Triumphalism reigns in Keir Starmer’s operation. For the factional warriors surrounding the Labour leader, sparring with Tories is business but crushing the left is pleasure. Banning Islington party members from reselecting Jeremy Corbyn as their Labour candidate is an act they relished. When he was courting the votes of Labour activists in 2020, Starmer declared that “local party members should select their candidates for every election”: but as this latest move underlines, the Labour leader is as interested in due process as he is in abiding by the solemn campaign pledges he made.
The purging of Corbyn is just one example underlining the nature of Starmerism. As a political project, it intends to permanently eradicate the left from the Labour party, and thus – given a first-past-the-post system Starmer has no intention of reforming – almost entirely from English politics.
