Spectacularly bad

Yesterday I praised one article by Compass Youth. But the latest offering, a strategy for taking on the Tories', is astonishingly muddle-headed.

The strategy is aimed at 'urban intellectuals' who might be attracted by Cameron's current rhetoric, and what it calls 'C1/C2 voters', which appear to be skilled white working-class voters who voted for Thatcher in the '80s.

The key for Labour to win back this coalition is apparently the adoption of 'helping people to help themselves' policies, such as 'hypothecated welfare' [whatever that may be], splitting up the National Health Service with elected boards and other measures to adjust the welfare state to 'give people a hand up, not a hand out'.

There are three rather serious objections to this. Firstly, the individual policies suggested are ones which would not work very well. Secondly, and more importantly, neither urban intellectuals nor 'C1/C2 voters' are very interested in the idea of a campaign based on gimmicky policies to tinker with the Welfare State [urban intellectuals are much more interested in foreign policy and the environment, to take but two examples, while C1/C2 voters are more interested in crime, jobs and immigration].

But most importantly, I just can't understand the point of writing a strategy for Labour which doesn't include working-class voters. There are not very many urban intellectuals, and the fact that many of them read the Guardian does not mean that their opinions should count for more. In contrast there are millions of people who work in low-income jobs, who may still vote Labour or may have stopped voting at all, and any strategy for the Labour Party must surely start with their priorities and their needs.