A New Party of the Left

More than half a million people have signed up to the call by Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana for a new left party. This is unprecedented and we should understand that this new development will reshape British politics in the months and years ahead.

What is driving this? Such a huge political development does not arise out of thin air. There has certainly been a desperate need for it: there has been no adequate political representation for the working class for decades, and the sharply rightward trajectory of the Labour Party has been responsible for many of the harshest attacks on the working class. That has now put Labour beyond the bounds of credibility for millions of working class and progressive voters. This has been evident for some time, but the building of a new party had been held back by objective factors: the reluctance of the Labour-affiliated unions to question their historic links with the party; and the restraining factor of the electoral system which has historically prevented new parties emerging. The former is now being challenged and the latter has now been broken by the extreme social and economic crises facing our people. These crises, brought about by decades of brutal anti-working class policies, including by the Labour Party, have created the conditions for a new party to emerge.

But the hammer blow to the Labour Party has been dealt by the mass movement that has arisen in response to the genocide-supporting policies of the Labour government since October 2023. The movement in support of Gaza and the Palestinian cause has been the catalyst which has broken down significant certainties in British politics. It enabled the election of independent MPs at the 2024 general election, on the basis of the demand of the No Ceasefire, No Vote movement – that no vote would be cast for candidates who had not supported a ceasefire in Gaza. Initially organised by the many former Labour councillors who resigned from the party, in protest and disgust at the leadership’s position, it gained significant support across society in the run-up to the general election. So the fault line in British politics, between the overwhelming majority of public opinion demanding an end to the genocide, and those that supported - through military, political and economic means - the enabling of that genocide, ran through the Labour Party.

For many people, it was Labour’s support for the genocide that finally ended the post-Corbyn period of ‘keeping your head down’ to try to stay in Labour. It also revealed that although Labour itself may be ‘post-Corbyn’, that is very far from the case in the wider movement – as has been clearly demonstrated by the response to the call for the new party.

By driving the most principled left MPs out of the Labour Party, together with councillors and activists who have resigned, and by doubling down on support for Israel, the Labour leadership has provided the impetus for the founding of the new party. Hundreds of thousands of young people have taken their first political steps, in their support for the Palestinian cause; many of those will want to widen their understanding of war, imperialism and injustice, and continue their engagement with active politics. We have already seen the political impact of this, with the popularity of the powerful and articulate voices of the next generation of political leaders, such as Rima Hassan in France, Zohran Mamdani in the United States, and Zarah Sultana and Leanne Mohamad here in Britain. There is no doubt that in the coming period millions of young people for whom this system offers no real future will be drawn into struggle against it. This new party can be their natural political home.

It will also be the home for the many hundreds of thousands who made the surge to Labour in 2015, in support of Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership bid. His campaign at that time acted as a significant pole of attraction to those open to supporting what were effectively radical left policies; support was drawn from many consciously seeking such policies, as well as from non-aligned individuals attracted to Jeremy Corbyn’s policies on a class, movement, or trade union basis. In effect, the anti-austerity and anti-capitalist sentiment that swept the radical left to power in parts of Europe at that time, found its expression in Britain, through support for Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour Party. It did not prove possible to defeat the establishment both within and outside the Labour Party, but support for his principles and policy programme have retained considerable popularity. Many of those previously engaged will provide a strong grounding for the new party, which will be unconstrained by the conservatism of the Labour machine.

So a mass party of the left will build on these foundations, creating and enabling an effective political force that can play a decisive role in the struggles in defence of the working class, and all those who have suffered from the attacks of this Labour government – and the governments before. Labour’s core programme and legislative focus is implementing austerity, authoritarianism and anti-migrant policies. Much is a continuation of Tory policy, but there has been a marked and transparent escalation on all fronts; this coming from a Labour government in which many had invested modest hope of positive change, has led millions of people who have always backed Labour to withdraw their support for it. Some have already walked in the direction of Reform but many just ceased to vote. This new party of the left gives people a viable dynamic alternative, active and vocal in the interests of the people, clearly breaking with elites and the rigged system which exploits and impoverishes the majority. Many will vote for this new party of the left and we have to make it a successful option.

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What is the situation that we face?

We are in a period of great danger in which barbarism has become a lived experience for so many. Its primary expression is the ongoing genocide in Gaza, which has been carried out with the full support of the Labour government. It has provided not only weaponry but logistical support. Keir Starmer and David Lammy, through their enabling and the political cover they provide, bear a large degree of responsibility for the genocide; not surprisingly, Zarah Sultana’s call for them to be tried for war crimes has widespread support.

The underlying cause for barbarism in all its current manifestations, is the crisis of the economic system which dominates our lives – capitalism – and the political structures which run alongside and support it. Capitalism has faced many crises and recovered, but it has now entered a qualitatively new phase. This crisis is all-encompassing: it manifests simultaneously and interactively in all areas – economic, political, social, ecological and ideological. In Britain, the economic crisis lays bare the deepening inequality in our society, with accompanying multiple manifestations in healthcare, work, housing and education. The historical limits of this system have been reached and it faces breakdown, unable to resolve this crisis within its own framework.

In terms of how this relates to our new party, we can recognise that the post-world war two economic structures that sustained this system are breaking up. The conditions which allowed for economic advancement for the working class within the system no longer exist. Popular support for the Labour Party was sustained by promising and often providing gradual reforms and improvements in living standards such as the creation of the NHS and a mass council house building programme. These were contained within the confines of capitalism, a system which the party never challenged but sought to work within. But the historic period in which Labour was able to persuade millions to support it, through the promise of such reforms has ended; the ability of governments to mitigate social and economic contradictions is nearing exhaustion. The attempts to manage the failures of the economic system - as Gordon Brown attempted to do in 2007/8 by bailing out the banks and injecting vast sums into the financial sector through so called ‘quantitative easing’ - were accompanied by austerity measures which only served to deepen the crisis and shift the burden onto working people.

Elsewhere in politics, the crisis is reflected in the global rise of the far right and the international drive to war led by imperialist states. There is an international arms race with Europe in the forefront, aiming to massively increase its military spending at the behest of US imperialism. Germany alone is planning to spend 650 billion euros, casting off its long standing limits and more than doubling its military spending by the end of this decade. Western politicians war-game their battle plans against China and Russia. NATO, which bears a good deal of responsibility for the ongoing war in Ukraine, continues to fuel that war, while increasing its military presence in the South China sea. There is increasing potential for escalation to nuclear-armed conflict, threatening the future of life on the planet.

In Britain, despite being elected only a year ago with a huge parliamentary majority, support for the Starmer government is being eroded at a breakneck pace. There is a loss of faith in the entire political system with both main parties suffering huge losses in membership. In the next four years there is every possibility of the far-right Reform, which now regularly leads the opinion polls by a significant margin, forming the government in Britain. The French presidential elections in two years’ time may well see a far-right leader elected.

We already know from Trump in the States and Meloni in Italy what that will mean for our society: for migrants, for black and Asian communities, for the rights of women and all our diverse communities, for human rights, workers’ rights, for the right to protest. We are already seeing this on our streets with the fascist-organised attacks on migrant hostels; but it hasn’t taken a Reform government to create the conditions for these attacks. They have been fuelled by statements from the Labour government - alongside the more openly racist diatribes from Reform – as well as the Tories and the mainstream press and media. Facing the growth of the far right, Labour has tried to attract far-right support by turning on migrants and refugees, focusing its political energy on harassing and criminalising these communities. But rather than stemming the growth of the far right, Labour paves the way for Reform. Moreover, the government has turned to authoritarianism in its attempts to suppress dissent, and in particular in its attempts to criminalise opposition to the genocide in Gaza. Labour compounds these crimes by seeking to solve the economic crisis - and fund its arms expenditure programme - by withdrawing welfare payments from disabled people, and the poor: some of the most oppressed sections of the population.

So the call from Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana, to build a new party of the left, is not only to be welcomed, but is an essential step to protect the working class from the attacks it faces. The possibility now exists that the new party can not only break through the straightjacket of the British electoral system, but can lead the big struggles necessary to transform our society.

Of course the economic and political crises are not just a British problem, they are international. All mainstream political parties have embraced neo-liberal economics since the 1980s, with a terrible toll taken on our societies and communities; social democratic parties across Europe, including Labour here - and in a somewhat different model with the Democratic Party in the US - embraced neo-liberalism, inflicting great harms on the people. So these parties have been part of the problem, creating hardship and deprivation for millions of people, particularly in the former industrial heartlands. We have seen the impact of this in creating the political space for a massive rise in support for the far right. This can only be successfully challenged by the new political forces on the left: that will offer real solutions to the problems people are facing.

What the growth both of Reform, in a reactionary way, and the emergence of the new mass party of the left represents, is more than just the break-up of the old two party political system. It signifies a far more extensive change in society and people’s consciousness - we see that the traditional values, ideologies and institutions of social control are breaking down and being challenged. There is a loss of confidence in the old mechanisms for maintaining social stability, as the security of existence for millions of people is threatened. It poses starkly the critical choice that humanity faces: we either work towards socialism and break with this system or we face a continuing descent into barbarism.

We have a huge task ahead of us. The crisis is not only multifold: it is existential. The new party has to embrace a programme that deals not only with housing, unemployment, welfare and social decay, but also climate change, ecological destruction, a new global arms race, and imperialist war. The struggle against racism, and in support of refugees and migrants, should be central to our programme.

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What is the new party to be?

These are our aspirations: that the new party is being brought into being to face the challenges of today’s world – and to win. That it will not be reproducing past models but it will hold within it the combined experiences that people have gone through, and the wisdom gained; whether the massive class battles of the 1980s, the attempt to prevent the Iraq war, to prevent privatisation and defend the NHS, or the experience of the Corbyn leadership of the Labour Party. Based on these experiences, the party will need to organise and mobilise on three fronts: electoral, movements, and trade unions.

Winning elections will be an important part of the party’s work, whether at national, regional or local level. We aim to build that political representation for and by working people, and all our diverse communities; we need to show our politics and principles in action, that we do politics differently, and can bring real change. But the new party cannot just exist on the parliamentary or electoral plane: it must engage in all areas of life. Because people aren’t only about place, about where they live or work: they also engage with wider principles, with what is going on in the world, how we shape the future of the planet, how we bring the global issues to the local.

So the party’s interface with the movements is crucial: whether it’s community defence, working to stop the climate catastrophe, to prevent war, to achieve freedom and sovereignty for Palestine, or to end nuclear weapons and militarisation. We aren’t attempting to reproduce or duplicate the work of the movements, but to support them and be part of them. They are dynamic and powerful mobilisers.

The trade unions – and other collective organisations of working people and our communities - must receive every support, and not be seen as something separate from ‘the political’. The division between the trade union and party political wings of the movement has been a block on progress, to the extent that the Labour Party has ended up making savage attacks on the unions and the workforce. The new party, as a mass force for resistance to the system, will be all the stronger if it has the trades unions at its heart, because they are in essence a political force. They not only serve and defend millions of working people, but are extensive organised networks at a democratic and participatory grass roots level; they can take action and shape policy that truly affects our society. They may not currently always live up to all the possibilities inherent in their social, political and industrial role, but the new party must work to enable and empower them: firstly through backing the complete repeal of the anti-trade union laws.

Being united as a party will be crucial. That doesn’t mean we will always agree on everything – far from it. But debate and discussion is essential to arriving at the best policies, so all must be heard. The party must be structured to enable the maximum internal democracy, ensuring that diverse views and different perspectives can be heard, and decided upon by the membership. One way of doing this is to allow ‘platforms’ to be established within the party, where members can openly come together and advocate a particular position, typically in the run up to a policy conference. Once the party decides on the policy, members will publicly support it. There are other ways of doing this, but the key point is that the new party must combine maximum openness and democracy with the ability to unite effectively and present a political alternative - and people can see it practices what it preaches. For many decades socialists in the Labour Party and outside have often worked in small groups which have sometimes resulted in an insular way of working. We must work in a new way in this new party. We need discipline for effective political action, but it cannot be imposed from above, as it was so ruthlessly in the Labour Party. It will arise from a mutual respect and understanding of what needs to be done, and how we will do it - together.