I don’t much like being told how to vote, so I assume you don’t either. As always, the left has got the best artists, comedians, musicians. Cool people love Jeremy Corbyn. During the referendum you couldn’t move for right-on types telling you to vote remain, alongside the government and the banks. It was obvious many would simply not do as they were told so I question all this Corbyn love. Brexit burst the bubble. Have we learned nothing?
The assumption that good, moral people will inevitably vote Labour and anyone who doesn’t is not even human gets us so far. But not far enough. We remain a deeply divided country. There has been a refusal to understand what Brexit meant, what the changing politics of Scotland means for England, what our place is in the world with Donald Trump in power. There are cracks everywhere and whether a two-party system can ultimately cover them up seems doubtful to me.
So whether the right manages to get any trendoids instead of naff old has-beens only matters if we think a 68-year-old man really does embody change and optimism. Well, he has the support of some grime stars – fair play to Corbyn; though I am not a fan, he has clearly been in his element, crowd-surfing at rallies, by all accounts. But he did not pull out the stops for Remain in this way at all. There are many doubts over whether he can run a government, but he gives good “human” and that has counted for a lot in an election that should be about issues but has been about personalities. Or more accurately, the search for evidence that Theresa May has one.
This has been the strangest thing: to run an entire campaign around cold, brittle, nervy May who most of the time looks like she is about to be sick. Most of us have more human connection with our Fitbits than you do after an hour with her. Yes, I have done that long hour and so I don’t understand how this was not known about her. During the referendum, her strategy was silent lurking. She became PM this way, by appearing strict and grown-up. Did she think she could merely lurk her way through the election too? It has been hellish. There she is, frozen, a centreless charisma vacuum with no actual beliefs, shunning the public. For all her calculations, she gets it wrong, cosying up to Trump, alienating key European players, ludicrously threatening no deal.
Even if she wins, she has lost this campaign and is weakened. Yet, for those not paying too much attention, she still wins on strength and stability and this unproven idea that she is a tough negotiator.
Labour has cut through in the south and around London but this is not the word coming back from the Midlands and parts of the north. There is a world of rallies and retweets and then a parallel universe where many Labour MPs fear losing long-held seats.
Both parties are breaking up the old economic models. Austerity has not worked and we need fiscal stimulus. It then becomes a matter of whether the public trust Labour to manage this. Their manifesto excited because, for many young people, it is the first time anyone has really spoken about redistribution, investment and infrastructure. Where Labour has failed to convince is on issues of identity and security. So the gains are that some leftwing ideas are in flight, others remain grounded and Brexit cuts across all this. The party that campaigned on a Remain ticket – the Lib Dems – is tanking.
If Labour is re-energersied after this – after, I imagine, a lot of rending of garments – I would hope it becomes more open and flexible. It has to work with the SNP and other parties . It has to lose the macho tribalism and stop calling anyone who does not bow down to Corbyn a Tory. It has to be about inclusion, not exclusion.
Caroline Lucas has been exemplary in showing us how they might do this new politics. The Greens have walked it like they talked it, standing down where they can help bring down a Tory. The Women’s Equality party has been battered by Labour when they could have joined a progressive alliance with the Greens to bring down the monstrous Philip Davies in Shipley.
A modern party has to persuade, instead of abuse, those who don’t automatically support it. But if we are stuck with two parties then we have to go with the one that will challenge Trump, obviously.
Throughout this election campaign those who have been most impressive are not those for whom we are voting. Andy Burnham, Nicola Sturgeon and Sadiq Khan have said and done all the right things. The centres of power are shifting in ways this election does not represent. If the vote share is high for Labour, the country will be split. The coronation of May will be a form of remortgaging. As dull as that.
The pollsters and the echo chamber will go into battle. I hope I am wrong and that at least we will have a reinvigorated opposition that can grow. And change.
That is why I am voting tactically.
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