What is going on with Labour, Brexit and the second referendum? In recent elections the party lost many more votes to the Greens and Liberal Democrats than to the Brexit party, through paying the price for Jeremy Corbyn’s Euroscepticism and fence-sitting. The argument is that Labour should ditch a sentimental attachment to the notion of a working class based in traditional heartlands; one that electorally offers diminishing returns. Second, the working class is described as being destroyed through automation, leading to an embrace of “post-workerism” and a backing of universal basic income. While future prosperity will be driven by the production of knowledge and intangible assets, the working class, old Labour and the foundations of leftwing thinking are disintegrating.

Source: The Guardian June 26, 2019 05:00 UTC