Monday 20th July 2020
Seven of us were present. Others attended a meeting by Zoom. One gave apologies for not attending.
Having not met for four months due to the Corona virus, participants today had the option to attend an outdoor face to face meeting or a Zoom meeting.
Considering the situation locally, we had a report on a recent meeting of the Constituency Labour Party with Ruth George, District councillor and recently MP for High Peak. She was (as usual), hard working, positive and well informed.
In contrast we were unable to identify anything positive about the decisions Johnson had made in confronting the epidemic, although the Chancellor’s furlough decisions indicated the the Tories had, at last, discovered a ‘money tree’!
Starmer had performed well against the PM in debate, was well organised, and his stand on antisemitism had earned him approval from many in the polls. But some of us were highly critical of both his apparently pro-Israeli view on antisemitism and his retreat to the political right, as evidenced by the manner of his dismissal of Long Bailey. There was also disappointment that he had not put forward any progressive ideas about Building Back Better. It was as if the work of a wide range of organisations and campaigns (largely initiated by Compass) had no relevance for him. It appeared that Momentum (set up to support Corbyn) was waiting to see how Starmer performed, how the epidemic developed and the government responded to it, before wading in with ideas which might rapidly seem inappropriate as things developed. But can we afford to wait? Some of us felt that now was not the time to raise new ideas but to focus on the epidemic. Others felt that now was exactly the time to indicate the directions for change. But we wondered where change would come from. We returned to our earlier discussions of the need for a different process for electing a government (and the need for a Progressive Alliance). But it was also suggested that perhaps policies will arise not so much from focussed deliberation by government as from events themselves determining change. The death of George Floyd and the BLM movement is an example.
It was even suggested (somewhat outrageously?) that the Tory government itself, being driven by the desire for power rather than ideology, could find itself leading radical changes forced upon them by rapidly changing circumstances
In this context the arguments around Brexit seemed somewhat irrelevant. Some of us felt that the prospect of no deal was disastrous, but others were less moved by such considerations. So much is changing (geopolitically as well as nationally) that it is difficult to make predictions about future trading. We enjoyed the opportunity for this face to face meeting and tentatively suggested that the next month’s meeting (August 17th) should also have Zoom and F2F alternatives.