On Saturday (31 May) Andy Burnham launched a broad critique of the government. “I believe you do have to take on the right,” the mayor of greater Manchester told a crowd in London, “but what’s the best way to do that?”
“Definitely not by aping their rhetoric,” he added. “We see from Canada and Australia that a strong, confident left, which leans into what we believe, rather than tilting the other way, can win and can win well.”
He is mostly (but not entirely) right. Two things are driving voters towards Reform UK: the cost of living and immigration. The government can’t compete with Reform on immigration and it shouldn’t try to – that is a conversation owned by Farage right now. And this idea bubbles under the surface of Burnham’s criticism of Starmer (the Prime Minister’s recent speech on immigration read, at least to some, like a direct rhetorical invocation of Farage).
But immigration is not even the most important electoral order of the day. The cost of living is still supreme, and if Labour can allay unrest on the issue it can recoup some lost favour. It is a shame, then, that the most recognised policy from the party’s first year in post is the decision to cut winter fuel payments to pensioners. Fairly or not, the voters see a party that rallies against austerity in theory but imposes it in practice.
So, Burnham’s analysis is sound: Labour is getting nowhere by aping Farage on immigration and neglecting its values on the cost of living. Now, not many Brits see this Labour government as particularly different to the last Conservative one. And, more than a fifth of Labour’s base is in search of a Reform, Green or Lib Dem candidate in the polling booth.
But there are grounds for scepticism on the broader points. A “strong, confident left” is one thing, but it’s incorrect to assume that this will necessarily keep Farage at bay. The British left is too divided to cobble together a so-called “left front” strong enough to resist the country’s lurch Reform-wards.
The Runcorn and Helsby by-election in May was the opening salvo of this semi-doomed strategy. Labour activists took to Lib Dem, Green and Conservative areas to squeeze as many possible tactical votes in Labour’s favour. The party modelled for 10,000 votes via this tactic. It ended up getting 12. And while Tory villages came out for Labour, Labour villages came out for Reform. The Reform candidate won.
Labour organisers on the ground noted that Lib Dem voters were happy to vote Labour to stop Reform, but prospective Green voters were not. Voting for Labour in the face of Farage was still too great a leap for these 2,000 Green supporters, galvanised by an active Green campaign. And I suspect that so long as Labour’s profile remains unchanged, the left will remain split along these lines and Reform will keep winning.
There’s another hitch behind the grand strategy of a left front. In France, strategists bank on increasing turnout from the non-voting “silent majority” as a guarantor against the far-right. And the so-called Republican front has worked in France before. But in Britain, I would not be so confident.
Because, at least according to the findings of the British Election Study, non-voters are not anti-Farage progressives waiting to be activated. Instead, relative to Starmer, non-voters favour Farage. Whereas among regular voters the Farage advantage (and this is of data immediately after the General Election) is small, among non-voters it is notable.
Survey their social attitudes and you find a less-than-progressive bent. They’re more redistributive than the voting median, yes. (Only slightly, I grant you.) But they’re markedly more conservative than the median too.
Non-voters are broadly of that crude, cliched charge: “hang the paedos, fund the NHS”. As are most voters, really. But non-voters more so. And so to rely on them to forge an alliance to keep Farage at the gates? It seems unlikely.
[See more: Andy Burnham has made his leadership pitch]
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