Mere hours before the election, the Guardian has broken a damning story on Labour. In particular, the liberal newspaper published an exposé on the party’s shadow cabinet packed with private sector lobbyists.
Except, it’s not exactly news to anyone who’s been paying attention to Labour’s transparent corporate capitalist agenda. And as it turned out, it wasn’t even news at all, since independent media had been all over it for months.
Guardian calling out Labour: too little, too late
On 2 July, two days to the UK’s General Election, the Guardian published a scathing article on Labour’s lobbyist links. In particular, the paper put out a piece titled:
Private sector lobbyists embedded into Labour’s shadow cabinet teams
However, if the liberal newspaper thought its big news story would strike a chord with the left, it was sorely mistaken. People on X roundly eviscerated the liberal media outlet for its last-minute mealy-mouthed excuse for accountability journalism.
Most notably, X posters lambasted the Guardian’s timing. After all, it’s the Kuenssberg-is-itching-to-reveal-the-postal-votes part of the election run now. In short: too little, too late:
Guardian just reporting this two days before election when this has been the case for years. https://t.co/TN4RF9yADV
— Dotty (@Dotty_95) July 2, 2024
Finally, with just 2 days to go to the election, the British media continues it’s ‘great noticing’ period
— nello (@bluenels72) July 2, 2024
Blistering and timely analysis from the Guardian. Who could have foreseen this?? https://t.co/gCujVi27yL
— Michael Tight (@Dr_Deep_Dick) July 3, 2024
It’s rather transparent how you waited until this late to start noticing
— ਜੀਵਨ ਰਾਏ🔻🇵🇸 (@jeevanrai) July 2, 2024
What’s more, the Guardian somehow didn’t get the memo that independent media has been talking about this for ages:
Novara Media had this nearly 3 weeks ago. https://t.co/m7ewT4Psys
— Mick ☕️🍉 (@MickCoffey2) July 2, 2024
And Novara hasn’t been the only one doing it – loads of the leftwing and liberal independent media has. Here’s an article from Morning Star in June 2023. Then, another by Tribune in December 2023. Declassified has been taking Labour to task over funding from the pro-Israel lobby. Meanwhile, Desmog has uncovered gas industry lobbyists sponsoring Labour’s shadow decarbonisation minister. Even Bylines has got in on the action recently.
Not forgetting the Canary – we have consistently covered the corporate take-over of Labour and the vested lobbies hijacking the party.
Missing most of the story
Unlike the Novara story however, the Guardian article doesn’t actually mention MPs’ former lobbyist connections at all. So as one poster on X pointed out, the media outlet-come-Labour-mouthpiece was omitting a crucial part of story:
Well, how on the ball you are!!
News has been on here for weeks. Useless shower…..
have you caught up with Praful yet? And even now you’ve missed half the story https://t.co/o4NF5TdICP— Up_Again ItWasAScam 💙 #TUSC #PAL (@up_again) July 2, 2024
To the latter point on Labour’s private healthcare poster-boy Praful Nargund, who’s going up against Jeremy Corbyn, that would be a big fat no. Genuinely, we checked.
Moreover, one person on X highlighted the Canary’s more thorough take-down of Labour’s private water sector lobbyist network (thanks!):
Too little too late but while you’re at it. https://t.co/c5mJWHEeAH
— kontiki1957 (@JohnLydiatt) July 2, 2024
Our investigation uncovered lobbyist and PR professionals infiltrating Labour at multiple levels. Vitally, the Canary showed how the revolving door between Labour, lobbyists, and vested private sector interests operate in practice. We weren’t pulling any punches, and called out exactly what these connections mean:
When it comes down to it, Labour’s intimate links with lobbyists and PR firms show precisely why it’s shying away from renationalising the UK’s waterways.
In other words, Labour’s capitalist crony right is in bed with the big polluters. As ever, the corporate stooges in parliament will stifle any meaningful action to protect people and the environment.
Meanwhile, by contrast, the Guardian employed the time-old shill media trick of giving the rich and powerful the last word. Specifically, it’s good journalistic practice to offer companies and individuals that a media outlet has made allegations against a ‘right of reply’.
However, the corporate press routinely places these responses from the ostensible oppressors or perpetrators at the end of the article. They do so knowing that readers go away with lasting impressions from the final paragraph of a piece.
In this instance, the Guardian gave over space to the consultant lobbyists to justify their cosying up to Labour’s shadow cabinet. Through this, the Guardian effectively let Labour and its lobbyist mates off the hook.
Independent media got there first anyway
Instead then, the Guardian piece explores a handful of private consultants that shadow cabinet members have seconded into their teams. Timing aside, it seems a valuable exposé. Only, the Guardian wasn’t even first to the scene on this either.
On 30 May, openDemocracy already had the story on both the Faculty AI, and FGS Global secondments. What’s more, the independent news outlet has been consistently exposing Labour’s consultant staffers for over a year.
For instance, on 6 June 2023, openDemocracy pulled up Labour for its freebie staff secondments from numerous companies in finance and fossil fuels. This included tax-avoiding PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), and oil and gas-backed hydrogen lobbyist Beyond 2050 Limited.
Then, in September the same year, the media site broke that Starmer himself had taken on a staffer working a second job with consultancy firm Grant Thornton. As the outlet noted, the company’s clients are a who’s who of unethical industry heavyweights, such as BAE Systems and Adani.
In short, independent media had well and truly pipped the Guardian to the post on this. With the Guardian’s enormous resources, it rightly had people wondering, why the delay?
Therefore, the Guardian’s little “nothing to see here” note at the end of its article might raise some eyebrows. Specifically, it carried a disclosure about the liberal outlet’s sole shareholder, the Scott Trust, which said:
The Scott Trust, through its investment in Mercuri, owns a minority stake in Faculty.
Of course, the Guardian assures its readers that its:
editorial interests remain free of commercial pressures
Guardian’s client journalism agenda
If Guardian hacks hadn’t been so pre-occupied sucking up to their political golden boy Starmer, they might have picked this up months ago. Then again, as folks on social media suggested, there’s probably a clear editorial agenda in this untimely revelation:
It will be too late soon. Client journalism has betrayed us
— oldcornishbloke (@mrkernow) July 2, 2024
This the Labour Party The Guardian have endorsed and encouraged the electorate to vote for? That Labour Party?
— Stephen Anderson (@newcwriter) July 2, 2024
Imagine if you felt any responsibility to the country or the concept of rudimentary journalism and covered this at any point before today.
— Kathleen 🌿🌲 (@mossgatherer_) July 2, 2024
More to the point, when corporate-captured cronyist Labour fucks up the country Tory-style, the Guardian can crow, “told you so” like the shameless worm it is:
Quick as a flash, the Guardian is on the case…
I think this is only being run as a strategic headline so they can say they warned us in 5 years. https://t.co/jVGeUOhRnc
— Chris Corney (@ChrisCorney1) July 2, 2024
So buckle up for a media masterclass in public gaslighting from the mouthpiece of new prime ministerial gaslighter-in-chief Starmer. Over the next five years, it’s sure to pick up a U-turn tip or two from good ol’ Captain Hindsight – because spinning round is an easy feat when there’s a constant revolving door.
Feature image via the Guardian
