An alignment between old Labour and old Tory?

Jon Cruddas is that all-too rare thing: a working-class intellectual Labour MP. On a day when the Labour front bench assumes the appearance, in one political commentator’s words, of a ‘bunch of weirdos’, Cruddas produces an especially perceptive and challenging essay, published on Progressonline.

It deals with the subject of England and the metropolitan elites’ abandonment of the English working class and lower middle class communities which were once Labour’s core constituency (though they also had strong representation in the Tory party, for both old Labour and old Tory were socially conservative). With the leadership of all three major political parties now firmly rooted in the more fashionable parts of London (as is the increasingly solipsistic media), the constituency Cruddas refers to is very much up for grabs. And, alarmingly, not just by the traditional, mainstream parties. Which is why his intervention should be welcomed as the first step in addressing the great unspoken issue of domestic politics. One wonders, as Clegg and Cameron continue their love- in born of a shared background of great privilege, whether one might see another alignment in British politics grow, between old Labour and old Tory, for Labour politicians such as Cruddas appear to share more in common, certainly so far as their values are concerned, with the likes of, say, Aidan Burley, the Tory MP for Cannock Chase, than they do with their own leadership. Some historical insight into those shared values can be found here in this essay by Allan Pond published in the Winter 2008 issue of The Quarterly Review.