Knocking on doors for Labour for more than 100 hours in London, Bedford and Milton Keynes showed me the stark difference in voters’ attitudes by age. Among a section of older, white voters in both more and less affluent areas, I saw a visceral hatred of Jeremy Corbyn, and sometimes Diane Abbott. The key charge against Corbyn is that he fundamentally believes British lives are of equal value to the lives of others. Pandering to so-called legitimate concerns will fail, as it always does for Labour, but so will labelling large chunks of the electorate racist. With five years in the wilderness at the national level, Labour may have to explore the potential of municipal socialism, as pioneered in Preston and seen in Barcelona.

Source: The Guardian December 21, 2019 09:56 UTC