REAL Change - Just People, Politics, and Possibility

For the money - or For The Many?

Just a year ago, Sir Keir Starmer stood at the Tate Modern declaring “Change begins now” after Labour’s general election win. But today, that message is being re-read in a very different light. This week, former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn announced that over 400,000 people had signed up to his and Zarah Sultana’s new party - nearly matching Labour’s total membership in a matter of days. What was once framed as a unifying victory speech now looks more like a turning point in the party’s fragmentation.

Under Starmer, Labour's internal structure has shifted sharply to the right. Dozens of left-wing candidates have been blocked from standing. Constituency parties have been overruled. Members have been suspended in waves - often for minor social media offences.

Supporters say this was about restoring electability. Detractors argue it was a targeted campaign to suppress dissent. The result, either way, has been a hollowing-out of the grassroots base that fuelled Labour’s 2017 surge under Corbyn.

Many of those now backing Corbyn’s new party cite the absence of a meaningful political programme under Starmer as their reason for leaving. Labour’s most headline-grabbing national policy during the campaign was a promise to fix potholes. Starmer framed this as evidence of delivering on the basics. But to disaffected former members, it became a symbol of political retreat.

“The party of the people? The party of potholes more like,” said one campaigner who resigned after years of activism in her local CLP.

There are also growing questions about the role of the media during this transition. Coverage of antisemitism within Labour dominated the headlines under Corbyn. But after he was suspended, studies show coverage of the issue dropped off almost completely.

Research by the Media Reform Coalition and Goldsmiths University found press mentions of “Labour and antisemitism” fell by over 90% in the year after 2020. Critics argue that this exposes how selective media scrutiny can be used to influence party politics. Starmer hasn't changed Labour. He has just changed the way it's viewed by the gatekeepers of power by offering nothing but the status quo.

Right-leaning commentators have warned that Corbyn’s new movement will split the left, handing advantage back to the Conservatives. But others see an opportunity. Green Party figures like Zack Polanski have suggested cooperation could be possible, and economist Richard Murphy described the new party as “a vital space for democratic renewal.” The surge in sign-ups suggests the appetite for a left-wing alternative hasn’t faded, the cheers of "Oh Jeremy Corbyn in nights clubs and that energy still existed - but it was lying dormant waiting for its political home.

This all leaves Starmer with a paradox. His leadership has brought Labour electoral victory, but at the cost of alienating the movement that once gave it purpose. What the party dominated by neo liberal thinkers views as modernisation, many former members view as capitulation to the same media and corporate interests they once sought to challenge.

Corbyn's comeback - whether it flourishes or flounders, as success can never be taken for granted - has already revealed one thing: for many on the left, Starmer’s “change” changed nothing. But for Corbynistas, a quiet revolution is brewing. It’s early days, but don’t be surprised if the stock value of pitchfork companies starts to rise.

The original surge of Corbynism in 2015 operated inside the machinery of a party that no longer shared its values. Many so called socialists remained in name only, and the internal war with Labour HQ was constant. It was a movement that fought with one hand tied behind its back and the other in a boxing glove.

But a new left party means a clean slate. No more factional warfare. No legacy structures. Just "a new kind of politics", built from the bottom up and not the top down, by the very people it hopes to represent. Yes indeed, the 2015/17 slogans are making a sudden and unexpected return. But this time, with nothing to hold it back but the limits of imagination - and the will to build something better. No bureaucratic chains. No gatekeeping NEC. Just people, politics, and possibility.

“For the many, not the few” isn’t a memory, or a fading slogan buried in an attic of old manifestos. It’s a warning shot. A quiet revolution is beginning to stir. To borrow from Lenin, “There are decades where nothing happens, and there are weeks where decades happen.”

Starmer’s rule has resembled not renewal, but consolidation - centralising control, hollowing out local parties, and silencing dissent on a level that would make Joe Stalin proud. His version of politics is a colder echo of 1997 - calculated, cautious, and deeply disconnected. However, this time the public see through it, because the same trick doesn't work twice.

But politics doesn’t always move at the pace of press releases. Change creeps in, until it rushes. And the appetite for something different - for something honest, for something hopeful - has suddenly cracked through the surface. Those who live through revolutions rarely know it’s happening at the time. Perhaps the revolution has already begun? Starmer may not see it yet, or at least he is in denial. But the hundreds of thousands signing up to Corbyn and Sultana’s new movement suggests very much that the public definitely does.

To find out more and to sign up, go to: yourparty.uk

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References

• Patrick Wintour, “Zack Polanski ‘open’ to working with new Corbyn and Sultana party,” The Guardian, 25 July 2025, https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/jul/25/zack-polanski-green-party-alliance-jeremy-corbyn-zarah-sultana-new-party

• Leo Sands, “Jeremy Corbyn, former Labour leader, plans new left-wing U.K. party,” Washington Post, 24 July 2025, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2025/07/24/jeremy-corbyn-party-leftwing-labour-uk

• Media Reform Coalition, “Labour, Antisemitism, and the News: A Case Study in Media Bias,” Goldsmiths University of London, July 2021, https://www.mediareform.org.uk/blog/labour-antisemitism-and-the-news

• Richard Murphy, “Of Corbyn and Sultana and the future of democracy,” Tax Research UK, 25 July 2025, https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2025/07/25/of-corbyn-and-sultana-and-the-future-of-democracy

• Zarah Sultana, Facebook post, 25 July 2025, https://m.facebook.com/ZarahSultanaMP/posts/1333581078329282