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An effective new leftwing party is one of the recurring dreams – or nightmares – of British politics. Many have tried and failed to create one that wins and then holds a significant number of seats in parliament. Labour, founded 125 years ago, has been the only successful example. Others have been defeated by the electoral system, the sheer number of interests ranged against the left, loyalty to Labour and the left’s tendency to over-promise and quarrel.
Could Zarah Sultana’s sudden announcement last night that she “will co-lead the founding of a new party” with Jeremy Corbyn and other “independent MP’s… and activists across the country” – a statement that he did not acknowledge until lunchtime today – finally begin to change the rigid shape of British left-of-centre politics? And would that help the left – or help destroy it?
The 31-year-old MP for Coventry South, who had already been suspended from Labour last year for opposing its retention of the two-child benefit cap, is usually one of the most effective political communicators in the country. She has more followers on TikTok than any MP except Nigel Farage. Unlike him, she has an ability to talk with moral force and clarity: about Palestine, inequality, the rightward shift of Keir Starmer’s government and other issues particularly important to Britain’s large minority of leftwing voters, a neglected electoral bloc since Corbyn’s Labour leadership ended in 2020.
She has been the great hope of some on the left for years. As a young woman and a Muslim, she represents parts of the population where the left remains strong. As an MP for a seat in the Midlands, one of the few Labour MPs to increase their majority at the last election, she has succeeded, so far, in the kind of place where the left needs to do better, away from its metropolitan heartlands. In 2022, after only three years in parliament, and with Starmer struggling as Labour leader, as he is now, she was already being spoken of by some on the left of the party as his potential challenger.
That won’t happen now, as she has resigned from Labour. But the prospect of her building a new party with Corbyn has considerable potential. As his comfortable victory over Labour as an independent candidate at last year’s election showed, the 76-year-old MP for Islington North remains a much better electoral politician than many of his enemies think. His decades of experience, connections right across the left and continuing moral authority for millions of Britons – especially as his criticisms of Starmer and Israel are ever more borne out by events – could dovetail well with Sultana’s more youthful and abrasive brand of politics. And with Labour in crisis, leftwing ideas such as nationalisation back in fashion, and the electorate more fragmented and fickle than it has probably ever been, conditions for a new leftwing party are unusually favourable.
Yet difficulties remain. One is that the Green party is already absorbing some of the left’s talent and energy, especially with the leftwinger Zack Polanski standing for its leadership.
Another is deciding exactly what form a new leftwing party should take. Should it stand in local and parliamentary elections as soon as possible – or should it build an activist movement first, establishing its credibility in communities? And should it try to mobilise across the country – or should it concentrate its almost certainly limited resources on a few winnable seats?
Leftists have been debating and pondering these questions for months, which is one reason why the new party, discussed at private and public gatherings since at least last autumn, has yet to assume a definite shape. Today, Corbyn finally said that he was “delighted” that Sultana “will help us build a real alternative. The democratic foundations of a new kind of political party will soon take shape. Discussions are ongoing…”. As for who should lead it, he did not say. An unhurried politician by nature, he has spent much of the year since the election working with the other four leftwing independent MP’s to create and solidify the Independent Alliance, which has as many representatives in the Commons as Reform UK.
Yet one of the lessons of our unstable politics over the past decade is that things can happen slowly and then very fast. Now that Sultana has made her move, having reportedly considered her options for months, she and Corbyn may quickly get over any tactical differences, as leftwing activists are drawn to their project and the scale of its opportunity dawns.
For Labour, in the middle of its worst week in office so far, the new party could be a serious threat. Even if it only wins a few seats, or none, it could split the left-of-centre vote across the country. Reform could be the ultimate beneficiaries of Starmer’s carelessly contemptuous treatment of the left.
But there is another possibility. If the next election leaves a hung parliament, which looks increasingly likely, a new leftwing party with, say, a dozen MPs, could hold the balance of power. Coalition talks between Corbyn, Sultana and their old party would be interesting.
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Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist
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