WHY CAN’T THE RIGHT FIELD ANY DECENT CANDIDATES?

This has become a common lament of right-wingers limping away from an electoral encounter with Jeremy Corbyn. It was heard a lot from the right of the Labour Party during recent leadership elections, and obviously now from the British right following May’s performance in the General. Often it comes with the corrolary “why can’t we come up with any inspiring ideas?”, again heard from both the Labour Right and Tories.

Such people, perhaps wilfully, are missing the point.

The problem is not the candidates as such but the fact that they are representing a discredited and bankrupt belief system.

The rise of Corbyn, far from representing “a return to the 70s” is symptomatic of the need for a new style of politics and a new economic consensus as the existing one increasingly fails to deliver. This need has generated the rise to prominence of Sanders in the US, Melenchon in France, Podemos in Spain, Syriza in Greece and so on.

Corbyn’s electoral opponents, from within both Labour and the Tories, represent the existing, discredited political consensus. Anything they say is either going to be in support of that consensus, which will make them look stupid, or a desperate attempt to avoid saying anything, which will make them look……stupid.

The discredited consensus I refer to is, broadly, Thatcherism. In the 1980s this was itself a new and exciting ideology. It was not the correct or humane one but it was new, and for a while it seemed to provide answers to the problems that had built up in the British economy since the second world war.

As expressed by the Tories at the time this ideology was based around “freeing the economy from state control” — privatising industries, lowering taxes, lowering regulation, curbing Trade Unions and lowering inflation at the expense of employment. In reality, of course “freeing up the economy” was mostly just a cod philosophical justification for crony capitalism . It provided an excuse for the corporate elite to abuse their power over the rest of us without fear of redress. Nevertheless for a long while a large section of the country and its commentariat bought into the Thatcherite narrative.

Now, those abuses are really starting to bite and furthermore are directly affecting the health of the economy as businesses make decisions for short term gain rather than the common good. People can see that the system is breaking down and they can see that they have not been its beneficiaries. As Tories, then, any candidate who continues to back those broad ideological principles is going to look foolish — out of touch, lacking in originality and callous. Doesn’t matter who they are, how charismatic they are or what their strengths and weaknesses are. They are supporting a discredited economic system and as such will lose, in the process tarnishing any charisma they do have.

And if they decided to offer a different set of principles, well, those principles would have to be broadly Corbynite wouldn’t they? Or they could try and offer up a mixture, which would make them look confused, muddled and ridiculous. If you don’t believe me check out the Tory spokesmen currently trying to simultaneously say they have abandoned austerity but are still somehow more financially responsible than Corbyn.

Speaking of confused, muddled and ridiculous let’s turn to Corbyn’s Labour adversaries of yesteryear. Blairites bemoaning a lack of decent candidates from within their own ranks is an even more common phenomenon than Tories doing the same. This strikes me as odd because, as people, the likes of Owen Smith, Yvette Cooper and Liz Kendall are clearly quite talented, quick-witted and astute politicians. Indeed, they are lauded as such by Blairite commentators at the start of any leadership contest. It is only when it becomes clear that they are losing, and losing badly, that the same commentators suddenly start bemoaning their supposed “lack of quality”.

What is going on?

In the case of the Labour right they are again clinging to what is now an old and discredited idea. This idea was also once new, bold and exciting, although with a much shorter shelf life than Thatcherism. As sold to us by Blair at the time it was the idea that by adopting some of the tenets of Thatcherism, Labour could build an electoral alliance between the middle class and Labour’s working class core vote. This new electoral alliance, and the policies that went with it, could keep the Tories out of power “for generations”, as Blair used to say.

Of course at a time when Labour had suffered multiple successive election defeats such an idea was for a time going to seem as if it offered a solution, as offering a new type of politics.

Once the novelty of that idea wore off, however, it was never going to last very long. What, really, is the substance behind it? How can you effectively attack the Tories if you can’t say anything you think might annoy Tory voters? How can you argue against the actions of government without coming across as disruptive and difficult? How can you argue for change (the job of the opposition) without upsetting people who don’t like change? The answer is, you can’t. You have to decide where you stand, argue your case and accept that some voters are going to be annoyed by it.

To take just one example let’s look at the issue of austerity again. The centrist front bench pre-Corbyn were determined to show those middle class voters that Labour was now “responsible” on the economy. Ed Balls as Shadow Chancellor promised to match the government’s plans to shrink its budget. All very well, but how do you then oppose a government whose programme largely centred around “balancing the budget”? Indeed, Labour did try to take the government to task for cuts, but that just laid them open to the question “well you also want to balance the budget so what would you cut instead?”

Again, any candidate attempting the desperate task of striking that balance is going to end up looking foolish regardless of their personal properties. Add the fact mentioned above that Thatcherism is in any case going out of vogue and they look even more foolish.

Corbyn, on the other hand, just said “No, I don’t agree with austerity, it’s immoral, it wouldn’t work and I would not continue with it”. This chimes with the mood of the times and it also shows us a candidate free from confusion, free from the baffling jargon used to cover such confusion, giving us a message we can all understand and get behind.

BUT WHY DON’T WE HAVE ANY DECENT IDEAS?
To conclude, let’s examine the lament, heard from both disgruntled Tories and disgruntled Blairites, “why can’t we come up with any bold, new ideas?”

You have to ask what, exactly, such ideas might consist of. In the case of the Tories they can only really mean moving further right — more cuts, fewer employment rights. Good luck selling that to the electorate in its current mood, after Cameron, May and Osborne failed to push through many such cuts even when they had a majority.

In the case of the Blairites the only bold ideas available are really Corbynite ones — invest in the future and put restraints on corporate greed and profiteering. What other ideas could they come out with that are not Tory ones? Either small fry about cycle lanes, sex education and so on or incomprehensible Progress style jargon about “stake-holder” communities and the like.

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