Labour is telling Britain it is now a conservative party – and we should believe it

Let’s take Starmer at his word that it is the party of wealth creation and growth, not redistribution and equality. What will this mean for our politics?

We now live, despite appearances, in an age of consensus. We should perhaps call it Starnakism, a much more profound consensus than Blatcherism (the portmanteau of Blair and Thatcher) or the postwar Butskellism (Rab Butler and Hugh Gaitskell). Its most telling feature is that the Labour party’s fundamental criticism of the Tories is their lack of competence, rather than their policies.

Yet the idea that Labour remains a progressive social democratic party hiding in plain sight is still in the air. While it is granted this is not obvious from its programme, it is held that deep down it is the party of change, of welfare, of state intervention; the party of labour rather than of capital, the party of international law, not war. It is held that in power, either circumstances or opportunity will make it more radical. That hope animates many.

Yet Labour is telling the world otherwise, and we should believe it. While the Tories promise tax and welfare cuts, it offers minor increases in tax and spend, premised on cuts in other areas. Labour says it will not increase benefits, or remove the two-child cap; it will only make improvements to education and healthcare that are trivial in the context of the challenges faced, adding only marginal numbers of appointments and teachers.

It tells us it is now the party of wealth creation and growth, not redistribution or equality (that is, people at the bottom will only get more if the size of the cake increases, and they will keep the same share of the cake as before). It sees no Israeli war crimes in Palestine. It will marginally retilt capital-labour relations, which one hopes will reduce inequality somewhat, but it does not differentiate between good and bad types of business – all business is good. Brexit is accepted.

Continued in the Guardian 28 June 2024