For most of us, having an accident means losing our phone or spilling our drink. Jeremy Cliffe is cut from different cloth: he claims to have accidentally started a new political party. Being conceived by accident, however, does not in itself condemn one to failure – as millions of us can attest. What chance, then, does Radicals UK have?
Two things speak in its favour. One is that it will no doubt get lots of favourable media support from the many centrists who hate Corbyn. The other is that they are clean skins. The Lib Dems are discredited by the fact that they trebled tuition fees and collaborated with the economic illiteracy of austerity – which was of course a major cause of Brexit. Radicals UK will be untainted by such disgrace.
On the other hand, though, two more powerful forces are against it.
History warns us of these. Back in 1981 the SDP launched itself as a centrist party wanting to “break the mould” of British politics. The mould bent but didn’t break. Within nine years, most of the SDP was subsumed into the Lib Dems, and the rest were beaten in a by-election by the Raving Loonies.
One reason why the mould didn’t break is path dependency. Political parties are powerful brands that have been built up over decades. This loyalty doesn’t only attract millions of voters. It means that members stick with the party through thick and thin, even if they profoundly disagree with their policies and leaders. This gives them a resilience that a new centrist party won’t have. It also gives them an army of unpaid labour willing to deliver leaflets, get out the vote and speak up for the party in pubs and workplaces. Parties need bodies as well as heads.
Secondly, successful parties (unless perhaps they are nationalist ones) need some kind of class base and – given our electoral system – a geographically concentrated one at that. What would be the base of Radicals UK?
The party’s promises to be pro-EU and comfortable with both immigration and new technology suggests the obvious base would be younger metropolitan types who voted Remain. Many of these, though, are Corbynistas – attracted to Labour by its (apparent?) offer to end austerity, tax the ultra-rich and solve the housing crisis. What can Radicals UK do to prise them away?
A few weeks back, Jeremy made some suggestions. Whilst many strike me as reasonable (such as shifting taxes from income to land and inheritances) only one speaks to Corbynistas’ main concerns – the promise to build more houses. But I suspect that Labour could match that. Sure, it could mobilize discontent with Corbyn’s lack of support for EU membership. But grudges fade whilst interests do not. Corbyn’s huge appeal to the young declasse "middle-class" elements is founded on these interests. That gives Labour a class base that centrism will lack.
Yes, Radicals UK might appeal to less regressive elements of capital: firms wanting free migration and an open society. But there aren’t many votes in this.
All of which suggests to me an analogy. We already have a political party comprising decent people with reasonable policies and which speaks for around half the country: the Women’s Equality Party. And yet it is a nugatory electoral force. Why should Radicals UK be different?
«But grudges fade whilst interests do not. Corbyn’s huge appeal to the young declasse "middle-class" elements is founded on these interests. That gives Labour a class base that centrism will lack.»
Very much agreed and also, as our blogger noted, a geographic base that is needed in FPTP.
The main and overlapping divides in english politics are between renters and landowners, and between servants/workers and masters/rentiers, and the Labour and Conservative parties cover them already.
The "Radicals UK" may want to be the party of the mandelsonian “aspirational voters who shop at John Lewis and Waitrose”, but they are not many, and while they are usually both landowners and workers at the same time, straddling the Labour/Conservative divide, they either vote Conservative when they feel more landowners than workers, or viceversa.
So overall I think I agree with our blogger. But I think that he might have mentioned two additional points:
* Sometimes new parties do reach tipping points, like the SNP in Scotland, which is in part a bit like "Radicals UK".
* "Radicals UK" seems an obvious punt to replicate the success of Macron's new party in France, of not that of the SNP in Scotland.
But his arguments I think stand because english politics and voting system are very different from those of Scotland and France.
Posted by: Blissex | October 20, 2017 at 02:51 PM
The Labour party was once a new party. It used to get the blame for splitting the anti-tory vote.
Posted by: Daniel | October 20, 2017 at 06:25 PM
Radical Suk. The URL tells the truth.
Posted by: efcdons | October 20, 2017 at 08:19 PM
Blissex labours under the misconception that the SNP is a new party.
The SNP is not a new party. It was founded in 1934 (following the merger of two other parties) and it was not until the 1970s it made an electoral mark. However it was wiped out in 1979 and continued its decline in the 1980s. The SNP's fortunes only changed in the mid 2000s.
If anything, the SNP illustrates Chris's point that it takes decades to build up a party brand(and there will be plenty of bumps along the way.)
Posted by: Yusuf Olow | October 21, 2017 at 12:11 PM
If 42% of women voters are correctly recorded in exit polls as voting from Trump, it is hard to see how women can be regarded as an sort of coherent political grouping. It puzzles me how anyone could have voted for Trump but I am astonished that so many women could bring themselves to do so.
This presupposes women in Britain are similar to women in the USA but my working assumption is that people are pretty similar everywhere.
Posted by: Lindsay Berge | October 21, 2017 at 12:48 PM
«The SNP is not a new party. It was founded in 1934»
It is a technicality, for all practical purposes it is a new party that took over the shell of a previous party (which until 1974 did not have members in parliament or council members according to Wikipedia).
As to technicalities, the SNP of old was the adversary of the Unionist party, and the latter "absorbed" the Conservatives sometimes in the 60s IIRC, so in theory the Conservative and Unionist party today is the same party today as the one founded in 1912 too :-).
Posted by: Blissex | October 21, 2017 at 11:08 PM
Pointing out that a party founded in 1934 is not a new party is a 'technicality?'. I dont think arguments that require ignoring the dictionary are wise.
Practical purposes? Practical in that ignoring the party's actual age is required to include them in your argument.
Nobody traces a party's founding to the date it got members elected (and 40 odd years is hardly young anyway)In any case you are wrong about when the SNP had elected representatives. The first SNP MP elected to Westminster was in 1945 (Robert MacIntyre in Motherwell in a by-election) and Winnie Ewing was elected in 1967 in Hamilton- also in a byelection. The SNP has had continued representation at Westminster since 1967. Until the 1970s the party lacked the cash to contest every seat and every election.
As to your reference to 'the SNP of old'-so not a new party then- this is just bizarre. You now seem to be defining the SNP's age based on who their adversary is.
Yes the SNP has changed a lot in its 83 year history-which makes them no different to any other longstanding political party
Posted by: Yusuf Olow | October 22, 2017 at 01:50 PM
The problem with these centrist is that they’ve given up they ability to think to appear ‘fair and balanced’.
Posted by: Oakchair | October 22, 2017 at 07:39 PM