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Talking strategically for a moment, what does yesterday's vote mean for Labour and it's electoral position in 2024: you could argue it doesn't make a jot of difference because we are 4 years out, but these things do make some difference even if it is in the immediacy. ...
... Voting against the Internal Market Bill has repercussions and will likely be a success in Scotland where even some of the most ardent unionists are in favour of devolution. The nationalist press north of the border will no doubt take aim at...
...Scottish conservatives for voting in favour of IMB and this only stands to benefit Labour who need to beat them into 2nd place in Holyrood minimum this spring. Longer term it allows Labour to position themselves as preservers of the union and guardians of devolution,
...a position that may attract soft nationalists and devo-sympathetic unionists, this is a similar situation in Wales where the Welsh Labour government are performing well in the face of Covid and it reflects in the polling...
...turning the minority government into a majority one is surely not out of reach if it maintains a stance of defending the union and devolution. As far as London and other metropolitan areas are concerned Labours position on IMB will be welcome. Not only are the places...
...remain leaning and soft brexit supporting but they also dislike the cultural and social stances Johnson takes up, meaning that very little change will happen in these places come 2024 (in fact Labour may even make further gains in these areas). ...
... The big question however is the red wall (the north and the Midlands). These areas are heavily brexit supporting, heavily patriotic and may well lean with Johnson on his defending the UK from a foreign power rhetoric. This is similar to the position Johnson took in...
... December so it's not far fetched to imagine it being successful now. Labour's saving grace in these areas may be two-fold. 1) Labour now has an opportunity to present itself as the party of law and order in defence of the rule of law whilst also demeaning...
... the Conservatives for abandoning their own position on the rule of law and law of order in a similar way to what conservatives did to labour over the past 5 years ("what happened to the once great Labour party?" can become "what happened to the Tory party of...
... Disraeli and Churchill?"). 2) the governments failure on testing may well explode over the next month and if big enough will obscure the brexit debate behind a wall of covid, a topic Johnson consistently struggles to attack labour on and defend himself. If Labour...
... can present itself as the torch bearer of law and order, of Britain's reputation and it's traditions, this may well be a patriotic position that could counteract conservative attempts to dominate political discourse with another culture battle...
... in fact this will be an excellent test run to see if this sort of rhetoric from Labour can straddle the electoral divide which it has struggled to reconcile over the past 4 years. If Labour can manage the immediacy of the brexit debates...
... and change the subject over the next month to covid again then this will be a test for how far the party's strategic and communications ambitions have come along. If it can come out of this unscathed, then Starmer and Labour may well be on to something.
