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THE Labour leadership contest is heating up and over the last few weeks so has the inquest into December’s catastrophic election defeat.
Many have laid the blame at the door of the manifesto, and in some ways they have a point: when combined with a doom-laden mass media onslaught, the “shopping list” of policies didn’t quite manage to communicate a compelling vision people felt they could realistically believe in.
But some have gone further in their finger-pointing, questioning the fundamentals of the policy platform itself, with suggestions that we abandon or dial back key elements of our transformative economic vision.
This would be a mistake. Now more than ever, Labour should embrace an agenda of economic radicalism and public ownership as part of a green new deal.
It’s popular. It’s up to the task of taking on our rigged economic system and the climate crisis. And it could be the backbone of a movement to win the country.
Perhaps the greatest tragedy of the election loss is the fact that polls show people agree with Labour’s diagnosis: our neoliberal economic system isn’t working.
The arch free-trade think tank, The Legatum Institute, had it right when reflecting on polling it conducted in 2017: “the capitalism ‘brand’ is in crisis. It is seen as greedy, selfish and corrupt.”
And people agree with the policies Labour propose in response, too. A survey commissioned by ClientEarth found that a remarkable 63 per cent of respondents were in support of a transformative green new deal.
Public ownership, a key plank of the green new deal, remains incredibly popular.
Most of us want to see public ownership across a range of public services, from water and rail to energy and Royal Mail.
Public ownership is efficient and would pay for itself in just seven years, according to research from the University of Greenwich.
The unfortunate reality, however, is that this wasn’t pushed forward enough during the election.
Despite the manifesto starting with the green industrial revolution, it was barely mentioned throughout the campaign.
The climate debate, which seemed like a step forward, was a reversion to tired tropes of liberal environmentalism.
The green new deal’s power to unite class and climate, and form the basis of a compelling economic narrative was left untapped.
What was missing in the election wasn’t the right policies. What was missing was a working-class movement grounded in communities to bring them about.
Socialist politics requires that working-class people are agents in a collective struggle for change. What we had instead was a list of socialist policies to be delivered from on high by a Labour government lacking a fighting working-class movement.
This meant Labour’s proposals felt distant and didn’t resonate. The promise of one million good, green jobs, despite brilliant proposals for what it would mean locally, was all policy and no political power.
In many of Labour’s traditional heartlands, there is no longer a powerful labour movement in communities, fighting for their rights day-in, day-out, to make our programme seem real and tangible.
Rebuilding this movement is a huge challenge, but the green new deal can help overcome it, and unite all wings of Labour’s electoral coalition.
More than two-thirds of voters in 45 “Labour heartlands,” the so-called “red wall” marginals, including major Conservative gains like Workington and Don Valley, stated that climate change would influence how they voted.
More than half said they supported government intervention to create green jobs. With climate continuing to be a key priority for the urban Labour base, the green new deal could form the basis of an alliance across class and geographical boundaries.
But there needs to be a genuine movement around the policies, starting with workers demanding a just transition and organising in communities.
It must also be a radical, socialist project that promises genuine transformation. There is now a consensus in the party around the need for the green new deal and the potential of the green agenda. But not on what that means.
There is a danger that we will slip back into piecemeal policies on climate and the economy, under the banner of the “green new deal.”
That would simply mean fighting a slow losing battle against climate apocalypse and continued economic crisis.
Our current economic system is creating grotesque levels of inequality while actively driving climate catastrophe, as the wildfires ravaging Australia, and the flooding devastating Indonesia, demonstrate.
We need a wholesale transformation of the structure and principles of our economy to serve the interests of the many, including workers and future generations.
Expanding democratic ownership must necessarily be a cornerstone of the platform. Without expanded public ownership, value extraction, speculation and profit will continue to undermine the needs of the many and the climate.
Public ownership allows us to switch polluting, resource-intensive private vehicles with high-quality, cheap, renewably powered trains and buses.
A public rollout of free full-fibre could result in 300 million fewer commuting trips, three billion fewer kilometres travelled by car, and 360,000 tonnes fewer carbon dioxide emissions.
New models of public ownership encourage the long-term thinking we need to build a truly sustainable economy, while revitalising regional economies and communities.
As we collectively decide the future direction of the Labour Party, it’s clear: to tackle the overlapping crises we face, we need a radical socialist vision, matched by a powerful, vibrant movement uniting a class coalition capable of delivering victory. And a genuine green new deal can be the uniting platform to help bring it to life.
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