British political realignment goes beyond a few splitters

The ‘sensible centre’ holds little appeal as a divided nation approaches the Brexit deadline.

The 11 members of The Independent Group pose for a group photo on Wednesday. Picture: AP

Warmed-over Blairism has no ­future in Britain, which is why the 11 “splitters” (eight Labour, three Conservative) forming the Independent Group (aka the Tiggers) are refusing to adhere to convention and contest by-elections in the constituencies they hold. All see themselves as members of the “sensible centre”. All are ardent supporters of the risibly named People’s Vote campaign for a second referendum. Perhaps for this reason, splitter number 12, ex-Labour MP Ian Austin, refused to join. And all evince an astonishing tin ear when it comes to hearing the mood of the country. Who voted in the 2016 referendum, one wonders. Orcs? Elves?

They may, indeed, form a new political party, but the likelihood of it mimicking the success of Australia’s Democratic Labor Party or Britain’s Social Democratic Party is remote. This is not because they don’t represent real fissures in the UK’s body politic but because of Britain’s anachronistic first-past-the-post electoral system.

If they went to the polls, six of the nine Labour defectors — sitting on huge majorities as they are — would lose their seats as voters endorsed the rosette and not the individual. The other two hard-core “Remainiacs” in heavily Leave seats — are vulnerable to a Leave-supporting Conservative or (more likely) a Labour “lexiteer” — a Leave-supporting, Jeremy Corbyn-aligned socialist. Austin, meanwhile, has a chance of retaining his heavily Leave seat precisely because he hasn’t thrown his lot in with the Tiggers.

As for the three Conservative defectors, two are in safe but Leave seats and would be toast at the hands of a pro-Leave Tory. The other — in a safe (albeit Remain) Conservative seat — like her ­Labour confreres, would find ­voters prefer the rosette.

Were it not for the first-past-the-post system, the extent to which these 11 individuals are ­indicative of a broader political ­realignment — which the 2016 referendum exposed — would be much clearer. The British electorate is more right-wing and more left-wing than is widely realised. Large majorities support Tory policies on restricting immigration and funding defence while being ­socially conservative on the newest rights campaign — transgender issues. “Corbynomics”, meanwhile — renationalising rail, putting workers on company boards, raising tax on corporations and redistribution “from the few to the many” — is widely popular. A political party that combined ­national populism with Corbynomics would make bank.

That they split from their parties over something more than the People’s Vote campaign for a second referendum is indicated by the deep unhappiness among supporters of that campaign. Senior members pleaded with departing Labour MP Chuka Umunna not to set up a breakaway group before Brexit had been settled one way or another. They did not want the People’s Vote group to be viewed as a de facto new party because it would breed suspicion among those Labour Party members who are more pro-EU than Corbyn. The plan was always to fight for a second referendum from within Labour. Umunna may also be the least charismatic man ever.

Now the splitters have gone over the top it’s become clear that in Blighty referendums are like mushrooms: all are edible but some only once. It’s hard to argue for a second referendum while being unwilling to submit oneself to the rigours of a by-election, a point made by people across the spectrum, and by both Remainers and Leavers, from the youthful, Corbyn-supporting socialist group Momentum to Mark Wallace, ­editor of in-house website ConservativeHome.

During the past 12 months — thanks to a series of parliamentary votes — four increasingly coherent factions have emerged of which the splitters are emblematic. There are those MPs still willing to follow either the Con­servative or Labour whip, then there is a large group of Europhiles, and finally a large group of Eurosceptics. As the number of government defeats on Brexit (now 10) reveals, the latter two groups combined are, fairly regularly, able to defeat the government. Crucially, although all these votes concern Brexit, the specific issues are signifiers for more profound divides around what can best be described as “identity ­issues” or “cosmopolitanism versus nationalism”.

If parliament did reflect the country and we had an electoral system something like that in Australia’s Senate, there would be four parties: one for Remain; one for Remain with conditions; one for Leave; and one for Leave with a withdrawal agreement. Piled on top of a developing electoral ­realign­ment is the reality that People’s Vote and Leave Means Leave are political parties in embryo with a campaigning base already in place (even if People’s Vote prefers this not to be the case).

Such internal acrimony explains the dreadful contretemps over anti-Semitism within Labour. Depart­ing Labour MP Luciana Berger, who is Jewish, has been deluged with vile abuse and has at times been physically unsafe (she required security at Labour’s ­annual conference). In what is some of the most appalling abuse I’ve ever seen, ardent Corbynistas have introduced a new and nasty epithet to the political argot: “Zio”.

While some of the viciousness has its origin in endless, tedious disputes over Israel-Palestine — and I don’t blame you if mentioning that makes you feel like you’re losing the will to live — much of it emerged out of the catastrophic failure of the Iraq adventure, on which Corbyn and his Stop the War coalition were proven correct. This hard-won moral authority is something Corbyn’s allies have turned powerfully to their advantage. It’s not just jokes about Tony Blair being an unflushable turd in the pay of sundry Middle Eastern dictatorships. Simply put, support for the Iraq war is now routinely tied to Jewish ethnicity among a number of Labour members, and it’s but a short hop from there to bonkers conspiracies about Israel using British Jews to “buy” the party and make Labour a vehicle for its interests.

There is also a serious case to be made that Corbyn is transforming Labour into “a party of the street”, much as Tommy Robinson has done with UKIP. The phrase is Nigel Farage’s, and it’s the main reason he quit the organisation he once led.

Farage always wanted UKIP to be a parliamentary party that contested elections at every level of government. Michael Foot, the opposition leader Margaret Thatcher trounced in 1983, had the same view when it came to Labour. Foot may have been on the hard Left, but he was a great parliamentarian and did his best to ensure his party was always committed to “the parliamentary road”. For Australians familiar with Labor history, Momentum’s willingness to operate outside parliament bears a striking similarity to the situation Ben Chifley confronted with communists in the trade unions, which in the end contributed to the 1955 Labor split.

However, this abjuring of parliament by individuals on Left and Right has not occurred in a vacuum. Survey after survey shows a large majority of Brits agree with the statement “parliament does not represent or listen to people like me”. Political historian Stephen Davies observes one of the worst things about staying in the EU is that its rules on trade, freedom of movement and state aid make both socialism and national populism politically impossible. “It’s not healthy,” he points out, “in a democratic society when the views and feelings of a large part of the electorate do not find expression.” It’s unsurprising people are casting about for alternatives.

The presence of a new “street politics” is why the 11 splitters have drawn so much hostility. No matter how much the departing Conservative MP Anna Soubry may argue otherwise, it’s simply not a centrist position to stop Brexit.

As is so often the case, the centre ground has shifted. “Centrism” on Brexit is actually the policy of ­Labour and the Tories: a withdrawal agreement leading to negotiation to keep trade as unobstructed as possible. The Independent Group is thus a Remainer bloc and as extreme as Momentum’s socialists or Jacob Rees-Mogg’s European Research Group. It’s vital to keep this in one’s head at the same time as evincing sympathy for those individuals — and particularly Berger — who have been badly treated.

I do feel sorry for Labour and Tory moderates pincered by the forces Brexit has unleashed. I also know many of them really do think working-class northerners only voted Leave thanks to living in constituencies where seagulls fly upside down because there’s nothing worth shitting on.

In that sense, Brexit was a catalyst for the realignment now under way. As in chemistry, it speeded up the reaction without itself being consumed by it: immigration and social cohesion have been issues for ages. “The question now is not so much that of social conservatism versus social liberalism,” Davies argues. “Instead the key issue is that of identity, and in particular the tension between globalism and cosmopolitanism on one hand and nationalism and ethnic or cultural particularism on the other.”

The splitters are trying to do an Emmanuel Macron, combining an atmosphere of insurgency with a conventionally Blairite program. However, in France that really was new. It helped Macron get elected, though his popularity is faltering now. Blair-Cameron identikit politicians with technocratic policies have governed Britain for decades. No one is buying the idea that Umunna and Soubry represent a “new style of politics”.

The next significant moment is this coming week, when parliament votes on more Brexit amend­ments. Theresa May needs to stop with the cakeism — vouloir le beurre, l’argent du beurre et le cul de la cremiere (“wanting the butter, money from the butter, and the milkmaid’s arse”). Corbyn also needs to stop being pro-Leave in the north and pro-Remain in the south and say what he thinks.

Mind you, if you’re into politics, this is like Christmas morning — if you ignore the fact the country, our parliamentary democracy and everything we hold dear is about to be obliterated in a fiery cataclysm, of course.

Helen Dale won the Miles Franklin Award for her first novel, The Hand that Signed the Paper, and was senior adviser to senator David Leyonhjelm. Her most recent novel, Kingdom of the Wicked, has just been published. She lives in London.