Director Ken Loach praised Jeremy Corbyn as the best ever Labour leader, despite his catastrophic election defeat last December.
The acclaimed filmmaker, speaking last night at the 50th anniversary of the founding of Islington People’s Rights, a local human rights organisation, said that the Left had “let down” both Jeremy Corbyn and Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell.
“We had the chance to build a hundred thousand new houses and we blew it,” he told a packed audience at the Rio Cinema, Dalston, describing the last election as a “struggle for consciousness”.
“We had these ideas, and we could have won with them,” he added.
He said he was unsure of the reasons for the defeat, but warned attendees “not to underestimate the opposition”, stating that the Right had considerable support from the mainstream press.
The result in the last General Election was the worst for the Labour Party since 1935, losing 59 seats and leaving them with just 202, and facing a Conservative majority of 365. The I, Daniel Blake director said the Left should never forget the defeat, and never let it happen again.
Despite claims that a lack of clarity in their political message was to blame, Loach praised the Labour manifesto, saying it had the power to transform society, and warned that homelessness would soar in the aftermath of the Conservative win.
The 83-year-old also praised the power of the climate movement, and said that left-wing causes should align themselves with it.
“That is where people do come out on the streets,” he said. “These are all battles we can win. We have got to discover hope.”
The director was quizzed about the future of the Left at the event, which featured a screening of his first outing as a director, the TV play Cathy Come Home, a 1964 classic following a young family plunged into homelessness.
The screening and Q&A was the final event in the 50th anniversary celebrations for Islington People Rights, an organisation which works to alleviate homelessness through advice and information about the welfare system.
The organisation was founded in 1969, with the aim of “reducing poverty and the effects of debt in Islington”.
Last week, IPR CEO and Jeremy Corbyn ally Gerard Omasta-Milsom defended Ken Loach’s record on anti-Semitism, telling Islington Now: “a lot of the anti-Semitic stuff that gets thrown at progressive people is ludicrous frankly.”
The director said in 2017 that “history is for all of us to discuss” when asked by the BBC in 2017 if the Holocaust occurred.
