The left faced disaster at the last election. The dominance of right-wing forces in Parliament left it looking like the political left would face oblivion, at least for a few election cycles.

But out of this profound defeat came a left with a new sense of purpose, and a level of discipline not seen since the peaks of the Socialist Party.

Many might've expected the new Labour Party to face a similar fate to the old one -- broken apart by infighting and left without much of a legacy. But so far, this Labour Party has shown itself to be truly united. One cannot imagine the old Labour Party mobilising so effectively to defend their leader, even though Youmaton was by far a less controversial figure than Jordology.

Sources inside the party attribute this to one thing: the trimming of the fat. See, the old Labour Party inexplicably had three factions: Labour Right, Socialist Left, and the Social Democrats. The current Labour Party has excised the latter, enabling a much more natural balance between the two factions. After all, in the old system, you had three factions and two leadership positions. Here, it's simple: a Leader from one faction, a Deputy from the other.

According to Drunk_King_Robert, legendary former Prime Minister, there is another problem solved by insisting on two factions.

"The entire idea of the Labour Party is to unite people in compromise. Yes, the party platform will not reflect everything that the Socialist Left might want. It also won't include everything the Labour Right want. That is, fundamentally, the tradeoff that you take. In exchange, you have a unified party that is greater than the sum of its parts.

"But when you introduce this third faction, the Social Democrats, what you are saying is 'actually, you don't need to compromise. You might lean towards the Left or the Right, but it doesn't matter! Here's a third faction calibrated purely to express your views.' Already, you are jeopardising the spirit of compromise. We need a party with people willing to work together to advance a common goal, not a party of people who refuse to go a bit further to the left or the right than they might otherwise. This triangulated, formulated faction was the death of the last Labour Party -- after all, it was always their members causing trouble..."

It would seem her assessment is correct, as the Labour Party has gone from strength to strength. After the disastrous collapse of the Liberal Party, the ALP was able to negotiate a coalition that saw the notoriously obstinate Country Labor Party allow Jordology to become Leader of the Opposition. With the defection of Grape from the ANCAP Government, the ALP-CLP Coalition now commands a reasonable portion of the House -- a far cry from the destitute state the left entered Parliament in only around a month ago.

Even more, forming Official Opposition puts the Labour Party in a strong position going into the upcoming byelections. Rather than going to the electorate and offering them little more than the chance to send a message to the Government, the potential now exists for them to change the government.

The two byelections will be the Labour Party's first electoral test. A victory in both would see the fledgling party catapult itself to serious political relevance; it would see them tie ANCAP for largest party in the House. Together with the CLP, they would hold six seats -- one more than the ANCAP-LNP right-wing bloc. This would position the Labour-CLP Coalition as a government-in-waiting, only needing the support of two crossbenchers to take power.

It's an outcome that the ALP will do anything to achieve.

-Sophie McCabe, writing for Direct Action