Politics: Corbyn Was Right About Public Shift

Jeremy Corbyn’s assertion that the centre ground of British politics has shifted his way prompted scepticism in many quarters but new polling suggests he just may be right. While half the population defines itself as occupying the political middle ground and the Tories have derided Corbyn as a 1970s Marxist, research by YouGov has revealed that a growing majority of the population supports the Labour leader’s policies. Ideas such as increasing the minimum wage and corporation tax, introducing a form of rent caps and increasing funding for the NHS have proved popular across the political spectrum.

Corbyn expressed confidence that the public mood was swinging his way at his party’s conference last week. “It is often said that elections can only be won from the centre ground. And in a way that’s not wrong – so long as it’s clear that the political centre of gravity isn’t fixed or unmovable, nor is it where the establishment pundits like to think it is,” he said. Could it be that Corbyn is achieving his goal of not just dragging Labour further to the left but also taking the viewing public with it?

Moving the Centre Ground?

Nationalisation was also a popular policy, according to the research, with a majority of respondents in favour of the state taking control of Royal Mail (65%), the railway companies (60%), the water companies (59%), and energy providers (53%). YouGov compared the popularity of various policies now with data from when Corbyn first took over Labour in 2015.

“The biggest increases (in support) had been ‘abolition of tuition fees for students at university’ up from 15% to 20% and ‘increase spending on the NHS’ up from 42% to 53%, making it the most popular policy,” it said.

The report noted a decline in support for tighter immigration controls, which have been championed more by Right-wing parties. That policy has fallen from first place as the top priority of 44% of respondents to third place with 31%.

That could be because respondents felt Brexit is solving immigration problems by “taking back control” of UK borders, or it may be because the debate over the immigration issue since the Brexit vote has made people more aware of the contribution that immigrants make to the UK’s economy and culture.

Leadership Matters

A third of voters who describe themselves as being in the “centre ground” backed Labour at the 2017 general election, compared to 50% going for the Conservatives, suggesting that the surge in support for Labour came largely from a strong turn-out of Left-wing voters. That prompted YouGov to pose the question of why the apparent support for Labour policies did not yield more votes from the political centre.

“The answer is that elections aren’t just about where the centre ground is on policy but also where they are on leadership and competency,” it said. “Even at the peak of Corbyn’s popularity in the days before polling day, more centrist voters thought Theresa May would make a better Prime Minister (39%) than thought Jeremy Corbyn would (30%). Furthermore, when we tested Labour’s manifesto during the campaign, nearly half (43%) of centrists thought that Labour ‘had lots of policies but they don’t seem very well thought through.'”

Those results present a challenge to Corbyn by suggesting that the public is still difficult to win over even when his party has popular policies such as abolishing student debt or funding the NHS. His own credibility may be Labour’s weakness, leaving him to hope that the popularity of his policies and the growing divisions in the Conservative Party will override doubts about his own suitability to be PM.

by Stewart Vickers

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