The death of Labour – not with a bang but with a whimper

June 8, 2009 at 3:15 pm (elections, Europe, labour party, voltairespriest)

Car-crash television doesn’t even describe it. Last night’s election results placed the Labour Party on 16% of the national vote, which leaves continuing government claims of democratic legitimacy ringing even more hollow than they were before the Euro-election bloodbath. None of the other main parties really flourished either, the Tories “winning” with 28% and the Liberal Democrats floundering in fourth on 14%. The Labour vote collapsed more than most, but a total vote for all three major parties of 58% is hardly a ringing endorsement of mainstream politics in the UK.

The big story of the night was the boom in minor party votes, with UKIP coming second on just under 17% of the vote, and the Greens holding their ground with 2 MEPs and an increased vote of 9%. Then there was the BNP.

We all knew they might get one seat. The frantic activity by anti-fascist campaigns in the North-West prior to the election, and the (late in the day) coalescing of the left behind Green candidate Peter Cranie, was a recognition of the very real danger that the UK might be about to send fascist representatives to Europe for the first time in its history. But in the event it wasn’t enough, and Nick Griffin (along with the even more bizarre Andrew Brons in Yorkshire and Humber) scraped on to the bottom of the list of elected MEPs.

It goes without saying that the result is one which throws the newly “stable” Brown leadership of the Labour Party back out on a very thin and rotten limb. Labour MPs in Wales will have been shaken to the core by the sight of Nye Bevan’s party being beaten by the Tories in the safest of Labour’s heartland regions. Suddenly those safe seats don’t feel so safe any more. At the time of writing Gordon Brown remains leader of the Labour Party and Prime Minister, and his government of also-rans, flunkies, peers and TV celebrities (he apparently can no longer command enough support within parliament to fill his cabinet) remains in place. But whether he staggers on or not, it is only a matter of time until New Labour is swept away by an electoral tsunami which may make 1997 look like a picnic. It was clear last night that voters were willing to elect anyone other than Labour, even if that person was a fascist or a swivel-eyed UKIP obsessive. That is not good for “the party of the many”.

How did this happen? Platitudes about general anti-incumbency moods and social democrats across Europe taking a kicking being put aside, it seems to me that this result was at least in part about working class disenchantment with politics in general, and real fury at the Labour Party in particular. In the northern heartlands where “Labour MP” used to be a job for life, the party has been shamefully negligent in ignoring socially excluded, poor communities for many years. That is what opened the door for the BNP – those who see no reason for hope often become angry, and the fascists offered them a channel for that anger, one which the whole of UK politics may come to regret.

And the Labour Party? You’ll hear people on the old left talking about apocalyptic “struggles” coming up, which may enable “us” to “reclaim” the party. It’s hard to see this happening, however. The right retains its hold over the party’s structures, the union leaderships remain in thrall to Labour HQ, and the left just doesn’t have the vision to offer an alternative or the muscle to push it through. Even union-sponsored splits remain a distant dream, as Labourites continue to run most union structures and maverick efforts like No2EU crash and burn.

It may, nevertheless, be the beginning of the end for Labour as a national party. Not with a bang, but with a whimper.