Is politics changing?

“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,

The courage to change the things I can,

And the wisdom to know the difference.”

Reinhold Niebuhr

Is politics changing? If we are honest with ourselves, this is the biggest question at the moment. Labour are taking a gamble that it can and it has. That what have been known as the fundamentals of politics can be shifted and worked around. The Tories, on the other hand, are more complacent, believing that the old certainties favour them.

 The Labour Party is certainly changed. In good ways and in bad. The giddy rush of new activists bringing new blood and energy to what has – at times – felt like a tired and stale party can only be a good thing. There is an enthusiasm for Labour politics, particularly among the young, that feels fresh.

But on the other hand, good comrades have left our Party – one I spoke to felt hounded out of her local Party for asking difficult questions of the leadership (not – I hasten to add – by anyone remotely connected to Jeremy Corbyn or his office. This is the opposite of what they want). Don’t get me wrong. I think supporting our leaders is the right thing to do. But internal dissent is also a part of our tradition – one Jeremy has practised, often wisely, for years. It is by asking difficult questions of ourselves that we prepare ourselves to answer them of the voters. We do ourselves nor our leaders no favours by following blindly. Leave that to the cults, we’re here to do the heavy lifting and try to form a government. That takes tough questioning.

The Tory Party has not really changed. I was at their conference in Manchester on Monday and they were reassuringly familiar. They were the Tory Party I expected them to be. I faced casual sexism and smug triumphalism. Their unshakable belief is that the fundamentals of politics have not changed. They do not believe that Labour can win from the left and are extremely confident in their ability to beat a Corbyn-led Party.

But to make sure of this, the Tories are wearing the clothes of change. they are talking about poverty, about the traps that an uneven society sets up for those not at the top. they are even talking about Tory union membership – which would have been anathema not so very long ago. They are stealing progressive themes and applying Conservative solutions. I don’t believe this will work. If I did, I’d be a Tory. But if they can convince the country not only that they are more credible than us, but also that they care, politics will have changed against us. Possibly permanently.

How we respond to this matters. We can either reject the Tories as “evil scum” as the protesters who shouted at me on the way into their conference did. Or we can welcome their conversion to our causes. Now we are all agreed on the problems, let us now fight to implement the best solutions. let us prove wherever and however we can that Labour solutions in action are what works. Let us show that at local level and champion our devolved and powerful Labour run administrations across England and in Wales. If you want fiscal credibility, let us show it in the running of the Northern Powerhouse. Let us use Osborne’s attempt to Toryify the North against him and show what Labour can do with power. Let us change our top down attitude to power where only Parliament counts and show what we can do locally to win nationally rather than the other way round. That would be a changed politics.

Is politics changing? I don’t know. It feels different to me, but I am a safe Labour voter in a safe Labour seat. I am the East London political elite (I can’t afford North London!) writ large. When I talk to the politically engaged they are more excited about politics than I have seen in a very long time.

But when I talk to those who don’t engage, that’s when the doubts set in. I don’t think their relationship with politics has changed yet and it may not. It is them we have to convince – not ourselves. Because if we want to change the government, change the country, we must change their minds. We have the means to do so, but we can’t do it just because we wish it to be so.

I started this piece by quoting the Serenity Prayer. I do not feel very serene about the state of politics at the moment. Our job as a Party is to very quickly identify what we can and can’t change in politics. Not what we can and would wish to. Do we have the wisdom to know the difference?