Monday 2nd November
There’s trouble for the new
Labour leader.
No, not that one. The other one.
I’m referring to Kezia Dugdale,
Labour’s Queen Beyond the Wall, who today is dealing with the irony that,
having successfully campaigned for Scottish Labour to have greater independence
from the national party, Scottish Labour is now, in return, trying to get
greater independence from her.
It all boiled down to a vote at conference
on the thermonuclear thorn in Labour’s side, Trident. Ms Dugdale had urged
caution, arguing for disarmament on a multilateral rather than unilateral
basis. However, Scottish Labour voted overwhelmingly for the abolition of
Trident, which now means that the Labour Party’s leader in Scotland has a
different position from her party, which has the same position as the national
leader, who has a different position from a large amount of his parliamentary
party, all of whom are waiting on the national party who, as it stands, has no
position at all.
Confused? Well, welcome to the
contemporary Labour movement. And we haven’t even mentioned the divides in the
unions, though their internal debate is easier to explain. It goes like this:
Union Member #1: Having a nuclear
deterrent is a commitment to having the capability to obliterate entire cities
and wiping out millions of people. That’s morally reprehensible.
Union Member #2: Yes. I agree.
But… jobs?
Union Member #1: We’re talking
about nuclear holocaust.
Union Member #2: Yes, which
probably won’t happen. So, my question is: jobs?
Union Member #1: Dead people!
Union Member #2: Yes, yes, yes.
But… jobs?
It’s the classic dilemma of the
left. There is a policy which seems to be utterly morally reprehensible when we
all want to join arms and sing the Red Flag, but if we were to change it we
would cause sizeable unemployment for hard-working people on the lower end of the
pay scale. It’s very much a lose-lose, and that’s before we talk in detail
about whether the deterrent works or not.
Perhaps this is why Labour is
outsourcing decision making to the ordinary members. It just seems like a lot
of hard work.
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