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Everything you ever wanted to know but were afraid to ask about British politics

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Over the weekend, I asked Facebook friends to send me their questions on what’s happening in aftermath of the UK election, which resulted in a hung parliament. Below are some of their questions and a few I added to clarify a few things. Hope this helps my American readers understand British politics a bit more:

Does the Prime Minister always get to decide when to call special elections? Has this situation ever happened before?

Yes and no. Before 2010, the Prime Minister had almost sole discretion on when an election would be called. One had to be held at least every five years, but when that happened was largely down to the whims of the government of the day (led by the Prime Minister). As you may expect, this led to a lot of elections called when the government felt it was advantageous for it (such as when they’re leading in the polls) or not called unless absolutely necessary if the party in power was suffering the polls. This was the case in 1997, when the Conservatives lost power to Labour after 18 years in government.

The Fixed Terms Parliament Act 2010 was meant to change this. Brought in by the Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron, it was meant to ensure stability during the 2010-2015 Coalition Government (more on this later). It set out a fixed date for the next election, which was held in May 2015. The next subsequent election was not due until May 2020. However, there was a provision in the Fixed Terms Parliament Act which allowed for the dissolution of Parliament – necessary for the calling of another election – if there was a vote of no confidence in the government of the day or if the Prime Minister requested dissolution.

Theresa May requested a dissolution of Parliament in April, setting the date for the next election as 8 June. As she was not the leader of the Conservative Party in 2015 (that was David Cameron, who resigned last year following the Brexit vote), some argued she was seeking a mandate of her own. She wanted to increase her majority to strengthen her hand when negotiating Brexit. It didn’t quite work out as well as she’d have liked though, as the Conservatives lost their majority. No one party has a majority of Members of Parliament now, which means Mrs May must seek coalition or a minority government.

What does it mean to “form a government?”
There are 650 Members of Parliament (MPs), so to have a majority a party must win at least 326 seats. There are two main parties – the Conservatives and Labour – and only they have formed a government since 1922. In the simplest of times, forming a government just means the largest party appoints people to the cabinet (as the leader of the party would be Prime Minister) and puts forward its agenda in a Queen’s Speech (we’ll get to her role later). But these are not simple times.

In 2010, like now, no one party had a majority of seats – a scenario known as a “hung parliament.” David Cameron, the leader of the Conservative Party (also known as the Tories), sought coalition with the Liberal Democrats, who held 57 seats. The Lib Dems accepted, and a coalition Conservative-Liberal Democrat government ran things until 2015, when the Conservatives secured a majority of seats and governed on their own.

Mrs May has squandered that majority, losing 13 seats and taking her party’s total to 318. The Lib Dems have ruled out another coalition – they suffered greatly for their role in the last one, losing 49 seats in 2015 – which means Mrs May needs to find another minor party to bolster her numbers. She looks set to do that with the Democratic Unionist Party out of Northern Ireland, which has 10 seats.

This is where it gets tricky, though, as the DUP really can’t join the government due to the peace agreement in Northern Ireland between the Protestants and the Catholics, but that’s another story for another day. Right now it looks like the DUP will prop up Mrs May’s government but not join it, meaning she’ll form a minority government with the understanding that she can depend on the DUP to support her agenda in most cases.

I read that Prime Minister May was going to propose something to the Queen. What is the monarchy’s involvement with the elected government (and vice versa)?

The role of the monarchy is entirely symbolic in practice yet vast in theory. Theoretically, the sovereign is an absolute monarch – all power is vested in the crown. However, the doctrine of crown-in-parliament means that whilst Her Majesty technically holds these powers, in practice and custom they are exercised by Parliament and the government (which consists of MPs – even the Prime Minister is an MP). This goes back hundreds of years in a system that has largely haphazardly developed. Britain has no written constitution, like the United States, so its democracy functions largely on customs and a body of separate laws collectively referred to as “the constitution.”

Because these powers are technically the Queen’s, she must invite someone to form a government in her name. She does this to whoever wins the most seats. Mrs May won the most seats (even if she didn’t secure a majority), so by custom she has the first shot to form a government. She went to see the Queen to be invited to form a government. If Mrs May can’t form a government (that is, get enough support to get through her agenda, laid out in a Queen’s Speech), then the second-place Labour Party could try to form a minority government and get enough votes to pass its Queen’s Speech. If no party can get their Queen’s Speech passed, another election will be held.

What is a Queen’s Speech?

The Queen’s Speech is essentially the ruling party’s agenda. It is a set of proposed laws the new government hopes to pass. During the state opening of Parliament, the Queen travels to the Palace of Westminster (where the House of Commons and House of Lords both convene) and, from the House of Lords, delivers a speech written by the party seeking to form a government. She has no political input (though could have some stylistic critiques, since she’s the one who has to say the damn thing). Why does the Queen, and not the Prime Minister, give this speech? Because the powers are actually the Queen’s, even if they are exercised by the Prime Minister and Parliament, so she’s telling the Lords, the Commons, and the country what she is instructing her government to do – even though it’s the government telling the queen what to tell them to do.

The state opening of Parliament and the Queen’s Speech is surrounded by a lot of really complicated pomp and circumstance. C-SPAN typically airs it live, and I encourage you all to watch it, because it really is a sight to behold. We have nothing like it in the United States.

Could the Queen step in and stop the nonsense or deny any requests?

No she could not. Okay, technically she could – all these powers are hers in theory – but if she did you can bet that parliament and the people would vote to abolish the monarchy. Her Majesty is actually quite committed to democracy and the constitution, so the thought of intervening in the business of parliament would appall her.

The best example of this happening is actually not in Britain, but in Australia, where Elizabeth II is also the Queen (represented by a Governor General, since she lives in London and not Canberra). In 1975 the Governor General dismissed the Australian Prime Minister because of political instability in the House of Representatives and Senate (think Commons and Lords in Britain). This was the greatest constitutional crisis in Australian history, and Her Majesty refused to be drawn into it.

What are the main belief systems of each party (and dot he ones with similar sounding names have similar beliefs/policies – ie is the UK Conservative Party similar to an American conservative)?

There are two main parties in the UK: the Conservatives (aka the Tories) and Labour. The Conservatives are capitalists, whilst Labour consists of varying shades of socialism (from democratic socialism akin to Bernie Sanders to some out-and-out Trotskyites). In the middle of this is the Liberal Democrats, which formed from the merger the Liberal Party and the Social Democratic Party, which had broken off from the Labour Party. It is more of a centrist party.

Then you have several smaller parties. The Scottish National Party, Plaid Cymru (the Party of Wales), and the Green Party all have MPs and are all centre-left to varying degrees. If Labour were to form a minority government, they would rely on these three parties.

There are only two parties with seats from Northern Ireland: Sinn Fien and the before-mentioned DUP. Sinn Fien is a left wing Irish nationalist party, mostly identified with Catholics in Northern Ireland. The DUP is a far-right unionist party backed by Northern Irish protestants.

If you want to get into who analogous parties, the Conservatives are probably closer to moderate Democrats than they are Republicans. Labour is probably closer to Bernie Sanders or the US Green Party, though current leader Jeremy Corbyn is far to the left of either of these parties. The Liberal Democrats are probably more like Barack Obama, though some Obama advisors have also advised the Conservative Party.

Who believes in LGBTQ equality, women’s rights, racial equality?
All of the main parties would tell you yes, they support a broadly socially progressive agenda. The Conservatives haven’t always been great on LGBT equality, initially opposing it and passing some of the most homophobic laws in modern British history. However, over the past decade – particularly under the leadership of David Cameron – they became much more progressive, supporting the Labour government’s bringing in civil partnerships in the mid-2000s and later introducing marriage equality under Cameron. However, the majority of Conservative backbenchers (that is, Members of Parliament not in government) voted against equal marriage, so whilst the Conservative-led coalition government introduced the bill, it passed only because of support from the other parties.

Most Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) voters favour the Labour Party, though there is growing support from BME voters for the Tories. Theresa May, as Home Secretary, was critical of racial profiling in policing, even as her own government was accused of Islamophobia through its anti-terror Prevent programme.

The fact is that race doesn’t really play as large a role in UK politics as it does in the US, though many BME people think it should. This is down to the relatively recent influx of a significant number of BME people (from the mid-20^th century to now) and the entrenched class system. British politics is getting more intersectional, but it has a long way to go.

None of the main parties oppose abortion access, though Labour would be more likely to relax abortion law than the Tories. Labour has introduced all-women shortlists for parliamentary candidates, which the Tories haven’t, yet the Tories have produced both female Prime Ministers. On economic issues that effect women, such as childcare and pay equality, the Tories have faced a lot of criticism from feminist activists, but Labour has also been accused of having a sexist culture in its far-left reaches.

Now let’s talk about the DUP – who register as important since Mrs May is looking to rely on them to govern. They are anti-gay marriage, anti-choice, refuse to meet or work on Sundays, believe in creationism and deny climate change. So it’s kind of like if the state of Alabama became a political party. There are lots of people, including the leader of the Scottish Conservative Party (who is an out lesbian), expressing serious reservations about any deal – yet it looks to be the only way Mrs May can hang on.
Does ideology split parties there?

As discussed, the Conservatives are capitalists and the Labour party are socialists. So ideology has a much starker impact on the parties in the UK than it does in the US, where both major parties are capitalist.

This all seems really convoluted. Isn’t our system simpler?

Those in glass houses really shouldn’t throw stones. A minority of voters elected Donald Trump because of our Electoral College, which to British voters seems just as maddening as the parliamentary system seems to many Americans. And when you look at how gerrymandered many of our districts are, it becomes difficult to argue that the American system as it currently exists is more democratic.

What happens next?

Right now no one knows. Theresa May met with her backbenchers earlier today, and she’s still trying to finalise any deal with the DUP. It does look likely that Theresa May will form the next government and continue on with a minority government, but her position looks increasingly untenable. She may well be gone by Christmas, with another top Tory politician taking her place as Prime Minister.

If you have any other questions, leave them in the comments below and perhaps I’ll do another blog.

Skylar Baker-Jordan writes the blog The Curious American. A contributing editor at The GayUK Magazine, Skylar writes about British and American politics and society for an array of publications, including the Independent and Huff Post UK. He is based in Chicago but makes frequent trips to London, where he hopes to relocate soon.

Skylar’s Naughty and Nice List 2016

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2016-naughty-and-nice

Santa’s not the only one who makes a naughty and nice list. So while you all are celebrating Christmas Eve Eve, I’ve been making my list, checking it twice, and drinking some bourbon on ice. While the naughty list has certainly outpaced the nice list, I was still able to wrangle up five nice people, and narrow it down to five of the naughtiest motherfuckers of the year.

Folks, a holiday tradition continues. Here are my naughty and nice lists for 2016.

naughty

5. Robby Mook

This should have been the year that made Robby Mook. The first openly gay person to run a presidential campaign, it looked like his candidate, Hillary Clinton, had the 2016 election in the bag. But a series of fatal body blows (Russian interference, the FBI – more on that later) proved too much to overcome. Even so, the Bernie Sanders’ staffers were warning the Clinton campaign that the Blue Wall of the Rust Belt was about to be breached, and instead of doubling down in states like Ohio and Wisconsin, he sent operatives to Georgia, Arizona, and Iowa. The campaign called me in September asking me to go to the latter, even though I insisted I was of better use in Wisconsin or Ohio. They didn’t think so, and insisted I go to Iowa. This loss wasn’t all Mook’s fault, but the low margin of victory for Trump in the crucial states we lost shows that just a little more effort and a little less arrogance could have prevented the greatest political emergency since the Civil War. And the buck stops with Mook, who should’ve fucking known better.

4. Nigel Farage

I blame Nigel Farage for literally every bad thing that happened this year. I’m not kidding: I got a hangnail today and blamed the bastard for it. It’s no secret that Nigel hates immigrants, isn’t particularly fond of gay people, and thinks Marine Le Pen is the Thatcher to his Reagan (though I hesitate to use that analogy cos Thatcher and Reagan don’t deserve to be so besmirched). But his Leave.EU campaign, which wasn’t even the official campaign, was on another level of racist trolling. His infamous “Breaking Point” poster had to be reported to the police for stoking racial animus, and earlier this week he made the most despicable comment about Brendan Cox, the widower of MP Jo Cox, who was assassinated by a right-wing extremist many believe was inspired by Farage’s campaign. After the tragic terrorist attack in Berlin, Farage blamed German Chancellor Angela Merkel for the deaths of 12 victims. Brendan Cox tweeted at him that blaming politicians for terrorism is a “slippery slope,” to which Farage gallingly replied on LBC that Brendan would know more about extremism than he did. It was a tasteless, low blow against a grieving husband, but it summarises everything vile about Nigel Farage. While Jo is in Heaven, there’s a special place in Hell for this unimaginable bastard.

3. The Trump Kids (Donald Trump, Jr.; Ivanka Trump; Jared Kushner; Eric Trump; Tiffany Trump)

How Donald Trump, Jr loves his father is beyond me. A story that circulated in the press earlier this year told of how his father once smacked him in front of his entire college dorm because he was wearing a baseball jersey, and not a suit, to a baseball game. The Trump kids all look like vampires with Stockholm syndrome, but the fact that they smiled and nodded as their father talked about banning Muslims and deporting the parents of American citizens was beyond the pale – and being beyond the pale is no mean feat for these pasty ass White Walkers. I hope every gay man in America gets a chance to scream at Ivanka over the next four years. I eagerly await my turn.

2. The Trump Minions: Stephen Bannon, Kellyanne Conway, Paul Manafort, Cory Lewendowski

Let’s just get it out of the way: Kellyanne Conway looks like a Stepford Wife and talks like one, too. Corey Lewandowski is a real life Lex Luthor who you just know punched that journalist. Paul Manafort is Putin’s butt buddy; he’s licked so much Russian ass that he’s basically starred in a scat porn. And Steve Bannon is the personification of human trash, literal garbage who should’ve been thrown out in 1965 along with his white supremacist ideology. These twats – and I’m sorry, there’s really no other word for it – got Trump to where he is now. In doing so, they’ve legitimised hate and brought America to the cusp of authoritarian klepocracy, meaning that whilst they get to line their pockets over the next four years, the rest of us are going to have to “bow down” to President Trump, as Conway once said. Seriously fuck them and everyone who loves them. Assuming we don’t all perish in a nuclear holocaust, I look forward to popping champagne when each of these asshats dies.

1. James Comey

Fuck James Comey. I will go to my grave cursing his name. In the most blatantly political move an FBI director has made since J Edgar Hoover tapped Martin Luther King, Jr’s phones, Comey sent a letter to Congress days before the election saying he had new e-mails that were of interest in the Clinton e-mail investigation (they weren’t; he lied) but told the White House not to mention Russian hacking to “avoid looking partisan.” This from the son-of-a-bitch who didn’t even bother having the FBI investigate it when known Russian hackers were in the process of hacking the DNC, instead calling their front desk like it was some goddamn courtesy call and not an attack on American democracy. This man wanted Trump to be president, or maybe he just didn’t want Clinton, I don’t know. But he used his position to undermine the American election and, as far as I’m concerned, is a goddamn traitor to his country. BURN. IN. HELL. Seriously, if you didn’t already have plenty of reasons to hate and distrust the FBI, now you do. James Comey is the devil. (James, I’m sure this will make a good addition to my file.)

Dishonourable mentions: Jill Stein; Pat McCrory; Vladimir Putin

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5. Ana Navarro

I don’t think there has been a more vocal, or more effective, #NeverTrump voice than Republican strategist Ana Navarro – who crossed party lines to vote for Hillary Clinton because she’s a patriotic American and decent fucking person. Throughout the year, she has read for filth and dragged Trump supporters for their unabashed infatuation with a misogynistic, racist, demagogue. Never was this better displayed than when she told CNN Contributor and Trump acolyte Scottie Nell Hughes (whom Saturday Night Live correctly identified as a “full blown nut job”) that she would say pussy if she damn well pleased since the candidate Hughes loved so much was allowed to say it. Ana Navarro was a badass all year, and she had remained a staunch critic of that vile man. Her voice will be one of the most important in the resistance, and she is sure to continue speaking her mind and inspiring those of us who still love this country and all it stands for.

4. Kate McKinnon

I was in Sheffield, England for the election. Being away from friends and family who understood the anguish I felt was difficult. I felt like I was living through a national tragedy by myself, until Kate McKinnon beautifully sang “Hallelujah” as Hillary Clinton. Watching it, I broke down in tears at a pub as I watched McKinnon-as-Clinton sing the mournful melody in her white pantsuit. Throughout the year, the out lesbian has proven an inspiration to young women and young LGBT people and has delivered some of the most memorable comedy in a generation. She deserved her Emmy, but her post-election cold open will be what she is forever remembered for.

3. Anna Soubry

Like the American Ana on my list, Anna Soubry has been battling the forces of bigotry for the soul of her party all year. A vocal Remainer, Soubry hasn’t backed down since the referendum, trying to temper the far-right voices within her own ranks, calling out the racism and bigotry being espoused by so many, and championing the cause of liberal democracy at a European level. She has had Nigel Farage’s Leave.EU criticise her appearance, had threads of assassination, and seen her attempts to make sure Britain doesn’t fuck itself over with a Hard Brexit all but rebuffed by the Prime Minister, Theresa May. I’m no Tory, but I have nothing but respect for Anna Soubry and the fact that she’s stuck by her principles and championed a more enlightened, internationalist approach.

2. Michelle Obama

Jesus Christ, will I miss our First Lady when she’s off the public stage. For eight years she has personified grace, classiness, and humility. No First Lady in American history has been as simultaneously glamourous and accessible as Michelle Obama. This year, her barnstorming speeches in favour of Hillary Clinton, whether her speech at the Democratic convention where she coined the most memorable phrase of the year (“when they go low, we go high”) to her amazing speech against the misogyny of Donald “grab ‘em by the pussy” Trump were the most important and memorable of the election cycle. Michelle Obama has come out swinging as a champion for girls and women, and while she has said she’ll never run for office, I am sure her advocacy will continue. She spoke for millions of Americans when she told Oprah that this is how it feels to live without hope, and it’s a shame that just when we need her most she’s losing her biggest platform. But I do have a little hope: that Michelle Obama will emerge as a sane, logical voice of the American resistance.

1. Jo Cox and Lily Jayne Summers

Where to start? The Labour Party lost two of its brightest rising stars this year. Jo Cox, who famously believed we have more in common than we do that separates us, was brutally assassinated leaving a surgery in June, just days before the EU referendum. Her death caused me to exclaim “Jesus, no!” in the middle of our Chicago office. It was a blow to decency in politics, and a blow to her two precious children and her lovely husband, Brendan. Lily, who passed away earlier this month, was one of my dearest friends and the founder of Britain Elects, the preeminent British poll aggregator. Both Jo and Lily represented what’s best about Labour: a stalwart desire to help not just those at home in Britain, or those with whom they agreed, but everybody everywhere. Both of them had spirits which touched the world and changed the lives of those who knew them. Lily told me, after the election, that I shouldn’t give up on America because working class people need me. Jo believed that no gulf was too big to bridge and that no bridge, whether between Brexiters and Remainers (and I’m sure that would extend to Trump and Hillary) was too difficult to build. As we finish this year, I take the lessons both of them taught us to heart and try to internalise the love and goodwill the spread everywhere they went. Jo and Lily will be sorely missed for the rest of our days. We were blessed to have them with us. And I, at least, was blessed to know one of them personally.

Honourable mentions: Joy Reid; Khizr and Ghazala Khan; Katy Tur

Whatever list you find yourself on, I hope you have a very Happy Christmas and a blessed New Year.

In memory of Lily Jayne Summers

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Image: Lily Summers/Facebook

My friend died.

Though I’ve said these words aloud many times in my 30 years on this earth, it never gets easier. So when Alex told me that Lily had passed away, and Pink News confirmed my worst fears, I went numb.

Lily Jayne Summers was an incredible human being. If you knew her, you knew warmth, compassion, and humour. If you didn’t, gee, did you miss out on knowing someone amazing. Lily was the kindest, most decent person I knew. The outpouring of grief on British political Twitter, regardless of party, speaks volumes. Lily was a young woman who judged people based on their personalities, not politics. She sought not to languish over our divisions, but to find commonality. A stalwart Labour activist and prospective council candidate in Swansea, she was still willing to not only work with, but befriend and love, people from across the political spectrum.

Lily first came into my life over three years ago. She, and her dear friend Ben, were running an upstart political commentary site called The Columnist. I asked if I could contribute, and she agreed. Lily was still a teenager; I was a recently-made-redundant 27-year-old looking to start a new career. I didn’t believe in myself, but this teenage girl gave me a chance because she saw something in me I didn’t see in myself. It was Lily that encouraged me, promoted my work, and has led me to where I am today. Without her, I would not have a career.

Beyond that, though, Lily was a friend. In the early part of 2014, when I was too depressed to get off the couch and spent months on end in my apartment, Lily talked to me, counselled me, and never judged me. She understood. She routinely checked up on me, making sure I was eating, I wasn’t drinking too much, and that I was looking for jobs. Lily, the teenager, saved this adult’s life.

As time went on, Lily committed herself to her studies and to Labour activism. But we never lost touch, and she never lost the compassion she is renowned for. After Trump won, Lily messaged me to make sure I was okay and to encourage me not to give up on my home country. Working class people, she said, needed me. She was that way: she always saw good in people who didn’t necessarily see good in us as LGBT people. She always believed that humans are, at their core, decent. And she sought to bridge divides that many of us thought too broad to broach.

This was no mean feat. Lily faced transphobia almost everyday of her life. She dealt with transphobic trolls in person and online. Yet she still kept faith that people were, on the whole, good and kind. Maybe they lacked understanding, she thought, but they didn’t lack compassion.

Lily Jayne Summers was unlike anyone I’ve ever known, and I can unequivocally say unlike anyone I’ll ever know again. While our epic Facebook chats will forever remain dear, and private, to me, below are some of my favourite exchanges on Twitter with her.

The start of a beautiful friendship:

@SkylarJordan You watch bbcqt? :O

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) November 14, 2013

@SkylarJordan Gosh that's disgusting.

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) November 19, 2013

When I realised she understood my sense of humour:

@SkylarJordan GOD BLESS AMERICA.

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) November 20, 2013

And then later served as tech support:

@SkylarJordan Hard-drive should look like this! pic.twitter.com/fCVGV292sF

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) November 22, 2013

Our first massive disagreement:

@SkylarJordan Get out.

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) December 4, 2013

And then our second:

@SkylarJordan @robynalice12 Since the 1990s. When did the LGB community ask whether trans people wanted to be involved?

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) December 26, 2013

When she low-key shaded our friend Ben Pelc:

@SkylarJordan @screwlabour OH NO! Cis is on there! STOP LABELLING PEOPLE IT'S WRONG.

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) January 2, 2014

Our third massive disagreement:

@SkylarJordan But that still doesn't make the monarchy, or rather the Queen/King democratic.

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) February 6, 2014

We were soon back on the same page though

@_Lilykins Your articles. Not Russia's invasion of the Ukraine.

— Skylar Baker-Jordan (@SkylarJordan) March 3, 2014

Oh and there was that time she totally draaaaged Robyn for her Bieber fever

@SkylarJordan @robynalice12 pic.twitter.com/ey8lJIX68k

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) March 20, 2014

Still, she understood thirst:

@SkylarJordan @robynalice12 pic.twitter.com/ey8lJIX68k

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) March 20, 2014

And held us accountable:

@SkylarJordan US is worse, imho. Trans people aren't allowed to serve in the US army.

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) May 8, 2014

Without lowering standards:

@SkylarJordan long as they're strong enough for it. And we shouldn't allow basic requirements to be lowered solely for woman, imho.

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) May 8, 2014

I mean this was not a woman who suffered fools gladly:

@SkylarJordan I would be more concerned if the LGB community had not sold out the T community on same-sex marriage for England & Wales.

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) May 29, 2014

Lily was not a woman who was afraid to set the record straight:

@SkylarJordan 1) she voted the 1998 Iraq Bill. 2) The King Forced Attlee to hold an election in 1951. 3) A King has dismissed a PM…

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) June 4, 2014

Though never say she didn’t cross party lines:

@SkylarJordan @missrobynalice @screwlabour Tories are always the sexy ones.

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) June 7, 2014

Always a good friend:

@SkylarJordan *offers hug*

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) July 4, 2014

Even if she was a hashtag opportunist:

@SkylarJordan Needs more anti-Monarchy tweets.

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) October 3, 2014

Though she was always there to lend a helping hand:

@SkylarJordan And if you ever need any help, I'm always here. ❤

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) January 1, 2015

While smacking me with truth:

@SkylarJordan "marriage equality" hasn't been achieved btw, there's discrimination against trans ppl in that "equality".

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) May 8, 2015

Yet still speaking truth to power:

@SkylarJordan @PeterTatchell @ukiplgbt Didn't Peter say transphobes deserve the right to have a platform?

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) June 9, 2015

Something we can’t forget about Lily is how anti-Corbyn but pro-Labour she was:

@SkylarJordan @susanp_80 @philmeinn Maybe so. But given Corbyn has rebelled 300+ times, I don't see why other Labour MPs can't.

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) September 14, 2015

@SkylarJordan @susanp_80 @philmeinn I'm against any immediate coup. Corbyn deserves 18 months and if he isn't good enough, then…

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) September 14, 2015

She never lost her charm, though:

@SkylarJordan @mrgarethm So are you. ❤

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) October 9, 2015

Until she supported Sanders, haha:

@SkylarJordan Sanders' record isn't perfect. But it's much better than Clinton's.

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) February 10, 2016

@SkylarJordan I'm not writing off anyone. But the idea of a politician opposing SSM until 2013 is a liberator of gay rights is hilarious.

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) February 10, 2016

@SkylarJordan and when she inevitably beats Sanders, I hope she destroys her GOP opponent.

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) February 10, 2016

I wish she had, Lily. 😦

Back to her principles:

@SkylarJordan @SamDoesPolitics Personally, I wouldn't want any cis politician using the blue and pink flag as their own.

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) July 31, 2016

Let Mitt Romney never forget how she felt about him:

@SkylarJordan The amount of politicians who are willing to sell their soul is remarkable.

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) November 30, 2016

And never forget her last tweet to me, and to America:

@SkylarJordan Plus, freedom should be defended against the GOP's authoritarian views. x

— Königin Lily 🇩🇪 (@MissLilySummers) November 30, 2016

I love you, Lily.

Yes, right-wing extremism killed Jo Cox

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Image: Flickr.com/ Garry Knight

This has been our septimana horribilis. On Sunday, we paused to mourn 49 victims of homophobic, Islamist terrorism in Orlando. As I attempted to work through my grief and put the hate in context, never did I imagine I would end the week doing the exact same thing for another brutal attack on freedom and democracy.

Yet here we are. “Oh God, no,” were my exact words when news broke that Jo Cox, the Labour MP for Batley and Spen, died following an attack by a far-right terrorist whom eyewitnesses claim shouted “Britain First!” Since then, people from across the political spectrum have eulogised Jo for the stalwart humanitarian and outstanding parliamentarian she was, and could have been.

It was hate that took 49 lives in Orlando, and it was hate that killed Jo. In the immediacy after her attack, many on the British right cautioned us not to jump to conclusions. “We don’t know why he did it,” they said, “nothing has been determined.” A man shooting a left-wing politician while shouting a far-right slogan could be purely coincidental and not at all political, they insisted, instead focusing on the alleged gunman’s mental health.

They can’t do that anymore. Yesterday in court, the suspect himself made that painfully clear. He gave his name as “death to traitors, freedom for Britain.” Whelp.

After the murder of fusilier Lee Rigby, the right-wing press, and indeed many on the British right, were quick to condemn it for what it was: an Islamist terrorist attack. The murderers made no secret of their motives, even on the witness stand. Rigby was killed by two men, at least one of whom had a long, documented history of mental illness. Coverage rarely, if ever, focused on that. Instead, “moderate Muslims” were called on to condemn the attack and to do more to root out the scourge of radicalism from their communities.

Now, in circumstances that eerily mirror Rigby’s murder, the British right finds itself in an incredible act of political contortion, trying to avoid the same treatment it gave Muslims three years ago. The fact is, the British right, particularly the Brexiters, do have something to answer for here. And it needs to be said.

No one who observes British politics, whether from within the Westminster bubble or from across the Atlantic, can sincerely say that the EU referendum hasn’t brought out the worst in people and politicians. The Brexit campaign has, from the start, been framed as a fight for the very survival of the British nation and people. “Take our country back!” they exclaim, lamenting the “swarms of migrants” coming over from Europe and beyond. To be pro-Brexit has been equated to being pro-British, and to be pro-Europe is unpatriotic.

As someone who has remained neutral in this campaign (though did argue an American and socialist case for Brexit on Radio 5), I have been appalled at the dog-whistle politics and even overt racism that has come from the Leave camp. From Farage’s “BREAKING POINT!” poster to Boris Johnson’s racist comments about Barack Obama, the Leave campaign has used white nationalist imagery and coded language throughout. Indeed, Boris’ comments about America’s “part-Kenyan” president echo those used by racists such as Donald Trump to insist Obama’s ancestry makes him un-American. Unsurprising, really, given that so many of the Brexiters feel that people with ties to foreign lands aren’t proper Brits. Not really.

This talk of losing control of the nation, of losing sovereignty, of losing national identity and security and border control, has been as jingoistic as it has been fascistic. It is a climate in which to be anything but a strident Leaver has been to be a traitor to Queen and Country. None of us exist in a bubble. You can only scare people for so long before some rogue agent takes matters into his own hands. The tone and tenor of this campaign has led to a vitriol previously unimaginable. I’ve written about British politics since 2009. I’ve seen more racism, more xenophobia, and more bigotry in the past seven weeks than in the past seven years combined. The hatefulness of the far right has hit a boiling point, and it was inevitable that someone would boil over the pot and into gunfire.

The right needs to own this. The Leave campaign needs to own it. No, not everyone on who is for Brexit is a bigot. I have many people I love dearly who sincerely believe Britain will be better off outside the EU. But the Leave campaign has not only tolerated, but embraced, this nationalistic fervour in both the cynical hope that the public will be scared enough to vote Out, and in some more nefarious instances in the sincere belief that actually, immigrants are the devil.

Some of my right-wing friends have claimed Jo Cox’s assassination is being tastelessly exploited for political gain. This is simply not true. Pointing out the political nature of the attack is not political point scoring. Correctly stating facts is not propaganda. Jo Cox was killed because she is—was—a left-wing, pro-Europe internationalist. She was killed by a far-right, anti-immigrant nationalist. These two things are not mutually exclusive. They are intrinsically and inextricably connected.

This isn’t to let my fellow leftists off the hook, either. For years we have sneered at white working class concerns, particularly over immigration. From Gordon Brown’s “bigoted woman” to true-but-tired memes castigating rural communities and small towns with few immigrants for being anti-immigrant, we’ve ceded the discourse to Nigel Farage and the far-right. If the traditional home of the working class is no longer hospitable, of course they’re going to look somewhere else.

If we dismiss their concerns as pure ignorance instead of acknowledging them and explaining an alternative view—that it’s not immigrants what done it, but years of austerity and globalisation bolstered by unmitigated free trade and lack of economic redevelopment—then it only makes sense that they would look elsewhere. It is not necessarily bigoted to be concerned over immigration, but if we don’t say that, it’s no wonder that those concerned over immigration turn to bigots.

We have poisoned this well too. From calling Tories and Tony Blair fascists to claiming Iain Duncan Smith is a murderer to the hateful misogyny directed at everyone from Stella Creasy to Liz Kendall to Priti Patel, we need to have a come-to-Jesus meeting with ourselves as well. I’m including myself in this. I have not always lived up to my own standards, something I’m quietly reflecting on. We’re not perfect. We’ve reached fever pitch, too, and it’s time for all of us to simmer down.

There’s a reason the second largest party is called the Opposition and not the enemy. As Jo herself said in her maiden speech, “we are far more united and have far more in common than that which divides us.” This week has been a tragic reminder of how fragile that unity is, and how British democracy only functions if we all approach political discourse with civility, respect, and the humanity of our opponents squarely in mind. Somehow, we’ve lost sight of that, and a brilliant young MP is dead because of it. We can’t get Jo back, but I hope to God we can get our decency back.

Skylar Baker-Jordan is journalist and cultural critic who writes about British politics and LGBT rights. His work has appeared at Salon, The Daily Dot, The Advocate, Pink News, and elsewhere. He founded The Curious American in 2013. He lives in Chicago.

Last edited 26 Sepetmber 2019

How I went from endorsing Jeremy Corbyn to voting for Hillary Clinton

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Image: Mike Davidson/Hillary for America

I love two countries. America, where I was born, and Britain, where I will die. I desperately want to see both succeed as fair, equitable, and socialist countries. There are people I love in both countries who are hurting. Cuts to benefits, the high cost of healthcare, and stagnant wages are all making life a living hell for the working classes.

When, in August of last year, I endorsed Jeremy Corbyn for the Labour leadership in a column for the Gay UK Magazine, I did so saying he had “all the electability and relevance of a Womble.” (Are you asking what a Womble is? Exactly.) Still, he was the best of an underwhelming lot, and the most anti-austerity of the bunch. So I tepidly threw support behind him.

I couldn’t imagine the overwhelming mandate that Jeremy would win. Nobody could. Registered supporters, sure. Unions, probably. But even Labour Party members voted overwhelmingly for him, something I—and no other pundit, so far as I know—predicted. Jeremy captured a zeitgeist that I felt well swept up in, myself: young urban socialists, disenchanted by Tory Austerity and Blairite “modernisation.” Many of us were young enough not to remember the bitter disputes of the 1980s, and those of us who weren’t largely fell into the camp that left (or was expelled, depending on whom you ask) by Neil Kinnock. We are angry, and we are right to be so.

Westminster voting intention:
CON: 39% (-)
LAB: 30% (+1)
UKIP: 17% (-)
LDEM: 6% (-)
GRN: 3% (-)
(via YouGov / 27 – 28 Jan)

— Britain Elects (@britainelects) January 31, 2016

But over the past few months, since Jeremy won the leadership race, I’ve seen Labour’s electoral chances nosedive. Labour is nine points down from the Tories in the latest YouGov poll. Jeremy, who we elected on an anti-austerity platform which, on the issues anyway, is largely supported by the British people, has utterly failed to turn the momentum of his campaign into any sort of tangible strategy. Instead of kitchen table issues, he’s focused on unilateral nuclear disarmament (something British voters don’t support), withdrawing from NATO (something else the British voters don’t support), and blundered on questions such as whether he’d shoot to kill a terrorist (I bloody well hope he would). No, not all of this is his fault—the media has been jarringly and unabashedly biased against him and miscreants from within the Parliamentary Labour Party, led by Simon Danczuk have been undermining his leadership since before he was elected. But the fact remains that as party leader, responsibility ultimately falls to Jeremy Corbyn, whose mismanagement thus far indicates he may be a leader in name only.

Two things have influenced my change of heart. One is this brilliant BBC documentary from the 1990s about the Labour Party in the 1980s. I’m a scholar of 1980s Britain, and I knew well how tumultuous the decade had been for the party. But hearing it from the people who lived it, speaking 20 years ago when power was within reach, and juxtaposing that to now when power is so far from us was eye-opening. We are repeating the past, and unless something changes, we will be damned in 2020 as we were in 1983.

Another is this blog by Jade Azim of the Young Fabians, widely circulated last November and succinctly titled “Sod It.” Jade, like a great many of us, was quite fed up with the Parliamentary Labour Party and, for that matter, the Twitter Labour Party, ripping into one another instead of the Tories. Unlike a great many of us, Jade had the guts to actually say something. It’s a poignant read about the disillusionment of a working class girl who became involved in politics to make changes that actually meant something. While champagne socialists natter on about Trident and defend Russia from any critique (looking at you, Seamus Milne), working class families like mine are worried about paying the rent, accessing our GP, and making sure our disability benefits—which we depend on to survive—aren’t cut by Iain Duncan Smith or a Republican-controlled Congress.

The gist of Jade’s blog can be summed up in one sentence: “give me a Blairite government over a Tory one any day. Call it ‘Red’ Tory, it’s still not bloody Tory.” Or, in other words, we have to work with the world as it is, not the world as we’d like it to be. The litmus test for politicians must be whether they deliver results, not whether they’re ideologically pure.

Which brings me to Iowa.

I can’t lie and say I haven’t long been a Hillary Clinton supporter. Those who know me know I campaigned for her in 2008. But my politics have shifted decidedly left since then, when I was still supporting the Conservative Party in the UK, and Bernie Sanders—like Jeremy Corbyn—has been a breath of fresh air. A solid candidate with democratic socialist (though not traditional socialist) credentials, he has struck a chord with the populist, left-wing contingent of the Democratic Party. Not since 2004 have I been this undecided this close to the Iowa caucuses, but with his proposals for a single-payer healthcare system (something I’ve long championed) and a return to Glass-Steagall in order to regulate Wall Street, I began to feel the Bern.

But then, Hillary Clinton said something in the last Democratic debate that struck a chord, and made me think of Jeremy Corbyn. She called herself a “pragmatic progressive,” something she’s driven home before. In a debate last year, she said “I’m a progressive, but I’m a progressive that likes to get things done.” She promises not what’s fantastic, but what’s feasible.

And on this, she has a point. Whether we like to admit it or not, the Republicans are likely to retain both houses of Congress this November. That means that whoever is elected president will have to work with Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell, and the conservative movement which has hijacked our democracy. This isn’t me being Chicken Little; it’s a fact. And as Clinton pointed out in the debate, President Obama couldn’t get a public/single-payer option through with the Affordable Care Act, and he had a majority in both houses. The fact is the American people, or at least their representatives, don’t have an appetite for it. I don’t like it any more than Bernie Sanders does, but alas, we have to work with what we’ve got.

I didn’t get into politics to debate abstract socialist orthodoxy. I got into it to help the people from whence I came, people like my friends back in Leslie County, Kentucky who are losing health insurance thanks to Governor Matt Bevan. I’d love a single-payer system in America, but it’s not going to happen. At least not now. We’re still fighting just to make sure everyone can access affordable, let alone free-at-the-point-of-access, healthcare. For my friends and family back home, Bernie Sanders talks a big game. But what about now? What can be done now? Fighting for a single-payer system sounds great until you’re dying of black lung and can’t afford your treatment. Taking principled stands on wealth redistribution are noble until a Republican president and his Republican-controlled congress cuts your Social Security Disability Insurance. Then what?

Hillary is far from perfect. She hasn’t always been great on LGBT rights, but then, neither has Bernie Sanders. And as I wrote for the Daily Dot, Hillary’s stance on the Black Lives Matter movement needs some serious work. Clinton’s record on incarceration and her links to the for-profit-prison industry are deeply troubling, and Sanders has been likewise tone deaf at times. Neither candidate has done enough to embrace this cause.

But Clinton has proven her muster on a range of issues, from reproductive justice to gun control. Her foreign policy credentials are impeccable. Yes, she voted for the Iraq war and Bernie Sanders didn’t. But one vote thirteen years ago is just not enough to prove you’re ready to be commander-in-chief. (After all, Jeremy Corbyn voted against Iraq too yet wants to negotiate a new Falklands settlement with Argentina.) Hillary has shown a deep understanding of the threats facing our country, from Daesh (ISIS) to Russia to the situation in the Taiwan Strait. She has a deep understanding of the realities of geopolitics and a longstanding commitment to human rights throughout the world. Nobody can deny this. The Republicans are still trying to make a meal out of the bones of our lost heroes in Benghazi, but her performance at the Congressional hearings prove her ability to neutralise their bogus attacks.

My heart lies with Bernie. God, would I love a Sanders presidency. But if I have to choose between a progressive reality and a socialist dream, I’m going with the former. I followed my heart with endorsing Jeremy Corbyn, and the party is in shambles. Labour has four years to course-correct, though. The Democrats have nine months. We have a straightforward choice: ideology or electability, principle or pragmatism. In both cases, I choose the latter.

That’s why I’m voting for Hillary Clinton.

This Labor Day, organised labour is more important than ever

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Image courtesy of Chicagology.

Picture it: Chicago, 1886. The soot, excrement, and brackish waves of Lake Michigan mingle as you walk through the smoky steel canyon that is the city’s industrial corridor. For months, you’ve been locked out of your job at the McCormick Harvesting Machine Company factory, fighting for an eight-hour workday and better wages; you make $9 a week working 12 hour days.

You walk down Western Ave towards Blue Island. There August Spies, a local anarchist newspaperman and activist, encourages you to “hold together, stand by [your] union” if you hope to succeed. The strike, ongoing since February, has been largely peaceful, despite some heated altercations between your striking comrades and strikebreakers working the factories. The shrill bell tolls, its brassy ring indicating another workday over. You feel those behind you pushing forward, shouting angrily at the workers leaving their shifts. “Class traitors!”

You manage to step away from the shoving crowds, your boots sinking in the mud and muck. As you’re reconstituting yourself, rubbernecking to get a better look at what’s happening near the factory gates, you hear a bang. Then another. Screams of horror and anger fill the air as the police move in. Two of your coworkers have just been killed, gunned down by the police.

The next day, you make your way to the Haymarket, a square in the city’s central business district well known to the labour movement. A light rain dampens your clothes, but not your spirits. There, Spies and others give rousing speeches about the need for solidarity and action. Mayor Carter Harrison stops by, tips his hat at you, and heads home, noting nothing unusual.

The final speaker, a British socialist, is finishing his short speech when the police arrive, ordering the crowd to disperse. A loud boom. Screaming. Gunfire. More screaming. You cover your eyes, coughing as you choke on the toxic cloud produced by the bomb. When order is finally restored, eleven people—11 cops and four workers—are dead.

The following days and weeks see protests by organised labour in New York City, Boston, London, Paris, Berlin, and throughout the world. 1 May becomes International Workers’ Day, except in America, where its associations with socialism and anarchy prompt campaigners to move the celebration to the first Monday in September.

This was the Haymarket Affair. In the ensuing trial and conviction, now widely condemned as a sham, would see four men, including Spies, executed. Though they may have died, the movement lived on. Labour historians consider the Haymarket Affair the genesis of the modern workers’ movement.

Today is Labor Day in the United States, a day traditionally seen as the last day of summer and featuring barbecues and picnics. Many people will go through today blissfully unaware of the struggles of our ancestors, who fought to ensure we had a fair shake and loud voice in our workplaces and in the market. Many of the perks modern workers have come take for granted—an eight-hour workday, overtime pay, vacation or holiday time, sick leave, maternity and paternity leave—are the result of decades worth of struggles and fights by labour activists, socialists, feminists, and others. We stand on the shoulders of giants.

Yet the work is not over. Yesterday, The Independent reported on the British government’s plan to crack down on union organising and demonstrating. Liberty, Amnesty UK, and the British Institute of Human Rights have accused the government of “seeking to undermine the rights of all working people” in their plan to require striking workers to identify themselves to police and receive authorisation form the authorities before taking any industrial action. Considering anonymity in striking is what helps protect workers’ jobs and alleviate concerns of retribution, the proposed changes to trade union laws are a galling attack on the gains our foremothers and forefathers fought so hard to achieve.

In America, Yahoo! CEO Marissa Mayer has sparked a national conversation about maternity and paternity leave after refusing to take all she is entitled to under a company policy she herself implemented. American ranks at the bottom of the Western world for paid parental leave—as in we’re the only Western country that doesn’t require it.

The United States is also the only Western nation that doesn’t require employers to offer paid vacation. When they do offer it, many Americans won’t take the time, for fear of losing their jobs or being overlooked for a promotion or wage. Vacations are good for workers and companies, resulting in a recharged and reenergized workforce. Yet nearly 1-in-four Americans get no paid time off.

You’d think with all these extra hours, American incomes would be at an all-time high. Quite the opposite: Americans work longer hours and retire later than any of their Western counterparts, and for a much smaller share of the profits of their labour. In 2011, Mother Jones pointed this out in a biting indictment of an article. It was updated only a few days ago to show its relevancy remains. Though the authors tackle a number of topics, from speedups to offshoring, the most glaring fact is in just how much wealth we’ve redistributed to the top:

For 90 percent of American workers, incomes have stagnated or fallen for the past three decades, while they’ve ballooned at the top, and exploded at the very tippy-top: by 2009, the wealthiest 0.1 percent were making 6.4 times as much as they did in 1980 (adjusted for inflation). And just to further fuel your outrage, that 22 percent increase in profits? Most of it accrued to a single industry: finance.

Despite not reaping the fruits of their labour, GOP presidential hopeful Jeb Bush thinks we should work even longer. The average American in full-time employment is working 47 hours per week, reversing the historic victories the labour movement fought so hard to win, yet they are hardly seeing any of the reward.

We haven’t seen mass industrial actions in the United States like we’ve seen in the United Kingdom, where workers on the London Underground have walked out over the introduction of overnight train services. They fear this will result in longer hours for the same amount of pay, taking away from their hard-won work/life balance. The trade union movement has helped propel left-wing candidate Jeremy Corbyn to frontrunner status in the Labour Party’s leadership contest, despite changes to party policy designed to weaken their influence. And while the government continues to undermine and attack the unions, they remain an integral part of British industry.

Quite the different story here. The Huffington Post reports that union memberships are at historic lows, and lays the widening wealth gap squarely at the feet of anti-union legislation and policies. “Unions, whatever their failings, give workers more leverage to demand higher wages,” they write, pointing out that income inequality has grown as unions have disappeared. Right-to-work laws, a name which sounds good but masks its ugly true intentions, severely limit unions’ ability to collectively organise and negotiate.

Studies cited by Newsweek, which in May had an excellent analysis of how the assault on unions is hurting American workers suggest that since passing a right-to-work law Michigan has lost 48,000 union workers; nationwide, right-to-work has shrank union membership by nearly ten percent. But right-to-work laws aren’t just detrimental to unionised employees. They hurt non-union employees, too:

According to research from the Economic Policy Institute, wages in right-to-work states are 3.1 percent lower—or about $1,560 less per year—than those in states without right-to-work laws. The rate of employer-sponsored health insurance is 2.6 percentage points lower in right-to-work states, and the rate of employer-sponsored pensions is 4.8 percentage points lower.

As unions continue to disappear, Groups like Fight for $15, which advocates raising the minimum wage, are seeing some successes at local and state levels, but they cannot replace the grassroots role local unions played in protecting and gaining workers’ rights. And as American workers continue to work more for less pay, the role of organised labour in this country is only growing in importance.

Picture it: Chicago, 2015. 129 years after the Haymarket incident sparked a global movement, the cradle of organised labour is run by a union-busting mayor who is pals with an outright anti-union governor. Mayor Rahm Emanuel has routinely squared off against the Chicago Teachers Union, which along with the Amalgamated Transit Union locals, the Service Employees International Union, and other labour groups opposed his re-election this past spring.

Other unions, from pipe fitters to hospitality workers, backed the mayor. But with Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner, a Republican billionaire elected last November, backing right-to-work laws and actively declaring war on trade unions in the state, solidarity is more important than ever. One study suggests Illinois could lose 200,000 union jobs if Rauner gets his way, causing the state’s economic output to decrease by $1.5 billion.

Yet Robber barons such as Rauner and Emanuel continue to pursue these disastrous, unfair, classist policies. In Britain, the government continues its assault or organised labour even as the trade unions begin to fight back. Meanwhile Americans work harder and longer for less pay and benefits than their parents or contemporaries elsewhere in the industrialised world. From paid parental leave to the fight for a living wage, American workers continue to be exploited by big businesses making record profits off their backs.

This Labor Day, as we’re barbecuing and day drinking, it’s important to remember the women and men who earned us this day. But it’s even more important to recognise the ways in which corporatists in both this country and abroad are conspiring to undermine and erode workers’ rights.

Nearly 130 years is long enough. Our work has value. It’s time we’re treated like it.

Why Labour Lost

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After leading his party to an unexpected and blistering loss, Labour leader Ed Miliband resigned on Friday. Photo: The Daily Star

It has been two days since Britain voted, delivering a shocking victory for David Cameron and the Conservatives. Defying the odds—and literally every poll—the Tories won a clear majority of seats in the House of Commons and will, when Parliament convenes later this month, form a majority government. It appears the pundits, myself included, were far too quick to ring the death knell of the old system. The exit polling, showing the Tories as the biggest party, was so far from the polls running up to election day that nobody—even Tory activists—believed it. If it was right, Paddy Ashdown promised David Dimbleby, he’d eat his hat. Alastair Campbell said he’d eat his kilt.

On last night’s Question Time, both did just that. The rest of us are just eating a lot of crow.

It was supposed to be neck and neck, with many speculating that while the Tories might in fact win the most seats, neither the Conservatives nor Labour would claim a majority and the numbers would favour Ed Miliband forming a government and walking into Downing Street. That didn’t happen (to put it mildly), and those of us on the left are now trying to figure out what went so very wrong.

There are some, like Tony Blair, who were warning even before the election that Labour was running too far to the left. “I am convinced the Labour Party succeeds best when it is in the centre ground,” Mr Blair told The Economist last month. He warned this election could be one “in which a traditional left-wing party competes with a traditional right-wing party, with the traditional result,” which, as Mr Blair defines it, is a Conservative victory. On that, at least, he was proven correct. Similarly, in a post being widely circulated on Twitter (from what I’ve seen, at least, mostly by Tories), Ian Leslie offers a similar analysis: “given that the last time Labour won an election without Tony Blair was 1974 it’s hard to believe people still think the answer is to move left.”

But people still do. When I spoke to Nancy Taaffe, the TUSC candidate who challenged Labour’s Stella Creasy in Walthamstow, she made it clear that, in her mind, Labour had abandoned the left to their own detriment. “The Labour Party is no longer a socialist party,” she told me, adding that “allegiances to Labour are fragmented.” Ms Creasy won the constituency with a commanding majority, receiving nearly 10,000 more votes than her nearest challenger. Ms Taaffe only received 279 votes. That’s not a ringing endorsement for old-school British socialism, and actually makes Mr Blair’s words last month eerily prophetic, especially given that so many people labelled Mr Miliband as a “marxist” hellbent on renationalising everything from the trains to the air.

This simply isn’t true, as Amit Singh points out in The Indepenent (a supposedly left-wing paper which actually endorsed a continuance of the ConLib coalition). While I don’t agree with everything Mr Singh writes, once particular excerpt does speak to this myth that Labour lost by running too far to the left: “Some regional MPs who are on the backbenches might push a genuine pro-workers stance in parliament. But any Labour MP with any ambition knows to vote with the party, and the party line is pro-business, pro-austerity, pro-war and definitely not pro-ordinary people.”

Even Tim Stanley, who can never really be accused of being a socialist, leftist, or even Blairite, sees the problem. Labour’s “neoliberal policies alienated the base in the long-run and – crucially –left the party without a narrative,” he writes in the Telegraph.

Mr Singh points out that sharing a stage—and an entire campaign against independence—with the Tories devastated Labour in Scotland, which is echoed by James Bloodworth over at Left Foot Forward. “The toxicity attached to the Tories in Scotland transferred to Labour” when they decided to campaign alongside, rather than apart from, the Conservatives, Mr Bloodworth writes. This echoes what Nancy Taaffe told me earlier this week. The vast majority of Labour MPs voted for an additional £30 billion in cuts in January, she says, which in Scotland meant a “betrayal – I mean all around Scotland now they’ve got stickers saying ‘Red Tories.’”

Let’s be clear, though. Even if Labour had taken every seat in Scotland, they still wouldn’t have a majority. It needed England, particularly key marginals in the North, where the party performed woefully. “The great surprise of the night,” George Eaton writes at the New Statesman, “was not Labour’s performance in Scotland (which was merely as terrible as forecast) but its performance in England and Wales.” Crucially, he points out that the party is bleeding support across the spectrum (the SNP in Scotland, the Greens and UKIP in England and Wales), and there is “no obvious strategy to address them all.”

We’ll return to this point later, because I think there is an obvious strategy. But first we must address the purple elephant in the room, which is UKIP. It was generally assumed Nigel Farage’s party would take votes from the Conservatives, but as it turns out, UKIP crushed Labour in key northern marginals. I don’t often quote the Daily Mail, but I think the Mail was spot on in its assessment of UKIP’s ultimate legacy in the 2015 election, at least in terms of actual votes:

“…by far (UKIP’s) most significant achievement was an entirely unexpected one. Instead of hammering the Tories, UKIP managed to take votes from Labour in a string of marginal seats across England, leading to a string of disastrous losses for Ed Miliband.”

Many of us on the left – and I’m humbly including myself here – have for years dismissed UKIP voters as racists, morons, and likely to be more supportive of the EDL than EDMil. As it turns out, again, we couldn’t have been more wrong. What makes this even worse is that we repeatedly warned. Just google “working class UKIP.” You turn up this. And this. And this. And this, from last May, when Labour MP Michael Dugher called Nigel Farage a “phoney” and “bullshit artist” while offering no real alternative to working class voters drawn to his populist (if, I agree, phoney) rhetoric. You also turn up this, also from the Independent last year, by Chris Blackhurst:

“The one party that did historically offer (the working class) hope, Labour – the one they’d been brought up supporting – turned into something unrecognisable, into a New Labour populated by smooth graduates, not folk from the factory floor. And, as Labour continued to reign, through three election terms, it grew further apart from them and their needs.”

This cost Labour in very real terms. The Telegraph ran a feature before the election on 10 seats Labour needed to win. It’s worth looking comparing the 2010 and 2015 results. In Warwickshire North, for example, the Tories carried by 54 votes in 2010; this year UKIP claimed more than 8,000 votes, costing Labour a seat. In Thurrock, Labour needed just over 100 votes to unseat the Conservative incumbent. Instead, both Labour and the Tories lost votes to UKIP, but Labour lost more – and needed more – leading to another seat UKIP cost the party. In Hendon, the Tories increased their share of the vote over 6 per cent whilst Labour lost votes to UKIP and the Greens. The same story plays out across the country, in Sherwood, Stockton South to Broxtowe.

I get it. None of us on the left wing of the Labour Party (of which I’m loosely including myself, given I’m a foreigner) wanted to consider that we needed folks we viewed as racists and homophobes. But here we are, with five more years of Tory austerity, because instead of questioning why the working-class of this country was abandoning what was, for generations, its natural home, we derided them as bigots, just as Gordon Brown did in 2010. The same way we blamed the rising tide of Scottish nationalism for defeat north of the border instead of asking ourselves just why, exactly, Scottish Labour voters were so disillusioned.

The answer to the latter is obvious (to borrower a phrase, it’s austerity, stupid). The answer to the former – to why traditional Labour voters abandoned the party to UKIP – is more complicated. To really understand what happened there, you maybe need to look across the waters to Northern Ireland. The DUP is a socially conservative party, and a lot of their positions are quite similar to UKIP rhetoric. But they are also made up of a heavy contingent of working-class, pro-labour (small L) voters who, while socially conservative, are still at least sceptical of neoliberal economics.

They’re really not that different than disaffected Labour voters back here in England. They’re struggling, they’re hurting, and they want someone to blame. In Northern Ireland that’s gays and Catholics. In the North of England, though, Labour used to make the case it was what we now know as the 1%, bankers and toffs in the City and Westminster. Under Blair, though, Labour stopped advancing that sort of social democratic argument. Instead, it has aligned itself with big business and “the centre,” which by 1997 was further to the right than it had been in 1979 or even 1983, when Thatcher would’ve almost surely been defeated had it not been for the Falklands.

Blair wanted to win. And he did, three times. In winning those electoral victories, though, he shifted the party to the right, and while Brown and Miliband managed to drag it a bit more to the left, it wasn’t far enough.

Because despite what the pundits are saying, the financial crisis really did shift the tectonic plates of British politics. Britain is not a centre-right country. If you look at the share of the national vote each party received, it’s roughly broke even, if you consider UKIP a centre-right party and the LibDems a centre-left party, which for this purpose is safe to do since both parties draw voters from both sides of the political spectrum. (The Greens, like the SNP and UKIP, took their biggest share of the national vote in history). And looking at how that would translate in actual seats, it becomes obvious that a grand coalition of the left – which, it must be said, I publicly hoped for – would have been feasible. Yes, the Tories still would have been the biggest party, but Labour, the SNP, the Greens, Plaid Cymru, and the LibDems (which again, we’re counting as left-wing to offer some balance to UKIP) would have had more total seats combined. And if, as many Labour activists are saying, the splintering left cost them the election, this matters.

Which brings us back to George Eaton’s earlier assertion that there is “no obvious answer” to address all the issues at play in Labour’s loss. There is. Labour has to once again appeal to the working-class of this country, which means lurching to the left. Voters have shown a willingness to vote for populist rhetoric and socialist policies in all four home countries. The voters who abandoned Labour for the SNP didn’t do it because they want independence – otherwise they’d have it by now – but because they want an end to austerity. Likewise, the voters in England who turned to UKIP didn’t do it because they like austerity, but because Labour refused to – and perhaps was incapable of – presenting a clear, convincing alternative.

There is soon to be a leadership election, and if Labour has learnt anything from the last one, it will be swift and decisive. The next person to lead this party needs to have more appeal than the last (and I say that as someone who genuinely likes Ed Miliband), but they also need to be someone who can present a clear alternative to austerity and Conservative politics. That alternative needs to be informed by current leftist thinking, not old Blairite notions of what the centre is. If the fracturing of the left cost Labour the vote, which so many party activists think, it’s Labour’s own fault. To fix it, Labour needs to make amends, and they need to do it now.

Only the left can return a Labour majority in 2020. The question now is does Labour have the leader to articulately convey a leftist, populist message to voters across this country.

Time will tell, but time is running out. The next election began yesterday. If Labour wants to fix this, it needs to do it now, before any other party has the chance.

In Walthamstow, Nancy Taaffe challenges Labour from the left

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Nancy Taaffe. Image: The Socialist Party

Walthamstow, a quiet working class community in North-East London, is as safe a constituency as they come. Labour control the local council, and the party has held the seat consistently since the 1990s, and has only lost one election since 1972. In the 2010 election, Stella Creasy—widely touted as a possible future party leader and the current Shadow Minister for Crime Prevention—commanded over 50% of the vote with a nearly 10,000 vote majority. It’s perhaps not surprising, then, that the community has not heavily featured in the media’s election coverage.

But Walthamstow is a community at a crossroads. Gentrification has pushed more and more people from central London to the area, at the terminus of the Victoria Line, which is in turn pushing up housing prices and pushing out residents who for decades have called this area home. According to the Financial Times, property values increased 22.3% over the course of 2014. A new development, known as The Scene, has seen the demolition of social housing to make way for a brand new cinema, restaurants, and flats which are now priced at £500,000, according to local resident Sarah Wrack. These businesses “are not aimed at the poor people of this area,” but rather “the people they’re trying to attract,” she says.

“It’s not for the people who live here at the moment, it’s to move people in and literally move people who used to be in that social housing out.”

Sarah Sachs-Eldridge agrees, another Walthamstow resident, agrees. “It’s impossible to get a decent home in this area. All of us have difficulties with housing.”

She blames the cutting of council tax benefit and housing benefit for forcing residents out, something Ms Wrack also believes is making Walthamstow unaffordable for many of its residents. Ms Wrack grew up in Tower Hamlets, in Inner-East London, which at the time “had the highest rate of child poverty in Europe,” she says. “It was a poor place.” The redevelopment of Canary Wharf forced Ms Wrack out, something she sees being repeated now in Walthamstow. ““In an area like this, almost everyone is poor,” she says. The same process which brought her here is “being repeated, as people are forced out further and further.”

Both women were out on Monday campaigning alongside Nancy Taaffe, who agrees with their assessment of the housing crisis in the constituency. It “is an expression of accumulation of loss of council homes that have come together in a sort of economic crisis of not being able to get a job or not being able to get enough money to buy,” says Taaffe, the Trade Union and Socialist Coalition candidate challenging Ms Creasy for the seat.

TUSC was formed weeks before the 2010 general election “to enable trade unionists, community campaigners, and socialists to stand candidates against the pro-austerity establishment parties,” according to its website. They are standing in 135 parliamentary elections across the country. Bob Crow, the late National Union of Rail, Maritime, and Transport Workers (RMT) leader, was one of its founders.

“Historically the socialist party which is part of TUSC was inside the Labour party,” Ms Taaffe says, noting that the Socialist Party left Labour “just before the ascendency of Tony Blair,” a time she claims Labour was “expelling all trade unionists (and) good socialists.”

Ms Taaffe: “They purged organisationally, they pushed socialists out and then they reconstituted themselves as a neo-liberal party.”

She stood for the seat in 2010, winning less than 250 votes. But she felt it was important to stand again. “The working class is disenfranchised. It doesn’t have a socialist voice,” she says, noting that “the Labour Party is no longer a socialist party.”

Ms. Taaffe’s comments, and indeed her candidacy, are part of a broader story that has dominated this election. Britain was, for nearly a century, a largely two-party system, with the Liberal Democrats a smaller but ever-present third party. Over the past decade, though, more and more voters have become disillusioned with what they felt were false choices between the Conservatives and Labour, and have migrated to smaller parties, including UKIP and nationalist parties such as the SNP in Scotland and Plaid Cymru in Wales. In England, where nationalism lacks the cache on the left, the Green Party has largely picked up the progressive slack, with parties like TUSC emerging to carry the banner of the traditional, if dwindling, socialist agenda.

“Allegiances to Labour are fragmented,” Ms Taaffe says, “and you can see that in Scotland,” where the SNP look poised to completely wipe out Labour, which may lose more than 40 seats in the country tomorrow.

“The austerity cuts have been absolutely devastating for women and the public sector. A million jobs have gone. So in Scotland where these jobs are going, on top of its history of losing manufacturing jobs, the betrayal — I mean all around Scotland now they’ve got stickers saying ‘Red Tories,’” she says. “It’s like a perfect storm of 30 years.”

According to Ms Taaffe, it’s the same across the country, including in Walthamstow. “Labour completely controls this area. £65 million pounds worth of cuts. We’ve lost 1000 jobs to those cuts.” One of those jobs was Ms Taaffe’s. She worked for years at the local library, but was made redundant in phase 12 of the cuts.

Ms Taaffe: “When I debated with Stella, I said to her ‘I was a single parent with two children. And you call yourself a feminist… and yet you wouldn’t make a statement about us losing our jobs at the hands of your party?”

“The least you can do if you stand in the tradition of the suffragettes is to speak for the thousands of women who are losing their jobs, the women who rely on public service for social care for their families, who have been pushed back into the home. It’s been like, we would argue it’s regressive what’s happening to women, because we rely disproportionately on the services that are going. So if you’re a feminist, you’ve got to fight the cuts.

“She said ‘we can’t stand up to Eric Pickles’. Eric Pickles is a bullying conservative man.”* Mr Pickles, the Conservative Secretary for Communities and Local Government, led the coalition’s efforts to slash the budgets of local councils over the last parliament.

Earlier this year Ms Creasy, along with the majority of Labour MPs, voted with the Coalition for an additional £30 billion in cuts to benefits and services, a move which fellow Labour MP and London mayoral candidate Diane Abbott at the time called a “great disservice” to the working class.

While it is extremely unlikely Ms Taaffe will defeat Ms Creasy in tomorrow’s vote, she is looking ahead to the next battle. “We’re going to be fighting for the existence of our local hospital,” she says. “Stella (and) the local councillors are not being honest…. our local hospital is in debt to the tune of £90 million. The plan and the details of the cuts won’t be released until June, which is a month after the general election.

“It’s just an outrage. 340,000 people use the hospital.”

And though Ms Taaffe and TUSC hope that Ms Creasy and her party will fight alongside them, she is not optimistic.

“The fight now is outside the Labour Party.”

(The Curious American reached out to Stella Creasy for comment, particularly on the allegations she said she and Labour did not want to stand up to Eric Pickles, but as of the time of publication has not received a response. However, Ms Creasy did address the issue of housing with the Walthamstow Guardian: “The price of housing is driving many out of our area and leaving others in overcrowded accomodation… Only Labour is committed to building the homes that we need and ending unfair agency fees to provide a city fit for all.”)

Updated 2/12/2015: Last month, Stella Creasy responded to this piece on Twitter, asking us to remove the following statement made by Nancy Taaffe: “She said ‘we can’t stand up to Eric Pickles’. Eric Pickles is a bullying conservative man.” The Curious American wishes to to clarify this statement. Ms Taaffe repeated a quote she alleges is from Ms Creasy (‘we can’t stand up to Eric Pickles’.) This was in inverted commas and followed by a full stop, indicating an end to the alleged quote. Ms Taaffe then went on to offer her on analysis, which is that “Eric Pickles is a bullying conservative man.” Because this statement was made by Ms Taaffe, and because The Curious American reached out to Ms Creasy for comment on this specific alleged quote, we will not remove it. However, Ms Creasy has denied the comment on Twitter:

@SkylarJordan well here’s my response- those comments are categorically untrue and insulting. I’d ask you to remove given I didn’t say them?

— stellacreasy (@stellacreasy) November 23, 2015

Louise Baldock and the Case of the Shoddy Speller

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There was more bullying on Twitter last night than on an episode of “Glee.”

Just a quick word on the Louise Baldock brouhaha. See, I was actually a minor part of this skirmish, trying to be a voice of reason in an otherwise trivial melee.

It all started when a Labour campaigner tweeted something about the Tories, and the local Conservative Future group responded attacking his spelling.:

Of course, Labour supporters rallied to his support, and a massive exchange began which you can read here: https://twitter.com/CameronBrownUK/status/394499685412790272

Now, I don’t support bullying, regardless of where it comes from. Especially a classic example of classism, where lack of education, poor grammar, what have you is used to discredit an opponent’s argument. This is a basic ad hominem, used to discredit working class opinions as barely worth acknowledging, unless with derision. It’s unacceptable in the 21^st century, and it honestly makes the bully look more foolish than the victim. You don’t have a better counter than “oh nice spelling, mate?” Clever, you. I’m sold. Tories FTW. (This is where we should collectively roll our eyes.)

So then, Gareth Anderson, a Conservative councilor from somewhere or another, starts tweeting examples of Labour bullying of Tories. I tell him that yes, I’m equally appalled. The bully can strike from the right or the left. The victim is still left battered.

Anyway, this goes on for probably about an hour, before Louise Baldock tweets the following:

Isn’t it just as much a logical fallacy to label the Tories the “nasty party” (not to mention trite, tired, and redundant)? Of course it is.

Louise says she has no more to say, and that’s that. I figure the conversation is over.
Well, flash forward to this evening, and Guido Fawkes has picked up the exchange. Say what you will about Guido Fawkes, but he’s pretty clever when it comes to digging up dirt on Labour. So naturally, he found an example of Louise Baldock, who criticised the Tories as elitist for bashing someone’s spelling, doing just the same. Unbelievable.

Except that it isn’t. We shouldn’t be shocked. Political discourse on both sides of the Atlantic has fallen to septic levels. British politics have typically been a bit more vitriolic than American politics, largely due to the structure of debate being more formal and restrictive in the US Congress. But this is just outrageous. Instead of attacking one another’s policies and offering their constituents a healthy debate, the Labour PPC and her Tory opponents launched into an argument that was tantamount to “I know you are, but what am I?”

No wonder Russell Brand wants a revolution.

(Note: apologies for the crude formatting. I’m having issues with WordPress this evening.)

What do Peter Hitchens and Russell Brand have in common? They both sound like Katy Perry.

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Let’s clear one thing up: I’m American, okay? I don’t claim to be anything but. I’m prone to hyperbole. I talk with my hands. I’m loud. I’m crass. And I don’t understand the point of apologising to someone who stepped on my foot, even if it was stuck out halfway across the train carriage. Watch where you’re going, ass.

One thing all Americans do understand, though, is political turmoil. After all, much like iOS7, our government tends to unexpectedly shut down. So you can see where I could possibly understand Russell Brand and Peter Hitchens, arguing from completely opposite political plains, that the government is fundamentally broken and beyond hope. The only thing is, I don’t understand at all. For like listening to a drunk Sarah Palin talking to a stoned George Bush, it’s all just a bunch of babbling with some laughs here and there.

I’ve already taken Hitchens to task over encouraging young Brits to abandon the ship of state, which he reckoned he “ought to be pleased by.” Likewise, the Telegraph Men columnist, Caroline Kent, did a bang up job in her personal blog (which she Tweeted-so I feel alright citing here) of surmising Brand’s articulate but ultimately incoherent argument; “he is basically just spewing the contents page of the Occupy manifesto in people’s faces,” she wrote, adding that it is “hardly groundbreaking stuff.” Hear, hear.

There’s been a lot of commentary on Brand’s Newsnight interview, and I imagine the story has only just gotten its legs. Less has been written about Peter Hitchens’ comments, because let’s face it, the average Brit hardly knows (or cares) who Hitchens is. But what I haven’t seen is anybody linking their dour pessimism together.

Yes, obviously comparing the two is akin to comparing Chantelle Houghton and Katie Hopkins, but I can’t help but to think that there’s a lesson for those living in the Westminster bubble. I mean, after all, it’s not very often that you’ve got the left and the right agreeing, albeit for very different reasons, that things are, on the whole, quite crap. On last Thursday’s Question Time, David Dimbleby deadpanned that anyone conscious knows the British people are disillusioned, and Russell Brand attributes voter apathy to a betrayal by the system.

In his column for politics.co.uk, though, Phil Scullion points out that “voter apathy grows in societies which are well fed, safe and where people feel they are being dealt with by the state in a just and fair manner.” By his estimation, then, people were most content in 2001, the zenith of the Blair premiership, when voter turnout was lower than at any time since full adult suffrage was achieved. However, in the two subsequent general elections, turnout has steadily increased by two to three points. By this logic, though, people are increasingly fed up. So Brand and Hitchens are right.

According to the other star of the week, they are. I don’t want to spend an endless amount of time analyzing Sir John Major’s windfall tax proposal, but his uncharacteristicly candid foray into policy debate is, at the very least, indicative of a wider concern. “If we Tories navel-gaze and only pander to our comfort zone we will never win general elections,” he cautioned, encouraging the Conservatives to look geographically north and economically down to address the concerns of workaday Britain.

Likewise, sitting opposite Peter Hitchens-figuratively and literally-on Question Time last week was Owen Jones. “There’s a huge disconnect with politics and ordinary people,” he said, going to lambast M.P.s for the same things Sir John cautioned his own party over, recounting a conversation he once had with Hazel Blears who allegedly admitted that there was no one in the Brown government interested in housing issues. Like Sir John, Owen recognises that the average Brit feels completely alienated from their own political process and their representatives. He too sees the writing on the wall.

I’ve sung a similar refrain for some time now. A couple months ago I did an analysis of the increasing support for Ukip over the past four years, pointing out that it hit double digits for the first time in April of this year. The question I was most often asked afterward was whether Ukip was chipping away from Tory votes or Labour votes. What’s interesting isn’t my answer, but that the answer most of my inquisitors offered depended on their political persuasion; Labour blames disenchanted Tories for the Ukip rise, and the Tories think Labour’s natural constituency is moving in favour of the nationalists. Recent opinion polls show Labour’s lead narrowing, with the Tories growth marginal, so it looks like the latter is true. At least now. I imagine most of the Tories that will have already defected.

So at least to here, I agree, with both Hitchens and Brand that the British public are forlorn and weary, not of Broken Britain but of the gits in government. What I don’t agree with, though, is their rhetoric. Phil Scullion hit the nail on its succinct head: “the content delivered by Brand is so often empty populism, wrapped in linguistic window dressing.” Likewise, Hitchens’ incendiary comment that young Brits ought to emigrate before it’s too late does nothing other than garner him the ire he feeds upon. In both cases the only purpose served is fueling the flames of their own vanities.

It doesn’t raise the level of political discourse. And it certainly doesn’t offer any real alternatives to the British people. What it does do is pander to the likes of Ukip and the SNP, fringe parties which feign populist (small p) agendas but which ultimately serve nothing more than their own doctrinal desires. It’s all a bit like listening to another American that Brits (especially Russell Brand), love to hate-Katy Perry: autotuned to sound appealing, but when you strip it to its barest, is nothing more than out of tune superficiality.

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Welcome to the personal website of writer Skylar Baker-Jordan

From Washington to Westminster

Tag Archives: labour

Everything you ever wanted to know but were afraid to ask about British politics

Skylar’s Naughty and Nice List 2016

Yes, right-wing extremism killed Jo Cox

How I went from endorsing Jeremy Corbyn to voting for Hillary Clinton

This Labor Day, organised labour is more important than ever

Why Labour Lost

In Walthamstow, Nancy Taaffe challenges Labour from the left

Louise Baldock and the Case of the Shoddy Speller

What do Peter Hitchens and Russell Brand have in common? They both sound like Katy Perry.