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There's some focus group material I can remember how to find that suggested that people are very receptive to Blairite policies. Okay, Blair did many things wrong, but he also did some things right. If you watch his interview with Alaistair Campbell for GQ on YouTube he's quite clear that his strategy was to start from the centre and build left from there. I genuinely agree with him on the strategy - and the focus groups suggested that someone adopting a similar strategy would get a lot of attention. Sadly our two-party dynamic makes it hard for someone to do that without winning control of either Labour or the Tory party. But that's why I've generally voted Lib Dem, quite devotedly so when PR seemed like it could be on the table. I know a bunch of you think they're pissants, and I'd agree on the current bunch. But I genuinely liked New Labour back in '97, and my first vote I could cast in my life was for them.
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h2o
Fox
It's The Economist, so no surprises really. They remain ideologically neutral with regard to partisan politics (which is why it's always a pretty good source of news), but ideologically cemented within the global liberal world. Fair points for consistency and honesty. But the piece ignores the key question: why are people (not just parties) abandoning the project they're backing?
To be fair, that wasn't the question they were engaging with, but they spent the majority of the piece attacking (all three!) parties for not supporting it in various ways. If a continuation of the policies started in the 1980s is the way forward the argument needs to address how these policies will start helping those people and things which have suffered due to them.