I've thought about this a lot since waking up to find that Yvonne Clapp, a woman who spent her life working in a low paid job in the NHS and then stood for Labour in the local council lost out to UKIP. The resulting ire of TUSC, telling me I knew nothing BECAUSE I WAS LABOUR, made me think even more. But best of all, the lovely Mark Everden, a thoughtful, dedicated organiser, asked me questions which made me go away and really reflect.
It seems to me, there are the following questions which arise from any UKIP surge in votes:
1. Is this a sign of Labour failing to provide a clear opposition?
2. Is this a sign of the electorate moving inevitably to the right, in an engineered campaign?
3.is this a protest vote, which will subside?
These are my thoughts on these questions.
1. No. Because, if an effective opposition was the aim, why haven't TUSC, the Greens or Respect seen a similar surge? The Greens have an impressive political programme, actually so do TUSC and even Respect, but what's missing is any sense of actual reality or understanding about where workers actually are.
Thatcher changed things. Never mind the TU laws. She sold mortgages to people, meaning they could never take take strike action again because the bank, not the council would come for them. She convinced us life was all a shopping basket, that services were bought and sold, that value for money was everything, even if those nodding and voting were those who received poorer services each year. She taught that choice was so important, in utilities, schools, telephones and housing, making us forget how wonderful it might be to have a home, a school and utilities which were of a given quality without having to deal with endless automated phone calls offering us a better choice. Thatcher said her greatest achievement was Tony Blair. I think she might have been right.
2. Possibly. Think about the Thatcher years. Followed by Major, then Blair but towards the end of the Labour Govt, the Telegraph, anti EU, ultra right wing and embedded in the establishment begin their campaign about MPs expenses. And quite bloody right. National outrage ensues. Bloody politicians. No one can trust them. They're all the same. Who can we trust? No one, just no one. Oh wait, along come these blokes. They like beer and smoking and they hate these bloody Poles. Just like we do. After years of Thatcher slagging off the bloody unions, public sector workers and loony lefties, at last, a party for us. All those petty prejudices which are blamed on our lack of education, but in fact spawned, fed and reared by a complex organised media - at last they have a name. Their name is UKIP.
As a political activist in the 80s and 90s, (a communist since you ask, so stick that in your sneering TUSC pipe and smoke it) we had different views on what the opposition should be, but totally agreed on the solution. Get. The. Tories. Out. I thought a lot about Nazi Germany today and it's rise in austerity after the Wall Street Crash, it's engineered hatred of the SDP, the infighting amongst Ultra left and right wing splinter groups. Can we ignore this? No.
3. Yep, it is probably a protest vote. But so was the vote for the various incarnations of the National Socialists. In a climate in which people felt downtrodden, their national pride stripped from them, the increasing sense someone else was controlling their future and no one speaking up for them.
So, going back to 2, is the UKIP vote because Labour doesn't speak for them? If it is, no one can criticise them for lack of trying. Labour has had numerous attempts at querying universal benefits, free EU immigration and no one can accuse Blue Labour of not trying to to reach out to those prejudices. Every time they do, we boo them and rightly so. But when those instincts run to UKIP, we blame them again.
What makes me so angry is that we run the risk of ignoring a real fascist threat, in order to snipe at Labour. This is a distraction and luxury, encouraged and fanned by the Coalition and UKIP. Keep on sniping and snarling while we decide which version of capitalism stays in charge.
In my highly personal view, we need to really grasp the nature of politics. Passionate political beliefs are like religion. Our faith and beliefs motivate and excite us. There are themes that we strive for and actively seek - for me, it is the look in her eyes of a woman who thought she was nothing and then realised she could be everything; it is the sense of power of a group of workers who realise the strength of the word No, who grasp that in withdrawing their labour, from a strong density have a power no law can give them; of a black worker, a gay worker or disabled worker who looks their abuser in the eye and calls out their bigotry. These are my water into wine.
But others have these too. For UKIP and the Tories, it is the rejection of public provision, the hatred of strangers, attitudes which only exist due to conjuring tricks and smokes and mirrors. Oh, and a daily press that helps them attack the downtrodden (aka benefit claiming scroungers),the "different" (trannies, gay marriage and immigrants) and reminds us of the danger of changing our system.
What is our strategy as a working class? Because I am in no doubt whatsoever, that UKIP did not emerge from nowhere. This is a carefully concerted plot. And we can counter it by arguing about the right kind of socialist, environmentalist alternative. Or we can turn nasty. We can unite, and link arms in a determined and proactive strategy to build the knowledge and understanding of workers to politicise them to reject the sorry arsed version of protest offered by uber-establishment UKIP and to demand power for ourselves. No one is doing that. But trade unions can. To work, comrades, to work.
