Labour leader Keir Starmer has come to the defense of organizations such as the National Trust and the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) following attacks from the Tory party in what
he deems their culture war rhetoric.
In a speech delivered earlier today at a civil society summit, Starmer characterized Tory assaults on the National Trust as desperate and harmful. He accused the Conservative Party of "sabotaging civil society to save their own skins."
During the event, he stated, "They’ve got themselves so tangled up in culture wars of their own making that, instead of working with the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, an organization the late Queen was patron of for 70 years, to find real solutions to stop the small boats, their rhetoric has helped demonize them."
"Instead of working with the National Trust so more people can learn about – and celebrate – our culture and our history, they’ve managed to demean their work."
Starmer criticized the Tories for engaging in a form of "weird McCarthyism," attempting to find woke agendas in civic institutions they once respected, all in a desperate bid to cling to power.
He also mentioned that a Labour government would "reset" the relationship between government and civil society.
Several Tory MPs have recently targeted the National Trust, the UK’s largest charity, which owns extensive land, including more than 1,300 farms, 775 miles of coastline, and 250,000 hectares, making it the largest private landowner in Britain.
In 2020, a group of backbenchers objected to the National Trust's connection of Winston Churchill's family home to slavery and colonialism. More recently, Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg supported the right-wing Restore Trust in its attempt to take over the National Trust.
Starmer urged charities, community leaders, and faith groups to actively participate in Britain's public life.
He remarked, "Now we need a new vision for a new era. A renewed social contract. A new focus on those who build the bonds that connect us, the communities that nurture us, and the local institutions that support us." Photo by Chatham House, Wikimedia commons.