Conservative baron Norman Tebbit established the so-called “cricket test” to label immigrants and children of immigrants as good or bad. The “good” ones – in his opinion – support England in matches against India, Pakistan or the Caribbean countries, a sign of integration. The “bad guys”, on the other hand, want the team from the country where they were born or from which their ancestors come to win.
Rochdale, a depressed suburb on the outskirts of Manchester with a football team on the verge of bankruptcy and a thirty percent Muslim population, is full of what Tebbit would call “bad immigrants.” And they are the ones who have given the victory to fill the vacant seat to the veteran far-left politician George Galloway (Workers’ Party), known for his friendship with Saddam Hussein and Baixar al-Assad, having campaigned for Hugo Chávez in Venezuela and collaborate with Russian TV channels. In the corridors of Westminster, he responds to the nickname “the deputy for Baghdad Centre”.
Galloway, 69, who in his long career has represented four localities and three parties in Parliament (he left Labor because of the Iraq war), has taken advantage of the conflict between Israel and Hamas to return to the commons after a lapse of twelve years. Labor handed him the seat after suspending the candidate for espousing the conspiracy theory that the Netanyahu government allowed the October 7 massacre as a pretext for the occupation and bombing of Gaza, which have caused thirty thousand deaths.
“Long live Palestine, this victory is yours, go to Gaza,” proclaimed Galloway, whose campaign had printed leaflets in the colors of his flag and had gone to mosques at the end of prayers to denounce the Labor leader Keir Starmer of “allowing, encouraging and covering up the current catastrophe”. The alliance of the Muslim vote and the radical left allowed him to clearly prevail over independent candidates as well as from the parties of the system (conservatives, liberal democrats and Labour, which was empty).
The election of Rochdale at the end of a Conservative mandate that has already lasted fourteen years has been a microcosm of the poisoned political climate that the country is experiencing, with a Labor party that does not quite believe that it will come to power and some Tories who are reluctant to lose him, amid cross accusations of anti-Semitism and Islamophobia.
Stumped to gain control of the party after the likely defeat in the general election, the right wing of the Conservative Party is increasingly Trumpist. MP Lee Anderson has been suspended for claiming that London mayor Sadiq Khan, who is of Pakistani origin, “has handed the city over to his Islamist friends”, and that the latter “control entire boroughs of the capital and cities like Birmingham ”, a clear exaggeration. Ideologically similar characters, such as the former Minister of the Interior Suella Braverman, have supported him, instead of criticizing him. At the same time, former libertarian Prime Minister Liz Truss, the shortest in the country’s history, blames her downfall on the “deep state” and not on the outrageous nature of her economic plan, which the markets (which do not they are precisely left-wing) they rejected.
Sunak has removed the parliamentary record from Anderson, but has refused to describe his comment as racist, or to explain what he thinks is wrong with what he said. Although the chances of a successful coup attempt are remote, a group whose visible leader is ex-Brexit negotiator David Frost is campaigning for a replacement in the Tory leadership ahead of the election, and paying for polls which suggest that the results might be better with another leader. The real battle, however, is between the moderates and the extreme right for control of the group after the elections.
Sunak has called on the police to take tougher measures against those who take part in the regular pro-Palestine marches, and those who demonstrate outside the homes of MPs demanding that they support a ceasefire in Gaza. With the economy in bad shape, public services even worse and record numbers of immigrants, the Prime Minister must feel like Sisyphus, condemned by the gods to push a huge boulder up a mountain, just to see -roll it down before reaching the top and having to start again. So day after day.
