A Sultana-Corbyn New Left Party Will Need All the Friends It Can Get

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At long last, the British left appears to have completed its hard reset. There is, finally, a new left party to vote for. Or is there? It’s all a little unclear, but a shock announcement by former Labour MP Zarah Sultana has not just pushed – but positively punted – the envelope. Sure, it might take Tolkien’s Ents less time to paint the Forth Bridge than it has for the British left to formalise itself, but let’s not look back. Let’s look forward.

In a move that took many by surprise, Zarah Sultana announced last night that she’s quitting the Labour party after 14 years to co-lead the formation of a new leftwing party alongside Jeremy Corbyn. This caused a huge amount of excitement online from every quarter of the left, with one notable exception: the man himself. At time of writing – and more than 12 hours later – Corbyn has still made no announcement of his own. That’s a little odd when the new canoe is built for two to row it forward, rather than one forlornly paddling in eternal circles. 

Less than an hour after Sultana’s announcement, the Sunday Times Whitehall editor Gabriel Pogrund claimed that he “understood” that Jeremy Corbyn had not agreed to join the new party and was “furious and bewildered”. Now, Jeremy Corbyn is too storied a politician to be furious and bewildered, never mind describe himself in those terms to anyone, least of all the Murdoch press. But it doesn’t mean that all around him are above it. 

Work on a new left party has been underway for some time, its spaghettied progress studiously recorded across several Novara FM episodes by Richard Hames. And my own understanding is that a committee meeting of those involved, including independent MPs and other figures from the wider movement, yesterday voted in favour of a Sultana-Corbyn joint ticket. This was perhaps not what some in the former Labour leader’s team would have liked but hey, that’s democracy baby. 

Now, it could also be that Sultana’s announcement came sooner than expected, with the Guardian reporting that the timing hadn’t been agreed. After all, the new party doesn’t yet seem to have a website, or even a name. But it could also be that the space-time continuum can only sustain so many meetings, consultations and concessions before action insists. Either way, Sultana appears to have seized the moment in a move that is kind of admirable. Not just for its boldness, but for its killer timing too. 

There was no better day than Thursday, the eve of the one year anniversary of Labour’s electoral victory, to part ways permanently with a party that pleases no one but BlackRock. And no better gift than a week in which the Labour government managed to humiliate itself over a pointlessly cruel and half-failed welfare bill, while alienating those millions who don’t want genocide, do want free speech, or both – by trying to proscribe Palestine Action. 

Those Labour betrayals have provided the ideal platform for both Corbyn and Sultana to set out, often passionately, an alternative model of government both in parliament and out. Both are aided by the parliamentary security of solid constituency majorities largely built on personal connection with local voters. And nationally they could unite millennial and older leftists with the scores of much younger women increasingly desperate to prevent a politics that resents their freedoms and accomplishments.  

Recent More in Common polling shows that a Corbyn-led party would also enjoy a 10% share of the vote. It would take votes from Labour, knocking the party of government to level-pegging with the Tories. But others would come from the Greens. Some party members buoyed by Zack Polanski’s leadership bid, will now be worrying about what a new left party might mean for their prospects. Polanski himself has indicated a friendly attitude to the new project. That’s good. If a tent with a single pole is always smaller than one with two, then get one with three and invite everyone in. 

And a new left party will need all the friends it can get. The Telegraph has already hauled out the exhausted phrase “hard-left” to describe the endeavour. The Sun has decided it’s nothing more than a pro-Palestine party. And we all remember the concerted character assassination of 2019, when Corbyn was pilloried by every media organisation in the country, who preferred the most feckless prime minister in recent British history to a politician with an interest in moderate redistributive policies. 

It was the hope, more than anything, that killed back then. But as Sultana wrote it in her announcement, in 2029 the choice will be socialism or barbarism. Given Reform’s continuing dominance of every poll, we may be heading towards a next parliament that’s more chaotic – and even more in service to the rich – than any seen before. So I’ll go for hope, even if it hurts, rather than none.