A former New Labour priest deals with the question of our times with rigour and vigor– but blindspots stay
In the beginning look, the former New Labour preacher Liam Byrne is not the perfect person to explain the surge of rightwing populism in Britain and beyond, and how it could be quit. At the end of Gordon Brown’s federal government in 2010, Byrne infamously composed a one-line letter to whoever would certainly prosper him as principal assistant to the Treasury: “I’m afraid there is no cash.” Both friendly suggestions and an inside joke, these words were used for many years by the Tories and Lib Dems to justify their austerity plans– and were arguably one of the reasons for the contemporary disillusionment with standard politicians. This loss of confidence, and the damages to culture and public solutions from austerity, have sustained populism ever before since.Byrne’s brief yet
ambitious book is, in a sense, his attempt to make amends. Yet a few of the disagreements and evidence he provides, in fast, certain sentences which fit his past online reputation as a smart but quick-tempered priest, are not likely to convince lots of people that he is thinking afresh. He typically cites and mirrors centrist authorities such as the Tony Blair Institute and Keir Starmer’s former advisers Claire Ainsley and Deborah Mattinson, that have all long said that the method to beat populism is to value its advocates, however rightwing. Given that Reform UK has actually surged ahead in the polls, while Labour is related to by a lot of populist citizens with contempt, this submission seems a dead end.
Source: The Guardian