Stella Tsantekidou column: ‘We have forgotten how to do politics’

What is it about Labour MPs that turns them into the anguished mother in Solomon’s parable whenever a failing leader needs to be put out of his misery?

Apparently, nobody in the Cabinet meeting last Tuesday brought up the resignation issue because it was not on the agenda. Are these ministers or obedient schoolchildren?

The only thing that enraged me more than those briefings was the response to Josh Simons taking one for the team to make space for Andy Burnham.

Some say Burnham is the messiah. I say Simons is the prodigal son who redeemed himself. And how did some of the Pathetic Loser tribe of our party respond to his sheer bravery and boldness? They responded with cowardice.

“Look at the polls! Andy will lose!”

With Cassandras like you by his side, he might as well.

What are polls for if not to be changed? If the concept of campaigning – turning people’s minds around – completely evades us, we don’t deserve to win. We govern by polling. Runing scared of confrontation. We have forgotten how to do politics. 

This cowardice runs deeper than our cabinet – it’s in all of us. I admit, I don’t always know if I’m falling in line out of self-sacrifice or self-preservation. 

Consider how we’ve handled every thorny, culture-war-adjacent issue over the last five years.

On immigration, both wings of the party have performed their respective moral panics with equal cynicism. Lacking the self-reflection to realise they don’t have the necessary pathos to perform, let alone embody, populism, the right of the party measures their success in positive headlines in the rags read by voters who hate us. 

The left, on the other hand, insists on its lack of curiosity and nuance. Apparently, not letting people stay forever if they overstay their visas or fail to obtain a new one is cruel and unusual punishment. That is news to me as an immigrant.

On trans rights? We went from a party whose vibe was calling women vagina-havers to one whose vibe is calling trans women men in frocks. Did we bridge the divide between competing rights, or did we prove to both groups that we are dreadful hypocrites who go with the wind? 

On the Israel/Palestine conflict we are now getting the grievance politics and inter-religious warfare we deserve. For a secular party that “doesn’t do God,” we sure proved nothing is sacred for us. Not even human life.

On cronyism? That Lobby Firm lounge monstrosity slapping you in the face as soon as you entered the conference in Liverpool this year was a sight to behold. If the choice for our conference is between that corporate takeover cash cow and the Corbyn years’ Student Union hippy fest, pass me the joint. 

On energy? The right wants to bin the one Cabinet member who can run a department. The left would rather see PM Farage reopen the coal mines than exploit our oil and gas reserves.  

On violence against women and girls? Know the same type of personality who fails to speak up on rape gangs is equally able to ignore someone’s connection with a paedophile if the political benefits are too good to pass up. 

How we deal with these issues reveals our pathetic disposition in the face of contradictions and competing interests. Our leadership hopefuls wouldn’t challenge Starmer without a poll rolling the red carpet for them. We approach policymaking the same way, waiting for focus groups to tell us what to think rather than trying to change minds ourselves.

This is the excuse I heard early in my journey as a Labour staffer: the UK is a right-wing country, this is why they always win, anyone left of centre has an uphill battle, poor us! With experience, I realised that, as conservative as the country may be, there’s another reason. The left is weak and cowardly. One negative poll is enough to scare us off trying to convince anyone of anything.

Only the right could have looked at the Brexit polling showing 60/40 odds and think, “We can win that.” If Brexit were the Left’s cause, we would have balked at the polling.

So, we don’t deserve to win. 

We don’t deserve to win because a handful of weak men can silence us by waving polling charts for one faction, gilt yield charts for another, as if they are religious texts. 

“But Stella, in the face of evidence, what are we supposed to do?!” 

Wrestle the laser pointer off their clammy hands, tell them where to stick it. 

And then? Renew your rail cards. We are going to Makersfield. 

READ MORE: Stella Tsantekidou column: ‘The dark arts are dead’

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