‘The manifesto’s not perfect, but at the launch you could feel change is coming’

I watched the 2019 manifesto launch on a livestream in a cluttered campaign office with now-NEC member Abdi Duale. I’m sure I’m not betraying his confidences by saying that he did not think very much of it. I was more enthusiastic, but could see the merits of criticisms about it lacking coherence, being a laundry list rather than a communication.

Suffice to say it didn’t provide the cut-through that the 2017 general election package did. We lost the election in a long stream of cold leisure centres and grave faces and braying, smug new Tory MPs. It was, as Labour members who campaigned in that bitter December will remember, awful.

The atmostphere was buoyant

It won’t be like that this time. The atmosphere at Co-operative HQ in Manchester, where Keir Starmer launched Labour’s manifesto yesterday, was buoyant, bordering on jubilant. In the crowd were assembled Labour notables – I spotted Sue Gray and Sadiq Khan having a pre-match catch-up, while outside Medway council leader Vince Maple was chatting to Birmingham council leader and deputy John Cotton and Sharon Thompson – mostly MPs and PPCs from the region.

READ MORE: ‘No surprises, but fear not: Labour manifesto is the start, not the end’

Unsurprisingly given the location, there was also a strong presence from the Co-operative party, with general secretary Joe Fortune, parliamentary lead Jim McMahon and various party staff milling about.

At 11am, the event kicked off with a welcome speech from Angela Rayner. Copies of the manifesto were passed out to press and frantically photographed, to be sent back to newsrooms around the country and combed for newslines (if you’re interested in a behind-the-scenes look at LabourList, confirming votes at 16 was the first newsline we spotted…).

Starmer was more confident and upbeat than ever

Introducing Starmer were a series of voters: Daniel, talking about the strain overcrowded housing puts on his family; 18-year-old Holly, talking about wanting Britain to offer more to young people; and Nathaniel, talking about his terminal cancer diagnosis and how he believes Labour will prevent late diagnosis and save lives.

The Labour leader gave an assured performance, notably more confident and upbeat than I think I have seen him before. His public speaking can have an effortful, even strained quality that was absent today, and indeed is slipping away the longer he spends as leader.

I ultimately found the whole event quite moving, and judging from the faces around the room, I think I was far from alone.

Being a Labour member is hard

LabourList is a publication for Labour supporters (or, at least, that’s the audience I have in mind whenever I write for it). Being a Labour member – the people who go canvassing for council by-elections, the branch secretaries, the keen students and retired teachers – is hard and often thankless work.

READ MORE: ‘Nervous energy’: Day one mood on wet Labour doorstep in London target

The leadership treats you indifferently and people yell at you in the street when you’re leafletting. You agonise, you feel morally compromised. You get up early and you lose, and lose, and lose, for hope of winning, for hope of making things better.

I had a lot of hope in the Corbyn years, spent a lot of time campaigning and thinking about universalism and that Anthony Crosland quote about needing “not only higher exports and old-age pensions, but more open-air cafes, brighter and gayer streets at night”. It was ultimately hope frustrated; and I did not think, in the bleak first few months of the parliament just passed, that I would see Labour on the brink of victory so soon.

A low-key manifesto, but this is a generational opportunity

The manifesto – the thing which had gathered us all there in Manchester – is what we were told it would be: low-key, without surprises. It has points of radical, interventionist policy, and, to my view, some notable omissions and fudges.

It is not perfect. But what it represents – Labour on the edge of government – is a generational opportunity. Like, I’d imagine, many party members, I feel daunted and grateful in equal measures.

Find out more through our wider 2024 Labour party manifesto coverage so far…

OVERVIEW:

READ MORE: Labour manifesto launch: Live updates, reaction and analysis

READ MORE: Full manifesto costs breakdown – and how tax and borrowing fund it

READ MORE: The key manifesto policy priorities in brief

ANALYSIS AND REACTION:

READ MORE: Fabians: ‘This a substantial core offer, not the limit of Labour ambition’

READ MORE: ‘No surprises, but fear not: Labour manifesto is the start, not the end’

READ MORE: ‘What GB energy will do and why we desperately need it’

READ MORE: ‘Labour’s health policies show a little-noticed radicalism’

READ MORE: GMB calls manifesto ‘vision of hope’ but Unite says ‘not enough’

READ MORE: IFS: Manifesto doesn’t raise enough cash to fund ‘genuine change’

READ MORE: Watch as Starmer heckled by protestorwith ‘youth deserve better’ banner

POLICY NEWS:

READ MORE: Labour vows to protect green belt despite housebuilding drive

READ MORE: Manifesto commits to Brexit and being ‘confident’ outside EU

READ MORE: Labour to legislate on New Deal within 100 days – key policies breakdown 

READ MORE: Labour to give 16-year-olds right to vote

READ MORE: Starmer says ‘manifesto for wealth creation’ will kickstart growth

READ MORE: What are the manifesto’s NHS and health policies?

Read more of our 2024 general election coverage here.

If you have anything to share that we should be looking into or publishing about this or any other topic involving Labour or about the election, on record or strictly anonymously, contact us at [email protected]. 

Sign up to LabourList’s morning email for a briefing everything Labour, every weekday morning. 

If you can help sustain our work too through a monthly donation, become one of our supporters here.

And if you or your organisation might be interested in partnering with us on sponsored events or content, email [email protected].