Grief at this Tory win can be overcome. Labour must harness the power of community
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Version 0 of 1. Progress lies in a sense of togetherness, forged in resistance to a decade of austerity. Labour needs to rebuild from the ground up, says Guardian columnist Frances Ryan A week seems barely long enough for the dust to settle on this election. Watching Boris Johnson tour old Labour heartlands in recent days has been salt in the wound; a charlatan selling snake oil to those he’ll betray before his new MPs have unpacked. Anecdotal accounts of racist and homophobic abuse are already emerging as the country’s bigots are emboldened. The Fabian Society calculates that it could take a decade for Labour to swing back to power; poverty and inequality will have fertile ground to grow on in the meantime. Each new headline now feels as if it holds ominous implications for the future; read Shelter’s study that shows 280,000 people in England will be homeless on Christmas Day, for instance, and you can’t help but wonder what the figure will be next year, or in five years’ time. To mourn this, if only for a few days, is not self-indulgence – it is self-care. To experience suffering and to fight for something better only to see it lost is a particular form of grief, and an almost comfortingly human response in an era so often characterised by cynicism and inwardness. Amid the despair, people search for ways to help. Food banks, refuges, and housing charities all reported a spike in donations in the days after the election result. It is an act of kindness, a pitch of solidarity and hope in the dark. But it is a tragedy that it has come to this. When the public respond to a general election result by rushing to collect food parcels for strangers, it’s a particularly damning comment on a new government. Piecemeal philanthropy only ever reflects state abandonment. Indeed, that Johnson’s victory comes off the back of a decade of austerity is a dark blessing. Communities have long been learning how to fill the gaps left by the Tory state. They have had to. This week, it emerged that some headteachers are even reopening their schools over the holidays to help pupils in poverty, those who wouldn’t otherwise get a Christmas dinner or present from Santa. It is horrific but a sign of the stitched-together safety net of recent years. Many libraries are now only open because volunteers staff them. Thousands of families wouldn’t have winter coats unless clothes banks existed. That it’s emerged a newly elected Conservative MP runs an app that demands money from food banks is a grim sign of the path we are on . In the coming months, there will be strength found in continuing to build our own infrastructure. People will channel their anger and fear into community organisations. Anyone who thinks this is pity or an endorsement of a David Cameron-style “big society” does not know their history – the working class has long relied on each other to survive. The long-term project of achieving rights and dignity must always come with the day-to-day business of getting by. And yet the truth is that none of this is sufficient – only the Labour party finding power will be enough. There is a reason it hurts to see a party floored by avoidable mistakes and infighting: each misstep adds more time for families who need a Labour government and aren’t getting one. These two strategies of community and electability are not mutually exclusive. The idea of the “big state” – people at the top with little connection to those on the ground, and centralised orders from Westminster – is increasingly unattractive to voters who have lost faith in politicians and in many cases, have been left for years to get on with only each other. Community organisers within Labour made some solid gains in recent years, even if it didn’t translate to votes. Now is the time not to lose heart but to take this forward, from providing advice to disabled people who have had their benefits pulled to legal help for families being wrongly evicted. The social institutions that can help people through today can tomorrow restore faith in the progressive cause. Neither is easy or simple: the days ahead will be hard and complicated. But they are a necessity, and a need that will only become more pressing as the years go on. In the end, the loss is only the beginning. We rebuild, from the ground up. • Frances Ryan is a Guardian columnist |