A Salutary Slap of Reality, Indeed

Poor old Polly Toynbee is beside herself. The brutes who swatted away Change UK like a fly, if they noticed it at all, have never rated Labour under Keir Starmer even as highly as they rated Labour at its catastrophic General Election defeat last year. 

Still less is Labour 20 points ahead, as it was supposed to have been under darling Keir. The beastly little common people prefer Boris Johnson, or they miss Jeremy Corbyn, or very often they do both. And Toynbee has noticed that Labour's policies, from back when it had any, were and are popular with the voters, until they are told that those policies are Labour's. 

Well, yes. That phenomenon has been observable and observed for at least 10 years, since Labour started having any policies beyond blowing up brown people. Corbyn deserves reproach for having failed to alter that public attitude. But it most certainly did not begin with him.

The trick is to get those policies adopted by the people who run the party that is almost always led by the Prime Minister. It is not necessary to join that party. Indeed, it might be advisable not to do so, since bets do have to be hedged for the once in a blue moon when there might be a one-term Coalition that was led by the Labour Party.

But priority must be given to influencing the people who have the power. The Budget of March 2020 has ended the era that began with the Budget of 1976. The Centre is the think tank for this new era. It already has plenty going on.