Labour must make sure its messages chime with voters like Harlow’s, argues Suzy Stride
Harlow is rightly known as a traditional bellwether seat, one that Labour has to win to achieve a working majority at the next election – the Ohio of British politics. But it does not quite fit the stereotype of a middle-class suburban swing seat. Instead, Harlow is a town that is resolutely hardworking and working class. There was a time that made it almost a safe Labour seat but from the late 1970s on political fortunes changed. Harlow followed the national story, staying Tory until 1997 when it became Labour before reverting back to the Tories in 2010.
To win the people of Harlow back we need politicians people can trust. My trade union, Unite, was key in supporting my candidacy, and our general secretary Len McCluskey is right to want more working-class people as Labour candidates. People are more likely to vote for candidates that look and sound like them, understand the issues they face, people whose politics have been formed serving their communities, as teachers, nurses, youth workers. The things I have seen as I have grown up, from my mum having to do night shifts stacking shelves to working among at-risk young people from some of the poorest estates in the country, and the inequality that these reflect, are what made me passionate to fight injustice. I think voters want this kind of authenticity.
We also need the right policy and as someone who works with vulnerable young people I know the importance of the benefits system and the lifeline that it is. However, we also need to be the party which addresses the issue of those who abuse the system at the expense of the most vulnerable; we must make sure work pays. We need to ensure that we tackle the issues of the working poor and ensure that people are paid a fair wage. And we must show that the Tories are not only putting people out of work but also creating a bigger benefits bill.
Immigration is a perennial doorstep issue and Ed Miliband is right to say that it is fundamentally about security – people feel that they are competing for jobs, homes and services, and too often employers are able to exploit vulnerable migrant workers to drive down wages. We need to show that we understand the fears that people face and even accept that we may have got it wrong in the past.
I spoke to the headteacher of a secondary school in Harlow recently who said that since the Tories got in families are suffering, parents of their pupils are losing their jobs, and are then losing their benefits. We need to show them that the Labour party is on their side, fighting their corner and acting as their voice; that we will build the homes and jobs that are so crucial to the people of Harlow and restore their hope for their community and for their country; that we can be the agent of change they need.
We need clear dividing lines that show them the parties are not the same – not just to dispel the lie that the deficit was our fault and to expose the Tories’ mismanagement of the economy, but to explain what we would do differently as the next government. We must show that our alternative to austerity is investment in people like them and places like this. If we can do that, then we can win Harlow – and win for Britain.
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Suzy Stride is Labour PPC for Harlow
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Well, sort of.
In the 1990s, we held all but a couple of seats on the Council, and the reason we lost the Council was also mixed up in the state of the local party at the time, AS WELL AS national, and perhaps some regional issues. How else to explain the fact that not 20 miles away, in a town more or less identical to Harlow, Stevenage’s Conservatives have never risen above 30% of the council’s Members ?
In 1998, Harlow Council was
Labour 38
Liberal Democrat 3
Conservative 1
and in Stevenage
Labour 37
Liberal Democrat 2
10 years later in 2008
Harlow Council was
Conservative 18
Liberal Democrat 8
Labour 6
Stevenage, however
Labour 30
Conservative 5
Liberal Democrat 3
United Kingdom Independence Party 1
Remember, these are both mainly London commuter belt people, with an admixture of skilled and semi-skilled white and blue collar workers, archetypical white van men and their spouses/partners. If we agree Labour was at the nadir of it’s popularity, then Stevenage should have been equally affected. Something is different between the two towns, and it’s not the population or the demography. It’s worth noting that Labour ran Harlow uninterrupted from 1973-2002, so if it really was the bellwether seat Ms Stride thinks it is, why didn’t the Tories take power when Thatcherism was at the height of its popularity ?
I wholeheartedly agree that “People are more likely to vote for candidates that look and sound like them, understand the issues they face” – it does make me wonder why Progress support and indeed promote candidates external to areas they grew up in, being selected, rather than homegrown opposition. Could it be that Progress support local candidates, so long as they are sufficiently centrist enough not to scare the horses of the party centre ?
The Frank Fields of this world will have you believe that the country is crawling with (and I quote) ” those who abuse the system at the expense of the most vulnerable” – they do exist, but are dwarfed by corporate tax avoiders. If companies like Amazon or Starbucks actually paid the taxes they are due, it would dwarf the ‘abuse’ that the redtops and the Daily Mail constantly carp on about.
But sadly, I assume that this is not about the reality or morality involved, but more about gaining the support of the tiny core of people who decide elections. The truth is different, but the Express and the Mail – whose support Labour desires, would prefer to spend their time demonising the unemployed, the single mothers, and indeed, “Chav” culture.
As regards immigration, I (on the left of the party) would also welcome a debate, but have seen precious little detail in Progress (or indeed any of the centre right groups) proposals for it. The main obsession with immigration is around A10 nationals. The only way we will stop A10 nationals coming to the UK is to pull out of the EU, not something I or indeed anyone on the left propose. What we do need to look at are firms hiring A10 nationals in preference to Britons before they’ve even left their country. Uncontrolled, it becomes a race to the bottom, a dutch auction of terms and conditions where the only people who lose out are the local workers.
We do need to have a clear demarcation between what happens now, what happened under New Labour (and we did not get it all right) and what we are proposing,
Backing Frank Field’s harebrained schemes on social health and unemployment insurance, Purple Book backers of academies and selective education, and more sucking up to big businesses is not going to do it.
Oh irony of sweet ironies – Suzy says “People are more likely to vote for candidates that look and sound like them…people whose politics have been formed serving their communities, as teachers, nurses, youth workers” – and does she herself come from Harlow or has been active there ? Er, no, not quite. Tower Hamlets, quite some distance away.
But the deficit was Labour’s fault – if it had adopted a more prudent approach, like Germany or Canada, and saved some money instead of spending everything, and more through borrowing, we would not be in the situation we are now, and Labour would still be in power.
Labour’s alternative to austerity is to invest in people and places – spending money we do not have to artificially create jobs. Anyone with any understanding of economics realises that although this may work in the short term, it basically postpones the issue and makes things a whole lot worse in the long run (rather like taking a pay cheque loan). Labour seems to think to it can hoodwink the electorate into believing they have a pain-free solution to its years of carefree spending!