This is Labour, this is who we are

By Matt Wallace

After 13 years, our time in office may be coming to an end. With the end of the campaign upon us, a judgment is about to be passed. But if a measure of a man is in how he reacts to adversity, the measure of a party is surely the same. So with this in mind, what can we say about the Labour Party?

We are millions of voters, thousands of members, hundreds of constituencies and dozens of groups. In victory or defeat, this is who we are. This is who we are: the movement for a progressive future.

In every great battle that has ever been fought, we were there. The engine of change. The movement that gives hope to the hopeless and voice to the voiceless.

In every great battle there have been those who rejected the future; those who saw the shining light of progress and said, too bright. This is too radical.

That is not us.

In victory or defeat, we shy from no battle, retreat from no fight for a future defined by justice, fairness and equality. This is what Labour are. This is what I am.

Sometimes, you are not on the right side of elections – but you are on the right side of history. Votes for women. Workers’ rights. Anti-apartheid.

In every great battle there has been a voice for change and a voice for the status quo, and those battles have not ended today.

Equal pay; equal rights. Protecting women’s choice.

The Labour Party does not begin and end with election campaigns, and these battles go on regardless. A future fair for all is not a political slogan but the lifeblood of a party, and if on Friday morning the British people lose faith in us for a moment, let us remind them why they had it to begin with. Let us give voice once again.

To the minimum wage; to maternity leave and child tax credits; to lifting millions out of poverty; to the biggest overseas aid budget in history; to rebuilt schools and new hospitals. To peace in Northern Ireland. To the NHS.

If our efforts are undone, we will do them again. If our progress is halted, we will start again.

I do not need an election to tell me that a future fair for all is better than a future fair for some – and this is the future we must live up to.

And with this at our backs, we march, and fight, to be on the right side of history, again. This is who we are.

This is Labour.