Politics is a bumpy business and this week has been a bumpy ride for the Labour Party and its leader, Jeremy Corbyn. And how.
It started with virtual insurrection in the shadow cabinet, proceeded to speculation about who a new leader would be and ended with an unexpectedly comfortable win for the party in the Oldham by-election. So can the warring factions agree a truce, or is Labour condemned to further turmoil?
Mr Corbyn is from the far-left of the party and its most resolute rebel, so the prospect of civil war has hung over the Labour Party ever since his election as leader. Although he got 60% of the votes of party members and supporters, less than 10% of Labour MPs voted for him – so few that he would not have secured enough nominations to stand at all had not some Labour MPs who disagreed with him about almost everything signed his nomination papers. They wanted to open up debate, but their tactic backfired on them drastically.
The battle-lines were clear enough. On one side stood Mr Corbyn, with his hands on the levers of power in the party, backed by energetic and vociferous grassroot party members. On the other stood the bulk of Labour MPs representing the voters who had put them into the House of Commons and who, the MPs believed, took a far more centrist position on most matters. Indeed, many of these MPs believe that unless the party moves more to the centre it will fail to attract the voters who are not yet voting for Labour but will need to do so if the party is ever to return to power.
Where issues arose that did not divide the two sides there was not a problem. Virtually all Labour people, whether among MPs or within the grassroots, were outraged by George Osborne’s plan to axe the tax credits of the working poor, mounted a common campaign against the Chancellor and, as they would see it, forced him to back down entirely. But it was clear to many that there might not be so many of these uniting issues and that one extremely divisive issue was at the top of the agenda: whether to back the government in authorising air strikes in Syria.
This is what caused the strife this week throughout the party from the shadow cabinet right down to the constituencies. Mr Corbyn, a veteran peace campaigner and former chairman of the Stop the War coalition, was opposed to the air strikes, but many in his shadow cabinet and the parliamentary party were in favour. Although it is understood that voting on so serious a matter as whether or not to go to war is inevitably a matter of conscience for MPs, it is also understood that on such an issue a party that aspires to government must have a clear policy by which its MPs abide. So Mr Corbyn wanted to whip his MPs against government policy. And his supporters in the grassroots wanted to pressure their MPs into conforming. If they succeeded, many believed, they could even stop David Cameron in his tracks.
This is what caused the insurrection in Monday’s shadow cabinet meeting. Mr Corbyn was forced to allow a free vote. His leadership looked weak; the party looked to many like a shambles rather than a disciplined candidate for government; his own shadow foreign secretary, Hilary Benn, outshone him in a widely-acclaimed speech in favour of backing the government; and the government won the vote with the help of sixty-six Labour MPs, over a quarter of the PLP.
The predicted civil war seemed to be breaking out. Furious party activists turned on Labour MPs who had voted for air-strikes, subjecting them to what many regarded as bullying and unprecedented intimidation. Meanwhile Mr Benn was being talked of as the obvious next leader of the Labour Party. All that was needed was the drubbing of Labour in the Oldham West and Royton by-election on Thursday for real battle to commence. And the drubbing was expected because Mr Corbyn’s position on war, on how to deal with jihadis who behead hostages and on much else would be bound to alienate the white working class of the north Manchester constituency.
But it didn’t work out like that. Labour held the seat comfortably, actually increasing its percentage share of the vote. The old calculus, that Labour MPs had Labour voters on their side, now seemed not so certain. What did seem certain was that Mr Corbyn would survive to fight another day.
But where does this leave the two warring sides in the party? For the grassroots the Oldham result gives them some extra time. Many of them believe that there are only two ways they can turn the party into the one they want. One is to put so much pressure on their MPs to do what they’re told that the MPs will end up having to toe the leadership line. The other is to replace recalcitrant MPs with Labour candidates who share their views: in other words to ‘de-select’ Labour MPs who don’t follow Jeremy Corbyn’s lead.
Impending boundary changes give them the opportunity to do this. However, the leadership, fearing more strife, has discouraged them from doing this. Yet many believe that the Corbyn-supporting grassroots organisation, Momentum, is intent on doing just this and has the backing of veteran left-winger, Ken Livingstone, who argues straightforwardly that in a democratic party, members ought to be able to select candidates who share their views. The deputy leader of the party, Tom Watson, has told him to shut up and the grassroots to stop the intimidation.
Meanwhile, those MPs who believe that Labour has no electoral future under Jeremy Corbyn will regard the Oldham result as indicating very little except that they should now bide their time. Elections next summer in Scotland and Wales, in local councils and for the mayor of London will, they believe, expose the unelectability of Labour under Corbyn and that will be the time for them to act.
But are there grounds for a truce? Could a deal be struck in which the grassroots back off from their threats of deselection and putting their MPs under pressure, in return for MPs agreeing to more of Mr Corbyn’s agenda? That must be the hope of the leadership wanting to keep the show on the road.
What is best for Labour and the country more widely: that the two sides should try and seek accommodation in some sort of truce, or that they should get on with their civil war and let one side or the other emerge bloodied but victorious?
