JUNE 15 was a defining moment in the history of our movement. It was the day that the shortlist of applicants for the post of Labour’s next leader was settled.

Four candidates, having received 35 or more parliamentary nominations necessary to join that list, were in the race. One of them was Islington North’s socialist MP Jeremy Corbyn, a veteran backbencher, “an old white guy.” Reportedly his clinching nominations were received with minutes to go before the midday deadline. If that is so, the phrase “A week is a long time in politics” can now start with “15 minutes” instead.

The other three aspirants, Andy Burnham, Yvette Cooper and Liz Kendall, are all shadow ministers, and the first two were ministers under Gordon Brown’s government before the 2010 general election thrust Labour out of power. Burnham led the field with almost 70 nominations, Cooper was a strong second with almost 60 and Liz Kendall had 41, five more than Corbyn’s 36. Corbyn had scraped on to the ballot with one vote to spare, and, among national newspapers, only the Morning Star, on June 15, was confident of his prospects before the ballot closed. The real contest would now begin.

Before June 15, Corbyn’s rivals had not shown they had much, in political terms, to argue about among themselves. The debate chiefly concerned who could best “project a vision for the future.”

But the three “centre” candidates, as the media likes to describe them, all confined the policy promises they could make to the margins. They regarded themselves as bound to repudiate some of former leader Ed Miliband’s cautious footsteps into old Labour territory (such as arguing for an energy price freeze and a tax on private mansions). Kendall went further, even opposing a top 50 per cent personal tax rate.

Burnham said he would look at the extension of student finance to technical apprenticeships, Yvette Cooper dedicated herself to ending child poverty without explaining how, while Liz Kendall supported Tory free schools and undertook to be “bold.” Cooper described her, without actually naming her, as having “swallowed the Tory manifesto.” Burnham and Cooper were content to steer away from the implications of the nasty hardcore of the Tory austerity programme.

The “centre” candidates had all left the back for the front benches bearing the political assumption that there was no question of ending the longstanding political marriage between Labour and the multinational corporations, which by extension included in the menage the United States as self-appointed world protector.

This wedding was confettied when the Thatcher government took power in 1979. The Labour governments of Blair and Brown from 1997-2010, to quote Owen Jones in The Establishment, transformed Thatcherism “into a permanent settlement.” In short, don’t frighten the horses — or the City of London. Only policy at the edges is available for debate.

In the darker shadows of Blairism and Brownism there grew a culture of unashamed personal self-advancement — particularly in the case of Tony Blair. This culture revealed itself on a pettier scale way in the expenses scandal of spring 2009 when then home secretary Jacqui Smith, former employment minister Tom McNulty and ex-housing minister Hazel Blears and others were all revealed to have had their hands in the till in the shape of substantial expenses fiddles.

The more approved manner of cashing in has been, to cite an anonymous Labour backbencher quoted by Owen Jones, to use the House of Commons “as a conveyor belt to a private-sector job after two terms and a spell in government.”

It was obvious enough in the minds of the three “centre” candidates that they were not to argue about the many elephants in the room — bonanzas for the big companies, madcap privatisation, the fading away of solid jobs and solid pay, insecure housing, exorbitant rents, huge bonuses for the rich (not just for the bankers) and punishment for the poorest. It was obvious enough to them too that the Tory austerity programme could not be threatened. The neoliberal deal was the only one on the table, and the only deal that could ever be available.

Sealed into this perspective, the pro-austerity three — plus sympathetic “moderate” fellow Labour politicians, the mass media and the bookmakers (who were offering 100-1 odds against Corbyn’s becoming leader) — did not spot what was glaringly obvious to others.

The trick-missers even included a clutch of Corbyn nominators whose motives were to enliven a lacklustre contest or even to strengthen his rivals. The fact was that the Corbyn campaign had far more going for it than those in the elite bubble imagined.

The reasons for the campaign take-off are not hard to find. One is that anti-austerity views have become increasingly prominent, however much shielded from mainstream media discussion. A manifestation of this, as noted in an analysis in this newspaper on May 20, is the exponential increase in elections since 1997 of the anti-austerity vote — for the SNP, Plaid, the Greens and others — achieving 2.8 million votes in May.

Another is the fact that many constituency Labour Party members, disappointed by their parliamentary leaders, have in recent times played a big part in the anti-austerity campaigns, most obviously through the People’s Assembly movement. Again, Corbyn’s bid for leadership was inherently likely to gain the keen support of some trade unions.

Add to that the long experience, the clear and calm reasoning, the undeniable honesty and commitment of Corbyn (who received 40 per cent of his constituency’s vote in 1983 and 60 per cent in May), plus the sheer logic of his case when allowed to be put, were all likely to build the campaign.

By June 17, when the first TV hustings involving the four took place, this big penny seemed not to have dropped in the minds of his rivals, to judge from their airy contributions. Corbyn challenged the subsidy to private landlords of vast amounts of housing benefit, the cruelty of benefit sanctions which had brought about suicides in some places, the huge cuts to public services and the low level of corporation tax.

Cooper spoke of working with business, Burnham spoke of helping people to get on in life and Kendall spoke of keeping “our values.” Overall, the offerings of the three made for very watery beer, while Corbyn’s resonated with many watchers.

By June 19 Corbyn’s campaign was endorsed by the bakers’ union BFAWU and by train drivers’ union Aslef. On June 20 the massive anti-austerity march and rally in London was itself a Corbyn campaign endorsement. On June 24 the Fire Brigades Union and the RMT joined up. Then, on July 5, came support from Unite — Britain’s biggest union.

Now Unison, Britain’s second-biggest union — and the union of which Corbyn is a longstanding member — has declared for him, while socialist media activists have been spreading the message from the beginning. The Morning Star editorial on July 6 was to the point: “The truth is that the gulf between the attitudes of most Labour MPs and those of the people they represent has been starkly exposed.”

By July 13 Ladbrokes had reduced the odds on Corbyn’s becoming leader to 7/1. This week bookmaker odds put him clearly in front of the others, while Cooper may now be neck-and-neck with Burnham or even ahead of him. Meanwhile, constituency parties have steadily built more support for the campaign. One hundred and twelve of these are for Corbyn.

A week ago a New Statesman columnist wrote, without much enthusiasm: “Wherever Corbyn finishes, the left of the party will be stronger than at any point since his election in 1983.” Certainly the little socialism left in the bank vaults of the Labour Party after its sell-off is being replenished. History is being made.