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Goodbye to the Working Class Reg Race

Goodbye to the Working Class By Reg Race

Goodbye to the Working Class by Reg Race


$10.00
Condition - Very Good
Only 4 left

Summary

A non-fiction book about the UK Labour/Labor Party, with a strong author biographical element

Goodbye to the Working Class Summary

Goodbye to the Working Class: Social change, incompetence and sleaze push Labour to the brink by Reg Race

After 1979, Labour lost eight of the next eleven general elections. Working-class voters deserted, starting in 1970 when widespread abstention began, and the Conservatives won a majority of the working-class vote in 2019. Brexit was a consequence, and not the cause, of these massive changes. The number of manual workers, Labour's heartland vote, has collapsed and Britain is now a nation where the biggest occupational groups are shopworkers, education and NHS staff. Demographics have challenged Labour's ability to win. But that's not all. Labour's Parliamentary Party is now overwhelmingly middle class, and Labour has left the working class as the working class has left Labour. It is now a Party of Councillors and Special Advisers, with a membership dominated by the public sector middle class. Labour has been the author of its own troubles too. It failed to adapt to change in the 1970s and 80s, attacked the low paid and appeased the powerful, and at a local level is disorganised and sometimes sleazy. Its failures are structural. There is no strategic plan, sectarianism is rife, it has regular financial crises, fragile or unelectable leaders are appointed, and disastrous rule changes are made in an age when social media and the internet can disrupt politics on a daily basis. Power has been turned upside down as a consequence. Political parties matter. Badly organised, ineffective leaderships create policy failures in government, and Labour has failed to ensure a supply of its own working-class or capable candidates too. 'Goodbye to the Working Class' explains why and how this happened. It is a human story of significant consequence for our politics.

About Reg Race

Dr Reg Race joined Labour in 1963 whilst at school. His family were compositors, plumbers, cotton weavers and bleachers. He gained a Political Science BA and Ph.D from the University of Kent, contested a Canterbury City Council seat at the age of 22 and organised the first defeat for the Conservatives there since 1868. In 1972 he became research officer for NUPE and was Secretary of the National Steering Committee Against the Cuts, organising against the biggest ever cuts in public spending. In 1979 he was elected as MP for Wood Green, and was active on a woman's right to choose, worked to get a national minimum wage agreed by Labour, campaigned to stop hospital closures and improve NHS pay, and to change the law on child abductions and sex shops as part of a campaign to change the position of women in society. His constituency was abolished by the Boundary Commission in 1983 and he went to work for the GLC as a financial planner and was in charge of the Parliamentary Campaign against abolition. He was later Chief Executive of a successful data analytics business.

Table of Contents

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS and credits 5 PICTURE CREDITS 15 FIGURE CREDITS 16 PREFACE 17 INTRODUCTION The Long View 24 A Homogeneous Country 26 Decline of Class 27 Voting Against your Class 27 Middle Class Takeover 28 Parliamentary Dominance 29 Bureaucracy no Longer in Control 30 Labour's Approach to Capitalism 30 Internal Revolts 32 Credibility and Authority 33 CHAPTER 1 MANCHESTER IN THE HIGH NOON OF BUTSKELLISM 36 My family and Other Workers 37 The Quakers 38 No Social Contact 39 Not Noticing 40 Newton Heath 42 Across the Mersey 43 Accelerating Decline 44 The Fading of the Working Class 46 The Politics of Croslandism 48 Profumo 51 The Real Manchester 52 Escaping from the Narrow World 54 CHAPTER 2 GLAD CONFIDENT MORNING AND AFTER: THE EMERGENCE OF A NEW MIDDLE CLASS 58 Templeman 60 First Contact 60 Unpaid Labour 62 A Long History of Failure 65 Decisive Events 68 The Great Change 70 Making it Stick 72 The New Middle Class: First Stirrings 73 Local Action Works Locally - but Only Locally 75 CHAPTER 3 THE 1970s BREAKDOWN OF KEYNESIANISM 76 Jobs 77 Industrial Unionism that Wasn't 78 The Deaths Column 80 Beginning of the End 82 Labour's Response 84 The Developing Crisis 86 Based on Rubbish Data 88 The Pivotal Point of Post-War Politics 90 NUPE's Engagement Plan 91 The National Minimum Wage 93 The Endless Problem of Wage Control 94 The Statutory National Minimum Wage Emerges 97 1974 and All That 99 5% of Bugger All is Bugger All 100 Going Outside the TUC Box 101 Government Strategy Implodes 104 Government Nonsense 106 Callaghan and Healey Make the Jump 108 Reaction and Counter Reaction 110 Crunch Time: the Winter of 1978-79 112 Testing the Temperature of the Water and Heating It Up at the Same Time 114 Failures of Leadership 115 Biggest Wage Shock in Modern History 116 The Powerful Do What They Can 118 1.6 Million on Strike 119 Going to the Top 120 Fisher Fails to Organise, Callaghan Digs In 121 Why This was Pivotal 123 CHAPTER 4 WORKING IN PARLIAMENT AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE REBEL ALLIANCE 125 Getting Started 126 The Patch 128 The PLP 132 Elitism and Control 135 The Campaign for Labour Party Democracy 136 Revolts and Structural Change 137 CLPD, the Original Form 138 Open Revolt for the First Time 140 Special Conference: the Irony of Victory 142 Slow Motion Train Wreck 144 No One in Charge 146 The Absent Issue 147 Hard Graft: Multiple Roles 149 Policy Development 150 Low Pay 151 Hospital Closures and Public Health 152 The Black Report 154 Abortion 156 Women's Rights and the Outrageous Attitude of Some Labour MPs 160 Dealing with the Sex Industry - and the F-Word 162 The Forgotten History of Women's Rights Legislation 164 Abducted Children and 'Seema's Laws' 165 Low Pay and Public Service Issues Rumble on 167 Stasis and Indolence 169 The 1982 Wage Dispute 171 The Economy and the Move to Deregulation, Unemployment and a Smaller State 172 Social Security Front Line 174 Deflation and Sod the Consequences: Learning to Win Elections with Mass Unemployment 175 Nuclear Power and Climate Change in the 1980s 177 Transport: the Attack on Subsidies 181 School Meals and Milk: the Education Bill 1980 182 The Falklands Crisis 184 Eastern Europe: Opposing Stalinism and Repression 186 Decay of the Tribune Group and Creation of the Socialist Campaign Group 188 Always Getting it Wrong 192 Leaving the Place 195 CHAPTER 5 THE FAILURE OF LOCAL LEADERSHIP 199 Ken's failing policies 200 Abolition: Victory and Ultimate Defeat 201 Defeat for Thatcher and Jenkin 205 Money and Who Controlled What 207 Rate Capping: the Year Zero Pol Pot strategy 208 Victory for Common Sense 210 Protecting London 215 Stopping the Bonkers Nonsense 217 Propaganda on the Rates: the Outreach Team 218 Legislation, Legislation, Legislation 220 Failing to Deal with the Poll Tax 222 Derbyshire: The Ultimate Horror Show 224 Unreformed Bureaucracy and Libel Actions as Control 226 Let's Build a Holiday Resort - in the Soviet Union 229 No Governance: Personal Rule 232 The Very Worst of Local Authorities 235 Lambeth: a Different Kind of Problem 236 Deliberate Concealment 237 Outright Corruption, Brown Paper Envelope Style 240 Local Government in the 1980s 241 The National Response: Tiny 242 Reforming the Local State 244 Malevolence in Action 246 The Last Benn Initiative 247 Twin Track Strategy, Failing 248 CHAPTER 6 BLAIR/BROWN AND THE TRIUMPH OF CROSLANDISM 251 Social Change in the 1990s: The Influence of Social Class and other Variables on Social Attitudes 251 The changing Size and Shape of the Classes 254 A Nation of Shopkeepers at Last 255 Political Generations 256 Uncontrollable Change 260 1997 and After 261 Preparation Low 262 Governing Blair Style 265 Lapses of Judgement - and Very Good Luck 265 Cassandras and Failure to Take Note 270 Important History Lessons 272 On the Ground in Derbyshire: the Divine Right to Rule 273 Trying and Failing to Create an Infrastructure 276 Huge Fight over Methane 278 Constructive Threats 280 GBP26m Victory 282 The Labour Establishment 283 A Limited Talent Pool 285 Fissures and Factions 287 Charges Withdrawn and then Reinvented 288 The 2001 Election: the Benn Factor 290 Selection and Payback 294 Nothing to Go On 297 CHAPTER 7 THE ACCIDENTAL LEADER EMERGES 299 Anger and Vacuum 300 The Unsupportable Friend 301 Not Learning 304 The PLP Candidates Fail 305 Chaos and Inertia 309 The Disappearances 314 Definitely Not Planned 315 Analysing the Corbyn Problem 316 The Strategic Opportunity. 316 Strengths and Weaknesses of Team Corbyn 319 Risk Profile 321 Key Objectives 324 The Narrative 325 Coordination and Action 327 Destabilising 330 Saving Labour 331 Decay and Poison 334 The 2016 Leadership Election 336 Inversion of Power: Permanent or Not? 338 Embourgeoisement - or Not? 341 It's Not the Ultra-Left Wot Won It 342 A Very Large Sub Culture 344 CHAPTER 8 THE DESTRUCTION OF WORKING CLASS REPRESENTATION AND THE ULTIMATE TRIUMPH OF PRESSURE GROUP POLITICS 346 Uncertain Start and Searching for a Role 347 The PLP in Charge - for a While 348 Revolts and Resolution 350 A Transformed Membership - the Working Class Largely Gone 352 Sub Culture Development 354 Is the Revolt Repeatable? 357 Power decisions 1945: Ushering in the Dominance of the PLP 358 Return to Normalcy? 360 Class Structure and Party Identification 361 Voters Switching Between the Conservative and Labour Parties 362 Small Parties Don't Hold on to Voters 362 Left Wing Right Wing All in One Person 363 The Disappearing Working Class - in Labour's Leadership Cadre 364 From a Party of Outsiders to a Party of Insiders 365 Support and Training 368 The Effectiveness Deficit 369 Experience of Running Absolutely Nothing 370 Parliamentary Reform Fails 373 PLP: A Tool of Pressure Groups? 376 The Minimalist Blair Revolution Inside the Party 378 The Upending of Internal Power 378 The Problems of Sharing Power 379 Working Class Candidates Gone 380 The Most Middle Class Party in Britain 380 The Working Class Say Goodbye 382 No Voter Loyalty 382 Right and Left - Can't Tell the Difference 383 The Elephant in the Room 384 Defining and Defending the Boundaries 385 Communities Largely Gone 386 From the Top Judgements and Misjudgements 387 Leaden-Footed Responses 389 CHAPTER 9 THE FAILURE OF PARTIES AS INSTITUTIONS 392 From Social Class to the Internet 395 Parties and Government 396 The Cult of Amateurism 399 Better Political Parties Mean Better Government 400 Poor Ministers Cause Problems 402 Labour has a Problem with its Culture 406 Labour In 2050 410 APPENDIX A A NOTE ON STATISTICS 413 APPENDIX B A NOTE ON THE SELECTION OF CANDIDATES 417 INDEX 423

Additional information

GOR012384866
9781914913020
1914913027
Goodbye to the Working Class: Social change, incompetence and sleaze push Labour to the brink by Reg Race
Used - Very Good
Hardback
The Conrad Press
20210923
480
N/A
Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.
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