Sunshine on Dundee: Scottish Labour conference sketch

It was a beautiful Friday morning and the sun was shining on Dundee.

Down at the waterfront, the V&A gleamed in the sunlight. The Discovery, the ship that took Captain Scott and Ernest Shackleton to the Antarctic, sat basking in the sun. Up at the Caird Hall a huge banner, draped across the front, proclaimed that the city ‘welcomes the Scottish Labour Party conference’.

It was lovely. As delegates were told on arrival: “The sun shines on the righteous – just look at what happened at the Tory conference last week.”

The Tories had been forced to cancel their conference because of the snow, meaning this was the first meet-up of the season, and the scene couldn’t have been nicer.

Admittedly, things had got off to a wobbly start, with Richard Leonard immediately confronted with a giant banner, set behind the stage, spelling former leader Keir Hardie’s name wrong. But after that things really picked up. And so what would Keir Hardy have made of it all?

Inside the venue, delegates wound their way through a maze of tight corridors around the main hall. It was busy. But while Greek myth suggests one of these labyrinths could be home to some sort of hideous, slavering, half-man, half-bull, turning the wrong corner at Labour conference brought a significant risk of bumping into Neil Findlay. Which is obviously much, much worse.

Meanwhile, inside the hall, the backdrop promised ‘Real change’, written in square brackets. It was a nice message, even if it did make Scottish Labour sound less like a socialist campaign group, and more like some sort of particularly sceptical vending machine. ‘Vote Labour: real change only, please, and nothing under 10p.’

As it happened, Findlay was on great form, having seen his preferred candidates elected to both the Scottish and UK Labour leadership. In fact, he was so full of good cheer he was actually crowdsourcing policy, through an initiative he called ‘the big idea’.

So what’s the big idea, Neil? Judging from the chatter at conference, it was Brexit, and sunshine or no sunshine, and spell check or no spell check, it was hard to escape the feeling that storm clouds loomed on the horizon. Jeremy Corbyn was due to arrive any moment, and with the UK leadership insisting on leaving the single market, it was no surprise to hear members murmuring dissent.

So what was Corbyn’s plan? “We will not accept an off-the-peg model for our future relationship with the European Union,” he promised, or threatened, depending on which way you look at it. “The Norwegian model may work for Norway, but we need to find our own model that works for everybody in the UK.”

This sounded good, even if a critic might suggest that when people advocate the Norwegian model, it’s not because they want a deal that would turn the UK into Norway, it’s because they want a deal that actually exists.

Which is not to say that a fictional nonsense deal doesn’t have strengths, it’s just that if we invent a deal which the EU will never agree to then there’s danger that – despite the advantages – the EU will never agree to it.

But to be honest, that wasn’t the bit that drew attention. Continuing, Corbyn boasted that “Labour has its own common-sense approach, in stark contrast to the Tories’ extreme and reckless plans for Brexit”.

So what sort of plan did Corbyn have? And how did it vary from the Conservative one?

“We cannot be held back inside or outside the EU from taking the steps we need to develop and invest in cutting-edge industries and local business to stop the tide of privatisation and outsourcing,” he explained. “Or from preventing employers being able to import cheap agency labour, to undercut existing pay and conditions in the name of free market orthodoxy.”

Foreign labour was undercutting British working conditions. The hall looked somewhat confused by this, possibly because it sounded like the sort of thing UKIP would say. But the key thing is that they want to do it for different reasons. UKIP want to cut immigration because they don’t like immigrants, while Labour apparently wants to cut immigration because they like them too much, and can’t bear to see them exploited.

by Liam Kirkaldy

Sketch: Are the Lib Dems back?

It’s an interesting argument, seemingly based on the idea that we can’t allow foreigners to come here – even if they want to – because we know better than them how rubbish it is. Though it does also suggest Corbyn is confident in his ability to win an election, and end freedom of movement in the process, but not at all confident in his ability to improve conditions for workers.

But sadly, not all the delegates seemed convinced. After all, it’s one thing for the Labour leadership to get Keir Hardie’s name wrong, and quite another to get international socialism wrong. At least it offered a new take on the idea of workers around the world uniting. Throw off your EU directives – you have nothing to lose but your freedom of movement.

Still, walking out of the hall, some of the delegates’ faces looked thunderous.

Outside, though, the sky remained a beautiful blue.