Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer chose the perfect day to encapsulate the farce of ‘democratic’ party politics.
Each year on the anniversary of VE Day we have become used to nauseating rhetoric about how millions of Europeans – including 450,000 Britons – died during the Second World War to ‘make the world safe for democracy’.
This year, the man who within a few months will almost certainly become the UK Prime Minister chose the anniversary of VE Day to demonstrate that ‘democratic choice’ is meaningless.
The leader of what is supposedly a party of the ‘democratic left’ yesterday welcomed into Labour’s ranks one of the most ‘right wing’ Conservative MPs in Parliament, Natalie Elphicke.
The press have concentrated on aspects of Mrs Elphicke’s family life, and the allegations that ended her husband’s political career.
But frankly all of that is triviality, compared to the essential political facts.
It is literally impossible to think of a more ‘right wing’ MP in the present Parliament than Mrs Elphicke. Ideologically it would have been more logical for her to defect to Reform UK than to Labour, but clearly she made a cynical decision that Labour had more to offer her.
On Starmer’s side there was an equally cynical decision to welcome her defection, because all that matters to the Labour leader is the point-scoring Westminster game. Mrs Elphicke’s defection damages Prime Minister Sunak and the Conservative Party, therefore it is good news for Starmer. Nothing else counts.
It’s now apparent that only one political stance can prevent someone being welcomed into the Labour Party: criticism of the State of Israel, or any other comment that can be construed as ‘anti-semitic’.
Anyone who passes that test is allowed into Starmer’s party.
The one benefit of this nauseating spectacle is that no-one can any longer be in doubt. The ‘democratic’ game of party politics is by its very nature incapable of generating solutions for the multiple crises besetting the UK and Europe in 2024.
Those for whom patriotism means more than a photo opportunity should need no further incentive to get ourselves organised and present UK voters with a genuine alternative.