Labour has just suffered a heavy by-election defeat.

In the Newark and Sherwood by-election, Labour dropped from first to third:

Here’s a charitable commentary on that:

There is a simple explanation for this precipitous fall: people don’t like Keir Starmer and – more importantly – they don’t like his policies.

We know from opinion polls that a majority of the UK public want our public utilities and railways re-nationalised and private businesses removed from the National Health Service, along with a swathe of other socialist policies.

More than 70 per cent of the population support these changes – but both the Tory government and Starmer’s Labour “opposition” are telling you that you can’t have them.

They demand that, in elections, you support the policies that they want to force on you, whether you want them or not.

Why should you?

The answer is easy: the party leaders assume that you are naturally tribal. If you were brought up among Labour supporters, you’ll vote Labour no matter what daft right-wing policies Starmer foists on you. Similarly, if you were brought up among Conservatives, the assumption is that you’ll vote Tory.

They want you to vote against your interests, by lying to you that you don’t have any other choice.

Of course you have another choice: You don’t have to vote for either of them.

In fact, voting for Labour under Starmer would be a vote against the very policies that (according to the polls) you want!

I read an article in the Morning Star that explains the situation:

If Starmer does well at the next election, it will now explicitly be on the basis of his gratuitous and open repudiation of socialist values and principles.

Look at the Green New Deal, housing, Palestine or workers’ rights: no sooner had members passed policy at this conference than a shadow front bench minister was brought forward to renounce the policy and insist that it was not going to make the next manifesto.

The contempt for members, their values and the commitment to socialism under former leader Jeremy Corbyn was made clear in repeated public statements from the front bench, as well as at length in Starmer’s speech.

It further explains:

Is repudiating our entire tradition, our entire worldview and weakening our cause for decades, the price we are willing to pay for a slim (practically non-existent) chance of ending that, in favour of Starmer’s brand of washed-out liberal elitism?

The extinction of socialism from mainstream British politics would have far greater long-term effects on the lives and living conditions of working-class people than another Tory term. It would be a defeat for decency in politics, a defeat for morality, truth and reason.

And it says:

Success for Labour in the present conditions would be detrimental to the development of a truly progressive political agenda, and the advancement of our cause.

Whether you remain a member of Labour or not, unless you have particular mitigating local circumstances (such as a properly socialist local candidate running for Labour) then Labour is currently asking you to vote for the destruction of everything you believe in.

The people making this demand are well aware of how humiliating this is — and how depressing. They are also aware that a socialist movement cannot ever thrive if it is not proud of itself, dynamic and confident. This is yet another intended humiliation to put our ideas and principles back in the box.

Don’t do what you are being asked to do. Don’t vote to trash your principles or our hopes for a better world.

The people of Newark and Sherwood didn’t vote to trash their principles – and most of them are unlikely to have read the Morning Star piece.

This Writer feels sure that Thursday’s result is not unique; Labour is losing ground across the UK because Starmer’s policies are rubbish.

There is a dilemma for party members, who are not allowed to campaign against the party or show support for any other political organisation.

But that doesn’t mean you have to campaign for Starmer’s Labour. And it doesn’t mean you have to vote for policies that would harm you, either.

Starmer and his right-wing headbangers are trying to gaslight you into thinking there is no alternative to them.

They are wrong.

But it’s up to all of us to explain that to them.

Source: Should socialists vote Labour under Starmer? | Morning Star

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