Blog 2023 Malcolm Blair-Robinson

Set in the mid nineteen nineties, this fast moving thriller lifts the curtain on sex, sleaze and corruption in high places as the long reign of the government totters to an end, following the ousting of the iconic Margaret Thatcher. Downfall catches the mood of those times with a host of fictional characters who engage in political intrigue, sex, money laundering and murder, pursued by an Irish investigative journalist and his girlfriend, the daughter of a cabinet minister found dead in a hotel room after bondage sex.

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The main parties are still dug into deadlock. A lead for the Tories in one poll is offset by a lead for Labour in another. The driver is the Scot Nats. Without their surge Labour would be on course for victory. What is interesting is that Labour has found a narrative; to restore the dynamic of working people in the economy and wrest control over everything from the financial sector. This is playing well on the doorsteps (less so with the media) and is supported by measures proposed to halt exploitation form zero hours contracts and migrant workers. Their campaign has strengthened at the same time as Milliband’s score rises. This means that Labour is no longer on the back foot and has become a powerful adversary to the Tories.

The effect on the Tories has been surprising. First came insults with the stabbing in the back debacle which misfired. Then came a new right to buy of social housing, attacked on all sides and which showed only a 25% approval rating. Now comes the flogging of bank shares. Surely in this day and age nobody is going to change their vote to buy shares, bank shares especially? It is as if the right wing eurosceptic Thatcherite minority has seized the tiller to steer a nostalgic course into the past. Maybe UKIP phobea is causing judgement to falter. Whatever it is, Thatcher is history. Whilst the top of the economy still enjoys all the wonders she brought them, the base of the economy, where most of the floating votes are, have not gained thus far much from the recovery. Their world is about low wages, long hours, poor job security, pressure on public services, unaffordable housing, exploitation by unscrupulous landlords; the list is a long one and in the worst cases includes foodbanks. There is no doubt that record numbers of jobs have been created, but too many are low paid, menial and dead end. This is why UK productivity per capita is the worst among the developed economies.

There is now no doubt that Labour has succeeded in preventing a Tory breakout. Unless new thinking is injected into the Tory campaign, Labour could even pull ahead.