One the more disturbing trends within the UK Labour Party in recent years has been the rising number of anti-immigration, and anti-European, members showing up in their colours. That trend has most recently been illuminated by the MP for Streatham, Mr Chuka Umunna, who has called for restrictions to be placed on skilled workers pursuing unskilled work across borders (Watt, 2014).
For a party founded by Trade Unions, that considers itself socially progressive and the champion of ordinary people's causes, this trend is a bit incongruous. The only connection that the trend seems to have with Labour policy is that anti-immigration and anti-European sentiments are popular topics for media controversies. The murkier underside to the Labour Party's policy approach is the determined, ambitious, opportunism to its politics that leads it to try and make use of any popular cause.
The determination to be in a position of institutional power is a powerful motivator, but it also invites bad habits and doublespeak. In politics it can lead to parties opportunistically jumping on popular issues for a short term boost in the polls and being deceptive about what voters will get from those parties if they are elected into power. Those bad habits can coalesce, and entirely take over the identity of that political group if it isn't careful.
The latest case of Labour getting on a controversial bandwagon is Mr Chuka Umunna's call for the establishment of arbitrary rules to stop the skilled taking unskilled work in richer countries (Watt, 2014). This would come as part of the package of undoing the European Union's Freedom of Movement - except for high-skilled workers moving for high-skilled jobs.
That concept seems to be entirely at odds with progressive roots of the Labour Party. The direction it invites British institutions to move in seems to present a basic threat to the rights of individuals. Taking away from people the freedom of movement, particularly from the unskilled (who are usually the poorest), means taking away one of the few powers the people have left to challenge the treatment they receive at the hands of domestic employers.
The Vice-President of the European Commission, Viviane Reding of Luxembourg's Christian Social People's Party, has in recent weeks been attempting to debunk the politician's myth of foreigner invasions (The Guardian, 2014), pointing out that immigration actually has a positive affect on the economy. However, moves like Mr Umunna's anti-immigration policy, from a supposedly progressive Labour Party, are not helpful in the debunking of damaging myths.
Policy approaches like these, towards immigration and Europe, show a worrying alignment of the so-called party of the workers with the ideologically conservative groups, like the British Conservative Party, whose policies aim to benefit business largely at the expense of the worker's ability to move freely across borders or to possess legal securities in the workplace. There are even long standing members of those conservative groups that dismiss such responses to immigration, with former Chancellor Mr Kenneth Clarke defending the contribution of immigrants (Dominiczak, 2014).
The fact that the Labour Party are willing to stand on the same side of the argument as those powers, and sometimes go further, exposes a murkier underside to the party. In the party's determination to gain the political power to achieve its causes, it is willing to align with populist causes like the suppression of immigration which threaten the rights of workers. The party needs to wary of such moves. It is not such a large fall from opportunism and manipulation to achieve an end, to the loss of an identity through the use of such tactics.
==========
References:==========
==========
+ Nicholas Watt's 'Stop EU citizens travelling to UK in search of work, says Labour'; in The Guardian; 10 January 2014
+ The Guardian's 'Top EU official slams British ministers on immigration'; 10 January 2014.
+ Peter Dominiczak's 'Ken Clarke hits out at Cameron immigration claims'; in The Telegraph; 13 January 2014.
No comments:
Post a Comment