What does Labour need to do to win the next election?

[muriel_volestrangler]

The Polly Toynbee piece in The Guardian today got me thinking about this:

For political vacuity and ineptitude, Labour has really excelled this week

Peter Hain's resignation caps an astonishing spell of blundering. Brown's only comfort can be that the Tory lead is so small

...
Commentators' keyboards are bashing out reams of reasons why, and they are not short of copy. Some start with Brown's election-that-never-was, but others start with this Monday, when something real happened in the real economy. What did Labour do? The very week that turbo-capitalism ate itself was the week that the government planned to give Northern Rock to Richard Branson or others, with no outright nationalisation that would guarantee taxpayers the profits as well as the risks - all for Labour's fear of the n-word.

...
In this same hurricane week the government for some reason chose to introduce its bill to lock up suspects for 42 days without trial, despite a mass rebellion on its back benches. And it has also emerged that 16 vast and vastly unpopular casinos will go ahead in the nation's poorest boroughs: Brown's noble gesture that established his moral compass turned out to mean only one casino cancelled. He said there were better ways to regenerate poor areas, so why change his mind?
...
In this week, too, an unprecedented 22,000 police marched on the government over a pay increase that would have cost a paltry £30m. It was only the first revolt over Labour's bid to hold down public pay to 2% while doing nothing and saying nothing about wealth: City bonuses hit some £7bn even in a crash year. The doubling of inheritance tax relief to £750,000, combined with the capital gains tax cuts, greatly fuelled inequality on Labour's watch. In this week, even some City winners such as Sir Stuart Rose were queasily critical of the growing wealth divide between London and the rest. Labour said nothing.

Believe it or not, in this same week the home secretary said she felt unsafe walking London's streets after dark and suggested electronic searches of children at school. Not surprisingly, no one believed that crime, including violent crime, had actually fallen by 40%, and that a smaller proportion of young people were committing offences as more stayed in education and apprenticeships. Why would Labour spend £2.7bn on Titan prisons for another 10,500 inmates if crime wasn't rampant? In this week, too, yet another report found further education colleges starved of funds: those needing most help and vocational training get least, compared with A-level and university students.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/story/0,,2246743,00.html

Now, I'm pretty much a natural Lib Dem voter, and there's no chance of the Lib Dems being the largest party, so the best result for me would be a hung parliament, with a Labour-Lib Dem coalition as a result. But at the moment I fear the Tories could end up with an absolute majority (or, possibly even worse, a majority thanks to support from the Paisleyites).

So, what could Labour do to peel a few Lib Dem voters away in a Lab-Con marginal, enabling them to beat the Tory? I'm in a Lib Dem-Con marginal, with Labour nowhere, so my next vote is decided already (assuming I don't move, which I have no plans to). But if I were in a Lab-Con marginal, at the moment I'd feel like voting Lib Dem anyway, on the "there's no difference between those 2 parties anyway" principle (which I (hypocritically?) hate to see on DU when applied to the Democrats and Republicans).

Or does Labour's only electoral salvation only lie in grabbing more Tory voters - with more of the same policies that Toynbee describes above? Is it possible in modern Britain to elect a government that would have been 'centrist' in the 70s and earlier, or have we moved to the right to the extent that all possible governments are Thatcherite now?

[non sociopath skin]

1. I think I'd like to wait till your young Cleggy gets his feet under the table ...

... before I see the Lib Dems as an alternative to the other two, Mu.

Call me a pessimist, but I see a Lib Dem/Tory coalition as at least as likely as a Lib Dem/NuLab one. I'd want to be a little more sure that I wasn't letting Young Cameron in by the back door by voting for the Sea Green Incorruptibles. :eyes:

The Skin

[muriel_volestrangler]

2. If he does go towards the Tories

would Brown do something to grab any left over Lib Dem voters who want to stay centre/left? Or would that mean all 3 large parties trending right to pick up the same voters?

I certainly don't want the Lib Dems any further right than they are now - there's a few policies I'd like to see dropped already (eg support of PFI), but neither Labour nor the Tories offer a good alternative on them. I'm rather hoping that a few leftish policies from Labour could attract back some disillusioned former Labour voters, in constituencies where they could make a difference, to keep the Tories out.

[T_i_B]

7. The Blair legacy...

would that mean all 3 large parties trending right to pick up the same voters?

At the moment the answer to that would be yes and further more, in my opinion that is the legacy of Tony Blair. His huge elctoral success has caused everyone to copy New Labour's tactics of top-down triangulation, with a pretty boy leader in his early 40's.

All the parties are going for the same ever dwindling number of swing voters, with policies becoming even more similar as a result. I don't think that the next election is looking like it's going to be the most inspiring thing we will ever see.

[non sociopath skin]

14. The Thatcher legacy, really.

Blair was just a disciple.

The Skin

[T_i_B]

16. In terms of policy maybe so....

...but Blair's real legacy appears to be how politicians fight elections nowadays. That, rather then policy is what it's looking like his main legacy will be.

[Greeby]

3. Same as last time: hope that nobody votes nt

[Morris Onions]

4. A new leader. And a new cabinet.

[Across the pond]

5. It would....

...take a minor miracle for Labour to win the next election outright now...the 'time for a change' vibe is in the air and it will be hard to shake; especially as the economy crashes off the rails. Brown had his chance to capitalise on his honeymoon period and he frittered it away...

It's high time progressives in Britain thought about trying to vote tactically to bring about a coalition government, hard though that is..

[Henny Penny]

6. A name change to...

"The Conservative Party" should do the trick.

[LeftishBrit]

8. Well, they've already changed all BUT the name

[Henny Penny]

9. Sad, but true! n/t

[non sociopath skin]

10. Actually, my greatest fear is that, awful as they are, the Real Deal Conservatives ...

... will still be even worse.

Frightening to think that even if the next POTUS is a Repug, he may still be to the left of Cameron ... or Brown!

The Skin

[muriel_volestrangler]

12. No, it's not that bad

Those Republicans are all nutcases, when it comes down to it - like John Redwood, or worse.

[non sociopath skin]

13. Not sure you're right, Mu. Playing to the gallery, yes ...

... nutcases, not sure.

The Skin

[muriel_volestrangler]

15. But it's a small gallery, at the moment

Bush's approval ratings are some of the worst ever - surely a Republican who was keen on getting elected would have an eye on the centre, rather than saying "we need to double Guantanamo", or employing people like Daniel Pipes as their foreign policy advisers. I feel those candidates really mean what they're saying at the moment.

[non sociopath skin]

17. Mightn't it be that the right-wing Repug constituency doesn't dislike Bush's policies so much ...

... as his perceived inability to carry them through?

I think the GOP candidates are being unwise to ape Bush and would be better advised to go for the centrist vote. But coming from a country where, in spite of the unpopularity of the previous Prime Minister, the leaders of all three major parties are currently apeing his style and policies, who am I to talk?

The Skin

[muriel_volestrangler]

18. Yes, I suppose that is true for many of them

but I feel it roughly reflects the candidates feelings too. They've come up through the Reagan, Bush I and II, and Gingrich era, where being the 'nasty party' to poor people and foreigners is a badge of honour.

[fedsron2us]

11. What does it matter

All three parties are basically wedded to an outdated view of the world that is going to collapse when the economic hurricane brewing at the moment finally hits. Whoever wins the next election is probably going to find themselves in the middle of the biggest recession since the 1930s and I can guarantee that they will not have a clue how to handle it.

[T_i_B]

19. Is Labour's meltdown our opportunity?

Interesting article from Sunny Hundal of http://www.liberalconspiracy.org which may well be relevent here.

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/sunny_hundal/2008/01/labours_meltdown_is_our_opportunity.html

The party actually has a bigger problem: it lacks vision and a driving message. One could go as far as saying that Labour, and the Conservatives of course, have lost their soul and surrendered themselves to marketing and positioning. Why should we vote Labour? What are its key messages and the issues that separate it from the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats? What is its long-term agenda?

Brown has pursued his aim of occupying the centre ground on policies by encroaching on traditional Tory territory. He wanted to build a "party of all talents" not only to imply the Tories were vacuous, but because he has no alternative. The days of a leftist government supported and funded by grassroots movements, standing up for its ideals and convincing the electorate of the viability of those ideas seems to be over. Following New Labour's lead, they are all interested only in marketing and positioning themselves as the least worst option.

But as that train seems to be coming off the rails, there is an opportunity here for self-described liberal lefties (including myself). Labour's woes could force it to develop a radically progressive agenda to re-energise its base. It needs to. Could we play a part in shaping that agenda?

The problem is that it feels as if the broader left has largely failed in recent years to organise itself, exert pressure and feed ideas to the party. Where are the broad coalitions on civil liberties, the environment, abortion and poverty? Should we continue to rely solely on trade unions to organise people?