Goldilocks, Labour and the Liberal Democrats

If you are a Labour supporter just now you are entitled to feel pretty depressed. Not as bad as a Liberal Democrat, true, but you might be forgiven for fearing that Labour is unlikely to be re-elected for a generation. Labour people are asking themselves, as they always do after a bad defeat, whether the party lost because it was too left wing or because it was not left wing enough. Such a debate completely destroyed the party in the 1980s and early 90s, until John Smith and Tony Blair cam riding over the horizon. I think this may now be an outdated question. The problem for Labour cannot be put in such simple terms. The truth is that in Scotland Labour was not left wing enough, while in much of England it was too left wing. In London, and the big cities, on the other hand, it seemed to get it just about right. It was a kind of Goldilocks scenario. The trouble is , while it was just right in some places, it was certainly not in others. So, if Labour were to move to a centrist position, it may well retain much of its support in the cities and large Northern towns, but it will lose Scotland for the foreseeable future and will not make much impact in most of England. So why so little impact in England? One part of the answer is that the centre-left anti-Conservative vote is divided between three parties, Labour, Liberal Democrat and Green. By now you should be beginning to see where this is leading. There simply seems no point in having BOTH a Labour Party and a Liberal Democrat Party. Remember that one of the reasons the Social Democrat Party, a predecessor of the Liberal Democrats, came into existence in 1981 (it lasted until 1988 when the Liberals joined it) was because Labour had moved so far to the left. The centre ground was suddenly vacant. Now that Labour looks like moving back towards the centre, those aspects of the Liberal Democrats that date back to the old SDP days of the 80s become irrelevant. Look at the last set of party manifestos and there is precious little between that of Labour and that of the Liberal Democrats. OK the Lib Dems are a little more concerned about rights, democracy, decentralisation of power and constitutional reform than Labour, but on economic and social issues they look almost identical. Labour can’t win overall from the left. We all know that. I am suggesting it can’t win from the centre. So the case for a merger is compelling. Let’s call it the Social Democratic Labour Party. I know, I know, that name has been taken by the SDLP in Northern Ireland, but, come to think of it, they could join the new party (policies are very similar). If you are a Conservative, therefore, I think you have nothing to fear from Labour moving to the centre, unless the Lib Dems disappear altogether, that is (effectively the same as a merger). The prospect of a centre-left party competing against a centre-right party looks far more attractive for British democracy than the current fragmentation. We would also have less to fear from PR under this scenario, with two parties dominating, possibly forming stable coalitions with small parties. Don’t rule it out. A Labour –Lib Dem merger may, as Goldilocks once said, be just right