Following Labour’s disaster, we’ve set up a new moderate movement for progressive politicians of any party

Ever since the EU referendum, the future for progressive politics has felt bleak. Not because its supporters suddenly don’t exist but because the progressive cause has started to feel like a circus without a ringmaster

The future of progressive politics has felt bleak for many on the left (PA)

I’m tired. You’re probably tired too. The past month’s news cycle has been relentless. Atrocities around the world; mayhem in the UK (and of course an atrocity of our own in the killing of Jo Cox, Labour MP for Batley and Spen). For those of us on the left of politics, we’ve been watching with ever-increasing despair as Labour disintegrates into a morass of mud-slinging, bad faith accusations, and abuse. The focus on female MPs in particular has been sobering, and the slew of rape threats, death threats, and that brick are making many of us feel like Labour has become the new “nasty party” for women.

Ever since the EU referendum, the future for progressive politics has felt bleak. Not because its supporters suddenly don’t exist (far from it: we number in our millions), but because the progressive cause has started to feel like a circus without a ringmaster: the acrobats are all out of time, the jugglers have lost their balls, and the trapeze artists have staged a sit in and are refusing to come down – it is chaos at a time when we need stability and hope.

Enter stage left More United, the new online platform that aims to crowdfund and support progressive politicians from any party and none. Suddenly Labour’s woes don’t seem to matter so much, as we have an answer to the traditional “splitting the vote” dilemma – because big money and big party structures will no longer have an unassailable advantage. We will have the power to fund and support individual candidates who represent our views – as opposed to a political party en masse. Ordinary people are going to get the chance to have a voice — and they have already signed up in their tens of thousands.

I am not a politician — and nor would I want to be. The current system leaves me cold. It is too ridden with internecine wars, with strutting feuds, with either virtue-signalling or tough-love posturing. I don’t blame the individual politicians, most of whom are admirable people who want to make a difference, and change the lives of the people for the better. But they are hampered by the current party political system with its “you’re either with us or against us” mentality.

In such a system, those who would seek to challenge the current set-up struggle to be heard. And that is a tragedy, because if the EU referendum showed us anything, it is that the UK is a country that is hungry for change.

The signs have been there for a while — you only have to look at the enthusiasm with which people have taken to petition websites to effect changes in their local communities, as well as nationally and even internationally. We are, despite what we have been dolefully informed for years, not apathetic about politics. We are simply tired of a system over which we feel we have little to no control, bar an election every five years where, for most of us, our vote counts for very little. We are forced to sit on the sidelines, watching as a single party takes over the political landscape unopposed, because the official opposition is too busy opposing itself. Is it any wonder so few of us engage?

UK politics has for too long ignored the revolutionary and democratising power of the internet. Sure, the political parties have their social media accounts, and they’ve dipped their toes in viral and meme culture (with varying success) but their engagement has more or less been restricted to an online version of what they were already doing.

More United represents something different: it represents the first serious attempt within the UK to really do grassroots politics at a big data scale. It represents a move away from tribalism and a path towards enabling politicians — who have of course long worked across party lines when necessary — to simply getting things done. And how will we do this? By disrupting the big funding blocs that currently dictate elections, More United has a chance of giving the voting public a truly diverse choice. It opens the door to independent candidates — and women candidates, who are less likely to attract funding from big donors.

I am wary of making big futuristic pronouncements — but if I had to, it would be that the internet will presage the end of traditional party politics. The internet has changed how we see things. We have become used to having a multiplicity of options, to tailoring our choices to suit our needs. We don’t see why we should have to restrict ourselves to a single party, to a single movement. We don’t see why the conversation should be one way. We don’t see why we should be dictated to and told to lump it or leave. We’re used to being able to interact, to make ourselves heard and to have direct influence.

The slow, clunky, and impenetrable structures of the traditional parties are fifty years out of date. They are in need of a radical overhaul — and I hope and believe that More United is going to give the landscape the massive jolt it so desperately needs. This is an opportunity to revolutionise Parliament, to enable more, and more diverse, voices to be heard. This is an opportunity to enable our politics to represent the true variety of the British people. And this is an opportunity to show how powerful we are when we stand together and demand change.