Labour ‘will get its head kicked in’ by Reform in the local elections this week and must ‘stop talking gibberish about diversity’ to win back disillusioned working class voters, a senior party peer has warned.
Maurice Glasman, the founder of the influential Blue Labour group, issued a grave warning days before the May 1 vote in which Nigel Farage‘s party is expected to make significant gains.
Reform is expected to win mayoral votes in two Red Wall Labour heartlands in East Yorkshire and Lincolnshire.
They are also in with a chance of winning the Runcorn and Helsby by-election triggered by the resignation of incumbent Labour MP Mike Amesbury.
Mr Glasman, who attended the inauguration of Donald Trump, has previously lashed out at Labour for being too ‘progressive’ and abandoning traditional working class voters.
In an interview with the Observer he praised the US president’s tariffs, saying he felt ‘fantastic’ witnessing ‘the end of globalisation’.
Discussing the upcoming elections he said Labour had to alter course to the right.
‘It’s game over if they don’t change. People are losing faith in government, in the most general way, and someone has to stop that. Labour must be a pro-worker, patriotic party, not talking gibberish about diversity.’
Maurice Glasman, the founder of the influential Blue Labour group, issues a grave warning days before the local elections in which Nigel Farage’s party is expected to make significant gains.
Reform are expected to win mayoral votes in two Red Wall Labour heartlands in East Yorkshire and Lincolnshire.
Lord Glasman’s Blue Labour group, which is pressing for the party to rebuild its links with working class voters, is enjoying a growing influence with senior Labour figures, including the PM’s chief of staff Morgan McSweeney.
Lord Glasman said in January Mr McSweeney was ‘one of ours, we love him’.
But he suggested the government was still going in the wrong direction, and attacked Attorney General Lord Hermer as an ‘arrogant, progressive fool’ – and called for him to be sacked over the deal to cede control of the Chagos Islands.
The only Labour figure at Donald Trump’s inauguration, he also criticised Rachel Reeves, saying the Chancellor had become ‘just a drone for the Treasury’.
A senior minister admitted today that Labour has made some unpopular decisions in Government, but insisted its agenda was starting to bear fruit.
Mr Glasman, who attended the inauguration of Donald Trump, has previously lashed out at Labour for being too ‘progressive’ and abandoning traditional working class voters.
Pat McFadden, a senior Cabinet Office minister, was asked by Sky News’ Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips about Labour trailing behind Reform UK in opinion polls ahead of the coming local elections.
He told the programme: ‘Look, we had some tough stuff to sort out after the election last year and I accept that some of those decisions have not been the most popular, but we are starting to see things turn around now.’
Mr McFadden pointed to a fall in NHS waiting lists for ‘six months in a row’, adding: ‘So, we’re starting to turn things around, but it will take some time to feel the benefit of these things, and at year end we know we’ve got more to do, because people want to see delivery. They want to see a Labour Government turn around the NHS.’
In an attack on both the Tories and Reform, he added: ‘We will do that and it’s a big contrast to what we inherited with the NHS, or, indeed, another force on the right that doesn’t believe in the NHS at all.’
