Nicola Sturgeon offered Labour and the whole of the UK a political lifeline when she said she would back a progressive alliance government. Jeremy Corbyn immediately refused her offer. Millions of progressive hearts sank across the country. It really doesn’t have to be like this.
Our political system is rotten to the core. Or at least it is for progressive people and parties. For the Tories it is just fine. So long as progressives remain divided against a singular opposition, they will lose. Progressives have to reset the system. But because of the competitive and adversarial nature of the voting system and Westminster, Labour feels it has to pretend that it and it alone can win. Even when it is obvious that the very best we can hope for is a hung parliament where progressive parties could work together to keep the Tories out.
What is sad is that this misplaced bravado fools no one and just makes Labour look at best a little silly. At worse it perpetuates what happened in the immediate aftermath of 2010 when Labour tribalists like David Blunkett and John Reid said they would rather be in opposition than work with the Liberal Democrats in government. That worked out well didn’t it! Instead of consigning the country, and those least able to weather it, to another five years of Tory rule – surely its better to share power than hand it over to the right?
