Labour has a working majority in Westminster of 165 MPs. In 1945 the party had a 146-seat lead which it boldly used to create the NHS and the welfare state as we know it. But, although Labour won last year’s election, it quickly lost control of the narrative. The story goes it won a “loveless landslide” and the party has been watching its back ever since.
By-elections may just change a single MP but recent ones have had a dramatic impact on politics, presenting an opportunity to tell a new story. After Keir Starmer took over as Labour leader, in April 2020, his party lost Hartlepool 11 months later to the Conservatives after 62 years holding the seat and there were rumours he wanted to quit.
Tony Blair took the opportunity of that by-election result to call for “total deconstruction and reconstruction” of the Labour Party. He argued it needed policy fit for a technological “revolution”, with a shift to electric vehicles and “a switch from aviation to high-speed rail”. He urged “sensible progressives” not to steer clear of the “big culture battle going on”.
One of those who persuaded Keir Starmer to stay the course was Morgan McSweeney, who took Blair’s first recommendation seriously. The point about a technological revolution is still worth repeating, but the former prime minister’s final piece of advice is a trap.
An anti-climate stance is a vote loser Two years later, in July 2023, the Conservatives’ narrow by-election win in Uxbridge and South Ruislip was evidence, they said, that they should offer people “choice on a matter of substance”. That matter was the extension of the Ultra Low Emissions Zone to the edges of London. Shortly after, Rishi Sunak weakened major parts of his government’s environmental agenda, including a commitment to phase out polluting cars by 2030.
Last week, we again saw attempts to shape a story around an election result. This time, Tony Blair emerged using a report by his institute to claim people are “turning away” from climate issues. Once again, he called for technological solutions, like carbon capture and nuclear power, but he also indicated he’d now given up on the shift to rail travel, gloomily resigned to the fact that “airline travel is set to double over the next 20 years”.
His intervention was a gift to those who want the government to abandon environmental policies, with his claim it’s what “working people” want. But Rishi Sunak and Tony Blair are both wrong.
Most people across all voting intentions think the government should do much more, not less, on climate, and they want the costs to be fairly distributed across society. That’s why attempting to turn climate change into a dividing line isn’t a viable political strategy.
Despite Reform’s gains, last week’s local elections made this clear. The Conservatives lost 635 councillors and 15 councils. As leader, Kemi Badenoch has undermined her party’s proud track record on the climate, deriding the world-leading target to reach net zero by 2050 set in law by Theresa May. This has been a mistake because a substantial majority of Conservative voters support net zero. Her stance didn’t win votes.
But what did people want? Although the Conservative leader loves being a culture warrior, research shows most voters tune out from these debates and instead want political campaigns “focused on their everyday concerns”. In polling conducted ahead of last week’s elections, only eight per cent of voters thought Kemi Badenoch would govern the country effectively.
Reform is offering more of the same The same polling shows that national issues dominated the local elections: the cost of living, immigration and the NHS. Reform’s extraordinary surge, gaining 648 new councillors, shows that people aren’t seeing the two major parties take on these issues convincingly.
But Reform offers more of the same. Deputy Leader Richard Tice told the media that, in the ten new councils it now controls, it’ll use “every lever” to block renewables projects. Nigel Farage claimed earlier this year that the UK could be self-sufficient in oil and gas, despite the reality. North Sea reserves are in terminal decline and the resources that do exist have to be sold on international markets. The reality of Reform’s proposal would keep us all hooked on the fossil fuels which are the root cause of unaffordable energy bills, exacerbating the cost of living crisis.
Labour shouldn’t make the same mistakes as the Conservatives, or follow Tony Blair’s dodgy advice. Research shows that Labour voters who were considering voting for Reform last week differ from many existing Reform voters in that they also back net zero.
About 11 per cent of 2024 Labour voters would consider voting Reform at the next general election. But far more suggest they might vote Green (29 per cent) or Lib Dem (41per cent), spread out across Labour-held seats.
Just after Friday’s by-election loss, one Labour MP told The Guardian: “…people haven’t felt the change we promised and they are fed up after 14 years of a hard time under the Tories. They will start looking for answers elsewhere.” The prime minister’s clearly heard, writing in The Times that he is “… acutely aware that people aren’t yet feeling the benefits” of his government’s attempts to bring down bills, lower immigration or improve NHS waiting times.
These elections have once again exposed deep frustration with business as usual politics and people’s sense that their communities are being left behind. The government can’t be complacent. Keir Starmer rightly understands that the challenge is for people to see the benefits of change sooner, and that means not wavering now on the environmental policies that will cut bills, create jobs and stimulate much needed economic investment. To succeed, he has to stay on that road and ignore the back seat drivers who think we will improve people’s lives by going slow or turning back.
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