The energy price freeze, the rent reforms, and now some serious kite-flying about the renationalisation of the railways.
At this stage, Labour candidates in key marginal seats are saying and doing what they are told, and only what they are told.
At this stage, Labour candidates in key marginal seats are saying and doing what they are told, and only what they are told.
Therefore, their public call for the rail franchises to be taken back as each came up is pretty much a policy announcement by the Labour Party.
Expect formalisation at Conference, in Ed Miliband's speech.
Mind you, Tony Blair did that. Still, Ed Miliband is, as he himself once put it, "not Tony Blair."
Meanwhile, economic patriotism seems to have reached even Michael Heseltine.
But in its post-Thatcher form, defined by her, his party can do nothing to express it.
Whereas in its post-Blair form, defined against him, Labour cannot fail to do so.
At least if pushed. As it is now being.
A week on Monday, it will be 20 years since John Smith died.
From Blair's succession later that year, the great ideological battle was effectively off.
But now, it's on.
John Smith is a good comparison with now.
ReplyDeleteHe was fanatically pro-EU (even sacked a Shadow Cabinet member for opposing Maastricht) anti grammar schools and pro-divorce and abortion.
A typical modern Labour leader in the same vein as Miliband.
Actually, I'm not sure Smith would have backed gay marriage as enthusiastically as Miliband did.
Back then, Labour still pretended to have some Catholic sympathies.
That is simply a lie. He was very strongly opposed to abortion, with a voting record to match.
ReplyDeleteBut he wasn't a Catholic.
Oh, and he ended up leading his entire party into the No lobby in the final vote on Maastricht.