To the disillusioned: we can’t compromise on the need for a Labour government

By Alex Smith / @alexsmith1982

In a spitting article in the Observer last weekend, Gary Younge said he’s been “too disgusted to vote for Labour since 1992…what is difficult to understand is why people have chosen to become so disgusted with the party now.”

Certainly, a huge number of people have become increasingly angered by the Party’s actions and policy choices and have been indefinitely repulsed. You just have to look at the comments on this site from formerly stalwart Labour people to know that the Party has neglected swaths of its core support. The feeling of disappointment and betrayal here is palpable.

And at Liberal Conspiracy, another space that intelligently supports progressive values, there is growing antagonism toward Labour, and its contributors are ever more sceptical that Labour can be trusted or even that we remain the natural party of the Left.

I, too, feel let down at times. I wonder where the social housing is; I wonder why income tax continues to be levied on earnings below £15,000 when the gap between rich and poor is growing ever larger; I wonder why the 50p top rate was wielded only as a political tool or recessional necessity, rather than as a point of principal; I oppose spending tens of billions on renewing a nuclear programme when we should be leading the global fight against nuclear proliferation; I abhor the premise for going to war in Iraq; and the idea of carrying my identity in my back pocket makes my skin crawl.

So why do I continue to believe and to work hard to promote Labour? Why have I chosen the bluster of the blogosphere and fustiness of the party meeting as the best places in which to do this? Isn’t my continued support a leap of faith too far?

Simply, I don’t think so. I won’t give up my personal values even if I don’t always feel they are being fully upheld by the political party I support. Because while a Labour government will always need to compromise, we can’t compromise on the need for a Labour government.

And without the “amoral”, “hard-headed” pursuit of power Gary Younge so criticises, the “soft-hearted” promises we make will only ever be empty as the party of opposition.

Rather, I feel compelled to express my anger and change the party from within because, to me, Labour remains the last, best hope for those who believe in social justice, mobility and fairness. The party will never be perfect, but it has always been only vehicle we have for sharing our national proceeds justly. It is the only party that knows in its very DNA that people are the ends of our national wealth and not just the means to it.

And it is historically the only party that through its policy on Health and Education and Taxation and Welfare – though frequently too tentative and trialled too often by error over the past 12 years – has been a consistent force for progressive social change in this country.

So for self-confessed progressives, there can be no more protest at the ballot box: a vote for any other party in the next general election is a vote for a Tory government. Would our angry readers and those at Liberal Conspiracy prefer that? I somehow doubt it.

No, the only alternative for the disillusioned is to grasp the nettle and express discontentment by reshaping the Labour Party in the form they want it from within. Anything else is frankly lazy.

So yes, I am disappointed and often infuriated. I want Labour to be better. I want it to be more democratic as a party and more pluralistic, open and honest in government. I want it to look again at our national priorities and conclude that it has rejected too many of those it was created to support.

But while I understand and respect the exodus from Labour ranks, I can’t abide it. While the party has too often neglected us, I refuse in turn to neglect the party.