Labour MPs revolt against Corbyn
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It was bound to happen before the next general election and is only happening now because there's a prospect of one this year or early next year rather than in 2020. The professional politicians and careerists in the Labour Party, fearful for their seats and the chance of government office, don't think that Labour can win an election under Corbyn and have decided to try to depose him now.
Given the current level of political understanding (or, rather, ignorance), they are surely right. Labour under Corbyn has no chance of winning a general election, certainly not one where the issue will be who is the best person to lead Britain out of the current economic and political crisis provoked by the Brexit vote. Sad and cruel perhaps, but the truth. Which shows the need not to engage in the politics of leadership as Corbyn's supporters are doing, but to do what we do: encouraging the spread of socialist understanding.
Which revolting MPs are fearful for their seats? Hillary Benn's majority is 16,967 (37.7%). Heidi Alexander's majority is 14,333 (33.4%). Chris Bryant's majority is 7,445 (23.6%). Gloria De Piero's majority is 8,820 (18.6%). Why do they think Labour will lose the general election? The last opinion poll reported
Quote:The UK-wide BMG survey for The Herald, carried out before the shock Brexit result, found that just over one-third, 36 per cent, said that they could vote for a Corbyn-led Labour party. But that figure jumped to almost half, 48 per cent, if the veteran socialist was no longer in charge – a 12 point boost.Cameron won the last general election on 36%. No party has won more than 36% of the electorate since 2001 when Blair won with 40% whilst halving Labour party membership – reducing it to its lowest level since the 1930s.The Parliamentary Labour Party are spinning the unpopularity of Corbyn.
Corbyn holds the moral high ground. Democratically elected some now wish to overthrow him in a palace coup. The supposed reason for Brexit was about a rebellion against the elite and those anti-Corbyn MPs are acting as the elite against popular wishes.Corbyn is right …he was elected by the membership and he can only be deposed by the membership in another election in which he would stand again against any challengers – something the rebel MPs have no wish to contest, expecting yet another defeat which would be even more damaging second-time around – vindicating and legitimising Corbyn even more, leaving the anti-Corbyn MPs no alternative but resign from Labour and no longer judge Corbyn's election as an aberration and blip. Whether Corbyn can win a general election, i'm not so sure. Can Benn or Watson or whoever can win a general election, i'm not so sure. Can the Tories win a general election i'm not so sure, Can UKIP win the general election i'm not so sure.Like Spain, i think we would be in some sort of political limbo…political purgatory …SNP will win in Scotland again, the 2nd Indy referendum will be on the table again. A maverick London independence party or pro-EU one may spring up and steal votes. One thing for sure, we'll be airing our old advert and won't have produced a new one…and we once more will be struggling to stand token candidates nationally.
To tell the truth, I'm surprised that 40 Labour MPs supported him. As 172 voted against, that's about 19%, one in 5. So old-fashioned leftwing reformism, as opposed to blatant greasy pole careerism, still exists in the Labour Party.The excuse they gave for stabbing him in the back, that he wasn't active enough in campaigning for Remain, doesn't stand up. In fact, his views on the EU probably coincided more with Labour voters than those of his critics. They probably would only give the EU 7-7.5 points and would not liked him to appear on the same platform as Cameron and other Establishment (or Elite, as they are also being called now) figures.I wonder what will happen next. The Labour Party could split. It's certainly what some Trotsktists are hoping. Here's Peter Taafe, the SPEW Leader:
Quote:Therefore it is necessary to face down and confront the blackmail and sabotage of the right by adopting decisive measures. If it is accurate, then a report in the Financial Times is welcome, which indicated a new determination of Corbyn to fight the right wing. He was asked by a delegation of Labour MPs: "Are you prepared to split the party over this?" He replied that he did not want to but then added, "But if necessary…" [Financial Times 28/6/16]If he follows through on this, it would mean a welcome, positive development for the labour movement. It would represent a complete break with the discredited right wing and the formation of a new radical workers' party, which would in turn act like a magnet for workers and youth looking for a serious struggle against capitalism and for socialism.He's probably fantasising but you never know.The SWP are also sniffing around:https://www.swp.org.uk/video/keep-corbyn-rally-diane-abbott-john-mcdonnell-dennis-skinner-jeremy-corbyn
I think it was only a matter of time before the labour mps or PLP organised a rebellion. The issue for them might be the threat of de-selection which may come to a head soon with new boundary changes. Hilary is one of those in the crosshairs. https://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/mar/06/mark-serwotka-make-it-easier-to-deselect-blairite-mps
If i was into conspiracy theories then i could suggest that this is all a convenient diversion by the Blairites to save Saint Anthony from any Corbyn war crime charges arising from the upcoming Chilcot Report which is released next week.
Whatever their reasons; chilcott, deselection or boundary changes, their claim that corbyn is unpopular is bunkum
Quote:Furthermore, the carefully co-ordinated coup puts its own political agenda above the interests of the Labour party. The establishment media and MPs claim Corbyn cannot be elected. But in reality, Corbyn’s tenure so far has been a success:Since Corbyn became leader Labour has won 4 by-elections. Oldham West, Sheffield Brightside, Ogmore & Tooting. Oldham West, Tooting and Sheffield Brightside saw Labour win with an increased majority.Labour won 4 mayoral elections under Corbyn – London, Bristol, Salford and Liverpool.The membership has increased massively under his leadership.Labour’s 2016 local election performance was as good as 2001, where the party went on to win a landslide victory in the general election.Corbyn won the Remain vote among Labour supporters in the EU referendum. Two-thirds of Labour supporters voted to Remain.Just heard Theresa May, tipped as Cameron's most likely successor, say on the radio that, if she wins, there won't be a general election till 2020 as planned. So the plotters have shown their hand too soon. Panicked about nothing but I don't suppose they really mind as they can keep their seats till then, though it does give the Corbynites more time to arrange for them to be deselected.
The PLP, the Conservative Party and the media have rounded on Corbyn in the most contemptuous manner."Vox Political’s Mike Sivier has described this as:'organised bullying on a scale we would not tolerate anywhere else' "http://www.thecanary.co/2016/06/30/britains-biggest-unions-just-slammed-labour-coup-plotters-backed-corbyn/
The most prevalent cliché of post-referendum analysis has been that the vote for exit should be read as a "working-class revolt." Setting aside the unspoken assumption that this rebellious working class must by definition be white, the post-referendum exit polls actually indicate the "working-class" characterization of the Leave vote is inaccurate.It is true that a higher percentage of working-class voters voted for exit than did upper- and middle-class voters — 46 percent versus 64 percent. But once turnout by class was taken into account, the numbers looked different. As Ben Pritchett's calculations (along with his caveats about the turnout numbers including anomalies) have shown, the far greater turnout of the middle and upper classes, versus the working class — 90 percent versus 52 percent — meant that in absolute numbers, a far higher number of middle- and upper-class voters (around 10 million voters) actually voted to Leave the EU than the working class (approximately 7 million voters), many others of whom abstained from voting.http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/36651-after-brexit-reckoning-with-britain-s-racism-and-xenophobia
I refer you to this link that i posted on another thread on working and middle-class identitieshttps://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/jun/29/most-brits-regard-themselves-as-working-class-survey-finds
Yes I read this a few days ago. Thing is it doesn't explain the fact that I've read references to the middle class on here and on the twitter feed. The answer is the middle class do exist socially but not structurally? So they do exist as a class at the same time as being a subsumed into 99%. It's like the paradox of falling into a super massive black hole. You are simultaneously spaghettified yet survive.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jul/05/political-establishment-momentum-jeremy-corbynThe elites hate Momentum and the Corbynites – and I’ll tell you whyDavid GraeberAs the rolling catastrophe of what’s already being called the “chicken coup” against the Labour leadership winds down, pretty much all the commentary has focused on the personal qualities, real or imagined, of the principal players.Yet such an approach misses out on almost everything that’s really at stake here. The real battle is not over the personality of one man, or even a couple of hundred politicians. If the opposition to Jeremy Corbyn for the past nine months has been so fierce, and so bitter, it is because his existence as head of a major political party is an assault on the very notion that politics should be primarily about the personal qualities of politicians. It’s an attempt to change the rules of the game, and those who object most violently to the Labour leadership are precisely those who would lose the most personal power were it to be successful: sitting politicians and political commentators.If you talk to Corbyn’s most ardent supporters, it’s not the man himself but the project of democratising the party that really sets their eyes alight. The Labourparty, they emphasise, was founded not by politicians but by a social movement. Over the past century it has gradually become like all the other political parties – personality (and of course, money) based, but the Corbyn project is first and foremost to make the party a voice for social movements once again, dedicated to popular democracy (as trades unions themselves once were). This is the immediate aim. The ultimate aim is the democratisation not just of the party but of local government, workplaces, society itself.I should emphasise that I am myself very much an outside observer here – but one uniquely positioned, perhaps, to understand what the Corbynistas are trying to do. I’ve spent much of the past two decades working in movements aimed at creating new forms of bottom-up democracy, from the Global Justice Movement to Occupy Wall Street. It was our strong conviction that real, direct democracy, could never be created inside the structures of government. One had to open up a space outside. The Corbynistas are trying to prove us wrong. Will they be successful? I have absolutely no idea. But I cannot help find it a fascinating historical experiment. The spearhead of the democratisation movement is Momentum, which now boasts 130 chapters across the UK. In the mainstream press it usually gets attention only when some local activist is accused of “bullying” or “abuse” against their MP – or worse, suggests the possibility that an MP who systematically defies the views of membership might face deselection.The real concern is not any justified fear among the Labour establishment of bullying and intimidation – the idea that the weak would bully the strong is absurd. It is that they fear being made truly accountable to those they represent. They also say that while so far they have been forced to concentrate on internal party politics, the object is to move from a politics of accountability to one of participation: to create forms of popular education and decision-making that allow community groups and local assemblies made up of citizens of all political stripes to make key decisions affecting their lives.There have already been local experiments: in Thanet, the council recently carried out an exercise in “participatory economic planning” – devolving budgetary and strategic decisions to the community at large – which shadow chancellor John McDonnell has hailed as a potential model for the nation. There is talk of giving consultative assemblies real decision-making powers, of “banks of radical ideas” to which anyone can propose policy initiatives and, especially in the wake of the coup, a major call to democratise the internal workings of the party itself. It may all seem mad. Perhaps it is. But more than 100,000 new Labour members are already, to one degree or another, committed to the project.If nothing else, understanding this makes it much easier to understand the splits in the party after the recent rebellion within the shadow cabinet. Even the language used by each side reflects basically different conceptions of what politics is about. For Corbyn’s opponents, the key word is always “leadership” and the ability of an effective leader to “deliver” certain key constituencies. For Corbyn’s supporters “leadership” in this sense is a profoundly anti-democratic concept. It assumes that the role of a representative is not to represent, not to listen, but to tell people what to do.For Corbynistas, in contrast, the fact that he is in no sense a rabble rouser, that he doesn’t seem to particularly want to be prime minister, but is nonetheless willing to pursue the goal for the sake of the movement, is precisely his highest qualification. While one side effectively accuses him of refusing to play the demagogue during the Brexit debate, for the other, his insistence on treating the public as responsible adults was the quintessence of the “new kind of politics” they wished to see. What all this suggests is the possibility that the remarkable hostility to Corbyn displayed by even the left-of-centre media is not due to the fact they don’t understand what the movement that placed him in charge of the Labour party is ultimately about, but because, on some level, they actually do.After all, insofar as politics is a game of personalities, of scandals, foibles and acts of “leadership”, political journalists are not just the referees – in a real sense they are the field on which the game is played. Democratisation would turn them into reporters once again, in much the same way as it would turn politicians into representatives. In either case, it would mark a dramatic decline in personal power and influence. It would mark an equally dramatic rise in power for unions, constituent councils, and local activists – the very people who have rallied to Corbyn’s support.
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