Party Planner

Someone in a position to have an impact needs to put up a list of all Labour members of both Houses of Parliament, together with Tony Blair, Alastair Campbell and David Miliband.

Seven days from now, it should be said, this list will be published again, but in two parts.

One part will list those who have informed us that they will not be joining any new party, nor advocating support for it.

The other will list those who have imparted no such information.

Once the new party is up and running, which way will the Leadership of Durham County Council jump?

That Leadership is Labour in only the most nominal sense, with so little connection to the wider Labour Movement that it has probably never heard the term.

But it is also greedy and venal, and most unlikely ever to risk the loss of its privileges on a point of principle.

I could pay for my legal representation several times over if I had a thousand pounds for everyone who has told me, "Oh, well, that's the County Council for you," or words to that effect.

A very high proportion of those people have been lifelong members of the Labour Party in County Durham.

There is a shoulder-shrugging acceptance that Durham County Council is, has always been, and will always be by far the most corrupt local authority in Britain, and quite probably the most corrupt local authority in the world.

When it comes to the people who control it, then trying to have their political and journalistic critics unjustly sent to prison, not to mention far worse than that, is just how they behave. It is just what they do. It is just what they are. "Oh, well, that's the County Council for you."

On the upside, it is inconceivable that 10 out of 12 people assembled at random from among the inhabitants of County Durham would ever convict anyone of anything on the say-so of the hated Council, even were there any evidence against me, which there is not.

There is something almost admirable about being able to get out of bed and appear in public while knowing oneself to be quite that despised.

But then, that is just a nice way of saying that the people who run Durham County Council are psychopaths.

In which case, once the new party is up and running, which way will they jump?

Yes, there are people who want to shut me up.