Labour's election defeat down to 'toxic culture'

A new review of the Labour Party's 2019 general election defeat has painted a picture of dysfunctionality and toxicity.

Labour Together used interviews with senior party figures, as well as previously unpublished polling and new analysis, to create the 150-page review.

In it, they emphasise that negative perceptions of Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership, doubts about the manifesto and the party’s 'ambivalent Brexit stance' reinforced each other in a 'snowballing' effect to deliver December’s catastrophic result, the worst for Labour since 1935. The paper also suggests that two decades of demographic and political change that hit the party’s traditional base could endanger more Labour seats in 2024.

Amongst the key findings, the report claims that Labour went into the 2019 election 'without a clear strategy of which voters we needed to persuade or how', alongside the failure to establish a coherent message with the power of 2017’s mantra 'For the many, not the few'.

It also says it was 'unclear who was in charge' of the election campaign, and that Labour was outgunned by the Tories in the digital war, with messages poorly coordinated and most of them failing to reach beyond the party’s base.

On the latter point, Labour Together argues that, aided by their clear 'Get Brexit done' message, the Conservatives succeeded in turning out two million previous non-voters, accounting for two thirds of the increase in their vote share. Labour failed to do the same, and instead pursued 'unrealistic' seat targeting.

Previous non voters were also swayed by the 'stop Jeremy Corbyn' mandate of the Tories, with the report laying large parts of blame at the feet of the former leader. So much so that Corbyn's public approval ratings collapsed at around the time a group of Labour MPs including Luciana Berger and Chuka Umunna left to found the Independent Group, citing antisemitism within Labour and its Brexit policy.