Once again we are obsessed with Keir Starmer and the Labour Party. All anyone has been talking about this week has been the immigration bill. Presented in this way and in this language, it has as its priority an attempt to woo back Labour voters considering Reform. For those who suggest the wording is just maladroit, we should point out that every word has been pored over dozens of times by people whose job it is to get these things right. So it says what they want it to say.
They would have known how this would be read by immigrants, but that was overlooked. Instead, the audience at whom they were aiming, was evidenced by the PM’s exclusive with The Sun and his choice of exclusive broadcast companion on his Albania trip: GB News. It was further confirmed by Yvette Cooper’s petulant elf face, which she wears for interviews when she is trying to get away from the soubrette image, and appear tough on foreigners.
Then came the revelation that the data on which the bill is based amounts to a dodgy dossier. Jonathan Portes is Professor of Economics and Public Policy at King’s College, and the economist’s economist. He points out the data on which the bill is based is simply wrong.
You don’t have to cook the books unless you are trying to be misleading. Judge for yourself, dear reader, the squalid purpose of this bill.
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It is possible that, in looking for support for his immigration plans, the prime minister was not overly keen to see that he has the approval of both Nigel Farage (Clacton) and Rupert Lowe (Gt Yarmouth) – until recently of course one of Reform’s finest until his views grew too much even for them.
Now in the past, Sir Keir has admitted that he doesn’t really understand politics, though one rather assumed he would employ people who do. Yet the logic of what they have done appears to have completely escaped them. By aping Reform’s views on foreigners, Labour doesn’t win back voters from Reform. They merely agree that Reform has been right all along, so reinforcing the voter’s intentions.
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Your diarist was looking for the outrage from Labour MPs and party members on the prime minister’s speech on immigration. But though there was plenty of outrage expressed, virtually none came from within the party. No sign of plotting behind the arras. The present membership give the impression of having been born into captivity.
Sir Keir has changed decades of party policy, culture and compassion without discussion, and the party has accepted it without demur. Perhaps it is boiling frog syndrome, though as one party member told your diarist: “It’ll be the usual. The left of the party will become more enraged and the rest will keep quiet. They’re in power after all”.
The Starmerites among Labour MPs seem to take a dismissive view of those they see as die-hard traditionalists, (which is to say, those who stick to party principles). But of course, this is where almost all the members belong too. How, one wonders, would the cabinet describe the party they serve? Would any of them dare to include the word ‘socialist’ these days? It might stretch a point even to call them social democrats.
There are good people in the party and in parliament. But few are prepared to express a view except slavishly to repeat the diktat from the whips. Yet our democracy requires us to vote for MPs to use their best judgement, not sheep-like to follow what the whips tell them.
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Never mind what the cabinet thinks of party policy, what do the EU think? Those ‘re-set’ talks loom next week, and our European neighbours can hardly have overlooked this week’s diatribe against foreigners.
We know the signs they are looking for before they will believe Britain is serious in any way about relations with the EU. They want evidence that we accept European ideals of community and solidarity. (Labour used to be hot on that.) Instead, what they have seen this week is the PM using words like ‘squalid’ when speaking of immigration, and warning of “an island of strangers”. Also, the government has been duplicitously talking to member states behind the EU’s back, in the hope of undermining the joint position. Always perfidious Albion. Always looking for a dodgy deal.
Sir Keir will not be able to pretend as he did with Donald Trump. We may see some movement on phyto-sanitary issues and youth movement, but nothing more expansive, (and East Anglia Bylines has been pointing out these issues as easy hits for the last year).
The telling point will be how the PM describes the talks. If he chooses the usual British Del Boy approach of boasting to us ‘Brits’ about how he’s pulled a fast one over johnny foreigner, then we are lost.
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There is a facile irony in Keir Starmer’s determination on a “rules-based” new immigration policy. Part of the EU’s frustration with Britain has been with our reluctance to follow the rules, and our attempts to wheedle round them.
Boris Johnson signed a Brexit deal, and ever since, the British government has chafed at it and wanted exceptions. Given the PM’s red lines on what he can offer in exchange, it seems that is what he will be doing next week.
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“The days of the UK being a global charity are over,” declares a government minister.
Anybody with lingering doubts about Labour can only read this and despair. It seems there is no going back. What we see is what we get. But that leaves us with an overwhelming problem: with Labour wedded to seeking the nativist vote, who do progressives vote for now?
The easiest way to unseat the Starmer putsch would be for Labour members to come to their senses, and hoof them out themselves. They have the power, but not the courage. Yet the members are still truculent at criticism – and the false conviction – that the wider progressive electorate owes them their vote. If the Labour Party abandons its principles, that is no reason for the liberal majority in this country to abandon theirs.
First, Pecksniff hopes to hear of huddles of Liberal Democrats and Greens, concatenating with a frustrated electorate, agreeing a cunning plan in pubs and Waitrose queues which will pressure the local Labour MP to realise which side of their pain is beurré. Then (on the assumption it is a hopeless cause), let us plan an overthrow of the backsliders at the ballot box.
Pecksniff is always extremely keen to hear of (and advise on) any plots afoot, and the leisured opulence of the Muckrakers Arms is always available to plotters of the best sort. Contact your diarist via @pecksniffsdiary.bsky.social or pecksniffsdiary@gmail.com .
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But what is this? “Clearly not something we’re talking about”, the Liberal Democrat spokesman assured us this week. Of course it’s not: he was referring to future membership of the EU.
The LibDems will need broader shoulders than they display at the moment. Dear Libbies, we are counting on you. With the Labour government involved in (to use a word in mode) a ‘squalid’ race to the bottom with Reform, the future of our democracy may depend on LibDems and Greens. They have an open door.
But if the LibDems are going to become anybody’s heroes they will have to fix bayonets and change their gutless position on the EU. Tell us, Libbies, do you want closer ties or not? We have seen through any delusions once possessed of the Liberal Democrats being the party of Europe, and at the moment they are in danger of looking just a teensy bit ridiculous. The party has been showing an ankle on this subject for so long and so frequently it is in danger of being done for indecent exposure.
When will we see the light of battle in your eyes? After the general election, Ed Davey wore the appearance of a particularly smug genie rising from a bottle. Then nothing. Give one good reason why the voters shouldn’t give up on you too and we all plump for the Greens instead.
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On Monday the Covid Inquiry heard that, if the government had listened to experts and implemented the same strategies as other countries, 180,000 lives could have been saved. That’s 180,000 people who died because of indolence, narcissism and incompetence, bringing grief and despair to probably millions more to whom they were dear. Those grotesques, Boris Johnson and Matt Hancock, were prime minister and health secretary at the time.
Neither man is susceptible to any kind of moral discomfort. Neither has apologised or suffered any sanction as a result of bringing the deaths of 180,000 people: our families, friends and neighbours. In fact, beyond their own self-exculpation of any blame, in the nether-most reaches of the Tory party there are still voices demanding the return of BJ.
(Those who believe the worst of Boris Johnson, by the way, might like to look up the definition of the ‘dark triad’, to see how it fits.)
The excellent Victoria Macdonald (one of the good ones) of Channel 4 News reports the Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice group saying the UK’s death toll was down to “political decisions rooted in arrogance” and a “dangerous belief that Britain was somehow different”.
Political arrogance and a belief that Britain is somehow different. Ring any bells? That accusation could be applied to almost any scenario of present British politics.
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On Tuesday came news that Patrick Spencer (Central Suffolk) has been arrested on two charges of sexual assault and has had the Conservative whip suspended. He is therefore sitting as an independent, though he has been asked not to attend the Commons while the charges are pursued.
The assaults are both alleged to have taken place at the Groucho Club in London during August 2023, and involve two separate women. Mr Spencer denies the charges and will appear at Westminster magistrates court on 16 June.
He was elected last July with a majority of 4,290. In his maiden speech, he spoke about “restoring a sense of moral probity and public spiritedness to our political system”.
It is not possible to make any further comment, since the matter is sub judice while legal proceedings take their course.
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There was a Broadland Council by-election in Acle this week. Reform won. But the votes which lost the Tories the seat look suspiciously like the same percentage of votes that went to Reform. And Labour lost more than half their votes, again with the Greens beating them by taking a very similar percentage. So at first glance, it looks as though Tory votes are haemorrhaging to Reform, and Labour votes are fleeing to the Greens.
Try telling that to Morgan McSweeney.
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Anyway, it makes for welcome relief to be able to report a council and, in particular, two of its members, who have acted in a way we can applaud.
Kittiwakes are an endangered bird species, but not apparently in Lowestoft. The birds turn up in the town every summer in their thousands, and nest on roofs, balconies, window ledges and even car roofs given half a chance. They also turn up to poo promiscuously. The town graciously built special ‘hotels’ for them, but the birds still prefer to poo in the streets.
But the East Anglian Daily Times reports that East Suffolk councillors Graham Parker and George King have granted £5,000 from their budgets to support ‘kittiwake champions’, who will provide public information, hands-on educational events and crafts for children.
The newspaper tells us “interactive stalls will pop up at public events, including the First Light Festival, featuring children’s activities like nest-building with beach-combed materials and clay kittiwake crafts, along with multilingual leaflets and displays of real kittiwake nests recovered after storms”.
Should either of these good gentlemen ever stand for parliament, dear reader, make sure he gets your vote.
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Thanks this week go to Celina Błędowska, Karl Whiteman, Kate Viscardi and James Porter.
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