Class misnomers

By Olly Deed

Gordon Brown’s speech to the Fabian Society on Saturday was widely reported as a pitch to the middle class voters of Britain. The speech feeds into the wider debate about whether Labour should revert to a core vote strategy or pitch to middle Britain. This debate suggests that the two are mutually exclusive: they are not.

Don’t get me wrong, social class is still important in Britain and there are distinctions that can made between these two very real groups. Working class boys and girls are still constrained by class. However, that is not to say that the values held by working class people are not also held by middle class families.

So why do we accept this outdated notion that pitching to these different groups requires fundamentally different messages? By pitching the aspiration message exclusively to middle England, we implicitly concede that middle class people in our society don’t care about fairness. That’s wrong.

Aspiration, a central theme of the Prime Minister’s speech on Saturday, is not the property of the working class or middle class. People of all classes aspire to good jobs, excellent qualifications and a nice home. This message transcends class divisions in our country and the sooner Ed Balls and Peter Mandelson work that out, the better.

So let’s be clear. Labour is not the party of the working class or the middle class. It is the party of both. The values we hold dear, such as fairness and aspiration don’t need to be tailored to specific groups. We should stop this misnomer now. A coherent campaign based on our values, those shared by working class and middle class voters, is the only way to win this election campaign.