Ditching of its green plan reveals Labour’s ideological vacuum | Larry Elliott

Keir Starmer will now be appealing to voters on the basis it can run the status quo better than the Tories

Until last week's U-turn on its pledge to spend 28bn on greening the economy, Labour had a coherent story to tell on the economy. It was not an especially exciting story but it made sense.

The narrative went like this. Since coming to power in 2010, the Tories have made a right mess of things. Misguided austerity has resulted in weak growth and flatlining living standards. Public services have been starved of money and too little has been done to safeguard the future of the planet. Failure on such a comprehensive scale requires a different approach.