Labour membership. The great lurching right show again
According to a report in the Observer Labour membership is currently at 366,604 down from 390,000 in January. These figures come from Labour HQ passed to a friendly journalist. The spin is that while some have left over Gaza and the scaling back of a green economy policy Labour is well ahead in the polls anyway, so, so what.
Membership stood at 532,000 in 2019 which was comfortably the highest of a social democratic party in Europe. Most have been in significant decline membership wise, even the German SPD which is in Government
The additional spin was those who had left were ‘far left’. The term is used loosely by Starmerites. It does not mean, unfortunately, those who have some familiarity with the ideas of Marx and Lenin. Rather it refers to those who have left-wing views on things like nationalisation and war.
The declining numbers matter though. Firstly members provide income, The cost of Labour membership is not high but when its aggregated into hundreds of thousands of subs its still significant. Hence the ever increasing number of e-mails in my in-box from Labour asking for money. Falling membership also means fewer people to go out on the doorstep. Labour can’t rely on most of the media at an Election even now, so conversations with voters remain important. They can be replaced by, for example, social media content to an extent but that requires money too.
It is a discussion of the moment but as ever there is a history
In 1992 under Kinnock Labour membership stood at 279,000. By the time of Blair’s victory in 1997 it was at a peak of 405,000. It represented at least in part a hope that some change was going to take place (as in fact it did).
One of those changes was the Iraq War in 2003. After this Labour membership went into sharp reverse. In 2004 it stood at 208,000 and by the time of the 2010 Election it was 197,000.
That might suggest that at 366,000 Starmer is not doing so badly. Yet as with Blair in 1997 the direction of travel should be up not down and Starmer isn’t even in No.10 yet
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