We should learn from our victories not dwell on our “failures”

By Michael Payne

The Labourite commentariat and twitterati have spent the last few days partaking in a mammoth post-match analysis of the local and devolved UK elections. Alex Salmond may have been named ‘Man of the Match’ on Thursday with his impressive result in the Scottish Parliamentary elections and the NO to AV campaign were definitely anointed ‘Best Goal Scorer’ (supported by leading midfielders Cameron & Osborne), but the real focus of the post-match analysis has been on the failure of Labour to get off the subs bench and onto the pitch in the South of England.

It’s quite right that we all spend a brief moment reflecting on Labour’s lack of great gains in the South but a brief moment is all we should spend.

As we ‘refound’ the Labour Party, we must not only discuss our policy formulation process and deliberate about the ‘brand’ of the party, we must replay the highlights of our real victories last Thursday: those where our local Labour teams kept their eyes on the prize, systematically tearing apart their self-confident, arrogant and power-holding Tory opponents.

Sadly those victories have already been resigned to the media archives. It is great to see one of Labour’s star strikers from Thursday being celebrated in the press over the weekend – we all extend our congratulations to Jake Morrison in Liverpool Wavertree for his stellar result against long-standing Lib Dem Councillor and former council leader, Lord Mike Storey but if Labour is to build on what Ed Miliband is calling our “staging post” we must begin to share the blueprint for our conclusive victories against our real enemies – the Tory elite.

The Gedling Labour team (who have not held overall control of the council since the height of Blair’s power in 1995) did not just have a ‘Star Striker’, a ‘Man of the Match’ and/or a ‘Best Goal Scorer’ – we had a long-term game plan. Our post-match analysis will be more about how we learn the lessons from smashing apart massive Tory majorities in key Tory wards, not decrying the fact we didn’t tear a few more strips of the local Tories.

The East Midlands will be crucial battleground in the next general election (whenever it comes), in 2010 Labour was largely wiped out in this region but along with other key areas, Gedling bucked the trend. Our hard-working, local MP, Vernon Coaker, held onto his seat against all national trends and now he has helped us in delivering a massive blow to the Tories locally, fundamentally altering the pre-match statistics for the county council elections in two years and the next general election.

I don’t just believe the Labour Party must learn from Gedling because it’s my home and the borough I now represent but because Gedling was, without a doubt, one of (if not the) best victory for Labour last Thursday. We came from a low base of nine Labour councillors out of fifty to an all-time high of thirty-two; taking thirteen from the Tories, five from the Lib Dems and five from Independents is the scale of victory we must repeat if we are to silence those within our ranks that see themselves on the MOTD sofa and long for us to start regaining possession of the ball in the South of England.

We must not repeat the mistake of last Thursday: believing a collapse of Lib Dem support will only ever be to the advantage of Labour. Unless we keep our eyes on the prize and learn from Gedling, we risk spending our future waxing lyrical about the new Conservative hegemony in the UK.

Michael Payne is deputy leader of Gedling Borough Council