The problem is with the product, not the salesman

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If the election results last week exposed just how much trouble Labour is in, the party’s reaction since then serves only to emphasise the fact. Whilst replacing a failed leader might not, in itself, be an altogether bad idea, believing that doing so will, in itself, ‘solve’ the problems facing the party is a triumph for hope over experience. Even more so when the ‘vision’ of all those being touted as replacements differs little from that of the incumbent. The problem is far more deep-seated than that, and it’s only due to an inadequate and unrepresentative electoral system coupled with a Tory collapse that Starmer was regarded as a ‘winner’ for getting a huge majority of seats in 2024 on 34% of the votes, whilst his predecessor, Jeremy Corbyn, was regarded as a dismal failure for gaining far fewer seats in 2017 on 40% of the vote. Which was the best salesman?

Whether history is made by the actions of prominent individuals or by what Boris Johnson called the ‘movement of the herd’ is one of those unresolved questions to which there is never a definitive answer. Mao, as I recall, once said that ‘the people are the motive force in the making of world history’; but then he also said something about ‘power springing from the barrel of a gun’, so take your pick of apposite quotations. I’ve long suspected that the truth lies somewhere between the two. Leaders come to the fore at a time and in a context which is set by longer term changes. The right person who happens to be in the right place at the right time can articulate things in a way which makes it look like he or she is driving change, but there are almost certainly others who could and would have fulfilled the role. I tend to support Ledru-Rollin with his "There go the people. I must follow them, for I am their leader", or whatever variation on the alleged quote you might prefer.

Whatever, the panicked masses of the Labour Party seem to have convinced themselves that, if only X were in charge, the party’s fortunes would be transformed. They might be in with a marginally better chance if they could agree on a name to insert instead of the X. I can think of few worse outcomes for them at this stage than for an MP to stand down to allow Andy Burnham to contest a parliamentary seat and then lose it (along with the Manchester mayoralty) to the Greens or Reform, but it’s an outcome which they don’t even appear able to foresee. The bottom line, though, is that whoever replaces the X, the party is still stuck in a context where they are expecting any new leader to do a better job of repackaging and selling the existing product rather than improving the product. It’s not an approach which has exactly been universally successful in the world of business. Maybe politics is different. Maybe not.