The welfare bill has gone through, but what is on the minds of most Labour MPs and supporters is how did we get into this appalling mess over disability benefits? A key factor has been the immense lack of judgment of the party’s real decision-makers, the team in the leader’s office, fuelled by their overweening arrogance. The egos of the young men cloistering Keir Starmer have clearly been inflated by the multitude of articles written by sycophantic commentators desperate to secure access to the new regime.
However, the seeds of this debacle were sown by the Treasury’s capture of the incoming government, enabling officials to bring back the same old austerity agenda of benefit cuts that they developed for George Osborne.
They misguidedly thought disabled people would again be an easy target, but this time they totally miscalculated the deep-seated adherence of Labour members to the principle and tradition of standing up for the poorest in our society.
In the past when senior party apparatchiks were getting too big for their boots or a cabinet minister was pursuing an obvious policy disaster, the leader would have had sufficient political nous to put his foot down before things got out of control. The failure to demonstrate this essence of leadership and exert control over his officials and the chancellor has left Starmer in the worst of all worlds.
He’s got his bill to pass, but he’s done so with a significant number of Labour MPs angrily refusing to support it. Many of those dragooned through the voting lobby to back the bill did so full of resentment, and aware they may face a scale of opposition in their constituencies that could cost them their seats.
With his authority damaged by poor judgment, absence of leadership and a sheer lack of understanding of what the Labour party exists for, Starmer will stumble on weakened and directionless, convincing himself that sitting next to Trump and attending Nato and G7 meetings means he has a historic role to play.
Succession planners have clearly been at work, though. Many Labour MPs would not have signed the reasoned amendment to the benefit cuts bill and expressed their criticisms had they not been encouraged to do so by their sponsoring cabinet ministers.
Those who believe they have a chance of succeeding Starmer were willing to see their backbench proteges undermining the leader because they know their chance could come sooner than anyone thought possible only a few months ago.
If the polls and next year’s local elections are as bad as some predict, the men in grey suits will inevitably be dispatched by Peter Mandelson to make Starmer an offer he can’t refuse. Some would rather this happened sooner and it could be triggered by a policy nightmare miscalculation on the autumn scheduled issues of child poverty, reform of the Send system, or the handling of the budget in November. Discussion of leadership failure and policy blunders masks the fundamental reason why Labour got itself into the mess over this attack on disabled people.
It is the absolute hollowing out of democracy in the Labour party, which enables a centralisation of power under a self-serving bureaucracy that is effectively out of control, operating with impunity. Poor decisions are made on strategy and policy from top to bottom because democracy has been stripped out of the party. Constituency Labour parties are not permitted to even debate some of the most significant political issues of the day, such as Gaza. Views questioning the leadership line, whether expressed in meetings or on social media, lead easily to disciplinary action.
The selection of candidates for council or parliamentary elections is so tightly controlled that anyone with a hint of independence of thought stands virtually no chance of being allowed on candidate lists. The selection process for candidates for forthcoming council selections has become more akin to the Spanish Inquisition or McCarthyite hearings. Dominated by party staffers and careerists, the selection panels draw on comments made in private group meetings supplied by informers.
Similarly, parliamentary selections in many cases have been ruthlessly fixed to parachute allies of the elite into safe seats that often they rely upon a satnav to find. Members of the PLP are looked upon simply as bothersome lobby fodder, whose views are ignored unless they seem equipped to cause turbulence in the face of threats, such as losing the whip or the chance of promotion.
The change of procedure for the election of the party leader that bounced through the party conference soon after the election of Starmer means that there is a negligible chance of any future leadership candidate getting on to the ballot paper if they’re not the chosen one for the current controlling tendency.
In the past, trade unions might have exerted some democratic influence in the party. But they are either bogged down by internal problems or being divided and are largely ruled by the offer of small scraps from the government table.
The saving grace people are hopefully clinging to is that the next general election is four years away, and that maybe the resistance shown over the welfare bill will prompt lessons to be learned. However, unless the fundamental issue of re-establishing democracy in the party is grasped, I fear nothing will change. It’s a very real fear that the cycle of inept policy imposition, disciplinary threats, embarrassing climbdowns and disillusionment will continue until Labour leaves office, having wasted its large majority and the early goodwill of its members and the electorate.
John McDonnell is the independent MP for Hayes and Harlington. He was shadow chancellor for Labour from 2015 to 2020
