LABOUR leader Sir Keir Starmer was told today to get serious about change or risk the rise of the far-right after another lacklustre attempt to spell out what he stands for.
Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said that “the country needs change and it is crying out for different choices to be made. It is now critical that workers and communities can see clearly what choices Labour is proposing.”
Urging Labour to tackle energy prices by bringing the industry into public ownership, she argued that the “hope” the Labour leader talked of “will require serious investment.”
Ms Graham said: “Relying on growth to generate that investment is not realistic.
“If we depend on growth to fund all the investment we need it will only result in inertia.
“Britain needs a Labour government — but it needs it to be serious about real change.”
Leading left MP John McDonnell warned that voter disillusionment with a Labour government that fails to deliver radical change could power the rise of far-right populism.
“If Labour fails to set out early upon a path of radical change to secure the all-round well-being and security of our people, then inevitably disillusionment will set in,” Mr McDonnell wrote for the Guardian.
“The risk then is the potential for a significant shift in our politics to the right, with the return of a Conservative Party completely shorn of any traditional one nation Tories and under the dominance of the populist right both within the party and beyond.”
But there was no sign of any radicalism in Sir Keir’s remarks in Bristol, intended to set the tone for Labour’s campaigning in what will be an election year.
Instead he reiterated Labour’s Treasury-first economic policy, indicating that a proposed £28 billion-a-year green investment plan may fall by the fiscal wayside.
“The money that is needed for the investment … will be subject to our fiscal rules,” he said.
“And that means that if the money is for borrowing … but the fiscal rules don’t allow it, then we will borrow less.”
Beyond that he outlined an amorphous “project hope” aimed at restoring public faith in politics, claiming Labour was the “light at the end of the tunnel.”
His tunnel vision was offered as Prime Minister Rishi Sunak went some way towards ruling out a May election, which had been widely rumoured, meaning the country will almost certainly go to the polls in the autumn.
“My working assumption is we’ll have a general election in the second half of this year and in the meantime I’ve got lots that I want to get on with,” Mr Sunak said during a visit to Mansfield, in remarks that fell short of being categorical.
Setting the bar of expectations low, Mr Sunak also claimed that 2024 would be a “better year” than 2023.
Labour claimed the premier was “running scared” of the electorate, which given the state of the polls he may well be.
Whenever it comes, voters look like being offered little substantive choice by the main parties of government.
Left campaign movement Momentum highlighted the shortcomings in Sir Keir’s approach, saying that “people are crying out for change.
“There are huge public majorities for public ownership of public services, wealth taxes, investment in our infrastructure and free school meals.
“Adopting popular, urgent policies is not ‘gesture politics’ — it’s being serious about changing Britain for the better.”
And campaign group Green New Deal Rising slammed the abandonment of the green investment fund.
“Young people are watching and will hold Labour to account to deliver a green new deal that responds to the scale of the cost-of-living crisis and climate catastrophe we face,” it said.
