Class and the State are Back

Whatever else it was or was not, that was not a New Labour King's Speech

What does it mean to be left wing in 2024? This feels like quite a live question, though I am not sure it should. Left wing economics have always been pretty clear cut - the use of tax revenue to redistribute wealth throughout society. The taxing of the well-off to fund state-provided services for the less well-off (though also with an element of universality such as free access to healthcare and education to 18). The use of the state as a vehicle to at least dampen and at best quash class inequality.

Left wing politics for me has always had this class element at its core.

But to be fair, that hasn’t been the same for multiple political actors across the spectrum from hard left to hard right and definitely in the centre.

One of my biggest critiques of New Labour was it’s explicit “we’re all middle class now” messaging and iconography that left a lot of people who were not middle class feeling quite left out of its apparently inclusive veneer. Even those of us who are comfortably middle class but on the lower end of that large and encompassing band have found ourselves feeling like - and treated like - chavs by those who had more senior positions in a party that was supposed to be ostensibly about fighting class discrimination.

For many who had no class politics at all this did feel more inclusive. Their natural home became Labour because Labour coded socially progressive in all the areas that had nothing at all to do with class politics (such as ending discrimination based on sexuality) and have something to do with economic inequality politics (such as race or sex inequalities) but did so through a liberal individualistic approach (‘lean in’ feminism or anti-racism efforts that raised individuals but failed to look at either women’s issues or issues for BME communities through a socioeconomic lens). So while these different lenses of equality were never explicitly at odds under New Labour, their different levels of profile made it clear where the politics of class stood even as the party did some really important things on economic inequality (such as the minimum wage and Sure Start). And it made those without a class analysis - or who explicitly rejected such a lens - feel more at home often than those for whom class was the basis of their politics.

On the right, this widespread discomfort with any discussion of class meant that there developed a rich (ironic term) seam to be mined among those who felt left behind by the middle class aura of New Labour’s inclusivism. And were never explicitly told by New Labour how much they were part of the project. Doing good by stealth may mean that those stealth taxes (and I invite you to examine the ubiquity of that phrase to assess how successful a strategy it was) may have meant rarely making a case to those being taxed. But it also rarely meant making an explicit case to those who were benefitting. Leaving people who were on the margins feeling unheard, unchampioned and unrepresented.

On the left, defining against New Labour was important in status terms - but it didn’t mean defining against them in class terms. For the most part - vastly aided by Blair’s misadventures in Iraq - it meant defining against them on foreign policy. Which, as Iraq faded from immediate memory morphed into a post-grad but hazy notion of anti-colonialism. This blended with a often times confused notion of anti-statism that frequently grips the left and right.

I don’t blame many on the left of being wary of the security state. It was - as is well documented - put to use against them throughout the 20th century and in particular during the Thatcher era when state operatives were sent undercover at places like Orgreave and Greenham Common. State oppression of dissent was a very real problem under the right wing authoritarianism of Thatcher and those with a liberal bent who are economically right wing would do well to remember that.

But the left are far from immune to this kind of authoritarianism either within their own far left ranks (take the way internal discipline has happened to women who disagree with Momentum on sex-based rights and so would not sign their candidate’s pledge - for example) or, far more iniquitously, when using the powers of the state themselves. Look at areas like 90 day detention or ID cards for left wing uses of state overreach. As I have written before, liberalism, socialism and progressivism are not always comfortable bedfellows.

But the majority of Labour members would largely agree that their democratic approach to socialism is about (as I said in the piece linked above):

imposing moral order on the amoral system of markets to avoid immoral outcomes. It is about the equalisation of rights, opportunites and income between classes to vastly reduce inequality. It is an economic choice.

So back to the King’s Speech. Politics is almost exclusively covered in ‘vibes’ terms these days. And on those vibes, I would say that they way this speech has set out the priorities of the government is distinctly un-New Labour in two really important aspects.

Firstly it does use the mechanisms of the state to reimpose order that has been frayed by the excessive dominance of market mechanisms that helped shareholders line their pockets at the expense of those who use what used to be public goods. Water and rail here being the obvious examples of newly reimposing rules. GB Energy being a place where this is being brought in to actively compete against market failure.

Secondly, there has been a lot more talk of class - from Bridget Philipson in Education and Keir Starmer from the leadership from Wes Streeting in Health and Rachel Reeves in Treasury than Blair and Brown would ever have allowed. Class politics are explicit in Starmer’s Labour. The moves to restore, strengthen and champion a bill of workers rights from the get-go is an explicitly class-based project (though the beneficiaries will also be those among the precarious graduate middle classes), Though because Starmer is seen as also standing against the left wing of Corbynism that has been overlooked by critics and champions alike, these are classically left wing demands.

Some time ago, I wrote both the generous and ungenerous case for what I think Starmer and Reeves are trying to do (now) in government. I think this restoration of the good active state goes some way to evidencing that more generous case. The emphasis on planning will rightly pit working class jobs and housing needs against the fury of the property-owning class. As will the focus on green energy independence and the need to build the infrastructure to support that (which will be a useful dividing line with the middle class Greens).

This King’s speech has been received in much the same way that the manifesto was. A lack of spending commitments that mitigate the worst of the current broken system (and I agree with most people that Labour sticking to all of these - and in particular the two-child benefit cap is unsustainable) has crowded out the sense that what they’re actually trying to do is change the system itself.

Many may not believe that’s possible. Maybe that’s why their arguments and fury still exist only within the realms of immediate amelioration. But even for them, the emphasis on class politics should excite more comment and support than it has.

I think there will need to be a bit more emphasis on measures that will help as Labour takes this journey through systems change.

I have worked in a lot of organisations where systems change was what excited people. Dammit, it excites me. But I also know the sharp end. I’ve been made redundant as part of systemic changes (ironically from the TUC of all places!) and so I know the necessity of looking after people during the process of change. But calling for that is different from opposing that change on the one hand or denying that it is taking place at all.

If the ambitions that are there in the manifesto and King’s speech are realised, the Starmer project is going to be a very different beast from New Labour however many old New Labourites they bring back to take part in it. I’m not sure that its champions or critics have properly grasped that yet.

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