It has been devastating to see the destruction of Labour at the ballot box. Many though feel that this is not the fault of Jeremy Corbyn, and instead there are other reasons. And this, despite direct evidence that more voters who switched from Labour citing Corbyn as the reason for the change rather than Brexit.
One big reason stated my many on the left is that this is the fault of Blairites who caused a change in the position of Labour to back a second referendum. This claim ignores the influence of unions in the change of this position.
While there is no doubt that the support for a second referendum, and therefore more delay contributed to the defeat of Labour in the North, there was an increase in votes for Labour which many will argue is due to this change. The change in stance of Labour to back a second referendum occurred after Labour was beaten into third place behind the Liberal Democrats in the European Elections. Both the Green Party and the Liberal Democrats were felt to be remain parties and both lost a share of the vote in the General Election. Yes, part of this may be due to the system of voting where proportional representation was used, as opposed to the first past the post system, but after the change in stance, Labour gained from its 14.1% vote share in the EU elections to 32.1% in the general election.
There is the failure of Labour to tackle antisemitism within its ranks promptly and also the failure of Corbyn to apologise quicker when challenged on this. The worst thing about this, was that Corbyn has always been against anti-semitism, has always been in favour of fighting against discrimination and has advocated kinder gentler politics. But too many of those who support him have engaged in abuse, this not just being on-line, but also driving MP's away from the party.
To make things worse for Labour, this has happened while poverty for those in work has increased, while the Conservatives have pledged to increase police numbers but not to the levels they cut them to, while schools are facing huge funding shortfalls and of course NHS performance failing to meet targets, including ones that the government have changed. As noted on a previous post, Labour came closer to re-election under Gordon Brown in 2010 despite the global credit crunch than it has under Corbyn with the Conservatives handing him an open goal with the mismanagement of the public services of the nation.
The Corbyn effect drove too many voters away. Despite the Tories giving Labour so many open goals.
In summary, before the change in policy, Labour lost votes in Leave areas and the Brexit Party gained them. After the change in the policy regarding Brexit while Labour gained a share in the vote from Remain parties, what happened was that the Conservatives made electoral gains in the leave areas instead.
