Labour Party: What Next?

So farewell Gordon Brown who, having been on the receiving end of personal abuse only really equalled by Neil Kinnock, ceased to be leader of the Labour Party and Prime Minster.

His exit and the formation of a Tory-Liberal Coalition poses some interesting questions for the Labour Party. I see no point in rushing a leadership election but there does need to be some kind of 'fight' for the job. Another coronation is not going to help anyone, even though I'm beginning to sense a desire to parachute a Milliband straight into the job. Let's have a genuine chance to debate some of the issues facing the Labour Party moving forward.

My view is that the party needs to build itself a distinctive identity. The party needs to move away from its recent past. Abandon this unnecessary support for ID Cards and the like. It needs to get out amongst the people and reconnect. At every level. From prospective Council candidates to Shadow Cabinet Ministers. There needs to be a real attempt to re-build a party who focus is on social justice and on representing those people who will not feel that any other party can represent them.

Undo the ties of New Labour, which offers nothing substantially different to a Tory-Lib coalition. Indeed some of the policies which a Tory-Lib coalition will put forward appear more radical than anything the Labour Party itself would have done had they retained power.

Now is the time to look at every policy. To question everything. To abandon those policies that reflect an experiment that failed. How do you improve education and access to education? How do you improve the NHS? How do you manage an economy where the whims of the City are more important than the needs of the people? What kind of armed forces do we want or need? What can governments do to create and protect jobs? What kind of parliament and electoral system do we want?

The questions are endless. What I believe to be a absolute truth is that the solutions to these questions will not be found with New Labour answers. We need new thinking connected to the basic premise that the job of the Labour Party is to help raise people up, rather than hold them down. To free people from poverty, hardship and ignorance.

There is time to fundamentally re-think what the Labour Party stands for and what its mission is moving forward. A vision for government and country.

On the other hand we can just appoint a Blair-Clegg-Cameron soundalike and drift along in opposition, sniping at the Tory-Libs until 2015 when the Tories win a proper majority.

Let's get out there and let's build a new, better Labour Party.