This may feel like an especially long and gruelling political cycle, but we’re now more than half-way through, and we’re increasingly being asked what we can expect to see from Labour in 2023 as the Party gets on election footing.
Currently, the Labour Party is enjoying an unprecedented 26-point lead over the Conservatives, and we are seeing a Party increasingly confident in its identity and positioning.
But the path to an election is long and littered with banana skins - and with increased prominence and political relevance comes increased scrutiny.
Confident, but not counting their chickens
The conventional wisdom was that it would take several electoral cycles for Labour to win power, with Keir Starmer performing the thankless role of caretaker and transitional figure. It was anticipated he would support the Party through a period of bitter bickering and finally self-reflective healing after the punishing Corbyn years.
That narrative has turned upside down, with Corbynites having been confined to the side lines more quickly than expected (and now performing the marginalised role of a Socialist Greek Chorus), and political commentators routinely suggesting it’s almost a given that Labour will regain the keys to Number 10.
That has led to a Labour Party flexing its muscles a little more. Policy announcements made over the last few months have shown a Party willing to be a little more provocative and less afraid of causing offence – from consulting on banning cigarettes, to launching the publicly owned Great British Energy.
But despite the excitement, polling results, and growing confidence, the frontbench will be refusing to count their chickens.
The public are fickle and there are other polling figures that might concern Labour. Voters are still evenly split, for example, on whether they trust Labour or the Conservatives more to grow the economy, despite the current recession, and Sunak’s personal rating is not far behind Starmer’s.
A smoked salmon and scrambled egg offensive
A crucial point for companies to note is that Labour has been repeatedly signalling that it is open for business. Rachel Reeves has been at pains to meet with business leaders since she was appointed Shadow Chancellor, with The Times recently reporting she has met 387 chief executives in 18 months, dubbing her breakfast meeting programme a “smoked salmon and scrambled egg offensive”.
This is reminiscent of New Labour’s prawn cocktail offensive in the ‘90s, as is the current Labour Party’s decidedly pro-private enterprise language. Take Reeves’ recent comments:
“In the end, it’s going to be businesses that create the wealth, the prosperity, the jobs and the opportunities around the country. I don’t think that I’ve got all the answers and all the ideas.”
Labour’s relationship with business and the City has been transformed since 2019. This hasn’t happened overnight, and Reeves has been methodical in her approach, but it’s still startling how much ground has been recovered in just a few years.
NHS: reform or die
The crisis in the NHS is surely going to continue to dominate in 2023 - though as we move out of winter, traditionally a crunch point for the NHS, it may start falling down the agenda.
Record A&E waiting times, more patients waiting for treatment than ever before, and a historic nurses’ strike mean the Conservatives are on awfully shaky ground, and the Labour Party will be keen to point to their own record on the NHS while in power, during which they reduced waiting times.
But Labour is facing its own challenges with the NHS, having already butted heads with the British Medical Association over Wes Streeting’s declaration that the NHS must “reform or die” and his plans to shake-up the organisation of GPs, as well as from his own side regarding his plans to use the private sector to help solve the crisis in the short-term.
The Party is also walking a tightrope: signalling support for striking NHS workers battling a cost-of-living crisis and fighting for better pay, while refusing to commit to said pay rise and instructing its MPs not to join picket lines.
Taking back control of the Brexit narrative
The word ‘Brexit’ was previously a bogeyman for Labour, with the frontbench keen to draw a line under the debate and protect Starmer from easy attacks that he is a “Remoaner” from the metropolitan elite.
It speaks volumes that Starmer is now confident enough in the Party’s position to not only discuss Brexit, but to take the Leave campaign’s language and reappropriate it.
In his New Year speech, he said he will “embrace” the ‘Take Back Control’ message and turn the slogan into a solution – spreading control out of Westminster and devolving new powers to communities via a ‘Take Back Control Bill’.
As we move into the New Year, we are not seeing a new Labour, but a Starmer-led Labour that has stopped second guessing.
It remains to be seen whether the gap in the polls is a sign that the public are embracing the Labour Party – or simply rejecting the Conservatives. But a Party emboldened by public support to be itself, and to lay out its agenda with confidence and clarity, is one to be reckoned with.
Juliet Patterson is an Associate Partner at Pagefield and a former Political Adviser to the Labour Party