On Tuesday 17th November, Shadow Foreign Secretary explained that the Labour Party needed to reset and re-think on their Foreign Policy narrative considering the dual challenges that the Party faces both from its electorate and membership.
In an event hosted by the British Foreign Policy Group, Lisa Nandy MP for Wigan shed light into how the Labour is approaching the development of its own foreign policy agenda. She expressed her hope to be able to restore trust and confidence in her plan for an open and inclusive foreign policy both from the electorate as well as stem out the divisions currently marring the Party.
Speaking about equally balancing all electorates concerns regardless of their nationalities, she said, “This is the million-dollar question. Although foreign policy can help win political parties win elections, but it can also cost them to lose these elections if they don’t get it right. At the end of the day what you do overseas is based on the values you want to portray, defend and advance. Foreign policy is a reflection of your vision for the whole country and if that vision does not align with the vision of the British people then that creates a problem. Do we share a common understanding with extremely different British electorates? These are the same issues that the Conservatives are grappling with.
“But we have lost almost our entire Labour base in every region of the nation and thus, shaping an inclusive and open narrative around foreign policy is one of my biggest priorities. I believe that Foreign Policy and the role that we play in the world has to be routed in consent with the British people.”
Her comments appear after continuous warnings from some members within the Labour Party who have frequently flagged their concerns around divisive policy framework.
Speaking at a webinar titled ‘Is the Left losing the British Indians’, Sunny Hundal said, “It is a bad state of affairs. What the Labour has done is essentially sending this message that ‘we will work with the Muslims and the Sikhs’. In the meantime, the Conservatives have done more outreach work with Hindus and Jews. Both political parties have drawn minorities into neat piles and targeted specific communities for them. It is noteworthy that a considerable proportion of Sikhs were angry with the Labour leadership after Jas Athwal’s temporary suspension from the Party in 2019 elections. But there was no major downslide in Sikh vote share for the Labour as the Party continued its engagement with the Sikh community.
“But the left has essentially taken the Gujaratis and the Hindu vote for granted. In Leicester East, Labour should have chosen a local candidate and instead they parachuted someone who was a Corbyn loyalist. The same thing happened in Ilford East with Jas Athwal. It is not shocking because both Tony Blair and Gordon Brown have essentially done the same. Labour has a factionalism problem and it needs to address it at the earliest.”
