Ward Word

I'm flattered. Of course I am. But I now have a third chronic health condition, and although it is awaiting a specific diagnosis, this one is in my chest.

So there will be no more elections for me. Not even, as some of you have so temptingly suggested, for Durham County Council in its Stanley Ward. That would have been fun, but it is not to be.

One of the Councillors there would be a loss to the Left, but I have known her for as long as I have been politically active. So, like several others, she knows that what I am about to say is nothing personal.

Ward by Ward, vote for whoever was best placed to defeat Labour at next year's elections to Durham County Council. Deprive Labour of every seat, and then work with what came next.

But yes, Stanley is a trophy this time. With two seats to fill, there need to be two non-Labour candidates, both on the same ticket.

The most prized trophy of all is, of course, the Leader's seat. And the unseating of this particular Leader is a matter of national and international importance.

It would be heard from the souks to the favelas, from the Dalit colonies to the Rohingya camps, and from Kashmir, to Crimea, to the scattered outposts of Diego Garcia. We would make sure of that.

Armed with an impeccably local running mate in order to stop the target from slipping through, some of us know just the man to do this.

They would dance in the streets of the annexed Jordan Valley at his election, and not least at his election against this opponent. And we would show them doing it. The Internet was invented for this.