The Labour Party is at the Rubicon. The first agenda item at the inaugural Labour Party conference of February 28, 1900, was “Object of conference: a resolution in favour of working-class opinion being represented in the House of Commons.”

Even in that first debate, the new leaders made clear that the appeal would need to be beyond the traditional working classes and should not be to encompass the concept of “class war”.

But it set up a political party whose reason for existence was entirely centred on giving voice and vote to working-class opinion.