The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
Labour lurch to far left will boost union
The former Labour MP Jim Murphy has come in for some stick in his time, mostly from Scottish nationalists who hounded him during the independence referendum.
The former leader of Scottish Labour was one of the most high profile campaigners for a No vote and so it wasn’t that surprising when the separatists picked on him, although the ferocity of some of their attacks was out of order.
But now Murphy, long out of frontline politics, has become the target of abuse again, almost as vicious, but this time from his own side.
Neil Findlay, the Labour MSP said to be Jeremy Corbyn’s chief ally in Scotland, is publishing a book, in which he accuses his one-time comrade of being an unprincipled “insincere Blairite” who undermined his colleagues to further his ambitions.
He also said Murphy wanted independence supporters to pelt him with eggs when he toured Scotland to urge voters (from the platform of an upturned Irn-Bru crate) to reject independence. Findlay is ungrateful, considering it was partly thanks to Murphy’s efforts the nationalists were defeated in a night of triumph in 2014 for Labour-led Better Together.
Fair game
On the face of things, the MSP appears to be settling an old score, for Murphy had earlier beaten him to the Scottish Labour leadership.
Also, Blairites such as Murphy have been fair game in their party for years, well before Corbyn’s ascendancy.
And Findlay’s charge that Labour shouldn’t have sided with the Tories to save the union three years ago is hardly original either. Labour has consistently blamed that extremely successful coalition for its poor showing in every subsequent election. But the timing of Findlay’s remarks and their tone point to a broader agenda than one bitter politician’s rant against another.
His book emerges as Corbyn completes a visit to Scotland, during which he tried to humiliate Kezia Dugdale, who was his more moderate Scottish leader before she surprisingly announced her resignation last night.
On Monday he suggested he was prepared to work with the SNP to oust the Conservatives at Westminster – “when we are united against austerity we are very powerful” he told an Edinburgh Fringe audience.
Not only was this an embarrassment for Dugdale, who had maintained her party’s traditional pro-union stance, but it was also a clear sign Labour in Scotland could follow the leftwards lurch of the party south of the border.
Coinciding with Corbyn’s comments, the Scottish Left Review argued that Dugdale, along with Scottish Labour general secretary Brian Roy, should be dumped so Corbyn’s people could take over the party machine.
Eclipse?
Is this what Scotland wants? While Dugdale had looked weak against the more trenchant SNP, and while Corbyn did make unexpected gains in the general election, surely no one in their right mind would welcome the eclipse of mainstream Labour here.
The party that nurtured the likes of Gordon Brown, Donald Dewar, Alastair Darling, John Reid, Robin Cook and, of course, John Smith, was an electionwinning juggernaut that overthrew 18 years of Tory rule.
Beside the Marxists and militants of Corbyn’s pygmy protest movement, one can almost feel nostalgic for yesterday’s Labour, a tour de force that defined an era.
But all is not as hopeless as it seems. The consequences of Corbyn’s rise have already been noticed in Scotland, with a drift of ultra leftists away from the SNP to Labour in the May election.
Perhaps a further surge to the left will draw more half-hearted secessionists into the Corbyn camp, where the enemy (Westminster Tories) is effectively the same.
It helps that as Corbyn has moved up the opinion polls, Nicola Sturgeon has moved down, so it is entirely plausible those who once deserted Labour for the nationalists will desert back again.
Only alternative
Where does all this leave those who prefer some centre ground – that is, the bulk of the population? Outside Scotland, the only alternative to the hard left these days is the hard right, unless you count the Lib Dems as an electoral option.
But in Scotland we have in Ruth Davidson’s Conservatives a pro-European, socially liberal and centrist party to turn to. Many have already made that turn, with the Scottish Tories delivering their best election performance in a generation in May.
That was when the SNP vote had just started to be split by the Corbyn effect. If Labour here was to become inseparable from the separatists in left wing ideology, Davidson would have an excellent chance of winning a majority in the next Holyrood contest.
And that is without even taking the constitutional question into account. If Scottish Labour sacrifices its unionist credentials for Corbyn, all will be lost – but only for Scottish Labour.
Meanwhile unionists, representing roughly two-thirds of Scottish voters, judging from the most recent election, will vote Tory, and this time without shame.