On every measure the government is failing, but few are truly enthused by the alternative. With Labour as divided as ever, the babble of debate has faded. The left has taken over, the right has fallen silent, and the whole argument is about Brexit. A party out of kilter with its natural supporters has no proposals to tackle the problems of “left behind” people, which led voters to reject Europe in the first place. Even worse, some remainers seem to gloat that the areas already left behind will suffer most when Britain leaves the EU. “Serve ’em right!” is no solace to areas that Labour has served badly in the past.

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Yet Labour offers only puncture patches and easy attacks on government incompetence. There are no clear proposals to repair a failing economy that can neither pay the nation’s way in the world, nor support the structures, services and standards an advanced society demands. The vote to leave the EU was the people’s revolt, but Labour is busier explaining why we can’t and shouldn’t, than asking what made the people reject both the EU and 30 years of neoliberalism.

Much of the explanation lies in the rise of identity politics, a clamour of causes and demands that threatens to eclipse the class conflict that should sustain Labour as the party of the underdog. Labour used to concentrate on broad policies while pursuing the goal of a fairer, more equal society. It offered a better life and prospects to its people by tilting the balance of a polity serving the interests of the middle class and the wealthy to the folk at the bottom of the heap.

Identity politics distracts from this basic aim. A hundred causes, mostly of concern to the few rather than the many, drive out broader considerations. Equality, fairness and the improvement in the lot of the people are eclipsed by a discordant clamour.

When people ask what Labour stands for, they get a babble about feminism, sexual harassment and gender equality, LGBT-plus rights, songs of praise for the EU, anti-Trump demos, sermons about the environment, fracking, privatisation of the NHS and fears about what malevolent Tories will (or won’t) do next. Little of this is relevant to the lives of workers in uncertain employment, families weighed down with debt and facing ever-higher bills while incomes stagnate. Nor does it heal the scars of the regions afflicted by de-industrialisation.

Why upset people when attacking the failures of a divided and failing government is so easy?

There are answers to all these problems but Labour doesn’t provide them, because all imply pain for someone: higher taxes and government interventions. An insecure party would rather be loved than face outraged interest groups and a hostile media. So it takes the easy way out by attacking the government’s obvious failures and going on about its litany of causes, without saying what it would, will or can do. Why upset people when attacking the failures of a divided and failing government is so easy?

The party should be a broad campaign for betterment, more concerned to get back into accord with its people and their needs, than letting a hundred banners blossom. When I was the Labour MP in Grimsby, the basic question voters always used to ask at elections was: “What are you going to do for us?”

If I were standing today I could answer it if the questioner were a human rights activist, a Euro-enthusiast or a middle-class, feminist Trump-hater. But while such people may abound in London, they aren’t so numerous in Grimsby. With the low-waged, the unemployed, the exploited, the homeless, and insecure tenants crippled by rising rents and charges, I might have more difficulties. Particularly if they wanted to get our fishing grounds back.

• Austin Mitchell was Labour MP for Grimsby from 1977 until 2015