasising that the nature of work and the economy is changing, and that Labour needs to analyse these changes dispassionately and come up with new solutions to meet these new challenges. At the heart of his speech was a focus on the “fourth industrial revolution”—technology and automation—and what it is doing to work. He outlined the independent commission on the future of work, chaired by Helen Mountfield QC, that he is setting up, and suggested that both old policies (like Wages Boards) and new ones will be needed to meet the coming challenges.
The policy areas Khan chose to illustrate the ways in which Labour in power can achieve—and is achieving—real change reflect the remit of his job as Mayor of London: cleaner air, tackling the housing crisis, social integration and reducing barriers of discrimination. But these arenas also represent a vision for the Labour Party which is much broader than a simple focus on material outcomes, taking in gender, race, and the environment as well. New policies to reflect evolving demands in these areas, too, will form a central part of a renewed Labour Party programme.
Both speakers emphasised the good things Labour is doing and can do in local government—this is one of the key success stories Labour can tell at the moment. Watson also suggested that local government successes and innovations might provide a route for Labour to return to power at a national level. It is certainly true that Labour councillors provide a backbone, alongside the trade unions, for the Party. And there are precedents for a strategy of renewal through local government: in its early decades, the Labour Party won credibility partly through its demonstration that it could deliver positive change at the local level. But it is also the case that Labour has never won major victories at national level without having a national story to tell: about the problems facing the nation as a whole, the interests that cut across class or sectional interests, and the transformative policies for national renewal that Labour offers. This was the case in 1945, 1966 and 1997, and the party should not forget it.
There were messages aimed at Corbyn and his supporters in both these speeches: both insisted that winning power at a national level is important, implicitly suggesting that compromise with purity of principle might be necessary, and that the “mainstream media” (which so often invokes the ire of Corbynite supporters) might have to be wooed in some way. But more than this, these speeches also contain important suggestions about what a renewed Labour party platform, updated for the contemporary world, might be built on.
Florence Sutcliffe-Braithwaite is a lecturer in twentieth century British history at UCL and co-editor of Renewal: A Journal of Social Democracy
