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New Statesman
12 hours ago
- Politics
- New Statesman
The British left is coming for the Government
Photo byWhisper it as yet, but after five long years of confusion and disarray, the British left is rallying. Local political organisations are coalescing, from Chiswick to Liverpool to Newcastle. The Green Party leadership contest has become a straight fight between an energetic, 'eco-populist' left candidate, and the party's more cautious establishment. The prize is clear: local elections due next May across England's major cities, including London councils. After that, who knows. Could Labour's urban fiefdoms fall victim to the rout northern councils saw in the local elections last month? It won't be easy. Bitterly, almost viscerally unpopular as Labour may be, it is the self-styled insurgents of Nigel Farage's Reform that have been the overwhelming beneficiaries of the Starmer slump. Farage himself has been happy to pilfer from the left – a long-time Thatcherite now turned improbable friend of the welfare state. But the Reform squeeze isn't only on Starmer's Labour, who, after talking up their fiscal discipline at huge political cost are now u-turning on its most unpopular consequences. It's also a squeeze on all those on England's left who fondly imagine that the popularity of their traditional policies, from nationalisation to more welfare spending, is enough to win them votes. Instead, they're now seeing those same demands nabbed by opportunists from the radical right, precisely because they are popular. A new programme for 21st-century England will be needed, focused relentlessly on the everyday cost of living and wealth inequality. But new organisations are also needed. Peter Mandelson once spoke of a Labour left buried in a 'sealed tomb' by New Labour. This proved to be optimistic, as the Corbyn surge of the 2010s proved. And fearful of a second Corbyn-style resurrection, Starmer's operation has driven a stake through the left's heart, stuffed its mouth with garlic, placed it in a lead-lined coffin, sealed the tomb, and stationed a grim-faced 24-hour armed guard outside, gripping their pistols and blazing torches. The monster will not now escape. As a political force, the Labour left is finished. The tactic of entryism – entering the Labour party and changing it – is finished too. Instead, the party's steely-eyed Van Helsings should have been looking elsewhere. From the shadows, far away from Westminster, a terrifying new apparition is approaching. Disguised by the size of Labour's majority, the 2024 election saw the non-Labour left win its biggest parliamentary representation in British history, on its biggest vote ever. Four million voters returned nine left MPs, spread between the Greens and five independents, including Jeremy Corbyn in Islington. At the height of its success, in the late 1940s, the Communist Party won two MPs and 94,000 votes. Since the foundation of the Labour Party itself, the non-Labour left has never seen anything like this support. Against a seemingly monolithic Labour majority, this may have mattered little. Britain's perverse voting system found Keir Starmer foisted into Downing Street with a landslide majority, but with half a million fewer votes than Jeremy Corbyn lost by in 2019. As a result, the party has been left with more marginal seats than ever before in its history. Fifty-one of its seats were won with a margin of less than 5 per cent. Accurately described after the election by polling expert James Kaganasooriam as a 'sandcastle majority', the turning political tide has now washed away Labour's 2024 support. The main beneficiaries, for now, are Reform, whose spectacular success in the local government elections saw them win control of previously Labour councils from Durham to Derbyshire. Its one-time heartlands in the North of England were already riddled and on the verge collapse, with Boris Johnson's demolition of this so-called 'Red Wall' in 2019 having already delivered the fatal blow. Johnson's failure to hold his new coalition together, coupled with Liz Truss' calamitous 44 days in office, saw many of Johnson's wins fall back into Labour hands five years later – but on the most tenuous and temporary basis. Demographic change, and a great, decades-long shift in the economy from manufacturing to services, has created new heartlands for the party, concentrated in inner cities and major urban areas across the country: a mix of underpaid, insecure younger workers, often with university degrees; more settled ethnic minority communities; and a solid layer of public sector employees, many of whom are now at or approaching retirement. Generally socially liberal, 15 years of persistent economic failure since the financial crisis have shoved this base increasingly to the economic left. And 25 years of failed military interventions have created a deep cynicism about Britain's role abroad – crystallised in the distance between Starmer's government and its voters on Israel. Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month Subscribe Even before entering Downing Street, the horrors of Gaza, and Britain's complicity in them, had been a powerful solvent on Labour's new base of support. That undermined Labour's vote in 2024, and resulted in the arrival of the 'Gaza independents', the four pro-Palestinian MPs elected in the strongly Muslim areas of Leicester, Blackburn, Dewsbury and Birmingham. Combined with Labour's blunders and cruelties in office, from the Winter Fuel Payment to disability allowance cuts, the party's support has been hollowed out. Its voters won't vote, its activists aren't active, and the party's once-fearsome ground game is crumbling. There was a taste of what could be to come in Haringey last month when a Green Party candidate, Rurairdh Paton, was elected by a landslide in a solidly Labour and solidly working class ward. Tellingly, local campaigners report that Labour grew so desperate for campaigners that local councillors from Folkestone in Kent were drafted in to door-knock. It's the better-established Greens who can seize this opportunity in Labour strongholds. Zack Polanski's leadership bid, and the newly formed internal faction, Greens Organise, have already identified the potential for a breakthrough. Polling shows the Green's support to be younger, and poorer, than the other national parties. These are not the middle-class do-gooders of legend. The broader left, outside the Greens, needs to recognise how the world has changed. Rumours that Jeremy Corbyn was about to set up a new party have swirled around him since his expulsion from Labour, almost five years ago. National negotiations to establish a new party, organised between different chunks of the post-Corbyn left, have come to little. A combination of political caution, and disagreements over a new party's potential direction and leadership have so far scuppered agreement. Perhaps wisely, Corbyn himself has been wary of jumping the gun. The history of left-wing breakaways from Labour, from the Independent Labour Party in the 1930s, to Scottish Labour in the 1970s, to Respect in the 2000s, has not been a happy one. Only George Galloway has, to date, made anything like a success of it, and then only via an increasingly eccentric one-man triangulation between the economic left and 'socially conservative' right. Whatever else he may be, Jeremy Corbyn is not George Galloway. And declaring a new party will not magically reproduce his 2015 breakthrough. Cooperation across the non-Labour left is the order of the day. On the ground, this cooperation is already starting to happen. In Lancashire, Greens have banded together with the newly formed Preston Independents to become the official opposition on the County Council. Greens and Independents are working closely in Islington. Local organisations are being pulled together by prominent independent left candidates, like former mayor Jamie Driscoll in Tyneside, Faiza Shaheen in Chingford, and former ANC MP Andrew Feinstein, who came second place in Keir Starmer's own constituency of Holborn and St Pancras at the 2024 election. Green Party members in all those constituencies are working alongside the independent left. Local alliances can become a national force. Across the channel, France's New Popular Front, an alliance between forces of the traditional left, the left populist France Insoumise, and the French Greens, was pulled together in weeks on a radical programme that catapulted the alliance to top of the polls in the snap elections – and pushed Marine Le Pen's National Rally to third place. France Insoumise MP Danielle Obono spoke at the London Green Party's conference last month on the practical experience of unity. There's a desire to learn from what worked – and what did not. The next general election isn't due until 2029. But a string of local council victories next year would pave the way for an unprecedented challenge to Labour – not from the right, as the party has always had to fight, but from its radical flank. And this new movement could take parts of Labour with them: from the tone of his Guardian op-ed on Wednesday, John McDonnell already regards his party as half-lost. Far from the coming in from the cold, what was once the Labour left has a different goal: burning the house down and building something completely new. [See also: Child poverty is rallying the Labour left] Related
New Statesman
12 hours ago
- Politics
- New Statesman
The town that loathes Keir Starmer
A boat passes through the northern industrial town of Burnley. Photo by Lancashire Images /Alamy On the shop floor of Burnley's last mill, 28 looms are thrashing away with a dull roar. At modern machines all around this stone factory, workers are diligently constructing the product that turned this town from a backwater into a centre of global capitalism: one man examines a roll of fabric for flaws; behind a glass partition a group of young women are sewing; upstairs others map out new patterns on CAD software. Steven Eastwood, who has driven forklifts around Ashfield Mill for decades, remembers a time when his employer still had local competitors. Now, from a peak of 99,000 looms a little over a century ago, only the weaving machines in this room remain in commercial operation. As Burnley's traditional industry has faded so too has its connection to Labour, its traditional politics. After winning every election here from 1935, the party lost to the Liberal Democrats in 2010, and then the Conservatives in 2019, before narrowly taking back the seat at the last election. Eastwood has voted for Labour his entire life. He says he will continue to do so with an apologetic shrug, as if he can conceive of no possible alternative. But asked what its leader now stands for, he cannot say. Speaking to his aides in opposition, Sir Keir Starmer told them he wanted to be judged by a simple test: in five years time, could he look in the eyes of voters in towns such as Burnley and tell them that Labour had made a genuine difference to their lives? Almost one year after he entered office – according to residents of the town – he appears to be on track to fail. Sitting on a bench inside Charter Walk Shopping Centre, Janine, a supply teacher, is using her half term holiday to people watch on a quiet afternoon. Born locally into a 'very poor working class family' she has been living in Bonn for the last two decades. When she moved back to Burnley recently she was shocked at the area's decline. 'I came back to a society that I could not recognise behaviour wise, attitude wise,' she says. 'I love this town but it's so run down. Betting shops, charity shops, boarded up shops. It breaks my heart.' She estimates her quality of life was 10 times higher in Germany doing the same job. At one school at which she now teaches, 14 and 15-year-olds have the literacy levels of primary school children. At another, a charity had to buy Christmas presents for pupils because their parents could not afford any. 'That was not the case when I was last teaching in the UK,' she says. 'I couldn't believe it.' A former Labour voter, she cannot understand why, in her eyes, the government is determined to penalise those in need of help. 'They're taking the Winter Fuel Allowance away, taking farmers' inheritance from them, they have no plan on illegal immigration and public services are on the floor.' Janine is now convinced the party's core voters will abandon them for Reform. 'I never thought I would say I wouldn't vote Labour but at the last election I voted Green even though I knew they wouldn't win,' she adds. Paul, a bus driver nursing a hot drink nearby, insists he cannot begin to talk about Starmer because his opinions will be unprintable. 'The government is fucking too right wing,' he eventually says. 'They're fucking backwards bastards on everything.' They are targeting people who have worked 'all of their bastard life', he says. 'Even the Conservatives left the Winter Fuel Allowance alone – they knew not to touch the pensioners.' Until last year, Paul had always voted Labour. At the next election he will not turn out at all. 'I don't like Farage, he's too fascist,' he says. 'I don't trust any of them.' When I say that Starmer wants to be able to tell the people of Burnley he has made a genuine difference to their lives, Paul laughs. 'I don't think that whichever government has ever been in they've ever had an impact on my life. You work your arse off all your life and they screw you.' Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month Subscribe Manning the till in a British Heart Foundation shop on Burnley's high street, Amanda says that she also used to support Labour. Now, she believes the party is 'not doing such a good job' in office. 'They've not done what they said they were going to do. Their decisions have been bad,' she says. 'As a person Keir Starmer seems alright. As a politician he's not doing a good job.' Shops are closing in Burnley, but at least it's not as bad as nearby Nelson, another Lancashire mill town, which has now become a 'dump', she claims. 'The government always say they will give us money but we never see any of it, or they spend it on stupid stuff.' At the next election, Amanda plans to vote for the Liberal Democrats or the Greens. 'They seem to believe in their principles more. The Conservatives and Labour have been in power for so long. They always get in so they've become a bit more complacent.' Like many Burnley residents, Afrasiab Anwar was brought up on traditional Labour values. After moving away for university he came back to his hometown in 2002, a year after local race riots saw white men attack takeaways and Asians firebomb a pub. 'It wasn't a place I recognised,' he says now. In an attempt to improve the town, he began working for the local authority before winning election to represent Labour himself and then, in 2021, becoming the council leader. In November 2023, however, when Starmer failed to call for a Gaza ceasefire, he and 10 other Labour representatives quit the party. Anwar's Burnley Independent Group now runs the local authority in coalition with Lib Dem and Green councillors. [See also: Why is Birmingham leading Britain's child poverty spiral?] Sitting in his office within Burnley's grand town hall, he is contemptuous of the government he once wished to see elected. 'It's been a complete letdown in every aspect. There's been nothing for places like Burnley. There's been no additional investment,' he says. 'Traditional Labour voters, what are they getting? Working-class people, what are they getting out of this Labour government? The two child benefit cap, the winter fuel allowance. It's the complete opposite of what a Labour government stands for.' On the doorstep, Anwar claims, voters tell him they did not believe things could decline further after 14 years of austerity. Under Starmer's government, though, 'they think it's far worse'. Burnley has long struggled to manage an uneven transition from the days of King Cotton. In 2019, it was ranked as the eighth most deprived area in England. It has some of the highest rates of fuel poverty, health deprivation and child poverty in the country. At the same time, however, the town has become a centre of high tech manufacturing that has seen it touted as a model for northern revitalisation. Former mills have been turned into campuses for the University of Central Lancashire; local firms engineer ultra-lightweight parts for Airbus planes. Anwar is convinced the old ways of doing politics here are gone: Labour's ties to their core support are irreparably broken. 'People are much cleverer now,' he says. 'They vote for people who they think will represent them, who will be their voice and who are genuinely a part of the town, a part of the fabric of the place.' While Labour won Burnley at the last election, its vote share dropped. Having received the endorsement of Muslim community leaders, Lib Dem candidate and former MP Gordon Birtwistle shot up to second place. When I ask Anwar if he plans to challenge his old party at the next general election he insists he is focused on running the council for now. For many others in Burnley, Westminster simply has no relevance to their lives. Standing on the high street, Uwais, a young boxing trainer in a green shell suit, says he has no opinion of Starmer at all. He does not watch television. He does not follow the news. 'I don't think it makes much difference,' he says. 'There's still potholes and shit.' In any case, he insists, Burnley is great. He pivots to gesture at a ragged figure smoking on a nearby street corner. 'Look at that guy over there on spice: he's living his dream!' Luc Paul would vote but he has no ID. On a break from his shift at a children's toy shop, he tells me he is appalled at Starmer's volte-face on trans rights. In opposition, the prime minister said there was a 'desperate need' to introduce gender self-ID. Now, he does not believe that trans-women are women. 'I don't think he stands for anything. He only wants power so he can get money for himself,' Luc Paul says. 'The Greens, Lib Dems and the Scottish party have a lot more going for them.' Cradling his walking stick under his arm and smoking a rolled cigarette, Steven says he remains a Labour supporter but does not know anyone who could run the country now. 'The government aren't meeting the requirements,' he says. After being admitted to the Royal Blackburn Teaching Hospital recently for a routine operation (Burnley's A&E closed in 2007), his wife picked up an infection and became seriously unwell. He blames outsourced agency staff for messing up her care. Retired on health grounds himself, he says the government has not helped to improve his life to date. 'It's a case of surviving,' he adds glumly. What does Starmer stand for? Steven says he cannot put his finger on it. Perhaps the most positive assessment of the government available in Burnley is that it has simply not yet had time to get to grips with problems that long predate its election. Perhaps further decline is just to be expected. Perhaps Britain is headed inevitably in the same direction as Burnley's mills whichever party is elected. John, an older man standing alone by a handsome stone building, says that of course Starmer is going to make mistakes. 'They're miles better than the previous government,' he says. He plans to back Labour again at the next election. 'I don't think Starmer's doing a bad job,' he says. 'You've got to remember what they came into office to. You've got to bear in mind it's not going to turn around too quickly.' [See also: Reform UK's taproom revolutionaries] Related
New Statesman
a day ago
- Entertainment
- New Statesman
Mountainhead is a tech-bro horror show
Sky Here in my TV critic's penthouse, with its giant bags of snacks, hand-knitted throws and wraparound 24/7 flatscreens, Jesse 'Succession' Armstrong has at last chucked me some more red meat to chew on in the form of Mountainhead, a film he has both written and directed. Obviously, I couldn't be more pleased. The stomach has been rumbling for a while now. I still miss his last lot of monsters; part of me will always mourn Tom Wambsgans. But it has to be said that the new bunch are too unambiguously cold – yes, even by the standards of the Roys – for maximum enjoyment. Also, for those of a nervous disposition, I would just quietly note that it's not beyond the bounds of possibility the dystopian future it so terrifyingly depicts could arrive in – checks smart watch, ignoring its advice to 'take a moment' – ooh, about six hours' time. It goes like this. Four tech bros, some of the richest men in the world, are weekending at Mountainhead, a rebarbative looking architect-designed house in deepest snowy Utah (it's named for Ayn Rand, as I'm sure you've guessed); their host is its owner, the the poorest of them (yet to make his first billion), Hugo Van Yalk (Jason Schwartzman), whose brainchild is a wellness app called Slowzo. The gathering is a reunion: these men-children, who once masturbated together on a biscuit, call themselves the Brewsters; they like bragging, banter, poker and working themselves up into a frenzy about transhumanism and freedom of speech. But behind the group hug, tension crackles like an old dial-up connection. The oldest, Randall (Steve Carell), is pretending his cancer is cured. His one-time protégé, Venis (Cory Michael Smith), is twitchily trying to ignore the fact that the launch of an AI feature on his social network, Traam, has broadcast so much disinformation that the world is rapidly descending into violence and chaos. Venis, in turn, is desperate to make up with Jeff (Ramy Youssef), whose own AI business is able to tell audiences what's real, and what's not. He's desperate to buy it. But alas, they fell out when they appeared on, yes, a podcast. As 'genocide-adjacent' events occur everywhere from India to Uzbekistan, and Argentina and Italy default on their debts, Jeff's stock is rising rapidly, even as his conscience is vaguely pricked (to locate such a conscience involves much scrolling). He's not selling. The dialogue is sharper than a premium Japanese knife, and often very funny. Jeff asks Hugo, aka Soups (a nickname that's short for soup kitchen, because they think he's such a failure), if his antiseptic house was 'designed by Ayn Bland'. Venis tells Randall, who wants to know if his company has a timeline for uploading human consciousness and if so, can he be first up, that, yes, 'Daddy' can be number one 'on the grid', but only after it has been tested on 'a mouse, a pig, and ten morons'. The attention to detail, rich-living-wise, is unimpeachable. Hugo's staff have a whole turbot ready for 'picking' – picking fish are all the rage – as well as about 8,000 sliders, and every kind of olive, fruit, artisan ham and cheese you can think of. The house (obvs) has a full-size bowling alley, a cinema and – most important of all – water pressure that gives you bruises when you shower. But, it almost goes without saying, no one's happy. The anhedonia of the rich, of which I'm lately only half-convinced, is made explicit when the four of them don matching orange ski suits as if they were prisoners. And, as my granny used to say, much shall have more, of course. The first half of Mountainhead is better than the second, when greed and Musk-like excess takes over, and it all gets a bit Lord of Flies, only with cigars, saunas and the possibility of a pre-pardon from the US president. Still, I stuck with it, and you will, too. Partly, it's the transfixing amorality, an abyss you detect in Bezos, Zuckerberg and all the others who are suddenly so pumped and obeisant to Trump. But the performances are magnetically pitch perfect as well: Carell in his knitwear, Michael Smith with his waxy, Jared Kushner face. It's a 90-minute horror show. All I'd say is: best not to watch it just before bedtime. Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month Subscribe Mountainhead Sky Atlantic [See also: 'The Bombing of Pan Am 103' is poignant and fascinating] Related
New Statesman
a day ago
- Business
- New Statesman
We have entered the Age of Electricity
Image:Like it or not, we're entering a new 'Age of Electricity', one which promises greater self-reliance amid geopolitical tensions, and a cheaper, upgraded future. But the central challenge facing Britain's electrification push isn't grid capacity or renewables rollout. It's cost. Specifically, how we charge for electricity – and how that system is actively making things worse. Labour's pledge to cut household energy bills by £300 a year this parliament grabbed the headlines but has fast become a political headache. The instinct is sound: UK energy bills are among the highest in Europe. But how you achieve that reduction is unclear, and the timeline implausible. Critics of clean energy are using this to go on the attack, blaming our high bills on renewables, Ed Miliband, and all manner of straw men. But the public are listening. With energy bills topping cost-of-living concerns, a perceived failure to deliver could be disastrous. We absolutely do need to build every last gigawatt of low-carbon power we can. But supply alone won't win the race. Without reforming the way we price electricity, demand won't keep up. The problem isn't the mission; it's the way the UK's energy bills are structured. And if that stays broken, Labour's clean energy vision risks unravelling. The short-term problem: unrealistic promises play into Reform's hands The public expects change – and when it doesn't arrive, they remember. In the Runcorn by-election, Reform's campaign persistently reminded voters of the government's £300 energy bill reduction pledge, casting it as emblematic of Labour's failure to deliver on cost-of-living promises. 'Can you afford to vote Labour?' is a slogan that will resonate as long as bills are high. The perception that electricity is expensive, and that clean power is to blame, is starting to stick. Energy bills are becoming shorthand for something deeper: the sense that Westminster doesn't understand – or can't – fix the pressures facing ordinary households. This is dangerous ground for any government to tread. In practice, a £300 bill reduction by 2030 is close to impossible. Structural reform of the energy system will take longer than five years to reach the average household. But the public is unprepared to wait. As long as the £300 target remains in the consciousness of the electorate, it will carry political cost. The most effective lever Labour has If rapid bill reductions are out of reach, what should the government do? There is a solution, but it requires honesty, not overpromising. Ministers need to be brave and make the case that reform will take time, that meaningful change beats quick fixes that could backfire. If (and when) they do, they only damage the wider mission. The way we charge energy bills is a huge problem. Electricity bills carry the weight of clean energy subsidies, fuel poverty schemes, and legacy system costs, making them artificially high. Gas – still the primary heat source for UK homes – bears a far smaller burden, making it artificially cheap. But because wholesale gas prices will set the price of electricity for some time to come, high gas prices drive up all energy bills – even for homes using solar panels, heat pumps, or other electric solutions. The result: electricity, the very thing we need more of, is more expensive than it should be. Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month Subscribe And the system is regressive. Everyone pays the same levies, regardless of their income. With public trust in government so low, sneaking levies onto bills is a one-way ticket to the 'they aren't governing for me' mentality that has set in across the nation. What's worse, people don't even know it's happening, and when they find out, they feel robbed. Robbed by government, by energy firms, let down by a system they believe is stacked against them. Tweaking around the edges won't fix this. Nor will it do anything for public trust. While the energy sector is mired in a needlessly messy debate over zonal pricing, policy cost rebalancing is an oasis of consensus. Rebalancing means shifting those policy costs away from electricity and distributing them more fairly – either across gas bills or into general taxation. Rebalancing won't break the gas link entirely, but it will help to level the playing field, making electrified heat and transport more affordable. More to the point, it is the best way for government to lower energy bills – by up to £400 for households already on electric heating, who today are more likely to be in fuel poverty. Done with the right support for gas users to avoid adverse effects, this is as close as policy gets to a silver bullet. Cheaper electricity drives demand. Demand drives up competition and drives down costs. The economic logic is simple. Why it matters If we want to ditch fossil fuels, electricity must be competitively priced. The current system guarantees the opposite. Unless the government fixes it, no amount of clean power investment will translate into truly affordable bills. This isn't just about the long term. Without rebalancing, Labour has little hope of delivering on its energy bill pledge. Even worse, new costs – for carbon capture, new nuclear, network costs, grid upgrades, and larger CfDs – are coming online. They too will be loaded onto electricity bills. Gains made elsewhere will be quietly eroded, just in time for the 2029 election. The public won't blame international markets; they will blame the government. Rebalancing alone won't deliver £300 savings for everyone. But it is the single most effective medium-term lever available. Combined with targeted support for gas users and the fuel poor, it would enable a smoother transition to low-carbon heating. The alternative? A worst-of-all-worlds compromise like the proposed 'Clean Heat Subsidy' risks exactly the kind of two-tier energy system which Labour has pledged to avoid: one in which the wealthier enjoy subsidised heat pumps and electric vehicles, while everyone else is stuck paying for a legacy gas system they can't afford to escape. This isn't a technical argument about net zero. It's about cutting bills, upgrading homes, and insulating the UK economy from global gas shocks. Electrification is inevitable. Rebalancing is how we make it affordable. The politics of timing But timing is everything. Today, policy costs are hidden in plain sight – loaded onto bills through a tangle of legacy levies. The result is a regressive system that charges consumers through the backdoor, opaque, unequal, and unfair. Public frustration is growing. This is fertile ground for populist opposition and makes bill reform urgent. There is a narrow window to get this right. Some of the older levies begin to fall away from 2027-2028. But others – backing new infrastructure – are just ramping up. If no change is made, these will simply add to bills, offsetting progress elsewhere. And unlike global gas prices, these are policy choices. Labour won't be able to pass the blame. If Labour is serious about electrifying and cutting costs, about cost-of-living relief, and about restoring public trust, it must deliver change. Change means addressing how energy bills are charged. Rebalancing is not optional. It's the foundation of a fairer system, and the clearest route to delivering on promises made. Anything less is just tinkering. What's needed is clarity, courage, and a willingness to break with the orthodoxy that is failing consumers and holding Britain back. Related
New Statesman
a day ago
- Entertainment
- New Statesman
Russell Brand's transatlantic trial
Photo byThere are two Russell Brands. One, the British comedian with a cockney lilt and spidery limbs; he cracks wise on Never Mind the Buzzcocks in 2011, a gothic jester; he organises anti-austerity protests and routs Jeremy Paxman on Newsnight; he's terribly concerned about the bankers, the bonuses, the bankers..; he guest edited an issue of this magazine in 2013. The other is his more recent incarnation. A stint in Hollywood – Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Get Him to the Greek – preceded the transformation of this left-populist raconteur into a new-age guru. His concerns about the bankers never went away, but were turbo-charged with new anxieties: mainstream media, the Great Reset, vaccine injuries, the lying political establishment. A predictable Pokemon evolution for a man, already distrustful of authority, implanting himself into the ecosystem of a nascent New American Right. Both Brands sat in the dock in Southwark Crown Court at 1030am on 30 May – black shirt unbuttoned below the sternum, jeans as skinny as they were in 2008, the customary ombre-lensed aviators in hand – and pleaded not guilty to five charges of rape, sexual assault and indecent assault. Two of the incidents were alleged to have taken place at the MTV offices and Labour party conference, between 1999 and 2005. On the day he was charged he wrote 'I've never engaged in non-consensual activity… I'm now going to have an opportunity to defend these charges in court, and I'm incredibly grateful for that.' Brand, 49, will go to trial on 3 June 2026. Brand has long been shorthand for something much bigger than himself: once, a symbol for the excesses of noughties television; more recently, evidence of the right's quest for spirituality; now, the impassable gulf between the American right and establishment Britain. On 2 May, when Brand first appeared in Westminster Magistrates' Court, Tucker Carlson wrote: 'The entire case is transparently political and absurd… He has no shot at a fair trial, because Britain is no longer a free country.' In the same post Carlson contended that the once 'famous leftwing actor' was being penalised – via rape allegations – for criticising the government ('for using Covid to turn the UK into a totalitarian state'). That sounds familiar. During last year's summer riots America looked on and saw not just tensions spill out onto British streets, but an overweening state happily locking people up for tweeting in response. Senator Ted Cruz suggested 'nanny-state totalitarians' were destroying Britain. Elon Musk couldn't stop posting about Keir Starmer's 'Woke Stasi'. The basic line that the MAGA right have taken on Britain is that it is over: overwhelmed by demographic change, overlorded by left-wing petty tyrants, overcome by contradictions that are no longer possible to hide or wish away. To them, Brand is just another political prisoner. And so, in Britain Brand sits as a faded rockstar – a once sexy Marxist with one foot in the establishment – diminished as he runs to his shed in Oxford to prepare for an immense legal showdown. And in the imagination of the American right he sits behind the glass staring at the judge in Court 2 as a victim of an authoritarian state that imprisons people for much less than what he is accused of; a standard bearer for their worst suspicions about Labour's Britain; a martyr who handily already looks a lot like a bad picture of Jesus you might find in a Tennessee Sunday school. Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month Subscribe Outside court there was a man I recognised from Brand's first court appearance – his green Krispy Kreme bucket hat and pink trainers made him hard to miss. There were a throng of confused spectating tourists too, stalled by the press pack. If there were fans present they made little attempt to reveal themselves. And so Brand walked through the crowd – flanked by a small entourage – and got in the car, in silence. Cognisant, you must imagine, that his friends are very far away. Related
