Must Labour lose members?
Posted on Wednesday 27 December, 2006
Filed Under New Labour
If Labour Party membership continues to decline at the present rate, deputy leadership contender Jon Cruddas has pointed out, Labour will not have any members left by 2013. Zero. Zilch. None at all.
But not to worry. Labour chair Hazel Blears was quick off the mark on Boxing Day, reassuring us all that Cruddas was using statistics she could not dispute in ‘a sensational way’.
That stance seems somewhat complacent for a senior official in an organisation that has lost one member every 20 minutes since 2000. Whatever became of the Blairite vision of a ‘million member party’?
The fact is that the number of card-carrying Labour Party members has fallen from 405,000 when Blair took over in 1997 to just 198,026 at the end of 2005. The real activist base is far, far lower than that.
If the bottom line of a major business slid by a similar proportion over a similar period, the chief executive would be toast. And rightly so.
Blears points to a global trend in participation in mass political parties. But much of the reason for that – at least as far as social democratic parties are concerned – has been their move to the right in every major capitalist country.
New Labour has kept Tory anti-union laws, Tory public spending limits and Tory privatisation policies. Cuts in corporation tax have been paid for with tuition fees, benefit cuts for single parents and the disabled and draconian measures against asylum seekers.
New Labour has reduced British politics to 360 degree small c conservativism, without opposition, without any possibility for radical change.
It is reduced to selling itself as a more efficient administrator of capitalism that the Tories. That much, at least, is true. This is the politics of managerial reductivism.
Labour has effectively been delabourised. Yet Blears wonder why what should be natural supporters cannot drum up enough enthusiasm to sign up.
It doesn’t have to be this way. Labour’s natural constituency – working people and their families – remains the largest sector of British society. The key to resolving Labour’s multiple problems, financial as well as political, lies in giving them reasons to support us.
In turn, that implies genuine political differentiation from the variants of neoliberalism on offer from Cameron and Campbell.
There is no reason why Labour’s membership must continue to shrink. But unless there is a change of direction at the top, continue to shrink it will.
<<Go back
Comments
21 Responses to “Must Labour lose members?”
I wonder if it’s possible to appeal directly to the leavers as a bloc (vote costing, rote-liberal ego fiends excepted, for preference) in the interests of a mass rejoining?
Would the party stand for it? An organised bloc of, broadly speaking, socialists in the party would be a thing to be reckoned with.
One of the themes being addressed by both McDonnell and Cruddas, I suppose.
I think both McDonnell and Cruddas are addressing this very point.
Irony abounds. There are plenty of reports of CLPs with active memberships so small that entrists could easily take over. It’s just that these days, not even most Trots see the point of doing so.
I’m afraid the effects of your return to the fold are showing already, Dave.
New Labour has kept Tory anti-union laws, Tory public spending limits and Tory privatisation policies. Cuts in corporation tax have been paid for with tuition fees, benefit cuts for single parents and the disabled and draconian measures against asylum seekers.
‘Kept’ is far too weak – in many areas, New Labour has entrenched and extended Thatcherite Tory policies. In other words, in many areas Blair’s government is effectively to the right of Major’s or even Thatcher’s. (Tuition fees for starters. Then you could look at the NHS, education, the broader scandal of PFI… Chap named Osler wrote about some of this.)
New Labour has reduced British politics to 360 degree small c conservativism, without opposition, without any possibility for radical change.
This is far too pessimistic – I don’t think the SNP or Plaid Cymru can be dismissed like this. The Green Party exists, the SSP still exists. Come to that, even the ghastly coat-turning anti-union free-market communitarian opportunists of the Lib Dems are well to the Left of Labour on many issues.
There are plenty of reports of CLPs with active memberships so small that entrists could easily take over. It’s just that these days, not even most Trots see the point of doing so.
Indeed. Since ‘Labour Into Power’, taking over a CLP would get you where exactly?
Sorry to be Mr Angry – season of good will and all that, even to backsliding renega^W^Wcomrades with differing opinions. Ho ho ho.
[New Labour has reduced British politics to 360 degree small c conservativism, without opposition, without any possibility for radical change.]
Dave, I hate to say this given that you’ve paid a year’s subs up front but the following policies:
1) the move from public ownership of assets to user fees under the PFI model
2) the last and next five years’ worth of criminal justice legislation
3) the move in foreign policy from mid-Atlanticism to Australian-style “loyal dawg” Atlanticism
4) the introduction of “the choice agenda” in public utilities
are all of them radical changes in the British political system, and the Labour party have been enthusiastically pursuing all of them. It’s now pretty much a reversal of the old Peter Cook joke; Britain has two political parties, the Conservatives, who are the equivalent of the Republican Party, and Labour, who are the equivalent of the Republican Party.
Having been at the sharp end of the Labour Party battles in the 1980′s I am well aware of what the type of people running the Labour Party these days are like. They don’t want a mass party or a political active and engaged party, they just want a captive vote. They don’t care if the Labour Party shrivels up and dies as long as people still go out and vote for them. I remember all that stuff about Labour’s missing millions back in the eighties, well, they fixed the boundaries of constituies to make sure they had a built in advantage as soon as they could. I don’t know if that will save them next time round, my husband thinks Tory voters are more committed than Labour voters. I must say, it’s very hard to be committed to Labour. I once sent an e-mail to the official Labour site asking how they could have the cheek to keep trading on the past of the Labour Party while denouncing everything that Labour once stood for. Tony Bliar made sure he got rid of Clause IV and everything else just follows. Bliar’s legacy will be the destruction of public services in this country and he wants to handon until it is irreversible. He has the nerve to say that he wants a job as an international statesman, it’s hard to see who would give him such a job, he is so tainted. I expect the Yanks might come up with something, but I don’t think the blokes over bright and I’ve heard his pretty lazy. Coming back to Hazel Blears, she didn’t express regret that the party membership is dropping, because these people are not partyminded. I know the working class will create something else, but, my god, it may take time and much harm and dislocation will be done in the meantime.
I interviewed John McDonnell at the beginning of December and he raised the topic of the dire state of the Labour party membership without being prompted. He seemed genuinely surprised at the state of the membership – said he knew that things were bad, but he was finding out (on the campaign trail) how bad it really was – people were coming up to him in droves, telling him that they’d left the party and why.
The interview is on the link above if you want to read more of what he had to say then. I put it back at the top of the site so that you can see it. Cheers, Kate
So just to recap:
1. Labour has moved politics to the right
2. Labour’s ranks are empty of any radical activists
3. There is no chance of reclaiming Labour because there’s nothing left to reclaim and, even if there was, there are no democratic channels left in the party to alter the party’s course.
Can anyone explain why anybody – not just Desperate Dave – would want to join now?
I could half understand it if it was a cunning plan by some pathetic trot sect to “take control” of a branch. But it’s not even that half-baked.
Sue R says the working class will create something else in time – you have to ask how propping up the Labour Party helps that project.
There are plenty of reports of CLPs with active memberships so small that entrists could easily take over. It’s just that these days, not even most Trots see the point of doing so.
The future´s bright, the future´s Socialist Appeal? Oh hang on, even Cruddas beat their “preferred” (local) candidate when it came to his selection (I am told it was fairly close). Though it would be quite worrying if 3-4 old men is enough to take over a hard right “old Labour” CLP – or promising, depending on what you think of a group doing its very best to still look like the Militant in ca. 1981.
Having been at the sharp end of the Labour Party battles in the 1980′s I am well aware of what the type of people running the Labour Party these days are like.
Were you or are you a member of a Leninist political party – so therefore your membership of the Labour Party was a fraud. Whatever the reason you clearly lost the argument and have never got over it.
They don’t want a mass party or a political active and engaged party, they just want a captive vote. They don’t care if the Labour Party shrivels up and dies as long as people still go out and vote for them.
No evidence offered – a long list of assertions.
I remember all that stuff about Labour’s missing millions back in the eighties, well, they fixed the boundaries of constituies to make sure they had a built in advantage as soon as they could.
You made that one up.
I don’t know if that will save them next time round, my husband thinks Tory voters are more committed than Labour voters. I must say, it’s very hard to be committed to Labour. I once sent an e-mail to the official Labour site asking how they could have the cheek to keep trading on the past of the Labour Party while denouncing everything that Labour once stood for. Tony Bliar
Bliar – do you see what she did there? My sides have split.
made sure he got rid of Clause IV and everything else just follows.
Funnily enough the Labour Party wasn’t in favour of the state running your corner shop and so removed the suggestion that it was.
Bliar’s legacy will be the destruction of public services in this country and he wants to handon until it is irreversible.
That’ll be why my kids’ schools are being rebuilt and the local hospital has a completely new A&E department? I have never understood why so many on the left seem to regard the model of the 1940s as the prefiguration of utopia.
He has the nerve to say that he wants a job as an international statesman, it’s hard to see who would give him such a job, he is so tainted. I expect the Yanks might come up with something, but I don’t think the blokes over bright and I’ve heard his pretty lazy.
Not as lazy as you, obviously, because he said no such thing.
Coming back to Hazel Blears, she didn’t express regret that the party membership is dropping, because these people are not partyminded. I know the working class will create something else, but, my god, it may take time and much harm and dislocation will be done in the meantime.
Not party minded? Yes, lock them in the GuLag.
I know it has been a bitter time for Leninists since 1989, but newsflash comrades – it ain’t coming back.
Leninists? Blairites? I think it’s pretty obvious that the point of the Labour Party is to be an organisation for people who don’t want to be either of those things.
Can anyone think of any other electoral organisations that have lost lots of members in the last year despite having significant electoral success? I can. The strange thing is that the arguments offered to explain why this isn’t a problem are very similar to Blears’.
One small point. There are serious questions over Labour’s claimed membership in 1997 – I have it down as 410,000 not 405,000, but no matter – which at the time a couple of people who should have been in the know at HQ told me was the product of New Labour boosterism. The sleight of hand, if I remember rightly, was that no one was counted as having lapsed after 1994 or 1995. The point of this little fiction was to give credibility to Tony Blair’s prediction that a million-member party was within grasp. But in reality, er, membership started sliding slowly almost as soon as he came to power, and within a year the disparity between Labour’s claimed and actual figures was so massive as to be embarrassingly inadmissible. Three years ago I was told by someone else who should have been in the know that no credible membership figure had been published for several years. Which proves nothing, but does suggest even 200,000 needs to be taken with a pinch of salt.
Over at Harry’s Place there is a discussion going on about gratuitious personal abuse. ‘Last of the Blairites’ is a fellow/gal who obviously thinks that is how you debate politically. I blame the NuLab for not educating its members in political history and debate. It’s interesting that he/she/it insults me and challenges everything I say (me, a mere woman) but does not do the same to the men contributing to this debate. Could last of the Blairites (and thank god for that!) be a teensy-weensy bit sexist and believe that wman should not lecture men? As for the missing millions? It shows how young and callow they must be, in their twenties I expect. In the days when Labour had a ‘theoretical journal’ and the CP published ‘Marxism Today’, there were many agonised and earnest debates over why Neil Kinnock lost the General Election and the phrase that was used was ‘Labour’s Missing Millions’. I suppose now the phrase should be ‘Labour’s illegally loaned millions’. Incidentally, I was thinking about Blair’s chances of being offered the chairmanship of the World Bank (say) and I decided he is more likely to be offered non-executive director of one of Chai Patel’s hospital chains. Talking about new schools and hospitals…aren’t a lot of these being done under PFI which has been shown to be extremely expensive in the longrun. My local hospital, Chase Farm, is closing it’s A&E so you are very lucky, Last (I may call you that if it’s not too familiar)to actually have a hospital which has been allowed to keep it’s A&E. I wonder for how long though, as they have already announced that they want to close most A&E departments. As for altering Tony’s name, I cannot claim credit for that. The fact that you have not come across it before shows that you are not versed in the ways of political satire and discussion and are just a ‘duckspeaker’. Sooner history deals with you and your kind the better.
In the days when Labour had a ‘theoretical journal’ and the CP published ‘Marxism Today’,
Did anybody ever take part in a street or demo-sale of Labour Weekly, possibly with a copy of New Socialist held up in front of it? And did anyone buy?
It is a bizarre question – as I think I know the answer – but were they readable in any way whatsoever? The “LPYS paper” Militant (if I could do that thing where you can cross out words I would have just done it), I mean Socialist Youth was bad enough, and that was supposedly published people with “big political ideas”. Supposedly.
was that no one was counted as having lapsed after 1994 or 1995
I left the country in 1997, and after a spell in Labour Abroad or whatever it´s called, I stopped renewing my membership around a year later (not only because the fees went up from something like a fiver a year to a similar amount per month). It didn´t stop me from getting NEC ballot papers up to around the year 2000.
Why does mis-reporting (in Last of the Bliarites) Tony Bliar, make me ‘lazy’? I don’t see how that follows and suggests that the Bliarites do not have the conceptual ability or verbal dexterity to debate politics, probably because they are all venial, self-seeking shitheads. I’ve never met one who wasn’t unbearably smug. I’d also like to ask Last, where he or she lives as I would love to move there. My local A&E (Chase Farm) is being closed down and my local schools are awesome, awesomely bab that is, so I would love to move to Cloudcookooshire, assuming I could afford the cost of a house there.
Incidentally, I would like to mention my pet theory, which I’d actually forgotten about until all the Bliarites reminded me of it. I firmly believe that Tony Bliar (and it was Victor Lewis Smith who coined that usage) is a police agent whose task was to undermine the Labour Party. If you look at how he has behaved there is nothing to contradict that view. A friend of mine knew him at university and said he was always very quiet and on the fringes of the Labour Club, he never got involved in anything the least bit illegal. At that time, I should explain to the younger people reading this, British society was in ferment, and police spies and agents were everywhere. That is not just my imagination, I knew people who were approached to spy on the Left at university and being principled people, they refused. I think Bliar was asked to infiltrate the Labour Party and the way things worked out, he ended up climbing the hierarchy and eventually, by a massive stroke of luck, being chosen as the Leader, and then the Prime Minister. I can hear the howls of outrage from the Bliarites as they read this, but they ought to find out what the world is really like.
I also think Last shouldn’t go out so much, he/she needs to stay in and read more. It was in the papers last Thursday, that Our Tone wants a ‘job with a purpose’ when he retires from wricking peoples’ lives. Shocking isn’t it that he and his family nearly get to their ‘freebie’ holiday in Florida because the plane skidded. Who’s lying there? Is Our Tone lying or is Mrs Gibbs lying? Can one of the Bliarites let me know.
“I firmly believe that Tony Bliar (and it was Victor Lewis Smith who coined that usage) is a police agent whose task was to undermine the Labour Party. If you look at how he has behaved there is nothing to contradict that view.” – Sue R
Isn’t that an argumentum ad ignorantiam? Is it not far more likely that he’s just a politician who’s drifted to the right? Hardly an uncommon phenomenon. Conspiracy theories are the last thing the left needs to get involved with.
Don’t you think the state protects itself? I repeat Ihave known people who were proven police agents, obviously, the state is pissing in the wind most of the time because history happens, but it’s still important for them to know who is doing what and what they are thinking. Do you believe that there aren’t police agents in Islamacist groups? If there aren’t, there bloody well should be. I don’t expect the truth of Bliar to come out until after I am dead, I am already fifty, and with the thirty-year rule, and fifty or one hundred in very sensitive cases, I shall not be around to see myself vindicated but I shall go to my grave holding that belief.
My brother, who used to be an active Labour Party member as well, came round today and he said to me that he did not believe that Labour will get in for a generation once they are voted out at the next election. A generation for those ad ignorem is twenty-five years. My response to that is that it doesn’t really matter because the changes that have been wrought in the fabric of the society and the state are irreversible outside of a revolutionary or war situation. Having said that, I can’t imagine how Labour voters will bother to vote. Everytime one of the paid MPs or officials opens there mouth, lies, distortions and half-truths tumble out. They just look foolish.
Of course the state protects itself and of course it’s likely that the police have spies in Islamist groups, and you may well have known people who were police agents, but none of that provides any evidence that Tony Blair is a police agent. Of course he could be, but why should anyone believe that he actually is?
There is decent reason to believe that Bill Clinton was an informer while at university so it’s not the sort of thing that absolutely couldn’t happen.
I think that the point Sue is making is not so much that Tony Blair is still a dedicated Stasi man who reports to his police-agent bosses to get his orders every month (this would be rather ludicrous), but that he joined the Labour Party in the first place as an agent or informer, rather than because he believed in it.
As far as I can see, the only evidence for this is the circumstantial “he fits the profile”, which I don’t find convincing at all, because he also fits the profile of a careerist.
It is unquestionable, however, that Blair did gain a lot, early on in his career, from his close links with a number of Atlanticist organisations which I’m not going to name because they’re the red meat of conspiracy theories (oh twist my arm then). It’s also very well documented fact that these same Atlanticist organisations have been the main channel in the past by which the USA has played silly-buggers with the internal politics of the European left.
So the general proposition that Tony Blair has got to where he is today at least partly by being a picked man of US foreign policy is certainly quite warranted. Of course this goes just as much for Brown, and equally of course it is not like anyone was really suspecting that it was on the cards for us to be other than a minor client state of the USA, but them’s the facts.
Thank you dsquared for putting my case succinctly and lucidly. I am just alarmed at the quality of the NuLab membership, they have no political education or history and are allowing this country to be turned into a dump, and anyone who protests is labelled a Trotskyist or a wrecker etc. Actually, if Bliar had worked for the Stasi, I could have perhaps held some regard for him, although I am anti-Stalinist, at least he would have had some communist leanings, but I think he was just purely a plant who because of the historical situation got lucky. (or rather, we got unlucky.). I agree if Bliar had not happened there would have been ructions in this country and obviously the demise of the Soviet Union transformed a lot of things: it’s just the gut-wrenching hypocrisy and sanctimony I can’t stand.
Sue R I actually live a few stops down the Picadilly line from you. If Chase Farm hospital is closing then good because it’s **** and the religion of socialism is the language of priorities and propping up a failing hospital is no priority in a world of scarcity and political realism.
And, yes, it really is lazy to rely on the reportage of a right wing media when it is easy enough to look up the truth.
As for Blair, Blairism and arrogance. I watched my party get smashed in 83 and 87, endured the heratbreak of 92 and more than that saw what 18 years of Tory rule did to my friends, my family, my community. If you find us arrogant (and I’d dispute it) it is because the political path we took saw the Tories get crushed in three elections and break a century long run of Tory rule interrupted by very brief periods of progressive rule. Your way led to nothing but irrelevance.
As for Blair being “a plant” – if we even entertain this crackpot idea for a few seconds, one must assume that a lot of people are in on it and that sometime in 1994 it became in the ruling class’s interest to have a national minimum wage, a big increase in taxation and a massive building programme in the NHS.
Funnily enough, I cannot work out what it was, exactly, that brought that conjunctural position to pass, but I am sure you can tell me.