At the We Demand Change summit in London last Saturday (Picture: Guy Smallman)
The We Demand Change summit gave a glimpse of how we can turn the tide.
Over 2,000 people descended onto an industrial estate turned music venue in east London last Saturday to debate how the left responds to Keir Starmer. But this was far from a routine conference of the British left.
It had been a difficult start to 2025 for the left in Britain. We’ve had to watch in horror as Labour tanks in the polls while Reform UK’s polling and membership figures seem an unstoppable juggernaut.
There hasn’t been enough struggle on the streets and picket lines and no left alternative. But the summit felt as if it could be a springboard for resistance against Labour’s attacks—and stop its failures fuelling the rise of far right Reform UK.
There are two reasons why We Demand Change matters. The first flows from the nature of the crisis we face.
Donald Trump’s trade war confirms that the liberal capitalist world order, which US imperialism built after the Second World War, is well and truly over.
The US faces a multifaceted crisis at home and abroad—with implications for the whole world. Trump represents a change of course by a section of the US ruling class who are trying to manage this crisis in a new way.
A total crisis of the system requires a total response. That’s why it fitted that We Demand Change involved a cross-fertilisation of the different movements from Palestine to strikes to climate and anti-racism.
The second reason is that we face a key question. How do we unite the different movements into a coherent left challenge to Labour’s right wing agenda?
We have seen a magnificent Palestine movement and a game-changing anti-fascist response to last summer’s far right riots and Nazi Tommy Robinson. There is resistance to benefit cuts and widespread anger against attacks on trans+ rights.
But official politics continues to lurch rightwards, with Starmer paving the way for Nigel Farage and Reform UK.
Our hope is that We Demand Change can be a space where the different progressive movements come together to discuss and share ideas and plan activity.
At the summit, there was an 800-strong debate on the day about how we build a left wing challenge to Starmer at the ballot box. But We Demand Change is not and should not be an electoral initiative or new left party that many want to see.
Instead, it can bring together different parts of the movement so that we can be more than the sum of our parts.
This is no easy task. So what needs to happen next?
The organisers of the summit have outlined three next steps—collating demands, mobilising for protests and days of action and a roll-out of local summits.
The sharpest end of Starmer’s attack is the brutal austerity—justified by increased arms spending.
So a central challenge is to build a roadmap of resistance to Rachel Reeves’s budget in October. It’s possible for there to be a day of rage and protest when the benefit cut is voted on in parliament. The slogan “welfare not warfare” can draw together Palestine and anti-war activists alongside disabled people and trade unionists.
Similarly the Palestine protests—particularly the local demonstrations on 12 April—can have a new focus. They can target the arms firms and industries that will benefit from Starmer’s new drive to militarism.
The People’s Assembly national demonstration in London on 7 June is a crucial date to get huge numbers of people onto the street. And it can have a very different feeling than a routine demonstration.
To coordinate this, it’s welcome that We Demand Change has called for summits across Britain to “bring local communities to organise, strategise and speak out”. These need to bring together the different organisations that collaborated so successfully last Saturday.
But the crucial test will be whether these events bring in the much wider numbers of working class people angry at Starmer.
The summit gave everyone who attended a much needed boost—and a glimpse of how the left can shape the crisis and halt the rightward lurch. But turning that glimpse into a higher level of resistance is the challenge for us all in the next few months.
Fill in the survey about where next on the We Demand Change website: wedemandchange.uk
Lewis Nielsen is the national secretary of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) | Jess Walsh is the SWP’s workplace and trade union organiser
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