Whatever happened to the British left?

This is an extended version of an article that originally appeared in the Spectator

Why can’t Jeremy Corbyn be a left-wing Farage? Why can’t he threaten Labour as Ukip and its successor parties threatened and continue to threaten the Tories? 

There is a gap in the market for a party to the left of Labour, and Corbyn seems just the man to fill it. 

The period from 2015 to 2019, when Corbyn led the Labour party, represented the high point of the far left in the UK. To the astonishment of many, Labour party members voted for Corbyn to be their leader twice. And to be fair, Labour did not do so badly under his leadership in the 2017 general election before losing catastrophically in 2019.

What happened to all of his followers? Many have gone off to support Keir Starmer. But you would think the rest could regroup to form a new force on the left.

Those of us who intensely disliked Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour party disliked most of all the gormless personality cult which surrounded him and did so much to destroy the left’s claim to possess a sceptical intelligence.

But there is no doubt that, if you want to build a new movement, having tens of thousands of wide-eyed devotees is a great starting point.