Can a new left party stop Starmer and the far right?

“Socialism or barbarism” wrote left wing MP Zarah Sultana as she resigned from the Labour Party last week and declared she would lead a new party of the left with Jeremy Corbyn. The announcement rightly led to a wave of excitement as 70,000 people answered the call in the first few days and signed up to the mailing list. This came on the back of a More In Common poll that put a Corbyn-led party at 10% of the vote.

There are rumours about disagreements and manoeuvres in the backroom discussions, but that shouldn’t be the focus here. What matters is that the announcement has given voice to a deep feeling that the left in Britain can hit back.

For too long British politics has been dominated by the two wings of despair: Labour’s failings and far right Reform UK. Finally, there is an opportunity to build a serious left electoral challenge to Starmer, and to make it an insurgent force. To seize that opportunity with both hands requires an understanding of the scale of the British political crisis and the kind of force need to build a radical left response.

Organic crisis

The deep crisis of British politics can be summed up in three words: Sir Keir Starmer. Labour marks one year in office with record unpopularity, embarrassing U-turns and tens of thousands at Glastonbury chanting “fuck Keir Starmer”.

It is tempting to put this down to the incompetence or ineptitude of the zombie Blairites running Labour. And to be fair they have displayed plenty of both. But these are the symptoms of a much deeper crises on three fronts, which explain how the wheels have come off so quickly.

The first is that the long-term financial malaise means Starmer can’t dream of anything near the economic stability enjoyed by Tony Blair in his first term. Instead, Chancellor Rachel Reeves is terrified of a bond market crash similar to the one that did for Liz Truss. So Labour’s self imposed “financial headroom” means it is raining down cuts to people on working class people, particularly those on benefits and pensioners. In a sign of how out of touch these Blairites on autopilot are, Starmer’s “mastermind” advisor Morgan McSweeney didn’t realise the measures would be so unpopular that backbench MPs rebelled and forced a climbdown.

Second is how the crisis of US imperialism has created an uneasy contradiction for Starmer. On the one hand he has tied himself to Trump’s close support for Israeli genocide, which in turn has been the most fundamental reason for the deep anger at Labour. And on the other he has attempted to assert Britain as a European player in the space left by Trump’s shuffling of the imperial chessboard. This means a rush to the new militarism and increased spending on weapons, or as many have put it, warfare over welfare.

And lastly Starmer faces a surging far-right party in the shape of Reform UK. Nigel Farage now commands 30% in many polls, claims over 200,000 members and recent local elections gave them 871 councillors. Labour’s response? To use the language of the far right – with talk of immigration having done “incalculable damage” to Britain – and brag of deporting migrants faster than the Tories ever did.

So this is not a passing blip. Starmer cocktail of austerity, racism and warfare over welfare is handing the keys of Downing Street to Nigel Farage, who is the bookies’ favourite to be the next Prime Minister.

The enthusiasm for Sultana’s announcement gives a sense that the left doesn’t have to just stand by and watch this nightmare unfold. Something can be done. How do we turn that into a serious challenge that stops Farage and fights Starmer?

Fighting on every front

There is an ongoing debate about whether the new project is a party, an alliance or an umbrella of different candidates. The starting point is that we need to be ambitious. Whatever is formed can be big. It is possible that when the call finally comes well over 100,000 people will join. We can turn that into an army of people that builds an insurgent force that fights Starmer, builds a class response to the crisis, and doesn’t see its role as pulling this Labour government to the left.

It can be a project that amplifies the movement for Palestine, which is still putting hundreds of thousands on the streets nearly two years into the genocide. That means resisting the smears of antisemitism, which were so central to bringing Corbyn down as Labour leader.  And we need a response to accusations of terrorism, which means defending those who are facing the most brutal repression such as the proscribing of Palestine Action.

It can be an organisation that puts people on the street against the new wave of austerity that it is likely to be deepened in Rachel Reeves’ October budget. If such a party had existed two weeks ago when the benefit cut vote put Starmer on the rocks, it could have called on its supporters to organise rallies and protests around the country.

In the process, it can identify election candidates across Britain who are embedded and represent the movements in communities and on the streets. But there is an urgency. The priority should be mounting a serious electoral challenge as quickly as possible. The 2029 election is too long to wait. There are a number of areas that could run a credible challenge to Labour in the May 2026 local elections and Holyrood elections in Scotland. An umbrella formation, involving revolutionaries and reformists, that allows candidates to stand under five or six principles is the best way to do this.

Such a formation needs an answer about what to do about Reform UK. Britain is catching up with Europe, with a far-right party top of the polls and setting the political agenda. Some on the left have argued that all that is required is left candidates, and that these will pull away voters from Reform.

Of course we want to win working class voters away from Reform’s racism. But a recent survey showed 74% of Reform voters haven’t considered voting Labour since 2005, and only 11% of Labour’s 2024 election voters are “curious” about voting Reform. If you add to the fact that the More In Common poll – which gave a Corbyn party 10% – left Reform untouched at 27%, then the conclusion is Reform UK are mobilising a right-wing vote. And the glue with which they do that is racism, Islamophobia and talk of the “culture wars”.

Any new left force we build needs to take this racism head on, not ignore it or just focus on “bread and butter” issues like housing or wages rather than refugees or trans+ rights. That means being explicitly anti-racist, rejecting the any notion that migrants are to blame and standing squarely with those under attack, from Muslims to migrants to trans+ people. And it also means being a megaphone for the anti-fascist and anti-racist mobilisations which have been so important in pushing back fascist Tommy Robinson and those who have tried to build a street movement.

Seizing the time

The above is not some impossible wish list made from the sidelines. Part of the crisis of mainstream politics is that it gives no expression to the deep rage at the genocide Gaza that has led to one of the biggest mass movements in British history. Westminster has given no voice to the anger people feel at the rise of the far right, illustrated by the magnificent anti-fascist response to the far-right riots last August. And there is no mainstream party that articulates the fury at Starmer’s attacks on working class people.

The strength of the new project will depend on whether it channels that mood and the movements that flow from it. We need to learn from the limitations of Corbyn’s leadership in Labour, the capitulation of Syriza in Greece and the taming of Podemos in Spain.

The vision outlined here is a fundamentally different one than the politics represented by the dominant figures of Corbyn and Sultana. The new project is likely to be closer to the left reformist currents in Europe than the radicalism of People Before Profit in Ireland. That is why the politics and roots of revolutionaries need to be maintained as an independent force in such a project, and not dissolved.

The challenge for the radical left is to be the most urgent in pushing for an electoral challenge, and win as many people as possible to the idea that what is needed is an insurgent force that channels the fight against the system, rather than assimilates into it.

That is not an easy task, but there is a chance here of a shifting in the dynamics of British politics. The radical left has to try and shape the debate. The scale of the crisis and the thirst for an alternative requires politics, initiative and above all, audacity.