Keir Starmer may be keen to move on from the budget megashambles, but chaos is hardwired into his party
F
reud has a word for it. Thanatos. Up till now it’s been tempting to give Labour the benefit of the doubt. That being in opposition for 14 years has made them ring-rusty. That they’ve forgotten how this government thingy works. Hadn’t quite realised they were supposed to be in charge.
But now it’s beginning to look like Labour has a death wish. Not that it doesn’t quite know how to run the country, more that it is hell-bent on self-destruction. This isn’t a matter of incompetence: it’s a deliberate act of self-sabotage. Almost as if it doesn’t quite believe it deserves to be in office, or is too self-conscious to be in power. The opposition benches are its feelgood safe space.
How else to explain the feeling of chaos that has underscored much of the last year and a half or so and drowned out the good things that have been achieved? First it was the freebies – from a party that had promised to be different from the Tories. Then there were the U-turns over cuts to benefits.
