Now that the dust is settling on the rather tumultuous events of the 2014 General Election – Labour’s worst performance in 92 years – and with the resignation – well sort of – of David Cunliffe, the Labour Party is now going through an official review.
But how fundamental this will be is very much open to question. What is really needed is a fundamental reappraisal of just what ‘Labour’ means and what the party stands for. Also needing serious thought is the relationship between Labour and its proposed coalition partner – the Greens. If it wasn’t clear earlier, the two parties are now actually rivals. At least two key electorate seats were lost to Labour eg Nikki Kaye’s Auckland Central and Peter Dunne’s Ohariu because of vote-splitting with the Greens (albeit Labour’s triumph in Napier was due to vote splitting between Conservatives and National – a rare tactical error by the right). The Greens despite their usual upbeat pronouncements can take no comfort from this election either. They need a fundamental reappraisal themselves. Ironically MMP is not working for the centre-left. The National propaganda theme of the hapless red and green characters floundering around in a rowboat – all at sea – was not too far off the truth.
But of even more fundamental concern should be the remarkable, indeed shocking, phenomenon of voters in traditional Labour seats giving their party vote to National.
In my opinion there were two main reasons for this – and both reasons reflect profoundly on what is the present-day Labour Party. While Labour long ago dropped any reference to the politically radical goal of socialism and indeed since 1984 has become a party of neo-liberal capitalism, (albeit of a somewhat softened version in recent years), interestingly it is openly radical on questions of social liberalism – radical but always within the bounds of and never challenging capitalism. It would be a mistake to identify this social liberal zealotry as being ‘left’. Issues raised by Gay marriage, ‘man bans’, third genders on passports, and gay adoption, etc., while apparently of passionate interest to the party insiders, do not sit well with the working people that Labour professes to represent, nor with the ethnic immigrant communities Labour fondly imagined (until the election anyway) were permanently loyal to it. Some defection to NZ First would be expected in these circumstances – but to National?
Another reason why core Labour voters voted National, in my opinion is so obvious that I fear it probably doesn’t even register with Labour’s policy makers. Labour’s policy of retrenching national superannuation entitlements from age 65 to 67, was a direct attack on the social entitlement of working people – what used to be called social security. Labour’s leaders in promoting this policy obviously hoped to score ‘brownie-points’ with Treasury and the business-financial establishment. A signal that Labour was still ‘sound’ and could be still relied on to take the ‘tough’ economic decisions (at the expense of its own people, just like its Rogernome predecessors). How the trade union leadership allowed this policy to get through is bewildering. But then again, it asks searching questions about present-day trade union officialdom as well. There are notable exceptions of course but it seems that much of the politicised trade union leadership is dominated by the same sort of people as the party officials – sedentary ‘middle class’ tertiary graduates. There is an impression from ordinary workers that many of their trade union officials are more interested in a career in parliament than working for the members. That for many ambitious and politically correct university graduates with connections, an office job in the union is just a step along the way to a parliamentary office and then the party list. Plainly, most Labour MPs and officials, have very little meaningful contact with manual workers. The people who work on the roads in all weathers, on building sites, cleaning offices and factories at night and driving heavy trucks. These people tend to be physically worn out by the time they reach the age of 65. Work for them is bloody hard. Labour’s policy makers obviously don’t understand that fact. For them in contrast ‘work’ (the constant round of meetings, the office, travel, conferences) is stimulating if not addictive.
Though many workers may not have university degrees they are not mugs. John Key to his credit held out against all sort of pressure from the usual interests (and no doubt his own caucus) to roll back superannuation. Key’s determination was not only vindicated – but proved to be a political masterstroke. It is the thousands of party votes netted from Labour voters that will enable National to govern in its own right. This is unprecedented under MMP and a personal triumph for Key.
Meanwhile life is not getting easier for the average person in the street – national and world conditions (economic, social and environmental) over the past thirty years appear to be deteriorating. There is growing wealth disparity. As the historian Frank McLynn observed:
‘It is a perennial peculiarity…to object to inequalities of race, sex, title, distinction, and even intellect but remaining blithely untroubled about the most important form of inequality; the economic.’
There is not a great deal of optimism that things can change – and underneath a great deal of fear and frustration. Given this situation there are plenty of things the Labour Party can do to renew itself and make itself relevant to the New Zealand people. But, unless the current party review is more thoroughgoing than one would imagine – I don’t hold out great hope.
The difference between 1922 and 2014 is back then Labour was a party of outsiders on the way up, motivated by a transcendent vision of a bold new world, authentic and with deep roots within the community and the labour movement. Labour may not have had the best result in 1922 but it was poised to overtake the previous reforming party, the Liberals. Unless there is a fundamental change, sadly I fear, the Labour Party in the 21st century will continue its slow decline, much as the Liberals did in the 1920s.
An excellent post Mike. Thanks.
A couple of ‘matters arising’:
1/ You said: “That for many ambitious and politically correct university graduates with connections, an office job in the union is just a step along the way to a parliamentary office and then the party list”
Hey, you just described Andy perfectly 🙂
2/ On the subject of retirement age: This is a transient thing. No longer do ditch digger wield a shovel – they sit in a cab. (They are also likely directors in their own company, but that’s another issue for another day) We are seeing the last of the truly manual labourers heading into retirement now, and future generations will be just as sedentary as you and I. Meanwhile I suspect most of the ill health experienced in old age by the ‘working class’ today is self inflicted. Alcohol, and tobacco being the main culprits.
If you think there are no physically taxing jobs out there now you need to get out more.
I’ve got friends who are only in their 40s who are struggling with their bodies because of their jobs – and in modern times there is the added pressure that we all expect to work more efficiently and get more done in a day than previous generations. This translates to working faster and having less rest – and don’t even get me started on the exposure to chemicals the people have to put up with these days.
Try reading my post more carefully Aaron.
Did I say there were no physically taxing jobs? Clearly not. I would cite farmers, forestry and meat workers as still having physically hard jobs.
But these too will transition as automation progresses.
You forgot worm farmers Andrewo.
I have a worm farm myself.
Great for the garden but VERY RISKY:
I have to be careful of skin infections and dust inhalation when handling the compost….
🙂
There are still plenty of manual jobs after all buildings for starters are not built by machines and need substantial manual labour to build them .
Just re read and it is still there!
“We are seeing the last of the truly manual labourers heading into retirement now, …”
This week. But there are already plans to automate much of it.
and when did you last see a hammer on a building site?
I look around my friends .. cleaners, demolition workers, nurses, nurse aides , care-givers ( you try wrestling someone twice your size into a shower, onto a toilet, in and out of a bath ) fire fighters, road workers, arborists, builders, plumbers ..i know TEACHERS who are worked so hard they’re burned out at 50.
You must be blind, Andrew. I gave up reading the rest of your garbage.
Yep, no one holding a shovel here, Andrew; http://static2.stuff.co.nz/1347931077/072/7696072.jpg
or here, http://strongerchristchurch.govt.nz/sites/strongerchristchurch.govt.nz/files/u18/trench-digging-450.jpg
And this road worker is obviously holding a well-disguised golf-iron; http://www.careers.govt.nz/assets/jobs/roading-construction-worker/_resampled/SetWidth220-nathan-tupe-roading-construiction-worker2.jpg
They’re not ditch digging.
You’re so long out of the workforce you don’t even know what you’re looking at anymore.
agree with pretty much all you have said…unions..decline..neoliberal..etc..
..tho’ i note you have avoided the ‘c’-word – corbyn..and any policy prescriptions..?
but i wd factcheck this one:..’ (albeit Labour’s triumph in Napier was due to vote splitting between Conservatives and National – a rare tactical error by the right)’
using garth mcvicar (!) to split the right vote and thus allow nash to come thru the middle in an ostensibly safe tory seat..was no ‘tactical error by the right’..
..it was done to get their man..the rightwinger nash..into parliament..it was quite deliberate.
..a rightwing trojan-horse in labour..as it were..
..and in a few (verifiable)-facts..it must be remembered that not only did a rightwinger buy his campaign-tool fire-engine for him..and finance his campaign..
..a group of rightwing business-people/friends of nash clubbed together to pay nash a monthly salary in the 12 months before the ’14 election..
..nash is ‘their man’..that much is clear..
..and when they hear talk of nash being posited as a future-leader of labour..how they must rub their hands together in glee..eh..?..their dastardly-‘plan’ is working..
..nash is so rightwing/neoliberal..i swear his aura has a blue-tinge to it..
..and his ascension to that seat is purely down to rightwing forces working in his favour..
Right wing crap, sorry Mike,
You must be one.
Your comments;
“Neo-liberal idealism, heaped on by layers of Dear Leader he’s o/k nothing to see here.
Are you sending this dung as a diversion when Key is overseas signing our life away with TPPA while the agreement is secret and you have yet to see it???
I didn’t see one bad mention of John Key secrecy, or compulsive lies that suddenly disappeared with a wisp of smoke.
I don’t want to you all as tenants in your own land” a liar he is and you never mentioned it or did he at election time last election did he when the Lockinvar estate sale was still smelling out the corridors of power?
I’d rather go to other blog subjects than navigate you Tories.
“But of even more fundamental concern should be the remarkable, indeed shocking, phenomenon of voters in traditional Labour seats giving their party vote to National.” and “Some defection to NZ First would be expected in these circumstances – but to National?”
Yes it should be of concern … and yet hardly a soul batted an eye. Not only that but gay issues and retirement age don’t quite cut it. You will need to cover “Dirty Politics” coupled with corporate money and it’s now juggernaut propaganda machine, and the integrity of the ballot count to fullt answer that.
However it’s all a hazy image in the rear view mirror and rapidly disappearing. The elements ensuring a one party state are fixed in place. So lets just see where this new epoch leads us huh? … then I look forward to another analysis with no expectations whatsoever.
The Left need a candidate they can vote for in the Auckland Mayoral election.
And not an unreformed neo-liberal Rogergnome hailing from the millionaire suburbs of Clevedon.
After having been knifed by his own caucus and with his parliamentary career effectively over, with loads of talent and charisma and a powerful and loyal electorate machine in West Auckland. And with time on his hands….
I would have thought that David Cunliffe would have been the Left’s natural candidate of choice to replace the badly damaged Len Brown.
As Mike Lee alludes to here, David Cunliffe despite his undoubted talent and the contribution he could make to reinvigorating the Mayoral office, is persona non grata and considered far too Left inside Labour Party inner circles.
Obviously the ABC mandarins inside the Labour Party could not allow David Cunliffe any position of influence and prefer one of their own as Mayor.
Even if their candidate is a colorless grey suited inner party apparatchik who only owes his position in parliament by been given one of Labour’s safest seats, a Labour safe seat which he even managed to lose once, in the ’90s because of his fealty to the Rogergnomes, and who, should have departed Labour with them, to the ACT Party. A candidate who if he ever has to front up on his own, will more than likely hand the Mayoralty to the Right after a colorless uninspiring campaign lacking in any grand vision or principles.
This leaves the position of Left Mayoral candidate wide open.
With this foray into the debate over the soul of the Labour Party and the Left, is Mike Lee is testing the waters?
What sort of response is he getting to this article behind closed doors?
Are the knives being drawn or sheaved?
the pre ’84 Labour Party was class collaborationist enough as a straight forward social democratic party, which does not negate the great reforms it instituted during the time from 1935 to 1974
however since the mid 80s it was gutted of any class struggle oriented element (that formed New Labour and the Alliance) and that is why it has drifted further rightward and remains as a parliamentary only focused party like the rest apart from Mana and small elements of Greens and Māori
Labour will not change until there is greater public participation again in political and civic affairs, and there will not be greater participation while neo liberal thought rules, so there is a bit of a ‘Catch 22” as an old term goes
As for the Auckland Mayoralty, a “Minto for Mayor” type candidate is needed standing on free public transport, a living wage city and ending the over $100,000 salaries and sitting the CCOs on their arses, Goff or any other Labour candidate is highly unlikely to endorse any of those so we need someone who will and campaign hard, a straight message like that might attract the young and a few non voters
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