We’re all in this together. It’s not possible to create a satisfactory life for just yourself. John Donne said it best in 1624:
No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend’s or of thine own were. Any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.
So, for example, the introduction of the National Minimum Wage is unlikely ever to affect me personally and directly – I expect to be able to get work that pays more than that anyway – but nevertheless it improves the quality of my life because it improves the quality of the society in which I live. So I’m proud to have taken part in making it happen, by working to get a Labour government elected in 1997.
I do accept that the Labour Party has some faults. Joining a political party is always a compromise, but it’s the most effective way to change things. I support most of Labour’s policies, and I’m part of campaigning groups within the party to change some policies with which I disagree.